They quarreled in front of the treeline for an hour or so.

It was not because of the morality of the mission, though Jophiel insisted that it would be nothing immoral, for all that the word from an angel like her was worth.

Agravain insisted on bringing Soraya along into the battle.

For the little princess's part, she hemmed and hawed on whether she wanted to come along or not. In the end, an appetite for excitement after long years of being confined in the palace won over, and she was gravitating towards approval.

“It’s not just thoughtless,” Rania put calmly, “only an imbecile would suggest such a thing.”

“It’s fine, isn’t it?” the barbarian said, “if she wants to come along then it’s fine. I won’t allow anyone to come near her. And even if any does slip through, you can deal with them, eh? Though if you’re not confident you would be able to do that much, then I understand your concern.”

In the end, it was the cheap taunt that worked on the maid.

With a click of her tongue, she asked if her lady was really fine with getting herself into needless danger.

“I want to go after all!” After a mere half second spent to weigh the risk, Soraya decided. “Agravain’s right. With him and you with me, there’s really no need to worry, isn’t there?”

There were probably plenty, even the barbarian was not dumb enough to not know this, but all the same, he shrugged the worries away. How he had not realized this before, he could not tell--but really, the fastest way to deal with all possible flaws in a plan is to stop thinking about them.

So long as the problem at hand is something you could punch off the surface of the world.

“Iranon, you stay here and watch our things, you hear?” he told the bard, “If one thing goes missing, let alone yourself and the wagon, you know what’s going to happen, right?”

“I’m not the sort of brute you are. You are looking at a thoroughly civilized guy, see?” he complained, “We have an agreement to stick together till the next town, there’s no reason for me to leave now.”

“Who knows, you could be dumb and care not for the shape of your skull. At any rate, don’t take a step from this spot, even if you have to wait till tomorrow.”

So they entered the forest.

The dense overgrowth proved a struggle for Soraya’s wheelchair. But even for a brute, Agravain dared not carry her and the chair overhead, lest she proved a prime target for what enemy lurking in the forest.

Jophiel had made it clear: whatever they were assaulting would put up a fight and some.

Instead, the angel stayed back to push the chair, while the barbarian and the handmaid went before, watching for any sign of danger.

The greatest danger of all, they almost stumbled upon before they knew it. The treeline ended abruptly, just after a dense formation, so dense it seemed to be put there deliberately. As soon as Agravain tossed aside several fallen trees stacked skewed on top of each other, they were exposed to the settlement Jophiel had hinted at.

Around the great clearing they emerged into, there were many such great fallen trees, apparently haphazardly thrown together to form a crude barricade. Such clumsy and inefficient work had caused them to think of the fallen tree as a natural occurrence.

Before them a small village lay in utter silence like a haunted place. Walking between the small huts, they found no sign of civilization or humans. Many of the huts bore signs of long years in disuse, thatched roofs with holes unmended. No smoke nor fire could be glimpsed anywhere in this settlement.

“Some challenge, this,” the barbarian snorted. “Who are we fighting? Wild beasts, or worse, boredom?”

“You are the type to die first in horror flicks, you know?” Jophiel said. The angel was perusing her codex again. Since her hands were occupied with Soraya’s wheelchair, she let it float before her instead. The angel’s commitment to realism was eroding by the minute.

“Not that I don’t trust you, but I don’t want to go around hunting for foe. Much more convenient if they come for me.”

The barbarian then tested a few swings of the battle axe. He had taken it from the wagon when told by the angel to pick one. There was no point fighting unarmed anymore, according to the angel, now that he had reached the level with the needed bonus.

Rania, on the other hand, stubbornly went unarmed.

Though now that he thought about it, it was probably not so much that she wanted to boast her unarmed combat abilities, and more that she wasn’t all that confident in her handling of a knife. To say that she couldn’t match the skills of her fellow maid, who had the trait Trained Assasin, was probably putting it lightly.

Not that the barbarian himself had any worth being proud about in his own skills, be it fighting with a weapon or unarmed.

Suddenly he made a wide arc with the axe, severing the trim of a thatched hut. The blade was sharp, cutting through the straw cleanly. A crude weapon, single-bladed with an unbalanced shafted--there weren’t many two-handed axes as such in the cutthroats’ storehouse to be picky, it was apparently an unpopular weapon.

“This thing suits me,” even so, he said, “simple, effective.”

And that was all he needed. Expertise be damned. Just about anything would drop if you hit it hard enough.

“Sometimes I envy your freedom from complicated thoughts, you know,” the angel sighed. “Only sometimes. Now listen.” She tapped on the codex, and out of nowhere, the familiar female voice rang in Agravain's ears.

Player Character #5, Agravain

Class: Barbarian

Focus Attributes: Strength, Endurance

Traits: Novice Fighter, Dump Stat Intelligence, Pugilist

Feats: Boss Brutalizer

Modifiers:

Skills: Rage

Rage bar: 67%%

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

Attributes:

Str 48 (+4)| En 28 | Dex 14 | Int 0 (-∞) | Wis 8 | Cha 11 | Luck 15

“So there’s your current status,” the angel said. “The little number in brackets is the bonus from your weapon, by the way. I will configure it so that you can call up your own information with a password later. But for now you can see your fighting ability is far worse than our cute maid. You’re a Novice Fighter, while the girl is a Journeyman. So don’t get uppity now, even if you did beat her handily with sheer strength. We still have a lot to do to get you up to speed.”

“So cut a few heads with this axe? Got it.”

“You didn’t get anything at all! Just shut up and listen! Unlike the Unarmed Weapon Skill which doesn’t work at all in the build I’m planning, you can work on your skill with the axe while doing general training. But today we aren’t just trying to improve your weapon skill. Pay attention, this is what you need to do today.”

Once again the impersonal, dispassionate voice echoed in his head.

Custom Daily Training registered and accepted:

-Defeat 12 pigmen without using more than 5% of your Rage Bar

“Question,” the barbarian said.

“Yes?”

“What’s a pigman?”

“They are like pigs, but also man, you know--”

Soraya’s scream cut her off.

At once on full alert, the barbarian whipped around.

There in front of the hut they had just passed, that very one whose roof he had trimmed with his axe, a creature was standing dumbly, looking slightly dazed in the sunlight.

Pigman was a term far from literal to describe it. For the thing was certainly more pig than human despite its ability to stand upright: a large, flabby face with an ugly trout and big ears, a roundish body entirely naked, and hands that were more trotters than human digits, save for a crude thumb which allowed the creature to hold the shaft a of a stone-headed axe.

As it had come out very near Jophiel and Soraya, there was a moment when the barbarian thought it was too late to prevent an attack. But Rania was already moving. The speed and reaction of a bodyguard. She closed in on the creature in a heartbeat, hurling herself in a tackle even as the stone axe raised. The thing’s body was far too fat to maintain balance, its mental state as much caught in confusion as themselves, and so stumbled easily.

Still, the foul beast was strong, fat limbs belying the inhuman strength. Very soon it recovered its footing. Even having inserted herself between the beast and Soraya, the maid could do little to block its retaliation. The pig thrust out its burly arms, sending her staggering like a fragile blade of grass in the wind.

A wide opening.

“You’re mine!” roared the barbarian, his battle axe already swinging before the creature could pick between Soraya and Rania to attack.

The crude blade sank deep into the pig’s skull, cleaving its brain in half. With a snorting whimper, the creature collapsed.

“One!” he said.

And there would be many more.

The noises just now had drawn the rest of the pigs out of hiding. But the more he looked at their sluggish and clumsy movements, the primitive tools they employed for weapons, the less he believed these were the original residence of this village, for these trotters could not have built the huts in which they dwelt.

What had happened to the villagers, one could easily guess.

Not that he cared. There were pig heads to be felled.

Their number quickly swelled to the dozens, enraged by the slaying of their kind.

With a loud snarl, the barbarian threatened them back. Even those dumb creatures would scruple before a greater and fiercer beast. Yet it would only be a matter of time before their advantage in number rendered the pigs the confidence to mount an attack.

Meanwhile Rania covered the princess’s retreat.

The pale, dirty and flabby flesh of the pigs seemed to melt together, the loud shouts and squeals they made were like the disgusting sounds of one’s bowel movement. The barbarian could not put a number on the mass of flesh anymore, only he knew there were too many for him to completely block their paths to Soraya. He had used the fact to taunt Rania before, but clearly the handmaid could not cope with just one of those creatures, let alone a horde or even several of them.

The angel had either failed to calculate the risk or did not care at all for Soraya’s safety.

Though to be fair, it was on him for wanting to bring the young princess along.

Amidst the noises and jumbled thoughts the barbarian was trying to block from his brain, a shrill voice pierced through.

“You oaf!” Jophiel cried, “Get angry! 4 percent should be plenty for this lot. Activate your Rage bar!”

“Not now!” shouted he, “I fear not the swine, but I have to stop them from getting to Soraya.”

Foolishly thinking it could sneak in an attack while he was distracted, one of the nearest pigs lunged at Agravain with its stone axe. The might behind which could easily fall a tree, let alone crush human bones. And yet the barbarian seized the crude weapon with one hand, stopping the movement as easily as catching a feather midair. In the same breath he yanked it from the clumsy trotter, the next he carved the pig’s skull in with its own weapon.

Yet instead of wavering, the rest of the pigs saw this as the signal for a charge. Stone axes and spears were raised at once, and on they came in raving battle rage.

The barbarian’s well-being was the least of his concerns right now, for these things could prove a threat to his person, yet no amount of self-regeneration or improved strength could help him get to every single one of them in an instant.

“That’s why--just do it! Didn’t I tell you how your rage bar works, idiot!”

She hadn’t.

Definitely hadn’t.

“Fine!” The barbarian roared.

His hand caught the nearest skull, in an instant pulverized it with a terrible grip.

His wrath burst like a dam broken by all the infernal forces of hell.

A battle cry with nothing human in its timbre escaped his trembling throat, signaling the commencement of an onslaught.

In a wide arc he swung the bloody battle axe, revealing entrails and other disgusting contents in the pigs’ foul bowels to the light of day. With each of his terrible strokes, several pigs at once met their demise, and their beastly squeals soon took on the tinge of driven panic and madness.

Yet even this could not check the horde’s advance. On they came and spilled over. Already the barbarian had noticed several making away beyond his weapon’s reach, circling for the easier targets: the princess and the maid.

Thoughts of what harm the filthy creatures could cause them, and not least his own powerlessness to prevent it, incited Agravain further.

More devastatingly his axe fell upon his foes as he tried to cut a path out of their encirclement. Even then, one of the pigs made a reckless charge, disregarding its own safety while hurling itself into a headlong tackle. As the barbarian had just finished a wide swing, the tackle caught him off guard and reeling back.

The foolhardy pig’s tusk slashed at his skin and its teeth gnawed on his flesh.

Snarling, Agravain dropped his axe, dug his hands into the pig’s flanks and lifted it skyward.

His arm and chest muscles bulged, and with a skin-crawling sound, he tore the pig in half.

As putrid guts and blood rained upon him, the barbarian loosed an ominous roar like dark oaths from an ancient god across the village, shaking every bone and heart still beating in that forsaken place.

The sight, the sounds, and the ever-mounting fear caused a devastating effect on the disorganized ranks of the pigs. The ones next to him were driven mad, while the peripheral ones froze in their path to the girls. Compelled both by primal fear and instinct, the creatures wheeled all at once from their previous directions, either charging for the veritable demon who had ascended in their midst, or fleeing as they had never fled before.

The rest was a massacre.

If Agravain had thought their flesh seemed to melt together before, when he was done, there was no way to tell where one ended and the other began. Flesh and limbs piled upon each other, entrails mixed, and headless bodies spasmed in a sea of blood.

Turning from the nauseating battlefield, the barbarian scanned for the ones who had fled.

But before he could take a step, the angel shouted for him to stop. “That’s enough!” She circled the mess, pushing Soraya along. The little princess was looking away from the black-red aftermath, paling and covering her nose from the stench rank to high heaven. Rania followed with her face set, eyes still glancing from side to side for any sudden danger.

“What?” he grunted, “Is the five percent spent already?”

“Nah, I’m glad you can still think about that though. But the job is done, overdone even. Have you noticed where the remaining ones are fleeing?”

“Deeper into the village,” he observed.

Here and there the pigs were limping far ahead. There was a large hut in the center of the village, which seemed to be their ultimate destination.

“The swine rally for a stand,” Agravain grunted with disgust, “yet desperation shall not avail them.”

“They are not half that intelligent,” Jophiel pointed out, “no, they flock for protection. If I must guess, there’s a big one in there, their chief probably.”

“So a boss?” Agravain picked up his discarded battle axe, by then had been dyed in foul pig blood. “All the more reason to go all out.”

“No,” the angel insisted, “your part is done. The boss is for her to deal with.” She nodded in Rania’s direction.

“Her?”

The girl had been clearly shaken, either by the terrible battle whose aftermath still assaulted all of their nostrils, or her almost failure to protect Soraya. Her face, though composed as ever, had taken on the faintest hint of doubt and uncertainty.

The barbarian had a bad feeling about what to follow.