Ashes of the Fallen

"Right, sounds good," he replied with a nod.

With everything settled, our strategy had changed slightly but not entirely. There weren't any boss mechanics that we were aware of yet, and it seemed likely that the primary difficulty was in the numbers. A technically difficult fight would probably come later in the game, for now it was a matter of overpowering creatures when outnumbered.

My faith in the group hadn't been shaken.

I was still confident we could pull it off.

"Hey, let me have one of those extra shields," I said somewhat randomly before we settled into position. Slinging a [Cracked Aspis] on my back and tightening the straps around my chest, I made sure that it was snugly in place. Keeping my [Old Aspis] attached to my left arm, I was now rocking two shields. With my [Crude Iron Hand Axe] in my right hand, I was now ready to go. My back was defended whether or not I paid any attention to it, my left would be easy to guard, and my right would depend on my ability to deftly parry and deflect.

All in all, it was something I could work with.

My overall dexterity was impaired and my shoulders and elbows couldn't move quite as freely, but that didn't matter. I wouldn't need full flexibility this fight. Mainly, I needed to survive attacks from all directions.

Especially, the not so wayward arrows… those spelt doom for me.

"Alright, let's get this shit show started," I said with some oomph.

Stretching my arms out and yawning once for good measure, I brought my hands together as I lowered into my stance. Knees bent, legs shoulder-width apart, elbows tucked in, and palms touching as a spark jolted them apart. The ash and smoke that clouded my vision was nothing more than a filtered screen as I began to focus. Eyes watering, the chief was my intended target.

The damp and dank, dimly lit surroundings were somewhat cramped and barely gave us room to maneuver but we would make do. The flames danced as an intense bright white light started to radiate from my hands, drowning out the weak torches that littered the cave walls. The black and gray rock interior clearly visible as lightning had gathered between my fingertips and illuminated everything around me. What came next would be deafening, with the cave walls amplifying the thunder and echoing throughout.

Ears would ring, but mine always rang.

"Through power…" I started to mutter, so only I could hear it.

And then at the peak, with power overwhelming me, I could no longer contain it. Thrusting both arms forward with a yell not vocalized, the silence of my scream masked by the thunderous roar of the chain lightning that pierced through the ranks of the minor goblins, crashing into the largest singular goblin standing at the center. Lightning spread like living tendrils as it arced, jumped, and bounced, connecting four other victims in its web of destruction.

The goblins panicked and shook as the paralysis temporarily took over their bodily functions, and in that moment where wide-eyed minor goblins looked back in confusion, flames washed over them in their entirety, sending them into psychological shock. Goblins burned and in the midst of those flames, I dove into the center of them all and shouted my taunts, commanding all of their manic desires to mutilate me.

I gave them a target to satiate their rage.

They charged, mouths open with spittle dripping and flying free as they cursed their profanities in broken English, completely consumed by their anger and blind to what I had in store. As the first wave crashed into me, I knocked a goblin flat onto its back with a shield bash, breaking its nose with the impact as blood dripped down onto my boot.

Swinging my right arm out and downwards I met another goblin's sword and parried with the hefty weight of my axe driving it back. Swords from every direction came next, three thrusts towards my midsection with two from the top, all easily avoidable as I double stepped backwards.

A simple dodge, I countered with a swing of my axe only to pullback and roll to the side, a feint to scare the minors as one of the guards lunged forth and attempted to impale me. The second guard followed up with a heavy thrust that was out of reach as I continued to sidestep and backtrack. Arrows flew left and right as I watched for a tell-tale sign of healing, that golden light that would envelop and enshroud a goblin, but it never came.

Another two thrusts from the spears, barely dodged as one clipped the side of my armor and sent my insides twitching reactively to the side, squirming to avoid the pain that would have followed. A sigh of relief without the sigh, as there was no time to waste, and then, pain registered in my chest as an arrow had hit just beneath my collarbone.