How did this walking catastrophe end up leading the most reluctant party in the Kingdom?

  One might suppose that in order to recruit them, Fanática had to use some kind of lure.

  Maybe she proclaimed that she had been sent on a very important divine mission.

  Perhaps tried to lure them with her charm and honeyed words.

  Orr at least paid a bag (or two) of gold for their assistance.

  The truth is simpler and far more terrifying: she didn't recruit anyone directly.

  They just kinda kept her company and… survived it.

  And after the third or fourth time she accidentally saved their lives while smiting something trivial, the Guild ledgers started to officially list her and her companions as "Party”.

  Her party constantly walked on a thin line - on one hand, in time of need she could be a stalwart ally.

  On the other she more often than not ended up being her own party's biggest foe.

  Gorzod the barbarian was the first to fall into her grasp.

  He'd been raiding a bandit camp solo - barbarians are a bunch quite distrusted by honest Nortron folks - when Faná strolled in mid-massacre.

  Her heresy radar had already detected corrupted trinkets among the loot, so she declared the bandits’ camp, alongside with their ill-gotten gains “heretical and evil”.

  With that, she turned it all into a pillar of golden flame.

  Which, also happened to cauterize dying Gorzod's fresh gut wound.

  He woke up day later with her praying over him, her halo blazing like a forge.

  She smiled sweetly and said, "The Goddess still has use for you, my large friend."

  Since then, he has tried to leave six times.

  Each time, whatever monster or avalanche he ran into - got one-shotted by her holy maul before he could even draw his axes.

  He gave up after that.

  Now he just grunts and carries the party extra baggage.

  Thrain Ironspit “joined” because of a debt.

  At least, that’s the version written in every ledger and whispered in every diocesan hall.

  His clan supposedly owed the Church a truly embarrassing sum after a “misunderstanding” involving consecrated mining rights and far too much blasting powder.

  The diocese bishop, in a stroke of petty genius, assigned Faná to "escort" Thrain until the debt was paid in monster parts or clan tithes.

  Four years later the balance hasn’t shrunk - it’s swollen, bloated by collateral claims and repair costs of occasional taverns that no longer exist.

  He's a grumpy, foul tongued penny-pincher that keeps running tally in his head that never quite balances.

  But for some wicked reason he endures her company more than he lets on - more than any dwarf should.

  Which only reinforced my suspicion that none of her companions are entirely sane too.

  Liora the elf huntress... well.

  A band of orcs once raided her forest village, led by a particularly ambitious orc general.

  Her compatriots fought bravely against the horde, and songs would later insist that they nearly won.

  But as usual the song’s lies - the orcs were just stronger, and more numerous.

  For the first time in her very long and very comfortable life, Liora tried her absolute best.

  Whenever her bowstring sang, an orc would fall - down dead or dying.

  But it wasn’t enough.

  She lay wounded at last, defeated by the general himself and surrounded by crude laughter of his minions.

  Liora closed her eyes and surrendered to her fate.

  That was when Faná leisurely strolled in.

  With one mighty swing of her maul the orc general was thrown miles away, burning bright like a falling star.

  The rest of the orc horde looked, dumbfounded, at the small human female, calculated their chances and... scrambled to run away.

  Perhaps they saw the gleam in her eyes.

  Thus, the village was saved that day.

  And in her moment of weakness, pain and blood loss, Liora decided to tag along with her village saviour.

  She ever swore the Holy Elven Vow in front of the entire elf village - binding her fate with Faná till either of them dies.

  And to this very day, she still regrets it.

  Being an elf, she mostly tells herself it is temporary.

  Deep in her heart, she is quite certain she will outlive the problem.

  Finally the most recent recruit.

  Erian, poor Erian.

  He was literally saved from a goblin ambush on his first solo quest in Cave of Trials.

  Faná appeared like the end of days and didn’t even touch the holy maul strapped to her back.

  Under her merciless armored fists the goblins evaporated into a bloody mist of repentance.

  Erian was fourteen at the time, a boy composed of mostly elbows and unrequited daydreams.

  He spent half the evening and the entirety of the next day stammering his thanks.

  She patted his head, called him "my dear," and said the Goddess clearly wanted him protected.

  Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

  Now he trails behind her like a duckling, scribbling notes while secretly wishing he could cast one spell half as terrifying as Faná's divine might.

  And Faná?

  She thinks they're all wonderful lost lambs the Goddess personally assigned to her care.

  Bystanders look at them with a mixture of pity and relief, though.

  How does the church tolerate her, then?

  Well, they treat her kinda like a walking natural disaster.

  Bishops pass her from diocese to diocese like a cursed hot potato.

  "Take her north - we just rebuilt the cathedral."

  "No, send her east - our coffers are empty, let them suffer instead."

  They smile through gritted teeth when she reports in, then quietly pray she never stays longer than a few days.

  The middle-level church priests kept inventing new kinds of travel forms, only to keep her away.

  The most important lessions, are lessions hard-learned: the most miserable are always those who try to gently guide her hands.

  Take the Archbishop of city of Aspera, a shrewd man who rose to a prominent position through politics sharper than most daggers.

  He invited Faná to the newly rebuilt Grand Cathedral of Aspera.

  He sat her down in his private study, poured her tea, and - with the gentlest possible tone - explained that her faith, while admirable, had perhaps strayed from orthodox channels.

  His inner monologue was reciting a speech about how, if he used her well, she could become a truly terrifying hammer with which he could strike his numerous enemies.

  Faná listened with wide, earnest eyes.

  Then she smiled at him with that serene, sunlit smile.

  "But Lord Archbishop, the Goddess loves me. She tells me so every morning when the light touches my halo. Pray with me, Your Holiness, and watch Her answer." she said softly.

  And she knelt just right there, on his priceless rug.

  She clasped her hands and began to pray aloud.

  The room grew warm first.

  Then the light became blinding.

  Then everything turned hot.

  The cathedral's altar ignited in a ray of golden flames.

  As the flames danced up over pillars and licked the vaulted ceiling - because the Goddess apparently agreed with Faná's interpretation - they began to "purify" anything that was insufficiently devout.

  Tapestries of lesser saints crisped to ash.

  The bishop's own regalia smoked at the hems.

  The stained-glass windows depicting humble obedience melted into colorful puddles.

  The Archbishop fled to the courtyard in singed robes, coughing from smoke.

  Behind him, his Grand Cathedral still stood - still structurally intact, but was now redecorated in a perpetual, glowing filigree pattern.

  Every brick hummed with holy light.

  The bell tower rang itself in perpetual Vespers.

  Faná emerged unscathed, her halo blazing brighter than ever.

  She patted the bishop on the shoulder. He flinched.

  "See? She answered! Your cathedral is now truly worthy. No need for further guidance - the Goddess has spoken."

  The Church has never tried "gentle correction" again.

  But it's the common folk: the farmers, the orphans, the old widows… to which she's a true terror wrapped in the armor of kindness.

  She'll always stop to help anyone in need.

  Once she tried to fix a roof with a "minor blessing", and the house ended up glowing for a month.

  Then she went out to find a lost sheep in the mountain, and somehow levelled the entire peak to the ground.

  Needless to say, the common folk have developed a very particular relationship with Fanática.

  Farmers whisper quiet prayers to the Goddess each dawn - not for bountiful crops or gentle rain, but for one very specific mercy: Please don't let the golden-armored saint pass through today.

  Shepherds tell both their flocks and their children that if they stray too far, then a terrifying nun in shining plate will descend like a comet of judgment and bury the whole hillside in holy fire.

  Leaving nothing but sanctified ash.

  Then there's the Guild, oh boy.

  Local Guild branches get very creative with their quests, whenever the party is around.

  They keep "discovering" urgent new monster nests and uncharted dungeons in the absolute furthest, most godsforsaken corners of the kingdom.

  The places so remote the maps just have "Here Be Dragons (We Hope)" scribbled on the margins.

  It become a norm among the Guild clerks to maintain secret ledgers titled like "Fanática Deployment Risk Assessment" and "Post-Incident Rebuild Budget".

  But when the situation turns truly hopeless - an ancient dragon razing the capital, a demon lord gathering throngs of demons, or an ancient lich waking up cranky - the same Guild that spent months dodging her suddenly sends an emergency raven:

  "Come at once. And bring the maul."

  And she comes.

  Always.

  When the dust finally settles down, she's usually the only one still standing - serene, her golden halo blazing.

  She clasps her hands, tilts her head skyward, and then prays in quiet, fervent gratitude to the Goddess above: "Thank You for this correction of the wicked, O Goddess of Perfect Light. May their souls find peace in Your endless mercy."

  In moments like this, if you squint your eyes really hard and ignore the smoking crater, shattered siege engines, and the distant screaming of whatever survived... someone could mistake her for a fair, holy saint.

  A radiant icon of divine grace descended onto this flawed world to smite evil and uplift the faithful.

  The kind of figure they'd carve marble on a cathedral wall.

  A legendary hero, that poets would weep over in ballads.

  But everyone who actually knows her understands the truth - she is a golden hurricane.

  A living, breathing natural disaster.

  Whenever Fanática walks, she carries the Goddess’s love in her heart and an absolute, terrifying intolerance for anything she deems evil.