“Damn, that’s even worse than I thought,” I commented, feeling that we might have gotten the better end of the deal in only needing to worry about the Dread Crew and the orcs.
“So it is,” Garr agreed. “However, as bleak as this may sound, Senzin mentioned that he did have some hope. Apparently, those we saw with him—Trivium and the other arakissi—are looking to rally other adventurers within the fens and align them against Sthera’s advance. From what he’s said, there are quite a number of them within the swamp.”
“So I’ve heard as well,” I replied with a nod, recalling from my own research of various feeds that the fens had been a popular destination for Eberian adventurers looking to escape the Coldscar area and continue deeper into the continent. “Hopefully, they’ll be able to get the help they need. Did he happen to say anything about Sthera herself? Is she pushing forward along with her minions like Zhul is with us?”
“I asked him the same thing, and Senzin’s reply was that they think she is, if only because of how many of her minions are around,” Caius answered with a shake of his head. “But they aren’t completely sure since they haven’t physically seen her take the field against them.”
“Huh, well that’s helpful,” I grunted, feeling a little frustrated and worried at that particular lack of information. “Was there anything else that he said? Anything more about Aryana or our people that went with them?”
“Unfortunately, nothing more than word that they’re still alive and are fleeing deeper into the fens with them,” Garr answered. “Senzin only had a short opportunity to pass along his message, and we had to speak quickly before he was forced to depart. The only other words he left us with was that he would try to reach out to us sometime soon if they could. But also that if we don’t hear from them within a week’s time, then to assume the worst.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” I stated as I glanced towards the ground, completely unsure of what we would do if that came to pass. Marching blind into swampland was among the last things that I ever wanted to do, especially when said swampland contained powerful undead creatures. But the downside of not doing that could result in allowing Sthera and the other Heralds of Riius to achieve their goals in the fens—whatever it was that they happened to be.
“In either case, I guess it’s good to have some sort of update on how things have been going for them,” I continued after a few seconds of thought, my attention shifting back upwards as our short trek across the down reached its final leg with Aldford’s southern gate coming into view ahead of us. “It’s better at least than being in the dark, and I guess it explains why we haven’t heard from Trivium and the others, either in-game or offline.”
“That it does,” Caius agreed as we drew close enough to the town’s entrance to spot Aldwin, Dyre, and Freya waiting beside it, the group talking between one another to pass the time. “Hopefully, though, once they make it to whatever this city is that they’re heading to, they’ll have the time to send us a more comprehensive update. Or if not, during one of their rest cycles which should be coming up soon.”
“Hopefully,” I repeated, trying my best to project a wave of optimism that I wasn’t sure I truly felt as we approached. “In any case, I appreciate the heads up. Unfortunately, while it doesn’t look like we can do much to help them right now, at least we have an idea of what’s going on now.”
“Yeah, if nothing else, it’s better than still being blind,” the dark elf replied as we reached the gate, the others looking towards us as they noticed our arrival.
“Hey, you finally made it,” Freya said by way of greeting, a curious look appearing on her face as she saw our expressions. “And what’s better than being blind?”
“Hearing from Senzin,” Caius answered. “Garr and I were just filling Lyrian in, but he finally reached out to us a few minutes ago.”
“Oh,” the woman replied, her eyes widening at the news. “Then I’m guessing based on what I see on your faces that he didn’t exactly have good news, did he?”
“It wasn’t the worst, but it certainly could have been a bit better,” I said as I glanced around for the others who I knew were supposed to be here with us. “But before we get into that, where are Constantine and Drace? It’ll save us another retelling.”
“They’re right outside the gates along with Riggs and Cassius,” Aldwin supplied, using his head to motion towards the aforementioned structure, which I now saw was partially open. “Apparently, they’ve already spotted our new arrivals by the light they’re carrying in the distance and went to watch their approach. It shouldn’t be too much longer before they’re here, I think.”
“Ah, well, let’s get you all filled in before they do,” Caius said as he glanced between the trio, already taking a half step towards the gate. “Because once they’re here, we’re most likely going to be running around for the rest of the night.”
“That we are,” Freya agreed, all of us turning to make our way through the gates and across the bridge that spanned the river bordering the town, finding the aforementioned other members of our group standing at its edge.
Moving to join them, we—or rather Caius and Garr—began to retell their story of Senzin’s astral visit and what trials currently befell our distant allies. In my case, since I already was familiar with the sequence of events after just having heard it, I took the opportunity to instead look out towards the night horizon, searching for the distant lights that Aldwin had mentioned.
And there they are, I said to myself after a few seconds of searching, having spotted several clusters of magical lights that heralded the twin vanguards of both the Legion and Lionheart guilds, their glittering shapes continuing to grow in size as they drew closer. It had been a long and agonizing wait over the last week to see if they would manage to make it here to us before our war took a turn for the worse, giving each of us, myself included, more than one sleepless night of worry. But with every day that passed, as they grew closer, that worry slowly lessened, replacing itself with the hope that things would end up working out.
Which it seems that it has—if practically right at the finish line, considering how close the orcs are in breathing down our necks, I mused as I stared at the distant adventurers, a part of me feeling especially relieved that there also hadn’t been any last-minute surprises to derail or taint their arrival. Given just how many players were supposedly coming tonight—which was five hundred and forty-six people at last count—we couldn’t help but feel a little nervous to receive them all, especially given our past experiences with adventurers. But so far, however, any issues or even outright betrayals that we might have had expected had failed to materialize, allowing us to breathe a deep sigh of relief that the orcs and the Dread Crew would be the only trouble that we’d need to worry about.
If at least in the immediate term, I thought, all too well recalling Riggs’s words about what could possibly happen if the coming adventurers happened to get too bored without an outlet for their energy. But like I’d said then, I very much doubted that there was anything that could even be vaguely attributed to boredom coming our way any time soon, especially in light of Senzin’s news about what was happening in the fens.
“…and that’s all he had to say before he faded away,” I heard Caius say as I tuned back into the conversation, taking my eyes off the distant lights to glance back towards the others.
“Damn, that’s rough,” Cassius commented as a wince crossed his face, the others also following suit with sympathetic expressions and sentiments. “I really hope they can pull through with everything they’re dealing with. It doesn’t sound like they have it any better on their end than we do here.”
“That it certainly doesn’t,” Freya agreed in a quiet voice, her head shaking from side to side as she spoke. “Hopefully, they’ll be able to either beat them back, or if failing that, hold out somehow and buy time. Maybe then if we can win against the orcs here, we could relieve the pressure on them by threatening Khudaza
l directly. It would force Sthera to pull her minions back or risk losing the place.”
“Doing that would probably be easier than fighting our way through the Hartwyld and into the swamp,” Drace mused thoughtfully. “At least with enough numbers to make a difference in any large-scale fight.”
“Take it from someone who’s crossed through said Hartwyld, it absolutely would be,” Constantine added. “Even with Garr and his people’s help, I think we’d be hard-pressed to sneak an army through the place unscathed.”
“That it certainly would be,” the gronn replied, nodding at the rogue as he spoke. “Our magic can do much to speed a journey along for a handful of travelers, but moving a large force would be beyond its limits.”
“We’ll need to see what we’re able to do when the time comes, and more importantly, if we actually get that far,” I said, using that opportunity to motion towards the distant array of lights that I’d been half keeping an eye on. Lights which had continued to grow to the point where the shapes of people were visible beneath them. “In the meantime, though, it looks like our guests are just about here.”
“So it seems they are,” Aldwin replied as everyone twisted to look out into the night. “I suppose then it’s time we prepared ourselves to receive them. Shall we go forward as planned?”
“Yeah, I think so,” I said as we all began to shuffle and move, the eleven of us fully crossing the bridge until we were standing a dozen or so feet away from it. “Everything looks to be going according to plan from what I can tell. Right, Cassius?”
“Looks to be,” the man affirmed. “If something were up, Berwyn or one of the others would have signaled us by now. If they’re this close, then things are all good to go.”
“Great,” I replied, relieved to hear that there hadn’t been anything I missed as we all began to sort ourselves into a line so that we would be ready to receive the guilds.
Having been well-coached by Stanton on how best we should present ourselves, it only took a few seconds for us to sort out our order, even with the unplanned addition of both Caius and Garr to our numbers. The result had Amaranth and I taking the center position of the line, since we were technically one person, with Aldwin then on my right and Freya on my left, both of them standing half a step behind me. Moving outwards from there, we then had Drace, Constantine, Caius, and Garr filling out the rest of the line half a step behind Freya’s left, with Dyre, Cassius, and Riggs filling out the right side of the bann in a similar fashion.
The message that we hoped to send with the carefully chosen lineup was to show off Aldford’s leadership structure, which put me directly at its heart, with both Freya, Aldwin, and the others then following in order of precedence. It was perhaps a heavy-handed message to send during our first encounter with the new adventurers, but the elder spy had been adamant in telling me that I had to assert both my leadership and authority immediately, lest I be perceived as weak.
Which also reminds me that we’re going to really need to find more time for the lessons he’s promised me, I thought with a slight mental grimace as we all fell into our places, the busyness of both the war and our other commitments having kept both the spy and myself from finding the time to connect regularly. While it wasn’t something that it was likely to change in the short term, it was something that I had to make time for, especially if I wanted to maintain control of the region’s leadership long term. Just another one of the endless things for Future Lyrian to worry about one day.
Letting out a short mental chuckle at what had become an inside joke with myself, I idly hoped that my future self wouldn’t hate my past self too much when the time came to follow up on all the tasks that I’d pushed forward. But for the meantime, there were more than enough things to keep me busy in the present—the most pressing of them now little more than a few hundred feet from arriving.
“Well, here we go, everyone,” I whispered as we all finished getting into position, leaving us with nothing left to do but stand and watch Legion and Lionheart’s final approach. “Here’s the moment that we’ve all been waiting for.”
Receiving a few muttered whispers to my words, we all fell silent as we continued to stare on ahead at the growing wall of adventurers, their advance visibly starting to slow as they drew closer. As they did and it became even easier to see them, I noticed that practically everyone’s attention in the crowd was focused nearly straight upwards, their eyes fixated firmly on the ætherwarped oak above. Continuing to slow as the distance between us shrank to less than a hundred feet, a handful of scattered shouts rang out from amid their ranks, causing all of them to grind to a stop. Or rather all of them save for four riders on horseback that maintained their advance towards us, quickly crossing what remained of the gap.
Scanning between the quartet as they closed, I recognized the lead figure to be none other than Berwyn, the visibly weary monk raising a hand to wave at us, a final signal that there was nothing for us to fear. Feeling the last shred of worry fade away from me at the sign, I allowed myself to exhale softly in relief before turning my attention towards those accompanying him, taking in their appearances for the first time. Focusing first on the pair to his left, I found myself greeted by the familiar faces of both Elliot and Elissa, or as they were known in-game, Mithaniel and Neria, the two siblings co-leading the Lionheart guild together.
Appearing somewhat similar to one another, there was little doubt for anyone that looked at them longer for a second that they were somehow related, the pair sharing not only a few facial features but also the same shade of brown hair and bright hazel eyes. Yet for all that initial similarity, it was beyond that they diverged radically, with Mithaniel’s larger figure completely towering over his sister’s smaller stature, a feat aided by the thick and heavy armor he wore. Armed with a sword on his hip and a large shield visibly strapped to his back, the man rode effortlessly on his horse as if he’d been born into the saddle, giving him a commanding, if not imposing presence. Striking a near opposite presence to her brother, Neria, on the other hand, exuded a more subtle and reserved demeanor, the woman’s plain dark leather armor almost wanting to make my eye slide off her as if she weren’t interesting enough to look at. Enough so that I wondered if there was perhaps subtle magic at play, or if the pair were simply that well-practiced at maximizing the contrast between one another.
Whichever the case, it was a mystery that would have to wait till later to explore as, after that initial glance, my attention shifted towards the last rider of the quartet, who rode closely on Berwyn’s right. Recognizing him as Jay—or rather as his in-game alias was called, Janus—his closely cropped dark blond hair and bright blue eyes were a near mirror to what I recalled seeing during our last conversation. Seeing him riding high in his saddle as he approached, my eye shifted downwards to take in the sleek, if yet still substantial armor that he wore, its build suggesting that it was designed for both protection and mobility. Completing the look for the Legion guild leader was the spear that had been strapped across his back at an angle, the dark metal weapon barely visible in the night’s gloom save for its head which at first glance appeared to be made of crystal.
With just enough time to finish that last inspection as the group came to a stop a couple dozen feet away, the next thing I knew was that the four of them had all dismounted from their horses and had begun striding towards us on foot. Following to the side and behind as the other guild leaders made their approach, Berwyn offered us rare smile as he looked back at us, one that we saw was also matched by each of the three guild leaders. Grinning with obvious joy and excitement as they strode forward, I saw their eyes shift repeatedly as they took in the sight that was Aldford, alternating between glancing at the tree above and the palisade bordering the town.
Unable to help but grin at their speechless wonder, I gave them the time to take in the sights as they drew closer, waiting until their eyes landed on me before I broke the silence that hung on the air.
“Welcome to Aldford.”
Chapter 60
“Well,” Mithaniel said in an awed voice as we walked through Aldford, his head tilted up towards the tree as he spoke. “I know you said you’d leave the lights on for us when we got here. But this? This is something else.”
“Oh, you could say that again,” Neria stated in a voice just higher than a whisper, her head turning every which way as she tried to take in the entirety of the town at once. “I mean, wow. Just. Wow.”
“Yeah, what she said,” Janus added somewhat speechlessly on the heels of the woman’s words, his attention alternating between the road ahead of us and the ætherwarped oak high above as if he couldn’t believe that it was there. “None of the feeds that I’ve watched do this place justice.”
“Well, we’ve been a little busy lately sprucing things up, so I’m sure it’s a little out of date,” I replied, grinning sheepishly at both the compliment and at what was becoming the traditional reaction for anyone arriving in the town for the first time, which was to stare in disbelief at the massive tree above. “But I’m glad that you all like the place so far.”
“Like the place?” Neria repeated in a disbelieving tone, her head shaking from side to side as if she couldn’t believe what I’d said. “I love this place already. The welcome we’ve had, plus what we’ve seen so far here already beats the pants off pretty much everything we’re used to back home. Or I guess back at Coldscar. It’s not exactly home anymore now, is it?”
“That it certainly isn’t,” Mithaniel said, managing to take his eyes off the tree above just long enough to look over towards me. “But Neri is right. This town is really something, Lyrian. And I don’t mean just because of that giant tree over there.”
“It really does dominate things, doesn’t it?” I queried, looking up to glance at the azure-hued oak myself for a second before turning back towards the others. “In either case, I really appreciate the kind words, we’ve worked really hard to make the place what it is today and to make sure that you all get settled. We know full well how far you’ve come to make it here.”
Glory to the Brave (Ascend Online Book 4) Page 76