Spongewood University

The forest thinned by noon, and open land stretched out before the Borscht Brigade. Rolling hills gave way to broad, muddy flats peppered with ferns and scraggly trees. The air was heavy with pollen, and the scent of earth and vegetation filled their lungs.

Ahead, Sharkie raised a hand. “Look,” she whispered.

A herd of diprotodons—massive, shaggy, wombat-like creatures the size of wagons—moved slowly across the field. Adults plodded with heavy steps, while younger ones bounded and played, kicking up clouds of dust and letting out rumbling calls like distant drums. They were peaceful and majestic in their sheer, ridiculous bulk.

Sharkie’s eyes went wide. “They’re beautiful.”

Rufus tilted his head. “They look like shaggy potatoes with legs.”

“They’re perfect,” Sharkie whispered, already gripping Master Longhurst’s wand.

She activated its power, and the magic coursed through her like sun-warmed water. With a twist and a shimmer, her form morphed not just into a diprotodon, but something more. Her fur gleamed, silver tipped brown in the light. Her legs were stronger, her eyes clearer. She let out a proud bellow and thundered across the field. The younger diprotodons took off in pursuit, and soon she was racing with them, bounding joyfully through the grass. One nipped playfully at her flank; another tried to climb her back. She knocked them off with gentle rolls and played for what felt like hours, grinning through her giant snout.

The others watched with smiles.

“Let her have this,” Izutsumi said. “She deserves it.”

Eventually, Sharkie returned—covered in mud, panting, and glowing with happiness.

“I want one,” she said. “Or to be one forever. I haven’t decided.”

After leaving the diprotodon herd behind, the Brigade continued northwest, moving through denser forests. The trees grew close together, and the underbrush became a thick tangle of brambles and roots. Despite the difficult terrain, the wand’s magic guided them with unwavering confidence.

On the third evening, as the sun began to dip behind the canopy, they heard it—hammering, shouting, and the unmistakable clang of tools. The group halted at the edge of a wooded ridge and peered through the trees.

Below them, nestled in a crudely cleared section of forest, stood what could only be described as a disaster-in-progress. A compound of wooden structures—some leaning, others half-collapsed—sprawled behind a spiked wall of logs hastily lashed together. Smoke curled lazily from a crooked chimney. Tarps flapped loosely in the wind.

It looked less like a fort and more like a carnival that lost a fight with an axe. And it was being built—badly—by students. Dozens of young mages and fighters were scattered across the compound, hauling beams, digging trenches, and being barked at by goblins. A few goblins were working alongside them, hammering planks with backwards hammers or sawing the same board repeatedly with no visible result.

The buildings leaned as if ashamed to exist.

“What… is this?” Izutsumi murmured.

Aggar adjusted his bowstring. “A goblin construction project. I’m amazed anything’s standing at all.”

The group pulled back and quickly discussed strategy. Dray would remain outside as backup. Rufus and Aggar would infiltrate to get eyes on the situation. Sharkie and Izutsumi, restless, would wild shape if needed and sneak in separately.

Rufus and Aggar moved first, sticking to shadows and ducking behind half-built sheds and crates. The air smelled of wet wood and burnt cabbage. They passed students dragging boards in silence, their eyes glazed with exhaustion.

Then Rufus saw him.

Bobby Spongewood—alive, well-fed, and yelling.

“Get back to work or I’ll bring out the Whip of Friendship!” Bobby screeched, waving a glittering purple whip with glitter tassels. “You’re not building Spongewood University with slouchy slats!”

Aggar clenched his jaw. “He wasn’t kidnapped. He’s in charge.”

They crept closer, hiding behind a wobbly hut as Bobby continued his tirade. Goblins laughed and snapped their fingers at students. A few buildings tilted ominously as if waiting for an excuse to collapse.

Behind them, rustling in the woods. Three bugbears approached Dray’s position. The dragonborn squared up and drew his sword just as the largest one let out a deep grunt.

“Well, well,” it said. “Look what we have..." Dray didn’t wait for him to finish. Before the bugbears could raise their weapons, he was moving blade drawn, boots kicking up dirt. He surged forward, his flaming longsword slicing a wide arc that seared the air and forced the lead bugbear to stagger back. But there were three of them. And they were big.Very big. One came at him from the side and slammed a morningstar into Dray’s ribs, sending him crashing into a rotting log. He grunted and rolled to his feet, barely catching the second blow on his sword. The flame guttered with the impact.

Back inside the compound, Rufus and Aggar made their move.

Rufus, knife in hand, dropped from the roof of a lopsided shed and landed neatly behind Bobby Spongewood. “Fancy meeting you here.”

Bobby turned, eyes wide. “Wait—what—how did you—?”

Before he could finish, Rufus slashed his arm and kicked him back into a stack of crates. Aggar loosed two arrows in rapid succession—one striking a goblin’s shoulder, the other pinning its cloak to a beam mid-run. Chaos exploded. Goblins began shouting. Students ducked for cover. Some, misinterpreting the sudden noise, grabbed nearby tools and began whacking random boards in panic.

Two goblins blew on horns made of goat bones. Three more came scrambling out of a large supply tent with clubs and axes, while one tried to climb onto a barrel for a better view—and promptly fell off, cracking the barrel and spilling nails everywhere. In the treeline, Izutsumi and Sharkie exchanged a look. The commotion had reached them. Sharkie shifted into her enhanced diprotodon form, fur shimmering with a faint glow from the wand. She let out a deep roar and charged through the wall, splinters flying like shrapnel. Goblins screamed. Izutsumi leapt onto the back of a cart and shifted into her classic brown bear form, leaping over the top like a predator from a nightmare.

“INTRUDERS!” screamed Bobby from under the crates. “WHIP OF FRIENDSHIP, ACTIVATE—!”

Izutsumi immediately body-slammed him.

Outside, Dray managed to run the first bugbear through. It dropped, but the other two pressed the attack. One tackled him into the dirt while the other raised a mace over his head. Then something odd happened. The bugbear’s foot skidded. It looked down just as its legs flew out from under it—a cascade of tiny, polished pebbles had spilled from the pouch of the bugbear Dray had killed. The creature hit the ground with a thud, followed immediately by the other one.

The Stones of Slipperiness.

Dray tried to rise but also stepped on the pebbles.

He flew backward, hit a rock, and groaned. His sword was launched from his grip—spinning through the air in slow, agonizing motion—and landed on a roof, igniting it almost instantly. Flame erupted into the air like a signal flare.

Inside the compound, Sharkie, now a lumbering beast, charged through tents and goblins alike. Three goblins were launched into the air by her sheer mass. Arrows peppered her fur, sticking out of her like toothpicks in a roast.

“Stop! You’ll damage the materials!” Bobby’s voice echoed from beneath some debris.

Aggar darted through the fray, loosing arrows at targets of opportunity while Rufus vanished and reappeared behind goblins like a specter of knives.

A blast of magical heat suddenly rocked the compound.

From the tower, a figure emerged—an older man in mismatched wizard robes, hair combed over to hide baldness, eyes wild behind thick glasses.

Bobby’s father.

“MY SCHOOL!” he screamed. “YOU’LL PAY FOR THIS!” He raised a wand and unleashed a fireball. The blast tore through the middle of the compound, sending students, goblins, and debris flying. A section of the tower’s wall was blown apart, revealing warped staircases and crates of questionable supplies. Izutsumi staggered, smoke rising from her fur. Sharkie bellowed and kept charging.

Outside the walls, Idiru fluttered in a panic. He watched in horror as Dray, battered and bleeding, crawled toward his sword.

“He’s dead!” Idiru shrieked. “Dray’s DEAD!”

Inside, the Brigade was struggling to regroup. The blast had thrown off their rhythm. Arrows continued to rain from goblin towers. A student accidentally launched a magic missile at a stack of barrels that exploded into glitter and bees. The bees attacked indiscriminately.

“WHERE IS FINCH GLITTERBELL WHEN YOU NEED HIM?!” Izutsumi roared, the words Finch had said would conjure him in a time of need, his way of repaying the group.

Then, like the punchline of a story, a flying pig descended from the sky.

“Did someone wish for me?” called Finch Glitterbell, resplendent in shining armor two sizes too big for him. “Because I’m here—and I brought Snuffles!”

“Please help Dray” Izutsumi said.

The fairy knight shot across the sky atop his loyal flying pig, zooming over the battlefield. He saw Dray fighting the last bugbear outside and swooped down, casting a powerful healing spell mid-flight.

Dray’s wounds stitched together in a surge of golden light.

With a roar, Dray grabbed his flaming sword from the burning roof, turned, and cleaved the bugbear in two.

Back inside, Sharkie, riddled with arrows but unbroken, charged the tower.

“NO NO NO—” Bobby’s father tried to raise a shield, but the diprotodon crashed into the base of the structure with an earth-shaking BOOM.

Wood snapped. Nails screamed. The entire tower collapsed in on itself like a kick to a sandcastle. Bobby’s father was crushed beneath the debris, his wand snapping in half with a pitiful pop.

Silence fell.

The goblins, now scattered and leaderless, began to flee. Some jumped over the walls. Some ran headfirst into trees. The battle was over.

With the goblins routed, the buildings in shambles, and Bobby Spongewood's absurd "university" reduced to smoking rubble, the Borscht Brigade gathered the freed students and began the long walk home.

This time, they followed the coastline, walking along grassy cliffs and pebbled shores, the sound of crashing waves a welcome change from goblin shouts and magical explosions. Spirits were high. Students began joking again. Sharkie even taught one to shape a sunflower into a hat.

It was peaceful… until Rufus got bored.

He quietly affixed a “Kick Me” sign to the back of Daniel, a meek young transmutation student with an unfortunate tendency to stand near ledges. Dray saw the sign and, grinning, gave Daniel a gentle nudge. Except Dray was a dragonborn, and Daniel was standing at the edge of the shoreline. He stumbled, flailed and fell into the ocean.

Sharkie, seeing an opportunity for mischief, dove in after him and wild-shaped into a shark. Daniel turned mid-splash, saw rows of teeth, and panicked.

He screamed and cast Web—trapping Sharkie in a cocoon of magical silk underwater.

She immediately began to sink.

Aggar and Izutsumi dove in, fighting through waves and tangled webs to free her. When they dragged her, sputtering, to shore, they were furious.

“WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?!” Izutsumi barked.

“Just a joke!” Sharkie wheezed.

“I didn’t think it was funny” yelled Daniel “I thought it was a real shark!”

“She almost died!” Aggar shouted.

It took the goliath barbarian twins, Fror and Ghor, to separate them and restore order. The rest of the journey was… quieter.

The Northwind Adventurers Academy gates stood open when they returned, just as they had left them. But the mood inside was different.

Students rushed to greet them. Professors emerged from halls, speechless at first. The rescued second-years ran to their dormitories, crying and laughing. For a brief moment, it was clear: the Borscht Brigade were heroes.

They were brought before Headmaster Arlindor and several College Deans, who listened with wide eyes as the group recounted everything—Idiru, the Feywild, Bobby Spongewood’s betrayal, and the burning of the so-called university. The Headmaster praised them for their bravery. But not everyone was cheering.

While the Brigade had been gone, rumors had spread like wildfire. Hiram Maynard—the promising fourth-year paladin—was dead, and the story had twisted in his absence. Whispers claimed the Brigade had betrayed him, murdered him in a power grab, that the “anti-magic pulse” was just a cover.

In the weeks that followed, two factions emerged. Some students, especially the rescued ones, idolized the Brigade. They were warriors, rebels, and icons of courage. But others whispered the word traitor, led by the Maynard siblings: Molly, a cunning rogue, and Ezra, a swordmaster with a temper.

Ezra challenged Dray to sparring matches again and again—and beat him each time, publicly and with no grace. Bruised and humiliated, Dray refused to stop trying.

Molly left notes for Rufus. Subtle. Menacing. Once, he found one in his boot: “We haven’t forgotten. We never will.”

Tension simmered under every class, every duel, every hallway walk. The name “Borscht Brigade” now sparked either admiration or disgust. And somewhere, deep in the heart of the Academy, the truth of what had happened waited to be remembered—or rewritten.