Orc Raiders

Part 2 of the Valkyrie Six


After a night of rest, three of the recruits were somehow wearing decent leather armor and swords.

"We're footmen now. We automatically get the equipment we deserve as we get more experienced. You can choose how we advance for our next promotion. The Skirmisher has some more ranged fighting capacity, and the veteran fights on horseback and is promoted to cavalry or infantry ranks."

"Definitely the veteran. We need more front line fighting capacity with so many of our Six being support or ranged focused. Ok, form up just behind Melara and Sophella, and provide melee support and skirmishing, get out of the way if the fighting gets heated, I don't want you dead," Valeraine said, as they were headed out of the camp.

The group marched in the formation Valeraine had described the night before, with Melara and Sophella first, followed by the recruits and footmen, and then Alendria and Valeraine herself, with Aliaga taking up the rear.

Bodahn and Sandal were somewhere behind them, following far behind. Isseria looked back and couldn't see them.

She was off to the side of the whole marching formation, taking a flanking position, ready to come in as a surprise.

It was an hour of steady marching through cold forested lands, full of snow. Pines, firs and other evergreen trees were everywhere.

There were no animals to be seen, at least, no predators that would worry them. Instead they spotted a group skulking through the forest, and chased them down.

The group, when they were cornered, turned to attack.

"My men and I would like a word with you about your purse and your belongings."

Isseria jogged to take up an encircling position. Melara went invisible, Sophella charged towards the man who had said that.

And then Isseria felt a queer feeling as she dematerialized and appeared again elsewhere. It was like the transporter on Star Trek or something.

They were all there. The thick forest was replaced with a field with only a few trees, and the snow was cosmetic, being only a half-inch thick.

Where were those outlaws now? Isseria wondered.

"Get back in position, and scout out the area," Valeraine said.

Isseria flanked their reforming formation on the left side, and continued looking for the enemy.

She saw them, finally, approaching from a distance. They must have been transported as well.

"It's a lot far for me," she said.

"I can't shoot that far," Alendria answered.

"Its too far for everyone I think," Aliaga said.

"Get ready. Be Careful soldiers."

The two fighting bands came closer and closer. Finally, the enemies started throwing stones their way.

"Two can play at that game. Just get in my boulder range!" Sophella yelled.

Alendria started shooting, and Aliaga started using her spells from about 100 yards out. At 60 yards, Isseria drew one pistol, loading cold-shot, and carefully fired. She could only shoot once every few seconds at this distance. The dual pistol stance was too inaccurate at range.

Valeraine smashed a fire shard into one looter's head, downing him.

There were 8 looters left standing when Alendria put away her bow and pulled out her mandolin. The song was soothing once again as Isseria pulled out her second pistol, and loaded up with kinetic rounds.

Sophella stunned a looter with one of her boulders, and Melara appeared right behind a looter as Sophella smashed her stone fist into another.

Two looters bypassed the front line, and the recruits pounced on them. One of the looters froze as Aliaga's spell slammed into him, and the other two took a barrage of blows from the recruits.

Isseria picked off two looters that decided to stand back up, and the looter fighting the recruits, was flung back by Valeraine's backdraft spell as they were about to smash a club into one of them.

"Take the weapons and coin from living and dead. After you've left the survivors with nothing to come back against us with, let them go."

Isseria picked up a few small coins from the bodies of the two she had shot after they got back up. She put their armor and weapons in a big heaping pile where the others had collected them.

"There's only one living, here," Melara said, with her foot on the man's back.

Isseria walked over, seeing Melara take axe and knife and stones from the man.

Valeraine talked to him, "Tell your master not to mess with the Six, if he wants to live out the month."

The man stood up, spat in Valeraine's face, and shouted, "Whore!"

He started running, but Isseria aimed her pistol and fired, downing him.

"Isseria! We don't kill the defenseless!" Aliaga said.

"She did the right thing. The Valkyrie Six are going to have to earn respect. Respectful survivors will get a respectful chance to leave. Disrespect will get disrespect," Valeraine said. She wiped the spit off her face.

"Anyone hurt?" Aliaga asked, changing the subject.

"I got hit with a stone," one of the recruits said. "But that song has me cheered up again.

Bodahn came through with a wheeled cart Isseria hadn't seen before.

"I got your stuff. Is there anything you'd like to keep, or do you just want to sell all this junk to me? It ain't much, but its something for coin."

"Any armor that's even sorta ok for Isseria?" Valeraine asked.

"You might find some eventually, but this group was pathetic."

"How many coins for all this?" she asked.

"62 ducats. I know its not much but this is bottom of the barrel equipment. Its worth more to be torn up as scrap and salvage."

"Alright. Let's all pool our ducats and then we can manage our funds together," Valeraine said.

Isseria gave up her coins, as did Melara and Sophella.

"Ready to move on?" Valeraine said.

Everyone nodded.

Isseria asked "What was that trans--"

They transported back to where they were before.

"That's the battle field," Bodahn said.

"Well I know, but why didn't we fight where we found those looters," Valeraine asked.

"You fight on a separate field. Two words, battle, field. As in, this world brings you into a separate place when you engage in battle. The battle fields vary depending on the local geography but they don't match your location exactly. You'll continue to go back and forth from the Battle field and the World zone over time. There's also city zones and village zones that work by teleportation. You get close to the city and then wham: city zone. Just is how it is," Bodahn said.

"Commander," one of the Vaegirs asked.

"Yes soldier, what is it?" Valeraine asked.

"I've been upgraded to footman as well."

"Very good, lets move out."

They teleported back to what Bodahn called the world zone.

"Alright, let's make sure we form up after each teleport from now on," Valeraine said.

There was another group right behind the first group that they hadn't seen before.

"For the Horde!"

"Oh crap, it's a Horde War Party!" Aliaga said.

They faded into the snowy battle field again.

-----------------------

Aliaga tensed up, contemplating the armor on that Orc rider. It was one of Hellscream's mounted raiding parties. Every one of them were Orcs of the greatest viciousness.

"Listen up," Aliaga yelled, "These guys are not like who you just fought. They are on wargs, they fight dirty, viciously. They are armed and armored, and I'm sure they have a warlock or two in their group. We need a phalanx."

"Vaegirs, fill in a square. Up front will be Sophella, Melara and myself. Isseria, form the left side of the phalanx. Aliaga, form the right. Alendria, form the rear. Troopers, fill in the gaps so we have 3 to 4 people on each side."

"We need to have a plan to disrupt their charge," Aliaga said. "I will mind control one of the riders and make him crash into another. Melara, can you do your force push thing to fling one of them off their warg."

"Do whatever you can to blunt this initial charge and then form the square," Valeraine said.

One of the mounted Orcs was stopped by a tree, they ran right into it like an idiot, but the others charged towards the Six. Aliaga took control of the one of the riders' minds. She made the warg smash into another rider's warg, and then when the rider was thrown off his warg, She made him attack the other fallen rider.

Meanwhile, Isseria quick fired shots into a warg, sending a rider leaping off his warg. Melara had flung another rider off his warg and landing some distance away, and Valeraine also blasted back one of the riders.

Sophella was punching wargs and riders with her fists and hurling boulders. She had drawn the attention of a large part of the group.

Aliaga always had a rough sense of the health of everyone in the group. Without an area healing spell, however, she needed to focus on the big heals. Alendria was already playing her healing song, so Aliaga prepared and then used her heal spell on Sophella after she was knocked down by a warg rider. It was more than was needed, surprisingly the so-called tanker had held up and only took a few cuts to her stony exterior.

The recruits fought on the edge of battle, and Aliaga desperately cast a heal on one of them as they were being cut down, and the man had a renewed surge of strength to fight back. Sophella didn't need much healing, but the troops and Isseria, who had somehow taken a front line position, needed a lot.

Isseria was the most fragile of the bunch, but she was deadly with her pistols. The constant healing spells sapped her focus, so she almost didn't notice a Orc slashing his broadaxe at her.

The axe slashed through her robes and cut the skin, but no further as she stumbled backwards.

She motioned at the Orc with her finger and the orc howled in pain slashing her with his axe, gouging into her side.

She backpedaled, casting a heal on herself when Alendria, who must have switched to bow, shot the orc.

"A little help over here."

She sensed Melara taking heavy damage and spared a moment to heal the Jedi as Alendria took the brunt of the Orc's charge, but not before shooting him with her short bow twice more.

Aliaga took control of the orc's mind after the first hit, and directed him to run back to Sophella.

Sophella was standing back to back with Melara, calling on the enemies to try to hit her. Chunks of her armor had fallen off, revealing the human within, but Aliaga's senses showed that Sophella was still ok.

It must have happened too fast as she didn't even notice Valeraine get knocked out.

The fray and frantic battle had created a gap between most of the Six. The troops were down and dead all over the place, but two of them were working together with Isseria and still surviving.

There were three Orcs in between them and Sophella. One between them and Valeraine.

"Shoot that one!" Aliaga said. And she ran towards the orc, inflicting pain on it, and then healing Isseria.

"My mana's getting low," she said to Alendria.

"The lilt is a low cost chant, I haven't really tapped into much of mine. In my world, magic users can share mana, but I'm not sure how well Elemental mana would work with Holy mana, in our world it works poorly."

Aliaga had never heard of sharing mana, although there were all kinds of potions to regain mana.

"I need to get a full set of mana potions once we have the money."

Alendria fired on the Orc enough to draw him towards them so he couldn't finish off Alendria.

The shadow word pain faded, and she reapplied it to the Orc.

"Let's see if this staff still works as a normal weapon!" Aliaga said.

Swinging the staff with abandon while approaching from the side so Alendria could still shoot, she made contact, bruising the already bleeding orc.

The staff wasn't so effective at blocking the orc's battleaxe though. Aliaga had never trained in melee combat, really.

She fought through the pain and bashed at the orc with the staff in a tomahawk chop motion.

"He's holding onto all my arrows! This is the last one!"

With a swift motion, the orc smashed his fist into Aliaga's face as the last arrow pierced into his left eye, and the Orc howled and collapsed, as I crumpled to the ground.

"I wish I could play Nexus for you right now, but it seems I don't know that song in this world," Alendria said.

She retrieved the Mandolin as Aliaga sat in the dirt looked at the devastation. Sophella was fighting what was left of the enemy force. Three orcs hemmed her in. Isseria was down, Melara was down. A lot of wargs and orcs were down or dead.

Alendria started playing her healing song again. Aliaga got up and kicked the orc, pulling the jagged arrows out of his body, and aggravating the bleeding. She pulled the arrow out of the orc's eye, and he howled and shuddered, and then went silent.

"They're bloody, but here, I got your arrows," Aliaga said to Alendria.

Alendria juggled her mandolin and pick, and took the arrows, stuffing them into her quiver, and then resumed playing.

Somehow, one of the Vaegir footmen was still standing, and came towards them.

"Anyone got any water?" Aliaga asked, as she was eyeing Sophella's fight, with two orcs left.

"Here," said the footman, passing over his canteen.

Aliaga took a few swings from the canteen, passed it back to the footman, and felt restored by the lilt. She stood up, having recovered some of her mana, and cast a healing spell on Sophella, who stood up straighter, her stone armor having somehow been repaired by the healing magics.

Aliaga hit both orcs with Shadow Word Pain, Alendria stopped playing the lilt and started shooting again, and the footman charged towards one of the last orcs. They even managed to get a few blows in, as the orcs withered and then tried to run but were cut down by Alendria's arrows, and Aliaga's shadow words.

As if by magic, Bodahn showed up as the battle was over.

Aliaga went around, looking to the fallen heroes. Thankfully, none of them were dead, and she was able to heal them up. Valeraine first, then Isseria, then Melara.

Two of the recruits were hurt but still alive, and one other footman, in addition to the one that had helped at the end.

Sadly, the six others were dead. Alendria gathered the recovering ones, and was playing her lilt and singing songs.

Sophella helped Bodahn pile up the orc bodies, and respectfully handle the soldiers that had died.

They looted the orcs for armor, weapons, coins and even found a sealed envelope.

Bodahn said all the armor and weapons were worth 800 coin, and Isseria wanted a lighter armor than the heavy stuff the orcs had worn. Aliaga took the coins from Bodahn and gave it to Valeraine who was sitting in a circle around Alendria.

"Oh I've been to every bar, tavern and inn in all of Illithi and Zoluren,
 But not a single one has ever called me home like this one,
 The snowbeast sandwich it is the snowbeastiest
 Baerholt's Tavern is more than a bar, it's got foreign cheeses from afar

 I've been to every Bard shop in all the land but not one keep compares to that man
 The True Bard who knows his timpanis like he knows his favorite wine from Ilithi
 D'or I've been falling into a trap, I've fallen for the man of a timely snap
 The violin he''s mastered, the harp he played until all of them ran away

My life is just a song, like when I was singing my life away to get from dying
Those monsters were running at me and I sang the fear into them
I couldn't hit them with a bow if I spent all year long shooting and shooting
My sword decided it wanted to run away but my music still stayed with me

Music without something hard is just a wasted song, just a parched throat in a storm
Give me a glass of something strong, you may think I'm a weakling but your wrong
I once drank a Gor'Tog under the table, when I drank that disgusting grog all day long!
Give me a brandy, made by the man that I find fancy, I just want the everlasting song!

And now here I am, with all these fine ladies, in a place without a single drop!
There's nothing to be found, not even a pint of a tonic that keeps me up!
What strange place, filled with orcs and men and not a single rat is moving on the ground
Now my path has been set by someone else, I will fight and sing with the Six until I'm down."


"Did you just make that up on the fly?" Aliaga asked. "I used to hang out at a tavern in the mage district, and we had a few singers there."

"I usually sing improv, or half-improv, if I adjust off of a song I already know," Alendria said.

"Let's leave this battle field, and then set up camp. Maybe Bodahn has some comestibles, we have the money now," Valeraine said.

So they left the field of battle, and then immediately teleported from the world zone into the camp zone, where their camp was already set up. All Valeraine had to do is want to go to the camp, and there it was.

The four remaining soldiers approached Valeraine.

"We were recruits, and now we're footmen," two of them said.

"And the two of us are ready to be promoted too, but you have to decide. Skirmisher or Veteran. As a Skirmisher, we're heading towards specializing in bows, or as Veterans, we will be on horseback, but our later options can be foot soldiers or cavalry."

"Jim here is ready to be promoted again after this choice too," said the other.

"Veterans for both of you," Valeraine said. And their gear changed as she said it.

Jim said to her, "Now I can become a horseman or an infantryman."

"Well as the six, we aren't really a mounted group. So I would say infantryman."

The man who had been barely armored was now wearing a full hauberk, and a nordic sword and shield.

"Good job out there guys," Valeraine said to them.