They made their way through the forest for around half a day. Around mid-day they were starting to get close to the location on the map. To keep themselves as safe as they possibly could when they got within two or so miles of the location on the map they entered stealth and started to slowly make their way through the forest. They would have to stop occasionally to let their stamina recover as stleathing for several miles was unsurprisingly more taxing on their bodies than just walking the distance.
They didn’t want to take any chances, not that it actually mattered as no one came close to them while they were moving. But they were just trying to be safe and make sure that they were hidden from any potential scouts that they could have come across.
Finally up ahead they could see the trees of the forest starting to thin. It eventually opened up to a large meadow in the middle of the forest, kind of. The entire clearing was several miles across and kind of oblong shaped. There was a river, the one they had been following before that ran along the north edge of the clearing. It was just as equally wide and deep as it had been downstream. On the west and south side of the clearing there was another scar on the landscape, a deep gorge that led down to the bowels of the planet.
The center of the river and gorge was mostly flat. On one side of the several mile wide area that was closed in on three sides was a small hill, only probably 50 or 60 feet above the rest of the plain. The east side of the hill ended in a cliff face.
In the area that was enclosed by either the gorge or river was a small cluster of buildings. It was hard to tell what the purpose of the buildings from where they were at. However one that was abundantly clear was there was a blacksmith of some kind near the base of the small hill. At the top of the hill there was a building that stood alone. All over the area were piles of raw resources ready to be shaped, or were being shaped into usable materials.
On the north west side of the area there were areas of tilled ground that had to be fields. On the north east side of the clearing there were some roughly made fences that held several different kinds of livestock. Finally on the north west corner where there wasn’t all that much space that would need to be defended they had started to erect a basic palisade wall. It was mostly complete but still rough in its construction. On the entire east side of the clearing they had started to dig trenches that could be used to help keep back invaders.
Finally there were tons of people milling about in the clearing clearly going about their work. It was hard to tell how many from their distance but he could easily see several people working the fields as well as the livestock pens. There looked to be new construction going on and people were busy working on the buildings. There were teams that were dedicated to digging up the soil and rough and tall grass of the clearing and replacing it with rough basic paths. And over the entire thing there were small groups of people who were standing guard at the edges of the clearing, patrolling to protect from monsters or to stop people from leaving, he couldn’t tell from where he was. He could see people standing uselessly around the construction site, or in the fields not doing anything.
They had finally found the village.
“Do you think those small pods of people are there to make sure that the workers keep working?” Adriana asked in a hushed tone.
“Most likely. I have a feeling that those who are walking the perimeter or are standing guard at the construction sites are there more to force them to work than they are to keep people safe.”
His stomach filled with butterflies. Finally, after almost 14 months he had found the bandits he wanted to catch and kill. He finally had them cornered, he had for the first time the upper hand. They didn’t know about Bjorn and Adriana. Actually they probably did as Vivian got away. But they had no way of knowing how close to their demise they actually were. He finally started to get a sense of hope.
“What about that building at the top of that hill, do you think that is where Kairon lives?” Adriana asked.
“Without a doubt. It has to be his home. That is where we will find him eventually. However this begs a few new questions.”
“Alright I’ll bite, what is the first one?”
“Well, how many people are down there? I can’t get a clear count, or even a good estimation. We are going to have to watch throughout the day and see if there is anything that can help us gauge how many people are there. Can you get a count?”
Adriana’s eyes scrunched up as she tried her best to count all of the dots from their distance. After a minute of trying she got a look of annoyance on her face before she just shook her head. “No, I can’t. Maybe if we got closer there is a chance that I could get a better count but that is another problem we will have to deal with. This clearing is too big, as soon as we leave the tree line and try to get closer we will easily be spotted, it is too open.”
“My thoughts exactly. It is too open and on top of that they have sentries set up at both the perimeter as well as on top of the hill to keep watch.” Bjorn pointed to both places to point out the people standing there. “However they have been too greedy, and we can use that to our advantage.”
“How so?”
“From the amount of people that I can currently see there aren’t enough of them. They are trying to protect too large of an area while failing at protecting really any of it. It is easy enough to keep an eye on during the day when they can see for several miles in each direction. However at night if they don’t pull back from their current positions there will be plenty of gaps that open up in their defenses that we can slip past.”
Adriana’s eyes widened at the implications. “And if we can make our way into the village we can do damage from within before slipping away.”
“Exactly, but for now damage shouldn’t be our goal. What we should focus on is getting information, getting intel. They are likely expecting us, or they are expecting us to run away seeing how Vivian got away. But it is very likely that they will be expecting us to show up at some time seeing how she recognized me. They have to know that this is personal for me.”
“If they are expecting us, why not deal damage?”
“Because they don’t know for sure. At least not yet, while we have the element of surprise we should try to infiltrate and get information about the small town that is forming. If we get enough information then it would be in our best interest to switch tactics. Or if we end up getting spotted, then we can switch to damage. In that case we can start trying to kill or pick off the guards.”
“Alright, so if we are trying to get information what should we focus on? And that begs the next biggest question, can we trust the villagers of this village. I think we probably can, from all of the information we gathered while in Escar these people were brought here likely against their will.”
Bjorn chewed on his bottom lip as he thought. “We probably could trust them if we got here several months ago. However there is a chance that the loyalty of the workers will have flipped, and instead of hating their enslavers they are starting to like and even cooperate with them. No, it is probably best that we don’t interact with them for now.”
“Alright so what is the plan for now?”
“We will set up-”
They spent the next several hours while watching the village discussing what they should do from here. It was ultimately decided that they would spend the first night observing the village. From there they would decide but Bjorn might go into the town that night. Adriana had come a long way since they left Leefside, however Bjorn was still the better choice for this mission currently. His stealth skill was higher, he was stronger with more tools to escape if he got caught. He had an easier time seeing at night than she did. All around he was the best choice.
As they grew nearer to evening they decided to back out and find a place for them to set up camp for the next few days. Or at least until they know more about this camp/village and what they can do about it. It took a few hours before they found a nice secluded easily defendable spot around 4 miles away from the small village. They quickly did some of the prep work to prepare the site to make it nicer to sleep in for a bit. They cleared rocks and flattened out the ground. It was busy work but both were too excited to really let it distract them.
It was just after suns set before they finally made it back to the village. Before they even made it out of the trees Bjorn could see that something was wrong. The village was too lit up. Periodically around the outskirts of the village there were small floating lights. They emitted a soft green blue light. They seemed to provide roughly 20 or 30 feet of good light before the source started to get diminished from there. They all hung roughly 7 or 8 feet in the air and didn’t seem to be supported by anything.
The only saving grace was that the small floating balls of light only lit up the two sections of the village that there was unbroken land. On top of that occasionally throughout the village there were more but there were less of them and they were less frequent inside the village. Occasionally there were orange and yellow glows throughout the village that indicated fires. All in all the entire village was lit up well, this would complicate what they had planned.
“What do you want to do? Whatever those lights are, they aren’t anything that we knew of or planned for. This will make our plans a bit more difficult.”
Bjorn chewed on his lip as he mulled over what to do now. “I don’t think it really matters. It will make it easier for me to be spotted, however that only matters while I'm on the outskirts of the village. Once I am past it most of the land that they have decided to occupy is left without light. It is the same with the village where there is tons of dead space. There is a good chance that I will go unnoticed. But first we should spend tonight doing some recon of the village.”
“That’s fair, you lead the way.”
They started making their way around the village sticking to the tree line trying their best to try and blend in. They weren’t trying their best to be super stealthy, they already saw what they needed from the village. They set up their defensive line in the middle of this massive clearing, the likelihood that they set up sentries in the trees is slim to none. So they took a risk and traded stealth for a little speed.
When they rounded the north east corner of the treeline they finally caught sight of a structure that they hadn’t expected to see, one that answered a few questions they had.
“Do you think that is where they are keeping the rest of the villagers/workers?” Bjorn asked.
Adriana made a small sound of disbelief at Bjorn’s question. “Without a doubt.”
“I was being sarcastic.”
“Oh.”
What they were looking at was another small palisade wall that was built into the hill. What they didn’t see earlier was that the small hill that the house or Kairon’s quarters was built on wasn’t only covered on one side with a cliff. The north side was half cliff face as well. The palisade wasn’t massive but probably medium big. The reason for Bjorn's sarcasm was that there had been a catwalk built into the palisade; only it was on what should be the outside of the wall. Obviously it was used to keep something within.
“How cruel. They force these workers to build for them and then they cage them up at night. They probably also forced them to build the walls that keep them caged up at night as well.” Adriana’s tone was one of indignation, she sounded like a SJW ready to go to war for the injustice of the situation.
Bjorn could barely contain a laugh at the absurdity of it. “Yep, without a doubt.”
“This throws a wrench in our plans. How are we going to try and find sympathisers in the village?”
“Looks like we might have to find someone to talk to during the day. I don’t know if they are still alive but they took a smith from Blackrock Bay that I have a history with. If we somehow manage to make contact with her there is a chance that she can give us information.”
“That plan hinges on the off chance that she actually made it here.” Her implication was easy to understand.
“Yeah, she was free spirited, there is a chance that they deemed her not worth the effort. I could see Ellie fighting back and they killed her. However she is or maybe was the best smith I have ever come across, so I doubt they would have killed her. She will probably be down there.”
They continued to talk in hushed tones between the two of them as they stalked through the forest. It took a few hours to walk all the way around the outside of the forest. It was completely uneventful however it gave them a better lay of the land. They determined that the best place to try and skirt into the village would be in the north east corner.
Bjorn would have to skirt down the river bank, it was wide enough and apparently old enough that it cut a small groove in the ground. The surface of the water was roughly 5 or 6 feet below the surface of the ground around it. He would have to stealth down the river bed and hopefully time it right that the sentries weren’t walking past.
They spent most of the night observing and it yielded some useful information. The stretch of land on the east side that wasn’t covered by a deep gorge or riverbank was probably close to a half mile long if not a little less. They had 6 different teams of two that constantly patrolled back and forth along the half mile long section of land. It also looked like they had teams patrolling along the river as well, but they had less security there.
Every 4 hours a new group of people would come and take over patrol and would walk along the stretch of land. From the pace and the motion of the heads most of those who stood guard didn’t take their job seriously. Probably a problem that was caused by working with the scum of the Eld.
They finished their surveillance for the day and made their way back through the forest heading to their camp. The rest of the day passed without incident. They just rotated their watch until it was getting close to suns down. Once time was up they left their gear, which included Adriana’s backpack as well as Malachi behind. He wasn’t made for stealth anyways.
The little stone golem was starting to make progress. He was almost to mid thigh on Bjorn, and he was once again almost too heavy for Bjorn to pick up even if his increased attributes. Still not the best in a fight as he was slow, but better than nothing. But now was not the time for a fight.
When they made it back to the tree line it was well and truly night time. However the night sky wasn’t cooperating with their mission. Tonight was one of the rare nights were 5 of the 6 moons that orbited the Eld were in full display in the night sky. This lit up the night entirely way too much and even Adriana had great vision and could see in the dark just fine. Making this evening another failed attempt.
He briefly thought about trying going in but that would probably be futile. He didn’t doubt his stealth skills, however he still didn’t want to chance it. Hopefully the next night would have better luck. Before they left something had changed slightly about the village. Bjorn couldn’t put his finger on it until Adriana pointed out that the village had more lights in and around the buildings. They still didn’t know how they were being made or what they really were but somehow they produced more. He tucked that information away for the time being.
It was the same story for the next two nights, too many celestial bodies in the night sky make it nearly impossible for them to really sneak in without being potentially caught. Finally on the third night something changed. With only one moon in the night sky they finally had a chance. What's more than that it was Mortum in the sky that night, which cast a purple hue on the landscape it shown on. The only way that it could have been better was if Umbriel was in the sky. But beggars couldn’t be choosers.
Finally they were able to put their plan in motion. No words needed to be said as they both knew that Bjorn was going to sneak into town. There was only a single slight nod towards Bjorn from Adriana as he slipped out of the trees and disappeared in the night to her.
He made his way down towards the riverbed as quickly and as stealthily as he possibly could. He didn’t want to rush, it could expose him even with everything being in his favor. He made it to the river bed without any sound of the alarm being raised. Now all he had to do was walk down it trying not to disturbed any of the rocks that the shore had been covered with. The water had washed away almost all of the dirt and only left behind the rock that had been too big to move with the water.
His tension grew as he drew nearer to the line. From where he was in the river bed he could see the glow of the lights that made up their line grow brighter. They were how he measured distance, how he determined where he was in relation to their defensive line. It took him hours to creep along the river bed but finally he got directly underneath where the lights were stationed. For some reason they hadn’t put any lights in the river bed, an oversight that he was happy to exploit.
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He could hear voices approach his location, the closest patrol must have been getting close to the river. He saw that occasionally they would skip doing their duty and look over the lip of the small drop off. He hoped that this would be another one of those times, however he didn’t trust his luck to hold. So he prepared his bow and an arrow to shoot up out of the riverbed if need be.
He sat there as still as he could be, to help mitigate his movements he took slow shallow beaths. The voices grew louder and louder until he could make out the words they were saying.
“-ou think there is actually any chance that the farmer that Vivian was talking about would actually come here?”
“He would have to be the dumbest son of a bitch in this entire world to do that. We know about him, we know that he has a grudge with the boss. If for some reason he did come here we are ready for him.”
“What about what to happened to Sonia and Vincent? He was stronger than both of us. You saw his corpse when they brought him back to town. What did he look like?”
“I didn’t really see him, I just got a glimpse, and I am not convinced that it was actually him. The body was too old and decrepit looking for it to be him. No, what I think happened was they were sent out on another mission and they didn’t want anyone to find out.”
The pair walked almost up to the edge of the river bank and stopped short. They turned towards each other not even sparing a glance down towards the river. Even with the lights overhead they both still carried torches. They had their weapons sheathed so he would have the advantage there if they looked towards Bjorn.
“Eh, maybe. But I doubt it, Kairon is many things but he doesn’t usually lie about those things. Besides, why else would we have more people on guard for the last few days than we normally would? “
“That’s easy. Vivian said they ran into goblins, which makes sense why we doubled our guard. If they attack they will attack either in the night or right before dawn. The double guard duty is to make sure that they don’t actually get the drop on us.”
Bjorn could see the heads and torches of the men above him. So if he was to attack he would have to be precise, hopefully it meant that they would have a hard time seeing him if they looked his way. He didn’t have to wait long as one of the two men looked in his direction holding out his torch.
There were several long seconds as he waited for some sort of recognition or realization that he was here. He was ready to spring into action. However it never came, as the pair kept talking and turned together and began walking away.
“I have a feeling that Vinny and Sonia were sent out to find out what happened to Luna and Ramsey. After all we haven’t heard anything about their scouting party lately, maybe something happened to them.”
Bjorn could hear the other man shudder. “What could have happened to Luna? That woman both arouses me and scares me at the same time.”
“I know, I would like to get a piece of that ass, I bet she is fun in bed.”
“Yeah right, if you want to have your cock bit off. I am fine looking and enjoying from a distance, thank you very much.”
“Hey speaking about scouting parties, wasn’t one supposed to come back sometime in the next few days?”
“Yeah that’s what I heard. Jarred sent one of his men ahead to let us know that he had a good haul this time.”
“Oh so thats what that guy who came in from the south west was yesterday.”
“Yeah, apparently we are going to send a party out tomorrow to help Jarred bring his his haul.”
A little bit of avarice entered the other man’s voice. “Knowing Jarred this haul will have some nice toys to play with. I didn’t get a turn last time before that sprite bit the dust. It was too bad, she had a nice body for her size.”
“Not for me, sprites look too close to children for my taste. I hope he brings an elf, its been forever since I got to fuck an elf. Not that there aren’t a few lookers here already. It’s too bad that Kairon said they were off limits. I would like to give that bitch tonya a tas-.”
They finally got out of earshot.
This was exactly the type of information he wanted. It wasn’t perfect but better than nothing. He briefly debated continuing the mission, it would be good to get more info on the town but it was a risk. Right now he had actionable intel, which could no longer be true if he got caught or found out. On top of that if he got caught and he still managed to get away they would without a doubt increase the amount of people they sent out to bring Jarred back. Which in turn made getting to the man harder.
On the other hand if he went out and dealt with Jarred there was a good chance that they would beef up their security once again and it would be harder for him to sneak in and cause damage from within. There was no good answer or a good path to go down. It was a problem of ifs.
In the end he went with his heart. Even though it probably wasn’t the smartest path to go down it was the path he wanted to go. Ever since he had to watch Meira get raped he knew that if he ever had a chance to get a Jarred he would sacrafice limb, or life to get at him. This was his chance and he had the best chance to catch that rat fucking bastard here and now.
He slowly made his way back away from the line and just as slowly and stealthily that he went in he made it back out. When he made it to the tree line he broke stealth and quickly made his way to where Adriana was supposed to be hiding.
“Bjorn, what are you doing back so soon? I didn’t hear an alarm get raised? Did you decide it wasn’t worth it?” Adriana’s voice called down from a tree overhead. She lithely dropped down to ground level and gave him a once over making sure that he was still fine.
“I am fine but I overhead a conversation between the two guards that protrolled near the riverbed. Jarred will be here, he is coming here with a new batch of slaves. This will be our best chance and easiest chance to get back at him. I say we take it.”
He could see that his words had an effect on Adriana. A smile broke out on her face. Out of everyone that Bjorn had to kill by the end of the year Jarred was the one who she wanted to get to the most. He was the one who set all of this in motion, if not for his greed and lust for Meira nothing over this last year would had happened. On top of that Jarred made a few passes at her when they both were in Leefside. It was time for her to get her pound of flesh. Of course she knew that Bjorn would get the rest of it.
“Come on fill me in.” Adriana said a bit of bloodlust creeping into her voice.
Bjorn filled her in and the pair moved to the tree line closer to the south west than they had been set up. It was awkward and hard to say as either they would leave by the palisade or they would leave from their little line. Being in the south west area would give them the best chance to be able to interact in time and tail the group.
The only real thing that they did to prep was for Bjorn to use his connection to Malachi to call him to his side. Other than that they decided to try and get as much sleep as they possibly could as tomorrow would be a long day. They already switched to nights, now they would have to switch back to days.
It took a few hours but eventually Malachi wandered over to their little hidey spot. As normal they could hear him coming before he ever showed up. From there they just settled in to wait. Bjorn tried to sleep first. After a few hours he woke up in a cold sweat as his mind replayed the nightmare that he has had to live through for the last year. After that he couldn’t sleep so Adriana took her turn.
Early in the morning right after suns rise he watched as a small party began to gather on the eastern edge of the camp. It wasn’t a massive party but maybe 5 or 6 people, it was hard to tell from the distance they were at. Once they were all gathered they hung around until a single figure began making their way across the village stopping just before the group. From the tall bow on their back it was probably Vivian. If she partook in this operation it would complicate things. At the same time Bjorn’s heart began to race at the thought of getting payback on her as well as Jarred.
Unfortunately she was just there to talk to them and then see them off. They talked for a few minutes before the party left their perimeter and immediately turned south moving along the gorge.
This was it. “Adriana get up.” Bjorn said as he shook her awake.
Here eyes shot open and after a second her breathing calmed down. “Is it time?”
“Yes.” He said simply. It didn’t have to be complicated, she understood everything she needed with that single word. She nodded, stood, and her grip tightened on her bow.
The party passed to the west of them. They watched as the party went. As they grew closer it was easy to see that there were 5 people. 3 humans, a hobgoblin, and surprisingly another drow. Vivian was the only drow he had ever seen on the surface, but apparently she wasn’t unique. They were armored lightly with leather armor, or none at all. They all carried at least a knife, and on top of that a few weapons ranging from swords to maces. There was a single person who was carrying a short spear. They were moving faster than a walk but not really moving with any speed.
Adriana and Bjorn exchanged before they dropped out of their perch up in the trees and began following after the group. It was easy. They weren’t very experienced woodsmen, so it was pretty obvious where they passed through. Adriana and Bjorn followed a semi decent distance back just to make sure they didn’t accidentally stumble upon them. On top of that Malachi was actually able to keep up pace with them as they went so they didn’t want to chance Malachi tipping them off.
Surprisingly it only took a few hours of following the group before they could start to hear voices up ahead of them. They slowed down their pace and entered stealth. Bjorn made a war party, he ordered Malachi to stay put, and the two lethal fighters began creeping forward.
Within a minute they had sight on their prey. There were 8 of them in total, and 6 people tied up and tied together. Those who were tied up had their heads hung low. There were 5 women and 1 man. Each and every one of them sported some sort of bruise on their barely clothed bodies. Every single one of them held their eyes downcast and their eyes were hollow. Only one of the women so much as dared look around it was brief but it was there.
The intel that he overheard the night before had been true, there he was, the man who took everything from him. Jarred didn’t look like he changed much; the only thing was that his greasy black hair was cut short, but the still smug lecherous half smile was plastered on his face. The same self satisfied look he had on his face that he had when he was raping Meira. He hated him, no that wasn’t enough. There weren’t words to describe how much he wanted this man to die today. It would be so easy, just a flick of his wrist, a loosening of his arrow.
Adriana’s hand landed on Bjorn’s arm and he left his blood soaked rage. He hadn’t realized it but he had drawn an arrow and was currently aiming it at Jarred’s throat. Slowly he let his arm drift downwards and the tension on his bowstring relaxed.
“Is that how you want to end it?”
“No.”
“Then let's talk about what we are going to do.”
“Let’s back up, we know which way they are going and they are talking amongst themselves and aren’t going anywhere yet. I have a surprise for them.”
They backed up roughly 50 feet to where they were obscured by the forest and set to work. They didn’t know how much time they had before the group headed onwards. They would have backed up more so they had more time but they weren’t entirely sure that the group would head into their direction. Bjorn had a plan for that but now was not the time.
He pulled a dart trap that had sat uselessly in his bag of holding ever since he had set up traps in Blackrock Bay. He got a wicked grin before the pair began setting up the dart trap around neck level. They set a tripwire that wasn’t overly obvious. If anyone with any sense of awareness really looked they could easily find it, but as a group making their way through the forest it was hidden well enough.
That was all of the time that they had before they could hear the voices through the trees talking and start heading their way. Bjorn and Adriana quickly hid, each drawing an arrow and setting up in a hidey hole that gave them a clear view of the trap but was hard to spot if they weren’t looking for it.
The group began making their way in the exact direction that Bjorn knew that they were going to head. Without even blinking or batting an eye one of the human reinforcements walked directly into his dart trap.
There was a soft snick as the dart shot forth from the trap and buried itself into the soft flesh of the man’s throat. The dart was tipped in a fast acting poison that quickly ate away at the man’s health. He would have had a chance if not for the strength of the poison, and for Bjorn’s toxicologist specialization. The man was dead before he hit the ground.
In the same moment that the man triggered the trap Bjorn and Adirana loosed their bows and their arrows crossed the distance in less than a second. Bjorn’s arrow took a man in the mouth puncturing through and severing the spine. Effectively killing him in a single shot. Adriana’s caught the drow in the chest just nearly missing his heart but puncturing the lung.
In less than a second 3 of the 8 fighters were either mortally wounded or dead. Bjorn drew another arrow and sighted on another target. His arm was drawn to Jarred and he had to force himself to aim somewhere else. Not yet. He aimed and fired a second arrow, this one caught a man in his midsection, taking him down. Their light armor doing nothing to stop the powerful bow combined with his archery skill.
He could see that the 4 were getting spooked, it wouldn’t do for them to get away so Bjorn decided to go the unorthodox route and break cover, storing his bow as he did so. Adriana would soon have another arrow flying crossing the distance but it was time for him to initiate a melee. At the same time that he did so he ordered Malachi to join, not that he needed the golem as this should be easy. He was more powerful than he had ever been before.
The 4 remaining bandits who were on their feet couldn’t decide where they wanted to look. Towards the 6 foot 5 giant of a man who looked half wood or towards the crashing sound coming from the woods almost directly opposite from the man. It didn’t take them long to decide who they were going to prepare themselves to defend against.
Bjorn had set himself up around 50 or so feet away from the dart trap so he didn’t have much ground to cover. In the same motion that he had stored his bow he retrieved his glass sword from his bag of holding. No time like the present to field test the weapon. As he closed the distance an arrow came streaking out of the woods from Adriana’s direction and it slammed into the man that Bjorn gut shot, it wasn’t a killing blow but made sure that he wasn’t going to rejoin the battle anytime soon.
Bjorn had satisfaction in the ruthlessness of Adriana. She had just shot a wounded man while he was down. She had abandoned part of her morality for pragmatism; he and her had several arguments over whether or not she should finish off a downed opponent that wasn’t likely a threat. She had held herself on the moral high ground saying she would not ever. It was good to see her change.
Two of the four remaining people moved forward to intercept Bjorn while the other man started to head in Adriana’s direction. Finally Jarred started to move backwards towards the slaves who stood there in stunned silence either not processing what was happening or waiting to see how this would end.
Bjorn had come a long way in terms of skill, confidence, and raw power, since the last time he fought multiple enemies at once. Instead of waiting for them to come attack him he immediately went on the offensive. He went after the short spear user first as they would be the biggest threat. They had more range with their weapon over Bjorn’s glass sword.
He stepped forward and swung his sword with two hands at the haft of the spear. He struck the wood with enough power to knock it aside. The man had to take a step backwards to avoid losing his grip on the weapon entirely. His partner tried to move in to meet Bjorn’s blade and give his friend some breathing room to get his weapon back under control but realized his mistake almost too late.
He expected the momentum of Bjorn’s blade to be reduced by the blow he had landed against his allies' weapon. However he didn’t know how strong Bjorn was. Bjorn’s blade continued its trajectory and closed the distance between the sword wielder and Bjorn’s blade. It cut through the air forcing him to take a step backwards otherwise he would have lost his arm. As it was Bjorn’s blade cut through his upper arm leaving a gnarly gash on his arm.
Bjorn’s opening attack wasn’t finished as he had been channeling the only spell he had under his control that allowed him to cast without having to channel the mana through his hand. As he channeled he pushed his advantage he had against the spear wielder completely ignoring the swordsman.
A crashing sound briefly interrupted Bjorn’s attention. Malachi had entered the fray. The small stone golem had barreled into the legs of the man who went after Adriana and knocked him to the ground. He hadn’t seen the stone golem coming in as it was coming at a side angle from where the man was looking. There was a crunching sound as the man’s knee gave away the the inertia of several hundred pounds of stone slamming into the almost stationary knee.
He pulled the part of his focus that had slipped back to the matter at hand. He found as his intelligence attribute increased it was easier to focus on more than one task at a time. He pressed his advantage by lunging at the man in front of him stabbing him through the belly. The spear wielder cried out and dropped his spear, putting both hands on the blade in his gut, trying to stop it from cutting deeper into his body.
This was the sword wielders chance. Bjorn’s blade was immobilized and his back was turned so he gritted his teeth and moved forward to kill Bjorn. However even though Bjorn’s back was turned his experience wouldn’t let him ignore the threat. He knew about the man. He finished chanting his sonic shatter spell as he was turning back towards the sword wielder.
Invisible rings of sonic force escaped his mouth and entered the blade. It started to shake in the man’s grip as he tried to bring it back under control. His overhead strike was stopped by the vibrations in the blade. In an effort to bring the blade back under his control he brought the sword back towards his torso so he could better control the blade. This was a mistake because by second 3 of the channel the metal blade shattered.
No one knew of this but during the forging process the blade hadn’t been properly annealed so there was considerable internal stress within the metal. That was the place where it gave out. That stress was compounded by the sonic shatter. When the sword gave way the internal stress forced the blade to blow apart sending chunks of metal flying out from the blade. The majority of these shards flew into the body of the man who wielded the blade. A shard of the blade lodged itself in the man’s brain; he was dead before his body hit the ground.
Bjorn turned back to the matter at hand and he used his strength to send the blade further into the man’s body. He struggled to stop it but it was like a child fighting back against a parent. He twisted the hilt which forced the wound in the man’s stomach to compound, widening the hole. His strength rapidly fled his arms and Bjorn yanked the blade free, leaving the man to bleed out.
Now it was time to deal with the real reason they were there. During this entire exchange Jarred had moved behind one of the slaves, one of the women. He had pulled a dagger from his belt and had it pressed firmly against her neck.
“Stay back or I'll kill her.” He shouted in an attempt to stop Bjorn. The fear in his eye coupled with the look of shock in his eyes told Bjorn he hadn’t recognized him yet.
It was the wrong play for Jarred to make. “Go ahead and kill her, I am not here to free them, I am here for you.”
When Bjorn’s voice filled the forest a look of abject horror filled Jarred’s face. He knew that voice, he knew who it belonged to. But it should be impossible, there was no way that Bjorn the farmer could find him so far away. There is no way that a simple farmer would be able to do what he just witnessed the man do. However there was no mistaking the voice.
“Oh god.” He said almost under his breath.
For the first time since the Spriggan invaded Bjorn’s body it decided to act on his own. It was weird as he lost complete control over a section of his own body. The arm which had been held ready for action at his side began to move upwards and outwards towards Jarred of its own free will.
“Stop, I'll kill her!” He shouted fear and panic filled his voice. But it didn’t matter, Bjorn wasn’t in control.
Blood red energy began to coagulate on the outstretched palm of the spriggan. The red energy that normally ran through the wood seemed to bleed and run down collecting on the outstretched palm. The hand quickly began to overflow with blood attuned mana as the spriggan drained Bjorn’s mana. He didn’t care, he didn’t try to stop the creature, he let this leech pull from his mana pool.
Jarred obviously had had enough of whatever Bjorn was doing and decided to make good on his threat. He yanked the knife across the woman’s throat. Blood began to flow down her throat and soak her chest as the wound began to pour. She became a deadweight in front of Jarred and instead of trying to keep her upright and use as a human shield he let the woman drop to the ground.
The blood that had been accumulating on the palm of Bjorn’s hand reshaped itself into a shard of blood and it rocketed forward slamming into Jarred's body sending him flying back. Bjorn had no idea what spell the spriggan had just cast but the shard had slammed into his right shoulder, a painful wound but not enough to really kill the man.
Once the spell was finished the hand was once again under his control and he ran forward to stop Jarred from getting away.
