The Arisen known as Vaela had learned many things in her journey across Vermund. She knew that goblins feared fire. She knew that griffins despised loud noises. And she knew—through painful, humiliating experience—that ogres had a particular interest in women.
It was this last knowledge she now weaponized.
The beast emerged from the treeline near the riverbank, a hulking mass of mottled grey flesh and yellowed tusks. Its small, pig-like eyes locked onto Vaela immediately, ignoring the armored Warrior beside her and the Mage chanting in the rear.
"Arisen!" cried her Main Pawn, a fighter named Gregor. "It marks you!"
"Let it," Vaela said, sheathing her sword and spreading her arms wide. "I want its attention."
The ogre roared—a sound like grinding stone—and charged.
Vaela didn't dodge. She didn't raise her shield. She stood her ground as three tons of muscle and malice barreled toward her, calculating the distance, the timing, the exact moment when—
Thwack.
The massive hand closed around her torso, lifting her effortlessly. The ogre's grip pinned her arms to her sides, crushing the breath from her lungs. She felt its hot, fetid breath on her neck as it pulled her against its chest, heard the disgusting slurp of its tongue dragging across her shoulder, felt the pinch of its tusks testing her armor.
"ARISEN!" Gregor's voice cracked with genuine panic. "IT HAS HER! IT HAS THE ARISEN!"
"Don't—" Vaela tried to shout, but the ogre was already moving.
It turned with surprising agility and ran. Not toward her party—away from them. Cradling her like some grotesque prize, the ogre sprinted into the forest, its bare feet thundering against the earth. Branches whipped past. Vaela bounced violently in its grip, her health draining steadily from the creature's slobbering assault.
Behind her, she heard the chaos she'd orchestrated.
"AFTER IT!" Gregor screamed, his voice breaking. "DO NOT LET IT TAKE HER!"
"Arisen! Arisen!" That was Lyra, her Sorcerer pawn, usually so composed. Now she sounded on the verge of tears. "I'M COMING! HOLD ON!"
Vaela smiled despite her predicament. She could picture them—Gregor abandoning his defensive stance, Lyra cutting off her spell mid-cast, both of them sprinting desperately through the underbrush. The ogre had tunnel vision now, utterly fixated on reaching its "safe" spot to continue its meal uninterrupted.
Which meant it wasn't paying attention to what was happening behind it.
Through the haze of pain and the rhythmic crunch-crunch-crunch of the ogre's gait, Vaela heard it—the telltale hum of gathered magick. Lyra had recovered. Smart girl.
"Meteoron!"
The sky above the treeline turned orange. The ogre must have sensed it too, because it finally stopped—some clearing it considered secure—and turned to face the threat.
Too late.
Vaela saw the massive celestial rock descending through the canopy, burning with arcane fire, and she began to struggle in earnest now. Not to escape—the timing had to be perfect—but to position herself.
The ogre raised its free hand to swat at the incoming destruction, which meant it loosened its grip just enough—
Mash. Mash. Mash.
Vaela's fingers found purchase on the rough skin of its thumb. She wrenched with all her strength, using the ogre's own distraction against it. The beast roared in frustration as she tumbled from its grasp, hitting the ground hard and rolling.
The Meteoron struck three seconds later.
The explosion flattened trees. The shockwave threw Vaela another twenty feet, her health bar flashing dangerously low. She tumbled to a stop against a rock, ears ringing, and looked up to see the ogre silhouetted against the inferno—back exposed, staggered, vulnerable.
Gregor was already there. He'd sprinted the entire distance without stopping, and now his sword rose in a perfect Helm Splitter, the blade catching the firelight as it descended toward the beast's unprotected neck.
"For the Arisen!" he bellowed, voice raw with desperate fury.
The blade bit deep. The ogre howled and tried to turn, but Lyra's second spell was already arriving—Levin, lightning from a clear sky, hammering down again and again.
Vaela pushed herself to her feet, drinking a curative, feeling the warmth restore her. She drew her sword and approached the writhing monster from the front, making sure it saw her—making sure it knew.
"Did you think I'd be an easy meal?" she asked quietly.
The ogre tried to rise. She plunged her blade into its eye.
Afterward, Gregor wouldn't look at her. He stood by the corpse, chest heaving, hands shaking.
"You planned that," he said. It wasn't a question.
"I did."
"You let it grab you. You let it carry you off like—" He couldn't finish. His voice had gone strange, thick with some emotion Vaela couldn't quite identify.
"Its back was exposed for nine seconds," Vaela said, cleaning her blade. "Lyra needed six to cast Meteoron. The math worked."
"The math—" Gregor turned to her, and his eyes were wet. "Do you know what it's like, Arisen? To hear you scream and be unable to stop it? To watch that thing lick you while it runs? We are bound to you. We feel your pain. We—" He broke off, looking away. "We are programmed to protect you. When you use yourself as bait... it breaks something in us."
Lyra approached more quietly, her staff tapping against roots. "The tactical advantage is undeniable," she said softly. "But Gregor speaks truth. We are your Pawns, Arisen. Not your... your sacrifice."
Vaela looked between them—these fragments of her own soul given form, bound to her service, panicking at her pain. She felt something uncomfortable twist in her chest.
"Next time," she said, "I'll bring a smoke bomb. Escape faster. Less... dramatic."
Gregor's jaw tightened. "See that you do."
But as they turned to leave the clearing, Vaela caught Lyra's eye, and the Sorcerer gave the slightest nod.
The tactic works, that nod said. But we are more than tactics.
Vaela smiled and led her party back toward the road, rubbing her bruised ribs. In Dragon's Dogma, even exploitation came with consequences. Even strategy had a soul.
And somewhere in the forest, she knew, another ogre was already sniffing the wind.
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