After a night of joy and party for the sellsword company, a morning of laziness and dizzy eyes took place, to nobody’s surprise. The men attempted to shook themselves awake while Donbert was already taking account of their supplies, almost smirking at his choice of not drinking much the previous night. “We were here to do our jobs, ya meadheads.” The archer said as he thumbed through his book with a crooked smile, to which the hangover mercenaries grunted and nodded. “It’s m’home, I’ll go take care of it.” Svein answered as he started gearing up, sounding a bit more disgruntled than anyone would expect a man coming back home. The butcher took Wolf with him and went back into his old hometown.They looked for any job board or local leader, which was made a bit difficult by the commoners apparently evading them and mumbling amongst themselves. It didn’t took much time for Svein to reach the townhall, where a frowning militiaman stepped between the door and the sellswords. “You’ve got guts ta come back around here, butcher, but ya’ve gotta be stupid to show up right to the mayor’s hall, eh?” To which the stone-skinned giant only answered with a grunt and the placement of his hand on the hilt of his sheathed sword, just enough to have the guard reconsider his words and shrink, heading inside as he mumbles. “… I’ll fetch da steward.” During the wait for said steward, Wolf was left to think of the situation, but the drunkard was never paid enough to respect this ‘fear’ thing, looking up at Svein before throwing a question his way. “So, what’s the bad blood all ‘bout? I’ve stolen many an innkeeper’s supply and even they didnae hold such a grudge against me.” To which the butcher answered with his usual quiet nature. “Was a butcher, they said I tortured animals and killed people, folks don’t like that.” Wolf was slightly appalled by the statement, but his curiosity was greater than any fear. “Well, did ye?” Svein kept his lips sealed for a few moments, before looking back at the door they were waiting to see open, abruptly ending the conversation.After a few minutes of awkward silence, the door opened with a dignified-looking man walking up to them, giving the stink eye to Svein. He asked for their business to which Wolf informed him about their status as sellswords, and their comrades waiting by the town exit. Soon enough the man budged and presented himself as Baduin the steward of Eurenkrug, finally offering them a job that payed a bit over six hundred crowns, hunting a group of particularly troublesome bandits that had been harrying the village – something they were getting increasingly accustomed with. Wolf with gold in his eyes signed the contract without a question and headed back for their camp in the outskirts, all the while during the talk Svein just loomed, not helping his reputation in the area.Soon enough, they returned to their fold and broke camp, heading up north in the road – Anton saw tracks leading to the nearby forests but betted on his mother that they were heading for the road, to do what brigands to best.They travelled during the night, mostly wishing that Anton’s gamble was correct, otherwise this would be a huge loss of time and they’d be risking losing the trail of these robbers. The road took a bend westwards as the sun rose among the northern peaks, the mountains were still dark but their outline was illuminated by the pink of dawn, it wasn’t the only thing highlighted by the light of day though – it also shone upon a group of travelers high up on the mountains, the poor armor denoting them as brigands, and the direction of the footprints confirming them to be Eurenkrug’s assaulters. The Doomslayers left their cart behind to chase them up the mountains, at one point the raiders gave up and turned downhill, meeting the mercenaries on the field.Fortunately for the sellswords, the terrain for the battle was a strange plateau among the rocky hills, but it did also allow them to see their foe clearly, a bit under half of them leathers and chain mails never seen among their previous encounters with robbers, now the bigger pay from Baduin made complete sense, not that they had a problem with it. The sellswords -as always- held their position and had Donbert harry them with as many arrows as he could, which caused the bandits to charge in. Lady luck was again on the Doomslayers’ side as their numbers were greater, surrounding the well-armed foes to slowly take out their weaker links before confronting the stronger ones, their equipment protected their skin but not their minds. Strangely enough the battle ended shortly after, with a few hurt by the brigands but no serious wounds, the sellswords carried the spoils back to their cart and started following the road back to a good day’s pay.On the afternoon of the same day they arrive, the whole group walking into the village to bring the news back to the steward. The local leader didn’t initially believed them, but the ‘new’ gear on both Wolf and Svein convinced him otherwise, finally giving up the paid considered juicy by the ex-beastslayers. With their bad streak broken in Eurenkrug, they considered one job enough and bid Baduin farewell, deciding to go eastwards back to the Fairdale to see if any of the other Niedergard settlements had new problems.They had enough supplies and able bodies for now, so they stopped at Hellstadt only to peruse the shops and look for more possible opportunities. While the rest were shopping, sleeping or drinking, Anton was stopped by a merchant, apparently taking a liking for his trained strut and looks. “You’ve got a group, boy? We’ve got a big haul and we’re heading south, and those damned Nieders have all the guards this side of the Hogfolk Mountains in their pockets, so we need some.” The militiaman was still shocked by the abrupt interruption to his day, to which he only nodded before the merchant shoved a parchment on his arms before walking away. “We depart in half an hour, either come or someone else will get the money.” The Eel still thoroughly stunned looked down at the parchment, upon looking at the contents his eyes would’ve popped if they could – and thus he immediately ran around the town to see who he could find first.“A THOUSAND crowns!? Half an hour or no go!? We gotta get the boys!” Wolf almost screamed, not knowing if he was seeing multiple zeros in the paper from the sum or his drunken stupor, one way or the other he started running with Anton, scouring the trade city of Hellstadt for the other eight of them. Many were easy to find, although the ones enjoying the company of women -paid or otherwise- had to be dragged along by Svein and Tostig, the two biggest bodies in the company. By a miracle of the old gods themselves, they made it to the entrance of the town while the caravan was still there, with the merchant that Anton met before standing with three guards in padded armor, somehow looking worse equipped than their own company.“Where are we headed, boss?” Gerhard approached the fat merchant while the rest of the sellswords were getting ready, shields buckled and gambeson caps secured. “Dahab, down south past Southern Reach.” He simply said, while Gerhard rubbed his blackened beard, they barely saw the Southern Reach desert while fighting those southerners a few days ago, the huge payday didn’t seemed so big now, it shrunk in the prospect of the travel – but they were already there, the biggest loss a mercenary can afford isn’t coin, but face.It didn’t take long for the group to set out on the roads, going down the windy roads toward the southern lands, passing by the mighty citadel of Siegfeste, it was very hard to not look at the ancestral fortress, but eventually the lot of them were able to get away.As the brown dirt turned to steppe and the stepped turned to sand as they came across the mountain pass between the Thundering Peaks – the barrier of nature that separated the northern noble houses from the desert of south and the mysterious men who lived there. To the surprise of no one with a few weeks of road experience under their belt, brigands were waiting at the mountain pass to assault anyone through the only avenue connecting these two worlds. They were wearing vividly red clothing with black foreign icons on them, this breed of bandits was familiar to the Doomslayers, not unlike the southerners they’ve faced before around this area. The desert nomads approached the caravan with malicious intent as the sellswords got into formation in front of it, with the three other caravan guards standing behind the liner – raring to go into battle. The fight was easy enough for the company, taking the necessary precautions to slowly tire out the highwaymen with a slow but brutal advance, luck wasn’t so much on the trio of caravan protector’s side, two of them charging for glory and coin and impaling themselves in the skilled spears of the desert dwellers, the other one learning from his companions and staying in line. Shortly after the loot was distributed and damages were addressed, the caravan started marching again.Now almost completely out of the valley, the men came across an empty old cart, most likely a previous victim of the southern ambushers. Wolf ran ahead of the group to take a look at it, by the time that the caravan and the rest of his comrades were passing by him, the drunkard was hammering off the sides and wheels off the ramshackle cart. “Back in the farmlands, ya’ve gotta take whatever destiny throws at you, these are some nice supplies jus’ waiting to be taken!” He blurted out as he beckoned his brother and some others to help, quickly disassembling the cart and turning it to wood and metal for future repairs.At noon they made it out of the Thundering Peaks valley, looking onwards to the ever-expansive desert, trying to search for their destination in the sea of sand. “See that city there? That’s Karrakan, past that is the Southern Reaches, and past *that* there’s our place.” The merchant pointed out from his donkey, pointing past a comparatively small settlement in the desert, like a glittering gem embedded into the dirt.Getting to Karrakan took longer than what it seemed from the Thundering Peaks, reaching the city well into the night of the same day, and it was very different from what they gleamed from far away. The farms and pens looked like they did in all other places, but the walled light brown city looked like something from another world, from the tall odd-colored walls to the golden spires sprouting from its center. Despite the men’s awe, the city was closed at night and they had a job to do, there still was a stretch of the journey left.When the sun started to raise, so did the heat. The Doomslayers quickly remembered why they stayed in the Niederlands for their jobs, the north was filled with savages and Perowingers while the south was plagued by blistering heat and quick-witted brigands. But not all was bad, well into the Southern Reaches they were able to see another city among the sands, the caravan leader pointed it out as Dahab and while it wasn’t quite as stunning as Karrakan, it still had plenty of Southern flair to it.Again travelling at day and arriving to civilization at night, this time they were allowed to pass given the merchant’s business in town. Before getting too deep into the strange settlement, the rotund caravan leader stopped and smiled at the Doomslayers. “This is where your job ends, you’ve done well, but hopefully I won’t need to employ sellswords again.” With that he left a small chest on Tostig’s hands, the one he assumed was leader given the travels. The container was quickly opened to show the pay they were promised, to much joy of the company to finally start to earn good coin. They cheered and laughed, each going in their own directions to spend their daily wage how they see fit before a new job brought them together and out of Dahab.With all shops and business closed for the day, it was sure for most of the company to go carousing, and so they went out in different groups to see what these strange lands had to offer.On the other hand, Tostig set out with Donbert to find a new contract, in the northern realms it wasn’t rare to find things that needed to be done at night, why would it be different here? After asking around for quite a bit, a man in colorful robes asked for them to follow him to ‘his majesty’s’ palace. It was one of the larger buildings in the city, the decoration so different to northern halls and so laced with gold that even the two experienced beastslayers had to do a conscious effort to not be slack jaw in awe. Eventually through many servants and hails on their foreign language from servants, they made it to the lavish room of the one that would hire him, a dark-skinned man whose lower half is completely swallowed by a sea of caretakers, while the man stared at the sellswords. A servant to the side spoke up in a tongue that Tostig and Donbert could understand, apparently spared from the caretaking madness. “Nomads are plaguing the lands of Vizier Zuhri Al-Bahri of the Treasury, and he has decided that it is time for them to leave this life, willing to offer seven hundred and twenty crowns to any crownlings who have enough steel and mettle. The rewards will be had on your return after clearing their hideout to the east of his majesty’s city of Dahab.” After that little practiced speech, he held out a contract written in both tongues, which Tostig signed a slight bit confused by their words and customs – and only moments after they were ushered out of the room and the palace by those who brought them there.Still a little bit stunned by this ‘vizier’, Tostig and Donbert set out in the dark of night to gather the rest, which was comparatively easier to their efforts in Hellstad. Very late into the night the entire company was gathered at the gates of the lavish city ready to head out, some of them still rather dissatisfied with being pulled away from their break so fast after such a long travel. One way or the other, they set out into the roadless deserts in the night, wrapping themselves in their best cloaks and hoods to withstand the deadly cold of desert nights – which they experienced in their travels up to Dahab with the caravan.With the indications in the contract, it was rather easy to find the location of the bandit’s hideout, they saw the poor tents on top of a sandy hill and doubled back a little bit, to set camp behind a cliff where they wouldn’t be seen, to wait for the morning so Donbert could exploit their ill-fitted armors.Dawn came with other sounds besides morning birds, screams of a poor soul in the direction of the nomad lair. Most of the men from the Doomslayers peeked over the hill to spy the situation, the only missing being Wolf who was getting up from a ferocious hangover. It was an image out of this world, a man a bit away from the tents -who they considered a patrol- was lifted upwards by the very sand around him, grabbed by both arms before these strange sand hands tore them off the screaming nomad and threw the rest to the side. The sandy shapes formed into many large humanoid shapes, slowly trudging towards the rest of the desert bandits. Safe to say, the owners of the tents were in panic, tossing arms and armor to each other to arm quickly screaming incoherencies in the language on their land. One wielding a bow delved into the biggest of the tents and screamed the word “Ifrit” several times as they all go ready for a fight. It was time for the sellswords to take a choice, either leave them to the wretched sand monsters or to slay them both to reclaim the prize offered by Dahab.Everyone within the Doomslayers were wordless for different reasons, after a few seconds Donbert was the first one to speak. “Sand demons! No one back home thought they existed, dammit! They seem to be slow though… we should be able to reach these ‘nomad’ folks before them.” Some nodded to him and some didn’t, hesitation still was heavily set after watching the outright unnatural event happen in front of them. Leif snapped out of it with a determined expression and turned to Geralt. “It’s time, go get it and be fast ‘bout it!” To which the lumberjack nodded and rushed off, coming back to the group with a longspear fixed with two large limbs near the point, with said limbs being wrapped up in a clean brown leather, he handed the strange polearm over to the one-eyed beastslayer. Leif stood up and decided to trust Donbert’s assessment, he unfurled the leather and raised the longspear high into the air, the leather tumbled down up to midway into the spear’s length, it sported a crudely painted green roaring lizard on it, while the limbs holding it were made of bone, the spear point surfacing through a sizeable skull in the middle of the limbs – it was a banner flying among the company, but more importantly it was THEIR banner. “We are slayers of beasts and bandits alike, let it be furred beast or sandy ones, grasslands bandits or desert brigands. Who says we can’t face ‘em at the same time!? This is where most other companies would cut their loses and call it a day, but we ain’t here for money, but to defend our fellow men from all dangers, including wild men tryin’ to plunder their lands. I say that we don’t spit lady luck on da face and take the chance to take ‘em out together!” Leif gave out a speech of sorts, as he usually did, but this time it was more convincing than usual, transmitting his iron will to those among him, as they raised up their weapons in the air and let out a proud war cry, getting ready to run up the hill and take both the ifrits and nomads at the same time.Leif sticked the butt of the battle standard on a solid spot in the sands to let it fly while the battle, running after the rest as they charged up the hill to the bandit encampment. They reached even grounds before the nomads noticed them, but that’s where the battle begun, with these ‘sand demons’ only halfway up the hill while the outlaws charged right for their oponents, wielding hammers, axes and curved blades that took up both hands for use, disregarding defense much more than their northern cousins. The Doomslayers used their greater numbers to overwhelm the nomads on the left flank while the right one was held only by Leif and Wolf, who were fighting a brutish hammer-wielding southerner. Both flanks were won by the sellswords by smart and lucky moves alike, although not without a hitch. On the right flank, the nomad hammerman was able to give a strong strike to Leif before falling to Donbert’s arrows and Wolf’s spear – Leif wasn’t killed, but he slowly retreated from the battle with his chest wounds re-opened and ribs broken. Eventually the bandits were picked clean, but the mercenaries quickly turned north and formed a shield wall as the lumbering sand colossus approached them, getting to their height just as the last of the nomads was felled.These things fought like nothing they ever saw before, a strange novelty to even the three experienced beastslayers. They gripped and hurled parts of themselves at the shield wall, and the very projectiles would animate after the fling to keep attacking until smitten to pieces. Their projectiles and strikes were many, but most were blocked the wall of colorful round shields, although the few that landed proved that their defensive approach was correct. One split Geralt’s head open as he was launched to the backlines by one of the bigger ones, a rather large projectile landed square on Hallstein’s face and sunk his now-broken nose, a spiked clobber by one of the smaller ones battered one of Gerhard’s legs and one of the larger ones severely harmed Svein’s shield arm. But once was set and done, these demons could only be divided so much until they stopped moving, and eventually the company reached that point and claimed victory over both bands of foes.As luck would have it, all survived, even Geralt and Leif with their more severe wounds just needed a bit of patching up to keep going, although further help at a temple would be advised – as Leif knew from previous experiences. Besides all usable valuables, several heads and a banner among the tents was taken to signify their victory over them, they didn’t rust the southern lords yet, so any proof of their deeds would secure them a payday. Many congratulations and claps on the back were had among the company, although the truest were given to Donbert and Leif, for convincing the rest to go forward during the pivoting moment.While the rest counted the many foodstuffs, weapons and coins found among the nomads, Donbert sat on one of their rugs while writing down on his journal, the light of the morning allowed him to see Dahab in the distance and with that their next payday – and the prospect of exploring what these southerners are all about. But that would be a job for the future beastslayer, as he committed himself to noting down their inventory and notes for now.‘New prospects:Deceased:------ 16th dawn of the Doomslayers’ Was noted down on Donbert’s journal as he smiled at the spoils of today’s gamble. Although tomorrow had many answers, such as where they would go next, who would live, who would die, and where in the old gods’ grace did Leif and Geralt got that banner thing.---------------------------------------------If you've got this far, thanks for reading! I'm still figuring out my style and i appreciate all comments and critics, don't be afraid to share your opinion. via /r/BattleBrothers https://ift.tt/2JZWhmJ
No comments:
Post a Comment