Aporeu chronicles Issue 44: Unrest in Wentel part 4: Seek and destroy
Stories from the adventurers
This week
Two adventurers that both seem to think they are useless, but think that the other one is wonderful. I wonder how much of this is true and how much is fiction. Read and decide for yourself, the stories about the end of the goblin threat to Wentel.Unrest in Wentel part 4: Seek and destroy by Gerolt
[Editor’s note: A man came to me with this story, rather amateurishly written. At his request, I did what I could to augment the prose and vocabulary. There seems to be a rather heavy focus on one member of the adventuring group featured in this story, with whom the writer is clearly smitten. Though somewhat biased, I decided the story still warranted inclusion in the Chronicles.] The story of a hero and the fool who tried to keep her safe This is a story about a hero who traveled from a land far away to come to the aid of the people of Arnheim. Her name was Jade on the Mountaintop, a mysterious Tabaxi with spotted light-brown fur so soft, and green eyes that sparkle like emeralds. Through her kindness, cunning and fierce determination, she quickly won the hearts of all but the most wretched. One day, the hero Jade went to the guild hall to look for a quest against the forces of evil. Despite a grievous injury sustained previously, Jade was undeterred, determined to lend her strength to the greater good no matter how much her legs hurt. Spotting a mission to clear the forest of vile goblin invaders, the hero didn’t hesitate for a moment to accept the dangerous task of facing Daknek, the cruel goblin warlord, in his own camp. Lending her support on this quest were five others; Lothrien, the elven shadow stalker; Ruzak, the dwarven master of battle; Cahir, the enigmatic blade of darkness; Svæin, the mountain of muscle; and of course, the fool who had sworn an oath to keep Jade safe behind his ridiculous-looking shield, always by her side for better or worse. Having learned the location of the goblin camp from a previous daring adventure, the hero made her way through the dark woods of the High Valley. She led the party to a secret tunnel that ran all the way into the heart of Darknek’s lair. Lacking confidence in his abilities, the fool decided to keep everyone waiting while he applied a skin balm he naively purchased from a shady back-alley doctor. Minutes later, he rejoined the group looking like an idiot with his skin all covered in a hard, eggshell-like coating. Jade headed into the long, dark tunnel, entourage in tow. The fool insisted on staying in front of her, ruining any chance of a stealthy approach. Through sheer luck, he managed to spot a strange, insectoid creature near a pile of rusted weapons. Indecisive, the fool hesitated while Jade coolly fired two shots, one to test the creature’s defenses, and a second to end its miserable existence. Emboldened by the hero’s example, the group pushed on through the dark. At the end of the tunnel, they came to a ladder leading up into the camp. Bold as always, Jade wanted to go first, but the fool stopped her, holding the hero back as usual. Lothrien went up in her stead and climbed to the top. The elf opened the hatch, setting off an alarm that Jade could no doubt have disarmed had she been allowed to take point. With their cover blown, the group hesitated, debating the option of retreat. Undeterred, Jade rallied her followers, confident they would be victorious regardless. Moving up, they emerged into a small hut, from where Jade’s keen and beautiful eyes spotted a vile hobgoblin scurrying over to warn his leader. Without hesitation, the hero fired a shot at the messenger in a valiant attempt to contain the threat. However, interference from the fool threw off her shot, and the arrow went wide. With the last chance of maintaining the element of surprise lost, the group was left with no choice but to either flee or boldly face the enemy in the open. Encouraged by the presence of a true hero, they chose the latter. Striding into the heart of the camp, they walked into a circle of jeering goblins. The foul Daknek emerged from his tent, flanked by his henchmen. In a futile attempt to break her unyielding spirit, the warlord told Jade he’ll spare the adventurers if they chose to leave now. The hero’s answer was an unerring shot to the shoulder of Daknek’s bodyguard, sending the foul and cowardly goblinoids scurrying for cover in a panic. Battle ensued, with Svæin, Cahir, and Ruzak stepping forward to meet the enemy while Jade and Lothrien rained arrows from afar. The fool remained standing in the open, eyes wide with fear and shield raised against an illusory enemy that existed only in his mind. Jade lined up shot after shot, but was forced to come to the fool’s aid when a demonic owl-like creature assaulted him with arcane lightning. Calmly tracking the elusive beast’s path through the sky, Jade eliminated the feathered fiend with a single perfect shot. Meanwhile, the mountain of muscle had dispatched of the bodyguard that Jade softened up for him, before grabbing on to Daknek, who was attempting to escape through use of cowardly sorcery. Cahir stabbed his blade of darkness through the warlord’s throat, ending Daknek’s tyrannical reign. While Ruzak was doing his job for him, keeping everyone safe with his shield, the fool was still engaged with his own imagination. Only through Jade’s encouraging words was he finally pulled back to reality. Shaken from his stupor, the fool noticed the enemies falling, and decided to finally join the battle now that it was as good as won. Their spirit shattered by the loss of their leader, Daknek’s remaining followers scrambled to flee and abandon camp. Blindly, the fool rushed after the goblin wizard that took him out of the fight so easily. However, he only managed to make a bigger fool out of himself, getting bested by yet another simple magic trick. The foul magician would have gotten away had Jade not used her heroic signature move to put yet another perfectly placed arrow directly in his evil eye. With the battle won, and yet another threat to the city of Arnheim dealt with, Jade led the group home, victorious and laden with the spoils of battle.Unrest in Wentel part 4: Seek and destroy by Jade
True Heroes The adventures of The Catlady When my paws reach my front door, I know I have returned from a heroic adventure surrounded by the biggest heroes of all time. I know this because I was there, and I can tell you I do not tell lies. So let me get something correct first, before you are reading this in confusion. I believe in the magic of reading epic hero stories read at night to children, but real life heroes are something else. They are truly, heroic. Heroes aren’t almighty, undefeatable or fearless. They are the ones who are weak, beaten down and terrified, and make the impossible victory happen anyway. Let me tell you the story of the attack plan I ruined and that made them all true heroes. I showed up at the guildhall with my only two skills, my smile and piercing arrows, guided by Gerolt, already known as Shield Of Dawn. To my surprise Quen, another great hero, wasn’t present even though he had been all the other times. But my sadness melted by the view of the strong shoulders from Ruzak and the magic beaming Cahir. I wasn’t surprised that Goldie Locks (Lothrien for who must know the name of this hero) also showed up, with his bow readied and his smile ready to kill. When I was about to ask who was going to fill the big shoes of Quen, I was not disappointed to get an answer of the biggest guy I have ever seen in my life. This monster of a man is called Svæin and was bringing some raw muscle to this group. While walking back to the hut we had previously cleared out, Gerolt and the rest came up with a plan. Because that’s what other guild members tend to do. We were going to use the tunnel we had discovered last time to get into the hut in the camp, and then having the element of surprise we would either turn things on fire or wait for a good opportunity to attack. We arrive at the entrance of the tunnel, and I decided to put on some ointment that
Because I failed my shot, I was obviously not allowed to sneak up the hatch to check the hut. Goldie Locks is appointed this important role and Gerolt is right behind him. I’m being impatient and pushing Gerolt and Goldie to hurry up, which causes Goldie to be not thorough in his search. He gives the clear signal, but when he flips open the hatch there is a weird noise and a rope activates something outside of the hut. We all climb out the hatch into the small hut. Cahir and myself take point at the door and try to sneakily get some vision on the camp by glaring outside. Cahir immediately spots the rope that leads to a tipi across in the camp, and all I spot is a hobgoblin walking out of the tipi while he is heading to a bigger tent. Without thinking about our earlier plans, I grab my bow and aim a shot at him. Gerolt runs through the hut when he realizes what I am doing, but he is too late to stop my foolish action. I completely miss and alert everyone outside.
This is where the plan fails and the rest has to cover up for my mistakes.
Because of my actions, both Gerolt and Svæin have to rush out the hut to form a protective front line. The battle that starts, all triggered by my horrible shot, and we’re in the middle of the chaos of goblins surrounding us while their big guys leave the tent and taunt us. I’m too distracted by my own failure to pay attention to the conversation, and I just get behind Gerolt, like he told me to do before.
Finally in the corner of my eye and distracted mind, I hear Gerolt mumble in Orcish that we should attack. This time, determined to not do anything on my own decision, I listen and line up a shot for a big guy that reminds me of the previous bugbear I killed called Julb, but I miss of course. Ruzak has taken position next to Gerolt now and Cahir is close to them too, while Goldie Locks has positioned himself closer to the back, like me.
When my arrow flies and misses, Ruzak manages to catch an arrow that was about to hit Cahir. Yes, He. Catches. An. Flying. Arrow. This man is freaking crazy hero material.
Unfortunately they have more attacks incoming, and a second arrow hits Cahir. When the arrow touches his side, some branch like pattern flashes brightly and white flower petals fly of his armor, seemingly to block most of that shot. Julb throws a javelin to Cahir, but of course Cahir manages to dodge it. Then Cahir finds an opportunity to attack back with a beam of similar branches and white flower petals, but he unfortunately misses. Not strange though in the rain of arrows and javelins. Another javelin is aimed at Cahir, but Gerolt swiftly places his shield in between and blocks it for him. Of course I don’t need to tell that he is a hero, as he already has his hero name, Shield of Dawn.
Our Mountain Man Svæin, charges at Julb and just straight up whacks him, positioning himself between the other hobgoblins. I don’t want to spoil anything, but this guy survives anything. I don’t know how, but he does. Truly heroic.
Goldie Locks dashes away, getting himself great cover behind some fences and landing a perfect shot on the hobgoblin next to the tipi. This hobgoblin seems to be casting some spell, and Gerolt notices some invisible danger. He dashes out of the way to block something that was clearly meant to hit me, and he yells to me to be careful. Of course with my painful legs I wouldn’t even be capable to escape any incoming danger, so I owe my life once again to Gerolt.
Svæin is now also getting stormed by wolves, but he miraculously blocks all of them. Gerolt takes on a more defensive position to protect me from the invisible dangers, and I feel so blessed to have him guide us through this battle and I can see it has the same effect on Cahir and Goldie Locks. Because I want to be useful, and I can’t get into a good position like Goldie Locks, I aim for the wolves that are harassing Svæin, but I miss again. Ruzak has moved up closer to the fight to help out Svæin, but in the midst of all the dangers he misses. Svæin gets hit hard by Daknek, and twice by Julb and is growling loudly, almost as if it’s motivating him to fight on. I’m pretty sure that if I had been up there, I had been down twice over. This man is a mountain of a man.
Then Cahir moves up a bit and swirls his magic at Daknek and his wolves, immediately murdering one wolf and hurting a second wolf and Daknek as well. This magic definitely feels different than his previous things, but somehow there seems to be some white flower petals falling around Cahir his feet, I don’t even know if he noticed.
Then there is a big goblin that tries to punish Cahir with a big swing. As he hits him white flower petals burst around them and the shining magical branches on the armor lash out at the goblin and seem to hurt him. Of course it doesn’t seem to bother Cahir at all. In this chaos Julb goes down by a big swiping attack from Svæin. When he is about to hit a second attack on Daknek, a blue force shield comes forth of Daknek his shield and blocks the attack. I think that’s stupid, that has nothing to do with skill! That’s just a magic thingy helping him out! I swear without that shield that Svæin would’ve gotten him!
Then all of a sudden an owl comes swirling down at me with glowing blue talons, but Gerolt manages to distract him so he attacks him and of course he manages to block that. Again Gerolt dodges something, jumping sideways. I feel like I am holding him back because he is trying to defend me, while he is way better up front with the others. So I decide to yell at him that nothing is there, that I will be fine and that he should attack something else. He seems to realize that this is probably a better tactic, which I clearly learned from him. I try to shoot the wolf again, but at this point I should’ve known that it wouldn’t work as I miss again. Ruzak cleans up my mess and kills the wolf off instead. Cahir now is getting hit by the bigger goblin again, but this time his magical armor doesn’t seem to be there. Svæin sees an opening and manages to grab Daknek and holds him in place. Goldie Locks gets another clean shot in on Daknek, piercing right through his armor from afar. Then the owl we spotted earlier comes down at Daknek and with a slight touch of his wings it turns Daknek invisible. Svæin yells that he is still holding him so that we should still attack him. Gerolt runs off to help, but because he is keeping an eye on me he misses his dart. I am just distracting my own friends at this point and wasting arrows.
Totally giving up on shooting at any of the big scary guys, I decide it is probably wise to get rid of the owl that can attack me and turn others invisible. I finally manage to hit, and he disappears into nothing. By now I have seen some other moments like this, and only now I realize it’s not just an owl but a familiar. I wish I could’ve realized that sooner and actually did something about it earlier.
Ruzak and Cahir together try hitting the invisible Daknek that apparently is trying to escape according to Svæin. With a big swipe of the longsword from Cahir, he thrusts it perfectly between his helm and armour and with that sends the helm tumbling down to the ground. Yes. You read that right. Daknek is invisible and he manages to kill him in one attack. This just proves Cahir is an amazingly multi talented hero, beaming dangerous branches and flowers everywhere, while also being deadly with his longsword and rapier. When most eyes are turned on the helm on the floor, the dead pierced Daknek is slowly turning visible in the grip of Svæin, surprising everyone that Cahir killed him.
But Svæin realizes the battle isn’t over yet and throws his javelin at the hobgoblin that has been casting magic spells all this time. It hurts the hobgoblin so bad that he gets scared and he turns himself invisible. Gerolt isn’t planning on letting him go, so with a growl and charging into his direction he challenges the wizard. “Get back here you coward!” I have seen him do this before, and I know the wizard can’t get far away from him even if he is invisible, so I follow him in the hope I can help out. When the wizard turns visible he immediately blinds Gerolt who is standing right in front of him, but because of that I see the perfect opening to shoot and finally hit my second arrow of this battle. It hits him straight in the eye and he drops at the feet of Gerolt, now suddenly revealing a goblin shaman instead of the hobgoblin disguise he previously had.
While the rest stands victorious over the dead bodies of the previously threatening leaders of this goblin camp, Goldie Locks tries to chase the bigger goblin who had attacked Cahir previously. Unfortunately all the other goblins are now running scared, and among the chaos that goblin gets away.
To conclude this story about the true heroes, you need to realize that true heroes are the ones that become victorious when others make big mistakes and the odds are all against them. I only made it back because I had these heroes with me.
When we walk back, I see the shadows of these heroes in the falling sunset. Gerolt holding his reflecting shield with the never ending smiling sun, known as Shield of Dawn. The cloak whirling around the legs of the arrow accurate Goldie Locks Lothrien, his hair perfectly coloring with the sunset. The heavy steps of Mountain Man Svæin that are to be heard everywhere, and his arms will keep any danger far away from his allies. Followed by the intriguing Cahir The All Talented, knowing he does so many tricks with his magic and swords makes me wonder what I will see him do next.
But none of these would have made it through without the broad shoulders and loud voice of Ruzak The Tactical Commander, having him yell whenever there were openings to fight and gain advantage.
Remember their names, and the true heroes will keep you safe. All you need to remember about me is that I’m here to tell their stories. I will make sure they shine each time again.
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