Chapter 36 — The Battle for Levish’s Orchard (Part III)
Toren reached back and ran a hand over the fletching and nocks of the arrows remaining in his quiver to get a quick count. With the change in zoot tactics the hounds couldn’t be sent to retrieve the shot zoots. Running out of arrows would be a real concern.
“How are you doing on arrows?” Toren asked the two brothers.
“Not great,” Horthal admitted. Two bundles remained on the older brother’s sled.
Kota glanced Toren’s way, eyes going to the mostly empty quiver and grimaced. “I can spot you a bundle. Horthal’s down to just one spare bundle and our emergency enchanted arrows.”
“I’d appreciate it,” Toren accepted, stabbing each of his remaining arrows into the ground in front of him to make room in his quiver. “One of them might be strong enough to need those emergency arrows.”
“There’s a tier 2 guarding the farm?” Kota asked with alarm.
Toren quickly made a placating motion with his hand. “Not yet tier 2. But best to be cautious of its unknown Abilities.”
Horthal nodded agreement. “We’ll have the enchanted arrows ready.”
Falma brought a bundle of twenty arrows over, glancing with worry at the extra preparations he was taking. “Should mom and I throw the dye bladders again?”
“Yeah. Even though it's more open here, the overgrowth could cause trouble, and we don’t know what stealth-type Abilities they might have-” A shrill call pierced the moist air cutting off Toren's words. In his [Mana Sensing], the near-tier-2 zoot and dozens around it began to move. “The big one’s coming, get ready!”
Toren was already nocking and drawing an arrow. The brothers were giving orders to the hounds.
When the prime alpha leapt over the fence, giving a clear shot, Toren loosed. The strider-sized zoot twisted mid-air around the arrow’s path.
“Urovo’s boon!” he cursed. Without a doubt that was a ‘threat evasion’ Ability. The worst case. Without a ‘sure hit’ Ability to counter, his bow would be useless.
Whether the brothers’ [Bull’s Eye] Ability could hit it…
Laiya’s [Sure Cut] might be able to.
But, if it had Abilities that could cut through her armor.
Evasion could be overcome with speed. He’d just have to be faster.
“Laiya! I need your help with the-” he started to order, but the large alpha was insanely fast, moving almost faster than he could follow. Before he could get his instructions out, it was already mid-leap and landed among them, a vicious tail whip sending Warnel’s sword flying. The alpha’s claws glowed with a Skill before Toren could close the distance. He let fly a knife.
With a graceful contortion, the prime evaded and spun to face him, beady black eyes full of malice at the attack being interrupted.
“Dad!” Laiya voiced in panic, alerted to the danger by Toren.
Toren could only pray that keeping the over-leveled zoot busy long enough would give the girl time to cut it. Though time might be a luxury they didn’t have; every zoot within range of the large alpha’s call was converging on their position, and the first wave was already engaged in bloodcurdling melee with the hounds—many of which had been distracted by the large alpha’s leaping infiltration.
The alpha’s glowing claws bit into the knife Toren used to meet the Ability-enhanced attack, buying enough opening for weighted metal to crush against flesh and bone, but the thing twisted unnaturally again, snake-like in its slipperiness. [Combat Awareness] and [Burning Blood] let him redirect the ridiculous zoot by its stuck claws enough that the metal club still managed to graze the beast’s snout before a more severe jerk forced the knife from his hand.
The blade of Laiya’s spear flashed downward, catching neck, but too shallow. The evasion must’ve been what lost him the knife.
Blood sprayed in a fan from the cut, but there was no time to celebrate. The creature’s tail was already striking the spear from Laiya’s grip, sending the girl to the ground, and whipping toward his helmet. The beast’s legs contracted as it turned.
It was fleeing!
In that moment of realization, Toren decided. Surging [Burning Blood] with a searing flood of mana, he swung for and caught the lizard’s knee with his club. A glancing hit was all he managed before his vision went colors and he was rolling back to his feet from where he had fallen.
[Combat Awareness] increased to 4.
[Focus Rage] increased to 2.
Toren hadn’t even realized he had made use of his new [Focus Rage] Skill. The way he had become hyper-focused and only peripherally aware of the rest of the battle suggested that he had.
“Laiya!” Warnel shouted as he reached his eldest to help her back to her feet. “Are you okay?”
“Laiya!” Falma and Emina echoed.
“Oww. My arms,” Laiya complained, but the girl had her spear in hand again, and her posture showed determination.
“Good effort, Laiya. You may have just… won us this battle,” Toren encouraged, voice shaky and tongue still clumsy from the blow.
The large alpha was shrieking commands from behind the claws and bites of the encircling lizards, hesitant to attempt another raid and looking distraught, ginger with its injured leg. An arrow from Horthal clipping its flank convinced it to give up on the battle entirely.
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With shrill ululations, the retreat was sounded and the toothy hunters quickly became the hunted.
Toren grabbed his bow from where he dropped it and started firing arrows into the fleeing bipedal lizards. The hounds gave chase. Their eerie howls adding speed to the flight of those zoots still out of reach.
Horthal and Kota called the hounds back before they could follow the zoots into the trees.
For contributing to victory against enemy forces substantially higher in level while outnumbered,
1000 XP Awarded.
Keep up the good work!
Two hounds were dead and almost all sported wounds, most minor, but several were incapacitating or serious enough to require immediate treatment—no doubt caused by Abilities. The brothers couldn’t be happy about that.
Hopefully, the surviving hounds’ XP gains would make up for the losses. Toren’s own XP gains were less than he had expected going into the battle, and his sniping at the end wasn’t enough to earn him level 5.
It was disappointing. There had been plenty of XP to be had! Reaching level 5 and getting a third Ability would have brought a significant increase to his fighting strength.
“Toren, we should hurry to get the claim stakes planted,” Kota advised, from where he was helping his brother stabilize the most serious of the wounded dogs. Focused entirely on healing and stitching up the hound Kota was holding still, Horthal didn't give any indication of agreeing or if he even heard.
“Alright,” Toren acknowledged. He had intended to help with the clean up, but the teen was right. With that almost tier-2 alpha still out there and with how many escaped, the perimeter needed to be secured. “I’ll take care of that now.”
“Are we really going to camp here for the night?” Warnel asked, worried. He had started on collecting the zoot carcasses and crests as they had done after the prior large battle.
“Not just the night,” Toren reminded, untying the enchanted metal stakes from the bulging travel pack he had unburdened onto the ground. “This is our new home.”
Emina and Falma looked around dubiously. The trampled grass and ferns hid most of the dead zoots from sight, but Kota’s hounds showed no slowing in their efforts to sniff out the bodies and add them to the pile awaiting processing by Warnel. And that was before mentioning the likely astral and drain worms infesting the orchard itself.
At the heavy silence from the Hatterwicks, Horthal looked up from his work and, with glances again in Falma and Laiya’s directions, met Emina’s questioning eyes. “Once the claim stakes are planted, you should be mostly safe. We’ll do a sweep around the property to clear out what we can of the rest and see if we can find signs of a main nest. That dangerous alpha was wounded, so we should be able to hunt it, at least.”
Toren cleared his throat and nodded his appreciation to the elder brother. “Thanks for your help, Horthal, Kota. Without your assistance, clearing this property would’ve been… perilous. And would have taken a full tenday or more, at best.”
Horthal returned the nod. “This hunt was worth a lot of levels. Levels that you needn’t have shared. Without a doubt, it’ll be the talk of the taverns until the next high tide or monster swarm.”
Kota gave a proud thumbs up, grinning ear-to-ear. "Can't wait to tell everyone at the Blue Raptor! That was a crazy fight! Hahaha!"
“If Toren doesn’t mind you visiting, you two are welcome to call on the girls as often as you like,” Emina shamelessly offered, no doubt eager to have the brothers’ protection around as often as possible.
“Mom!” Falma groaned, but the complaint sounded more exasperated than opposed.
Warnel was pretending like he hadn’t heard, grumbling about zoots while sawing with his knife. Maybe Toren wasn’t giving the guy enough credit for wisdom.
Laiya, like her father, kept silent, focusing on her task of keeping watch. She did glance Toren’s direction briefly, though.
“Sure,” Toren agreed with a laugh as he slung the cord-secured bundle of claim stakes over his shoulder and started for the nearest corner of the property. At least, Kota had the grace to blush with embarrassment.
~~~
Name: Toren of Theravos
Race: Human
Age: 20
Profession 1: Level 4 Burningblood Berserker (6100/8000)
Mana: 29/58
Strength: 16
Constitution: 12
Dexterity: 14
Agility: 12
Wisdom: 12
Intellect: 8
Will Power: 17
Perception 14
Appearance: 8
Charisma: 8
Luck: 10
Attribute Upgrade Points: 3
Traits:
Sacrificial Guardian
Abilities:
Burning Blood (Rank 1) Proficiency: Low
Slow Bleeding (Rank 1) Proficiency: Low
Ability Upgrade Points: 3
Profession Skills:
Pain Tolerance 4
Severe Wound Recovery 3
Berserker Knife Arts 1
Spear 9
Club 8
Focus Rage 1 → 2
Combat Awareness 3 → 4
Intimidate 2
Skills:
Theravos Language (Speaking) 15
Theravos Language (Reading/Writing) 10
Religion 10
Meditation 5
Bone Strengthening 3
Hunting 20
Butchering 13
Archery 19
Stealth 17
Arithmetic 4
Foraging 16
Tree Felling 6
Running 12
Mana Sensing 14
Danger Sensing 1
Wound Binding 8