We didn't charge in wildly. Instead, we walked up to the encampment in a slow, and organized manner because there was no real threat. When one of the goblins did decide to peek and take aim, he was taken out by Seralyn’s deadly accuracy from afar before he could let go of his arrow. Once close enough, Velariah and I split off to the rear exit.

Strangely enough, when we got there, there wasn’t a single goblin that tried to flee, something which I’d expected to happen. Instead, a few of them guarded the entrance with the crude, small spears they possessed.

When we closed in on them, I could tell from their facial expressions that they were mortified.

“Should have brought my spear,” I commented.

“I think your current weapon will do well enough, even from a stationary position, especially versus goblins.”

“Right,” I said with a nod as we closed in. It wasn’t like these creatures had any reach at all, so I should be safe no matter what.

We charged the last few meters and I instantly struck down two goblins as soon as I got within range, my haphazard weapon movements being more than enough to slice through them. Velariah lashed out as well, splintering a weapon with her sword, empowered by her holy magic, before stabbing a green-skinned creature through the chest.

Unfortunately for us, we couldn’t be supported by Seralyn here and we soon had an arrow and then another fired at us. I blocked one aimed at me with my shields, but due to the second shot’s terrible accuracy, it missed my defenses and got stuck somewhere in my abdomen. No damage was done by it, but I disliked the idea of the enemy getting a lucky shot.

“We really need a spellcaster for our party,” I said, striking down another goblin. “We only have Seralyn to attack from a distance, and she can’t help both flanks in a situation like this.”

“First priority when we get back to town,” Velariah said. “For now, we’ll have to do without.”

For a moment, I felt something in the ground. Something heavy impacted it from somewhere nearby, but after that, there was nothing, which made me think I imagined it though I knew I didn’t. There was also no other follow-up to it so I couldn’t identify where it came from.

“Something’s wrong,” I spoke the gut feeling that I had.

“What is it?” Velariah asked, ready in a defensive position with her gauntlet raised to block projectiles.

“Felt something in the ground. Nearby. Don’t know where. It’s quiet now. Vel, I don’t trust this at all.”

“What do you want to do? Push forward?”

“We can, but I want to keep an eye out on our surroundings, so let’s go about this carefully.”

“Understood.”

The knight stepped forward, quickly disarmed goblins by, well, disarming them. Literally. After that, a quick decapitation followed while I too used my massive reach and struck down several others. In the distance, at the other end of this small camp, I saw another archer being taken down by our own ranger. At the same time, the elven party impaled creature after creature, their reach simply no match for us.

Then, suddenly, I felt a series of tremors in the ground. Heavy creatures, trolls judging from their typical seismic activity, were converging on our location and in unusual numbers.

“Vel, back! Get to the others, get them ready. We’re being ambushed by trolls,” I shouted, fearing the nearby goblins with the urgency with which I spoke.

“Got it!” She called back as she retreated and hurried her way back through the entrance to walk around to the other side.

“And have Nira call reinforcements!” I yelled back at her.

I was certain she’d heard me, and thankful to have at least a bit of experience in a situation like this. I wasn’t sure if this had been set up, with the goblins to be used as bait, and I didn’t judge it out of the question. The fact remained that we were being ambushed and we didn’t have much time to make decisions. However, calling reinforcements as soon as possible would be the first priority. Second, I imagined it would be useful to clear out this place as quickly as possible so we couldn’t be attacked from two sides.

I was in a position to do it, but even if my armor was of high quality there was always a risk to it, more so than when just cleaning through the goblins in a methodical fashion. I narrowed my eyes at the multitude of armed green-skinned creatures before me, and figured that our best chances only existed if we could finish this fast. There would be questions later, but whatever came we’d have to see. For now, there were goblins to be slain.

I completely turned off my mind and brought my weapon to my side before I started charging straight through our enemies, trampling and cleaving them along the way. Then, when I almost ran straight into the others, I turned around and repeated the same carnage as before.

I took a few blows in the process, but almost all of them hit either my armor and shields, which I was using to great effect. Few attacks hit my legs, but I was lucky to have superb natural armor in the form of chitin to protect me. One hit did strike a weak spot, though. A sword that was surprisingly sharp, for it being of goblin origin, managed to find its way between two of my leg segments and cut into the area. I had no idea what it had hit, but I knew that the pain that resulted from it was highly annoying.

Yes, annoying.

It wasn’t too painful, but it was a sharp sting that just remained and moaned for attention, like certain sprains that I hadn’t felt ever since I lost my human legs.

I ignored it and struck down the last few enemies, who didn’t even bother to flee. They died with terror in their eyes and, again, I felt sorry for them in a way.

But I didn’t allow my feelings to linger. As soon as the last goblin was struck down, I went to help my allies who just finished up their part of the extermination. Velariah was there and she’d already informed them of the situation. When I approached, I could hear her talk about some sort of plan.

We weren’t given much more time as the newcomers made themselves known. Massive, bulky trolls converged on the little encampment from three sides, leaving just a small gap where we originally came from.

“Nira’s out to get help,” Velariah informed me. “We just need to get the hell out of here and make sure they don’t penetrate our lines. Possibly take some down in our retreat.”

“Understood,” I said with a quick nod. “If we can separate them, I can possibly hold quite a few busy.”

“Let’s move quickly!” Velariah called out as she led the way and started running back. In our withdrawal, Seralyn managed to snatch a few arrows, which she fired off again moments later, aiming for the eyes of the approaching monstrosities.

She wasn’t as accurate as usual, probably because she was constantly on the move now.

“I’ll try to buy time,” I suggested, looking through the area to see several more trolls join the fray. I counted seven of them, and there was no telling how many more were on their way. The ground was simply shaking too much.

I watched my companions continue to run off, and the two soldiers that had been closest to us soon came sprinting towards them. After they all came to a halt, they readied their weapons, and Seralyn continued her assault on whoever she had the best chance of hitting.

At the same time, I made my way to the troll that was closest to them, using my speed to my advantage and dodging the blow that inevitably came. From there, I did a quick turnaround and sliced the back of his knees, completely severing one of his lower legs and severely injuring the other.

An immobilizing wound that was fatal given time. That was my goal here.

My allies got themselves ready and started to spread out into a combat formation, but still stepped backward, knowing there were simply too many trolls for them to take on. I was lucky to be able to pick off one that was separated, but that was where my luck ended.

Trolls weren’t nearly as dumb as they looked, and certainly not as stupid as goblins. As soon as they saw one of their own fall to me, they started gathering in groups of two, and then three as they closed in. This would make striking them down in the same fashion much harder and incredibly risky for me.

We needed numbers to separate them once more to take them on. Right now there were ten on our side, against nine trolls, and they had more on their way. That, I could feel.

In order to buy more time, I feigned attacks, charging up to them and forcing them to be on the defensive or risk getting their limbs cut off. I stayed well out of range and slowed them down considerably. I saw several openings where I could get attacks in but I refrained from doing so, figuring it wasn’t worth the risk, just like Valtheril had told us.

A bellowing roar followed when Seralyn managed to strike down another grey-skinned monster with a well-aimed destruction arrow to the throat; oozing icky blood followed, and the troll collapsed. At the same time, two more soldiers had shown up in support, their weapons drawn.

Not a moment too soon, either. As much as I was able to keep them occupied, I couldn’t do it forever. Some of our adversaries started ignoring me, and a group of three started charging at my friends, intending to pulverize them beneath the heavy weight of their primitive yet deadly maces.

I wanted to help them, but I couldn’t have them be overwhelmed by even more trolls, so I went back to stalling and trusted they could deal with just three of them. I was certain they could with the numbers advantage they had, but kept an eye on them, which was easy when I had four.

I circled another group of three that intended to help out their brethren, temporarily stopping them in their tracks as they had to defend themselves. I feigned attacks and kept my distance.

In the meantime, I was watching the elven party use their spears to moderate effect. They had taken our advice to heart and were actively dodging incoming attacks while forcing their enemies to spread out.

They didn’t hit any strikes, but the tips of their weapons were an excellent distraction. As their enemies were fixated on smashing the elves to bits, Draco, Velariah, and the soldiers walked up behind them.

When the opportunity was there, Draco leapt into the air to bring down both axes in the back of one of the trolls, followed by rock spike—which I thought was overkill, seeing as his axes embedded themselves deep enough to shatter ribs and slice through vitals.

Velariah, lacking the lizardman’s natural tallness, instead opted to resort to my strategy: use her white-hot blade to slice through the beast’s legs.

While she didn’t cut through all the way, it was plenty to bring her target to its knees, for it to then be stabbed by two spears from the front. While those didn’t penetrate as deep as they would have had they been of decent quality, Velariah’s sword from behind did. A stab through the heart was all it took to instantly finish it off.

As for the last one, well, the soldiers showed once more why they’d been referred to as ‘elite’. Their attacks were incredibly powerful, just like our weapons, but they had years of training, and almost superhuman strength behind their blows, resulting in cuts that rivaled my weapon’s.

I was impressed to see the speed with which they completely dismantled their enemy. They worked together to strike weak spots, resulting in limbs that became powerless before they were severed. Ultimately, a strike to the neck area was what did it in.

Seeing them in action made me wonder. They were professional soldiers and not adventurers, but what rank would they have if they were?

I shook off the thought as I had to focus on what was going on near me. More challengers had shown up and I made the decision to keep them occupied, allowing the group I’d previously kept busy to run towards our party unhindered. Now that they had killed the first three trolls, I imagined they could deal with these.

Better a slow drip than a swarm.

As I charged, I noticed a lone troll approach from behind the trees at the edge of the clearing. It wasn’t too far from the ones I was aiming for, so I decided to charge that one instead after making sure there were no others to support him. After all, every enemy that I took out was one less to deal with later. I carefully assessed the risk and went for it.

He and I both noticed and then charged at one another. My agility easily outclassed his strength as he brought down his hammer, to which I only had to take a small sidestep, and before he was able to lift it again, I’d already cut several centimeters into his flank.

A roar of pain and rage followed, which prompted two more trolls to come to his aid, but they were far too slow. I managed to cleave into my enemy once more before I made my retreat and allowed the gushing wound to do the rest.

I then turned my attention to the other group that I had initially planned to delay and found they were already headed my way, eager to avenge their not-quite-dead-but-soon-to-be comrade. I took them for a game of cat and mouse, but soon had to abandon them to keep another group busy that threatened to overwhelm my party. Unfortunately (or fortunately depending how you looked at it) they were oblivious to my lightning presence on the battlefield and I managed to severely wound one with a slice to the back with my polearm.

Then, something which I’d almost forgotten about happened. The paralyzing effect from the lightning steel brought the troll down to his knees and then to his side as I saw him twitch as if he’d been electrocuted.

I was impressed the effect worked on enemies of this size and with the insane resistances that they had, but there was no way I was going to complain.

Another masterful and empowered arrow from Seralyn ended its companion’s life before it could even react, an arrow stuck in its eye socket.

Seriously, how did she keep doing that?

That one arrow changed things significantly and I could only imagine our archer’s smile in my mind at the opportunity that this opened. There was only a lone combatant remaining and I could easily take him down.

He turned around and I feigned a charge, waiting for him to bring his weapon down to then do a surprise attack, but instead of swinging, he waited. Instead of bloodlust, there was focus in his eyes.

It was too late when I saw what he did. When I got too close I had to eventually avoid him, and when I did, he hurled his hammer at me as I passed.

I had the wind blown out of me as the hulking object impacted my armor from the side, and I stumbled just before I fell over forward.

My armor had absorbed a good deal of the impact, but hellish pain was coursing through my body, and my sight had become blurry.

“Fuck,” I screamed as I scrambled to move forward and away from danger. I had managed to increase the distance between the two of us just before I almost faceplanted the ground, but trolls were fast.

I heard a roar come from behind me, and with the little sensations I felt in my legs, I used them to drag myself forward as best and fast as I could. My vision started returning, albeit slightly, and during the process, I saw a flash of fire, followed by another roar from behind me. Then, a thud followed, and then there was nothing, silence.

“It’s okay, El. You’re safe.”

Velariah’s soothing voice washed over me as I saw her figure appear before me, an arm extended to help me get up.

“Fuck,” I moaned in pain. “Thank you, Vel, but ugh.”

I took a deep breath and found I had difficulty doing so.

“Here,” She offered me an uncorked vial containing foul, green liquid. Without even waiting for me to raise my hand, she put it to my lips and forced me to chug down the contents. At the same time, feathery wings that I recognized as Nira appeared at my side, and within seconds, I felt her magic flow through me, healing my internal damage.

“Thanks,” I said weakly. “How are we doing?”

“Tuh,” The white-haired chuckled. “Good now that reinforcements are here. The trolls are being taken care of as we speak.” She turned her head in the direction of where I now heard sounds of battle coming from. “And it ain’t looking pretty for them, let me tell you that.”

“I assume that means we’re winning?” I said, recovering some more of my voice thanks to the ongoing healing effects.

“Definitely. Did you really have to go and get yourself hurt again, though?” She asked in a half serious, half teasing tone.

“Couldn’t know trolls actually trained for the fucking Olympics now, could I?”

“The what now?”

I shook my head and sighed deeply.

“I’ll tell you when we get home.”