Spring, 628 CA
In the cold blue light of late evening, two armies clashed. A massive force of Etronian soldiers clashed against a screeching horde of orcs. Ten thousand humans, elves, and beastmen soldiers of the Kingdom of Etronia surged forward to encircle the much smaller force of monsters. For every one orc, five Etronians took the field. The Etronian forces attacked with greater fervor due to the fear that they would lose their chance to attain great honor on the battlefield.
In the center of the battle was a swirling cyclone of flame. Even those on the flanks could see this expression of arcane might. As he had done dozens of times before, the commander of the army took the field. His name was Count Armond Feldrast, and his hatred of the orcish menace burned brighter than any other.
The orcs of the Blue Skull Tribe died screaming. They fled from the flames burning in the center of the battlefield, only to retreat into the charging lines of enthusiastic soldiers.
In the chaos of the one-sided battle, Captain David York was separated from his unit. His enthusiasm and desire to collect as many orcish ears as possible caused him to charge with such ferocity that, after a few seconds of frantic fighting, he found himself alone. On all sides of him stood angry, heavily armed orcs. There was not a single friendly face in sight.
David would not have it any other way. He was surrounded on all sides, giving him the perfect opportunity to test out the results of his thirteen years of training.
An orc stepped forward. The moment it entered the range of David’s sword, its skull was cleanly cut in two by David’s black scimitar. The silver sigils on the side of his blade shone in the evening sun as the orc’s pliable brain matter was bisected.
[Enhance Sharpness, Lvl. 5]
Another orc charged forward. David easily sidestepped the orc’s lunging sword, catching its wrist with a fierce riposte. The orc’s blade fell to the ground with a green hand still gripping the handle. A swift strike to the neck cut off the orc’s scream of pain.
Three orcs reached David at around the same time. One of the orcs struck an arcane shield conjured by David’s shield bracelet and was stopped in its tracks. The remaining two orcs, however, raised their weapons simultaneously and brought them down toward the human warrior.
David passed through the small gap between the orcs’ large bodies, coming out behind them. Before either of them could turn toward the man, David slashed at them horizontally as he retreated.
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“Glacio!” David called out as his scimitar drew a line of blood from one of the orcs. The wound was shallow and would certainly not kill the orc by itself, but the magic spell David infused into his attack did the rest of the work. Before the damaged orc could take two more steps, a thick coat of ice covered its form, and it was no longer able to move.
The other orc, surprised by the sudden freezing of its compatriot, hesitated just long enough for David to back up a few steps.
“Ignis!” David chanted as the runes on his blade glowed red. He slashed his blade through the air, forming a crescent of fire that scythed through the air. The flying crescent of flame struck the orc, and it screamed in pain as its midsection was engulfed in flame.
With the speed of a trained soldier, David lunged forward and pierced the burning orc through the heart. He would have extracted his scimitar, but that was the moment when the third orc which had been delayed by David’s Shield appeared. The third orc slashed downward at David, and he was forced to abandon his blade in the charred corpse of the slain orc as he dodged.
Now without a weapon, David took up an unarmed fighting stance as the orc approached. It was certainly not a favorable position to be in, but he would have to make do. He took up a boxer’s stance and stepped toward the orc. David only had a few seconds to disable the orc and retrieve his sword before the rest would reach him.
The orc swung, and David pulled his head back just in time to dodge the attack. The orc overextended, giving the human warrior ample opportunity to launch an attack of his own.
[Enhance Strength, Lvl. 7]
David stepped forward and struck the orc in the jaw with an expertly aimed left hook. Mana flowed through David’s body, causing his punch to land with a Strength of 32, far above the natural human limit. The orc died instantly. Its jaw detached completely and flew several meters away from its body. Simultaneously, the force of the blow caused the orc’s skull to shake with such force that its brain turned to mush.
The remaining dozen orcs surrounding David were approaching quickly, but the closest was more than twenty meters away. With the orcs in the immediate vicinity dispatched, David had about ten seconds to spare.
“Reverto ad gerentis, tenuit gladio,” David chanted as a dozen orcs charged toward him. Once he reached the end of the incantation, an opaque shape formed in David’s hand and quickly resolved into the shape of his sword. His blade had disappeared from the chest cavity of the slain orc and returned to his hand.
The first orc to reach David was struck in the chest by the conjured blade, and the rest soon met the same fate. The monsters had no chance. If he had been fighting humans, David would have felt bad for his enemies. They fell to the ground one by one, not knowing that they never stood a chance.
After more than fifty orcs had died at David’s hand, he decided that he had killed enough for one night. It would be unfair to his men if he killed all the orcs all by himself. David fashioned a chair for himself by stacking the bodies of five orcs on top of each other. He sat on this pile of corpses as he waited for the rest of his men to catch up.
The first Etronians to reach his position were not his own men. Rather, it was Captain Erasmus Thorn of the Fifth Company and his retinue who reached him first. David waved lazily from atop his bloody throne as the white-haired soldier approached.