Upon hearing the screaming, most people broke rank and sprinted towards the source of the noise. There were people like me however who simply walked behind the chaos, with most of the people supposed to be in the front row being behind people. With S being even further behind, walking alongside me as we joined them in investigating.

She, thankfully, had not even a scratch on her armour. Meanwhile, one of Jacq’s skeletons bore dents in their armour and skull, so likely took all the hits from the ogre. In spite of this, she seemed lost, if not downright depressed. Focusing on something else to the degree of not noticing things like trees and people in her way, nor even communicating to me.

Continuing to watch her brood on her thoughts, the people we were following headed into a nearby cave somewhat shielded from the forest’s foliage. Inside, the screams became louder, and the occasional clang of metal and grunt could be heard when the screams had a pause.

Now running, I finally spot Jacq herself in the twenty odd people all piling into the narrow cave; all her skeletons not with her.

Finally, we get close enough to see blood; both the green blood of the greenskins whose corpses littered the already cramped tunnel, and mixed in was the occasional spot of red blood of the humanoid(s) who released such a scream. The noise of fighting was still a ways away from the sound of it, but we patiently wait either way. Mainly because I was likely critical for transportation, and I’d get blamed for letting people die if I wasn’t trying to get there.

The tunnels soon opened out to a massive room, in which you could see all the people massacring everything green and moving. Two people, who weren’t with us before, laid bleeding on the cold, jagged floor. I used most of my energy to open a portal, and lead the two through it as the others were found… Although this made me on the edge of passing out, getting closer with every second.

Safely getting the two outside to where the main group were, the healers who remained waiting got the message with no words needed. Immediately getting them from me and starting treatment both efficiently and cautiously.

I could also see that the others were still busy looting the previous site as we were trying to save lives… the ‘main’ objective of our mission.

S shortly followed, getting through my portal with yet another survivor who’s taken of her hands swiftly.

“Stamina potion… please…” I demand with heavy breath. One is thrown my way without delay, and I glug the contents of the blue potion down with one swig. Continuing through the portal to the inside of the cave.

In the time passed, it had become far less cluttered, with the dying lined up patiently against a wall. And the combatants retreating to allow the seven healers present more access. However, without many provisions due to the rush, they couldn’t do much. Six of the ten people lying there definitely not breathing, and the screeches of agony from the other four resounded through the otherwise silent cave. S and myself, with later Jacq joining in as well, couldn’t even access them due to the wall of people blocking the healers off, even when I pointed it out verbally, my words went unheard…

Out of the four, three fell silent. The forth falling unconscious, and finally allows to leave through my portal before I joined them, the world falling dark on my end due to magic power deficiency.

-

Gentle noises from the environment awoke me, the sun poking out of a cloud at that very moment to burn my retina for good measure. Again, the sensation on the back on my head was of an odd, but not necessarily uncomfortable firmness.

Before I regained my vision, I called out, “Miss Ess?”

‘Hey Sam. I carried you until we reached an opening, then the others continued as Jacq told me to let you rest. She’s also here, looking after the survivors. It’s not like anything happened whilst I was waiting…’ she explained through telepathy.

As I rose my head from her lap, my retina burn died off enough to let me see her. And so, I sat up and faced her.

She gave me a meal, waiting for me to finish it. Dismissing offers to share with ‘I’ve already eaten… I don’t need to eat anyway.’ I couldn’t even finish half of it before my stomach gave up.

However, she was lying evidently from the green, viscous liquid still dripping from her sword. Yet, I don’t bother pointing it out, instead asking in a cold, monotone, “Did the fourth end up surviving?”

She simply shook her head, looking down without a word.

“Oh well, how about this. Given the dim mood already, I will let you ask me a question about myself, and I will answer it for you. Hopefully it will at least distract you from what just happened.”

It took her awhile to consider the deal, but eventually looked to me and nodded.

‘Why are you a traitor?’

At her question, Jacq- who was trying to look as if she wasn’t listening in and doing her own thing a few metres away- suddenly twitched and unconsciously looked this way before turning away swiftly.

“Will you believe my answer?” I countered, remembering how absurd the story was.

Only when she faced me and nodded, I continued, “Do you know what this is?”

I pulled up my leather armour, revealing plenty of scars which still showed up on my extremely tanned skin, and other than that there was a burn with a circular form. A round shape which once magnificently portrayed a beetle, was now disfigured. Although the burn should be black, it was only a pale red- barely coming up on my skin at all. Jacqueline closed the distance to take a look herself, not even putting up a pretence as intrigue dominate her thoughts.

“It is what you think Miss Ess and Jacqueline, I used to be a slave. My masters were merciless, cancerous... and overwhelmingly stupid enough to teach me void magic. So, I became a traitor when I used the latter to murder my master and freed myself. Do you wish for more details, or is that depressing enough as it is?”

Both fell silent, likely asking themselves the obvious question, just to remember what ‘void’ magic truly was. Nodding as it eventually made sense. Then, as both looked down at the ground at a similar timing, both finally asked the other obvious question.

As the answer couldn’t come to her, S blatantly asked me, ‘Why are you a traitor for that though? Are the gods really that strict even in such circumstances?’

Jacq, knowing the answer, simply faced away from S as I coldly answered, “That is how the world works, Miss S. Although I had a few gods, goddesses and gatekeepers on my side, the high council couldn’t come to the decision to remove the title due to there being a draw in their ruling, so, due to how the system works, it stuck. It is that simple. I refuse to regret my decision, so get hated.”

‘I… I… I can’t understand! How can the gods, who out ruled slavery in this world, allow such a thing? And how does a council even end up drawing, with an odd number of people?!’

Jacq looked back at me, curious herself as to the answers.

“For one, I was enslaved in the underrealm, although being born in this realm and returning here before the council met. One of the reasons it was controversial was due to the laws governing the underrealm taking precedence in the case. And, for the latter, a member of the sworn into the council refused to pick a side. Their reason being both loyalties to the system making accepting our ruling impossible, but also a sense of ethics meaning he couldn’t reject it either. This was allowed back then, because, although a draw could have happened, apparently my case was indeed the first that it did, and so they flipped a coin and made it stick... Due to privacy on cases in the high court, my name was masked. But, as it caused wars between some of the gods and goddesses in this plain, likely any god knows the case, including Lithy.” I had no emotion in my voice as I recounted it.

S fell silent once more, looking down at the floor. Jacq left, keeping with the survivors. And the awkwardness continued for a few more minutes.

Eventually both decided we should rejoin the effort. With S physically dragging me as she sprinted, yet, due to my own weakness in that regard, she ended up carrying me most of the way. Jacq had summoned some skeletons to carry the still unconscious survivors. Going straight in the forest, only deviating slightly as to not hit trees, we reach the lines in a reasonable about of time.

They all seemed fine, even somewhat bored. They also let the blue wolves join the bloody sword’s side, likely due to the lack of vanguards on one flank and lack of rear guards on the other. Most, aside from few individuals in the middle row and all of the mages, were coated in the green-skin’s blood, to a point where it likely caused problems. Also, the amount of corpses made physically moving an army was hampered significantly.

“You three, make a section to join our flank. We could use the help,” one of the mages announced, snatching us for what was now the left flank.

Due to this, I proceeded to summon my bow, S wielded her blade and Jacq set up her skeletons to make yet another flank, with being central in it. As we set up as they continued to march at a snail’s pace, there was no need to coordinate a pause with the other flank. And soon, both flanks, lead by some of the rearguard, ordered us to speed up since the corpses had long come to an end. So we gained ground at a relatively decent rate, seeing visible progress in ten minutes against the dense forestry shrub which dominated the ground.

Soon, we reached one more combat. This fight was slightly smaller in scale than the one earlier, but with three ogres, and the rest of the near triple digits of things being orcs, with a handful of the orcs being high ones. The fight relied mainly on both the vanguard not falling, and the rearguard mage’s area of effect attacks, which, even for the thousand flames mages, was significant. With them alone halving the amount of living greenskins. Jacq, on the other hand, didn’t join in by using her magic. Instead, her sole contribution was her summons, who definitely did their job.

I, myself, killed a couple orcs. Primarily aiming at eyes, inside of open mouths and in elbow and shoulder joints, either killing them outright, or crippling their attacks for the vanguard to mow them down. The ogres were the only problem, but as we slaughtered the orcs, an individual in the high orcs became significant.

Even though high orcs was basically just a rank of how visibly dominating an orc seemed, being killed the same way but with a slight bit of caution added on; one soon stood out, the one wearing a crown. And since most- but not all- of the orcs were ‘male’, having aesthetically male chests, this was one of the minority who were female. In fact, even though they were overall lower in number, the females made up a high proportion of those we judges as high orcs.

A lot of the comments from the people were about this individual, otherwise being comprised of complaining about kill stealing, and notifying others were they were and which targets was theirs. It was highlighted by the commentary between the bloody swords and red fangs about the red gangs actually showing caution when fighting them, and the bloody swords backhandedly insulting them for doing so.

Using a massive blade and shield, they stood at the back. As I could see them between the ogres and over the orcs, I took some shots. Not missing, she soon took notice of me. Anticlimactically, however, as they began to shield me off, they suddenly fell. Their head being unceremoniously split in half probably due to the arbalest or some magic.

With that, the remaining orcs became frenzied. Attacking each other and us with a new-found vigour. The ogres on the other hand, simply swatted the orcs away, mostly towards our lines, as they revelled in the chaos. Soon being the only ones, due to there only being ten orcs even left after the king’s death, and the high orcs being killed by the rearguard before the vanguard could even reach them. Annoying them to no end.

Each of the ogres took time to kill, that was, until Jacq actually used her magic to completely dissolve one into darkness. For the other two, One was whittled down on the right flank, using the arbalest to secure the kill. On our end, the ogre was distracted by me, significantly wounded by the fire mages, and killed by a large swing by S and another skeleton, simultaneously decapitating and disemboweling it.

The former lasted longer, as they mainly used patience on their flank to wait for openings, whereas we mostly spammed attacks until it became weak enough to kill. And with that, we regained the drops… As in, I took an ogre and some high orcs without anyone realizing, as the others simply grabbed loots. Mainly fighting over the crown.

That was the last major fight, as the rest was just killing remnant stragglers until we met up with the three other flanks. Upon meeting them, we were told our mission was completed, each guild participating was given a certificate of acknowledgement by a ‘witness’ from the guild hiding his identity as one of the healers, and we were basically forced back to where we came.

We casually walked back, not needing to rush or anything. Eventually, after hunting a couple beasts and securing as many herbs as they could force me to put in my inventory, we exited the forest, Jacq summoned her carriage, and we headed back. Getting back as sunset started to kick in, painting the otherwise plain, navy-blue sky with an array of purples and reds.