"You're our property now. You will do what we say or we will beat it into you" he is telling them in a slurred voice.
I have heard enough though. I wave the rouges forward and they stealth, moving to the sides and toward the drunk soldier. To me, their forms get all misty and indistinct before I lose track of them with my eyes. I still know where they are though and I think it is part of the party system. When they are close I point to Azzaria and she lets loose an arrow that nails the soldier in the back of the neck. His voice immediately cuts out from her silent shot, or maybe because he has an arrow in the neck, I can't be sure. The women he was just talking to in the cage catch on quickly and, when he stumbles into the bars, they hesitate for only a second before they grab him and hold him in place. He didn't die from the crit (Critical hit) by Azzaria, probably because he is level 18. Doesn't matter because the two rogues appear next with a total of 4 daggers now buried in the human's back. He goes limp and the rogues kick his body under the wagon to conceal it in the tall grass that is all over the little valley. One rogue stays to unlock this wagon while the other heads to the next one in order to start on its lock.
Walking up I lean in close to the wagon and whisper to the captives. "Don't leave the cage right away when he finishes unlocking it. We need to unlock all three wagons and then we will all move at once. I need you to be quiet and quickly move to the tree line. Grondar has people at the top of the hill. There will be a distraction and all of us here will cover your retreat." Waiting for them to acknowledge that they understand, I then move on to the other two cages to say the same thing. At the last one I see Zia. Derl steps forward to hug her through the bars and quiet her down so that she doesn't give us away.
After being comforted by her father for a minute she looks to me and says quietly "Hi Vol. These humans don't care if I am ripe or not." I have to literally clamp my hands over my mouth to stop the laugh that was about to escape.
"No honey, they don't. Doesn't matter though because I already claimed you, and anyone who wants to take you has to go through me. That's why we are here. Now, our stealthy friend over there is done with the lock and we are about to move. Go with your father when we open the cage. He is going to lead everyone to safety while we hold the bad men off." Looking over to Derl I can see that he is hesitant to leave us here, but his daughter is with the group he will be leading. Just then I get a message mentally from Thia. There are a couple soldiers heading this way. "Stealth around the wagon here and move up behind the two soldiers that are heading for the other gap" I tell the two rogues, pointing at the gap between the last two wagons. "Derl, you get these people moving, now. Azzaria, silence the one on the left when the rogues attack and I have the one on the right."
With no further argument Derl opens the cages, thank you whoever oils the slave cage hinges, and the freed captives all start heading to the trees. A couple seconds later and the two soldiers I was warned about come around the corner. I'm hiding behind the wagon on the right and Azzaria the one on the left so I get a good look at the soldier's face when he gets to see what is happening. It goes from bored to alarmed in a split second and he opens his mouth to yell. I hear the thunk of an arrow to my left and I am already mid swing with my staff. I see my enemy's eye go from alarm to pain and know that the rogue did his job. My staff connects with the soldier's temple but it only cuts off the pained scream the man let out. It was brief, only a fraction of a second, but Thia is already telling me that the camp is alerted.
The jig is up now, so while the pair of rogues finish off the soldiers here I step into the gap of the wagons. When Thia tells me a group is headed here to investigate I start throwing fireballs into camp. I am throwing them randomly in the hopes of causing enough havoc to confuse them a little. And now we hear the screams I was expecting, not that the fireballs weren't good enough. I hear bowstrings twang from behind and a clash of metal coming from the camp. Looks like my allies got the signal. I cast Fog in the area to cover the escape and to help deal with the incoming enemies. A second after doing so I can see three soldiers enter the Fog spell and the rogues start to circle around them. They are a couple swordsmen and a knight like the one that gave us trouble at the village. Azzaria starts firing at one of the swordsmen and I cast a Lightning spell at the other. The one I hit freezes up from the golden arc of electricity and the rogues close on them. The knight is in the middle and he raises his shield when he sees one of the rogues attack my target. When he turns and lowers his stance I can tell that he is going to shield bash the rogue.
Acting quickly I hit the knight with Buffet to knock him off balance. I think it only works because he turned and I hit is exposed side. With how heavy he is in that armor and his strength he still only takes a step back, but it allows the rogue to back off into the cover of my spell. Fog is the perfect cover for the rogues to work in so I leave the swordsmen to them. I can feel Thia coming in to assist me and I get a warning from her that the Captain we observed earlier is heading our way. Learning from the previous fight with a knight I launch another Lightning spell while Thia hits him with her new Chain Lightning. The spell jumps to the other two enemies but the knight gets a general direction for me from the attack and starts rushing toward me. I start moving out of his path to the right, and I cast an Earth Wall in his way close enough that he can't avoid it in his headlong charge. I get to the side just as he crashes into the wall. The wall cracks from the power of his collision, but holds, and the knight bounces back a step.
Seeing him off balance from the stopped charge I cast a Earth Spike into his side to knock him off balance more. Thia has been peppering him with Zapp since he moved away from the other and I hit him in the side with another Lightning spell. The combined attacks knock him down and he is struggling to get up with the shield and heavy armor, so I decide to try something. Focusing on my Earth Shape spell, I force the ground around him to encase one of his feet, condensing the earth into stone. I have enough time to create one shackle to hold him while Thia and I start pouring on the lighting. When the knight finally gets up but can't free his left leg he looks down. A moment after, his other leg glows briefly before he raises it and stomps down on the ground next to the earth that is binding him. The ground at impact shatters; releasing him from my spell and giving him the chance to charge at me again.
At this point he is down below 25% health but still kicking and headed my way. I start to step to the side again and cast an Earth Wall like before, but this time goes differently then last time. Just before the wall can obscure him from my vision I see his shield take on a whitish glow like his foot did earlier, the glow of a skill activation. Right after the wall is up it explodes back at me and the knight comes stumbling through. Luckily for me, the increased proficiency of my magic has allowed me to keep my buffs and barrier up longer, and the pieces of my wall bounce off the protections I have. I use Buffet again to try and get some distance but he just leans into it and steps forward after weathering the spell. He takes a swing at me with the war hammer he is holding and I have to use the Mana Shield ability from my staff to block it. He hammers on the disc of mana that appears between us a couple of times, but I am not idle during this. After the third blow, one of the rogues appears behind him and is able to dig his daggers into a gap in the armor just under the breastplate. Using the sudden distraction I release the Mana Shield and push a charged up Lightning spell through the staff. The knight catches the rogue who stabbed him with a reflexive backhanded swing of the spike on the back of the hammer's head, only to take my overcharged spell right in the face.
The knight falls on his back to the loud clap of thunder and moves no more. I use Identify to make sure he is done, then go to check on the rogue that was hit. He is bleeding from the swing that hit him in the side, but he still has half his health and the bleeding isn't too bad. I still reach into my storage space and hand him a potion. He takes it and the bleeding comes to a stop. At that point Azzaria comes up beside me and points her new dagger at the rogue whil
e casting a healing spell on him. Looking at them and the other rogue that shows up I tell them "The Captain is coming and he is bound to be dangerous. He should be here any second. No doubt I will need all of you in order to have a chance. Are you all ready?" They all nod with determination to my grim statement. That is when a naked woman walks up. Thinking she is an enemy or something I immediately used Identify on her.
Timbre: Female Dire Wolf, lvl 12, Vanguard. HP: 99%.
At that moment I notice the only thing she is wearing. It is the necklace I gave her, but I look back up to her face because it is in a rather distracting place on the mature woman. She is about 5 foot 10 inches with wolf ears on top of her head and a tail with fur the same color as her coat as a dire wolf. She has the same bright blue eyes and skin that looks like it has a healthy tan. She is very attractive and it is making me uncomfortable, so I shake off my surprise and hand her a set of my cloths out of storage so that she can cover up. She looks at me and then at the cloths. This whole time Azzaria is trying to stop from laughing at my surprise and then how uncomfortable I am. Finally she takes pity on me and explains what is happening here. "Beast Companions can take on a humanoid form when they reach a certain level. It is up to the companion how they distribute talent points so some take the option and others don't. My guess is that she took it with the last level you obtained. It isn't something that she can maintain indefinitely until she puts a few more talent points into it." After saying that she helps Timbre with the cloths while I stand there dumbfounded. This new development is something I was not expecting at all.
"Hey Azzaria?" when I have her attention I continue "What is a Vanguard class?"
She looks confused for a second then understanding dawns in her eyes. "It isn't a class really, just a little description of her build. Beast companions don't have classes like we do. She is a front line fighter and so she will be focused on things in her talent tree that will allow her to be like that. It is much like the knights we fought but with more speed and dodging."
The two rogues moved off while we were talking to prepare for the captain and I can hear them take out a couple soldiers that were coming from the left. There were a few shouts that were abruptly cut off and there isn't any movement in their health so it must have been some kind of assassination skill that they used. I rush over to the swordsman that looks like it had the best armor and start taking off the leather. "Help me get this off and then onto Timbre. Quickly!" Azzaria complies and starts putting the pieces I take off onto Timbre. There is leather armor for her chest, shoulders, thighs, and forearms. She also gets the boots that fit her from the other, slightly smaller, swordsman. Last, I grab the shield and hammer that the Knight was using and ask Timbre "Can you use these?" She nods and gives me a beautiful smile before taking them from me.
Glad I didn't remember to sell everything I didn't need, I pull out the skill book we found during our trip to kill the Corpse Driver Beetle Queen. I don't know if she can use the Shield Projection skill book but I hand it to her anyway. To my surprise she takes it right away and opens it. Just like anyone else, the process starts with glowing pages that turn on their own and she finishes learning it right before the Captain enters my Fog spells effective area. Thia is still watching from overhead and Timbre takes a few practice swings with her new hammer. She looks like she is getting used to the shield and hammer quickly. We all spread out in the fog and get ready for the Captain to arrive. We don't have to wait long. Azzaria moves to my left and I go to the right. Timbre stands in the middle as the Captain walks toward her into the fog. The rogues are stealthed once again so I don't know where they are exactly, but I feel like they are closing in on the captain. I recast buffs on myself and give Timbre Haste, as well as recasting Fog since it is starting to dissipate.
Captain Brock Harkenson: Male Human, lvl 20, Swordsman, Duelist. HP: 100%.
As the sounds of battle continue the Captain gets within range for me to use Identify, and what I see worries me. He is wearing leather armor with metal studs spaced all over. He is also carrying a thin rapier as a weapon. The choice of weapon and his duelist subclass has me thinking he is a speed based fighter. When he gets to about the center of the fog he stops. He takes a few seconds to look around, and he seems to be able to locate us through the shroud of magical fog. "I can tell you are there" he calls out to us. "You can't hide from me like this. Give up now and I won't kill you. You will be slaves, but it's better than dying right?" After a few seconds where no one says anything he reaches to his waist and draws his sword.
I'm glad he decided to talk for so long because I was charging a fireball the whole time. Before he started talking Brock was looking in our direction, but now that I have charged a fireball spell to the point it is painful to hold he is looking at just me. The diamond in my staff is actually glowing a bright fiery red that he is able to see even through the concealing fog. Just as he crouches to start after me an arrow sprouts from his back. This only annoys him it seems, and the next arrow is cut in half with swift strike of his sword. But while he is distracted I release my overcharged Fireball at him. It rockets across the short distance between us faster than any other I have used before to hit Brock right in the chest as he is turning to meet the threat. The resultant explosion was twice as large as a normal fireball and, from the amount of mana I used, I expect it was 3 times stronger or more. I don't have any hope that it will kill him outright, but I am hoping to do some serious damage and possibly slow him down a little.
A second after the Fireball bursts Brock comes lunging out of the smoke to land a heavy blow to my Mana Barrier. A large crack appears there and I know that I can't take another of those without it collapsing. I quickly summon the shield skill through my staff and take the next blow on it. The mana that is drained from my shield in order to protect me from the blow is noticeable now. As Brock is about to strike the shield again a glowing white shield rushes in from my left and smashes the Captain to the side, causing him to miss me. I back off and Timbre is there to take my spot and raise her shield. Timbre is fast as a dire wolf and even faster now in humanoid form, but it's still not enough against someone with such a high level advantage. She is used to being fast enough to avoid blows a good part of the time but now isn't. The shield she got is allowing her to defend better though she is still not able to block everything.
I see a green glow envelope Timbre and know that Azzaria has switched to spells since Brock kept cutting her arrows out of the air. I fire a Mana Bolt and then Lightning. Brocks sword glows with a skill activation and he blurs into motion stabbing his sword at Timbre with incredible speed. She is blocking the majority but her health is dropping quickly from the ones she can't stop. I need to do something to turn the tide or he will just grind Timbre down and turn to the rest of us. I almost forgot about the two rogues when all of a sudden they appear on either side of the Captain, thrusting their daggers into both legs. They turn and dash back into the cover of the fog, but Brock's skill stopped when they attacked and he recovers fast enough to slash the back of the one on his right as the rogue retreats. Luckily, he only takes a shallow cut during his retreat, but I can see that it took 25% of his health with it.
Concentrating, I focus on casting a Waterspout from my left hand as I cast Lightning from my right and through the staff. I'm getting resistance from my left and I am focusing harder than I ever have. Getting the spell to form in my left hand at the same time as another one is nearly impossible. When I'm done charging the Lightning spell on my right I just hold it and divert some of my focus to the left. After a few critical seconds it feels like something gives and the Waterspout spell builds in my left hand, ready to release. It is taking more mana to cast than it should but it's ready. With a pounding head I look to the Captain again and see that while I was preoccupied Azzaria cast a roots spell on him to snare his feet, but he has cut through one side already. Timbre is fighting back though. Whenever he takes his focus off her to try and cut the other leg free she comes at him with
a swing of her hammer. He has to parry the strike and doesn't take any damage from it, but it's keeping him from getting mobile again.
Stationary as he is, now is the best time to take my shot. Not knowing how long I have, I point my left hand and my staff at the enemy before releasing my spells. The water shoots forward first and then the lightning. Midway to their target the spells become one and continue as a sparking column of water that plows into Brock. The force of it knocks Brock back a step and, with his leg still bound by roots, he trips and falls to the ground. He is below 50 percent health and he isn't wearing a helmet so I can see that he is pissed. Plus, the cursing and insults spewing from his mouth are a dead giveaway that he isn't happy. On his butt on the ground he raises his sword that glows with a skill activation and swipes it behind him. An arc of force can be seen coming from the sword and expanding out about 10 feet from him where he turned and aimed behind. The two rogues appear after being hit by the skill about 5 feet from the Captain. They get thrown back another 5 feet and land on their backs. During this I was downing one of my new mana potions because I have been burning through most of my mana. Faster than I can believe, he slashes the roots off his leg and hops onto his feet. Timbre moves to ram him with her shield but his sword glows again and it blurs forward into her shield. In the corner of my vision I can see her health take a slight dip even though the blow was to her shield. The strength of the skill knocks her down and back a few feet.
A Mage Prepared Page 27
