Master Fatty Chunk turned away as if the conversation were finished.

  “Get your things,” he said. “You have one hour.”

  I stared at his back. “You can’t just...”

  “One hour,” Master Fatty Chunk repeated, and the air tightened again, just enough to remind me what arguing cost.

  He paused at the doorway and glanced over his shoulder. “Bring your party to the mess hall when you are done. I will speak to them myself.”

  Then he was gone.

  The pressure vanished with him, leaving the room warped and quiet, the floorboards groaning softly as they settled back into place.

  I stood there for several seconds, fists clenched, heart hammering, forcing myself to breathe.

  I went to the bunk room first. I gathered what little I owned that mattered and left the rest behind. Then I went looking for Meka, Winnie, and Clarice.

  I did not have to search long. By the time I reached the mess hall, they were already there, along with the rest of my class.

  The moment I stepped inside, voices erupted.

  “Runt!”

  “Be safe!”

  “We heard you’re leaving!”

  I raised a hand but did not slow. I went straight to Greta, who was seated with the instructors.

  “Can I talk to you for five seconds?” I asked quietly. “In private.”

  She looked at my face, pushed her plate forward, and stood immediately. We moved to a corner.

  “What?” she demanded, already furious.

  “He’s taking me,” I said. “For training. Along with the rest of my party.”

  Her expression hardened. “That is not happening.”

  She turned and called out, “Randall.”

  Randall walked over, frowning. “What’s going on, Greta?”

  “That fat bastard is taking Azolo,” she said. “And now he wants to take Meka too. And Winnie. And Clarice.”

  Randall froze. “He wants to take my sister?”

  “For training,” Greta snapped. “Apparently.”

  “For what?” Randall demanded. “To eat her?”

  “I don’t know,” Greta said. “But we are not allowing it.”

  They started arguing immediately, voices low and sharp, throwing around ideas about guild authority, instructor rights, and how they would stop Master Fatty Chunk from doing anything of the sort.

  I listened for a moment, then cut in.

  “Greta. Randall.” My voice shook despite my effort to control it. “You cannot stop him.”

  They both turned on me.

  “I can’t explain this properly,” I said, forcing the words out, “but there is no way in all of the hells that you will be able to stop that man. What I’ve seen him do dwarfs anything you think he’s capable of. Greta, he is not an iron gut.”

  She stared at me, trying to parse that.

  “I hope that means something to you,” I added. “Because he’s standing two feet behind you.”

  “Oh. Good,” Master Fatty Chunk said, irritation bleeding into the word.

  Every muscle in my body locked up.

  “You’re all gathered already,” Master Fatty Chunk said. “Good. I dislike repeating myself.”

  He looked at me. “Which ones are Winnie, Meka, and Clarice?” His gaze hardened. “Do not waste my time.”

  Before I could say anything, Winnie raised her hand. “I’m Winnie. That’s Meka. That’s Clarice.”

  I slapped a hand against my face.

  Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

  “Oh, I like her,” Master Fatty Chunk said, sharp and unapologetic.

  He pointed. “You three. Come here.”

  “All righto,” Winnie said cheerfully, standing up. Meka and Clarice followed her.

  “What’s going on, fat man?” Winnie asked.

  “Oh, I already like her,” Master Fatty Chunk said, openly amused now.

  “You three are coming with us.”

  “Going where?” Winnie asked.

  “Where I decide,” Master Fatty Chunk replied. “If you are lucky, it will only be mildly unpleasant. Probably one of the bronze zones.”

  “What?” Greta and Randall shouted in unison.

  Randall’s face turned purple, matching his clothes. Greta’s green skin darkened to a furious brown.

  “What gives you the right to take anyone’s students?” someone demanded.

  A draconian man across the hall stood abruptly. “She’s mine,” he said, pointing at Clarice. “Get your own.”

  He had to be the archery instructor.

  “You all sit the fuck down,” Master Fatty Chunk snarled. “I did not ask for your opinions.”

  The world bent.

  The pressure slammed outward, crushing the room. The floorboards bowed. The air screamed. I dropped to my knees as if the weight of the world had settled onto my spine.

  Children collapsed around me. Instructors staggered. One of them clung to his staff, barely upright.

  Greta’s eyes were wide with something very close to fear.

  “It’s true?” someone whispered.

  Master Fatty Chunk looked around the room with open contempt. “Yeah. It’s fucking true.”

  He gestured vaguely. “Now shut the fuck up and let me do my job,” Master Fatty Chunk said. “These four are coming with me. If you have questions, keep them to yourself.”

  Greta looked at him, then at me. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I never thought…”

  She did not finish the sentence.

  The pressure kept building. My vision darkened at the edges. Breathing hurt. I could hear others choking, gasping, crying out.

  “Master... Fatty... Chunk...” I forced out, my voice barely working. “YOU ARE KILLING US.”

  He paused.

  He looked at me. Then at the room.

  He took a slow breath.

  The pressure vanished as swiftly as it had appeared.

  The mess hall snapped back into shape with a violent crack. Windows shattered. Tables splintered. Hairline fractures raced across the walls and ceiling.

  People lay scattered across the floor, groaning.

  “What in all the hells was that?” I asked, dragging in air.

  “You will learn about that later,” Master Fatty Chunk said, annoyance clear in his voice. “Now get moving before I lose what little patience I have left.”

  I did not expect what happened next.

  Randall stood fully to his feet.

  The scrape of his staff against the stone floor cut through the groans and the settling wreckage of the room. He straightened his robes, smoothed them down with shaking hands, and lifted his chin.

  “I am not going to let this happen,” Randall said.

  The room went quiet in a way it had not been since Master Fatty Chunk arrived.

  Master Fatty Chunk turned his head slowly. “What did you just say?”

  Randall swallowed, brushed dust from his sleeve, and repeated himself. “I said I am not going to let this happen. You are trying to take my little sister, and you will not even tell me where you are taking her. There is no world in which I allow that.”

  I felt something twist painfully in my chest.

  “Listen, shitstain,” Master Fatty Chunk said, his voice low and venomous. “I have had farts more dangerous than you. Do you really want to die so badly?”

  Randall met his gaze anyway. His legs were shaking, but he did not back down.

  “I am not going to fight you,” Randall said. “I am going to report exactly what has happened here to my uncle.”

  Master Fatty Chunk raised an eyebrow. “Your uncle?”

  “Duke Claremont,” Randall said.

  For the first time since Master Fatty Chunk had entered the room, he paused.

  He rubbed his fingers thoughtfully through his thick, glorious beard. “Hah,” he said. “Now that is a reasonable way to approach this.”

  He tilted his head. “Very well. What do you propose? Because I am still taking them.”

  Duke Claremont.

  Oliver’s father. Randall and Clarice’s uncle. I knew that much. What I did not understand was what kind of weight a man like that carried to make Master Fatty Chunk back down, even for a moment.

  Randall drew in a breath. “Greta and I will be allowed to visit them twice a month. You will inform us where they are at all times.”

  He hesitated, then added, “Is that acceptable to you?”

  Master Fatty Chunk snorted.

  “Pigman,” Randall finished, clearly deciding he was already dead and might as well commit.

  Master Fatty Chunk smiled, wide and humorless. “I have been called worse.”

  He nodded once. “Yes. That is acceptable.”

  “Now you lot,” Master Fatty Chunk said, turning back to us, “get your shit. Get ready. We’re leaving.”

  Meka’s ears drooped. “But wait,” she said. “We didn’t know we were going to leave. I didn’t tell my family anything. They’re going to be worried.”

  Winnie scratched the back of her head. “I’m not going to lie, fat man, you’re terrifying,” she said. “But if I get to train under you, my da is going to be thrilled. Just… let us write some letters first. It won’t take long.”

  Master Fatty Chunk dragged a hand down his face, slow and deliberate, and looked up at the cracked ceiling.

  “Fine,” he said. “Thirty minutes.”

  He pointed at us. “Not a second more.”

  Then he added, clearly annoyed, “And don’t get comfortable. We’re gone for a year. At least. Maybe longer. This is already more social interaction than I’ve wanted in years, and I’m done with it.”

  His gaze hardened. “When you’re finished with those letters, I am taking all of you. Immediately.”

  I did not know how to explain what happened next. One moment he was there, looming over the wreckage of the mess hall, and the next he was simply gone.

  The room seemed to inhale.

  After the pressure he had left behind, the air finally moved again, and sound rushed in to fill the space. Shouts, questions, disbelief, nervous laughter. Trainees and instructors alike talked over one another, trying to make sense of what they had just seen.

  They had witnessed real power for the first time.

  Most of them had probably expected Master Fatty Chunk to be a fraud when the rumors started, a loud name wrapped around an empty rank. Someone pretending to be mithril in a place like this. But everything he had done, even if it was almost nothing by his standards, had crushed that idea completely.

  Whatever he was, he stood above them. Above the iron guts. Above anyone I suspected might even brush against platinum.

  From that moment on, no one in this guild would doubt the stories again. Not here. Not after this.

  Master Fatty Chunk was exactly what his title claimed.

  A master, worthy of the name.