The stone giant went blank.

“Wait a minute,” he said. He closed his eyes and felt the space with his fingers. “You are an Evilun!”

“I am,” I said.

“I thought you were a player,” the stone giant said, “but now I sense the evil in you. Killing you would be a sin.”

The turn of events was very welcome.

“I don’t want to hurt you either,” I said.

“What is an Evilun doing in a quest?” the stone giant asked.

“I am not your regular Evilun,” I explained. The stone giant frowned, as though he was trying to see into my soul.

“You have a really strong evil aura,” he said.

“I am the king of two clans of Eviluns,” I told him. “Skhites and Hornies. And I also have stone giant friends.”

“Do you happen to know Bono by any means then?” the stone giant asked with a hopeful face.

“Bono is my friend,” I said.

The stone giant clapped gleefully.

“Bono is my son!”

This was Bono’s father? Well, the quest had mentioned something about Bono’s family history.

“How do you happen to be here?” I asked him.

Bono’s father winced.

“Long story,” he told me, “that idiot Pook took advantage of me being a lonely widower. Offered me a quest. Promised some good time with some stone girls… the girls turned out to be mere illusions.

“I also failed the quest. Pook hadn’t disclosed that the cost of failure was that I had to become his eternal slave. I pleaded with him, but he couldn’t reverse the outcomes of the quest. I have been here ever since. But Pook is a nice being, if a complete idiot. He is a multi-dimensional entity. We are inside him right now. Since his poor quest making was the reason why I am stuck here, he has sworn to save my son’s life when in danger.

“I decided that instead of getting angry with Pook I could assist him with quest making. He has only created two real quests so far. The first one that I accepted, and the second one is this. He’s a perfectionist, you see. ” The sarcasm was heavy in his voice.

I couldn’t help but speculate on the reason behind why the elf king had failed to kill Bono.

“I think Pook has already saved Bono’s life once,” I said.

“He has?” the stone giant said, “Well, he hasn’t told that to me.”

“But he messed it up, maybe that’s why he has kept quiet to you.”

The stone giant raised a brow.

“What do you mean?”

“The elf king shot a powerful curse at Bono,” I said, and the stone giant put his hand over his mouth in concern, “I thought he died. Everyone did. Then I met Bono a couple of days ago… except I didn’t meet the ‘complete’ him. Bono’s head is the only living part of his body. It has detached from the rest of him, and exists independently.”

“So he can’t move around?’ The giant’s cheeks were reddening, signalling an impending eruption of anger.

“Well, I met him moving around… using his lips,” I said this in a low voice, not wanting to sound offensive.

“That’s worse than death!” the stone giant spat. He turned at Pook who was still far away, and hollered, “Hey you idiot, come here!”

“Why aren’t you two fighting?” Pook shouted from where he was standing.

“Come here you half wit!”

As Pook came shambling as fast as his fat body allowed, I checked the stats of Bono’s father. His name was Fono. Perhaps it was a family tradition for the names to end with a ‘no’.

“What is wrong with you both?” Pook asked. “If you would just fight, and if one would just kill the other then the first quest of my life will be carried out successfully.”

“Shut up!” Fono barked. “He is an Evilun. And I am never going to hurt him, nor is he going to attack me.”

“What?” Pook said. Though he barely had anything resembling a face, his expression suggested his life’s work had just gone up in flames.

“And what did you do to my son?” Fono demanded Pook. “You saved his life, but in the worst way possible. You could have just let him die! I can’t even imagine all the misery that he goes through existing as a head.”

“I had magically placed my stone in his head,” Pook explained, “I-I thought it would protect him from all dangers, but the curse of the elf king was too powerful, only his head survived—”

“And you hid that from me!” Fono was getting angry by the second. “I thought you were an innocent idiot who didn't know the difference between his face and his ass, and that was the only reason I was tolerating you. But no, you are… you are…”

Fono was struggling to come up with a decent word for Pook.

“A cheat?” I said, more out of curiosity and to help Fono (since he looked really stuck) than with ill intention for Pook.

“Yes, that’s what you are! A cheat!” Fono said to Pook.

“But… but,” Pook said, falling on his knees, utterly devastated, “you never told me to inform you when your son is in danger. I only promised to save his life and that I did… Have I been so dishonest that you should call me a cheat?”

“Ah! There he goes again!” Fono said, throwing his arms in the air, exasperated. “I… I can’t even get angry at him because he is a complete knucklehead!”

“Okay, okay,” I decided to intervene. “Calm down, both of you.” I then turned to Pook. “So now the matter stands that Fono and I are not going to fight each other. So the best thing you can do is just transport me back to where I was… and more importantly join Bono’s head—”

“What do you mean join Bono’s head?” Fono asked fretfully, “Join his head to the rest of his body?”

“Um, no,” I said. I did not want to piss off Fono further, but I was choiceless. “Actually I am talking about joining Bono’s head together. It has been smashed to pieces.”

Fono’s mouth dropped open.

“What? Why!”

“Pook told me to do that in order to get into this quest,” I replied. From the look on Fono’s face I was aware he was getting angry at not only Pook but me too, and I didn’t really want to be the subject of his wrath. In an act of self preservation, I quickly shifted the blame to Pook, “It was done with Bono’s consent. Pook assured us that nothing would happen to Bono, and that his head will be joined when this quest is completed.”

Fono pulled at his ears in despair.

“Oh my! Can this get any worse? So if this quest is not completed and if you remain forever stuck here, then it means that Bono’s head would always be lying around in pieces?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Look Pook,” Fono said to the oddity, forcefully suppressing his emotions and assuming a disturbingly calm tone, “I know you are a moron and an idiot, but please for the sake of everything fix this. Get him out of here, and fix my son!”

“But… how?” Pook said, ever so innocent. He was like a child that had scribbled on his dad's office papers and didn’t have the wildest idea how to undo it. “For that you two must fight. And you two are not willing. If only you fought then everything would be solved smoothly.”

Fono slumped down, his face contorting. And then he shook his head, as he got up. He pointed a massive finger at me.

“You,” he said, “I know you are an evilun. But I must fight you. This is the only way out of this. I can’t stand the thought of my son’s head lying around in pieces. It’s driving me crazy!”