Barbarian Box Set: Barbarians of Zandipor Books One, Two and Three

“She is coming back to the village,” Cookie Monster says as he lunges forward. He wraps his mighty hand around her arm and pulls her out from behind Creepe.

Rolanda’s arm swings out as fast as the strike of a wicker and the rock that she’s holding slams into Cookie Monster’s head. He stumbles backward as thunder erupts behind his eyes.

But it is nothing compared to the hurt of his soum. His mate has rejected him.

Cookie Monster falls to the ground, sitting in the dirt like a pitiful granu. He watches them leave with his mouth dropped open.

Rolanda leaves with the vile Creepe towards the Seeka tribe, speaking together in her magical language. Does she not know that leaving with Creepe will surely mean her end?





six




Thank God for this guy.

My steps are lighter as I walk beside him. He speaks English, he knows where he’s going, and most importantly, his cock has stayed hidden in his loincloth.

I like this new guy. I’ve always been a really good judge of character and I can tell that this guy is a good one. Analyzing people and sizing them up has always been one of my strong suits. It’s something that I take great pride in.

And Creepe is a good one. Not like that other guy, Cock Monster.

It feels so nice to be walking outside in the sunlight after being stuck in the damp dark cave for so long. I close my eyes as we walk, breathing in deep as the heat from the suns washes over my face.

We emerged from the forest about an hour ago and are walking down a long valley with pink grass that tickles my hands as I trek through it. There’s a mountain in the far distance and what looks like another colorful forest off to my far right.

There are two moons visible in the sky, even though it’s the middle of the day. Three suns, each a different size, shine down from overhead but surprisingly, it’s not very hot. It’s nice and mild with a gentle breeze that makes the pink grass wave to me as I walk.

Long white streaks of meteors rip across the sky like scars made out of clouds. Every few minutes you can hear a muted thump as the ground vibrates from a meteor slamming into the planet.

“Oh, shit,” I whisper, freezing where I stand. There are seven or eight huge dinosaurs coming this way. I slink down into the waist-high grass and look up to Creepe for support.

He just grins. “Those are macrinom beasts,” he says with a shrug of his narrow shoulders. “They eat leaves, not scared Sandrokas.”

He doesn’t look nervous at all but this is still a little new to me so I’m not feeling as brave. I peek over the pink grass past his muscular blue thighs. The dinosaurs are the size of buildings and they move just as fast, lumbering forward on their stumpy legs.

Creepe looks bored but I stare in fascination as they slowly cross our path about fifty yards ahead. Their thick heads are massive with short stubby teeth that look as big as my car. Tiny birds dart from head to head, landing on their thick lips and pecking at the food stuck between their teeth. Brave birds.

The dinosaurs have two lines of sharp spikes that trail down their backs to their long swaying tails. They look just as deadly as the T-Rex that I had seen but they don’t seem interested in us in the least.

I can’t get over how big they are. They make our earth elephants look like rodents. How many leaves do these guys eat in a day to get that big? It’s surprising that this planet has any vegetation left on it.

One of the smaller ones dips its head and pops back up with a clump of grass and dirt hanging from its powerful jaws. He chews it slowly, eating the dark soil along with it.

“They’re so beautiful,” I whisper as they pass.

“They’re slow,” Creepe says, curling his flat nose up in a look of disgust. “And stupid. Come.”

He storms away and I take one last look at the departing herbivores before running forward to catch up with him.

The rest of the day is not much more than hard hiking with very few stops. Creepe doesn’t talk and seems annoyed whenever I ask a question, answering in as few words as possible.

I did spot another T-Rex in the far distance. He was busy digging his face into a dead dinosaur’s body, ripping out guts and bloody muscle tissue.

I thought that stepping into the caged ring before a fight was the most thrilling thing ever. I was wrong. Being close to a hungry man-eating dinosaur is unreal.

Even Creepe looked nervous, ducking down and picking up the pace. The T-Rex wasn’t the real threat he had explained later. A kill of that size attracts a lot of scavengers who will fight over the scraps of the carcass once the T-Rex leaves with a full belly. Those scavengers would be more than happy to trade those scraps in for a nice juicy pink Sandroka.

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