Everyone in our squad was woken up early the following morning by Gorkas, after which we had a few minutes to make ourselves look decent and put on our armor and secure the weapons we would need for the commission. Breakfast was served especially early that day, with the camp helpers already being informed that a squad would be going out early on a commission. Although I wasn’t exactly eager to eat more than one portion at the time, Cameron encouraged me to eat up as much as possible as he wasn’t sure when we would next be able to eat.

I had a much easier time of it than my squadmates that morning, since I was able to equip and unequip the leather cuirass, pauldrons, greaves, and vambraces all by myself, they were not so lucky. Since there were just nine of us in the tent who weren’t armored yet, they each broke into pairs and helped one another out with making sure the armor was secure and wouldn’t come loose as they moved.

There was no uniformity in it either, with some armor pieces having similarities in purpose but just by the look of them I could tell they were not made uniformly. If not for the cloak that I still wore over my leather cuirass, then I would look extremely out of place among my armored squadmates.

After our morning meal was finished Gorkas appeared once more and made sure that we were all ready to head out. Near the exit of the camp one of the helpers handed each of us a waterskin which could be secured around our shoulders, which was a nice thing to have, although I was informed that I’d have to hand it back to the supply team when we returned. He led us into the city, where we were let in without much fuss after Gorkas showed the guards his identification, and told them we were from Backhand Blow. Next we went all the way through the city, although not directly through the center to the northern gate, where our ‘place of contact’ was, whatever that meant.

As we came out of the gate, the scene of many wagons laden with goods lined up in a line that stretched at least a hundred meters drew my attention. Unlike the southern gate near which the mercenary camp was, there seemed to be a lot more trade going on through the northern gate. This might have been because to the north of Verorum lay a multitude of other Targisan towns past which lay the Kingdom of Hessia, another large country.

Since the rays of sunlight were still absent from the sky, but over the horizon streaks of light could already be seen, Gorkas judged that it would be a while yet before our employers would show up so took us a few dozen paces away from the main road to an open piece of grassland. There were very few trees directly in the vicinity of the city, and after I asked about it on our way there Cameron responded that it was because trees could be used by enemies to make siege equipment, so most countries would decree that all trees within a certain distance of the city ought to be cut down.

Gorkas ordered us to sit down on the grass while we waited, which was an order I wasn’t entirely averse to. We had walked at a brisk pace from the mercenary camp, and someone like Edmund was already heaving, his endurance slightly worse than that of his elder brother.

While we were waiting, Cameron decided to strike up a conversation with Gorkas in a loud enough voice so that we could all hear its contents. Whether this was out of his own interest, or for our benefit I didn’t quite know, but I paid attention regardless. Cameron asked about some details of our commission to which we received the details of why Gorkas chose this one in particular. He said that this commission only paid for escort in one direction, that being the southern town of Agrow in the Kingdom of Hessia.

He said the caravan of goods we would be escorting would be coming from a medium-sized trade guild that he had worked with when he was still a normal mercenary, and that although the ‘cheapskates’ would only be paying us to escort them to Agrow, and then continue onto the heart of Hessia by themselves, it was still a better option than sitting still and not earning any money.

The caravan would be six wagons large, and there would be two guards that were employed by the guild, so our fighting strength would be twelve including us. This did not count any wagon-drivers, overseers, or the man in charge of the caravan either, so he thought that considering our size the force required to protect all six convoys was sufficient.

Oddly, Cameron did not ask how long it would take the caravan to reach Agrow so I decided to ask Gorkas myself hoping that while ‘on the job’ he would be a bit more talkative than he was otherwise. All I got in response was a loud “It’ll take as long as it takes, shut the hell up” from the squad leader, accompanied by some laughter from my squadmates.

After the conversation ended, there was no sign of a convoy of six wagons appearing out of the northern gates, so I decided to talk to Dorian at my side to pass the time. He said that although it usually took longer to travel while escorting a convoy, it would take about half that time for us to make it back to the mercenary camp while on foot by ourselves. I wanted to ask about the pace at which we would be moving as well but couldn’t quite find the right words since there was no precise measurement for speed known by everyone.

When about half of the sun was already visible from the horizon, the convoy we were going to be escorting made its appearance and Gorkas made us all stand up and head over to it while keeping our traps shut. He then approached the wagon in the lead within which a man with similar clothing to Bathory’s father sat, and conversed about something that we were unable to hear.

When they seemingly reached an agreement, Gorkas came back and designated which wagon we would be following on foot, with only the front two and the back two having escorts, while the two in the middle would be used by us to rest in shifts. Herman and I were assigned to the wagon that was second from the front, and he instructed us to walk parallel to where the driver of the wagon was, so that we would be able to talk to him should he need something from us.

We departed shortly after, and seeing that Herman wasn’t taking the opportunity to talk to the driver of the wagon we were escorting I didn’t initiate a conversation either. There wasn’t much to do in the first stretch of our journey, as I remembered that the area around Verorum was relatively safe, so I just focused on keeping my breathing steady, and just thought about other things.

There was a moment in which the wagon near the end had one of its wheels break so us mercenaries were called in to help lift it up while the axles were replaced. Another time a group of six goblins appeared off the right-hand side of the road, and seeking to impress our employer Gorkas charged them while screaming and scared them off without any combat.

By the time the sun had reached its zenith, the whole caravan veered off slightly from the road and stopped, where the horses were left free to allow them some time to rest and eat the grass in the wilderness and the oats that were packed for them beforehand. This was also an opportunity for us to rest as well, and Gorkas ordered that Cameron and Dorian would be the next to ride in the middle wagons while Opie and Edmund would take their place.

There wasn’t much of a culture for eating lunch in Euphelia for commoners, and it was expected that there would be only two meals a day, one in the morning and one in the evening. Thankfully Cameron made sure I ate two portions of the ‘gruel’, so I wasn’t suffering from hunger as much as I would’ve with only one. My legs and feet were already quite tired, but I knew that I would have to get used to this kind of ‘marching’ if I were to remain in the mercenary band.

While this was good exercise for my lower body, it really didn’t do much for the upper part, so I would have to train twice as hard when we returned from the commission to make sure my arms and such were just as strong. The break lasted for only half an hour, and soon enough we were back on the road, with the uneven terrain almost making me trip every now and then.

I had already begun paying attention to the road when I traveled with Des, but the parts that a horse could traverse didn’t exactly translate to what a human could. Traveling in a group also felt quite different from traveling alone, and it wasn’t just due to the subconscious ‘safety in numbers’ I was feeling. The noise of the wagons wasn’t very quiet, and I doubt they even oiled the metal parts of the wagon properly as it ‘squeaked’ every so often, distracting my train of thoughts sometimes.

As expected, the first day passed without much trouble and when it came time to make camp the wagons were arranged as a barrier while the people would sleep within it. Inside a few tents were set up mainly for the leader of the caravan, and the overseers. The wagon-drivers, the guild guards, and us would have to sleep out in the open, which wasn’t that terrible when the weather was calm, but would be a recipe for disaster otherwise.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

We were provided the same food that the rest in the caravan ate, and this was apparently the common way of doing things when someone hired protection for goods. It made sense, as you would want people who had enough strength to fight, as it would be in your interests to keep them energized as a merchant.

I had already expected such a thing, but the first night there would be a ‘night shift’ of sorts, where two of us would have to stay up the whole night, while patrolling the perimeter every now and then. While it sounded bad in theory, there was the upside of being allowed to ride in the wagons for the first part of tomorrow’s journey, where they could take a nap to catch up on sleep.

Since it was only a day’s travel at a speed where if I walked I could keep pace with the wagons, it was still relatively close and therefore, safe. The first night shift would be taken by Gorkas and Kurt, and they would be accompanied by one of the guild’s guards to watch the goods of the caravan.

The night passed uneventfully, which was a gift considering how tired I was by the end, with sleep overtaking me in record time the previous evening. My sore legs protested loudly with searing pain when I stood up in the morning, which made me appreciate how convenient Des was when traveling great distances. The campsite was quickly dismantled and the caravan began traveling shortly after breakfast was served.

The food at the caravan, while not great, was a step above what Backhand Blow provided which made sense as merchant guilds have more financial resources than mercenary bands, perhaps this was also an incentive for mercenaries to take up commissions for them.

The trip passed uneventfully for a whole four days, and by the fifth my actions moved like clockwork when it came to helping pack up the camp, and fall in line next to the wagon we were escorting. The other members of my squad too stopped being as talkative, either hoping that with fewer distractions the commission would end sooner, or too tired from walking to even spare the energy for discussion.

While I was sure that my legs felt sore, I couldn’t be certain as they were so numb from the days of walking. We must have covered at least 200 kilometers, and the surroundings were no longer open fields with visible planted fields, but now a forest that ranged from sparse treelines to dense ones blocked the view that previously stretched to the horizon.

At some point we had crossed the border into Hessia, but I wasn’t sure exactly when it had happened the previous day. This meant that the city of Agrow was not that far away, but we would still have to camp at least once to have enough rest for the following day. This being the border between two countries, made this part of the journey the most dangerous. Coincidentally, this would also be the night when Herman and I would be taking the night shift.

I didn’t see it as anything but an unfortunate coincidence, but Herman was shooting me some dirty looks during the evening meal as if I was the cause of him being stuck on the night watch. The merchant guard who would be staying up with us did not feel the need to introduce himself, but just explained what we had to do in the presence of Gorkas, who reiterated that if he saw any of us nod off or not notice danger during the night, that he would kick us out of the band on the spot.

We would spend the majority of the time sitting by the campfire that was right outside the circle of wagons, and every now and then one of us would be required to walk around the wagons and see if there was anything we could spot. Due to the fire, the first time I walked around I had to walk away and stare into the darkness to let my eyes adjust to the absence of light. The walk around was also dull, with nothing even visible past about 30 meters away due to the trees, and the only sounds I could hear were snoring coming from the campsite.

When I came back Herman asked if everything was alright, and I responded by saying I didn’t see anything unusual. Since he was also bored out of his mind and just trying to stay awake, he wasn’t against conversation with me, and we had a candid talk about our origins. He explained that he was from Netsam, an area without centralized power but one that was with a fierce warrior culture. I could see it in his eyes when he spoke that he was proud of being from there, but there was also a mixture of longing there for his homeland.

I too missed some aspects of Earth every now and then, and now when there was nothing to do but talk and stare into the fire, the face of my mother stared back at me. He also informed me of his suspicions that the reason I was on night watch was that Gorkas wanted me to slip up, which would give him an excuse to kick me out.

While I didn’t do anything in particular to make the squad leader dislike me, Herman theorized that just my presence and the lack of armor displeased him, thinking that I would bring down the overall combat power of the unit. Herman was in agreement with him, as a group of armored infantry wouldn’t benefit much from one with light armor. This made sense in theory, but I felt that with my own strength I could cover the aspects that slow infantry couldn’t, but this went against the established military knowledge.

Soon Herman went to patrol as well, and after he came back I made a promise that I would purchase some armor as soon as I earned enough money, which earned me a grunt of approval from him. Herman was someone who also spoke Aswang and we spent the next hour talking about things of no consequence for me to practice my pronunciation, and since the sentence structure was slightly different from Rahlian, my shift-partner was a great help to me there too.

When I went to make the following patrol, the background noise that was present the previous time was gone. There was a silence in the air, which made me feel slightly uncomfortable. There was a feeling that I was being watched too, which ignited my paranoia. This gut feeling convinced me to walk the circle as I usually would, but then double back slowly to see if I was just imagining the feeling of being watched.

My gut must have alerted me of something my conscious mind had missed, as in the part of the forest in the direction of where we arrived shined slightly, the moonlight illuminating something that was clearly made of metal. As soon as I saw it I decided to waste no time, and ran as fast as possible to the campfire to alert Herman. He did not believe me at first of what I saw, but I explained in no uncertain words that I saw something shiny in the forest, and that I suspected that it was armor or a weapon.

He decided to trust me, but instructed me to remain here near the campfire while he went and woke up the squad-leader. The agonizing minute I waited, with my sight fixed firmly in the direction where I saw the anomaly made me doubt what I saw as well, but according to my memory it was no figment of my imagination but clearly real.

Gorkas arrived shortly after, and I could clearly hear the noise of people waking up in the camp as well. He was at first quite upset with me, but after his mocking did not change my story in the slightest he decided to believe me, and made preparations to defend the camp. He woke everyone up, and while he was ordering the mercenaries to all leave the camp and leave the defense of the wagons to the guards, the first arrow landed near us hitting the tent in which my comrades were sleeping.

There was now no doubt about the veracity of my claims, and as such every armed man in the camp unsheathed their swords and began to move according to Gorkas’ orders. I rushed back out to the campfire where I could at least see what was happening, and was met with a few men who resembled the bandits I met previously running at the wagons quickly.

My squadmates lined up to meet them, with Cameron suggesting I stay back and watch for any that might try to go around them and hit the camp. Cameron’s words proved true as after thirty seconds of combat, two bandits with swords and shields bypassed the melee and attempted to make their way to the camp entrance.

I moved to intercept them, but my appearance must have deceived them into thinking I wasn’t even a mercenary in the first place, with only one of them stopping to deal with me while the other tried to keep running. While that notion offended me slightly, I decided to use their lack of caution with my sword, quickly dropping the shield in my left hand and unsheathing my short sword.

There was less than two seconds between me releasing my shield, and my sword becoming firmly lodged in the ribs of my opponent, who while trying to process the absurd action of me dropping my shield, lowered his shield. I used an intermediate form of Sylrift that focused on fast and powerful stabbing motions, at the expense of your own body being open to attacks, but since my strike worked there was no danger from the now-dying bandit.

I didn’t revel in my small victory, and as soon as I retracted my sword I turned to my right, where the other bandit had just passed me and was running at top speed towards the gap between the wagons that was used as an entrance. While the man I had just slain did not have much in terms of armor, the one who bypassed me did, but since he didn’t think I was in any position to threaten him he had shown me his back, something that suited me just fine.

I ran faster than he could, since I only wore boiled leather armor, and reached him with the help of some wind sorcery that I thought warranted use in a combat situation. Since the first attack worked fine, I repeated the action, this time aiming for the upper part of his torso, hoping to avoid his spine that would harm the ‘weight’ of my stab.

Things worked out just fine with this one too, and I had killed two men in no time at all while my comrades were still fighting the rest. The bandits that ambushed us did not seem at all prepared to fight armored mercenaries, and as such when ten of us came out of the wagon camp it came as a big surprise to those who were further back.

The combat lines didn’t move much at all, with my squadmates holding their own and not yielding an inch, and the casualties on the side of the bandits piling up over time. Since it was supposed to be a surprise attack, they must have thought they could get to us before we were ready to meet them head on, so seeing their plan fail they eventually all fled back in the direction where they came from.

Gorkas didn’t let us drop our guard, warning us to retreat to the entrance of the camp, and stay on the lookout for ranged attacks since they had at least one archer.

We stayed near the entrance of the camp, while Gorkas went back inside to check in with the leader of the caravan, finding out whether they attacked elsewhere or only from our direction. It was still the dead of night, so we had no indication about anything further away from the camp, so Gorkas ordered some of the caravan workers to light firewood and throw it away from the wagons, allowing us a longer range of vision.

These makeshift torches only illuminated the dead bodies of the bandits, with no casualties on our side at all, although some still became injured. The stress of not knowing whether the fight was truly over, really wound me up and I was itching for Gorkas to either call the fight ‘over’ or for the bandits to return so I would have a clear opponent to fight. We stayed fully armed, and on our feet for at least another half an hour, and when the sky began changing, indicating that dawn was not far away, squad-leader Gorkas finally announced that we had won.

The whole camp erupted into cheers, with me cheering the loudest.