A/N:
Another day, another chapter!
I asked this question on Wattpad, and I'll ask again here. I was just throwing some ideas for new projects. I was thinking of doing a JJK fic where the MC has the powers of Monkey D Luffy.
I have a basic idea of how it'd all work, but I'd love to hear your thoughts and ideas on this! Is that a story you'd like to see from me?
Anyway, I won't keep you, enjoy!
...
The forest path narrowed into a strip of packed dirt, roots snaking across like tripwires. The morning air was cool enough to bite, though the heat rolling from Karlach's armour turned the space around her into a pocket of summer.
She strode just ahead of the others, axe haft balanced across her shoulders, boots crunching with the steady rhythm of someone who had no interest in hiding her approach. Every so often, she glanced back, a grin tugging at her mouth like she couldn't decide if she was marching into a fight or a tavern brawl.
Wyll kept pace on her left, jaw tight and eyes fixed forward, like looking at her too long might loosen the resolve he'd found earlier.
Shadowheart walked a few steps behind them, glaive resting against her shoulder. She glanced between the two every now and then, as if taking quiet measure of how close they were to killing each other.
Astarion, of course, looked bored. He strolled beside Fin with that light-footed grace of his, twirling a dagger in one hand. "So," he said idly, "are we expecting this to be a polite conversation or another one of your… direct solutions, Fin?"
Fin adjusted the strap of his haori, eyes scanning the treeline ahead. "That depends on whether Anders wants to talk or draw."
Karlach chuckled. "If it's Anders, he'll talk. Then draw. Then probably try to stab me in the back while smiling about it."
"That bad?" Shadowheart asked.
Karlach's grin sharpened. "Worse. Tyr's little choir boys think they're saints while they're spilling blood for a devil. Makes the hypocrisy reek."
Wyll's voice was clipped. "Not all followers of Tyr are like that."
"No," Karlach agreed. "Just the ones who tracked me down, chained me, and tried to march me back to Avernus."
The weight in her tone settled over the group like fog.
They didn't have to walk much farther before the trees thinned, revealing a squat stone building up ahead. Its roof sagged slightly under years of weather, but the iron-bound door and narrow arrow slits spoke of more practical uses than shelter. A sign hung crooked above the doorway, the painted scales of Tyr dulled and peeling.
The tollhouse.
Through one of the slitted windows, Fin caught a flicker of movement — a silhouette pacing, shoulders squared and tense.
Karlach's jaw set. "That'll be Anders. And if he's here…"
"…the others are too," Fin finished.
They slowed as they neared the front, boots crunching over gravel. The door stood closed, but faint voices drifted through the cracks — low, hurried, not quite steady.
Inside, Anders and his companions were already rattled.
Karlach tilted her head toward Fin, a smirk pulling at her lips despite the heat in her gaze. "Boss, you want first words, or should I kick it down and let my axe introduce me?"
Fin's eyes stayed on the door, cursed energy humming faintly under his skin. "Hold on, I got a plan"
Everyone looked at Fin like he was crazy
One plan later...
The air inside was stale with old smoke and something sharper — oil, maybe, and the faint tang of metal polish. Sunlight filtered through the narrow slits in the walls, cutting the interior into pale stripes.
Anders stood behind a table near the centre of the room, polished breastplate gleaming despite the wear in his eyes. Beside him, Cyrel, a female human, leaned against a support beam, dark hair pulled into a tight knot, fingers idly tracing the spine of a small leather-bound spellbook. Trynn, a halfing, perched atop a table, bow resting across her lap, eyes darting between the newcomers.
The three looked like they'd been waiting — and not comfortably.
Anders's gaze locked on Karlach the moment she stepped through, his jaw tightening as though her very presence was a challenge. "Karlach."
Her smirk widened. "Anders."
Fin followed her in, his steps measured, eyes scanning the room.
Anders's voice was steady, but there was an edge under it. "You've been busy since you slipped your chains."
Karlach rested her axe casually against her shoulder. "Free people tend to be."
"You're no free woman," Anders shot back, turning his gaze on Fin. "You're travelling with a fiend, stranger. Do you know what she's done? What she is?"
Fin's expression didn't shift. "I know enough to walk in here beside her."
"She's a murderer," Anders pressed. "A soldier of Zariel's hellish legions. She's burned villages, butchered innocents — she's the enemy of every decent soul in the Realms. If you have any sense, you'll step aside and let us take her back where she belongs."
Karlach's jaw flexed, but she didn't speak. Not yet.
Fin took a single step forward, weight in his stance. "That's a lot of certainty for a man who's never fought alongside her. Or against her, without half a legion at his back."
Cyrel's fingers drummed lightly against her spellbook. "You've seen the heat rolling off her. You think that's for show?"
"It's for keeping parasites warm in winter," Karlach said flatly, eyes still locked on Anders.
Anders's mouth thinned. "She's playing you, stranger. That's what devils do. They twist, they lie, they make you think you're doing the right thing — until you're the one burning in the pit. Help us, and you'll be on the side of the law. Of Tyr."
Fin tilted his head slightly, like he was weighing a blade in his hand. "Law doesn't mean much if it's built on lies."
That was enough to draw a sneer from Anders. "You think you know lies? You think she's told you the truth? You're in over your head."
Karlach's grin finally slipped, replaced by something harder. "Funny thing, Anders — I've been in over my head before. Usually, when people like you are holding me under."
For a moment, silence sat heavy between them. The smell of oil and steel hung thick.
Then Anders's voice snapped like a whip. "Enough." His gauntleted hand closed into a fist. "This ends now. You're coming with us, Karlach — back to Avernus."
The shift was instant.
Karlach's axe hit the floor with a thud as her hands balled into fists. Heat flared off her in a wave so sudden the air shimmered, the wooden walls creaking as they dried in an instant. Flame licked at the seams in her armour, spitting sparks to the floor.
Fin didn't move when the first burst of fire spat past his shoulder, heat kissing his cheek as it roared toward the ceiling. He just tilted his head back, watching it curl upward.
Karlach's eyes were molten, voice rough with rage. "Avernus was never my home." She took a step forward, fire spitting from between her teeth. "And I am…"
Her foot slammed down, the boards beneath her blackening in a perfect circle.
"NEVER."
Another burst of flame roared, forcing Trynn to flinch back on the table.
"GOING."
The heat surged again, Cyrel's hand darting to her spellbook.
"BACK!"
The last word ripped from her like the crack of a forge, the tollhouse walls glowing faintly in the firelight.
Anders's grip tightened on his sword hilt. "So be it."
Fin's fingers twitched at his side, cursed energy already rising.
Almost immediately, his voice cracked through the heat and tension. "Shadow!"
From above, the floorboards creaked, and Shadowheart stepped out from her perch on the narrow upper landing. Her mace gleamed briefly before her free hand snapped forward, holy sigils spilling into the air. The magic hit Anders like a chain, locking his limbs rigid in an instant. His eyes widened, body frozen mid-motion.
Before Cyrel or Trynn could even process the ambush, a heavier impact rattled the room.
Wyll vaulted the railing, boots slamming into the floorboards in front of Anders. His palm lit with burning green as he thrust forward, the Eldritch Blast roaring point-blank into the paladin's face. The force launched Anders backward, his armour screeching as he slammed into the wall hard enough to crack plaster. His sword clattered from his hand, skidding across the floor in a sharp spin.
Fin's smirk deepened. Textbook.
It was a basic strat he'd run a hundred times before: split the party, have the casters sneak on from the roof, open the fight with control and a clean strike before the other side even knew what was happening—a pre-emptive checkmate.
Truthfully, he wasn't even sure he needed to bother now — he was far stronger than he'd been in Act 1, and this wasn't exactly the most dangerous fight he'd faced. But Anders… Anders was different. Fin remembered exactly how stupid the paladin could be to fight in a straight engagement. One turn — one single turn — and the man could smite so hard it would leave half the party bleeding on the floor.
Better to end the game before the first move.
Or so Fin thought.
Anders groaned, his head rolling forward as the Hold Person faltered under Wyll's blast. His boots scraped the floor as he staggered upright, pushing himself off the cracked wall. His once-pristine armour was dented on the chestplate, a decent dent where Wyll's blast had landed.
His eyes… they still burned with the same iron conviction.
"You think that's enough to stop us?" Anders spat, voice ragged but venom-laced.
Karlach's axe came up, the air shimmering around her like heat off a forge. "No. This will."
She surged forward, steps hammering the boards. Her greataxe carved a vicious arc that would have split a lesser man in half, but Anders caught the haft on his gauntlets, the two of them straining against each other in a shower of sparks.
Cyrel's fingers twitched, a syllable already rising — and Fin blurred forward.
One step became three, his heel gouging the floor as he closed the gap. His hand chopped up on her jaw, the forming spell fizzling into nothing but static. Her eyes widened as her jaw was forcefully shut.
Fin didn't answer. His elbow sank into her gut, folding her over, and then his palm caught her shoulder in a push that sent her sliding back, her hidden dagger also tumbling from her grasp.
"Cyrel!" Trynn barked, already bringing his bow up. The halfling's shot wasn't aimed at Karlach or Fin — but at Shadowheart, still poised on the landing.
The arrow never reached her.
It thunked into the wall an inch above her head, and from the corner of the room came Astarion, crouched in the shadows with a smug smile and a shortbow. "I'd rather she stay pretty, thank you."
Before Trynn could draw again, Astarion fired — one bolt, then another. The first grazed Trynn's shoulder; the second buried itself in her thigh, spinning her off the table with a yelp.
Down below, Karlach fought like a siege engine with teeth. Her swings were wide, made to batter through Anders's guard rather than barbarically. Anders met her force with precision — tight, deliberate dodges and ducks, waiting for the moment to counter.
He found it.
With a grunt, he shoved her axe aside and broke free just long enough to spot his greatsword on the floor. His hand shot out, snatching the hilt, and in the same motion, he pivoted into a vicious upward slash.
Karlach jerked back, the blade missing her throat by a finger's width, the wind of it tugging at her hair.
Fin was already moving in to flank, cursed energy wreathing his forearms — but Anders pivoted, forcing them both back with a sweeping guard.
"Two at once?" Anders growled. "Zariel will damn you both."
"Get in line," Karlach shot back, sparks leaping from her armour.
On the landing, Shadowheart finally descended, mace and shield raised. She moved straight for Trynn, who was still struggling to reload. Her shield crashed into Trynn's chest with the force of a battering ram, driving her to the floorboards.
"You'll find I'm harder to kill than I look," she said coldly, bringing her mace down — once, twice — each blow methodical, until Trynn moved no longer.
Across the room, Wyll had squared off with Cyrel, rapier flashing in quick, precise thrusts that her footwork barely managed to evade. A faint smile crept onto his lips as he angled her toward the wall.
"Not much room to dance now," he said, his blade nicking her sleeve.
She hissed, retreating a half-step — just as Astarion's third bolt whistled past and embedded itself in the wall beside her head, drawing her focus away from Wyll for a fatal moment.
Back with Anders, Karlach moved like a storm given shape — harsh, almost primitive in her rhythm. Every swing of her axe was a full-bodied commitment, a brutal declaration of intent. There was nothing ornamental, nothing feigned; she swung to break, to crush, or to burn.
Fin was her opposite in every way. Where she tore forward in heavy arcs, he slid between the gaps like water finding every crack in a dam. His steps were swift and exact, his cursed energy reinforcement flaring in brief, sharp bursts that cut through the space Anders had to defend.
And yet, they moved as if they'd fought together for years.
Karlach's axe came down in a savage overhead cleave, the kind that left Anders no choice but to brace his greatsword with both hands to absorb the blow. Sparks screamed from the impact, and in the same heartbeat, Fin was already sliding low on her right, palm flaring as he drove a cursed-energy strike at the exposed gap in Anders's thigh plate.
The paladin twisted just enough — the blow glanced, armour denting instead of shattering bone — but he had no time to counter. Karlach was already recovering, reversing her axe in a vicious hook that forced Anders's blade high again.
Fin flowed into the new opening, feet whispering across the floorboards, his haori trailing like a shadow's edge. His hand snapped out in a precision strike toward Anders's ribs.
Steel met him there — Anders rotated his guard with uncanny speed, catching Fin's hand on the flat of his blade. But that meant his guard was low, and Karlach's next swing was already screaming in from the left.
Anders pivoted, greatsword catching her axehead inches from biting into his neck. His boots skidded, the force driving him half a step back.
Fin didn't let him stop for a second. He darted around Karlach's far side, a sudden upward kick slammed into Anders's wrist, making the greatsword falter in his grip.
Karlach saw the moment — she always saw the moment — and dropped her next swing straight down, the haft shaking under the effort to split man and steel alike.
Anders blocked again. Sweat ran into his eyes, his breathing ragged under the weight of defending against two predators whose styles fed each other — one the hammer, the other the scalpel.
They pressed him like a tide: Karlach forcing him to plant his feet with every crushing hit, Fin slipping in to carve at the angles that defence left bare. The sound was a constant rhythm — clang of blade, crack of cursed energy, the scrape of boots, the hiss of heat.
Even barely holding on, Anders was a wall. Every time Fin thought he'd broken his stance, the greatsword was there, angled just right. Every time Karlach's swing seemed destined to land, Anders shifted weight or redirected the haft. His parries weren't pretty anymore, but they were survival, pure and stubborn.
Fin couldn't help was be impressed with the work Anders was putting in, but still, the cracks were widening.
"DAMN YOU!" Anders roared, his greatsword whipping outward in a vicious horizontal sweep.
Karlach's boots slammed back into the floorboards as she leapt away from the arc, heat flaring from her armour.
Fin didn't retreat — he went forward.
He vaulted over the blade, twisting midair, one foot planting lightly on Anders's shoulder before stepping onto the man's head. The paladin staggered under the sudden weight, and Fin pushed off, flipping back to the ground behind him in a smooth arc.
Anders spun, his greatsword flashing again — this time angling for Karlach's neck. The steel grazed her skin, the sharp kiss of death only a breath away—
Shhhk!
The edge parted cleanly, but not flesh — the blade itself sheared where it met her throat, the severed tip tumbling to the ground with a hollow clang.
Anders froze mid-swing, confusion breaking across his bloodied features. "What—?"
Fin stood a step away, one hand raised, fingers still faintly curled as cursed energy flickered out. The air between them hummed with the echo of Dismantle. "Your blade," he said almost lazily, "was in my way."
Anders's bewilderment turned to fury, his grip white-knuckled around the useless hilt.
But it didn't matter — because behind Fin, the rest of the fight was already over.
Shadowheart stood over Trynn, mace in hand, shield up as the corpse had its head bashed in, her expression unreadable. Wyll wiped his rapier clean on Cyrel's torn sleeve, the wizard lying unconscious at his feet. Astarion leaned casually against the railing, as if the skirmish had been nothing more than a day's amusement.
Anders's eyes darted from their bodies to Fin, then to Karlach. His breath came heavy, ragged — the look of a man staring at the last hand in a losing game.
Karlach, still burning from head to toe, only grinned wider.
Fin didn't grin. He smiled — slow, deliberate — watching Anders's rage curdle into desperation. "Go on," he murmured. "Show us what you've got left."
Karlach's grip tightened on her greataxe. The seams in her clothes flared brighter. Fire licked along the weapon's edge, curling upward in a spiralling blaze until the steel glowed like molten gold.
She stepped in close, boots gouging blackened marks into the floorboards, and brought the flaming axe down in a single, brutal stroke.
The impact rang like a forge strike, a shockwave of heat bursting outward as Anders's chestplate split apart under the blow, the metal warping and collapsing in on itself. Shattered fragments clanged to the ground, the stench of scorched steel filling the air.
Anders stumbled back, chest bare, breath hitching from both the heat and the sudden weightlessness where his armour had been.
Karlach straightened, the axe still burning in her grip. "Now you've got nothing between us."
Anders didn't answer with words. He roared and lunged past her, greatsword's shattered stump raised like it could still kill. His boots pounded across the floor toward Fin, the weight of his fury carrying him forward faster than reason.
Fin laughed — low at first, then breaking into a wicked, sharp bark of amusement. "Pathetic."
He crossed his arms over his chest, letting Anders's first swing whistle past his face by an inch. The air stirred against his cheek, but his head tilted just out of range.
Another swing — a backhanded slash — Fin bent at the waist, letting it sail over his head, his eyes never leaving Anders's.
The third was a downward chop. Fin stepped in under it, close enough to hear the paladin's remaining armour strain as he moved, and slammed the heel of his hand into Anders's forearm to throw the strike wide.
Then it was Fin's turn.
His right fist snapped out — a straight to the jaw that cracked Anders's head to the side.
His left followed instantly, slamming into the ribs.
Right again — a cross to the temple.
Left, short and sharp to the gut.
Then a low kick to the knee, making Anders stagger, followed by an elbow up into the chin.
A spinning backfist — blood and loose teeth burst from his mouth as Fin's fist connected with his chin — and then a hammering one-two into the breastbone.
Anders's arms flailed, trying to block, but Fin slipped through every gap, every opening.
Uppercut.
Hook.
Palm strike.
Rising knee.
The rhythm built, each hit feeding the next, cursed energy flickering with every motion. His boots barely touched the ground between moves — a predator circling in the space of inches, each strike sharper than the last.
Then he planted his feet.
One last breath.
He coiled his arm back, fingers curling into a perfect fist, cursed energy tightening through every muscle from his toes to his knuckles. His gaze locked on Anders's exposed midsection.
And then —
He drove the punch straight into the paladin's gut.
KR-THOOM!
A sound like the air itself tearing apart exploded through the room. Space distorted around his fist for the briefest heartbeat, the pressure collapsing inward before bursting outward in a concussive shockwave.
Black Flash!
The world didn't just hear it — it felt it.
The moment Fin's fist buried itself in Anders's gut, the cursed energy detonated like a collapsing star. Space warped inward around the impact point, the air shrieking under the sudden compression before it all snapped outward in a single, violent burst.
The shockwave tore through Anders. Armour plates didn't crack — they exploded, fragments whirling past in a deadly halo. Blood burst from his mouth in a red mist as his body folded around the blow, his eyes fully bloodshot, his feet leaving the ground entirely.
Then he was gone.
The force launched him backwards like a siege stone fired from a god's own trebuchet. He didn't just hit the wall — he bursted through it, splinters and shattered beams erupting outward in a storm of debris. The far side of the tollhouse didn't stand a chance; the walls burst apart in a deafening crash, daylight flooding the smoky interior as Anders's body sailed clean through.
And he kept going.
Out over the cliff behind the tollhouse, spinning limply in the air like a rag doll caught in a storm.
Karlach stepped back from the hole just in time to watch him vanish over the drop. A faint, wet splash echoed up from the river below — the same river where they'd found her moments earlier.
For a moment, no one moved. The only sound was the groaning protest of the tollhouse's damaged frame and the faint trickle of debris still falling to the floor.
Fin flexed his fingers once, then stepped toward the ragged hole in the wall. The sunlight framed him in the wreckage, his haori drifting lazily in the breeze. He glanced down at the water far below, squinting at the faint crimson swirl already dissipating downstream.
Then, with a smirk, he muttered loud enough for everyone to hear,
"…Guess he finally learned how to take the plunge."
Astarion laughed — a sharp, delighted sound. Karlach grinned wildly. Even Shadowheart's lips twitched before she shook her head and muttered something about "show-offs."
The fight was over — and Anders had gone out in spectacular, messy style.
Karlach was still breathing like she'd sprinted through a battlefield, her skin glowing, heat shimmering off her in waves. Her teeth were bared in a feral grin as she stomped toward the jagged hole Anders had left.
"ZARIEL!" she roared, the sound rattling the already-unstable beams. "YOU HEAR ME, YOU HELL-SPAWNED BITCH?!" Her axe came up, fire still licking along its edge. "SEND ME MORE OF YOUR PISS-DRINKING LACKEYS! I'LL CARVE THEM UP AND FEED THEM TO THE DAMN RIVER!"
She returned, then the table to her left went flying into the far wall in a shower of splinters.
"I'LL GRIND EVERY LAST ONE OF YOU INTO DUST AND PISS ON THE PILE!"
Karlach whirled on the nearest intact piece of furniture — a perfectly innocent chair — and cleaved it in half like it had personally wronged her.
Fin, standing beside the rest of the party, didn't even blink. "Tear it all down."
That was all she needed.
Karlach turned on the tollhouse. Chairs were reduced to kindling, the front counter split clean through, Anders's old armour stand folded in half and hurled into the wall.
The rest of the party could only watch.
Shadowheart blinked. "Is… is she just smashing everything?"
Astarion's eyebrows rose as Karlach shoulder-checked a support beam. "She has a certain… thoroughness."
Wyll opened his mouth to speak — only to duck as a broken stool leg sailed past his head hard enough to stick into the wall. "Alright, that's enough—"
Fin suddenly shoved him toward the door. "Out. Now."
"What? She's not—" Wyll started, before a blazing axe swing missed him by about a foot.
"OUT, OR DO YOU WANNA END UP LIKE THAT CHAIR?" Fin repeated, herding all three of them toward the sunlight like a farmer driving particularly slow livestock.
Karlach was now kicking in the remains of the counter, muttering incoherently about "ripping Zariel's spine out and using it as a spit."
They spilled out into the fresh air, and Fin shut the door behind them just as something heavy — possibly the rafters — came crashing down inside.
From the safety of the road, the four of them could still hear Karlach bellowing triumphantly between crashes.
Shadowheart folded her arms. "…So do we go back in?"
Fin smirked. "When she stops yelling."
A particularly loud CRUNCH echoed out, followed by another creative death threat involving Zariel, a forge, and questionable anatomy.
Astarion sighed. "We're never going back in, are we?"
The others simply shrugged, waiting for Karlach to...cool off.
...
[End of Chapter]