The Toad Boss - Part 1

The giant Toad boss stood four meters tall and three meters wide, with silver claws on all its limbs.

A pungent, earthy odor, thick with the scent of decay and stagnant water, wafted off its skin.

Instead of typical amphibian skin, its surface was covered in large, overlapping, dark scales, fissured with cracks from which faint, sickly vapors emanated.

'Ribbit-ribbit!'

The Toad croaked repeatedly, expanding like a balloon and contracting like a sponge.

Near the podium, Annelise and the Bishop went still, locked in place, as did every one of the thousand guests gathered in the cathedral.

With spears poised and eyes locked on their target, Beatrice's guards edged forward from the Cathedral's inner walls, creeping ever closer to the altar.