“Only in true adversity would one’s mettle be judged properly.” - Old orcish saying.

“Hold on there, Kev-boy!”

Kev heard Skuldj’s gravelly roar over the din of the brutal fighting they were suddenly subjected to, the dwarven maiden holding her ground a bit further to his left with the half-elven twins between her and his position. Like the rest of their platoon, Skuldj was busy attempting to fend off all the enemies that seemed to suddenly flood over them just moments ago.

The dwarven maiden was holding off at least three adult men who were trying to push her over using her massive tower shield, one of its sides planted into the ground and her sturdy left arm keeping the shield steady, while her long-hafted war pick harried another two foes who had to watch out for her strikes even as they pushed the offense.

Next to her, the twins Ciel and Leece danced around even while pressed by seven enemy soldiers, their sabers and spears complementing each other and preventing the enemies from simply pushing through them by threatening to take their lives if they forced their way through. The twins lacked the bulk and strength to literally hold the enemy at bay like Skuldj, so they did their best in their own way instead, through aggression and cooperation.

Fighting two against seven was far from easy, however, and the only things that prevented the twins from being overwhelmed and butchered by their enemies was that Skuldj and Kev also occasionally helped distract the enemy soldier closest to them, as well as the uncanny coordination between the twin sisters. More than once an enemy soldier was about to push through them after getting past one sister only to meet their end by the other’s hand.

Even with their skill and teamwork, however, facing so many opponents at once pushed the two to their limits. Already the fabric coating of their armor was tattered in many places, displaying the metal plates beneath. Both of them were also bleeding from several minor wounds in less armored areas, but fought on relentlessly even so, refusing to take a step back or to let the enemy through.

Leece – who was closer to Kev – was parrying a heavy chop from one of the enemy soldiers with the saber in her left hand, allowing the blow to slide off harmlessly to the side, while the spear in her right hand thrust out like a snake at another man’s throat to force them into defending themselves. Even as her second target moved to defend himself, however, Leece already shifted her spear’s trajectory to deflect another cut aimed at her head by a third enemy, the spearhead striking the side of the blade with enough force to shift its descent a bit.

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Instead of landing on her head as intended, the enemy’s blade struck her on the left collarbone, which was fortunately covered in armor, preventing the blade from actually cutting into her flesh. That said, a blow with that amount of force would likely still leave a painful bruise at the very least, and the way Leece’s left arm almost jerked as she took the hit pretty much verified that.

Sure enough, another of the opponents Leece was facing tried to capitalize on the momentary opening, but was held back by a flashing saber courtesy of Ciel. There was nothing stopping yet another soldier from attempting to do the same on the other side, though, at least until Kev stepped in, mustered what strength he could, and pushed hard against the two enemy soldiers he was blocking with his shield.

One of those soldiers stumbled back and bumped into the soldier trying to strike at Leece, causing them to fail at their strike in turn.

When Kev forced his way, however, he ended up in a somewhat unstable position as a result, and before he could correct his posture, three enemy soldiers bore down on him and literally pushed him until he lost his balance and fell on his back. He could hear how Larissa to his right yelled his name and likely tried to come over, but from the way she cursed, more enemies stopped her on the way.

Prone as he was, Kev was put in a difficult situation, but he still kept his wits about him and used his axe to hook the leg of the one soldier that tried to walk over him and tripped the man. He felt the enemy soldier fall down, hopefully an easy kill for whoever was holding the line behind Kev at the moment, but he couldn’t relax as the other two turned their attention to him and stabbed down at him with their weapons.

All Kev could do was to raise his shield to cover his unprotected face with it. He felt as if he was punched in the chest and gut as the enemy soldiers struck him there with their long blades. His armor fortunately kept the sharp metal blades away from his body, even if he still had to deal with the force of the blow itself. The strikes repeated another couple of times, as the enemy soldiers tried to pry a hole in his armor to stab through.

Before the enemy soldiers managed to do that, however, a figure flashed past the corner of Kev’s sight and went past where he was, from the other direction. Moments later he heard a couple gurgling noises and saw the enemy soldiers that were stabbing at him fall to their knees.

As Kev shifted his shield away from his face, he saw that those enemy soldiers were too busy dying from throats that had been slit wide open to bother him any further, and that a one-eyed woman he recognized as the one being groomed to take a leading position in the Lady Boss’ platoon was standing over him, her blades deftly countering those of the enemy soldiers that had stepped in since.

Next to her, he also saw the mother of the half-elf twins join her daughters, albeit with a lot less grace and a lot more brutal violence as Olyvee wielded her pair of long knives to hack at the soldiers harrying her daughters. Her vicious strikes already tore at least one head off its owners’ shoulders and intimidated a couple more.