Lagrord faces off against a fiercely snarling Kagnan. The wild barbarian leader lunges and feints with his left-wielded hand axe, but Lagrord’s whiplike, fluid attacks have drawn two more vicious wounds in Kagnan’s chest. He is breathing hard, but he doesn’t relent.
A solid blow to Lagrord’s chest would have won the day for Kagnan had it not been for the magical armor the half-orc is wearing. Kagnan’s eyes light up in victory, but then they die as Lagrord runs him cleanly through the heart. With an infuriated kick, Lagrord throws the chieftain off his blade and turns to help his friends.
With their leader dead and the fury and dread of Colden’s chant echoing through the cavern, the remaining barbarians lose heart. They fall quickly to your assault. But one, however, manages to escape out the door, shouting, “Betrayal! Treachery!”
Though you have only moments, you quickly look to Kefto and see he is definitely dead. His chest is split open and you can see his heart cloven in two by the mighty impact of the great axe.
In like manner, Kagnan lays there his, eyes open and staring, next to the orcish pups he slayed.
“We must away!” screams Garta. “We must!”
Jirt, his voice broken by anger, “What, and just leave him here??” he screams back.
“I too have lost loved ones!” replies Garta. “If you value your life, we must go now.”
“What about that blasted golem?” says Jirt, surprising you all. When you look at him questioningly, he glances at Kefto. “He liked it.” He says, fiercely wiping away his tears.
“The golem is back with the women and children,” says Garta.
Nareth gasps heavily, but tries another time to pull himself together. Saved one and lost another, this is the terrible truth he had to face quite often before.
" Help me Jirt, we won't leave him here. Go, quick! We don't have all time in the world ahead. ", the captain pulls his buckler behind his shoulders and holsters his dirty sword. He tries to pick up Kefto's corpse from the side of his chest. It does not look like, he really understands what he is doing. He is desperate with the expression of deep sorrow in his old tired eyes.
Garta gets in front of Nareth, blocking his access. She screams in the soldier’s face.
“We don’t have time for this!” she panics shrilly. “We HAVE to get out of this cavern NOW! The barbarians will be up here in no time, once they learn of our treachery! Unless you want to lose the life of your other charges, including the King’s advisor, we must run through the pass now!”
She begins run-limping back the way you came, the only entrance to these man-made archer caves.
Colden, a mix of his rational side with a plethora of emotions, duking it out trying to decide who comes out on top. A second later he's decided, emotions are for another time.
"Everyone, follow Garta. Let's honor Kefto by surviving this, if we get caught by the barbarians and die, his death will have been in vain. Go NOW!"
He runs up and literally starts to push everyone out of the cave, slamming their backs and kicking their butts to get everyone out of shock and get moving.
"We will not go for the golem, maybe we'll meet him again some time, but not now."
Nareth release the body, exhaled and rose up:
" Farewell friend. May this place be your tomb, Kefto ", he gave the soldier his last salute and starred at Colden. The captain was surprised how easily he agreed to leave Kefto's body behind. His maniacal desire to accomplish their mission drove him forth. Tough choices were still unusual to him, but obviously he had no time to recall a quite and simple life in Astorwind. Not now.
" Aye... Let's move then. I will cover your back!.. Jirt! I says, move along! ", he draws his sword again with readiness.
Sus'Ann is shocked by the turn of the events. The murdered pups, the serious quarell turning into bloodshed, it's all happening too fast for her. She fears that if a women would intervent into the men business, things would go for the worst.
*Well i could not have make more harm, that's a reminder for the future. Forgive me Refiner. And save us, because you are our only hope now.*
You all rush out into the blinding sunlight, leaving the massacre of the dead echoing silently in your memories behind you. The sunlight burns your eyes as they adjust from the shadows and darkness of the newly christened tomb.
You hear shouting coming from across the ravine, and you see Herald, formerly Harsfath, looking your direction in horror and disbelief. The barbarian that escaped is standing at his side, pointing at you and waving his arms wildly. Harsfath looks as though he can’t believe his ears, and his expression question and doubting, but still striving for faith to his new allegiance.
At the bottom of the steps you see the golem approaching the pass, leading the women and children in his wake. He slowly approaches the trenches, his sad face programmed onto his expression as he surveys the dead bodies of the orcs and barbarians slaughtered.
The path down the stairs and into the pass is clear at this moment. You’re not sure for how long.
At that moment, Herald, formerly known as Harsfath, shouts at you, trying to get your attention. He appears to be furious and confused. You can make out the word, “Kagnan” among the garbled echoes in the pass. The golem looks over at the shouting barbarian and then back up at you, his face in its confused expression.
@ThacoBell
To be fair, this whole story was derailed at the very beginning. I hadn’t expected you to choose to go to seek out the barbarians to form an alliance, but here we are lol.
Nareth looks back at Herald and yells:
" Herald! Ya have a choice now. I grant you freedom to make own decision, you are no slave anymore. Your oath died with Kagnan. Ya can follow us, as a friend and brother in arms. Ya also can chase us and return under your Dizrym deity! ", at this moment Nareth regretted that he ignored an old man's curiosity about the Refiner's path. The Herald's decision won't be hard to predict, thought the captain and turned back to his group.
ops, I completely forgot about this thread, sorry!
"Come, let's head for the pass and get the hells out of here!" Colden again tries to keep the team in motion, stopping could very well mean their demise. He's sure no discussion can solve this dire situation, they have just slaughtered their chieftan after all.
Harsfath, formerly Herald, screams out in the rage and pain of betrayal, falling to his knees and renting his coat. He buries his face in the ground and starts shuffling dirt from the earth onto his head.
The barbarians cry out in rage and rush at you as you come to the bottom of the stairs. FG-11 looks at you in confusion. "What's going on?" he says.
The barbarians are charging at you and you have mere seconds. "We have to go!" cries Garta.
Without giving the golem an explanation, you charge out into the pass, leaving him among the barbarian women and children with that confused expression programmed on his face. The dust of your retreat quickly buries FG-11 on the horizon, standing there among his new charges.
The pass walls loom on either side of you like judges, closing in on you as they narrow. In the heat of the fear pumping in your veins, you realize dully you've never been to this area before and you're running blindly into the warzone between Astorwind and the orcs.
The raiders have taken up pursuit behind you, so you have no choice but to keep running. To slow down now with no where to hide would mean certain death.
"We have to keep running!" cries Garta, leaning on Lagrord for support. She is still limping, but the adrenaline coursing through all of you seems to have kicked in for her.
The whooping and ululating of the raider warcries echoes in the cavern around you, bouncing off the walls and rocks. Then the edge of the pass comes in sight. The pass is almost a 2 miles wide. You are all exhausted, but the pursuit is relentless, despite the enemy being invisible in the black dust behind you.
Then an arrow thunks into the ground in front of you, followed by another. There are two orcs taking aim at you, hiding on the other side of the rocks. They are scouts meant to forewarn the inhabitants of the pass fort of any incoming Astorwind soldiers attempting to retake the fort.
Without any other option, you charge full on into them. Garta, awkwardly, throws a dagger at one as it rises up, distracting its aim, and Jirt raises his shield to deflect the arrow of another. As you leap over the rocks, Jirt screams all his rage and sorrow as he attacks. He smashes one with his shield and cuts across the neck of the other. Without pausing, Nareth stabs the bashed one in the heart and you come to the edge of the northern border, the abandoned frontier of Astorwind's former northern land.
You pause for breath and to get your bearings. The sight before you, despite the danger of the moment, leaves you all even more breathless.
The land spreads out below you to the east and south, with the spine of the mountain continuing on the the north and west. In the land beneath you is the ruins of the lost farmlands and homesteads of Astorwind, taken and held by the hated Bloodeye Clan raiders a decade ago. It is possible that some of the warriors that originally took this land from you are among those in pursuit of you at this moment. You can see in the distance that some of the steads were burned long ago, but others have been recently inhabited by the raiders. The damage to the ages old ruins was barbaric, war and conquest.
Now the orcs have pillaged these lands, but you don't see any trace of them or their army in the old farmsteading community below you. The black dust of Astorwind swirls around you as you descend the mountain, making sure to keep your heads on and not stay gawking so as to avoid pursuit. You approach the abandoned community and what you see makes the barbarian pillaging look civilized.
Entire families of raiders are strung up from their legs and left out in the air to dry, their bodies gutted like fish. Teeth marks are clearly visible in the torn flesh of the dead, and some of the bodies are on spits over the remnants of dead fires.
A cursory inspection reveals that the orcs only just left this place recently. The destruction of the land is complete and churns your stomachs. The horrors of war and starvation fall upon you all.
You approach one particular building and stop, stunned. It looks as though it has been smashed recently from the sides and the roof. It's newly splintered beams stick out at jagged angles to their framing. None of you can imagine what could have caused this type of destruction.
You see a giant uprooted tree sticking out of the roof of another building, this one charred and burned. You can almost hear the screams of the raider family inside as they burned, their charred remains impaled on the outer walls of the building.
Another building has been crushed by a large boulder, far larger than all of you could budge. It looks as though it was thrown onto the house.
You know that you have to keep on to meet up with the army. You can see your footsteps behind you in the black dust and ashes from the building. It would be very difficult to hide here, so you continue running to the end of the village, marveling at the destruction before you.
You come to the edge of the village and realize it was on a plateau high above the flatlands of Astorwind. There are multiple ways down from the plateau, but you see before you a great scene of carnage. Dead orcs and barbarians litter a week-old battlefield. Vultures, crows, and scavengers pick among the dead, feasting.
Beyond the carnage, you can see the encampment of orcs engaged in battle with the forces of Astorwind. The field is a the perfect spot for two fully engaged forces to dominate. It seems as though they met at dawn that morning and have been fighting since. You can't tell how long they have been battling, but you realize it can't have been long. The fight is clearly one-sided.
Among the orcs, about 400 strong, you can see 3 giant moving figures, swinging great weapons made from trees. They are pale and huge with great white flowing beards and hair, standing about 4 times the height of a man. One of them picks up a horse and throws its thrashing body into the Astorwind army.
The Astorwind army is much larger, over double the size of the orcs, but the giants are wreaking havoc among them. Then you see a giant boulder crash into the front ranks of the Astorwind forces. Its impact is so powerful that you can feel it from all the way up here. Though you are too far away to hear the screams of the dying, you can see them, like little wooden action figures, scatter and fly about in all sorts of directions. You see at the edge of the battlefield on the side nearest you one of the three giants, lifting a boulder to make another throw.
You can still hear the barbarians closing in behind you, following your trail, and you look back to see them charging into the village.
*Lgrord's shoulders visibly slump, both mentaly and physically exhausted*
"I-I don't think we can make a difference here. But they might"
*He points back towards the barbarians*
"Can we lead them into the orcs? Give them the massacre they crave?"
"Excellent suggestion.. I don't know how we can do that without at the same time risking ourselves going straight into that chaos, but we should try."
"We also need to find the Astorwind command and report our findings as soon as we can, but if they lose this battle there will be no command, so somehow we must first win.. "
Colden sighs, he's not sure if the others can hear it, but he can feel a bit of defeatism. How could they ever beat down the giants? It would sure take more than a couple of bolts from a crossbow to fell such a magnificent beast.
"Nareth, you have the most battle experience, what do you suggest? Should we charge in with the barbarians at our tales and then pray to the Refiner to make us invisble so we can sneak out from the carnage?" The last part is said in jest, but Colden can't help but actually wishing he had faith in the Refiner in being able to make such things come true.
After the run and before doing anything else, he also takes a few seconds to adjust his clothes and hat. If he's going to die, he should do so looking like a true gentleman.
Nareth peers into the distance, covering his eyes with his palm from the icy wind:
“ Damn it Refiner! I've never seen anything like this before. We need a bigger club here, aye, Jirt? ” The captain allowed himself an awkward chuckle, a sure sign of anxiety.
“ We definitely need to find a way to join with the King’s army on the other side. Laggie is right, this would be wise. We are few, we could hide in these rocks. Now the main thing is to attract these orcs ahead - they must meet our mates from the caves themselves. ”
He scuffles in his breast pocket under his cuirass and pulls out a crumpled flag of Astorwind.
“ I suggest pretending to be a sudden attack by Astorwind from the flanks - open fire on the orcs, drawing them here. They will meet our pursuers and start a good old game of beating each other on the head. The main part here is to take cover until the storm settles, then we can rush towards the Astorwind’s army under this very little flag. Jirt, is your Patrol horn still with you? We need to make some noise here to get the guys in front of the caves. "
Nareth pulls on his helmet preparing himself for action.
Well... a natural 20 with a negative 1 for being rushed? Holy crap... minion wants this story to turn out a specific way.
Jirt nods at his Captain and looks over his shoulder. The raiders are nearly out of the village.
You rush down the side of the plateau, scrambling to keep your balance as your feet tumble and stir up black dust and pebbles. You get to the bottom without a problem and take off in the direction of the nearest giant, the one hurling boulders. He uproots a scraggly tree with hardly any effort and throws it into the Astorwind forces right as you drop below the tree tops, losing sight of the battle. But you have your bearing and take off in the direction of the nearest giant.
The raiders, more familiar with this terrain, don’t have as difficult of a time descending the mountain. They don’t seem to notice the battle going on between the orcs and your people, instead so focused on their rage and your betrayal that they charge blindly down after you. They throw a few spears and daggers in your direction, but the projectiles fall short or bounce off branches as you duck into the trees.
With the raiders hot in your heels, you dash through the tree line and onto the dead, abandoned battlefield of corpses. You try to keep your footing among the bodies and weapons. It is treacherous trodding on the blood and guts of the corpses, but each time one of you goes down you quickly help them back to their feet. You are exhausted and panting heavily. You have been running almost 4 miles at a breakneck pace with only one pause at the top of the plateau.
Behind you, the whooping and snarling of the raiders let’s you know they are gaining ground. You’re halfway across the battlefield when they start throwing spears, daggers, and axes at you with better accuracy. But your luck holds and none of you are struck.
As you cross the battlefield, now that you are closer you see the giant lifting up another tree. He seems to appear out of nowhere as you approach. Knowing that it’s now or never, Jirt raises the horn to his lips and, despite being terribly out of breath, blows a clear, strong note.
The giant startles at the note and turns to look at you. He has sharp, beady yellow eyes and dark brown, dirty teeth. His white beard is yellowed from dried blood and puss from an infection on his lip. His hair is scraggly under an old dented helmet made from what looks like two splayed out cauldrons smithed haphazardly together. He wears thick patches of uncured leather as clothing.
At his feet are several orcs milling about, trying to push move boulders and other projectiles near him for easier access.
The giants eyes widen as he sees you charging at the head of the barbarians. He clearly doesn’t discern that you are running from the raiders, not with the raiders.
“Duck!” screams Jirt as the tree sails through the air towards you.
You all dive forward, helped along with a rough shove from Jirt and Nareth, into an arm wrenching, knee twisting roll. Your charge is at a full speed when the ground, unforgiving, rushes up to meet your limbs and faces.
Then you feel the impact of the tree vibrate in your chests as it crashes into the ground mere feet behind you. Several of you get scraped by the branches of the tree as it tumbles through the air over your heads and backs.
Then your vision goes black as the impact throws up a cloud of black dust all around you. The tree continues to tumble into the ranks of the barbarians behind you. The war cries are abruptly replaced by screams of pain and death. The crunching sound of snapping limbs and the sickening THUNK! of flesh being impaled lets you know the aim of the giant was true.
You are laying there, adrenaline pumping through your veins without much time to do a true injury assessment. The black dust obscures your vision and, thus, the vision of the giant, and the orcs at his feet. You are certain that the enemy’s view would have been impeded by the tree’s flight through the air, so you do not think it likely that they saw you escape the impact.
What do you do? You have mere seconds to decide before the dust settles and you are revealed.
Colden ruffles up his clothes (the dead rarely look as dashing as him) and puts his arms and legs in odd angles and pretends to be deader than dead. He's a decent actor, participated in many plays during his years in the bardic college and was notorious and famous for his roles as "Tree" and "Stone". No other actor could stay still as well as him!
"I'll give them all the performance of a life time!" he thinks to himself as he tries to calm down his breathing.
The captain drops his head on the ground twisting his arm in a weird gesture, trying to hide his blade underneath from the curios eyes. He gazes in astonishment at Colden and his corpse posture, then tries to mimic the same pose and gives his eyes an empty, lifeless stare.
Just in case... I am not sure if it is a wise idea though. Just Captain is not really smart enough when it comes to any rogue/thief related decisions making.
Comments
A solid blow to Lagrord’s chest would have won the day for Kagnan had it not been for the magical armor the half-orc is wearing. Kagnan’s eyes light up in victory, but then they die as Lagrord runs him cleanly through the heart. With an infuriated kick, Lagrord throws the chieftain off his blade and turns to help his friends.
Though you have only moments, you quickly look to Kefto and see he is definitely dead. His chest is split open and you can see his heart cloven in two by the mighty impact of the great axe.
In like manner, Kagnan lays there his, eyes open and staring, next to the orcish pups he slayed.
“We must away!” screams Garta. “We must!”
Jirt, his voice broken by anger, “What, and just leave him here??” he screams back.
“I too have lost loved ones!” replies Garta. “If you value your life, we must go now.”
“What about that blasted golem?” says Jirt, surprising you all. When you look at him questioningly, he glances at Kefto. “He liked it.” He says, fiercely wiping away his tears.
“The golem is back with the women and children,” says Garta.
What do you do?
*Lagrord's voice is breaking as he says the words.*
I've just ruined any chances for peace. We will forever be known as traitors and murders to the tribes now. What have I done?
" Help me Jirt, we won't leave him here. Go, quick! We don't have all time in the world ahead. ", the captain pulls his buckler behind his shoulders and holsters his dirty sword. He tries to pick up Kefto's corpse from the side of his chest. It does not look like, he really understands what he is doing. He is desperate with the expression of deep sorrow in his old tired eyes.
“We don’t have time for this!” she panics shrilly. “We HAVE to get out of this cavern NOW! The barbarians will be up here in no time, once they learn of our treachery! Unless you want to lose the life of your other charges, including the King’s advisor, we must run through the pass now!”
She begins run-limping back the way you came, the only entrance to these man-made archer caves.
"Everyone, follow Garta. Let's honor Kefto by surviving this, if we get caught by the barbarians and die, his death will have been in vain. Go NOW!"
He runs up and literally starts to push everyone out of the cave, slamming their backs and kicking their butts to get everyone out of shock and get moving.
"We will not go for the golem, maybe we'll meet him again some time, but not now."
" Farewell friend. May this place be your tomb, Kefto ", he gave the soldier his last salute and starred at Colden. The captain was surprised how easily he agreed to leave Kefto's body behind. His maniacal desire to accomplish their mission drove him forth. Tough choices were still unusual to him, but obviously he had no time to recall a quite and simple life in Astorwind. Not now.
" Aye... Let's move then. I will cover your back!.. Jirt! I says, move along! ", he draws his sword again with readiness.
*Well i could not have make more harm, that's a reminder for the future. Forgive me Refiner. And save us, because you are our only hope now.*
She follows the escape of the others.
You hear shouting coming from across the ravine, and you see Herald, formerly Harsfath, looking your direction in horror and disbelief. The barbarian that escaped is standing at his side, pointing at you and waving his arms wildly. Harsfath looks as though he can’t believe his ears, and his expression question and doubting, but still striving for faith to his new allegiance.
At the bottom of the steps you see the golem approaching the pass, leading the women and children in his wake. He slowly approaches the trenches, his sad face programmed onto his expression as he surveys the dead bodies of the orcs and barbarians slaughtered.
The path down the stairs and into the pass is clear at this moment. You’re not sure for how long.
At that moment, Herald, formerly known as Harsfath, shouts at you, trying to get your attention. He appears to be furious and confused. You can make out the word, “Kagnan” among the garbled echoes in the pass. The golem looks over at the shouting barbarian and then back up at you, his face in its confused expression.
What do you do?
To be fair, this whole story was derailed at the very beginning. I hadn’t expected you to choose to go to seek out the barbarians to form an alliance, but here we are lol.
" Herald! Ya have a choice now. I grant you freedom to make own decision, you are no slave anymore. Your oath died with Kagnan. Ya can follow us, as a friend and brother in arms. Ya also can chase us and return under your Dizrym deity! ", at this moment Nareth regretted that he ignored an old man's curiosity about the Refiner's path. The Herald's decision won't be hard to predict, thought the captain and turned back to his group.
"Come, let's head for the pass and get the hells out of here!" Colden again tries to keep the team in motion, stopping could very well mean their demise. He's sure no discussion can solve this dire situation, they have just slaughtered their chieftan after all.
The barbarians cry out in rage and rush at you as you come to the bottom of the stairs. FG-11 looks at you in confusion. "What's going on?" he says.
The barbarians are charging at you and you have mere seconds. "We have to go!" cries Garta.
Without giving the golem an explanation, you charge out into the pass, leaving him among the barbarian women and children with that confused expression programmed on his face. The dust of your retreat quickly buries FG-11 on the horizon, standing there among his new charges.
The pass walls loom on either side of you like judges, closing in on you as they narrow. In the heat of the fear pumping in your veins, you realize dully you've never been to this area before and you're running blindly into the warzone between Astorwind and the orcs.
The raiders have taken up pursuit behind you, so you have no choice but to keep running. To slow down now with no where to hide would mean certain death.
The whooping and ululating of the raider warcries echoes in the cavern around you, bouncing off the walls and rocks. Then the edge of the pass comes in sight. The pass is almost a 2 miles wide. You are all exhausted, but the pursuit is relentless, despite the enemy being invisible in the black dust behind you.
Then an arrow thunks into the ground in front of you, followed by another. There are two orcs taking aim at you, hiding on the other side of the rocks. They are scouts meant to forewarn the inhabitants of the pass fort of any incoming Astorwind soldiers attempting to retake the fort.
Without any other option, you charge full on into them. Garta, awkwardly, throws a dagger at one as it rises up, distracting its aim, and Jirt raises his shield to deflect the arrow of another. As you leap over the rocks, Jirt screams all his rage and sorrow as he attacks. He smashes one with his shield and cuts across the neck of the other. Without pausing, Nareth stabs the bashed one in the heart and you come to the edge of the northern border, the abandoned frontier of Astorwind's former northern land.
The land spreads out below you to the east and south, with the spine of the mountain continuing on the the north and west. In the land beneath you is the ruins of the lost farmlands and homesteads of Astorwind, taken and held by the hated Bloodeye Clan raiders a decade ago. It is possible that some of the warriors that originally took this land from you are among those in pursuit of you at this moment. You can see in the distance that some of the steads were burned long ago, but others have been recently inhabited by the raiders. The damage to the ages old ruins was barbaric, war and conquest.
Now the orcs have pillaged these lands, but you don't see any trace of them or their army in the old farmsteading community below you. The black dust of Astorwind swirls around you as you descend the mountain, making sure to keep your heads on and not stay gawking so as to avoid pursuit. You approach the abandoned community and what you see makes the barbarian pillaging look civilized.
Entire families of raiders are strung up from their legs and left out in the air to dry, their bodies gutted like fish. Teeth marks are clearly visible in the torn flesh of the dead, and some of the bodies are on spits over the remnants of dead fires.
A cursory inspection reveals that the orcs only just left this place recently. The destruction of the land is complete and churns your stomachs. The horrors of war and starvation fall upon you all.
You approach one particular building and stop, stunned. It looks as though it has been smashed recently from the sides and the roof. It's newly splintered beams stick out at jagged angles to their framing. None of you can imagine what could have caused this type of destruction.
You see a giant uprooted tree sticking out of the roof of another building, this one charred and burned. You can almost hear the screams of the raider family inside as they burned, their charred remains impaled on the outer walls of the building.
Another building has been crushed by a large boulder, far larger than all of you could budge. It looks as though it was thrown onto the house.
You know that you have to keep on to meet up with the army. You can see your footsteps behind you in the black dust and ashes from the building. It would be very difficult to hide here, so you continue running to the end of the village, marveling at the destruction before you.
Beyond the carnage, you can see the encampment of orcs engaged in battle with the forces of Astorwind. The field is a the perfect spot for two fully engaged forces to dominate. It seems as though they met at dawn that morning and have been fighting since. You can't tell how long they have been battling, but you realize it can't have been long. The fight is clearly one-sided.
Among the orcs, about 400 strong, you can see 3 giant moving figures, swinging great weapons made from trees. They are pale and huge with great white flowing beards and hair, standing about 4 times the height of a man. One of them picks up a horse and throws its thrashing body into the Astorwind army.
The Astorwind army is much larger, over double the size of the orcs, but the giants are wreaking havoc among them. Then you see a giant boulder crash into the front ranks of the Astorwind forces. Its impact is so powerful that you can feel it from all the way up here. Though you are too far away to hear the screams of the dying, you can see them, like little wooden action figures, scatter and fly about in all sorts of directions. You see at the edge of the battlefield on the side nearest you one of the three giants, lifting a boulder to make another throw.
You can still hear the barbarians closing in behind you, following your trail, and you look back to see them charging into the village.
What do you do?
"I-I don't think we can make a difference here. But they might"
*He points back towards the barbarians*
"Can we lead them into the orcs? Give them the massacre they crave?"
"We also need to find the Astorwind command and report our findings as soon as we can, but if they lose this battle there will be no command, so somehow we must first win.. "
Colden sighs, he's not sure if the others can hear it, but he can feel a bit of defeatism. How could they ever beat down the giants? It would sure take more than a couple of bolts from a crossbow to fell such a magnificent beast.
"Nareth, you have the most battle experience, what do you suggest? Should we charge in with the barbarians at our tales and then pray to the Refiner to make us invisble so we can sneak out from the carnage?" The last part is said in jest, but Colden can't help but actually wishing he had faith in the Refiner in being able to make such things come true.
After the run and before doing anything else, he also takes a few seconds to adjust his clothes and hat. If he's going to die, he should do so looking like a true gentleman.
“ Damn it Refiner! I've never seen anything like this before. We need a bigger club here, aye, Jirt? ” The captain allowed himself an awkward chuckle, a sure sign of anxiety.
“ We definitely need to find a way to join with the King’s army on the other side. Laggie is right, this would be wise. We are few, we could hide in these rocks. Now the main thing is to attract these orcs ahead - they must meet our mates from the caves themselves. ”
He scuffles in his breast pocket under his cuirass and pulls out a crumpled flag of Astorwind.
“ I suggest pretending to be a sudden attack by Astorwind from the flanks - open fire on the orcs, drawing them here. They will meet our pursuers and start a good old game of beating each other on the head. The main part here is to take cover until the storm settles, then we can rush towards the Astorwind’s army under this very little flag. Jirt, is your Patrol horn still with you? We need to make some noise here to get the guys in front of the caves. "
Nareth pulls on his helmet preparing himself for action.
Jirt nods at his Captain and looks over his shoulder. The raiders are nearly out of the village.
You rush down the side of the plateau, scrambling to keep your balance as your feet tumble and stir up black dust and pebbles. You get to the bottom without a problem and take off in the direction of the nearest giant, the one hurling boulders. He uproots a scraggly tree with hardly any effort and throws it into the Astorwind forces right as you drop below the tree tops, losing sight of the battle. But you have your bearing and take off in the direction of the nearest giant.
The raiders, more familiar with this terrain, don’t have as difficult of a time descending the mountain. They don’t seem to notice the battle going on between the orcs and your people, instead so focused on their rage and your betrayal that they charge blindly down after you. They throw a few spears and daggers in your direction, but the projectiles fall short or bounce off branches as you duck into the trees.
Behind you, the whooping and snarling of the raiders let’s you know they are gaining ground. You’re halfway across the battlefield when they start throwing spears, daggers, and axes at you with better accuracy. But your luck holds and none of you are struck.
As you cross the battlefield, now that you are closer you see the giant lifting up another tree. He seems to appear out of nowhere as you approach. Knowing that it’s now or never, Jirt raises the horn to his lips and, despite being terribly out of breath, blows a clear, strong note.
At his feet are several orcs milling about, trying to push move boulders and other projectiles near him for easier access.
The giants eyes widen as he sees you charging at the head of the barbarians. He clearly doesn’t discern that you are running from the raiders, not with the raiders.
With a snarl, he hurls the tree at you.
You all dive forward, helped along with a rough shove from Jirt and Nareth, into an arm wrenching, knee twisting roll. Your charge is at a full speed when the ground, unforgiving, rushes up to meet your limbs and faces.
Then you feel the impact of the tree vibrate in your chests as it crashes into the ground mere feet behind you. Several of you get scraped by the branches of the tree as it tumbles through the air over your heads and backs.
Then your vision goes black as the impact throws up a cloud of black dust all around you. The tree continues to tumble into the ranks of the barbarians behind you. The war cries are abruptly replaced by screams of pain and death. The crunching sound of snapping limbs and the sickening THUNK! of flesh being impaled lets you know the aim of the giant was true.
You are laying there, adrenaline pumping through your veins without much time to do a true injury assessment. The black dust obscures your vision and, thus, the vision of the giant, and the orcs at his feet. You are certain that the enemy’s view would have been impeded by the tree’s flight through the air, so you do not think it likely that they saw you escape the impact.
What do you do? You have mere seconds to decide before the dust settles and you are revealed.
"I'll give them all the performance of a life time!" he thinks to himself as he tries to calm down his breathing.
*ded*