Chapter 21
Enemy Territory
(Max P.O.V)
“Damn it!” Anna loudly shouted while burying her head in her hands
“What’s wrong sis?”
“Nothing, I just got kicked in the face by regret.”
Understandable, this mission is incredibly dangerous. Even I’m scared just thinking about all the things that could go wrong the moment we leave the city.
“You guys can back out if you want, I won’t hold it against you.”
“It’s not the mission, it’s….nothing.” Anna proceeded to walk ahead of me and Aaron.
“Is she ok?” I ask Aaron.
“I don’t know, she been acting weird since last night.”
“What are you guys waiting for? Come on already!” I’m glad to see she’s eager to do this mission. Having someone who can easily mow through ghouls on my team really boost my confidences.
Aaron and I quickly rush over to Anna, who was impatiently waiting by the gate.
“So where are we going?”
“We’re going straight into the forest. Hopefully the dead body will still be there.”
“Well let’s not waste any time. Let’s hurry up and find it before something eats it.”
“Wait!” I shouted, stopping both Anna and Aaron from walking into the forest. “Are you sure you guys are ready?”
I quickly look away the moment Anna turn to face me. I don’t know why, but it’s hard for me to look directly in her eyes.
“Yes I’m ready to get this mission over with. Now stop wasting time and show us were the body is.”
“Alright.” I walk ahead of the two to show them the path to the body. As we were walking through the forest, I would nervously look back to see how they were doing.
I’m what you would call an adventurer nerd. When I’m not at the adventurer guild, I would be standing by the gate the leads to the forest, just so I can watch adventurers prepare for their job. Before adventurers leave town, they would always get their weapons ready and get in some kind of formation. But Aaron and Anna didn’t do any of those two things.
Not only were they unorganized, but neither of them had their weapons outs, Even though we’re walking around in enemy territory, and can be attack at any time, they’re causally walking around like we’re in a park or something. If I didn’t see what they did yesterday, I would’ve immediately assume these guys are amateurs.
I kept frantically checking my surroundings as we walk until we came across clearing in the forest. A weird sense of relief swept over me the moment I saw a dead body lying in the middle of the clearing.
“C’mon, let’s go check it out.”
“Stop.” Anna quickly grab my arm.
“What’s wrong?”
“….” Anna silently stare at the dead body in the middle of the clearing. “Nothing. Aaron stay here, we’ll go check this corpse out.”
“Ok.” Aaron nodded his head.
“Alright, let’s go examine this thing.”
“Right.” I follow Anna into the clearing. I let out a sigh of relief once we got closer to the body. “Thank goodness, nothing tore the corpse up while I was gone.”
“Yea, it’s a miracle nobody ate it…”
I crouch down next to the corpse so I could examine it. The body face was ghostly pale, and the blood on his forehead was completely dried up.
“See? This is the only wound the man has, someone kill him with a blunt object, and from the looks of it with a single blow.”
“Yea, you kind of told me that yesterday. Do you think you can find more evidence to figure out what that something is?”
“I’m on it now.” I slowly examine the body up and down, unfortunately except for his head injury, nothing else stood out about the man. His clothes were perfectly neat, which means the person who kill him didn’t even check our robbed this man belongings. So if they weren’t after money why did they killed him?
I looked over his body again, I started to learn more about the man, after continually examining his body. Like I know the man had to be middle age due to hair slowly greying, also his clench fist had a ring on it, which means he was married. Wait… I looked back at the man’s clench fist.
Why is his fist clench? Was he trying to fight his assailant? No, from the looks of his clothes and injury, I’m confident he was immediately killed the moment his assailant attack him. Which means he’s hiding something in his hand. I tried to pry his hand open, but they were tightly sealed.
“Freaking rigor mortis.” I muttered to myself. I kept struggling to open his hand until I felt something pop loose. I looked in my hand to see that I took one of his fingers.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.” I said hoping the dead man would forgive me for defiling his corpse. After saying my apology, I slip my finger through the opening his hand had. I immediately felt something soft and warm in the dead man’s hand. I pull that something out to see that it was a white fabric. I was immediately confuse since the fabric didn’t match the man. So those this cloth belong to the man assailant? As I was thinking my vision fell back on the man’s hand which had a ring on it.
“!” Of course, how could I be so stupid? There’s no way this man was traveling by himself. No one is crazy enough to navigate a forest by them self. So then, where is his partner?
Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.
“What did you find?” I turn to see Anna was crouching right next to me. Seeing her this close to me completely broke my concentration. “Well, are you going to show me?” Her eyes were focus on my clench hand.
“Oh, um, right.” I open my hand up to show her the white fabric. “This is just a wild guess but I’m pretty sure someone was with this man. It seems that person was snatch from him he tried to save that person, but the only thing the man could save was this piece of cloth.”
“Well I’m just going to assume that cloth came from a dress or a skirt. I’m also going to assume that orcs are behind this
“That’s a pretty huge assumption, what makes you say that?”
“Because there’s one right behind us.”
“Eh?” Suddenly, a huge shadow loomed above us. I felt my heart completely stop once I heard heavy breathing behind me. I turn around to see a green giant standing in front of me. Well since I was crouching he looked like a giant, but I’m pretty sure even if I stand up he’ll still be way taller than me. The orc raise his right arm that had a club in it.
That club… Anna was right, the orcs are behind this. Wait, why am I still analyzing this? I need to quickly protect myself! I quickly grab my shield and raise it upward, hoping it would stop his attack, but seeing how these orcs can killed humans in one blow, I doubt it. I close my eyes and waited for the orc to strike me. Strangely, the orc attack never came. Did he miss, or did he attack Anna instead? I was afraid to open my eyes to find out.
“The orc dead, you can open your eyes now.” Hearing her calmly talking to me gave me the courage to open my eyes. The first thing that pop into my vision was the orc that was going to attack me, seeing an arrow stuck in his head immediately told me that Aaron was the one that save my life.
“You should pay attention to your environment more, I bet you don’t even know that we’re surrounded.”
“Wait we’re surrounded? That means…”
“That’s right.” Anna said with a smile on her face. “We walk right into a trap.” Four more orcs came rushing out the forest charging right at us.
This doesn’t look good, each one of them is easily capable of killing a human with their bare-hands.
I quickly pick my sword from off the ground. I’m not really a fighter, in fact I’ll probably just get in Anna and Aaron way, but we have a higher chance of surviving if we work together.
“Stand down.” Anna raises her left hand to me. “These guys are mine.”
“Are you insane?!” Is probably what I should say in this situation, but seeing that confident smile on her face despite knowing what these guys are capable of, must mean she has some sort of plan, right?”
Anna stood perfectly still as the orcs continue to charge at us.
“Um Anna, aren’t you going to do anything?”
“I will in a moment.” Anna said calmly.
The closer the orcs got to us, the more I panic. Why isn’t Aaron doing anything? Does he really trust his sister this much?
Anna finally grabs her sword and begins to unsheathe it, but it was too late, one of the orcs stuck his hand out to grab Anna, there was no way she could pull her sword out in time to stop him.
Seeing their friend cut-down, the three orcs reach for their weapons. Anna quickly charge at the three unprepared orcs. Anna drops her body to the ground and cuts one of the orc’s legs off, before he could fall to the ground, she quickly stands back up and swings her sword at his head, decapitated him.
In a panic, the third orc swung his club at Anna. Anna calmly sidesteps his attack. The orc’s club slams into the ground, creating small cracks in the ground appear around his club. A cocky smile appear on the orc’s face as he raise his club from the ground.
How is Anna going to deal with them? Their attacks are too powerful to be block and if they manage to hit her… then it’s over.
Seemingly unfazed by the orc’s attack, Anna calmly walk over to him. The orc raise his club again and swings it at her. Anna raise her sword up to block his attack.
Strangely, the orc’s club bounce off Anna’s sword. As the orc watch his club fly out of his hand, Anna sinks her sword into the orc’s side. The orc drop to his knees in pain, without mercy, Anna takes her sword out his side and cuts his head off.
The last orc watch in horror as his entire team was cut down one by one. Somehow, Anna was able to create another surreal scene, the orc that was twice her size and probably ten times stronger than her was completely terrified of her.
Anna turn to face the cowering orc.
“Well then, looks like your next.”