The life of a mercenary isn’t a glamorous one by and by but neither was the life of a guard for a minor frontier Baron that I previously lead for a couple of years.
A singular moment can be all it takes to change your life forever, more often than not however it takes a series of moments one after the other. Though it should be noted that is not necessarily that they all happen that close together for them to truly change a life. For me to get to the point in my life that I am now experiencing has not just been about my moments but also those of my parents and their parents and so on and so on.
For example, take the moments specific to my father such as the moment he first set his eyes upon a horse, the one where his first wife told him she wanted a divorce, the one where he all but died and was then transported to Telondia by an apologetic God or the one where he first viewed his status screen. Then there are the moments shared by both my mother and father and then later myself and others such as the moment they first set eyes on each other, the moment they got married, the moment I was born, the moments were my sister was born and then my brother and finally my mothers last moment this side of heaven at least.
Some of the important moments after that for me include the moment my father's employer died, the moment his heir fired my father, the moment my father also passed away, the moment I placed two bets, the moment one of them came in, the moment I found my sister employment, the moment I sent my brother who like everyone else in a similar situation couldn’t nurture his magic talent within Telondia to one of the mage academy’s elsewhere. These were followed by moments such as the one where I spent the last of my winnings on a horse, a sword and a bow, when I saved my charge's life and later was fired for not saving anyone else’s including his father's heir when I was blackballed and had to join a mercenary company for no one else would hire me directly as a guardsman.
Then just as this tale is about to truly begin came a moment when upon returning from a patrol and finding the border post we were heading to being attacked our attempt to relieve it was thwarted by a smaller enemy force we hadn’t spotted attacking us. This is hopefully the last time you read the word moment in my story but perhaps again not, time will of course tell.
“The captain’s down, don’t bother he’s done for but he took the last of the enemy down with him so that’s something I suppose.”
“Lieutenant things aren’t looking good for the main battle, the standard atop the border post has just fallen.”
“All right everyone if we stay here any longer then we’re done for or we’ll have to surrender and though I don’t really think it’s an actual possibility it might be too late for even that. We’ll have to scatter and hope as many of us as possible make it to the secondary rendezvous. I hope whoever makes it there will try and wait for the rest as long as they can but no later than noon of the day after tomorrow. Those of you who don’t make it by then or earlier if the enemy finds us first will get left behind and you’ll have to make your own way back to camp if you can.”
“Lieutenant?”, enquired one of the mercenaries, Alavan Syithe.
Don’t worry about your comrades back at the border post, unlike the mainly local forces we just faced the captain told me he thought the others attacking the fort were mainly fellow bonded mercenaries from the Bloody Clock Mercenary Company. Although I don’t know much about their new commander they’ve never to my knowledge played loose with the rules. As soon as that standard fell the survivors would have promptly tried to surrender and been allowed to do so by them. It’s been a pleasure serving with you all and I hope to do so again very shortly.”
“As you command Lieutenant”, responded all those present, though they waited a while before Carrying them out.
“Corporal Ryder I want you to put on the captain's cloak and then ride his horse as close to the main battle as you can, trying your best to look as if you're trying not to be spotted while in reality doing the exact opposite and see if you can pull as many of the enemy away from our retreat as possible.”
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“Lieutenant!”
“I know what you’re about to say Niel but it may be the only chance for the rest of us to get out of this alive and if anyone can pull it off without dying it’ll be you, just do your best and don’t worry I’ll take care of your horse and if you don’t make it I’ll see your sister gets it.”
“Alright sir, see you at camp or in the next life if it comes to that.”
………….………………..
One last arrow, perhaps one last chance to one way or another get rid of my last and most persistent of pursuers. There were six of them at the start, two of them were most certainly dead by now, another one seriously wounded and I had left two others in the dust. This last fellow was one hell of a tracker and nearly as good of a horseman as me. I had thought I had lost him a time or two but he somehow always managed to find me again, he must have a high-level tracking skill of some description. Here goes, “steady boy, steady”, he should be coming into view any second now, there he is, got you.
His last arrow flies true and hits his opponent right in his jugular but he doesn’t just wait around for him to hopefully bleed out and instead charges at him, sabre held high. The tracker might be wounded but he puts up quite a fight and nearly manages to inflict some damage of his own but to no avail.
He was unhorsed in the later stage of the fight and I have to secure his horse before looting his body. It’s a fine specimen of a horse and should raise a good price if I decide to sell her, its saddle has seen better days, however.
I easily find his purse but it just has a single silver coin and a few bronze so I conduct a more thorough search and manage to find four gold coins in the saddle of his horse and a further seven sown into various places in his clothing. I also discover a few handwritten letters on his person from several different women and a detailed map of the area and a pair of nice-looking daggers attached to his boots.
With that done it is time to make my way to the secondary rendezvous though I am running late so perhaps I should make my way to camp directly, no I owe it to any other possible survivors to at least make the attempt though just in case I will approach the area as stealthily as I can manage. With that in mind and not previously having a map of my own, I decided to have a close look at my newly acquired one.
It wasn’t as detailed as I would have liked, didn’t cover the area where our camp was located, only the secondary rendezvous and at some point in time someone perhaps its previous owner had added a small x as a point in the lower right-hand side of it. Since I was on my way to the rendezvous I decided to have a look at the area it indicated but before heading off I decided to turn my notifications back on and have a look at my status screen.
Completion of Mission: Overnight Patrol A-54C2 is no longer viable
Completion Rate before termination of mission: 90%
Mission: Be a distractor generated
You have Slain (Level 15 Warrior)
You have Slain (Level 14 Warrior)
Mission: Be a distractor still in progress (1h 23m 32s till completion)
You have Slain (Level 16 Rogue)
Quest: X marks the spot, generated
Your class rank has increased to 10, 2 Free Stat Points and an extra Class Skill slot awarded
Professional skill: Shock Tactics (Basic) => Shock Tactics (Apprentice)
Shock Tactics (Apprentice)
> Costs: 50 Stamina - Cool-down: 1Hour
The damage you deal is increased by 10% for 5 minutes once you begin a charge.
STATUS SCREEN
Name: Niel Ryder
Age: 24
Race: Human
Level: 14 (41%)
Active Class: Warrior
Class Rank: 10 (7%)
Profession: Mercenary (E Rank)
Professional Level: 6 (84%)
Factions: Brothers n Arms Mercenary Company
Health Points: 323/340
Stamina Points: 289/340
Magic Points: N/A
Stats:
Agility 17
Charisma 12
Constitution 17
Dexterity 18
Endurance 17
Intelligence 12
Luck 11
Perception 15
Strength 16
Wisdom 12
Free Points 2
Titles:
Child Prodigy, Horse Lord, Traveler (Second Generation)
Free Skills:
Carpentry (Basic 53%), Climbing (Basic 87%), Cooking (Journeyman 22%), Farming (Basic 67%), Firestarter (Apprentice 53%), First-Aid (Apprentice 52%), Shelter (Apprentice 32%), Swimming (Apprentice 65%)
Skills: (16/16)
Animal Care (Journeyman 80%), Black Smithing (Basic 63%), Cold Resistance (Apprentice 89%), Crafting (Basic 97%), Dancing (Journeyman 23%), Haggling (Apprentice 53%), Heat Resistance (Basic 68%), Herbalist (Basic 78%), Horse Riding (Master 24%), Hunting (Apprentice 67%), Identify (Apprentice 99%), Pain Tolerance (Basic 47%)Scribe (Basic 89%), Stealth (Apprentice 9%), Trapping (Apprentice 37%), Unarmed Combat ( Journeyman 3%)
Class Skills: (19/20)
Archery (Apprentice 91%), Axe Throwing (Apprentice 8%), Balance (Journeyman 24%), Block (Apprentice 90%), Daze (Apprentice 45%), Double Handed (Basic 88%), Feint (Apprentice 47%), Knife Fighting (Apprentice 78%), Light Armour (Apprentice 94%), Mounted Archery (Apprentice 24%), Mounted Combat (Apprentice 49%), One-handed Weapons (Apprentice 77%), Parrying (Apprentice 47%), Shield Work (Apprentice 28%), Stick Fighting (Apprentice 11%), Lance Mastery (Apprentice 47%), Sword Mastery (Journeyman 35%), Two-handed Weapons (Apprentice 41%), Unseat Rider (Basic 69%)
Professional Skills: (14/14)
Battle Instincts (Apprentice 18%), Drill (Apprentice 78%), Fatigue Duty (Apprentice 7%), Map Reading (Apprentice 27%), Melee Fighting (Apprentice 36%), Night Vision (Apprentice 24%), Patrolling (Apprentice 48%), Sentry Keeping (Apprentice 53%), Shock Tactics (Apprentice 6%), Siegecraft (Basic 78%), Roll Call (Journeyman 23%), Scouting (Apprentice 38%), Screening (Basic 43%), Tracking (Apprentice 31%)