she's been the witch's marker in this campaign of Serpents & Sorcery for three years now, thirty levels from mage cadet to arcane mastermind, and her grasp of real and unreal is fraying.
when a gecko wanders across the silent game board at night and startles her, it catches a tiny but very effective extended expanded augmented rapid-cast mana bolt. there is nothing left except a few scales and a faint smell of cooked lizard.
that morning, the witch frowns at the scorch mark on the battle mat. she counts the pieces.
"there's nothing for it," she tells the head maid, "i'm going after her."
the head maid's voice booms overhead as the witch sheds height: "why not just build a new one, ma'am?"
"because this one is mine," the thumb-sized witch squeaks, "and because i haven't gotten to hunt one of my own in an age."
with a wave, she cloaks herself in the garb of the campaign's elusive villain, the Lich of Prisms.
"such a pity," she says to herself, "that this adventure won't be canon." □