Chapter 1: Discovery

I wake up to the sound of alarm shouts. Already sleeping in my chainmail, it only takes me a few moments to get battle ready. As I stride out of my tent, my second in command is already coming up to me.

“What’s the situation?” I ask him over the sound of the camp waking up.

“A hungry wyrm seems to have found the camp” he replies adding boss as an afterthought. I frown when I hear that, then nod and call out to a few squad captains to group up with their men and follow me.

We slowly walk to the edge of camp when one of the priests of Kathar comes up to me.

“My master sends me to let you know we won’t be able to help you as we are still preparing an important ritual.”

I didn’t expect any help from them regardless. Besides, a wyrm might be a very real danger, but with the whole company here it shouldn’t be a problem. They hired us for these kinds of problems after all. Crazy as they might be when it comes to their beliefs, they are far from stupid.

By the time he was out of sight, four of my captains had assembled their squads. Each squad is composed of ten mercenaries. We march ahead to the sound of battle. The 9th squad is currently trying to fend off the wyrm a bit away from camp, and already 2 men seems to have been gobbled up by the monster.

“9th squad, fall back !” I roar. They had held up well for how green they are, and deserves to rest. I made hand gestures to the other 4 squads to encircle the wyrm.

The wyrm, one of the larger snake monsters out there could become as long as 30m and as wide as 2m. This one seemed close to its maximum size, but not quite there yet. Still too large for my tastes, and its extremely durable scales are still annoying to deal with. Luckily it doesn’t have any magical capabilities or any ability for that matter, except its raw physical prowess. Relying on its raw strength and agility. I believe it’s a gold rank threat if you use the adventurer’s threat levels.

Chasing the remaining men from the 9th the forest green monster’s charge loses momentum when it sees a row of spears ready to receive it. Far from stupid it knows that the spears could piece its scales with its own momentum helping. Without it however, one would need exceptional arm strength or a skill to deal any meaningful damage through its natural armor. The spears are here merely to contain it.

2 full volleys of bolts fly towards its eyes. I stand back and observe my men as one of the wyrm’s eyes gets pierced by a steel bolt. The beast’s roar is deafening, shaking my whole body. The mercenaries stay poised even after that terrifying roar. They have been tempered by many battles.

After surrounding the beast with spears, it should be Max’s turn. Coming up behind the monster, I see him use [Brutal Slash], cutting deeply into the wyrm. Backed into a figurative corner, I see that the monster is panicking. Cornered and afraid, it moves towards me and the 1st squad. The whole squad brace their spears against the ground, ready to welcome the slithering monstrosity. The wyrm crashes into us, and I see the first 2 spears breaking without piercing its skin. The third goes right under and between two scales, penetrating deeply right below its head. Two other spears manage to pierce its natural defenses but not as deeply, and most of the other spears are now broken or simply glanced off.

Finally slowing down, the others are able to attack it from all sides, the monster barely able to keep the fight going. I know this will take a long time if we do not use any skills. I let go of my spear and unsheathe my trusted sword. I cannot use my fighting skills with anything else. I execute [Piercing Thrust] and a small light covers the tip of my sword as I ram it into the it’s head, easily penetrating the durable scales. The wyrm’s last cry is heard and the mercenaries let out a cry of victory. We have lost a total of 2 men from before we really took it on, and a few others are lightly wounded from this scuffle. Really light casualties all things considered for a beast this strong. But with forty versus one it is to be expected.

As the adrenaline rush slowly fades, I can feel the first rays of the sun on my face. I guess we are lucky the sun is getting up, as we cannot stay here, the body will attract all sorts of monsters and we do not want to be close by when that happens. As we get back to camp, my mercenaries start to pack everything efficiently. We are close to where we are supposed to escort the priests now. To be honest I can’t wait to get out of this godforsaken jungle. I’m constantly sweating and the insects are eating us all up. It doesn’t help that the canopy is thick and the visibility is pretty bad even mid-day.

Most of the camp is starting to pack up, but a red tent sticks out like a sore thumb in the middle, and I see that no one is packing around there. As I approach, I can see my second in command coming over.

“Are you sure you wanna join in on this one Max?” I’m pretty sure my second in command doesn’t like to deal with these kind of things. More of a battle junkie really.

“You know the looming brute approach has been very successful in the past” He isn’t wrong on that but these guys seem pretty immune to that. I look up at him and realise how funny it must be for some people to see us side by side. I’m a full head shorter than my second, smaller of frame, and no beard. Compared to him I almost look like an aristocrat, be he does look particularly brutish.

The red tent in front of us now, I think back on all the crazy rumors I have heard about this particular breed of priests. Known to use blood and sacrifices in times of need, their magic closer to demon magic than what is widely used. Some say it is not considered magic but more like miracles. Which I guess is why they qualify as priests.

What greets us inside the tent is worrying to say the least. A transparent orb swirling with red is in the middle of the room with the priests deep in a trance all around it. One of the acolyte not participating comes up to us and gestures for us to keep quiet. I can see the glee in his eyes as he watches his brethren work on whatever they are doing.

“Will this take long?” I ask not bothering to whisper.

“No, they are almost done” he says failing to really whisper in his excitement.

Looking at these so-called priests I almost start to regret accepting the assignment. Nothing good will come out of whatever they are doing. Well, as long as it isn’t directed at me or my company I guess it is hard to complain with the amount they paid. Upfront too. The priests of Kathar have a nasty reputation to all the enemies of the Brudian Empire and few wants to be on their bad side. Priests might be a stretch in any other culture but the Empire doesn’t worship gods at all, and this is the closest thing they have to religious clergy. The most intriguing part is that our destination is in Khalex territory. The Empire and the insect folks do NOT get along, and I can’t say I have any love for them myself. They are proud, arrogant, insane and most importantly deadly. I am pretty strong myself and I think I can take on about ten to twenty trained men without any major [Skills], but every Khalex adult is at least that strong or stronger in my experience. Thank the gods there are so few of them.

I break out of my daydreaming when I feel that something is wrong. There are no more whispers from the priests and the tent is in complete silence. The orb is slowly floating up, and I can see the red mist inside it violently trying to get out of its oh so small container. I notice after a few moments that it tries to go in a specific direction. I really hope that is not what have been guiding us for the last few weeks. The orb suddenly stops and slowly float down again, most of the red mist disappearing to gods know were. One man in particularly decorated robes rises up and greets me. I hope this will be short, we really need to get moving.

“Ah, Reagan” the priest greets me. “To what do we owe the pleasure of your presence?”

There is something unnerving about him. His old wrinkled face and lack of hair not as repulsive as it should be on him. His smile reassuring on the surface but hiding something sinister.

“The camp is being packed and we are ready to move out.The wyrm’s body will attract all kinds of beasts.”

“Perfect, we are very close to our destination and should reach it within the day.” he responds while looking in the distance.

“We will leave as soon as you are ready to move out then. I will see myself out.” That came out sharper than intended. I have always disliked magic and that red mist did get me more riled up than I thought. Relieved to be out of the madmen’s den I survey the camp to check up on the progress.

“They sure do not try to hide the scary stuff” Max says from behind me. I had almost forgotten he was with me.

“Yeah, at least they don’t pretend and are pretty upfront about seeking power beyond them”

“Power is everything in the Empire you know.” That’s true, and I guess why their order is so powerful there.

“They aren’t all that different from mercenaries in that sense” I answer, snorting at the thought. Power is very important in our line of work too. In any work involving killing in truth. In that sense, we are a very similar existence. Only we do not try to draw power from beyond our understanding.

Almost everything is packed in large backpacks and most mercenaries are already grouped up by squad. Almost a hundred men in total. Not bad considering we started with barely ten men. Unlocking my first skill really helped us get a reputation.

With the priests in the middle of our formation we start to move out. We set a brisk pace and I can feel that everyone is more alert now. Probably because we are soon to reach our mysterious destination, but also because we have been in Khalex territory for about a week and we have seen none of the insect warriors.

The day passes without incidence, but I’m starting to feel something in my gut. Something is not right, and we have not seen any wildlife for some time. Our footsteps feel too loud somehow. But I understand that is not the case, but the silence reigning around us makes it feel that way. It is like this part of the jungle is completely devoid of life. Not even insects are around us anymore.

I can’t help but feel like the priests are up to something sinister but now I’m more afraid of what they are looking for. This assignment did seem a bit too good to be true.

A scout comes towards me, looking worried. “Khalex ahead sir.” Well, shit. But this is not unexpected, we have been in their territory for a while and it’s a miracle we did not encounter any earlier. I still would have preferred not to meet any green murderous flying insects. I take the head of the column and before long two Khalex comes into view.

The two of them seem to be guarding some kind of ruins, with barely anything left of it except one structure. The front wall of the structure is mostly collapsed but otherwise the integrity of it seem to be stable. Vegetation has grown over most of everything here and every other house or building which once stood here is but collapsed stone covered in green.

The standing structure is intriguing and could by some stretch have been a temple with the weirdly high roof and spiral pillars. Albeit one with a very different style than the ones from the Kingdom. I can’t see any deeper inside as there is not much light penetrating the jungles canopy here. Only the collapsed front wall allows me to even see this much. No surface is free of cracks or imperfections, most of which are hidden by vegetation. Nature trying to reclaim what is hers. I have to admit, it’s one hell of a sight.

The two Khalex approaching takes me out of my contemplation and I turn my attention to them. Two visible, I wonder how many are here, but most importantly why. The one walking in front is taller than most of my men by a head. Pretty normal for a Khalex, but the number of scars on his chitin is impressive. His deep green carapace is covering his whole body and his two wings are folded behind him. he looks exactly like what we do not want to deal with. An elite Khalex. The saying goes that one Khalex is worth ten men. In practice it’s slightly less. But I digress. The weird antennas coming out of its forehead are twitching. Other than that they do seem pretty similar to humans, somehow, two arms, two legs and standing like us.

I’m relieved to see they do not seem hostile. I can see the leaders 3 finger hands right now, hovering around a sword at his wait. That might even be a magical blade, but it’s hard to be sure. Thankfully the Khalex are not numerous, the humans outnumber them twenty to one. At least that is what is believed. Not much is known about their breeding or how their society works, simply because they do net send emissaries or anything except warriors. And their warriors is all that is known about their society. The last war taught everyone that we may beat them on the fields, but the jungle is their domain.

The elite Khalex speaks up before I can. “What does your kind hope to find here? Only despairawaits the unprepared.” Talk about ominous. I did not take the Khalex for a dramatic race. “Are you here to stop us from proceeding? “ I certainly do not hope that is the case, because if there are even a few more hidden insect warriors around, I’m not sure we will be able to handle them all. Especially not in this jungle. Worst of all is that the one talking feels extremely dangerous. Maybe he even has a high tier skill.

“Is that going to be a problem?” I think this is the first time I have a conversation with a Khalex. I mean I know they are different from us but this? Definitely weird.

“We are not here to stop anyone from entering, we are merely guarding against this place.”

Huh, considering his scars and how strong I think he is, that is worrisome. Walking away from us to continue their guarding duty of mystery temple, it seems he is done talking with us. From the corner of my eyes, I see that the high priest is behind me. It really feels like he knew they would be here. And that they would not hinder us. I can’t shake this uneasy feeling, but I’ve never been one to run from adversity. “Well then, shall we pay this temple a visit?” I ask no one in particular. The wind and silence are my only response as we start moving towards the ruined building.