Legends of Runeterra

More meat was brought in and piled between the two troll kings who sat facing each other: chunks of flesh from the bellies of giant sea beasts, ribs from woolly mammoths, slippery, stinking fish, the great wings of flightless tundra birds, giant ernuk heads, and piles of wriggling body parts that Trundle was secretly glad he didn't recognize.

Besides the food, huge stone bowls of foaming soup were brought up. The smell was so strong it made Trundle's nose hairs curl. It was like the smell from the cracks in the ground around a volcano, and Trundle felt that it would taste worse than the yellow water that the soft-skinned people in the South called beer.

This is indeed a feast for kings, but only one king can eat to the end.

"Shall we just eat it?" Yetu asked.

Trundle nodded. "Eat and eat until one is dead. The one who survives is the true king."

Yetu smiled and said, "Your stories are good, Trundle, but your stomach is too small. A true king needs the biggest stomach, and Yetu has the biggest and fiercest stomach of any. I once swallowed two whole mammoths with a yawn and didn't even realize it."

The trolls surrounding the two kings all let out a humming sound.

"Really?" Trundle said. "Well, one time I drank too much water and peed all over the Laxtak Sea."

The trolls all cried out "Ah!"

Yetu frowned, his eyes rolling in his sockets, trying to recall what happened not long ago.

"Wait, you said you dug out Laxtak..."

Without missing a beat, Trundle retorted, "Dig a hole big enough to pee in."

The heads of the surrounding trolls went back and forth between the two troll kings, watching them brag to each other, each one more exaggerated than the other.

Finally, Trundle said, "Before I got here, I just climbed to the top of the Yeti mountain and bit off a piece of the moon."

The trolls laughed at his boasting, but Trundle pointed through the hole in the roof toward the crescent moon in the sky, and every troll looked up, their murmurs filled with a new respect.

As they looked up, Trundle tucked the empty pocket under his cloak, close to his body.

“Stop telling stories,” Yetu roared. “Eat.”

Trundle nodded, and the feast began.

He first picked out a large rib and gnawed the meat from it, then crushed the bone with his knee and sucked the marrow from it. Yetu swallowed a piece of Juvask belly meat in a few bites and then took a big sip of the foaming soup in the stone bowl.

"Drink!" Yetu ordered. "It's not a meal without the muddy soup!"

Trundle took the offered bowl and drank it in one gulp. The poisonous taste made his eyes water, a taste that was a little like the water that seeped from the corpse swamp, and a taste like the red rocks flowing on the ground. As he swallowed, his throat burned, and his stomach caught fire, and he knew that his back door would be in trouble when he cleaned his intestines later.

He forced a smile and said, "Not bad. Just not strong enough."

Yettu smiled. He saw the sweat on Trundle's brow and leaned forward, wiping his chin. "I see fire in my belly. Burn you, little one."

In response, Trundle grabbed a chunk of whale meat and swallowed it in three large gulps. He spat the gristle and bone to the side and then dove hungrily into the pile, scrambling for other scraps.

Yetu tilted his neck back, and a whole omar slid down his throat, its tail disappearing into his throat with a smack. Trundle scooped up a pile of loose meat and offal with both hands and stuffed it into his mouth with relish, chewing it into a minced meat and swallowing it.

They ate and ate, each mouthful of rotten meat, each bowl of muddy soup, drawing cheers from the spectators. But no matter how much they devoured, the mountain of flesh before them never seemed to shrink. Yetu scooped up a handful of tiny skulls, crunching them, turning them over and over, savoring them as if they were savoring some delicious delicacy.

"These were found in the wreckage of a wooden ship at sea," Yetu said. "A lot of little people, all dead and about to go to waste."

Trundle didn't mind eating the flesh of the minions, but he avoided them because they didn't have much good meat and their brittle bones got stuck in his teeth.

Another batch of ribs and tender meats, along with the slurry, was devoured, knowing that this feast would cost him on the journey home. The northern king buried his head in the fur and flesh of a mammoth, but Trundle saw the legendary signs of Yetu's satiation: his face began to flush, and his eating slowed down.

Trundle, too, began to feel the effects of the vast quantities of meat and slush.

Yettu burped, a rumble from his abdomen shaking the snow from the ceiling, sending huge icicles tumbling down. The trolls leaped out of the way, and Trundle took advantage of their distraction to pull up the bag hidden under his cloak, opening it to meet his bloody jaw.

He looked up to see little Sligu staring at him. The clever creature must have seen him hide the bag in his cloak. Little Sligu nodded slowly to him. Trundle smiled at him and leaned forward to continue plucking meat and bones. He stuffed the food to his mouth, but didn't actually eat it. Instead, he stuffed most of it into the bag against his chin. He took his time, taking a bite here and chewing it there. He calmly stuffed the whole wing, the head, and a whole blackened rib cage into the bag until it was full and could no longer be stuffed.

Trundle's stomach growled, and he belched out a foul, yellowish stench.

"Are you full?" Yetu said, chewing a long and heavy thigh bone.

Trundle patted his bloated belly and shook his head.

"Full? Are you talking about me?" He smiled, revealing a mouthful of broken bones and fat between his teeth. "I was just warming up. When do we officially start?"

The other trolls laughed, and Yetu growled at them to be quiet.

"I'm the king!" he roared, "not him!"

Trundle was still laughing. Yetu was king because he was the strongest, the most vicious, and the biggest eater. But Trundle knew that kind of king was the easiest to overthrow.

And the most cunning king? That kind of king has the possibility of being king forever.

Trundle leaned back easily and yawned, as if preparing for a nap.

"Hey," he said, extending his hand to Yetu, "could you lend me your dagger?"

Yetu looked at him with suspicion, bloodshot eyes and grease oozing from his eye sockets.

"What? Do you think you can cut me?"

"No, just to make room for the next dish."

The King of the North grasped the hilt of his short knife and pulled it from the folds of skin on his chest. He threw it across the hill of flesh in the middle, and Trundle caught it in his sticky palm. For a troll weapon, the knife was surprisingly fine and unnaturally sharp.