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"You ever wonder why are we really here?" Kergek asked Grug as Stompy moved through the streets and under the main entrance of their city.

"Don't tell me you don't remember."

"Too drunk for that, I'm afraid."

Many people were across both sides of the streets, eyes lit up in wonder as the creature the foreigners were sitting upon walked, its steps shaking the ground beneath it.

After all, it wasn't always when one could see a caveman and a dwarf drunk on his ass riding a mastodon at the back of a lionfolk formation marching out of a city to fight gnolls

The dwarf's name was Kergek Axesong, a wandering dwarf minstrel who, like any other proper bard, wanted to bed every woman he could charm with his charismatic attitude, his dazzling smile, his mastery of the lyre, and his proficiency with an axe. He was still a hill dwarf, you know, and no hill dwarf worth his beard would leave home without a tool cum weapon.

The mastodon was Stompy. Kergek had found him cuddling to his mother's corpse after something large, probably a dire bear, killed her. While at first he planned to sell him to a noble or a wealthy merchant with a menagerie, but with time and after fighting the good fight with him, Kergek just couldn't get rid of Stompy.

And then there was the caveman, Grug. Before we continue this tale, there's something the reader needs to know.

Cavemen, you see, were to normal humans what mountain dwarves were to hill dwarves, the 'tougher cousins' to put it in a way. They were and sturdier than normal humans, with large, wide noses, receding chins, and sloped foreheads yet clearly human. Grug was no exception: nearly seven feet tall and weighing as much as a bull killer ape, the black-haired barbarian had little more than a loincloth on him, preferring to carry mostly weapons of caveman made: a two-handed club, a spear, and a stone axe. He simply did not see what use did he have for armor or metal at all. He met and befriended Kergek a couple years before while he passed through his land, a cold and dark valley full of giant savage mammals and violent tribes of cavemen at war with ogres.Grug had met Kergek shortly after saving his and Stompy's life from a band of ogres. They talked a bit, decided to travel together in search of glory, thrills and adventure... and women, in Kergek's case.

And they were there because the local lord, having heard of their exploits and taking advantage of them passing through, had hired them to kill gnolls.

Again, before the story continues, the reader needs to know about something. The intelligent population of Calcraft was divided in three parts: humanoids (essentially humans or human-looking beings like elves and dwarves), monstrous humanoids (orcs, goblins and the like), and finally humanoid animals, more evolved, bipedal relatives of normal and dire beasts, including lionfolk, wolf people, lizardfolk, and of course, gnolls.

Gnolls were savage cannibals, in the sense they happily ate the flesh of any intelligent being they could get their claws one. Naturally, someone thought that a savage, cannibalistic human would be more than a match for them, the magic-singing dwarf and stocky near-elephan nonwithstanding

Of course, the pair would have to do their job under the watchul eyes of the regiment's officer, and the chieftain's firstborn daughter, Ajabu, an orange-ish furred lioness. Calling her beautiful would understate the truth: eyes as golden as the sun, wide of hips, and heavy of bosom, Sheta was by far the epitome of beauty, no matter the race, and also quite handy with the spear. Sadly, she also did not like non-lionfolk being granted such privileges from her father, like being unofficial leaders in his army.

Grug grunted when he saw Ajabu look back at them from her zorse and scoff. He hated it when people who thought themselves better than him didn't have the courtesy to hide it in public.

"Ignore her, Grug, we'll show her." Kergek told him.

If only had he known at that moment, that the lioness he disliked and who disliked him just as much, would end up being more than just an acquaintance...