A Tale of One Battle
As Fedus 28, 5427NG on the The Celestial Calendar approaches, the impossible events that happened over the last afternoon, evening and night are thrown into stark relief. Even more of the harbor has been burnt to the waterline, and the stench of burnt wood and tar almost (but not quite) overwhelm the pervading background aroma of burnt and charred flesh. Screams and skirmishes are breaking out in direct proportion to one another in various neighborhoods and city blocks throughout the destroyed parts of the city, which are still smoking and smoldering among piles of rubble and detritus. A vigorous defense by the Craysilt militia as well as the military garrison stationed there has stopped the advancing enemy, and have begun to push back. The population itself has retreated into the depths of the Old Keep, many of them risking their own lives to bring water and food to those fighting up front. Women and children banded together in ersatz street gangs of healers, and those dedicated to spiriting away the wounded and reclaiming their dead.
A woman named Hestia, unbeknownst to herself, was fast becoming a legend among the fighters as she flitted hither and thon singing songs to bolster the troops. She was no mean healer, either, and the comfort and nerve she brought to the 5th Co. Grenadiers is directly credited to their survival and eventual win. An eleven year old girl, who had been delivering water in a wheeled barrel, is credited with single-handedly saving the entire 12th Battalion from a devious trap set by the kobolds before they left. She is to be awarded the Golden Dragon; the highest award available from the Kingdom to non-military personnel. Mrs. Cabbage, of the notorious Northbay neighborhood of Craysilt, sat in her rocker, knitting, throughout the invasion. Until, that is the final Orc lander finally bumped up against her dock. You see, Mrs. Cabbage, the widow of Ole' Man Cabbage, owned a fish house. Therefore, she owned the dock these bastards were trying to land on, and she could not have these aliens using her dock. Nobody used Widow Cabbage's dock without her permission! She cocked the heavy crossbow mounted on a pin at her window. She moved her rocker next to the same window, to watch her dock closely. Her dock was her responsibility, and here this weird alien ship thing comes a-bumpin' up against her wood? "Oh, honey. No." Widow Cabbage waited until the entire troop of Green Skinned invaders exited the lander, and had fouled her wood with their disgusting bare feet, before she blew it up, destroying all of them in a single giant Whump! and a titanic splash that, for a fraction of a second, exposed a very confused crayfish meandering along the sandy bottom to the atmosphere as the massive shockwave did its thing. It happened so fast, none of the invaders even had an opportunity to scream. "Huh. I may have overestimated how much explosives I needed," the widow thinks to herself, face and front blackened from soot, her lit cigar and wide, smile are the brightest things about her for a moment before a huge sneeze shakes off a cloud of soot that suddenly envelopes her like some wild stage production out of one of The Bardic College Campus. Little pieces of her dock, and a former boat called The Lady Clare. The sand sharks were ecstatic. A bob of harbour seals, curious about the small boat trying to row stealthily away from the carnage on the southeast side of the bay in a little coracle, playfully decides to investigate. But Junior was a little too young and brash, and got a little too close. The orc shaman kneeling on the little round floater saw what looked, to him, like one of the quadruped carnivores that were fighting alongside the humans, a "dog". The orc instinctively struck out with her oar, striking Junior on the side, hard. Oh, it did no real damage; Junior had an impressive layer of blubber. But it was all Junior's father, Larry, needed to see. That orc shaman disappeared into the depths of the harbor, never to be seen again. Yet again, the sand sharks were delighted, thanking Larry with many a tail thrash and toothy grin. They may be small, but Tellus' sand sharks are still sharks. The spy waiting at the end of Northbay's northernmost dock was getting nervous. His orc contact was supposed to have been there fifteen minutes before, and one of the barrel like vessels the orcs had invaded in was being guided in to a dock a couple of hundred feet on away to the south. Widow Cabbage's Dock. That was bad news. He liked money just fine. And his loyalty was absolutely for sale to the highest bidder. But he felt like things were progressing in directions he was uncomfortable with, and began retreating down the dock toward land. Cautiously. Stealthily. He melted into the shadows behind a shack near the landbound side of the dock like he was made of shadow himself. He waited. He'd be damned if he'd kill ole lady Cabbage without getting paid at least half, first. That green skinned lady with the big teeth needed to show up soon, or he was going to bounce on out of this city sooner rather than later. "Wait at the end of the north dock, she said". The spy mumbled to himself almost noiselessly, although the massive explosion and brutal carnage Widow Cabbage caused with her dock exploding just then convinced him to leave quick, fast, and in a hurry. Fuck. This. He vanished like a fart in the wind.
Just before the middle of the night, a strange feeling came over the soldiers and militia guarding the shore, and the men began to grumble. It was an oppressive feeling, a sense of being crushed slowly. Like one was being watched at every moment, no matter when, or where they went. Morale began to tank quickly, and then, when the bats came, the orcs came screaming back on the offensive. Then came the bats. The city has suddenly become mobbed, absolutely chock full, of flying rodents. They are not aggressive, per se, but they are panicked and frantic. Nobody knows where they came from. The reasoning for such being that the enemy was sowing confusion and fear amongst the troops and citizens, and that assumption was quickly adopted by almost everyone. Except Raquel and the rest of the Scrotes, who insightfully infer it is some type of test run for an assault yet to come. At the time, they had been busy fighting Corrine Cotnor. The fight was epic! The Scrotes' exploits upon the battlefield were dominating, yet Corrine is a powerful figure in her own right. The fight lasts for over an hour, before Corrine disappears with a cryptic message about wet feet or summat, and the orbs began to supply information to their Hosts about an incoming organic mass, and a surge of water. They were right next to 'the water'. With a powerful word, indeed, Cora somehow caused time to stop, and Asmodeus to appear, still wearing his button down shirt with rolled up sleeves and a waist apron, as he is now (as the adventurers know) a bartender in Stilton Head. Sarkhan, against his own instincts, opened up his divine senses to the archdevil, and wound up in a temporary coma. Their request to be teleported to The Gilded Goose (or, just outside), and they proceeded to rest for the first time in forty hours. Sarkhan awoke to a bouquet of violets and roses, with a nice little note, from the King of Hell. It is at this point in the battle, Ithanya and the rest of the Hot Cross Buns were just finishing off an entire company of orcs, and noticing the preternatural silence that had descended upon the fields of battle. A low, rumbling roar is fast intruding upon their senses. Looking curiously toward the bay, they saw why; an immense kraken was attacking the city! Ripping buildings up by the roots, hurling them at the barricades erected by the defenders. It swept through their makeshift barriers like the tide itself, and with it came a wall of water that floods the city. At that moment, a voice booms out a challenge to the kraken, and King comes into view...because he has grown huge! The same size and powerful build as the kraken, now, King Billy was wielding his ancestral sword, Branwyn Wyrmbane. A very powerful item, many of the men whispered that it was the entire reason they were under attack.
While the Scrotes sleep off a LOT of battle, the Hot Cross Buns are about to deal with an incoming tsunami. Meanwhile, the God Punchers are almost ready to invade Hell. Again. But this time, they have an ace in the hole...Plume In the Wind has returned to punch gods and piss accurately!
A woman named Hestia, unbeknownst to herself, was fast becoming a legend among the fighters as she flitted hither and thon singing songs to bolster the troops. She was no mean healer, either, and the comfort and nerve she brought to the 5th Co. Grenadiers is directly credited to their survival and eventual win. An eleven year old girl, who had been delivering water in a wheeled barrel, is credited with single-handedly saving the entire 12th Battalion from a devious trap set by the kobolds before they left. She is to be awarded the Golden Dragon; the highest award available from the Kingdom to non-military personnel. Mrs. Cabbage, of the notorious Northbay neighborhood of Craysilt, sat in her rocker, knitting, throughout the invasion. Until, that is the final Orc lander finally bumped up against her dock. You see, Mrs. Cabbage, the widow of Ole' Man Cabbage, owned a fish house. Therefore, she owned the dock these bastards were trying to land on, and she could not have these aliens using her dock. Nobody used Widow Cabbage's dock without her permission! She cocked the heavy crossbow mounted on a pin at her window. She moved her rocker next to the same window, to watch her dock closely. Her dock was her responsibility, and here this weird alien ship thing comes a-bumpin' up against her wood? "Oh, honey. No." Widow Cabbage waited until the entire troop of Green Skinned invaders exited the lander, and had fouled her wood with their disgusting bare feet, before she blew it up, destroying all of them in a single giant Whump! and a titanic splash that, for a fraction of a second, exposed a very confused crayfish meandering along the sandy bottom to the atmosphere as the massive shockwave did its thing. It happened so fast, none of the invaders even had an opportunity to scream. "Huh. I may have overestimated how much explosives I needed," the widow thinks to herself, face and front blackened from soot, her lit cigar and wide, smile are the brightest things about her for a moment before a huge sneeze shakes off a cloud of soot that suddenly envelopes her like some wild stage production out of one of The Bardic College Campus. Little pieces of her dock, and a former boat called The Lady Clare. The sand sharks were ecstatic. A bob of harbour seals, curious about the small boat trying to row stealthily away from the carnage on the southeast side of the bay in a little coracle, playfully decides to investigate. But Junior was a little too young and brash, and got a little too close. The orc shaman kneeling on the little round floater saw what looked, to him, like one of the quadruped carnivores that were fighting alongside the humans, a "dog". The orc instinctively struck out with her oar, striking Junior on the side, hard. Oh, it did no real damage; Junior had an impressive layer of blubber. But it was all Junior's father, Larry, needed to see. That orc shaman disappeared into the depths of the harbor, never to be seen again. Yet again, the sand sharks were delighted, thanking Larry with many a tail thrash and toothy grin. They may be small, but Tellus' sand sharks are still sharks. The spy waiting at the end of Northbay's northernmost dock was getting nervous. His orc contact was supposed to have been there fifteen minutes before, and one of the barrel like vessels the orcs had invaded in was being guided in to a dock a couple of hundred feet on away to the south. Widow Cabbage's Dock. That was bad news. He liked money just fine. And his loyalty was absolutely for sale to the highest bidder. But he felt like things were progressing in directions he was uncomfortable with, and began retreating down the dock toward land. Cautiously. Stealthily. He melted into the shadows behind a shack near the landbound side of the dock like he was made of shadow himself. He waited. He'd be damned if he'd kill ole lady Cabbage without getting paid at least half, first. That green skinned lady with the big teeth needed to show up soon, or he was going to bounce on out of this city sooner rather than later. "Wait at the end of the north dock, she said". The spy mumbled to himself almost noiselessly, although the massive explosion and brutal carnage Widow Cabbage caused with her dock exploding just then convinced him to leave quick, fast, and in a hurry. Fuck. This. He vanished like a fart in the wind.
Just before the middle of the night, a strange feeling came over the soldiers and militia guarding the shore, and the men began to grumble. It was an oppressive feeling, a sense of being crushed slowly. Like one was being watched at every moment, no matter when, or where they went. Morale began to tank quickly, and then, when the bats came, the orcs came screaming back on the offensive. Then came the bats. The city has suddenly become mobbed, absolutely chock full, of flying rodents. They are not aggressive, per se, but they are panicked and frantic. Nobody knows where they came from. The reasoning for such being that the enemy was sowing confusion and fear amongst the troops and citizens, and that assumption was quickly adopted by almost everyone. Except Raquel and the rest of the Scrotes, who insightfully infer it is some type of test run for an assault yet to come. At the time, they had been busy fighting Corrine Cotnor. The fight was epic! The Scrotes' exploits upon the battlefield were dominating, yet Corrine is a powerful figure in her own right. The fight lasts for over an hour, before Corrine disappears with a cryptic message about wet feet or summat, and the orbs began to supply information to their Hosts about an incoming organic mass, and a surge of water. They were right next to 'the water'. With a powerful word, indeed, Cora somehow caused time to stop, and Asmodeus to appear, still wearing his button down shirt with rolled up sleeves and a waist apron, as he is now (as the adventurers know) a bartender in Stilton Head. Sarkhan, against his own instincts, opened up his divine senses to the archdevil, and wound up in a temporary coma. Their request to be teleported to The Gilded Goose (or, just outside), and they proceeded to rest for the first time in forty hours. Sarkhan awoke to a bouquet of violets and roses, with a nice little note, from the King of Hell. It is at this point in the battle, Ithanya and the rest of the Hot Cross Buns were just finishing off an entire company of orcs, and noticing the preternatural silence that had descended upon the fields of battle. A low, rumbling roar is fast intruding upon their senses. Looking curiously toward the bay, they saw why; an immense kraken was attacking the city! Ripping buildings up by the roots, hurling them at the barricades erected by the defenders. It swept through their makeshift barriers like the tide itself, and with it came a wall of water that floods the city. At that moment, a voice booms out a challenge to the kraken, and King comes into view...because he has grown huge! The same size and powerful build as the kraken, now, King Billy was wielding his ancestral sword, Branwyn Wyrmbane. A very powerful item, many of the men whispered that it was the entire reason they were under attack.
While the Scrotes sleep off a LOT of battle, the Hot Cross Buns are about to deal with an incoming tsunami. Meanwhile, the God Punchers are almost ready to invade Hell. Again. But this time, they have an ace in the hole...Plume In the Wind has returned to punch gods and piss accurately!
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