Chapter 27 Beast Fury

She was inaccurate at this range, her arrows missing their mark, but I didn’t need them to hit. Simply draw the enemy mob perception, as I readied my own bow. As an extra guarantee, I triggered Shadowstep. Stealth successful. I fired my own arrow, which hit its mark with enough force to knock the Skybreaker off his feet.

Critical strike. 2.2 multiplier. I saw that I had taken half of his health off already. The other two had already spotted Ayla, readying themselves to charge her. Throwing away all my self-preservation, all my Hunter’s instincts, I raised myself from my stealth position and shouted a war chant.

A tank I was not meant to be, but I had to draw aggro. I had the better armour and level, and besides, I thought as I drew the Vandal’s blade, feverishly. I wanted to know, just what did 20 strength actually mean?

The Skybreaker I had clipped with an arrow was held back by a deluge of arrows from Ayla, whilst the two other tribesmen advanced on me. I only needed one of them alive. One was a Barbarian, the other a Shaman. His lips were moving. Incanting a spell, and I saw the Barbarian roar. The Shaman was buffing him.

[Bear’s Strength – Grant an ally +2 strength and 10% resistance to bludgeoning attacks for 30 seconds. If the caster’s concentration is interrupted, gives a 15-second debuff of 10% increase in damage from all sources.]

It would have been smarter to go for the Shaman, but the Barbarian was hardly going to let me pass. Besides, I had no intention of using a bludgeoning weapon. He swung his club with brutal force, and I dodged it, going low and jabbed with the Vandal’s blade. It met tough hide armour and didn’t penetrate. I drew back as he came in for another club attack, this time striking me. Shit. My timing had been off. I needed to aim for his weak points. The Vandal’s blade would lose its durability long before the Barbarian’s hide armour would.

An arrow sailed close, and I chanced a glance up. Good. Ayla had finished off the Skybreaker I’d critically struck. Hopefully she’d get a lucky arrow shot off against the Shaman.

I roared, exploding with my newfound beast strength, and before the Barbarian could swing his club, I’d lifted him clean off the ground and pummelled him into the mud. I plunged the Vandal’s shard deep into his side, at a weak point between the hide armour pieces. The Barbarian howled as I took his own club and beat him with it.

Despite my strength, it seemed to anger him more than hurt him. Shit. The buff — he resisted bludgeoning, but I recovered quickly, pummelling him with my fists before sinking the Vandal’s shard deep into his side once again. The strength, the force of my arms. I couldn’t believe my own power. The power of the Beastmaster. I could get used to this.

I turned to the Shaman, wiping the blood off my brow, and my Vandal’s blade, and thrust it at him. ‘If you want to live, then you’ll tell me where the Komo tribe are being held captive!’

The Shaman gave an eerie smile. ‘Dead. Just as soon you will be. The Warlord will take your head and mount it, skyman.’ He began to chant before retrieving his own bone blade and thrusting it deep into his own heart.

‘No!’ But it was too late. He collapsed forwards, a mad smile on his face as his life faded.

Shit.

Dead. Why hadn’t I clocked the bone blade? But then how could I have possibly known a mob would take his own life before betraying the Warlord. I had never played a video game like that.

These are real people. This isn’t a game.

There was a gurgling behind me. I turned to see the Barbarian, he was still twitching. Alive. I raced for him.

‘The Warlord-‘

I mentally clicked on Sovereign Presence and felt my aura emanate, like steam rising from steel plunged into water. And when I spoke, even my voice sounded high and imperious. ‘You will tell me where the Komo tribe is being held captive. You will tell me now.’

The Barbarian’s pupils seemed to dilate. He stopped struggling against me. I got off him, but not wanting to take any chances, I disarmed him, taking his club and primitive bone blade. The Barbarian got to his feet.

‘In the northlands. By the first forests and the lake.’ These directions could hardly have been more vague, but a notification had appeared on my mini-map. I opened it and saw that a new location had appeared, as well as my quest log updating.

[Tribal Colours – You have ambushed a patrol of the villainous Warlord, and through great guile of interrogation have wrested the location of the Komo tribe. Save them now, and become Ayla’s saviour.]

I read it through twice, before glancing at my character portrait. He stared back. He wasn’t backing down. I sighed, closing down my HUD. The Barbarian looked entranced, or at least gently befuddled. ‘What would you-‘

I plunged the Vandal’s blade deep into his neck and before he could collapse onto the ground, I caught him, gently lowering him. He had to die, didn’t mean he had to die without dignity. Ayla approached, moving from her hiding spot in the trees. She stared down at the dead Barbarian. I thought she would object, but she said nothing as I began to loot them.

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They had food, dried meats, heals, some bone arrows. I was able to loot a hide armour piece, though it had lost so much durability it was hardly worth it. In the end, I decided to keep my own bone armour.

‘Said they were by the first forest and the lake,’ I explained as the Sovereign Presence began to dissipate and my voice became my own again.

‘The way you fought,’ she muttered.

‘What,’ I said, ‘you’ve never seen someone fight like that?’

‘I have,’ she said quietly, as her blue eyes met mine. ‘Once.’

We healed, or at least I did. I was somewhat tired, not enough to get the tired debuff, but we had one shaky lead. We needed to press that advantage, move before the lead went cold. Following the mini-map, it took us another two hours before we reached the fortified prison that held the Komo tribe.

It wasn’t a large encampment, certainly far smaller than Adrian’s had been, but larger than Ayla’s village. I searched the perimeter, as I had done with Adrian’s base, hoping to find some loose palisade, some clumsy work, but came up lacking. These were mobs, they wouldn’t cut corners the way avatars did. These palisades were stronger too, reinforced. Nothing short of a battering ram was getting through.

Neither brute strength nor luck would win us the day. We had to be smart. Opening up the technology tree, I searched through until I found the object I was looking for. To her credit, Ayla seemed to trust me, so didn’t question why I was now gathering plant fibre. Once I had enough, I began crafting primitive rope, before then affixing an arrow to it.

Ayla nodded, clearly catching where this was going, and stood beside me as I fired the arrow to the very top of the palisade. It found purchase. I tugged a few times, and found it sturdy enough. Ayla went first, making the ascent. It was only eight feet tall, but one slip, one false move and we’d stir the hornet’s nest.