Fur of flame

Sketagon

<Continue>

Old Fart is not staying in his vision range again. It is not normal for such a massive dog stops making waves on this small stream. "He must ran of somewhere into the wood again", thinks Lenny.

He then swim back to the bank to get his clothes and wash them. Not until now he can feel the unbearable smell stuck on his clothes. It is a combination of both sweat and a stinky unknown substance, which he presumes to be rotten flesh of animal or, maybe, human. It is funny how he was used to this kind of smell just fifteen minutes earlier and now he can barely breath in it.

Right after he dips his clothes into the stream, those smells suddenly vanishes. They were not just faded away slowly, they vanished, literally. Not only the smell, all the dried dirt were washed away faster than he can blink. There is something in the water that cleaned his clothing in a surprising way. Now when he takes them out of the water, they looks like brand new shirt, jacket and trouser, except for the tattered areas. Maybe even a magical spring can not fix what is already broken.

While locking himself in various thoughts of this spring, a bark behind pulls him out of his own fantasy. Old Fart is back. It was sneaking behind him with the intention of licking his face one more time. However, Lenny pushes it back again, just to realize that Old Fart is not a giant monster anymore. It has shrank back into the normal sized husky he knows. Lenny does not know why, but maybe after all of these events, he does not surprise anymore.

An awesome confrontation.

The sun soon helps him to dry his clothes on a large rock before slowly ducking down the horizon. Lenny wears his clothes on, while telling the dog that they need to stop playing fetch and go back to grandma's house. Old Fart seems to understand what he said, but reluctantly disagree by trying to push the stick he found into Lenny's hands. However, he determines to leave now, because it would be very dark in the fog when the sun goes completely down, so the two heads back to the trail and walk up.

The light is fading out at an incredible rate. In just a few minutes after walking into the fog again, Lenny can not see any thing at all. He can still hear Old Fart barks,  but complete darkness blocks his view of the trail to the point of no direction sense could be defined in his head anymore.

"Old Fart, where are you? I can't see anything at all", he calls his companion.

Old Fart does not bark back, this time it starts to growl. There is something lurking in the dark, around them. Lenny can feel it too.

"What is that? Who's that?" says, Lenny, to the darkness.

No respond. Old Fart is still growling, indicates that this 'something' might not be a friendly being. Lenny hears some foot steps and the crunching sounds of wood around him. Evil escapes from the sounds it makes, sending chill up Lenny's spine. He has no weapon or whatsoever in his hands right now, as his only hope is Old Fart. However, despite of hearing it growling all the time, he still can not locate it in this darkness.

Then, he feels foul breaths behind his nape. The breaths have a smell of a thousand rotten bodies, clearly is not a product of Old Fart. The 'thing' is just behind him, it emanate evil in every single sound it makes. The evil that could normally strike down any average person just by fear is surrounding Lenny as if it will consume him all at once.

"OLD FART!" He yells loudly to tell the dog his position, in the hope that he would respond in time.

*WOOF*, Lenny feels a small fireball jumps right between him and the 'thing', light everything up. The first thing he can see in the light is a dragon-like head that requires him to look up 70 degrees just to see its green demonic eyes. The eyes have no pupil inside, just plain glowing green color. Even the longest fang Old Fart has in its Hell Spawn form is just about a half compare to this monster's fangs, which are pouring drops of poison to the ground, burning it. Beside of its long, bloody tongues, which always sticks out of its creepy mouth, there is no any other sign of flesh, no skin, no meat, as if the entire monster is a demonic skeleton that can move on its own.

Lenny is shocked by its appearance, but what is more shocking than that is the monster seems to be scared of the small fire ball in front of it. Moreover, the fireball is... growling and threatening the giant monster away. Turn out, it is Old Fart. Now it is not a white husky dog that jumps around when excited, nor a giant Hell Spawn that can freeze anyone heart if they don't know how sweet it is.  Instead, it chose the form of something in the middle: a fire hound. It is still as small as the husky form is, but has the look of a fearsome Hell Spawn form, in which the flame pours out of its body as fur. While still not be able to feel any heat from Old Fart's fur, Lenny notices that every trees around it in the range of 200 foots starts to catch fire and lighten up a huge area around it. The small dog is emitting a flame aura that can break spirit of any opponents upon contact. The dragon-like monster is being intimidated completely to the point of not even dare to look straight to Old Fart eyes. Its submission to the dog is like the most mean abject servant to a an almighty god. Soon after the appearance of Old Fart, the monster lurked back into the darkness like a lamp running from the wolves as if it has made a terrible mistake.

The chill in Lenny is long gone, only the awe stays. He has heard the granny said that Old Fart can protect him from any Hell Spawn in this fog, but what he has just witnessed is incredible. Now he absolutely admires his small but fiery companion in every single aspect.

The dog lows down its flame, while not forget to proudly bark one or two times toward the dark to celebrate its victory, then runs back to Lenny. It leans against his legs, expecting a treat.

"Good boy, you are an amazing dog, Old Fart." Says Lenny, while patting its head and scratch its neck. He knows that its flaming fur will not burn him or hurt him, because the dog can control it.

They promptly continues going up the trail as Old Fart is lightening the way for Lenny now. Soon after, they reach the house, in which a delicious smell of good food is coming out of the kitchen, excites them.

<To be continued>

Intimidation

Fur of flame