Faust calmly scanned their surroundings. He could see Leona and Cassius slowly walking closer to him as they banded together near the hill Cassius was on.
“Uh-oh, they didn’t exactly take their time. We shouldn’t even be in their territory yet… but we can’t be sure…” Cassius mumbled, and the screeches started coming from different directions. They were moving. First only in front of them, then on one side, then on the other…
Aquila was the first one to notice.
“They’re attempting to surround us!” he shouted and jumped off the hill.
“We need to make our way in one direction before they can close in!” he told his friends and Leona ordered.
“Follow me in that direction!” she pointed at one of their sides where they last heard a screech from.
With their heavy equipment they hurried in the said direction and the screeches around them continued.
“It should be 6 of them…” Aquila shouted over, and Faust gripped his spear tighter.
‘They have the numbers, but from what we’ve been told we should still be stronger due to our equipment. We just can’t let them ambush us… I never thought they would attack during the day…’ he followed Leona and Cassius as they sprinted on.
Cassius pointed his finger in a certain direction and shouted:
”THERE!” before shooting an arrow in the said direction. When Faust looked to where his friend pointed, he could see no more than 2 icy blue eyes lighting in the dark. Only when he came closer did he see what the creature looked like.
‘Damn. That thing really looks like a malnourished and animalistic version of the orcs I have seen…’ he analyzed but was soon proven wrong as the orc nimbly dodged an incoming arrow and hurried off into the darkness with inhumane speed. Its skin was a dark green and perfectly blended into the forest. It had a tall and skinny frame. It held a wooden spear in its right hand.
Aquila sent another arrow after it, but he missed due to the now much longer distance.
“Dammit they’re fast!” he exclaimed as he walked over to the other three.
“I don’t think we will be able to catch them like this…” Leona pondered.
“We will have to give them the confidence to attack us… I think.” Leona said and looked at her comrades.
“It will be riskier… but I think we will be able to end the mission faster… and we should still be able to take on 6 of them easily.” She explained.
“Aquila. Are you sure there’s only 6?” she asked him.
“Not sure. It's only an estimate from the screeches we’ve heard.” He clarified and his face grew dark.
“Let’s look for a position we can defend well if we want to wait for them to approach us. Something like a large rock I could fire from…” he explained, and they looked around for a suitable terrain.
They found a rock and Aquila climbed onto it. They could hear the screeches closing in.
Aquila frowned.
“Eight.” He said with a low voice.
Leona’s heart beat so hard she could feel it in her throat.
‘Shit! This isn’t going according to plan at all…’ she lamented as she looked around hastily, checking for Faust and Cassius as they waited.
‘Eight… they will be attacking us soon.’ Faust thought and his blood pumped madly. He felt fear. He shook his head and laughed at himself. ‘Show some courage dammit!’ he gritted his teeth and nodded at Leona. He could see she was also afraid.
‘These are real monsters… that will actually try to kill us!’ She thinks and frantically looks around, her eyes darting from tree to tree. The dim light was working to their disadvantage.
Then the screeches suddenly stopped.
“They must be getting closer… those green bastards…” Leona muttered, and Faust was briefly astonished at her words.
‘I didn’t know she could speak like that.’ He marveled but quickly focused on the task at hand. It remained quiet for several more minutes.
“Ehm… guys? Could it be that they left?” Cassius asked and briefly let his guard down.
At that very moment, a green flash jumped out from behind a close tree and darted towards Cassius’s back, piercing it with something that looked like a spear.
Cassius was thrown forward as he issued a pained cry when he hit the ground. He groaned.
The orc that had surprised them had acted too quickly for any of them to react in time. Leona who stood next to Cassius whirled around and held her shield in front of her, spear pointed at the stray orc now standing close to them.
Faust’s eyes darted between the downed Cassius and the stray orc that showed its teeth before jumping at Leona. The usually well-mannered woman jumped a step back as the creature’s wooden spear thrust at her head. She blocked the strike and countered with a spear thrust at the creature’s throat.
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It had incredible reflexes, so it managed to dodge the thrust before throwing attacking again. Leona deflected the spear with a grunt, stepped forward, and slammed her heavy shield into the orc with all her weight.
This caused the orc to stagger backward a bit. Right at this moment, before Leona could finish it off with a spear thrust an arrow arrived and went straight through its head.
The lanky and powerful body collapsed on the ground.
Leona looked at Aquila with a thankful glance and then knelt down next to Cassius who already propped himself up again. She couldn’t see any blood on his back and quickly helped Cassius up.
“The spear couldn’t penetrate my armor. A wooden spear could never penetrate a chainmail. But fuck! That hurts! That’ll be a bruise!” he blabbered while he picked up his shield and spear again.
Faust and Leona were about to complain about how he scared them when Aquila shouted out.
“CAREFUL!” his voice caused Faust’s mind to jolt and the three quickly went back-to-back. Just as they assumed their new formation a spear flew right at Faust’s face. He only saw it very late.
He reacted as fast as he could and lowered his head so his face would point downwards. The spear hit his helmet and put a dent into it. Faust staggered a step back and groaned.
He resorted to this way of blocking since he wouldn’t have been able to raise his shield in time.
‘That cost me a few brain cells!’ he mocked himself as the dizziness caused by the impact disappeared. Aquila immediately sent an arrow to where the spear came from, and a screech resounded.
“Hit!” he shouted and laughed.
‘Having an archer is awesome!’ Faust laughed to himself before 8 more orcs suddenly lunged at them. Two toward Aquila and six toward Faust and his 2 comrades.
‘Our luck be damned!’ Leona cursed and a brutal fight ensued. The recruits had learned that they had to protect the openings in their armor more against these orcs and were embroiled in a melee with the spear-wielding stray orcs before them that had appeared seemingly out of nowhere.
Cassius killed one almost immediately with a counterthrust that penetrated the orc's stomach. The only problem was that it was stuck. Cassius cursed and unsheathed his long knife.
In that process, the other orc had jumped past his fallen comrade and used its wooden spear as a pole that it swung at Cassius’s head. Cassius could only see the pole approaching his neck before his lights went out and he collapsed onto the ground, unconscious.
Meanwhile, Faust and Leona had worked together to kill 2 more orcs which left 3 more. Aquila was struggling on the rock. As the orcs tried to climb up, he shot one of them, yet the other managed to lodge a spear into his shoulder.
He didn’t wear thick armor, so the spear slightly penetrated it. He screamed and then laughed as he pulled out the spear. Only the tip was bloody. The now unarmed orc jumped up at Aquila who kicked it in the chest, making it fall down the rock and right onto the orc that knocked Cassius out.
Both collapsed on the ground and Leona immediately jumped over, impaling both with her spear before drawing her knife, turning around to Faust who faced the last 2 opponents.
Suddenly Leona left his side, yet Faust didn’t have the time to look where she went. 2 orcs attacked him with their spears, and he still felt lightheaded from the hit to the head before. He was too slow to kill them with spear thrusts.
He couldn’t charge forward as he was outnumbered. He was battered with thrusts and swings which he mostly deflected the attacks with his shield.
Still, a swing arrived on his right shoulder with massive force, and he couldn’t block it or his neck would’ve been exposed. When the staff hit his shoulder, he felt pain like never before. A loud crack resounded. His hand lost grip of his weapon and he couldn’t help but moan in pain.
‘You little shit! You broke my shoulder!’ Faust roared and used his shield to block incoming strikes desperately. He was slowly getting overwhelmed.
Right when he was on his back foot, he heard a woman scream:
”FAUST!!!” Leona slammed into one of the two orcs from the side and made it fall to the floor. She discarded her shield and jumped down onto the disarmed orc with her weapon, penetrating its skull, killing it instantly.
‘THAT’S WHAT YOU GET FOR HURTING FAUST!!’ she thought angrily and wanted to jump towards the other orc only to find its shoulder penetrated by an arrow. Faust had darted forward and used his shield to slam the orc into the chest.
The last orc dropped its weapon and it fell to the ground as Faust threw away his shield and used his left hand to slash the incapacitated orc's throat with his knife.
He found himself on his knees over an orc, propped up on one hand while the other hung down limply. He looked at Leona who stood up.
“We did it…” he mumbled with a smile before Leona quickly hurried over to him with a concerned expression.
“You’re hurt! It's broken!” she exclaimed as she kneeled next to him.
Faust didn’t dare to disagree. The cracking sound and his inability to use his right arm were convincing arguments.
‘Shit. She looks really worried… it must look worse than it feels…’ he thought to himself and gave his best to smile at her.
“It’s not that bad.” He answered, but he knew that the only thing that kept the crippling pain away was the adrenaline.
Leona looked him deep in the eyes.
‘Oh no! I shouldn’t have left him alone… but I couldn’t let those 2 orcs behind us live either! His shoulder looks bad, but it should heal... I think…’ Her panic slowly faded away and was replaced by genuine concern.
Aquila hurried over and saw the state of Faust’s shoulder.
“Ah fuck, man. That will hurt a lot. I'll put it in a splint later, but for now, we must check on Cassius, gather the ears, and get the fuck out of here! I am also injured!” he quickly analyzed the situation.
Faust was still in shock due to his shoulder injury and Leona stayed with him. Aquila in the meantime hurried to Cassius who had slowly started moving again.
“What the hell happened? Where am I? Why does my head hurt so much?” Cassius groaned out loud. He had been unconscious, but the helmet had prevented injuries other than a concussion from the impact. He would have a headache for a few days, but he would be alright.
Aquila and Leona quickly cut off the orc's ears and put them into their bags.
Faust knelt on the floor and the pictures of his father getting gutted by 2 orcs appeared before him.
‘I would have ended up the same as him if not for my friends… I need to be stronger… much stronger. I need it to protect what is dear to me!’ he looked at Leona who cut off an orc's ear with a smile until a pang of pain hit him. The adrenaline was slowly wearing down.
‘The pain is only going to get worse… shit.’ He groaned and had to chuckle at his situation. The injury would probably heal. None of them had suffered fatal wounds and they had accomplished their mission.
Still. Only now did he have the time to even think about his first kill…
“I killed an orc…” he looked at the monster below him and the blood coming out of its throat where he had cut it. Its eyes had dimmed and all that remained from the bright blue were two light grey hulls.
‘I don’t feel any better after killing an orc. Trajan was right. Revenge doesn't make things better,’ Faust sighed.
‘Yet it doesn’t make me feel worse either. Probably because my first kill was an orc… not a human. These monsters are the personification of evil… nobody should feel bad for killing them.’ He concluded and stood up with a sigh.
The four slowly gathered and prepared to set off… when they heard screeches… numerous screeches. Tens of them. Most of them came from the direction they had come from. The way back. They could no longer leave the way they came. Their battle must have attracted more of them… but how were there so many on the outskirts of the forest?
Panic spread in their minds. They were injured and vastly outnumbered.