Eli Pov

___________________________________________________

I was up in the trees where I could see this night’s foray. It was late night or very early morning when the carriages first started coming down the road, their torches providing a faint spark in the gloom of the late night. As the carriages came down into the line of fire, I lifted up the barrel of my air gun and took aim at the horses in the back. After a few more seconds of palpable tension, I pulled the trigger. My bullet took one of the horses in the back straight through the eye, killing the beast instantly.

Further ahead, some horses started going down as well from Salamede’s shots further below me.

The drivers promptly jumped off their wagons and ran back to where they came from, with only a few bothering to get their swords or maces before taking off.

When all the horses had been dropped, I nodded in satisfaction. I looked down below at my temporary comrades, then fell through the crisp night air and landed among some of the orcs and Frojan below.

“I can’t believe we let them go.” I heard some orc growl behind me.

“Better let go. Humans will send big pack. Traps will make many dead. Now, get traps set up for road, will check on traps in woods.” I said, not even looking behind me as I took off.

Coming through the treetops, I eventually came to the spot where the real battle would happen. Off too my right I saw Salamede coming through the trees as well. Below was a group of Frojan setting off random water spells. After a few more minutes, they couldn’t use their spells anymore as the ambient mana depleted. These were just one of the teams I had stationed around the forest actively depleting the mana.

I was betting on them coming through the forest since the roads would be a killing field for them out in the open, not to mention we would have the roadside traps all set up by now. Normally, mages would only be sent out in small teams by themselves but apparently the Coalition thought sacrificing large numbers of soldiers to accompany them was worth the price.

That roadside battle had been extremely bloody, and I was trying to avoid repeating it. They knew this was probably going to be the only time they would be sufficiently well manned to get information on us and would hit us with every mage they could scrounge up. After nearly half an hour lounging about in the treetops with Cell off to my right helping keep watch, the orc scout came back with the first report. I made my way to the forest floor and took in all the figures. A good 30 or so mages were among the group two hundred soldiers.

“Perfect” I said. “Ready, make.” Was all I said as the surrounding orcs and Frojan got into their positions.

The mana dead zones were done in a large wave along the forest. In these dead zones, we placed a few physical traps; large swinging logs, magically hardened earth and wood spikes placed along certain paths to slow them down. I went over this all with Cell and Salamede earlier and they all got into our spots, Salamede high up in the trees while Cell waited among the shrubbery of a fork in the forest. Both were given give mana crystals to make sure they could keep their crafts working if they went into the dead ones.

After giving some quick orders on where to put the remaining stakes, I left to go watch the road. After a while, an orc scout came back to my position in the trees and informed me that the humans took the forest paths. I was hoping to get a few free shots in before I dragged them through the forest, but it appears they aren’t total fools.

By the time I got back the fight was already in full swing. The mages and the soldiers had been herded along several paths in the forest ravine. Salamede was to my left getting off potshots at the mages whose gilded clothing marked them for death. In the starlight I saw three squads of mages form a loose group while six or seven others splintered off from the main group to fight the orcs getting quick arrows in behind boulders or trees.

There was screaming everywhere but it wasn’t nearly as bloody this time around. The positions of the orcs were all mana drained, which meant the Frojan couldn’t use their spells while the occasional blast of wind knocked the orcs arrows off course.

Bounding out of the underbrush below me, Cell’s doll body jumped clear over the heads of a group of soldiers and landed right on the three mages in their center. He caved one blue robed woman’s head in with a chop of his hand while the metal blades of his shoulder arms decapitated her two compatriots before he took off again into the trees.

Less bloody for the soldiers.

The position of the other mages bodies, riddled with bullter holes, told me they had tried for the orcs position but found out too late why no water blades were assailing them. To my right, the forest had a good number of soldiers clumped around trees forming a meat wall in between the mages and the orcs who were content to pepper their position with arrows. In the middle of the mob of soldiers were group of mages, the most prominent being a trio giving orders.

The trio were well dressed in brown, white, and blue painted armor with the look and composure of veterans but they didn’t seem aware of the fact that they were still in range of my gun.

Good, that means Salamede only attacked the mages when they came up to the orcs.

Our true range wasn’t a card I wanted to play immediately. But I wanted to end this as quickly as possible. Off to the trios left a mage in a frilly green skirt and leather pants with leather chest piece came down from a tree. A few quick words passed between them and the girl took off again.

Ah, this might be my chance.

The woman’s short blond hair showed no movement as she glided through the cold night air. Eventually, she stopped by another detachment of mages. This wing had no mana dead zones to contend with but the Frojan mages were more concentrated here and only engaged in delaying tactics. A shout from the black-haired commander in a metal chest piece showed her frustration.

Wasting no time, I galloped through the trees towards the front line of the fight, as poorly defined as that tended to be in this world when just throwing hundreds of bodies at each other wasn’t an option. Coming up to a long line of mage squads, the air was a orchestra of water blades and flying earth spikes, fire balls, and wind blades punctuated only by the occasional cry as one or more projectiles found their target.

The mages were two or four to a group and they were dispersed enough that it took a birds eye view to know were exactly the battle lines had been drawn. Moving over to the Frojan side, I looked around until I found the man… frog in charge. He was a large red thing with a leather cap, spear, and a green robe with brown cloth pants.

“Frogss men.” I called.

The commander clutched his spear and looked up, only to relax when he registered who was talking to him.

“Ah, the pandego.” He said in the deep rumbling voice typical to his kind. “Come to help us out?”

“Yes. Will kill mages left side, then you move men through to hit mages from two sides.” I said. The red Frojan nodded as his surrounding retinue looked excited. Taking off through the trees, I went to the left most edge of the line of mage groups and got to work.

I summoned a large slab of stone for a group of three mages who were hanging around the back side of a particularly large tree. The slab was summoned mid air and gave off a light whistle as the block nearly twice the size of a man soared through the air. It landed right on the mages, crushing them instantly with a loud crunch. I didn’t wait to see the result and moved further down the line. Two air mages were travelling through the trees to investigate but a bullet in the chest of the left one sent her falling to the ground below. Her companion immediately ducked behind the tree when she landed.

I jumped through the air to her left and sailed past her. She turned to look at me and there was a flash of fear in her eye before my bullet took her between the eyes. The cacophony of spells going off all over the place meant only the group directly ahead of me heard the noise and looked over to investigate. What they saw was a tide of Frojan flanking them as the frog men moved through the trees and took up positions.

The first mage who pulled back got a bullet in the throat. The other three decided to hunker down with a few stone walls being summoned but they couldn’t summon them fast enough when I got another in the back. The Frojan closed in on the last two panicking mages and I moved on as the cutting whirr of water blades sounded off behind me.

I repeated this for a good while until the last fifteen or so finally understood what was happening and tried to leave. Jumping through the trees, my shots rang out from different directions as the small mob tried to pull back. Coming up to the commander, the group of about nine mages were all that was left.

Sadly, the Frojan hadn’t caught up with me and I was reluctant to push my luck with a fight against nine mages with no back up, so I decided to hang back when the commander with caramel skin started looking green and took off with her people towards the main group.

After considering it for a moment as the mages scurried off, I dropped down amongst the Frojan coming up behind the tree I was in.

“Stop. Heal wounded and go re-enforce orcs.” I told them.

The leading Frojan came up through the crowd of bewildered frog men.

“What? Why?” He asked. I could tell he was furious but his fear of me kept it out of his voice.

“Orc position may not hold. Better to get them to leave now. Will be useless since mana is absorbed in fight and may make them leave. Be happy with gains” I said in a calm even tone that showed through the wobble of my voice when it traveled through the air enchantment on my mask that disguised my human voice.

The red Frojan leader looked at the retreating mages then back to me.

“Aye, a shrimp in the mouth is more than ten in the river” He said before he turned and started barking orders to his subordinates.

Satisfied, I leapt back into the air and went through the dark trees. Oddly, along the way in the rising morning sun, I saw bits of the tree’s branches curling. It varied by specimen but the twirl at the end was impossible to miss.

Necrosis was officially setting in.

Then I scolded myself for getting distracted and went at full speed. Coming up to the battlefield, I could see the crowd of men with shields gradually moving back as the mages apparently decided they had had enough. However, as they pulled back, several orcs sprinted forward to shoot arrows at them.

One of whom was Gula.

A volley of stone shards was the mages response as they all pulled back from the forest.

They mostly missed but I saw Gula take one along her right arm and near her wrist.

Dropping down, I landed to Gula’s left.

“See to wounded” I called before a cheer could go up amongst the orcs and few Frojan. I then turned to Gula. The question I was going to ask her died on my tongue when I felt a spirit connection coming from her.

‘We need to talk. Alone.’ Her voice sounded in my head.

“Comes, we see if any humans around elsewhere.” I said. The rest of the orcs started milling about gathering arrows, checking the relatively few dead for anything useful, and get scouting. After ten minutes we were out of sight of the others, even so, I had been doing small healing spells on Gula to help with the two wounds until I could use a full healing spell.

“I told you, wait for them to fall in the mana dead zone then shoot them with arrows.” I chided her as I finished healing the open wound on her left wrist.

“You know, I thought fighting with you after we first met would be some kind of adventure. But sometimes it feels more like putting in a door. Besides, I had a chance to take out a mage when they retreated” Gula huffed back at me with a raised eyebrow of black hair over the scar over her left eye.

“So? Let her go. I know mages are important but putting yourself in needless danger only makes things harder in the long run.” I reprimanded as I moved on to healing her right arm.

Gula grumbled beside me as she puckered her light green lips and stuck out her sharp chin in a pouty face.

“Easy for you to say. They’ve been dropping like flies since you arrived but once you leave it’s going to go back to the good old days where dozens of orcs would die to get a single mage. More importantly, I don’t know why you insisted on letting the drivers go. Everyone was too nervous with being this far out, but I bet Gusla will complain to Mor later.” She fumed in a sour tone as she rubbed the smooth skin on her arm and the cut it left in her black leather armor.

“Letting them go prompted the mages to respond immediately under circumstances more favorable to us, as opposed to sending out a small scouting party to tell them what happened. It also came with the added bait of getting invaluable intel on the new threat.

Either way we would have done what we came here to do. But now they don’t have anywhere near as many mages to deal with the problem, which means the orcs manning the traps aren’t in as much danger now, and they are wasting time pondering over information regarding a threat that will be gone in a few days.” I responded in a casual manner with my hand behind my back as I moved around a boulder. “But I am curious what it is you wanted to talk about now that it isn’t about your wound.”

“Thanks, by the way.” She responded in a cool tone as she looked off to the left.

“No problem, but time is of the essence. Is there a problem?” I asked her.

“Nope,” She said as she took a letter from her knapsack “letter for your lady. The dwarves dropped it off when I was on a patrol when you were out burning that fort, but this was the earliest I could get it to you.” She said as she handed the plain white envelope over.

“Ah, thanks.” I said as I reached into the vines and pulled out the wooden coin, sending out a low screech that prompted two others ‘pandego’s to come out of the trees. They dropped down beside me, with the interested party landing to my left.

“Here. Letter from your mother, a courtesy from the dwarves and Gula” I said as I handed it to her.

Salamede rushed forward and enveloped Gula in a hug.

“Thank you, thank you!” Salamede said before she pulled back and took the letter from me. Gula merely rolled her eyes and sighed as she waved goodbye with her Frojan in tow.

After that we headed back to our temporary home, Salamede immediately ripping open the envelope and reading the letter within upon our arrival. She sat in the corner for a bit, wearing the vine suit as she read over the contents in the morning sun filtering down through the roof. As usual, Cell was somewhere below on patrol.

“How is she?” I asked Salamede as I sat near the shower curtain pushing out mana from my body.

“Good, good. I can tell she’s worried but the letter I sent her was a great source of comfort for her.” Salamede’s rough voice responded.

“Good.” I replied in kind.

I spent a while making more mana crystals as Salamede made a good lunch of fish again. After a quick meal and a long nap, it was time get to work on poisoning the fort closest to the Viper base. As we moved through the treetops in the mid-day sun, I was working out the details on my delivery system when we came upon the command post for the orcs and Frojans operations. Orcs still patrolled the surrounding area with Frojan dispersed throughout but they all seemed a bit more relaxed than usual.

When we dropped down, there was only a slight turning of heads and a few approving smiles. Mor was in her usual rightward spot by the table under the boulder with the big green, silver backed Frojan opposite of her on the left, each with their usual entourages of assistants and guards.

“Ah, the heroes of the hour. What are going to be today’s miracles?” Mor called with a happy tone.

“None but what we said we would” I responded as I came towards the table as Cell and Salamede stood beside me. “Poison humans, need orcs to help us watch backs while working. Gula come with.” I said in a hurried tone. We were so close to the end of this thing I could almost taste it.

Mor got a more somber look across her hard features, but she nodded in agreement.

“I know the Viper base is your main goal, but I must warn you we have not the means to take it.” She warned me.

“Is fine. We have means.” I reassured her. “Is Poison ready?”

Mor got a dubious look with her square jaw showing puckered lips with an obvious question in her red eyes, but her short black hair didn’t move as she nodded and moved to the back of the cave with a hand wave for us to follow her.

In the back were eight large barrels front in center of the rest of the supplies that Mor pointed to. I popped one’s lid and saw the faintly purple liquid inside slosh from the motion as the torch light played off its surface.

“A few drops of that and they’ll be crapping their guts out for a good week.” Mor said with a nasty grin.

“Good, good. Start delivering the rest to fort while we make way to deliver in fort.” I said with a nod to Cell, who came forward and picked up the barrel before he slung it under one muscular vine arm. I turned around and went back to the entrance of the cave. It was now my turn to do the leg work as I left with Salamede and Cell.

We went up into the trees and travelled to the fort closest to Viper base. Like its two siblings, it was a large box of grey stone and its corners had ballistae’s, but unlike the other two it’s surrounding woodlands were almost untouched with only a few scorched patches around the small field of stumps hugging the walls.

After looking around, we found that Gula was already here, waiting in the woodlands on the left side of the grounds with a good view of the fort and the road. We made our way down a bit more slowly this time since Cell had to be careful with his cargo, which he daintily set beside a tree.

“What’s the plan?” Gula asked as she walked over to look over the barrel. The rest of her team was looking around the woods and over the road. This was a moment of rest that I couldn’t afford to waste so I plopped down on a log to my left.

“We tinker and we plan. But we need to do it somewhere safe. Anywhere close by?” I asked her.

She turned upward with a raised eyebrow.

“Hmmm. A bit further south is a grove that lays between several popular paths for our troops. But it is far enough away that the scouts won’t bother us. If mages do come, they would have to pass several patrols undetected. Even without that, I don’t know if they have enough mages left to do patrols. None of the scout’s reports indicate they’re keeping up their regular watches.” She said.

I strummed my fingers on my impromptu seat before coming to a decision.

“They’re probably just saving their strength and hunkering down until the reinforcements arrive. Which will be a few good days yet. Still, no reason to trip up on the last dash of our journey. Let’s head out to the grove and get our plan sorted out.” I said. Gula nodded and the rest of the Frojan headed out to lead us to our destination.

It took almost half an hour, but when we got there I was left with a small open patch in the forest with grass and a small pond to work around. Then I crafted a crude board about seven feet wide and three feet tall. On it were several circular indents that I was slowly working an enchantment around. I was going to use some magical water bubbles to float the poison in the air and over the fortress. Timed right, the enchantment would have them hopefully pop their payload in a small mist.

The first order of business was seeing if I could make bubbles out of the poison. A few minutes in, and I had set up working. Soon a small tower of purplish bubbles was floating in the air above the board as the poison was dispensed in the small circular impressions and had its water molded into a small flowing bubble line. It took a bit, but the bubbles would deform into droplets after leaving the manipulation field. Given wind and other factors they would probably pop before making it over the fort’s walls. But a light concentrated spray might have the momentum to make the distance.

While I was working on an enchantment that would put out something more like a very light drizzle, I heard Gula huff to my right as she looked out over the pond.

“What?” I asked as I made the air constructs that I would put in the triangles for the enchantment.

“More door placement. We’re currently poisoning an entire fort and I’m getting flashbacks to when I had to put a window in my home.” She said irritably.

I could only laugh at her incredulity.

“When combat is boring, that’s when you’re doing it right. Exciting combat is when you don’t know exactly how it will turn out. And I have no intentions of not knowing how this will all play out.” I instructed. The orc turned to me as the mid-day sun was shining over her black armor and reflected off the soft waves in the pond in front of her.

“It sounds like you didn’t know what that pillar was going to do when you lit up those barrels. Or were you just looking to spice things up?” Gula asked with a raised eyebrow, her left eye showing the vertical scar stretch as her right eye had the long bit of hair from her black bowl cut swaying just barely out of her view.

I puckered my lips under the deer skull helmet and looked to my two companions. Salamede was on my left up in the trees keeping watch over my back, but when I turned to my right towards Cell, his spherical head in the featureless mask turned away with my heads motion. I stared at him for a moment even as he refused to look at me, instead displaying a great interest in the small rock by the pond he currently had his head facing towards.

“That” I took a deep breath as I returned to my work, “Was an unforeseen complication but now we only have to get some poison into the air over the fort and we’ll be good to move towards the Viper base. “

It took a few more tries, but I eventually got the dimensions and power down. It would spray a long haze of hundreds of minute droplets in a long arch that would go right over the walls. This method also meant I could use wind and manipulation enchantments so it would have the momentum to keep going after it left the initial manipulation field.

Once activated, the board put out thousands of droplets that shot far into the air and came back down as a slight mist.

“All right, I thinker we’re good. Let’s give this thing a live fire exercise.” I said to the surrounding group. They all perked up at that and excitedly moved to go towards the fortress.

This time I walked along side Gula and her Frojan since I needed to get some figures on the poison’s effects as we made our way over a particularly large fallen tree that presented an almost horizontal wall across the forest floor. A tree I had pretty effortlessly jumped to the top of.

“How familiar are you with this Bells Drop poison?” I asked below to Gula as she made her way up to me, holding and jumping on various branches and footholds in the rotting mass of plant matter.

The line of a scar across her nose scrunched up more in displeasure than effort.

“Tastes like a drop of honey mixed with the faintest whiff of fish. Takes a few hours to take effect but I guess that depends on how much you take.” She said as she pulled on a branch.

I put out a hand and helped her to the top, a gesture she accepted.

“And how would you know the taste? Accident or part of the training?” I inquired.

“Neither” She said when she stabilized beside me. “The other trainees thought it would be funny to slip some in my meal one day.” She then looked past the log and over the forest floor looking how to get down. A task the Frojan found easy as they launched themselves off the tree with the typical grace of their less intelligent cousins.

I could offer no comment or condemnation that I thought she would accept so I put out my hands in a lifting motion to take her down myself. She glared at me but looked back down over the log and rolled her gold eyes with a sigh before walking over to me. I scooped her up in a single motion and brought her down princess style with a whoosh of air as I took off, taking special care to brace her neck before I stuck the landing of my jump.

She got down without a word, but at least gave a respectful nod before heading off to catch up with the Frojan. I followed behind them until we got to our destination. The forest surrounding this fort was still a field of stumps, but the field was only a few yards and the uneven troughs and peaks in the field meant we could just dig under the ground and aim the board after a few tries if we had too. In the little spot where we met the first time, there was now also several orcs with the rest of the poison barrels.

“Ah, there you are. We were told you would be here already?” a muscular orc with blond hair and a square jaw asked/accused.

“Testing thing. Thing is done. Now we try to poison human.” I responded as I strode forward with Cell landing beside me, carrying the barrel and board with his two over the shoulder arms.

We used the barrel we brought with us to test the board and its enchantments out. It took a few tries, but it shot out the droplets with enough speed that I just needed to worry about the angles I would have to use. A half hour of more practice and I felt confident that I could get the trajectories right.

The rest of the afternoon was spent doing the more laborious task, digging a few small tunnels just outside the wall and setting up good places to place the board while it did its work. The later task was mostly done by Cell since his head was small enough not to be noticed when it protruded from the ground to get out bearings. It was late afternoon when we finished.

But we still had to wait for the night before risking our attack. Fortunately, the orcs intel seemed good since we saw no patrols on the roads or any humans aside from those that patrolled the top of the walls with bows leaving me with a good opportunity to get some rest. The sun set over the treetops as the stars finally pushed it back and took over the sky.

‘Do you think enough people will be out for this to have any effect?’ Salamede asked as she stood to my left as I rested against a log.

‘They doubled the night watch according to the orcs. Even if we just get a few dozen men, it’ll take a lot of extra manpower to tend to them and give them water from the diarrhea.’ I responded as I roused myself from my nap.

I got up from the log I had been leaning against and stretched before walking up to the tunnel in the ground we made and taking the plunge into the darkness below with the board swaddled in my left arm. A small flame in my right hand helped guide me through the tunnel with roots hanging down from the ceiling as I scooted along the tunnel floor. The small holes leading to the surface helped provide air and I felt the movement of wind increase when I came up to the larger hole I needed to use for the board.

Below each larger hole was a barrel of poison and this first one came with a mug. I heard Cell coming up behind me. The vine doll squatted still as he waited for my instructions. Going over our plan, Cell stuck his mask and head out of the hole as I handed him the board. Cell would send me general impressions of where the poison was hitting after I handed him a mug of the liquid and he set it off. A few adjustments and he told me we were sending the droplets into the fort between the torches on the wall. I had shared Salamede’s concern that there wouldn’t be enough people out to have any effect but the sounds coming out of the fort told me a considerable number of craftsman were up seeing to the horses, house maintenance and we saw that they had doubled their night watch since they stopped their patrols.

We repeated several more times at different locations with the only sign of us being there was an extinguished torch that accidently got a full blast of the poisonous droplets. After what felt like a few hours, we were finished. Coming back up and out of the hole, we came back into the trees with the orcs, Frojan, and Salamede eagerly waiting around me.

“Finished. We are tonight.” I said to the surrounding crowd.

A silent cheer went through the orcs and Frojan, who mostly padded each other on the back and pumped their fists in the air.

“Go. Rest. Tomorrow morning, we take stone blasphemy. Tell Mor be ready” I proclaimed to the group. Another round of silent cheering went out before the groups turned and rushed through the underbrush and woods to give their reports.

Finally, they all left except for my three people and Gula with her Frojan.

“So” Gula asked as she strode forward in the starlight that filtered in between the trees “I guess you’ll be finished soon.” Her face held a pained hesitation.

“Yes, we’re near the end now. Thank you. For everything.” I said as I put a hand out.

“Thanks? I should be thanking you. You’ve done more for me than anyone else ever has…I... Mor was talking with me earlier and it looks like I’ll be getting this collar off in the next few days.” She said with a hint of trepidation as she took my hand.

Gula was an orc. As such she was my sworn enemy as a human, but at this time, in this moment, I felt a profound sense of happiness for her.

“Excellent. It looks like we’ll all be getting what we want.” I said as I shook her hand. She nodded with unshed tears of joy in her eyes and a smile that showed off the whites of her teeth even in the faint starlight.

After that we all parted ways. Heading back to our original home with the craft to break down the fort’s walls, I spent the night in a blissful sleep snuggled up against Salamede. The early morning came and after a hasty breakfast of oats, I was down on the foggy forest floor going over some instructions with Cell as he used the craft to break the Viper base walls while Salamede packed up our supplies. One way or another, we’d have to leave after today. Either we got the information we needed and went out to get the people who started this whole mess, or we would be left in ignorance and move deep into the swamps or the mountains, where my pursuers would hopefully never dare follow.

‘Remember Cell, put the mana crystals in the pouch in the side for the-‘ A sharp crack of breaking branches to my right drew my attention. I prepared my air gun, but the bushes rustled to reveal a rather sweaty dwarf.

“Ah, master mage.” The short black-haired dwarf with dreadlocks and sapphire blue eyes said. His red armor, edged with gold, had some dirt on it as did his small cape and the axe on his back. “We’ve been looking all over for you but miss Gula gave us the general direction you’ve been coming from and we’ve sent scouts all over. I come bearing dire news. This concerns your lady.”

I raised an eyebrow behind my deer skull helmet but used the wooden coin to summon my friends. After a minute, Cell came out of the hole in between the bushes and Salamede came down from the tree tops, both dressed in their typical attire.

“Go on”. I told the dwarf as Cell stood to my right and Salamede my left.

“The lady’s mother. There was an incident last night. Two mages came to her house and there was a fire. Our watcher can’t be constantly present to oversee the house and didn’t see what happened. All we know is that the house’s front was set ablaze and all three were put too cells while the local law gets testimony and verifies accounts.” He said as quickly as he could.

A sharp gasp to my right from Salamede made my heart ache.

“M-Mother?! We… I need to go-“

“No. You-“ I started.

“I’m not leaving mother at the hands of some death cult!” Salamede said as she rounded on me in anger.

The odds all said this was the necromancers doing and we didn’t need any particular discussion to reach that conclusion. But we did need to discuss who to send to go deal with the problem. Cell was out of the question since he was the only one who could use the craft to bust down the Viper base door to let us in. Salamede would be at too big of a disadvantage since she had no magic and barely any battle experience.

God damn.

I’m so close. I’m so god damn close and then this happens. Just one more day and…

No, no sulking.

“We can’t afford to wait. The men in the fort adjacent to the Viper base will be crapping their guts out by now and the officers have probably guessed they or the Viper base is going to be attacked. If the Coalition leaders haven’t already gotten the raven saying as much, they soon will. I’ll go bust her out of the prison and bring her back here. You’ll need to lead our part with the ‘pandegos’. Cell, bash down the front gate and do everything you can to keep Salamede safe, even if it means losing the commander.” I said with a firm tone.

Salamede said nothing for a moment before coming forward and getting me in a hug.

“Thank you, Eli.” She said in a shaky voice before releasing me.

“And thank you, master dwarf. I will not forget the aid your people have rendered me.” I said with a light bow.

“I will tell Gashton of your gratitude.” He said before turning back around, taking a quick look at the hole in the bushes before leaving.

I went back up to our platform and got my regular equipment from the pile of goods Salamede put together. Going in as a vine monster would draw too much attention and the water jet was actually better for cutting someone out of a prison cell. I stashed the tube over my back in the vines and put the armbraces and leather armor in a bag that I slung over my shoulder.

As I was getting up, Salamede came up to the platform. She lifted up her mask and walked up to me, taking off my deer skull helmet. A deep kiss of exhilarating sweetness and a squeeze of her breasts lasted for a few seconds.

“Come back safe, Eli.” She said when she pulled away.

“You stay safe. And… if it comes down to you or the commander. Get to safety.” I said as I put my helmet back on. She hesitated for a moment before nodding. I looked at her for a moment before looking out over the sun rising over the trees as the fog perished beneath its beams.

What a beautiful start to a miserable day.

I took off into the trees and headed north.