Chapter 3.1

A force of over 500 armored spearmen marched through the countryside. Other than the sound of their feet impacting on the dirt road there was only the sounds normally found in nature. Birds chirping, insects buzzing around and from time to time angry squirrels could be heard chattering over some unknown slight.

Near the back of this troop was a young man in newly fitted studded leather armor with a spear slung across his back. Erasi couldn't help but be miserable, 20 fucking years all for the sake of killing a scumbag. It'd been nearly a month since him and his new found comrades had left his home town behind and only a week since he'd registered with the Mercenary Guild and been outfitted with his armor and spear. The only real silver lining was the armor. He looked like a badass, like he could face down an army by himself. Not that he'd ever try such a ridiculous thing.

Things had went much smoother than he'd expected. Although there was a bounty on his head in his hometown and no Hunters Guild would accept him as a member, luckily the guild master in Firinta Wells only did a local bounty and only added his name to a black list for the Hunters Guild without listing a reason. All this information of course was delivered in a letter in Hard Bol, the city they'd stayed in for a week while his armor was being finished. Erasi figured he should be happy but this awesome looking armor had a deplorable feature which trapped all his sweat and made him feel like he was being stewed for some magical beast to eat.

The worst news the letter contained was that his family had returned to find out their son was being hunted by the local guild. Kaldris didn't go into detail but from what was inferred Erasi's mother had went ballistic. She'd even attacked the guild master and left him half frozen right outside the Hunters Guild. This resulted in her being ordered back to the main branch of the Breedlove family under house arrest for a year. Apparently they made a spectacle of it for the sake of the Hunters Guild. While not trying to protect Erasi at all.

So here he was marching while his balls marinated in his juices towards a place called Ryne Fortress to work for what Captain Vion called a " self righteous loathsome prize winning druko that just happened to pay well".

As it turned out the Bloody Jesters were contracted to squash border skirmishes with a tribe that lived outside of kingdom control. It was an easy job from what everyone was saying since apparently the tribe was was a relatively minor tribe that was taking advantage of Ryne Fortress being hard pressed to send any soldiers as they were currently being plagued with beast attacks on their northern border.

Ryne Fortress was situated along the north western border of human controlled territory and was part of the Dul'Ryne kingdom. The name was a combination of two family's names. Dul and Ryne respectively were the two so called noble families that carved out a kingdom after the fall of the Vanguard Kingdom. After asking around after learning about this Erasi found out that there was also a Dul Fortress and a Dul'Ryne Citadel with the latter being the capital. Truly no imagination was used where naming was concerned.

Soon the order to halt for lunch was passed down. Erasi grimaced as he pulled out some jerky that unfortunately wasn't druko meat and some hard bread. He'd come to the conclusion marching food was terrible. No one talked as they ate, it seemed weird the first day but Erasi found out the hard way why, he'd tried to strike up a conversation that first lunch on the second day of marching and after several failed attempts finally decided to eat only to have the march order given before he could take a bite. The assholes he'd tried conversing with actually fucking laughed as he tried to eat and march. No one bothered to tell him that lunch break was only 10 minutes or so, not that he had anything to tell time with.

After another week the Bloody Jesters mercenary group reached Ryne Fortress. Erasi was elated at first until the most evil bitch in the world came calling. Captain Vion had decided he'd go with her and Borthe to meet their illustrious employer Baron Fisel Ryne.

"Well come on Erasi looks like Captain has taken a liking to you haha!" Borthe said cheerfully as he covered his bald head with his jester helmet. Erasi followed suit putting on his own helmet which the captain had specially designed the jester face on. It had elongated and curled red lips in almost a sneer, half the face was black and the other half was actually silver. The eyes were triangular with a wide base, on the black side the eye was surrounded red with a silver looking spear crossing it vertically with the shaft broken by the eye, the other side was the same except the eye was surrounded black with a red spear. Erasi was a little happy with the look though he'd never admit it to the greatest evil he'd ever met.

Soon Erasi and Borthe were following about two steps behind a helmless Vion as they made their way towards the fortress. Erasi wasn't very impressed by the so called fortress, it did have walls but they were barely 9 feet tall and were created of what looked like dirt and wood. The entrance they were heading towards was guarded by two soldiers who were obviously not intending to stop anyone as they carried on playing dice even as three armored spear carrying people approached.

The city inside was worse than his hometown. Erasi could only imagine what kind of so called Baron would let the fortress and town be so shabby. The roads were uneven and winding and more loose dirt than road. The houses and businesses were slipshod masterpieces of dried mud and wood. As Erasi was looking around Captain Vion spoke with a tone of ridicule.

"No wonder they can pay so well, fuckers obviously don't give two shits about their people. Oh well not our problem as long as this shit stain pays we'll finish as quickly as possible and move on."

"Yeah my family's druko farm is less of a shit hole than this place." Borthe responded which Erasi was sure if he could see his face he'd be glaring at his surroundings. One thing he did learn about his new comrades along the way was they were all commoners and all of them hated seeing the common folk mistreated. Which was why he couldn't understand why that evil devil bitch decided to make him sign a twenty year contract.

A few turns later Erasi found himself looking at a rather nice walled villa with guards patrolling with alertness. At the open gates stood 6 guards, three to each side and in the middle a fat man who was trying to wipe his profusely sweating brow but his handkerchief was already incapable of holding anymore so he was just smearing his sweat around.

Erasi frowned and thought to himself 'Fuck me I knew it'