Chương 22: (22) B1 C22: Impressive Swordsmanship

To my great displeasure, Lucia charged in at the rabbit, her caution thrown to the wind, as soon as she'd managed to escape from our hiding place. It was like she didn't even care about being caught—the damn girl was yelling while she was running toward the Silverscourge. The rabbit, to its credit, was just as surprised as I felt. It's meal was abandoned, even as a chunk hung from its mouth, as its stupified gaze tore into the suicidal teenager.

I sighed, already preparing to charge in after her, as the rabbit finally began to move. Before she ended up skewered, however, Lucia froze in her place. She stopped, waited for the rabbit to pounce forward, and brought her sword up to meet with it. The large creature slammed into her blade just as her feet planted firmly into the dirt. Her entire body swung with the impact, and soon the rabbit was torn to the side with hardly an ounce of effort required on Lucia's part.

The exchange happened so quickly that I almost couldn't catch it, but Lucia wasn't done just yet. She stepped forward, smoothly lifting her sword upwards as her heel slammed into the earth. The blade sang and cheered as it sliced through the rabbit's shoulder. The creature roared in fury and pounced once again. Lucia, already recovered from her attack, simply redirected the attack as if the rabbit weighed nothing at all.

I felt my eyebrows rise in awe as I watched her treat the dangerous beast like nothing more than a whining child. Before the rabbit even fell back to the earth, Lucia was upon it once more. Her blade pierced its hide with ease, severing the creature's connection to one of its hind legs. A stream of blood flew into the air, coating the air in a vicious aroma. I hardly felt the heat hitting my tongue, as my attention was too focused on the impressive fight happening right in front of me.

The rabbit finally fell upon the earth, now short one of its legs. It stared at its wound in frustrated agony, then let out an animalistic roar as it pounced once more. It hardly managed to get any air, probably due to its reduced mobility, but the creature wouldn't have stood a chance even with that extra leg. Lucia's blade sang once more, this time slicing through the air on its path to victory, as well as to the creature's neck.

I watched as its head flung from its shoulders, the furious expression stuck on its face like an oil painting as the ground below it was coated in crimson excellence. The creature became silent as its heavy body landed on a small pile of twigs. The sound of its body hitting the ground was gruesome compared to the beauty of Lucia's swordsmanship, and I couldn't help but feel incredibly impressed.

"Whoa," I muttered in awe. Lucia turned to me, a smile clear on her face, as she sheathed her weapon. I lifted myself from the bushes, my eyes tearing into hers as if searching for some otherworldly explanation, "Did you not feel the pain reflection? You were moving as if it didn't exist!"

"Oh, I felt it, but it wasn't nearly as bad as you made it seem," Lucia replied with a sigh, "It was more like a slight tickle. My training was more difficult, if I may brag."

"That's… Damn, alright," I nodded, "If you ever catch me underestimating you again, hit me on the head. Hard."

"Will do," Lucia laughed, "So, do you think I'm ready to join you on your hunting trips?"

"Most definitely," I nodded. … The moon was high in the sky when we finally discovered the forward scout encampment that Dave's note had mentioned. Luckily, we'd managed to find it only a few hours after we finished chowing down the Silverscourge Rabbit, so they hadn't left just yet. During our short journey wandering around for them, I'd killed one of my own Silverscourge Rabbits and was delighted to learn that their pain reflection simply didn't affect me.

I didn't know why they'd become so common, all of the sudden, but I was very glad for the extra blood points they'd give me. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to feast on it due to Lucia's everwatchful gaze, but the excitement was there nonetheless. As we searched for the slavers, I hadn't taken the sword back from Lucia's grip. She knew how to use it far better than I did, so as far as I was concerned that was her sword now.

I wasn't too worried about the lack of a weapon, as I still had my claws to fight with if we found ourselves in an emergency. Of course, I made sure to pray to every god that would listen in hopes that such an emergency wouldn't make itself known. While we were moving through the forest, I made sure to keep an eye out for any potential shelters or roads.

Even a slight sign of civilization might be able to lead us to a new shelter, though I wasn't fortunate enough to find anything that I'd be able to use to block the sun. When we finally found the small encampment, some five or six hours into the night, I immediately crouched down and began stalking from a distance. Lucia did the same, though I noticed that she moved far more sluggishly than I did. So she can treat a dangerous monster like it's nothing, but moving around in the dark is too much?

There were six slavers in total, all gathered around a small campfire. On the opposite end of the campfire from where we stood was a large hut about the size of a suburban living room. I felt my breath hike up my throat as I nearly cheered in excitement. Genuine shelter—at last. However, upon looking closer at the hut, I felt my excitement fade away like fog lifting from a window. The windows were barred and reinforced with steel frames, yet the door was old and rotten.

The moss-covered walls failed to hide the age of the structure and the inevitability of its collapse, so even though it was the first sign of shelter I'd found this deep in the forest, I knew I wouldn't be able to use it as a reliable shelter from the sun. This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon. A disappointment for sure, but not one to get caught up on. I turned my eyes back to the campfire, where the slavers were having a late night meal. Damn.

They were still eating? It was halfway through the night! Two of them were warming their hands near the campfire while they conversed with hushed tones. Both of these individuals wore leather armor similar to Lucia's, but one carried a dagger and the other a shortsword. Rogues, both of them. Nice and easy to kill, but neither would give me much BP. I turned my attention to the other four and found each of them keeping a vigilant eye on their surroundings, despite the food in their hands.

It was only the two rogues who didn't seem to care about the treeline. Evidently, none of them were able to see me, as I was watching from over twenty meters away while hiding behind a thick layer of foliage, but their presence didn't seem encouraging. Of the four, one of them appeared to be a swordsman, same as Dave had been, while two were mages. The last was somewhat of a mix between a magical build and a physical one. He was bulky, like a swordsman, but he carried a wand and book at his side.

I couldn't tell what type of magic the mages specialized in, though if Norman had been any indication, their spells would almost certainly be sourced from their weapons. One of the mages carried a basic staff, though the other had her hands wrapped by a set of golden chains. It was a focus, which was essentially the magical equivalent of a dagger. The swordsman was carrying what appeared to be a broadsword, as well as a shield that he had slung lazily against his hip.

The last slaver, the bulky one that might've secretly been a mage, carried a prayerbook alongside his standard-issue wand. So he was a Paladin, then? Paladins were rare to see, especially in the lower levels, so I naturally became wary when I caught sight of his prayerbook. He'd be able to cast holy spells, which were naturally going to hurt like a bitch. As far as FFO was concerned, they were Wardens, and thus were the magical equivalent of Vanguards.

They might've used magic, but they were very much close-combat fighters. The Paladin was the one to speak first.

"They should've signaled us by now. They're an entire day late!" he complained, his voice loud enough to carry even beyond my location. The man had one hell of a voice. One of the mages, the one with the staff, pondered in silence for a moment before she turned back to the Paladin. She gave him a sigh, then turned to look at the rest of the group, "We can't start without them. Until Sergeant Ryan meets up with the forward group, they'll be sitting ducks, which means we will be as well."

"Maybe they deserted us?" one of the rogues by the campfire suggested with a snicker. He tossed a twig in the fire, then watched as it cracked and burned. The Mage who spoke, who I assumed must've been in charge, shook her head at his suggestion.

"Eddie, maybe. He's always been a cowardly bastard, but there's no way David would abandon his duties," She told him, "If I had to guess, Carissa ran into a problem at the docks. We'll wait one more day, and then I'll send a letter to the captain. She'll know what to do."

"Do you think Carissa's okay? What if somebody attacked them?" The rogue asked, his eyes alight with mischief.

"If they did, they are dead," The shieldsman, a rough man with a deep voice, said with a serious expression. The rest of the group turned to look at him, so he continued with his explanation, "Carissa is nearly level forty. I know she isn't as strong as the Captain or even the Captain's Lieutenants, but she's far stronger than the rest of us. Plus, she's built around shrugging off as many hits as possible. In a straight fight, she'll easily outlast everybody she's fighting."

"Thirty-seven levels don't make much of a difference when you're attacked by an entire group of enemies," One of the rogues mentioned, "I mean… it helps, i guess… but more than one enemy is still fucking tough to deal with."

"That's cause you're a petty bitch who doesn't bother to learn how to fight properly. All you do is go for backstabs and sneak shots." the other rogue laughed, "The moment somebody actually faces you like a man, you panic and wail!"

"Regardless, my patience is getting stretched pretty fucking thin. If David doesn't start moving within the next ten minutes, I'm sending my sword straight through his eye!" The paladin spat, "I've had enough waiting!"

"Calm yourself, Jonathan. If you go on like that, you'll give yourself a heart attack,""Please, as if Moarde would let that happen to me. When I die, it'll be in glorious combat!" the paladin responded. My ears perked up upon recognizing the word he used. Moarde was one of FFO's many deities. Specifically, he was a minor God of War. If I remembered right, Moarde was once an FFO player, but he died in a car accident just a year after the game was released.

The devs immortalized him into game canon by deifying his character. It had been a cool moment, at the time, but now it made me wonder if Moarde, like myself, had come to this world after his death. Something to look into when I had the time. As there were six of them, I knew I wouldn't be able to sneak close enough for them to be within Crimson Instinct's range without being noticed. I'd be found, chased after, and quickly killed.

That's not to say I wouldn't be able to take down a few of them before they got to me, though, as my Critical Damage was truly insane by this point. No—I was more worried about how easily I'd be outnumbered. A 2 v 6 was never a good position to be in, especially with a rogueish character build. I didn't know how much health Lucia had—the sword-skills were a definite bonus, but she was still only level seven.

She'd nearly been killed by a single gunshot wound, which once I thought about it, didn't necessarily indicate weakness. In FFO, guns weren't weapons meant for exclusively higher levels. They were classified using the usual weapon system, so it was fully possible to find and use a level one firearm. It might've had the ability to fire across a long range, but the damage wasn't anything special.

So if Lucia was just shot with an especially powerful gun, she'd probably still be able to perform quite well in her level range. It felt a little naive to immediately assume that, of course, so I still made sure to keep an eye on her performance anyways. We couldn't risk a direct confrontation—my low health would be the end of me, so I had no other choice but to try and fight them one at a time.

If they were distracted and separated from the rest of the group, I stood a greater chance at killing them without alerting the others. Of course, I had to consider that isolating them wouldn't lead me directly to victory. If I couldn't kill them instantly, the sound of our fight would alert the others and ruin our plans for stealth. Still, if I managed to kill just one of them, the following skirmish would be all the easier because of it. The paladin—Jonathan, I think his name was—was my primary concern.

The prayerbook at his side was no doubt filled with dozens of holy spells, each fully capable of harming me to a truly disastrous extent. The two mages were scary as well, though the rogues and shieldsman were no doubt able to pack quite the punch of their own. I looked to the horizon. I had just less than five hours until the sun rose, which meant there were maybe three hours worth of activity left—so long as I dedicated two hours for the return trip through the forest. Three hours.

I looked back to the bundle of slavers. Was it even possible to kill them all in that time without making them suspicious? I would have to be patient and go at them when the opportune moment arrived, but if I waited too long, or simply got unlucky, time would fly by and I'd lose my chance. This was going to be difficult.