The Mayor of Noobtown

by Ryan Rimmel

  Grou’tuk was there. He had stepped just inside the short tunnel through the eastern wall that was now totally exposed. From here, he was immune to the archers above. At his shouted command, Warg after Warg were rushing in to kill us. He grinned when he saw me land in the middle of this mess. Asshole.

  I had left six defenders down here, as well as the young woman who was serving as lead healer. Even now, she was attempting to drag away one of the wounded men. Three separate Wargs, each with a rider, were already inside the courtyard, attempting to kill my remaining men. Fenris was fighting one by himself. Another man, bearing a sword and shield, was also engaged in one-on-one combat. The last goblin/Warg duo was being engaged by two men with spears, until a crossbow bolt exploded out one man’s back and he collapsed, soundlessly.

  Suddenly, the man with the sword vanished, as the Warg grabbed his leg. With a practiced motion, the wolf flung his victim to the pack. The man landed next to several other Wargs and his screams were pitifully short. The goblin glanced around and took aim at the young woman who was still desperately trying to drag away the first wounded man. He fired.

  I took all this in at a glance with Perception, so my next move could only be described as particularly stupid. Swinging with my bracer, I smacked the bolt away from the healer before rushing towards the Warg. He turned to face me as I closed in, but he wasn’t fast enough. I got near enough to drive a dagger into the side of its neck, as well as another blade into the goblin riding him. Only then did I notice that I hadn’t deflected the bolt, so much as caught it in the forearm. It caused me 9 points of damage. Stupid.

  The Warg was already wounded from his fight and died at the same moment his master did. The death of the swordsman had caused a slight delay in the Warg reinforcements. Their unplanned fresh meal gave me a moment to run to the aid of the spearman. He was still locked in mortal combat with one of the Wargs in the tunnel. He was trying to step back and give himself room to use his spear effectively, with the Warg focused on trying to strike around the sharp weapon. I struck from the side, driving both daggers into the Warg’s unprotected flank.

  With all my bonuses and the sneak attack, the Warg died instantly. The goblin rider snarled but, before he could leap at me, a spear took him in the chest. The spearman grinned. All at once, I heard the click of Grou’tuk’s crossbow. I dodged instinctively, the bolt flying past me. The dodge cost less Stamina than I would have expected, but then I remembered where I was standing. The shot meant for me had instead struck the spearman straight in the heart. The bolt didn’t stop there. It exploded out the unsuspecting man’s back, leaving a gaping hole the size of a walnut. A very bloody walnut.

  He died still grinning. Looking around, only Fenris and I were still standing. The other spearman’s throat had been torn out while I’d been fighting elsewhere.

  Two more huge Wargs and their riders were next to Grou’tuk, preparing to enter the fray. Several things occurred simultaneously. Fenris managed to shield bash the goblin rider off the Warg he was fighting. It had almost managed to break out of the tunnel into the courtyard, causing the goblin to lose the grip on his crossbow. The still loaded weapon clattered to the ground next to me at the same moment that SueLeeta finally figured out how to light up the oil.

  I was secretly hoping for a fireball. What I got was something more akin to a respectable bonfire. Grou’tuk and his Warg were in the tunnel, and not even so much as a cinder came his way, despite the fire being right behind him. The same could not be said for the other two Wargs. As they were covered in hair, the oil seemed to coat their tails and hindquarters. Both ran forward, yowling at the top of their lungs and bucking their riders into the flames. The wolves charged past me into the courtyard, where no relief awaited them.

  “I seem to have gotten you alone,” I stated, holding out my daggers.

  Grou’tuk chuckled, “I was hoping it would come down to this. I’m going to let my Warg eat your balls.” The Warg growled hungrily. With the fire behind him, and the sounds of battle all around, it was quite the site. It was also a sight to see. Especially considering he was at full health and I had… 42 hit points.

  It happened so very quickly. Grou’tuk’s Warg began to hunch down, preparing to lunge. I started rolling forward, towards him. Grou’tuk threw his crossbow to the side and drew his short blade. The Warg recalculated his lunge, now that I was so low to the ground. I grabbed the crossbow. Grou’tuk’s sword was pointing towards me in a guard position. The Warg lunged. I fired a Power Shot into its chest from the still loaded Crossbow.

  My Power Shot didn’t just travel fast and do a bit of extra damage. It also had knockback, and that was important here. When the bolt struck the Warg in the chest, it caused him to go flying backward nearly a yard, despite the fact that he was in mid process of launching himself at me. Flying backwards from his position meant flying into the fire, with a shocked Grou’tuk still on his back.

  It was not without cost, unfortunately. My Stamina replenished quickly, and I had a lot of it. It didn’t instantly replenish, though, and I’d been making extensive use of it. Furthermore, using any Marksman ability with a Mechanical Weapon increased the Stamina costs, as well as the bonus effect, by a factor of five. I’d depleted a big hunk of my Stamina for that one shot.

  The Warg bounced and kept on rolling. He had some oil on him, he was on fire, and he had suffered at 42 point wound from just the crossbow, but he was still alive. SueLeeta and the other archers fired several more arrows into him a moment later. However, Grou’tuk was not with his Warg. He had been knocked clear on the initial impact and, due to his Ride skill, had managed to get to his feet immediately while in the burning oil.

  While the burning oil wasn’t doing anything for his complexion, he didn’t plan on staying there very long. He only managed to suffer about 20% health loss before exploding out of the fire and straight towards me. He had a short sword that I suspected was magical. Meanwhile, I was armed with a discharged crossbow that was a bit undersized to use as a melee weapon. So, I Magic Shot his ass.

  His eyes widened as I dumped Mana into the weapon and fired off a second bolt. It was an immediate second shot from a crossbow that I had just shot moments before. He saw a Magical Bolt that required an absurd amount of Mana for a non-casting class. In fact, it had cost me nearly all of my Mana; I hit a Mana crash status, even after my 30 second lockout was over. It was a talent that he couldn’t have reasonably expected me to have and something that cost a fortune in Stamina to dodge.

  He couldn’t afford to. It would have cost 80 Stamina to dodge at this range; that was half my Stamina pool. He’d been riding hard to get here and had been fighting and dodging strikes from my archers. His Stamina pool wasn’t full by any means. The Magic Shot exploded against his chest in a fountain of light, blinding him momentarily. This bought me a few precious moments to roll backward and grab my daggers. He was down to about half his hit points. I was far worse off but couldn’t back down now.

  Goblin fighting relied on stabs in vital locations to reduce mobility, followed by attacks from blind spots. A quick glance at his fighting stance showed Grou’tuk would not be deviating from tradition. If I’d had a long sword, I might have been able to keep him away; with my paired daggers, I had to have a different strategy.

  He slashed at my leg; I cut his shoulder. He cut my thigh; I stabbed his arm. He kept attacking me and I kept attacking him. I made strike after strike, so that dodging all of my blows would eat up too much of his Stamina. My strategy was pure counteroffensive strikes. Anytime he struck me, I struck him back.

  He had better armor than I did, but my Defense was higher due to my Resistance perk. I spent Stamina on Mitigate, when appropriate, and Dodge, when it was cheap enough. Still, I kept on the attack. It was a knife fight where both sides managed to nearly gut the other for nearly 30 agonizing seconds.

  Finally, we broke apart. I was having to commit Stamina to avoid a bleed effect I’d gotten, and my Stamina was dangerously low. I wa
s down to a little over 13 hit points, having lost a total of 30 in the battle. Due to my Iron Will, I could feel the injuries; they were terrible. I was still able to function, though. Grou’tuk’s hit points finally dropped to 25% in the last moments of the previous clash. They were continuing to tick down as his own bleeding status took its toll.

  Outside the gate, arrows rained down on the remaining Wargs who were unable to break past the bonfire. Fenris managed to drive his sword into his opponent’s chest. The healer finally managed to drag her patient outside the tunnel.

  Grou’tuk’s expression was bleak. I wanted to collapse but my perks were keeping me on my feet, despite a status effect I had involving a dagger strike to my groin. Whatever perks goblin riders had, Iron Will was not one of them. He staggered, until the weight of all of his injuries overcame his determination.

  “You will pay for this,” he screamed, turning and running out of the tunnel. I made no effort to pursue.

  “What are you doing?” screamed Fenris, as he stood over the bodies of the other Warg and its rider, “He’s getting away!”

  I just stood there. I could do nothing else.

  Grou’tuk ran towards the other goblins. Finding a nearby Warg, he leapt onto its back and twisted it around to run. At that point, an arrow whizzed through the sky and into Grou’tuk’s skull. Instantly, the remaining battle collapsed. The Wargs were entirely done with this mess, as whatever hold Grou’tuk had over them ended as soon as he did.

  My Stamina ran out and I dropped to my knees. Fenris’ look of elation at the battle being won turned to horror as my health bar continued to drop. I had quite a few bleed effects on me and that groin wound. I brought up my character sheet just to check; I had 11 hit points and 22 points of bleed effects over the next 30 seconds. I was going to die.

  I considered calling for Shart, but I had Mana Crashed. I didn’t have any Mana to do anything with. The Iron Will saved me from the headache and pain, so I just felt distant. I called for the demon once, all the same, but he wasn’t listening.

  Breaking out of menu time, Fenris suddenly rushed over towards me. He grabbed me and started pulling a bandage out of his pack. The pretty blond healer angel pushed him aside and opened my mouth and spit into it. She was really going to town, all but regurgitating a mouthful of something.

  Something that tasted bitter, like Healing Root and something else. I started chewing the already moist pulpy mass. The second flavor was something called Staunch Berry. I loved Staunch Berry, because Staunch Berry halved the effects of bleed damage for a very short time. They also tasted like raspberries.

  I slid into unconsciousness.

  Chapter 24: After the Battle of the Western Gate Fortress

  Jim

  HP 7/175

  Stamina 87/175 (Stamina wound)

  Mana 4/40 (Mana Crash)

  I awoke shortly thereafter, much to the surprise of everyone.

  “Well that sucked,” I coughed, as Fenris and SueLeeta both stared at me in shock.

  “How are you awake?” gasped SueLeeta, who then obviously stared at me for a long moment, finding my health, “You have less than 5% health!”

  “I have a perk for that,” I wheezed, looking around. The fire was out, and there were dead Wargs and goblins everywhere. Most of the people nearby were either being ordered about by the pretty blond girl or standing there trying to figure out how they were still alive. The healer had been in charge of the auxiliaries, or healers, and I didn’t even check her name when I assigned her that role. The Battle Leader menu had just more or less placed her there, though she probably would have done it anyway, I guessed.

  ● Jarra the Healer: Alchemist Initiate

  ● HP: 25

  ● Stamina: 35

  ● Mana: 40

  ● Alchemy Initiate

  ● Herbalist Novice

  ● Glassmaker Novice

  ● Healer Novice

  An Alchemist Talent is someone who has devoted their life to the pursuit of Alchemy. They frequently pair this skill with Herbalism to find herbs from which to make their potions. Though, some also practice the skill Glassmaking in order to build the other items of their craft.

  I could also delve deeper into her character sheet with my Lore skill than others I had seen. She had Novice cooking, for example, but that didn’t show up unless I was really looking for it. It seemed that Lore auto-sorted to the class’s relevant skills, Combat skills were listed more broadly than someone's Bread Making ability. She had Novice Bread Making.

  Fenris watched me as well, again activating his Lore ability. He was trying to puzzle me out, I suspected, “We are alive and free, thanks to you.”

  “Yes,” I groaned, “What are your plans now?”

  SueLeeta leaned up against a well and looked over the destruction, “Honestly, I don’t know. We were trying to head to one of the River Cities, but we skirted too close to the old mountains.” She gestured towards the stark peaks on either side of the fortress.

  “But,” she continued, “there is a war going on out there, and worse. I don’t know if we can make it anywhere.”

  As she spoke, she eyed Fenris, “We lost people getting even this far. We think we might be able to get some of them back, but we aren’t sure. Fenris isn’t going to leave the valley until we at least check.”

  Suddenly Jarra the Healer was among us, eyeing the three layabouts with near outright hostility. She was tall for a woman, around 5 foot ten inches, and had long blond hair. She was wearing a simple green dress that had seen better days. Despite everything, she marched, not walked, towards us. Her posture was perfect and her shoulders squared. From what I could tell, she still had a bit of curve on her, despite her recent mistreatment. She had somehow found the means of cleaning her face off, too. She was pretty, even possibly beautiful, but her expression was very serious. She struck me as the kind of girl who wanted to succeed on her own merits and not on her looks, a real no nonsense kind of girl.

  Fenris retreated wisely, moving towards the Wargs with his skinning knife already out. SueLeeta held up her bandaged arm. Without my Healing ability, and with a very limited number of healing roots, it was not wise for her to be doing much of anything. Compared to me, her wounds were still trivial.

  As Jarra turned to look at me, her expression softened somewhat. In that distracted moment, SueLeeta abandoned me as well. There was a critical appraisal of my injuries from Jarra that one only really sees from a healer, stern but compassionate.

  “Thank you for helping us,” she said after a moment, brushing several strands of her long blond hair behind her ear as she spoke.

  “It was not a problem,” I responded. I was too tired to posture or flirt. Iron Will stopped the pain but, deep down, I knew I was very badly injured. That does wonders to shut down one’s libido. Also, I was married. Well, I was sort of married. I had vowed till death do us part and I’m pretty sure I died.

  “I am Jarra the Healer,” she said to me, almost cutely. It was almost like a girl trying to save a wounded puppy, but I’d take it. I’d never really looked at my own face since the truck event, but I was aware that I was younger now than I had been in some time. She was likewise young.

  “Hello, Jarra the Healer. I am Jim.”

  She processed this a moment, her eyes getting slightly wider, before turning away. Coughing, she replied, “That is an… ahem… unusual name.”

  “I’ve heard that.”

  “Are you from around here?” she asked, after a moment. She was watching the people milling about, some gathering supplies, some talking amongst themselves quite loudly.

  “Yes,” I replied, “I am fairly well acquainted with the local area.”

  She stood motionless for a moment while two of the men started yelling at each other. They didn’t quite come to blows, but it was a near thing. After they were separated, she finally spoke again. “We don’t have a place to go. Fenris was taking us to the City of Narwhal, but I don’t know that they would even have
taken us in. They certainly won’t now that we have no supplies for a bribe. I don’t know if we could make that distance now, anyway.”

  She got quiet for a moment, her shoulders slouching ever so slightly, “We don’t have any place to go. We need to get to someplace that we can hold up, where we can plan out our next move. Do you know anywhere defensible in the valley?”

  “Well, I know a place that you could setup that's very defensible.”

  Chapter 25: To the Victor

  Simply telling Jarra that I knew a place was enough for her. She set upon it with vigor, ordering nearly every person around to prepare for the journey. Fenris didn’t even put up a token protest, as she ordered him about like a general commanding a lowly soldier. As the minutes passed, everything of any value, including pelts from the slain Wargs, was loaded back onto the three still functional wagons.

  The meat was left to rot. Apparently, whatever caused the transformation from wolves to Wargs made their meat inedible to humans. I just stayed where I was and chewed Healing Root like it was my job. After all, I was grievously injured. Besides that, I had already freed them and given them a place to go. What more could they reasonably expect from me?

  Jarra finally got herself and all 86 refugees ready to go. I wasn’t actually counting them, but my Battle Map had many uses that I was now able to flip through. You know, after the battle. The majority of the people had hidden during the battle; most were not battle ready and many were elderly or children. The healthier people fashioned a cart for the invalids, which Jarra prepared to have me loaded on to. I chose to walk, like the badass savior I was. I was doing much better by now. I had 14 hit points and my Stamina had just dropped out of its crashed state, so it was slowly refilling.