Battleborne

by Dave Willmarth

  “Ha!” Captain Rockbreaker thought about it for a few seconds. “No, no objection.”

  “Great! I could use some more practice to level up my Archery skill.”

  “Hold on just a second.” Rockbreaker closed his eyes, and a notification popped up for Max.

  Quest Received: Shoot to Kill

  Scout the enemy position and return alive to report on what you observe. Bonus objective: Pick off any unwary guards if you manage to get in range of your bow. Reward: 10,000xp; Bonus Reward: 250xp for each grey dwarf killed; 500xp for each grey dwarf killed with a head shot; Additional 1,000xp and +1 to Archery skill for every ten grey dwarves killed.

  Max grinned and held up a fist for the captain to bump, taking several seconds to realize the dwarf had never seen or heard of a fist bump. Awkwardly dropping his hand, he accepted the quest, equipped his bow and quiver, and waved at the dwarves before setting off into the mushroom forest.

  The moment he was out of sight of the dwarves, Max crouched low, as low as a seven foot tall chimera could, and practically tippy-toed through the mushrooms. He moved slowly, placing each foot carefully, toe first, then his heel. He did his best to move quietly since he was in no hurry. Max kept his bow ready with an arrow nocked, just in case.

  About halfway across the cavern, he spotted movement out of the corner of his eye, off to his right. Freezing in place, he turned his head slowly to focus on the motion. About ten yards away a creature emerged from behind a large mushroom, standing on four legs with its head raised and sniffing. Max stared at it for a few seconds, not even breathing.

  Fungal Stalker Female

  Level 15

  Health: 900/900

  It appeared to be a cross between a boar and a cat. Its rounded snout, beady eyes and tusks were all pig, as was its pot belly. But it had the sleek fur and grace of a large predatory feline, with cat paws that sported sharp claws, and a long tail that twitched slightly.

  He watched the creature sniff the air, moving its head side to side as if trying to determine a direction. After several seconds, it snorted once and turned its back to him, trotting back behind the same large mushrooms.

  You have learned the skill: Stealth!

  By moving carefully and quietly, you have approached a fungal stalker’s den without being detected. Though their eyesight is poor, they are able to focus on movement, and stalkers have a keen sense of smell. Good thing you didn’t try to run. And that you don’t stink too badly. Your instincts, luck, and forethought have combined to earn you the Stealth skill. Now let’s see if you can sneak safely away.

  Continued use of this skill may increase its level and functionality.

  Max shook his head at the snarky tone of the notification, and decided he wasn’t going to retreat. Instead, he moved to his right toward where the creature had disappeared. Moving even more carefully than before, he stepped behind a large mushroom stalk, then stopped to take a few quiet breaths. Peeking around the other side, he spotted just the snout of the stalker laying on the ground, snot leaking from its nostrils as it breathed in and out. He was maybe thirty feet from where the creature lay.

  Taking one more deep breath to calm himself, he raised his bow, drew the string tight, and took a half step sideways. Sighting down the arrow shaft, he quickly loosed at the stalker’s head.

  It heard the twang of the bowstring, but by the time it opened its eyes and began to react, the arrow plunged deep into its head just behind its feline ear. There was a loud squeal of surprise and pain as the stalker actually got to its feet, the body following its brain’s last command for a moment before going limp and falling back onto its belly.

  Critical Hit! You have executed a fatal sneak attack from stealth on an unwary foe.

  Max whispered, “One shot, one kill.” to himself as he listened for any reaction to the stalker’s cry. He’d learned early in his career that failing to silently kill a sentry often brought more.

  When after thirty seconds he saw and heard nothing, he moved forward and placed a hand on the creature to loot it. He received his arrow back, along with both tusks, thirty pounds of fungus stalker meat, and its heart. Not wasting any time, he quickly searched the area in case there was a nest of some kind. Finding nothing, he continued toward the city wall, now consciously engaging his Stealth skill. He quickly found that using the skill made him move more quietly, slightly faster, and with less effort than before. Moving from cover to cover, he kept an eye out for any patrols or other local creatures as he advanced.

  Half an hour later he was well within firing range of the wall. There was a fifty-foot wide open space along the entire base, an obvious kill zone. He crouched behind a large stalk about ten feet back from the forest edge and used his dark elf vision to Examine the wall itself. It was nearly perfectly smooth on its face, with just a few chips here and there low to the ground, as if some creature or entity had tried to break through with claw or hammer. At the top of the wall, he could make out the angry faces of grey dwarves in full armor as they stared out at the cookfires of the growing Darkholm army on their doorstep. They spoke to each other, the words harsh and unintelligible to Max.

  Looking to his left and right, he found that he’d emerged from the fungal forest well to the left of the gates. He could see them about fifty yards down, closed tightly and imposing in their size. The wall itself was twenty feet high, with the gate house rising up another ten. The twin doors of the gate were each twenty feet tall by ten feet wide, and looked heavy.

  Max also spied a small cluster of rocks off to his left, and headed that direction. He quickly realized they were the broken remains of a huge stalactite that must have fallen from the cavern ceiling. Looking up, he saw several score more of them hanging down.

  Using the fallen stone as cover, Max drew another arrow and took aim at the top of the wall, His elven vision had no trouble picking out targets as they moved back and forth. Selecting a grey dwarf that was on its own near the point where the dwarf-made wall ended, merging with the stone of the cavern wall, he loosed the arrow just as the target stopped and turned.

  It flew like a shot up over the stone and into the grey dwarf’s side. Another successful sneak attack! There was a grunt of pain, and the dwarf disappeared. A second later there was a loud crash, and the other greys began to shout. Max guessed that he’d knocked the grey dwarf off the rampart to fall into the courtyard beyond.

  Knowing he had seconds before his enemy figured out what was going on, Max chose another target that was facing outward toward him. A deep breath, a release, and that one took an arrow to the face. He didn’t wait for it to fall, nocking another arrow and firing at a third target that had his back to Max. The arrow punched through the left upper quadrant of the grey’s back, where Max hoped its heart was. No point in shooting it in the head, as the helm might have deflected the arrow.

  The greys quickly figured out what was happening, and several crossbows fired from atop the wall in Max’s general direction. He crouched down behind the broken stalactite, listening to the shouts of the greys and the snicks of bolts impacting or glancing off of the rock. Keeping low, Max crawled toward one of the rocks, then behind a large mushroom stalk. Not bothering to be quiet with all the shouting going on, he got to his feet and moved quickly toward another nearby stalk, five steps away. He held his breath as he moved, expecting a crossbow bolt to ruin his day any second.

  When Max made it to cover again unpunctured, he paused to breathe. His heart was pounding and adrenaline was rushing through his system. A quick peek from behind the stalk showed the greys were still firing at his previous position. Once again choosing the target closest to the left end of the wall, he put an arrow into that grey’s face before retreating back toward his own lines. He only moved maybe twenty feet back before stopping to put his back against a stalk. There he waited to see if the gates would open to allow a patrol to emerge.

  Five minutes passed, and the shouting quieted. The gates didn’t open, and no patrol was eviden
t. Max sat in the darkness under his chosen mushroom and watched as much of the wall as he could see. When he spotted two grey dwarves speaking quietly and pointing out over the wall, he assumed one of them was an officer of some kind. He waited until he clearly saw one of them issue a command, and the other turned to bark orders at the troops. Taking careful aim, he targeted the commander’s face, and put an arrow into his open mouth as he spoke. Another arrow followed right behind, narrowly missing the subordinate officer, or maybe a sergeant, who ducked down behind the stone just in time. Still, the arrow struck a grey dwarf that had been behind him, and Max heard the subsequent crash of another grey dwarf body striking the courtyard below.

  The greys became infuriated, and the one shouting orders popped back up to glare in Max’s direction. A moment later more crossbow bolts flew his way, and he once again retreated. This time he moved to a spot just beyond the farthest point he’d seen any of the bolts reach. Still easily within range of his longbow, he could now safely snipe at targets on the wall without worrying about return fire.

  And that’s just what he did. Moving from left to right, he stood and fired arrow after arrow, hitting faces, chests, and one arm of a dwarf that was pointing directly at him and shouting something. He laughed aloud as the greys roared in frustration, angry that their superior height did not give them superior range over whomever was firing up at them. Max had hit, and hopefully killed, more than a dozen of the enemy when a large stone came soaring up over the wall, headed in his direction. The pointing grey dwarf had apparently been a spotter, and good at his job. The stone arced downward and struck the mushroom that Max had just stepped out from behind. He dove to his right, ducking into a roll that quickly brought him back to his feet behind another mushroom. He took a few seconds to fire again, this time at a target far to his left, hoping the deception would make the greys think he’d moved back in that direction. Another target took an arrow, this time through its exposed throat.

  The greys had finally had enough. Three thick, knotted ropes were lowered from the top of the wall, and almost immediately a grey dwarf began climbing down each one. Max grinned, targeting the nearest and putting an arrow into its back before it was halfway down. The other two also died before they reached the ground, but several more were already descending each rope above them. Max fired twice more, the shots to the backs of defenseless foes hanging on ropes all scoring critical hits. When half a dozen of them had reached the ground, raised shields, and were charging across the kill zone toward him, Max turned and ran.

  The dwarves pursued, more than twenty of them shouting and pounding their way through the forest after him. He easily outran them, his legs nearly as long as their entire bodies. Occasionally he stopped and fired at them, mostly hitting shields. Though twice he caught ones near the rear of the group with shields lowered, and racked up two more kills.

  Eventually they realized they weren’t going to catch him, and turned back. Max made them regret turning their backs on him, taking a grey low in the back with a non-fatal wound. When another dwarf turned to help his wounded comrade, Max shot him in the face. The others quickly abandoned the one with the arrow stuck through his guts and retreated. Max calmly walked over to the cursing grey dwarf who was attempting to pull the long arrow the rest of the way through his body. When it noticed him, looking up to snarl and shout something, Max simply shoved the sharpened lower end of his bow through its eye, silencing it. He looted the two dead dwarves, then began to follow the others back along the path, hoping they’d leave their other dead behind for him to loot as well.

  *****

  When Max reported in to Rockbreaker several hours later, he was close to leveling up again. He’d gone back to the wall twice more, picking off targets on different sections until they sent a new patrol to try and hunt him, then picking off a few of the hunters while executing strategic retreats. The greys changed tactics, sending only a couple shield bearers in the second and third hunting groups, along with several crossbow shooters and, in the last group, a level seventeen mage. The mage had been a surprise for Max. She could cast at a longer distance than the crossbows could reach, and she caught Max hanging around just outside crossbow range.

  Her first attack was a fireball, which caused Max’s heart to thump wildly as he tried to dodge the fast-moving projectile. Having flammable blood made fireballs extra terrifying. He’d not been able to dodge it completely, and it struck his left knee. Luckily the steel armor and thick leather protected him from complete immolation, though the heat did burn his skin superficially.

  Max hid behind a mushroom, then targeted the mage, half panicked at the thought of what she might do to him with a direct hit. First he cast Confuse, which worked on the entire patrol, except her. It did manage to interrupt the spell she was casting, which created enough time for Max to put an arrow through her chest. When that didn’t kill her outright, he put a second shot through her face to finish her off. Max managed four more quick shots that killed or injured other hunters before his spell wore off. The newly alert hunters saw their dead companions, and quickly retreated, once again leaving their wounded behind.

  Max stalked forward to loot the mage, and found two of the greys still struggling. One of them was conscious enough to look up at him as he approached, fear in its eyes. The grey watched as Max channeled Drain for half a minute to heal his minor burns, then stomped on the neck of his wounded comrade. He weakly held up one hand as if to ward off the monster that was coming for him.

  “Ple…please.” His voice was a strained whisper, and blood sprayed from his mouth. “No…kill.”

  Max paused, staring at the dying enemy. An idea struck him, and he asked, “You understand me?” The grey nodded his head weakly, blood loss from the arrow near his collarbone causing him to fade. “If I let you live, you will answer my questions?”

  The grey stared at him, hatred warring with his desire to live. It only took seconds for self-preservation to win out. He nodded once, closing his eyes. Max took a moment to loot the other dwarves, then knelt next to the wounded grey. He quickly snapped the arrow shaft in half, tossing away the fletched end. Reaching behind the grey’s back, he gripped the tip of the arrow and yanked the shaft free. He immediately cast Nature’s Boon on his victim, and then had to cast it again before the bleeding stopped. With the grey dwarf stabilized, but not quite healthy, Max had ended his scouting mission to return his prisoner to the Darkholm dwarves for questioning.

  And that was how he found himself standing in front of Rockbreaker, holding the diminutive prisoner by the back of the neck as he reported in and completed his quest. He’d returned alive, killed a total of twenty three grey dwarves, eleven with head shots. Unfortunately, returning with a prisoner did not award any quest bonus. But it did raise Rockbreaker’s opinion of him, as well as that of many other dwarves. The combined experience from his kills and the quest rewards finally put him over the top.

  Level up! You are now a Level 11 Chimera.

  You have earned three free attribute points.

  The dwarves took the terrified grey to one side for questioning as Rockbreaker clapped Max on the back. “Well done, Max! Bringin’ back a grey for questioning was smart. Maybe he’ll tell us what be in store for us inside them walls. Though it’s likely he’ll die, first.”

  Max shook his head. One of the first things he’d learned during his SERE training was that everyone breaks, eventually. No matter how mentally and physically tough you believe yourself to be, competent captors will eventually get information from you. The question here was whether the grey would break quickly enough for his information to be useful in taking the city. Dwarves were tough, and could tolerate a great deal of pain. And the grey hated the Darkholm dwarves down to his soul. He might resist beyond normal limits out of pure spite.

  On the other hand, the grey was a coward at heart, having begged for his life, agreeing to answer Max’s question almost without hesitation. It gave Max an idea.

  “How far are y
ou willing to go in interrogating the grey?”

  Rockbreaker’s eyebrows raised. “What do ye mean?”

  “In my world, most of the nations entered into a pact of sorts, agreeing to rules of conduct when it came to treatment of prisoners. Limiting the use of physical and mental torture as means of interrogation. Do you have something like that here?”

  “We do not.” Rockbreaker frowned. “We do have our honor, which prevents us from killin’ an unarmed prisoner. Short o’ that, what d’ye have in mind?”

  Max flashed the dwarf an evil grin, then quickly explained what he wanted, mumbling quietly into Rockbreaker’s ear so that the others wouldn’t hear. Another result of his SERE training was that he’d gained insight into the quickest, most effective ways to break someone. In this world of magic, he could modify those methods somewhat.

  When he was done speaking, Rockbreaker took a step back . “Damn.” He shook his head, impressed and a little taken aback at the same time. “I’ll need to check with the general. That be a line I’ll not cross without approval. Give us half an hour.” He took off at a jog.

  Max went to sit with his back against a mushroom stalk, and quickly assigned his free points, two into Wisdom, one into Intelligence. The longer range of the grey mage’s spells had him even more interested in developing offensive magic.

  Red appeared, standing on his knee. “I heard what you’re planning. That’s just wrong.”

  “What? The information we get from that grey might save hundreds, or even thousands, of lives. On both sides. If we can take the city quickly, without killing every grey in the place, or losing half of our force in the process, it’ll be worth it.”

  “But what you want to do is horrible.”

  “I don’t want to do it. I’m not a complete monster.” He paused when she crossed her arms and raised one eyebrow. “Okay I’m technically half monster, I guess. But that’s not what I mean. The dwarves are questioning him now. If he gives them the info we need, my way won’t be necessary. But if it becomes necessary, I’ll do what needs doing.” He frowned at her as he remembered something from childhood. “Besides, aren’t you Fae supposed to be bloodthirsty yourselves? Always leading humans to their doom, taking their hearts, stealing firstborns, that kind of thing?”