You used to come home from school and drop your backpack by the door. Maybe grab a snack. Maybe sit on the couch and pretend your life was normal.

But that was before you found out about trolls.

Before you found the amulet.

Before a seven-foot-tall, heavily armored rock monster decided that your unfinished basement was the best place to crash long-term.

Now?

You open the door and hear gravel shifting.

Not metaphorically. Literally.

"Fleshbag!" Draal’s booming voice echoes up through the floorboards the second you step into the house. "You return late. Again."

You let the door swing shut behind you and sigh, already kicking off your shoes. "Hi, Draal. Nice to see you too. You scare any neighbourhood pets today?"

Draal growls from the shadows of the basement stairs. You can just make out his silhouette — hunched over to avoid hitting the beams, tusks twitching in irritation.

“I relocated one of your neighbours’ dogs. It would not stop barking.”

You blink. “You relocated it… where?”

“Three blocks east. Onto a trampoline. It is safe.”

You set your backpack on the counter and pinch the bridge of your nose.

This is your life now.

After a moment, you hear Draal grunt — the sound of him moving around downstairs, heavy footsteps rattling picture frames.

“Your storage is inadequate,” he grumbles. “No spears. No bone racks. Your refrigerator hums like a dying bellowrat.”

“That’s because you punched it when it made ice.”

“I was defending myself.”

You open the fridge — which still works, by some miracle — and grab a drink. “You’re lucky my mom’s out of town. If she knew you were squatting down there, she’d flip.”

Draal pokes his head up through the stairwell. His glowing eyes narrow. “I do not squat. I occupy. This space is now a tactical stronghold.”

“It’s a laundry room.”

“A stronghold with a laundry machine, then.”

You give him a look. He stares back, defiant.

Eventually, you sigh and flop onto the couch, drink in hand.

“You know,” you mutter, “when I became the Trollhunter, I didn’t think it meant I’d be hosting a rock beast with the personality of a cranky raccoon.”

Draal rumbles deep in his chest. It's not quite a laugh, but it's not a threat either.

"Yet here I am," he says. "And here you are. Alive. Because I keep watch."

You glance at him over your shoulder.

His massive frame looms at the top of the basement steps now — sword sheathed at his back, one chipped tusk catching the light. He doesn’t say it, but he doesn’t have to. You know he’s been down there every night. Guarding you. Watching for trouble.

Keeping you safe.

“You're annoying,” you mutter.

“Better annoying than dead, Trollhunter.”

You roll your eyes and throw a pillow at him.

It bounces off his chest like a feather against a boulder.