We are marching.

I don't want to do this. Have I mentioned that? I think I said it before. I don't want to do this.

The Commander is at the front, dressed in full body armor. The Captains are lined up in the first row behind him. Also wearing full armor. The rest of us have small shields and swords. If Darius is going to conquer the world, why would he arm his soldiers so poorly? A stray arrow or a rock could take us out of action easily. If he had so much land and gold to offer, then surely he could afford to better arm his soldiers.

We were untrained and unprepared, and we were apparently going to face opponents who could still defeat us even though we outnumbered them twenty to one.

Could it be dragons? Fifty dragons sounds like too many. Forty-nine too many. One dragon could easily defeat all of us, including the knights. So probably not a dragon. This world has magic, so it could be anything, zombies, goblins, or even werewolves. Fighting any of those wouldn't be easy, we have swords but no skills on how to use them effectively in battle.

They didn't even give us any battlefield strategy. The Commander didn't say anything. We're just marching in a square formation. The mountainous terrain would make any elaborate manoeuvers difficult, but still, it wouldn't hurt to try to use our numerical advantage. The odds would swing heavily in our favor if we surrounded our opponents.

I will not engage whatever it is that we're fighting. I don't care about Darius and his mission. If whatever it is we're supposed to fight is really scary, I'm gonna throw my sword at it and run.

It makes sense that the knights are at the front. They're experienced and well armed. If Darius' enemy runs through them, the rest of us will be easy pickings.

I don't want to do this. I'm sure I'm not the only one. Most of us probably don't want to fight for a king we don't even know. But no one is saying anything. Humans could've avoided so many wars and rebellions if all the soldiers who didn't want to fight turned around. It was easier to desert at camp than it was en route to battle. Would I be left alone if I threw away my sword and shield and went in the other direction? There were six soldiers around me. Five of them would probably agree with me and want to flee, but it's that one soldier, the one who wants to fight that's the problem. Most likely a prisoner, they were the ones who cheered when Darius promised them a good life in this world. That would be the one who cuts me down before letting me go to safety. It was the fear of that soldier that kept me marching.

I was glad I was closer to the center of the square than the front. It was those at the front who went flying when Sauron started swinging his spiked baton. I learned something from The Lord of The Rings.

Wesley looked livid. Maybe he also wanted to desert. Or maybe it was the smell. We were downwind of the knights, but we were marching quickly. Their rotten smell lingered in the air. Whoever we were fighting would smell us before they saw us. We weren't going to surprise them.

This is so surreal. Two hours ago I was about to have the best moment of my life, now I'm marching to fight....

They had to be kidding. We were going to fight trolls. Mountain trolls. This had to be their domain. We were going to fight trolls and we were the bad guys.

They had smelled us coming as expected, and they were ready. There were at least fifty of them, like Darius said. I'm about five-ten, every one of them was roughly three times my height. Most of them weren't armed, but I saw at least three of them carrying clubs that looked as heavy as a small car.

Fifty trolls, versus a hundred and one knights, plus nine nine nine mooks, and me. I didn't count myself among the mooks since I wouldn't engage.

I was slowing down, letting the others pass me. They didn't notice because they were focused on the trolls.

We were attacking a clan of trolls in their domain because Darius wanted to rule the world. I hadn't known him that long and already I hated him. All of this nonsense would go away if he was no longer around. I could only fantasize about that, his bodyguards would tear me to shreds before I got within ten feet of him.

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The trolls did not charge. They just watched us coming. If anything, they looked scared. Was it the smell? What did they make of the knights and their rotten smell? Did they think they were undead? Were they undead? They were Darius' secret weapon.

I had wormed my way to the back of the square and they were now all ahead of me. I would not engage. No way.

The knights didn't hesitate. The Commander was the first to charge, followed by the Captains. The trolls also charged.

The square was too stunned by opponents who were close to twenty-feet tall to go any further. They had stopped marching.

The trolls and the knights collided and the knights went flying. Some of the knights were crushed as the trolls ran through them. Everytime a troll threw a punch, four knights went flying. There were fifty trolls to a hundred and one knights. This was going to be a quick rout.

The Commander was holding his own. He was fighting the biggest troll, he had gone straight for it, and it looked like he was winning. He was fast, not as fast as Darius' bodyguard, but close. But he could only take one, the others were making light work of the Captains. Their style of fighting worked well with their size, they rarely ever kicked, it was like boxing but with much smaller opponents. They didn't roar or growl like they did in the movies, they sounded like humans with deep, gravelly voices. They're probably not as smart as humans, but they're not mindless beasts either. They could probably speak a simplistic language if they weren't so mad.

The Captains were quickly and easily defeated. Half the trolls looked at us, the others are looked at the Commander. They're chasing us. We're running. I was behind the others so I had a good lead. I throw away my sword and shield and run harder than I ever have in my life. The Captains didn't even put up a fight, we don't stand a chance.

I hear, but I don't see, the devastation behind me. Collisions, bones breaking, bodies flying. The trolls are surprisingly fast for their size. But they're now killing innocent people. Innocent in this world anyway.

With every strike I can hear them getting closer. I will be the last of the earthlings to die. Is that what I want? Kidnapped from another world and forced to fight for a king I didn't know, only to die running and screaming. This wasn't how the heroes went in fantasies. They went down fighting, regardless of how hopeless the situation.

David and Goliath. Pick up rocks, aim for the eyes. Or better yet, aim for their mouths, so that they choke on them. I said I wouldn't engage but I don't want to die like this.

We're in the mountains, there are plenty of rocks to choose from. I turn around. The fleeing earthlings gawk at me in surprise as they pass me. The sight of the rampaging trolls is a terrifying one. I can feel the world shaking. Anyone they catch is ripped apart limb from limb. That is likely my fate.

It's too late to change my mind. I pull out a quarter from one of my jean's pockets. I hold it up so that they see it. My hands are shaking. I throw it as high as I can. All the trolls that saw it look up. I pick up a rock the size of a football and throw it, NBA jumper style into the mouth of the closest troll.

Its companions hear it choking and stop to check on it. It's a female, and she's now on her back, struggling to breathe. I've never killed anyone before, obviously, but I'm watching her die.

The trolls don't know how to help her. Would the heimlich work with a rock? Do the trolls know about it? Probably not. They're gonna be mad when she dies. They'll get creative in how they kill me, probably suffocate me by shoving my head up their butts, or eat me. Did I mention that this is surreal? There are people dying and screaming and I'm thinking about digestion.

I back away slowly. I can't run. My eyes are stuck on the dying troll. We provoked them, and now she's dying because of me.

I watch her take her last breath. She's no longer moving. The other trolls wail in despair.

[Trickster Level 3!]

What was that? Something happened in my head. Words and numbers. What do they mean?

[Warrior Level 2!]

Again? I'm going mad. Surreal, or just a weird trip, I'm losing it.

The trolls focus their rage on me. I'm running again. I feel refreshed. I feel energized. I'm faster than before. I catch up to and run past the other earthlings like an Olympic sprinter. It's like they're standing still. The loud collisions behind me tell me the trolls are now giving it their all. I'm their main target, the other earthlings are in the way.

I think I can outrun them now but I'm not sure. I don't hear them getting closer. But earthlings are dying behind me. I'm much faster than them now, I can't just leave them. Everyone is the hero of their own story. I can't selfishly focus on trying to get home while people are dying. I wonder if I can use the same trick again. That would depend on the intelligence of trolls which I'm not familiar with. Humans like shiny things, slightly less intelligent relatives of humans like them even more. I have plenty of shiny coins in my pockets.

I turn around again, but the trolls aren't chasing us anymore. They're under attack. It's the Captains, the stinky knights. They had been decimated but some of them had somehow recovered.

They're not human. Or they're a different kind of human. They looked human, many of them had lost parts of their armor and from head to toe they looked normal, but they had three rows of sharp teeth. They were all over the trolls like a pride of lions on a young elephant.

The trolls were fighting back, picking them off -- with great difficulty-- and smashing them on the ground. I thought the trolls would win easily again until I noticed that the fallen knights were eating the dead earthlings, and it was renewing them somehow. Open wounds were healing as I watched, broken bones were readjusting themselves.

The Captains were definitely not human. Taking a bite of the trolls seemed to make them heal even faster. I had underestimated Darius' secret weapon. And the Commander was back. He had never been uninjured unlike the other knights. He was too fast for the trolls to get their hands on him.

The trolls were losing numbers but they still had the upper hand. They were painstakingly removing the knights from themselves and giving them injuries they couldn't recover from. I saw the Commander smiling. He had normal human teeth unlike the Captains. We were losing and he was smiling. Was he happy with the result?

There were less than twenty earthlings left including myself. The Captains were relentless, they were going to fight the trolls until they were completely dead, self-preservation wasn't an option for them. And the Commander was smiling.

"Retreat!" he shouted. "Retreat!"

The Captains kept fighting despite the order. Only us earthlings obeyed. Running away was all we did today. We didn't fight, and we'd never been expected to fight, that's why we'd been armed so poorly. They only wanted us to be food for the Captains.

We followed the Commander away from the battle, back to camp.