The Brothers in Arms filed through the inn’s door first and I then followed them. The patrons of the inn dismissed the Brothers in Arms at a glance, they were just normal adventurers something you see every day. I caught their attention however. I was just glad the inn had high ceilings as I stood in the doorway observing the inn’s patrons.
A counter ran along the back wall behind which was a stout male elf, probably the innkeeper, who had paused in his cleaning of a mug. There were several humans and elves sitting at the counter eating and drinking. A fire crackled in a fireplace against the left wall and against the right wall were several long tables. The rest of the floor space was taken up by circular tables. Some of the tables were empty but most were taken by people. What looked to be the caravan members had taken over the long tables and the round tables were taken up by adventurers.
In the silence of my arrival the innkeeper called out, “Galstaff, you said you’d be back in a few days from your quest in the ruins but what exactly did you find there?”
“This is Miles. He’s a human we found in the ruins after running from a Purple Worm,” replied Galstaff. Turning to the rest of the assembled crowd he announced, “On a side note, any of you heading to the ruins to do some hunting be forewarned that it is now much more dangerous than you remember. The earthquakes have caused some upheavals in the earth and more dangerous monsters are now found closer to the surface.” Focusing back on the innkeeper Galstaff asked, “Now what is on the menu for dinner, it smells good.”
“My wife’s got some vegetable stew prepared or roasted hare with curd cheese. If that doesn't strike your fancy there’s also some roasted mutton and millet biscuits leftover from lunch. You’ve got your choice of cider, mead, or ale,” explained the innkeeper, whose name I later found out was Ethon.
After ordering a mix of the roasted hare with curd cheese and the roasted mutton and millet biscuits we went to find a table. We chose one of the round ones and seated ourselves around it. After picking the sturdiest chair I could, I gingerly sat down. The chair creaked but didn’t break.
Conversation during dinner was minimal. Garret and Galstaff were discussing the next leg of our trip and calculating what time we would need to leave in the morning and what pace we would need to set if we wanted to make it to the next inn.
Thinking back to the various games I had played and books I read I wondered if there wasn’t another travel solution. Looking to Garret I asked, “If the caravan is headed south do you think it would be possible to join them with your group as guards and me as a passenger or would that add too much time?”
Garret and Galstaff paused their conversation and looked thoughtful.
“It’s possible. It would be safer and faster than you running.” mused Galstaff. “I’ll go ask.”
Galstaff headed to the nearest table where members of the caravan were seated and started talking to them. Nods and smiles were soon seen and then a handshake was shared.
Heading back Galstaff confirmed, “They would like the extra protection a few extra adventurers would offer. Since we are headed in the same direction I offered our services but since we need to use one of their wagons to carry Miles and it is only for the next few days I let them bargain our cost down to about 5 silvers for each of us.”
“Is that cheap,” I asked quizzically. “I know that it takes 100 coppers (CP) to 1 silver (SP) and 100 silver to 1 gold (GP), but how much can that buy?”
Grognak grunted, “Considering your meal was about 10 CP you can go a fair ways with just a few silvers. Add to the fact that it is a short escort and that we are using a wagon it’s a good deal.”
After dinner everyone started to turn in for the night. I wasn’t feeling tired so I waved them off and sat in front of the fire thinking about where I now found myself.
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Morning dawned cold and damp with dew covering the field around the inn. Breakfast was again a simple affair, some oatmeal with fruit and then we were on our way.
I want to say that traveling in a caravan was an exciting activity with new things to see and monsters to fight around every bend. It wasn’t. The whole trip was dreadfully boring. Glossing over a few details (OK so QUITE a few) we made it to Porthaethwy in 3 days. We left the caravan and headed directly to the docks to find a ship headed across the bay. Finding a ship was easy, there was a boat crossing the bay almost every 3 hours.
Crossing the bay was no big hassle but once across I found out that there was almost a week of travel time from Porthaethwy South to Safeld.
Checking in at the local Adventurer’s Guild Galstaff found a merchant headed to Safled in need of an escort.
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The merchant’s name was Wilnan Wolfswift. He was a man of a medium, solid build with squinty hazel-green eyes staring out at the world over a broken nose and known for getting his merchandise quickly and safely to its next destination, he was our best bet to get to Safeld quickly and with a minimum of problems.
We were about halfway to Safeld when we ran into bandits.
Grognak was riding point and had just gone around a bend in the track when he suddenly reappeared riding quickly back to the group. In answer to our questioning looks he said, “Tree across the track, bandits.”
The other members of Brothers in Arms sighed and got down off their horses and started to walk towards the probable ambush.
Looking at them I asked, “What should I do?”
Looking back Elas replied, “You might as well come along and get some experience fighting. Bandits are generally not that well trained and rely on numbers and ambushes to attack caravans. Since they’ve lost the element of surprise we should be OK.”
As I got off the cart to follow them I wondered how my first combat experience would be. Back on Earth I had taken some martial arts classes so I knew how to punch, kick, and throw; but I wasn’t sure how much help that would be in the upcoming fight. The only weapons I had were my chainsword and bolter. I also had grenades, but like the bolter I wasn’t sure if I would be able to find more ammunition for them.
As we rounded the bend in the road Galstaff called out to the surrounding woods, “You might as well come out and face us, we know you’re out there. The tree was a dead giveaway.”
A ragtag group of 12 people walked out of the forest around us. They looked poor, wearing simple leather jerkins and threadbare pants. The only bit of the motley crew that looked well taken care of were their weapons shinning in the sun.
“You know the laws concerning banditry,” Galstaff said. “You have two options here; surrender and let the courts decide your fate or die here and now.”
The one bandit with slightly better apparel sneered at us. “We got you outnumbered two to one, we’ll take our chances.”
“Don’t say I didn’t try to end this peacefully,” sighed Galstaff dejectedly.
In an instant Elas had drawn and shot his bow at the bandits closest to him. One went down without a sound with an arrow to the throat, while another slowly collapsed with an arrow in his chest weakly clutching at the shaft in a feeble effort to remove the object of his demise.
Garret had pulled out a small hand crossbow and was harrying the bandits near him. The bandits were supporting a collection of bolts in their arms and legs, nothing fatal yet but enough to cause some serious pain.
Grognak ran with an earth shattering roar toward the bandit who had spoken who looked shocked at the sudden reduction in his fighting force. As Grognak neared him, his sudden impending doom brought light to his dazed eyes. The bandit interposed his sword between himself and the charging Grognak. As their weapons meet in a clash of steel the bandit was driven back.
Galstaff and Janek had retreated to the center of our little formation. With me in the back and Garret and Grognak dealing the most damage most of the bandits ignored them, which was a mistake as both started to cast spells. Galstaff shouted an incantation and three rays of fire hurtled from his outstretched hands to strike three bandits who promptly had their pants set on fire. Janek also shouted an incantation and with a gesture a light streak left his hands a streaked toward a bandit. The bandit flinched as the light hit him and as the light faded a dim glow still surrounded the bandit.
While this was happening two bandits charged at me with loud shouts. I had had little experience with swords but knew that the bit on the end was pointy and I definitely didn’t want to test my armor’s durability.
I grabbed the sword hanging at my waist and drew it. As my hand tightened on the hilt it ground into life. The bandits charging me paused a moment at the sight of a sword in motion. Their delay gave me enough time to swing the sword at the leftmost one in a left to right slash.
The bandit attempted to interpose his sword between himself and a now howling chaos of a chainsword to protect himself. I say attempted because as my chainsword meet the bandit’s sword the weapon’s tone changed from an angry buzzing to a high pitched scream as sparks flew as the chainsword paused to chew through his sword and then continue its deadly arc.
The bandit screamed as the chainsword started to chew through him. I had caught him about mid-chest, and as the blood sprayed from the chainsword and the wound covering anything and everything in the vicinity. As the chainsword continued to carve through his torso the bandit’s screams slowly burbled out as his lungs filled with blood.
At the end of the swing I still had two bandits in front of me, but now one had had his torso separated from his legs and the other did not look too keen on attacking me.
With my chainsword dripping blood I lunged at the second bandit. My lunge brought my chainsword into contact with his chest. The leather jerkin was never meant to stop something like this, I’m not sure if there is anything in this world that can. The force behind my lunge punched the weapon clean through him. The bandit’s eyes were wide open in shock and as I watched they slowly glazed over in death.
Grabbing the now dead bandit by the throat with my left hand I pulled him and the chainsword apart. In another explosion of blood my chainsword was now free and I had a projectile weapon. Looking around I threw the corpse at the nearest group of bandits.
The entire display had taken under 5 seconds. Now facing us out of the original 12 bandits, 4 were dead, 3 were on fire, 1 was slightly glowing, and the leader was engaged in heavy combat with Grognak.
The small break in combat allowed me to read the blue box that floated in the corner of my vision.
Kill(s)
Bandit (*2)
Experience
Deferred
“Experience deferred? Now, what the hell does that mean?" I wondered as I turned to face the remaining bandits.