Rivendell, the Last Homely House east of the Sea.
It lay hidden in a quiet, beautiful valley. Mountain streams murmured as they ran, joining into a river. Travelers crossed the water by a narrow bridge with no railings at all, and reached the Elven settlement—an ensemble of buildings both exquisite and majestic, white and graceful, clean as if washed by moonlight. The immortal Elves strolled among them, while the local lord, Elrond, was of mixed blood: both Man and Elf.
In the original The Hobbit, Elrond is praised like this: fair as an Elf-lord, strong as a warrior, wise as a wizard, venerable as a Dwarf-king, and kind as summer. A perfect all-rounder—powerful, and with a genuinely good temperament to match.
Elves and Dwarves had long been at odds, yet Elrond didn't mind opening his home to Thorin and the others. He arranged a banquet for his guests, provided lodging and medical care, and helped the wounded warriors through a difficult moment.
Elven herbs were astonishing. After only a single night, arrow wounds and blade cuts had already sealed and healed. Everyone was lively again, brimming with strength.
Even with such tactful, meticulous hospitality, Thorin still wasn't used to traveling alongside ancestral rivals. Taking advantage of the early morning, he led the company out of Rivendell. Only Bilbo was reluctant to leave that beautiful refuge beyond the world; after spending just one day there, he was already homesick. In the end, he still remembered Dumbledore's encouragement and forced himself onward into this peril-laden adventure.
The expedition pressed on and soon entered the Misty Mountains. This stretch was brutal—clambering along sheer rock faces with the constant fear that one misstep would send you falling to your death.
One night, rain poured from the sky. Stone-giants played and wrestled in the valleys, hurling boulders the size of seven men embracing. They flew like catapult shot and slammed into the mountainside, showering down a rain of rocks that left the travelers with lumps all over their heads.
Everyone feared the giants would keep at it and smash the mountain path apart. Thunder rolled through the stormy night, and their hearts felt like they were trying to leap straight into the clouds. In the end, the brothers Fíli and Kíli found a dry, spacious cave, and everyone hurried inside to escape the rain and danger.
They'd been terrified all night. They didn't even dare light a fire, and instead just wrapped themselves in their stinking, soaked clothes and endured it.
But the trouble didn't end there. Last night they hadn't inspected the cave carefully. It looked empty, gave no sign of danger, so they slept soundly—only for it to turn out to be an exit from an Orc settlement.
They had walked right into a trap. Door-to-door dwarf delivery.
The next morning, Orcs poured out of a tunnel deeper in the cave and ran straight into them.
"Uh-oh," Bilbo muttered, the sound of disaster.
The dwarves grabbed their weapons and fought back. Another chaotic brawl erupted, but the Orcs kept coming—far too many of them. The cave was cramped, making it hard to swing weapons properly. Thorin and the others were eventually overwhelmed and taken alive by those wicked creatures.
The expedition was driven deeper into the sprawling caverns. The scene shocked and frightened them: inside the mountain's belly was an Orc kingdom—or a tribe, at least. Either way, the Orcs here were numerous and formidable, thriving under the rule of a fat, towering chieftain who looked almost like a troll. These weren't the same Orcs who'd ridden wolves after them days ago; they were a different breed entirely.
Thorin and the others were dragged before the chieftain. It looked like they were about to be judged—whether they lived or died, whether they'd be hacked apart, or kept as laborers.
Bilbo tried to think his way out. He scanned the surroundings. The cavern was complex and fairly open, but it still counted as an enclosed space—there was little wind, so the Cackling Laughter Potion wouldn't be blown away. The burglar calculated the best moment to use it. Before that, he had to get the filters into everyone's hands, and that was the real problem.
The chieftain was smug and delighted with himself. He even began to sing. The moment he opened his mouth, the dwarves all looked like they were suffering, while the Orcs around him beamed with joy, intoxicated by a voice that killed without spilling blood.
When the song ended, the chieftain began his interrogation. "Where'd you come from? You've got Elven weapons! Don't lie to me. Heh."
No matter how the dwarves tried to joke, stall, and argue their case, the chieftain just lazily waved a hand. "Bring me the meat grinder. Bring the bone-crusher too. I'm going to give my guests a proper welcome."
Bilbo quietly pulled out a filter and pressed it into Thorin's hand. Thorin passed it to Dwalin, Dwalin to Balin, and so on—slowly, one by one, until everyone held a filter.
They had all seen how Bilbo used the thing.
They understood. This was the moment to break out with wizard tricks.
Their little movements caught the chieftain's attention. From his high seat, he could see perfectly.
"Hey! What are you up to?" As soon as the chieftain spoke, the Orcs around him grew noisy.
Bilbo shouted cleverly, "I'm presenting a gift to His Majesty! I guarantee it'll make you laugh your head off!"
"A gift? Show it!"
"This gift," Bilbo said, "will fly away the moment it comes out. So we need lots of people gathered together, otherwise it'll escape."
The chieftain didn't care in the slightest. With a wave to the side, the tribe's Orcs surged forward and packed in, surrounding the dwarves so tightly that not even water could slip through.
"The gift you're talking about—how funny is it?"
"Very funny. You'll feel incredible after you inhale it." Bilbo wiped his face, and beneath his nose appeared a little black block—like a tiny mustache. The dwarves copied him and put on their filters too.
"Take it out. Hurry up." "Come on, come on."
The Orcs still hadn't realized the situation had quietly shifted. Only a few started mocking the dwarves' appearance. "Ugly as hell. Look at their faces—like they've all got tiny mustaches. Never seen such a stupid-looking getup."
Facing the pressing crowd, Bilbo didn't know why, but a fierce urge to give a speech suddenly rose in his chest. He hurriedly suppressed that inexplicable impulse and pulled out the Cackling Laughter Potion.
It was sealed in a small silver canister. Nothing special about it—except for some hard-to-read German printed on the outside. Bilbo yanked the stopper free with all his strength. A greenish gas hissed out, turning into a thin mist that spread through the air.
He thought it was dispersing too slowly, so he lifted the canister above his head and poured it forward.
"What kind of gift is this? It's just gas! Hahaha—hahahahaha…"
"Smells good? Kinda spicy! Hehe—hehehehehe…"
"Smells like your mum's overnight fart! Teehee—teeheeheehee…"
The Orcs around them were confused at first, but as they spoke, they started laughing wildly. When the chieftain heard it smelled like a fart, he discreetly took two big gulps of air—then roared with laughter himself. "It really does smell like a fart! Hoh-hoh—hoh-hoh-hoh-hoh…"
The cave filled with their echoing madness.
"Hahahaha—hehehehe—hihihihi—hoh-hoh-hoh!"
More Orcs rushed in when they heard it. They seemed to sense something was wrong.
"They're escaping! Stop them!"
Bilbo hurriedly handed the remaining potion to the dwarves. Everyone copied him, lifting their canisters over their heads and dumping potion onto anyone they saw. Wherever they went, it became a boiling ocean of laughter.
The potion grew too concentrated inside the cave, especially in the low places. The very air turned green. Orcs inhaled massive amounts of high-concentration Cackling Laughter Potion and laughed more and more uncontrollably—faces twisting into masks of pain, throats going hoarse, stomachs feeling like they'd split. They laughed until they couldn't breathe, until their diaphragms cramped, until they collapsed on the ground and rolled around.
The expedition members kept straight faces as they moved through the green mist. Wearing their filters, they became a sight those Orcs would never forget. In the years to come, that tribe would pass down, generation after generation, the story of the Laughing Demons: figures with tiny black mustaches who raised their hands at people and wielded a strange gas as a weapon.
"Heehee… they… heehee… they got away!"
The chieftain laughed so hard he fell off his throne. Like a huge leather ball, he rolled and rolled, tumbled into a massive crack in the earth, and laughed himself to death. Around him, Orcs laughed until tears streamed down their faces. They smashed stones into their own cheeks, slapped their companions like mad—yet they still couldn't stop laughing!
The expedition fled at full speed, bursting out of the cave and into the vast lands beyond the Misty Mountains. Behind them, the caverns still rang with delirious laughter, like a light song carried by the mountains.
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