|
About:
|
"
"These lands have been fought over for thousands of years, there are ruins and ghost towns everywhere!" She spoke with excitement in her voice, and while it wasn’t a smile, her expression had brightened.
True to Noah’s words, the forest gave way, exposing a derelict town built on the bank of a river that would join the channel. The wood had paled under the sun and rotted, with many of the buildings even caving in as time went on. There was no telling when its original inhabitants disappeared, not that it mattered, as it had now become the temporary home of the ogre tribe. Noah could hear chanting and roaring in the center, as well as metal on metal. The ogres had gathered by the light of a bonfire and formed a ring of their ranks. In the center, a slave was fighting for her life against an ogre whelp with a rusty sword.
"There isn’t enough time for recon, we have to get in there now."
"Sounds like fun, let’s go."
No hesitation, they charged into the town, seeing the ogres up ahead with their backs turned. "Scatter Shot!" Audrey cast. She fired an arrow with several mana counterparts, each of them burying themselves in a fleshy target and drawing howls of pain. Their alarm broke up the fight and all of the ogres turned to face the intruders. This time, it was more females than males, but they were just as bloodthirsty and charged with weapons overhead.
Audrey was firing at her full speed and the ogres were spreading out to flank her and Noah from all sides. Noah cast his spells, and any ogres that came close met his sword. Like on the ship, they fought back to back, Audrey keeping them at bay and Noah dealing with any that managed to avoid her arrows. Their rhythm was then broken, and quite painfully, by a shockwave in the form of a wind spell. It slammed into the two of them like a runaway car, knocking them through the air like ragdolls. Noah had no idea which ogre sent it, and with how his head was spinning, he didn’t expect that to change. The force had been dispersed across their entire bodies, so minus one or two broken ribs, he wasn’t badly harmed, and Audrey was slowly getting back on her feet. The problem was they had both dropped their weapons when they were struck and the ogres weren’t going to let this opportunity slip by.
Noah staggered to his feet, struggling to maintain his balance while his mind and body did a hard reboot. One ogre wouldn’t give him a chance to rest and charged towards him. By the skin of his teeth Noah managed to draw his short sword and drive it into the beast’s heart, though its momentum ending up pulling the sword from his hand. Nearby, he saw Audrey grab one of her arrows and stab a charging ogre in the eye. Noah looked around, seeing a nearby corpse with a bow on its back.
"Audrey!" he yelled as he tossed the bow to her.
"Henry!" she replied as she simultaneously tossed a sword to him.
Both weapons were caught and the battle resumed at full fury with arrows and blood flying. The ogre that had launched the wind spell revealed itself, hurling a ball of air from its hand that glowed like a neon sign. It was aimed for Noah’s clone and simply passed through it, ending up striking a rundown cottage and causing it to collapse. Noah closed in on the mage and beheaded it with a swing, while Audrey dealt with two ogres trying to launch fireballs. The last of the light came with the last of the ogres, the younglings eager to prove themselves, and they were dispatched with little trouble.
Finally, the battle was over. Both Noah and Audrey stood, surrounded by corpses, their hands, faces, and clothes stained with blood, and their breathing ragged. Their ears were strained, trying to pick up any sounds of an ambush or survivors fleeing. Nothing.
"Thank you," Audrey said.
"You don’t have to thank me."
"I do, because you’re one of the few men I’ve ever met that I can say it to wholeheartedly."
"You did it!" they heard. They looked over to see Steven and Jen running towards them, the two of them beaten and bloody but alive.
"You saved us!" Jen exclaimed.
"How are the slaves?" Audrey asked.
"Two of them were killed before you arrived, but the rest will live."
"Are they still here?"
"Come and see."
Audrey and Noah were led to the center of town, where the slaves were huddled around the fire. As the four adventurers approached, they got to their feet, either fearful or defensive.
"We’re not going back," one man warned, sporting a pair of broken antlers.
"Yes you are," said Audrey, "back to your homelands, or wherever it is you wish your feet to carry you. I did not take this job to deliver you to the capital, but to deliver you from bondage. What you do now and what happens to you is your choice. You are free."
Their reactions were mixed, some skeptical and most were relieved, most hugging each other with tears of joy pouring down their gaunt cheeks.
"So what now?" Jen asked.
"We spend the night here, and tomorrow, we’ll make our way back to the channel to regroup with the others," said Audrey.
"First we should do something about all these bodies before something even meaner than an ogre comes prowling," said Noah. "We can just toss them into the river and let the current carry them away. However, a female ogre stole my ring, and I absolutely can’t afford to leave it behind or lose it, so for now, we’ll just move the males. Can I trust you all?"
A human woman stepped forward. "You helped save us and free us. We are in your debt and will do whatever we can to aid you."
While everyone carried the male ogres to the river, Noah scoured the village for the females. He had only the moon and a torch he was carrying for light, but his vision went beyond that. When his invisibility was active, he became aware of the mana around him, as though his own mana formed a lens over his eye. It was rarely helpful. His original hope of being able to gauge others’ strength was crushed long ago, and he couldn’t differentiate sources, so everyone looked the same to him. Luckily, he could tell when something carried mana, such as a monster recently summoned from a magic circle, or in this case, a magic ring.
He moved through the battlefield, the soil reeking of blood and voided bowels, searching for a twinkling light in the darkness. Some ogres weren’t yet dead, simply too wounded to move, and their mana gave them away. He’d finish them off and the aura that shrouded them would vanish, like the heat leaving their corpses. He was started to grow fearful before he finally found it, on the ground next to a female with an arrow in her back.
The village was eventually cleared, leaving everyone too exhausted to eat, not that there was much to eat anyway. They gathered around the fire in the center of town, simply falling asleep on the bare earth, though Noah and Audrey remained awake, staring into the flames.
"Tomorrow I’ll lead Steven and Jen back to the ship and make sure that the rest of the slaves are freed, then I must return home to declare the ogre tribe has been vanquished," said Audrey.
"I’ll keep heading south to the capital."
They didn’t speak after that, but the silence wasn’t awkward. Rather, it was comforting. Nothing needed to be said, the quiet didn’t need to be broken. It was when he laid back, ready to fall asleep, that he turned to her and spoke. "My real name is Noah, by the way."
It was the first time he had seen her smile, and then, a small laugh. "I’m Alexis."
Please comment!
This story was taken from one these sites, check them out to find more sex stories:
|
