by Scott Seier
A branch snapped off to his left. Both Siren and Blitz swung to face the noise. At first they didn't see anything. The stared into the canopy that surrounded them and held completely still. Blitz looked into the lightly swaying leaves, something in his mind was telling him that he was missing something. A small gust rocked the trees all around them. There! No, there was a single patch that didn't move with the rest. Focusing Blitz's heart dropped into his feet, then down to the earth below. A fanged face was grinning at him through the branches. Fur ringed his face and his jaw was elongated more than was natural. His eyes were a deep silver color while his pupils were stark yellow. "Found you." The face growled out, a deep, resonating voice that Blitz could feel in his chest. "Shit."
The girl is channeling a large amount of mana into something unpleasant.
The singer happened to be perched on one such branch. My summon sent her crashing down to the ground with dozens of similarly thick branches battering her from all sides until she hit the ground, landing in a heap of rather pointy broken wood. Couldn't have been very comfortable. Well done. I was going to just take her head when she wasn't watching, but that works too. I smacked myself in the forehead.
There was a roar of anger from above me and I looked up just in time to see an archer clothed in all red armor aim a shot at me. He spat out a few deadly sounding words and his arrow lit up pure white. Will crashed through some intervening branches and swiped at the archer, but the red clad man leapt into open space to avoid the attack, then let his shot fly anyway. The missile streaked towards me, way faster than I could hope to react. In that moment I really regretted not throwing all of my saved attributes into agility. I may have been able to dodge if I had. The arrow got within five feet of me, then Vigil blurred out of nowhere and coiled himself around the glowing projectile. There was a muted pop and the Vigil reformed himself and dropped the ashy remains of the arrow. Not to worry. Well within my ability to deal with. I gawked at my friend.
The archer fell with a look of shock when his attack was so easily negated. Before he hit the ground he tucked his body into a roll, took the hit on his braced shoulder, and smoothly came to his feet taking no damage. We stared at each other for a few seconds, both eyeing each other up. Vigil spread himself in a wide veil around my head and shoulders, readying himself to deflect any further attacks. The archer spat to the side and then leapt backwards. He turned in mid-air, and hit the ground running. Sprinting towards the heap of wood his partner had fallen in. Will dropped from the canopy with a thunderous thud and went after him. Will got within ten feet of him when he finally exhumed his Friend from her DIY tomb. She did not look good...
Blood ran from several wounds and her arm was bent at an odd angle, but she was conscious, and positively enraged. She was screaming at the archer in red, battering him with ineffective blows with her unbroken limb. Will was a hairs-breadth away from taking her head clean off when the archer made another massive leap backwards. Some kind of movement ability. While in the air he somehow juggled his injured friend and knocked an arrow, putting a green glowing shaft into Wills chest before landing. Will growled and ripped the arrow out, barely flinching, but he didn't pursue. He looked back over his shoulder and sniffed the air for a moment. A toothy smile splitting his animalistic face.
Billy dropped from the trees at the same time Hael and Gleer burst through some underbrush nearby. We all converged, our groups full fighting strength returned. For a long time the archer and singer shot daggers at us with their eyes, but they were clearly outmatched in this conflict. Will alone could have probably taken them. The singer locked eyes with Gleer and our mage smiled brightly in response. "How did you break that silence? It was supposed to be nearly indispellable?" Gleer called across the gap between us, more real curiosity in her voice than taunting. The singers eyes widened and her nostrils flared with anger. "You'll pay for that, little pig." She tried to take a step forward, but her left ankle gave out. The archer taking more of her weight for her so she wouldn't fall. She shot a look at me then. "And you'll pay for this, you piece of trash. You got lucky."
Hael smiled kindly at the feral girl and her archer protector. "Feel free to try and enact that vengeance at any time, but I suggest that for now, you retreat and get patched up. If you die here there's no way that you'll respawn before we end this." The archer spat again and the singer's eyes widened even further, oceans of rage rolling off of her. "You shit stains don't know what's coming your way. We're the strongest group under level twenty! In all of Acrion! There isn't any chance you could beat us in a straight fight. And even if you could, Grim would wipe you all out like insects." Hael just shrugged at her words. "I gave you the chance to leave... Billy?"
Our hunter spun out from behind our group and launched three arrows in under a second. The red archer dropped his charge to the ground like a sack of potatoes and shot two of the incoming arrows out of the air with arrows of his own, dodging the third smoothly. The two bow wielding players squared off, both uncertain about the others relative skill.
The red archer was first to make a move. He launched a glowing shot at...me? Billy knocked it out of the air in the same way he had deflected her opening attack. The explosive shot hit the ground nearby and detonated, sending a pillar of dirt into the air, but leaving everyone unharmed. The archer cursed and gripped his bow tightly enough to make his knuckles go white. Billy was as calm as ever. Unflappable.
The two marksmen eyed each other for another few seconds, Billy simply waiting for him to make a mistake, as he tried desperately to ascertain any sort of weakness that she may have. She had none... trust me. He apparently realized this eventually. He knocked an arrow and aimed it at the ground between his feet. The area surrounding the two outlaws was immediately obscured with a red tinted smoke. Billy crouched and looked like she was going to charge into the smokescreen, but Will grabbed her arm and held her back. "You don't want to do that." He rumbled out. Billy snapped her head towards the last known location of her target just as the entire cloud of smoke ignited and exploded. After a few seconds the dust cleared enough to see that both he, and the crippled singer, were gone.
Billy straighted up and nodded her thanks to Will. The lycandruid just rubbed his nose. "The stuff he uses stinks, I couldn't miss it even if I tried."
"Interesting how she didn't try to mind control us." Gleer said casually as we all took stock of the situation. "She did start pouring a bunch of mana into something earlier. That's why I..." I pointed vaguely at the tree that stood nearby, most of the bark and all of the branches a
long its entire side was gone. "I see." Gleer said, eying the damage. "Can you increase the weight of that barrier you summon? No way it should of had the necessary force to do that." I tilted my head and began to answer but was interrupted by Hael. "Sorry to break up the meeting of the minds, but I'm feeling more vulnerable the longer I'm out of contact with my information guys." The rogue looked around and glanced at Will. "Any sign that they may be up to something? Or do you think we're good to head out?"
Hael ordered us back to the information group's last known location the moment it was clear that the archer wasn't still lurking around somewhere. When we finally found our four non-combat raid members, Joe confirmed that two signatures had moved in a straight line out of his range and that no one had come back from that way since. Hael sighed in relief. "Those guys are no joke. Didn't think many people could match Billy in a one on one duel." Our hunter scoffed and turned her back on Hael. He chuckled. "Not that you wouldn't have toasted him if he didn't run away." Billy shot him a look over her shoulder and through her hair, but nodded once.
I didn't notice where that conversation went. I was too busy trying to figure out if our raid was hidden somewhere nearby and I was just too obtuse too notice a few hundred players. "Hey, where's the army? Weren't you guys grouping them up?" I said. Looking around the small pocket of short grass that we were standing in. "Back at the crater, we couldn't risk running them into another trap, so we left them behind. We have Joe here scanning to see if our red archer friend decides to lob a big one at us again. It's the best place to stage them at the moment. We kept our info group here in this clearing to make sure they won't get caught up in any errant attacks from random outlaws around the crater. Gleer set up some solid invisibility charms to make sure they wouldn't be seen." Hael patted Gleer on the shoulder, but the mage girl was back to reading, completely enraptured, and probably didn't notice that he was speaking at all.
The Push...And The Push Back
We made it back to the crater fairly quickly. The sight was less than inspiring though. Healers were running around from player to player, trying to patch up as many as they could. There was a man with a wagon full of huge casks ( I have no idea how he got a wagon into the middle of the forest) who was passing out mana potions to whoever asked. And there were three ladies who were set up near the mana guy that were patching and repairing damaged armor.
I also noticed there was a very elaborately armored caster sitting inside a circle that he had drawn in the dirt, he was of particular interest to me, because his level read 19, but his bearing was identical to that of the raiders Milenta had called in. I raised an eyebrow in Hael's direction and the rogue just shrugged. "We needed some help so I brought in some help. Briget there is going to put up a small portal for us to bring in some low level mercs. If we can agree on a good price that is..." I eyed the mage again. I'd seen comparable leveled casters attempt to transport players. They died... if this guy thought he could put up a portal and maintain it as a horde of mercenaries tramped through it, then I would need to get some pointers from him. All of his skills, abilities, and gear would have to be top notch to pull something like that off.
As I eyed the meditating player, a lone arrow arched lazily towards the portal wizard from somewhere in the trees nearby. I tensed and got ready to call out the attack, but a tiny streak of blue light intercepted the arrow before it could pose any real threat.
Hael laid his hand on my shoulder. "The outlaws are still out there, they're just testing or defenses, but we have confirmation that the bulk of their forces are about two miles south of here. We got Joe, along with a few others with similar tracking skills working round the clock to keep tabs on them." Hael smiled in a semi-strained way when I just raised an eyebrow in response, then he walked off to do whatever it is that he does. I absentmindedly brushed my hand over the gauntlet that Vigil was currently in the shape of. Another arrow shot into the crater area, only to be taken down again by the same blue light.
I wandered over to where Will and Billy were standing just in time to catch the last thing that Will was saying. "And what's with him giving those jerks a chance to run? He should have just ordered me to rip them apart. Or Lyst, he could have sent that knife cloud thing." Will caught sight of me then and swept me into a half hug. "Perfect timing! You're telling me that his summon couldn't have put both of them down? I just don't get Hael sometimes."
Billy stood stoically, and didn't answer right away, seemingly taking her time to formulate a proper response. "I believe," she started slowly. "That the singer was the lynch pin of their entire opening move. I'm thinking that Hael wanted her to escape so that her death didn't bring any unforeseen consequences." Will was about to interrupt but Billy pushed on. "If the girl died, then Hael would have to try and plan a new strategy around how her death may effect the enemy commander's moves. It's a complicated principle, but at least with her still on the board we know what she can do. If she died and was replaced in some capacity we would have to redo all of the work we put into trying to figure out her ability. We already sniffed out all of the thralls that she was keeping in reserve within our ranks, and we have a way of consistently tracking her, and that archer. On top of that, thanks to you, we know that their two abilities increase the potency of each other. These are all things that we have in our back pockets that they don't know we know. I agree with Hael's move. The enemy you know is never the one that surprises you."
Will took his time and mulled over the huntress's words. I'd been curious about Hael's decisions during that skirmish as well. Even ordering just Billy to take on the archer by herself. I could see now that he was most likely planning on their escape the whole time. We talked amongst ourselves for a few more minutes, until Laz came around and told us that Hael was setting up a little planning session and that the raid was officially going on break for the next hour. Well, everyone got a break except us. joy.
"I'm not completely sure of it, but from what I could smell, both of their abilities originate from their bodies in some way. Biologically... in a video game kind of way. The woman's breath is what was producing the enthralling effect. She used a separate ability, in her voice, to spread and direct it. That's my best guess at least. When she was yelling at us, the whole area began to stink, but she didn't have enough mana to trigger the mind control effects. The archer on the other hand. His was different, I would have been completely in the dark if I didn't witness him use that smokescreen thing. It's masked under the sickly sweet scent of that explosive stuff, but there was the scent of blood. I think his blood is what he derives his explosive attacks from. I have absolutely no idea why they got stronger when they got closer, but I can confirm that the potency of both of their abilities doubled, at least, when they were standing next to each other."
Will took a step back from the center of the small semi-circle that we'd formed for our meeting, reclaiming his previous spot now that his report was finished. "In that case, Gleer, I need you to take care of the girl. Billy, the archer. Separate them if possible, but when our team comes into direct conflict with them, and I'm sure it will eventually come to that, then you have your assignments." Hael didn't waste time, both girls nodded their understanding. "That leaves the other three... and this "Grim" that she spoke of." Curious, I raised my hand and Hael paused, acknowledging me before he went on.
"How do we know they are a standard group size plus Grim. I assume that Grim was the one who addressed us at the walls, right? So four others appeared. Five total." Hael glanced at Billy and jerked his head in my direction. "You wanna do the honors?" The huntress sighed, but started talking without rubbing my face in my own ignorance too much. "The girl, when she was yelling at us. She gave us a few key pieces of information that I don't think her commander would have approved of. Firstly, she said that her group was the strongest group under level 20. That's self explanatory. They are all under 20, certainly good for us to know. Secondly she said that if they couldn't take us out, then Grim would be able to do it. She
disconnected him from her first statement about her group. Normally I would say that it didn't matter, but the fact that Grim showed up with those four near Four Flags tells me that he actually is hiding a sixth person, or rather the fifth to that specific group, and that he is separate. This idea is slightly reinforced because we know for a fact that none of the outlaws ever drop any money when they die. That means someone is holding it all. One might think that it's their leader, but this Grim character would probably never risk holding on to that much on the off chance he got taken out somehow. If I were him, I would use a hyper specialized player to be my bank. Knowing that this guy has recruited four extremely unique players to his cause already, means that it's very likely he snagged a fifth. When the girl was referring to her "strongest group", I'm confident that she was talking about the manticore and bigfoot shifters, herself and the archer, and lastly the banker. Grim is just the mastermind, and apparently the overwhelmingly strongest, although that has yet to be confirmed."
"Are we all caught up now?" Hael said, looking around our little circle. "Good, like I was saying. The other three, then Grim. We have the Manticore, the Bigfoot, the banker, and Grim to deal with. Based on what we've seen, the Manticore will be fast and stealthy, so I think that I'm the best match for it at this point. Will, your job is a bit of a mixed bag. Your muscle is the only thing that could probably match that bigfoot guy, so initially I need you to deal with him, but you are also the most powerful overall in our group, so I will need you to intercept Grim if he decides to intervene in the fight." Will shook his head. "I'm not so sure about that one boss."
