Warning: Even more depictions of blood and gore.

Setting off north once more, Rael walked while Varith practically skipped along. The semi-solid blood and gore on Varith flew off in chunks with every wild gyration. “Too weak! Too weak!” Varith repeated this phrase more times than Rael cared to count.

“Too weak?” Rael finally broke down and asked.

“Those trolls! They didn’t have an ounce of decent fight in them!” Varith declared, still flinging purple foulness. “How am I supposed to get into the fight when the fight isn’t in them?!?”

“Those trolls are likely the bottom of the bunch, they had almost no clothing and only had clubs which means they weren’t very influential or important to the tribe.”

“Oh? The beasties have a hierarchy? They seemed a little dim witted to have a social structure at all.” Varith said while glancing back at Rael.

“Another reason for them to be at the bottom. The more powerful trolls are a bit more intelligent and usually come armored and armed much better.” Rael assured him.

“Well then!” Varith said, perking up a bit. “I suppose I may have to actually try if when we meet the bigwig trolls!”

Rael thought incredulously. “We should be reaching their territory right about now. It won’t take them long to notice us and send out a group of warriors.” Rael informed Varith as he readied his mother’s bow once more.

Varith replied by cracking his knuckles loudly and giving another sadistic grin. The two walked for another five minutes before the sounds of more trolls reached their ears. Rael was hit with nervousness again as he listened to the group draw closer. Varith crouched behind a root and began working the fingers of his gauntlets.

“Don’t worry, Rael,” Varith whispered, “I remember my promise. I’ll save you at least one so you can get some fun in.”

Rael thought to himself as he positioned himself on top of another root located about eight meters from Varith’s position.

The party did not wait long before the trolls made their appearance. This time the group had ten of the three meter tall creatures. While their hair was still matted and disarrayed, these trolls wore poorly cured leather armor. Each had a pair of dingy thick shorts, sleeveless vests, and carried a spear. One of the trolls in the group was a head taller than the already massive brutes. He had adornments on his armor, teeth and semiprecious stones hung from leather straps hanging from the bottom of his vest, and he had a necklace with one massive tooth around his neck that swayed with each step.

“Gorluk tus-kar!” The presumably lead troll shouted as he took notice of Rael. The rest of the troll group brandished their spears and began to advance toward Rael. As they passed the root which hid Varith from their sight, the mammoth man let out a roar and made a mad leap into the group once more.

Surprised but not stunned, the troll group showed remarkably more experience than the group Varith had decimated. With a quick shout from the lead troll the group of ten turned and met Varith’s leap head on.

Smashing into two of the closer trolls, Varith quickly had to take the defensive as seven spears thrust his direction. Swatting aside a spear from a troll on his left, he turned while bringing his right hand close to his side as he moved to face the offending troll. Using the motion of his turn, he then shot his right fist into the side of the trolls face, instantly smashing the creature’s cheekbone and jaw, which removed it from the fight but didn’t kill it. Before he could finish it, Varith was halted by a flurry of spear thrusts from four of the creatures as they began their offense. Twisting his torso rapidly, Varith managed to gain some distance from the group and Rael noticed he had another grin on his face.

“That’s more like it! Make me sweat, beasties!” Varith said with a laugh as he continued to twist and deflect the barrage of spears.

Rael thought as he shook off his nerves again and took aim at one of the trolls currently focused on Varith. Rael hadn’t lied when he said he was one of the better archers in Sanvar, but this is first time he was aiming an arrow at a living breathing creature. Rael hesitated a moment. Then, he let his arrow fly. It made a faint whistling noise as it closed the distance to the unsuspecting troll.

Thwip! The arrow lodged itself into the neck of a troll who was in the middle of a savage series of jabs. For a moment the troll simply paused and looked confused, as if the sound was something it had not been anticipating. The creature started to reach for the shaft, still quivering in his flesh, before sinking to the ground. Purple blood flowed from the wound, and a gurgling noise erupting from its mouth.

“Nice assist!” Came Varith’s booming shout. The remaining eight trolls backed away for a moment, glancing back at their leader as if looking for guidance. They still had their spears pointed at Varith ready to defend or attack. Varith, however, moved much more quickly than they could react. Using his gauntleted right hand, he smashed through the shafts of the two nearest troll spears, bringing the groups attention back fully unto him.

“Gatrik mekt rasab! Hadjar mekt tus-kar!” The leader shouted. Hearing what the two men could only assume was attack orders, Rael tensed and Varith grinned wider. The two trolls, now wielding broken spear shafts, hurled them at Varith who had to twist to the right and duck to avoid. Not even bothering to see the results of their attack, the two split from the group and began to charge at Rael.

Rael noticed the charge, quickly set another arrow, and fired it at the closer of the two. It lodged into its abdomen and caused the beast to stumble. He began to notch the second arrow as the troll closed the gap at a terrifying speed, but he wasn’t quite fast enough. The troll leaped up on to the root where Rael was fumbling and took a lumbering swing at him. The dexterity enhancing effect of the bow saved Rael’s life as he deftly bent backwards, dodged the swing, and placed his hands on the ground. He then kicked his legs up and used a back spring to gain a bit of distance on the troll.

Rael struggled to maintain distance from the troll while leaping from root to root with the beastie was never far behind. The troll, while fast, was not as agile as the current Rael. Running up a length of tree trunk and kicked off, Rael flew over the head of the pursuing troll and landed six meters away on another root. Using that time, he notched his arrow and aimed at the trolls enraged face.

Thwip! The arrow flew from the bow and near instantly lodged into the left eye of the troll. The troll let out a blood curdling scream as it desperately grasped the arrow shaft and sunk to its knees. The troll attempted to yank the arrow out, but it’s usually impressive strength was failing. It collapsed on the forest floor, still clutching the arrow with a look of horror and pain on its face, as it died.

Rael let out the breath he hadn’t noticed he was holding and looked around. With one troll dead and in a pool of blood, he noticed that the troll he had hit in the abdomen was already on its feet. The beast had seen its comrade fall and was clutching the arrow that Rael had shot in its massive fist. It charged at Rael again.

Rael thought thankfully to himself. He calmly sighted another arrow on the charging troll and let it fly. Thwip! The arrow pierced the side of the troll’s neck, just above the collar bone and sent a stream of blood down the still rushing troll’s chest. Rael notched another arrow as the troll began to lose speed from blood loss. Thwip! Another arrow shaft appeared lodged in the troll, this time in its chest. The troll hit the ground without a sound as the arrow had pierced the heart and killed the beast.

Rael felt relief as he hopped down from the root and looked around. He could hear Varith still laughing a bit away and knew his desperate fight hadn’t led him too far from the man. Reaching down, he retrieved the arrow from the last troll’s fist and neck, but the one that had killed the beast was too firmly entrenched in the chest cavity. Leaving the other arrows as a lost cause, Rael began to sprint in the direction of Varith’s laughter.

Turning the bend of a root, Rael was greeted with a stunning sight. It seemed as if a field of violet blossoms had sprouted all across the area. Rael quickly shook off his reverie and returned to reality. Blood was splattered everywhere, though most of it had seemed to be attracted to Varith who dripped and slung gore with every movement. Three troll corpses were scattered about the man, and the remaining trolls had backed off from the deranged battle enthusiast.

“Haha…haHA….HAHAHAHA!” Varith was still laughing as he swung his gauntlets down and behind him sending another wave of blood onto the ground. The corpses told Rael why the last of the trolls had given Varith space. One was hanging about four meters off the ground on a tree trunk, its head had been caved inwards and beaten into the trunk. The only thing holding the creature aloft was the fact its spine was still attached, though Rael doubted how long that would last with the jerking twitches running through its body. Rael didn’t even want to know how the creature had made it that far up the trunk.

A second corpse was laying on a root a few meters away from where Rael was observing. The head was hanging off the side facing Rael with its arms dangling. Rael looked down and saw what couldn’t be called anything less than the drying remains of a fountain of blood, covering a cone shape space about a meter across at the widest. What was most disturbing to Rael was the condition of the chest portion of the beast. It was laying across the top of the root in a way the legs could not be seen from Rael’s position but that was not important. The fact it was lying flat on the root was. It seemed the unfortunate creature had had its bones beaten into a powder and the bulk of the chest was simply splayed out like a burst sack of meat on the root.

The remaining corpse was lying behind a trunk and Rael could only see its feet. He was sure that it was in about the same condition as the other two.

Dragging his attention back to Varith and the remaining four trolls. One was nursing its face where Varith had hit it, while the two other lackey trolls were looking at the huge man nervously. The leader of the group was still about a meter behind the others and had a grim expression on its face.

“MEKT!” The lead troll shouted, and the lackeys began to advance on Varith once more.

“Come get some, beasties.” Varith said as he set himself, placing his left foot forward, he pulled both his elbows level to his shoulders. His left arm extended in front of him and his right hand was beside his head. He had opened both hands with the palms facing the trolls.

Rael thought to himself.

He wasn’t quite correct with his guess. As the troll with a dark black bruised lump where his cheek bone once was began to charge, Varith used his left hand to deflect the reckless thrust upward and stepped into the charge. He grabbed the troll’s right arm with his own right hand above his head. He stepped under the arm and brought his right hand down, twisting the troll’s arm behind it. Varith clenched his left fist and drew back, readying for a massive blow. He rotated his feet, hip, then leaned into the punch in one fluid movement. He used the combined motions to enhance both his punch and the jerk on the troll’s arm he still had ahold of.

The resulting impact was tremendous. The punch disintegrated the troll’s shoulder blade and socket while the pull on the arm separated it from the mangled joint. The force of the blow sent the troll spiraling to the left, without its arm, and it hit the ground screaming in pain. Varith didn’t stop there. He swept his right foot behind him, and he rotated again bringing his right arm, as well as the trolls, crashing into the next trolls face. Varith began wielding the troll arm as a sort of flexible club to deflect spear thrusts from the remaining two lackey trolls with his gauntleted left hand and swinging repeatedly with their companion’s appendage.

Rael watched as Varith continued his brutal assault on the remaining trolls. Blood was flying about, as he used the wrist as his grip and swinging the arm at the remaining trolls. Rael readied another arrow but could not fire as Varith’s wild gyrations kept blocking his view of the other trolls.

Varith hadn’t stopped moving or laughing the entire time. He giggled as he dodged a spear thrust aimed at his throat while laughing uproariously when he landed a bone crushing blow. The remaining two lackey trolls were quickly dispatched with Varith’s impromptu club. One took a series of rapid blows to the head and crumped, while the other received a rather vicious uppercut that forced its lower jaw into the roof of its mouth.

Varith wasn’t even breathing hard as he eyed the last troll, the leader and presumably the more powerful of the bunch. The troll being scrutinized was calm as he surveyed the corpses of its now dead party and donned a look of disgust and disinterest. Tossing the makeshift club aside, Varith brought his fists together in front of his chest, causing a metallic clang and drawing the remaining troll’s attention back to him.

“Now…” Varith began as he advanced on the troll, “time for the final show.”

“Tus’kar mofil deran e trolus.” The lead troll spoke and also began to approach the gore soaked man.

Rael thought and brought his mother’s bow to bear, arrow notched.

“Stay your bow!” Varith practically roared. “This one is all mine!”

“If you say so, but this one is probably an elder and much stronger than the others.” Rael warned.

“That’s what I hope.” Varith responded without looking back.