Episode 156 - Glute Thirst

>  *Fire! Blood! The HQ is on fire, and assaulted from all sides by armed thugs. With two newborns inside, can our heroes prevail?*
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This article contains spoilers.

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## Plot

The Boyz are still in the middle of an attack on their HQ by a hit squad presumably sent by Waltz.  They've killed one group of the attackers near the windows and unbarricaded the front doors.  Pegasus is the only member of the group who is aware of the attackers waiting to ambush Ragna and Dweezil at the entrance.

The rest of the group wonders why no law enforcement has reacted to the raucous attack occurring on their HQ, forgetting that the inefficiency of Atla's police force is what led to their existence as troubleshooters.  Their thoughts are interrupted by Pegasus crying out and warning the group of the attackers hiding outside.

Heeding Pegasus' warning, Dweezil confronts the ambushers who consist of a Minotaur and a Dragonborn armed with halberds.  Dweezil uses his ability to switch the Minotaur's halberd with a jar of pickles and using his honed fighter's skills, he deftly wields the newly acquired halberd attempting to disarm the dragonborn.  The Dragonborn manages to parry the strike though surprised by the suddenly changing situation.  Dweezil realizing he's in a life-or-death situation (and that he has a limited time to wield the stolen halberd due to his power's limits) summons up his stamina and presses his attack against the Dragonborn.  After several glancing blows, he strikes a hard enough hit to force the Dragonborn to drop his halberd.  The Dragonborn reacts by charging forward to disarm Dweezil but clumsily fails.

Sapphire Melody observes the battle from a nearby window.  She reaches out to the unarmed and distracted Minotaur who has his back turned to her.  Attempting to attack the minotaur with the full electrical might of her Shock and Grasp, she realizes that she cannot reach him.  She vainly swats at him as the Minotaur takes no notice of her presence.

Ragna wastes no time and cleaves the Dragonborn into two pieces.  The sheer adrenaline and frenzy of this action causes Ragna to run towards the remaining Minotaur, embedding his axe into the beastman's neck.  Ragna follows up with a second attack cutting off a large section of muscle. Despite the brutal attack, the Minotaur continues to hold on and stand his ground.  Having no other recourse, the Minotaur swings the jar of pickles in his hands at Ragna and slams it into the side of the Orc's head, shattering it.

The other remaining enemy archers follow up with their own attacks trying to take down Dweezil and Ragna who are out in the open before them.  While the arrows fly wide and miss Dweezil, Ragna is hit by one of them as he continues to battle the Minotaur.  In his anger, Ragna turns to face the archer who struck him and lock his gaze.

Dweezil swings his stolen halberd at the group of bowmen as they focus on Ragna and catches one of them by the glute meat.

Meanwhile, Melody Sapphire decides that since she can't reach her enemies from her window spot that she should put her efforts into the more pressing matter of the smoke filling the air.  She notices the kindling and tar under the windows.  Assessing the fact that Shira has been useless during the fight (Shira is unable to fight in broad daylight and has no available sources of water to power the Depths), Melody tells Shira to aid in stopping the fire from spreading.  She hops out of the window and using the blanket she stole from the Crow's HQ attempts to smother the embers and begins to stomp on them.

Angered by being shot, Ragna falls into a hot, burning rage.  Without even looking at the Minotaur, Ragna swings his battle axe and murders him.  Ragna advances on the Elven Archer responsible for shooting him in the back.  Engaging him in battle, Ragna gets a few blows in but the Elven Archer resists.  The rest of the archers realize that their targets are too close for long range archery and switch to close hand combat with knives.

The Elven Archer attempts to stab Ragna, but the blade slides off of Ragna's armor and into one of his archer allies.  Dweezil is wounded by a knife plunged into his chest by another archer as he lets his guard down.

Shira follows Melody's advice and tries to put out another one of the fire mounds.  She struggles to find something to help her deal with the fire without touching it directly.  She settles on pulling a curtain down and jumps out of the window.  Seeing the pile of pitch and ember, she tosses the curtain over it and scoops it up in one swift movement.  She manages to toss the pile away as the thin flammable material of the curtain quickly catches fire.

Melody Sapphire realizes that she is now close enough to the action to actually begin murdering her enemies.  She decides to leave Ragna's target alone and attempts to grab at one of the healthier archers.  The archer deftly dodges and smirks at the warforge, causing her to become irritated and determined to crush him with extreme prejudice.

Dweezil becomes fixated on hacking the remaining glute meat from his target.  His target collapses from the pain of Dweezil's repeated attacks.  Feeling playful/sadistic, Dweezil shaves the man with his sword and ends up cutting parts of his face off.

Ragna kills his Elven Archer target off with the Elf's last thought being, "Man, I made a mistake."  Ragna's blow splits the Elf from his forehead to his sternum.  With minimal struggle to free his battle axe, Ragna's battle momentum carries him forward once more.  Ragna attacks another archer but misses.  Without missing a beat, Ragna finishes Dweezil's work on the one fallen archer's glute meat and kills him.  Ragna's continued bloodthirst propels him forward as he manages to deeply injure the archer who dodged him previously.

As the battle begins to reach a climax, smoke has begun to truly fill the area and attracts civilians who stop to gawk and stare.  The din of combat is suddenly interrupted by a piercing whistle.  The Guard of Helm has finally arrived.  The group grumbles their dissatisfaction despite the quick response time of the Guards.

## Quotes

* "How can you drink water?  Period." -Raphael, hating on water drinkers
* "Not a water drinker." -As they read the Patreon names
* "Tweet at Pretend Wizards if you drink regular ass water." -Brittany
* "Look I want to adopt good high quality children." -Brittany hating on Jordan.
* "Next time you're going to say butt, just say glute meat." -Brittany to anyone listening

## Trivia

* This episode occurred during Ron's birthday which is why he was absent.
* Christian remembers that Shira is a dark elf and John is limited by action in broad daylight.
* Shira's no killing curse is further defined by Christian in this episode.  If Shira kills someone by making them explode, the curse will reconstitute that body as a whole.  After Shira's consciousness is transferred when she kills someone, Shira's body becomes automated and intent on killing the target again with Shira's consciousness trapped inside until the time period wears off.
* Shira's power The Nest is better defined.   The Nest copies mundane material properties and applies them to another object which is limited to the volume of a 3 ft cube.