by Logan Jacobs
My aim was better this time, and I got the beast in the thigh. It staggered with a yelp and clawed at the gray kobold beside it as he tumbled away. They both hit the ground with a thud, a whole lot of snarling, and a spattering of green blood.
By now, the rest of the horde had turned to see what was happening at the back.
“Well, shit,” I sighed as all of the sword and dagger wielders forgot all about the walled town and charged me.
“Muerraggahhhhh!” The largest of the horde was a big orange brute, and it bellowed out some kind of command. The rest obeyed without a thought.
Now I knew which one was the brains of the operation.
A blue sword-wielding kobold came rushing from the newly organized line as I stepped toward the remaining crossbow lizards. Its attack was difficult to parry, and since I had lost my sword to that blue asshole, I now only had my curved dagger to defend myself with.
A second kobold rushed in on my unguarded left and slashed at me with his dagger, but I was too tied up parrying the blue dude with the sword to block, so his blade got me on the hip.
I snarled in pain and swung my dagger wildly to get them to back the fuck up. As they dodged, I shuffled away to put some distance between us, and I risked a glance to where I thought my sword was. Movement in the corner of my eye jerked my attention back up, and I just barely dodged an attack from a green kobold rushing in from the right.
A crossbow bolt whizzed past my head a little too close for comfort. I took to referring the crossbow-wielding kobolds as “bow-bolds”, and the four remaining beasts were lined up to my left, each one ready to fire a bolt in rapid succession.
I somehow managed to dart behind the green kobold that had just rushed me, and the poor thing was pierced by the bolts.
These weren’t the fast-firing crossbows of my world. These had to be drawn back with a foot and nocked each time before a bolt could be fired again. That gave me just enough time to rush the line of bow-bolds and do some serious damage.
The first didn’t even get a chance to yelp as I drove my dagger into its throat. The second parried my attack, and the third managed to shove a bolt into my thigh with its hands or paws or whatever. I slashed my dagger at it to get it away from me, and I could have sworn the motherfucker laughed.
I stabbed a green kobold through the eye and dodged an attack from one to my left. Another came up from behind and slashed across my uninjured thigh. I growled in pain and swung around blindly. The beasts easily stepped back, and I realized that I was surrounded.
“Okay,” I laughed. “I did wayyyy better this time. Cool.”
Chime.
My second attempt at killing the kobolds had gone surprisingly well, but I knew I could do better this time around, so I did some quick math as I ran toward the horde. If I had taken out six this last time and there really were twenty in the horde, I only had to do about seventy-percent better this time to defeat them all.
No pressure.
I went with the same tactic as the last try but instead of going to the right, I swung around and went for the bow-bold on the left side. I drew my dagger just a few strides before I came in contact and used my momentum to drive the blade home. I left it in the creature’s back and used the crossbow on the next bow-bold in the line. My aim was getting better with each shot I made, so this bolt sunk deep into the kobold’s neck, and it was dead before it even hit the ground.
Fuck, yeah.
I didn’t give the kobolds any time to react to my sudden presence. I leaped to my feet and slashed at a dark brown beast with my sword. The blade cut across the back of its thighs, and it let out a shriek of agony as it collapsed.
From there, the fight seemed to continue along the same thread as the previous attempt. The bow-bolds tried to shoot me, I used another as a shield, and then rushed the line. More of the creatures fell to my sword, but in the end, they surrounded me again and stabbed me through the back.
Dicks.
It didn’t seem to matter which tactic I used. If I came at them from behind, they always caught up to my attacks and eventually overwhelmed me. I managed to take out all of the bow-bolds in one attempt, but the remaining kobolds didn’t need the backup. They were just as handy with their swords and daggers and cut me down like a sapling in the forest.
Moving around them to make an attempt from the front seemed impossible. They had such a headstart on me that even if I ran full bore, they would reach the town before I could kill even one of them. Even if I tried to go around the horde, they would easily see me in all the open land. Trying to use the trees as cover would just slow me down.
But after a dozen or so tries from the rear, I had to give it a whirl.
My first attempt for the front ended exactly how I had predicted. I tried to run while ducking in the tall grass, but my sword kept knocking against the ground. The five nearest kobolds noticed me in a heartbeat and broke off from the main horde to attack me. I would have gotten away, but a bow-bold shot me through the calf and knocked me to the ground. The rest of the party pounced on me and tore into me with fangs and claws.
Dying really wasn’t a fun experience.
The second time around with this strategy, I let the horde reach the outskirts of the town. The tolling bell rang through the air and from the quivering of the kobolds, I knew that they were too intent on their target to notice or care what I was doing. I managed to use the bell tolls as cover for my banging sword, and I circled around to the front of the horde.
When I got closer to the town, I realized that there weren’t actually proper walls. The entrance was surrounded by a deep trench and a wall of sharpened logs that acted as a barrier. Neither would keep the kobolds out for very long since they could easily run around either side and enter the town from another location.
During my first few attempts at killing the kobolds, I had heard the distinct sound of metal on metal from the village, so I had guessed that someone in the town had been defending against the horde. A group of swordsmen would be a comfort at my side, but, unfortunately, nobody showed up now that the invading lizard-men were right at their doorstep.
I was going to have to fight alone.
I growled out my frustration as I broke away from my cover of tall grass. The closest kobold was in the middle of a taunting bark, and it turned into a strangled squeal as I slammed into it. My dagger pierced its stomach, and its scrabbling to knock me off only made the blood flow faster, so I yanked the blade out as fiercely as possible to give it a quick death.
The beasts on the far side of the horde hadn’t noticed me, but the ones nearest turned toward me with their teeth bared. One of the bow-bolds near the back shot in my direction but missed by a mile. Then a sword-wielding kobold charged and slashed at me wildly, but I dodged and then swung my dagger up at its chest. It dove back to avoid my attack and knocked itself and a companion down to the ground.
I pounced with both weapons drawn and snuffed out their lives like a pair of candles.
A gray kobold rushed me before I could remove my blades from my two victims. That mistake would have cost me my life if the attack hadn’t been blocked by a sword. The kobold seemed just as surprised as I was, and the sword-wielder used the pause to slide the blades apart and pierce the creature through the gut.
“Get up and fight!” a female voice roared at me, and the hand that pulled me to my feet was stronger than I would have guessed for a woman. “Or are you trying to get yourself killed?”
The woman was shorter than I was, but she was definitely built for battle. An iron helmet covered her head, and the hair that poked beneath the edges was black. The armor she wore was a combination of leather and iron. The leather seemed to act as padding for the plates over her torso, arms, and legs, and it protected the joints where the armor was too bulky to cover. The only bit of visible skin was her chin, and the tan there was the color of melted caramel.
She must have noticed me staring because the blue eyes beneath her helmet narrowed dangerousl
y, but she didn’t say anything else. She just tore away from me, leaped at the nearest kobold, and slashed the head of the beast off with a practiced precision.
My gawking was cut short when the rest of the horde converged on us, and I quickly yanked my sword free of the kobold body and parried a spear thrust aimed at my chest. I tried to do the same sliding trick the woman had used, but my blade only jolted an inch or so toward my enemy. The kobold was giving me no ground, so I kicked it as hard as I could in the knee. It buckled, and the tension left the sword pressing against mine, so I was able to free my blade and rip it across his chest.
A bolt flew past my face and nearly took off my ear. When I saw the line of bow-bolds aiming at me, I snatched up my recent kill and ducked behind it. The hollow thunk of bolts hitting their mark was followed by the spray of blood as a few pierced right through the creature’s body. Some blood splashed against my lips and filled my mouth with the taste of mud and something metallic that was different from my own blood.
While the bow-bolds were reloading their weapons, I leaped up and lunged into their midst. Two of them fell like sacks of flour, and another managed to block my dagger with its crossbow. The blade sunk deep into the wood and was torn out of my grasp, so with my other hand I swung my sword in response and was rewarded with a spray of blood from a slashed throat. I retrieved my dagger and attempted a cool throw at the next bow-bold, but its curved blade didn’t really soar through the air so well, and it merely bounced off of the creature’s blue scales and tumbled into the grass.
That idea didn’t work, but I would learn from it.
The warrior woman had been grunting and growling as she took out her own enemies, but her shriek of pain tore through the air over the tolling of the bell and pierced me more painfully than any bolt from the crossbows. Two more kobolds fell to my sword as I tried to get to her side.
I reached her just in time to watch the big orange kobold bring his sword through her stomach. Her eyes widened in surprise and met with my own. There was a certain acceptance in her expression, but I could also see the fear of death take over just a second before the light finally faded.
This woman had saved my life at the expense of her own. And I didn’t even know her name.
“You fucking assholes!” I shouted as I rushed toward the big orange bastard. I had to leap over and weave around the bodies of the kobolds the woman had killed. She had been a much better swordsman than I was, and she had still died.
I knew I was going to reset this, but it still pissed me off that they’d killed her this round.
In my haste for revenge, I forgot that I hadn’t killed all of the bow-bolds, and a bolt pierced my spine just before I reached the orange brute. The impact and pain threw me off balance, and when I tried to bring my sword down, the orange kobold parried it easily. It made a quick adjustment and brought his own blade up, and the inferno of death engulfed me once more.
Chime.
“Fuck!” I shouted when I returned to the trees, and several birds shrieked in alarm and scattered into the air.
Going for the front was the best tactic I had tried so far. The woman was way better with a sword than I was, but I couldn’t stand the idea of her dying to make things easier for me. I had to figure out a way to get her to help me while still keeping her alive. Or I had to just kill all these assholes before she had a chance to come out and help me.
I broke away from the trees and made my way to the front of the horde as I had the last time. Instead of throwing myself at the side of the enemy, I slipped around to the side of the town where the trench began. When the kobolds were looking the other way, I darted from the tall grass and did a baseball slide into the ditch. I landed awkwardly on my sword’s sheath and held back the groan of pain. The kobolds probably couldn’t hear me over the tolling of the bell, but I wasn’t taking any chances.
I crawled through the trench until I reached the entrance of the town where the horde was waiting. I could hear their excited panting and the rustling of their scales against the empty scabbards at their sides. From down here, it sounded like there were fifty or a hundred of the beasts, and anyone in the town that couldn’t actually see the horde would be expecting the worst.
Was that why the woman was the only one that came to defend the town?
As if summoned by my thoughts, the woman appeared from within the town and strode confidently across the land-bridge to meet the horde. She looked even more impressive from that angle. The helmet she had worn last time was in her hand, and it let me see her face a little better. She had shorter black hair that just barely touched her shoulders. The light breeze in the air pulled it away from her face, and with the fierce look in her blue eyes, she looked every part the warrior that saved my life and risked her own.
She was absolutely beautiful.
The woman took a deep breath and put the helmet on without taking her eyes off of the horde. She knew she was going to die, but she was going out to fight them anyway.
What a fucking badass.
As she drew her blade, I scrambled out of the trench. My sudden appearance made her do a double-take, but she merely gave me a small nod before turning back to the kobolds. I drew my own sword and gripped it tightly. Having her at my side had a comforting effect, and I thought this might be the one to end it all.
The horde spread out before us like the defensive line of a football team. None of them actually stood on the path leading into the town, but they were split almost evenly down the middle, with twelve standing to the left, and eight to the right. The big orange one was practically two kobolds all on its own, so it made sense the others looked to it as their leader.
The crossbow-wielding kobolds made up the back end of the horde, and they were all readying their weapons when they saw us standing between them and the town. The rest drew their swords or daggers and snarled at the woman and me.
I tried to stay close to her, but it didn’t work very well at all. Although it made for some pretty epic kills when we worked together, we mostly just got in each other’s way. When she snapped at me to spread out, the orange kobold came up and shoved his sword into her back. I avenged her that time by slicing across the bastard’s face, but there were still too many remaining in the horde, and I fell to their attack.
Chime.
Just like with my attempts at the rear, it seemed that every attempt from the front was a failure. After several more attempts, I managed to defeat all of the kobolds, but the woman had died in the process, and I was bleeding all over the place from various wounds, so it didn’t feel like much of a victory. A man from the town had rushed to my side and called for someone named “Dora” before I blacked out and woke in the trees.
Chime.
I respawned fewer times than I had in the catacombs and at least I didn’t have to listen to a monologue each time like then. I only had to deal with the knowledge that my best chances were to take the horde out from the front and that the woman who fought at my side was going to die.
I tried so many times to find a way to fight without her. Flat out telling her not to fight earned me an angry glare from the proud warrior woman, and trying to defeat the horde before it reached the town always resulted in my quick death. And she always met the horde when it reached the town. Sometimes other men came out with farm tools and butcher knives, but she was the most capable fighter the town had, so they all ended up dying trying to defend the town.
It made no sense. She was clearly armed to protect the town, and it was large enough that she couldn’t have been the only defender. Had the others been killed in previous raids? The age of the wood on the buildings made me think it wasn’t a newly settled town, so it wasn’t like the townsfolk couldn’t have sent word out for guards before the attacks began. If the raids had been happening since the start of the settlement, the town wouldn’t still be standing. It would have been abandoned a long time ago.
I could let the woman die, of course. That would be the easiest way to victory, but I
couldn’t have that weighing on my conscience. Killing the sorcerer’s men was one thing, since they were evil and trying to kill me. If I let the woman die, it would be like I was running my sword through her myself.
She was on my side, so I couldn’t just let her die.
But trying to save her life was really fucking hard. Every attempt I made resulted in her death. It didn’t matter if I tried to get the horde to chase me, or if I came from the left or right, or if I set fire to the tall grass around the town. Either the horde would just turn around and slaughter me, and I had to start all over again, or the woman joined the fight and she died.
In one particularly low moment, I tried to return to my savepoint just outside of the catacombs. There must have been another route down the mountain that would bring me closer to the town than where the horde came from. But my powers must not work like that because whenever I focused on returning to my savepoint, it always brought me to the trees behind the kobolds, even if I concentrated on the entrance to the catacombs or the little brook. Even spawning at the stone dais would have been a comfort if it meant I could get to the town sooner and somehow save the woman.
“It can’t just end like this!” I shouted as I pulled at my hair.
I didn’t even know her name, and yet I just couldn’t imagine walking into the town victorious without her there. My goal was to save the town, and she was part of it.
“I don’t care if it takes me a thousand tries,” I growled.
I was going to save that amazing warrior woman, too.
I respawned again to the trees and took a deep breath. Then I ran after the horde and circled around to the trench again. This time I didn’t wait for the woman to appear before scrambling out in front of the town. I knew she would show up.
She always did.
The kobolds grew more excited when they realized I was going to stand and fight them. The bow-bolds ducked down in the back, and the front line came rushing forward.
“Let’s go, you dumb fucks,” I growled. Then I met their attack in the middle and sliced through a gray kobold on the right and a greenish one on the left. One of the large brown ones came at me like a raging bull, and I drove both of my blades through him. I fell with him and used the impact to dig deeper into his flesh.