Green Tide 6 (1/2)

“Psychic Blackout!”

A total of nine Psionics cried out at once as they finished their collective chant. Amplified several times over by their Synchronous Chanting Skill, the resulting wave of mental jamming magic spread out like a tidal wave, covering a distance of nearly fifty meters. The orcs caught up in it began to stumble and cry out in confusion and pain, forcing them to ease off their assault. The raptors’ spear-and-shield toting front line then pushed forward as one, knocking the greenskin mob off their feet and into the stagnant swamp below. The water was only knee deep so it was unlikely they’d drown or anything, but the mud and filth would still make it difficult to get back up.

The raptor phalanx then backed off, putting several meters between themselves and their enemy. This gave the magic-wielding mercenaries and adventurers acting as their support the space they needed to do their thing. Dozens of Wizards, Warlocks, Pyromancers and Cryomancers unleashed a chaotic assortment of area effect Spells, killing the orcs by the hundreds. Unfortunately it was the only magical volley they would be able to get off before the greenskins rallied.

“WAAAAAAAAGH!”

A deafening cry swept over the muddy bog. All at once the effects of the Psychic Blackout disappeared and the greenskins exploded out of the shallow waters with rage and power blazing in their eyes. They clashed against the raptor’s front line with renewed vigor, giving the Warriors and Paladins no time to rest or gather their wits while the healers strained their MP reserves to support them. The next collective Psychic Blackout would surely come in mere moments, but it would still be as short-lived as the previous one, as well as the one before that.

The reason for which was the presence of a warlord. This one was standing at an impressive three meters and wielding something that was probably intended to be an axe, but was more like a random slab of rusty metal tied firmly to one end of a really big stick. It wasn’t sharp by any means of the imagination, but it was still heavy enough to make anyone or anything hit by it go splat. Yet as chilling as that thought was, what truly made this orc a threat was his ability to direct and empower the Green Tide.

This was possible through a number of Skills he had unlocked after Ranking Up into a warlord. The one he used just now was called Commanding Shout and had the effect of fighting off the Psychic Blackout and bringing the mentally disturbed grunts back into the fold. Another of the especially troublesome Skills was Fodder Field, which protected dense gatherings of orcs under his command from being bombarded with magic. Most Spells and Skills aimed at the parts where the Fodder Field was thickest would fizzle out and fail, accomplishing nothing but wasting the user’s MP.

“Psychic Blackout!”

That was why the Spell-slingers within the enlightened coalition had to wait for the Psionics to disperse the dampening field in order to unleash their power. Alternatively they could target the fringes of the enemy formation, but that was likely to do more damage to their own allies than the enemy forces. Physical projectiles such as arrows, spears or giant boulders could still be used, of course, but one tended to run out of ammunition surprisingly fast when faced with an orcish scourge. The archers within the punitive force were dangerously low on arrows despite being told to bring as many as they could carry because the other side was constantly getting reinforcements. For every orc that fell in battle, another would appear from an adjacent area. The grunts were being pulled towards the conflict like a moth to a flame, and they wouldn’t stop until the one calling out to them was put down.

In other words, the raptor forces would not be able to claim victory until the warlord was eliminated.

“Git ‘em boyz! Give dem scalies a right proper bashin!”

Which was precisely why the orc kept a considerable distance from the front lines while he bossed the lesser orcs around.

“WAAAAAAAAAGH!“

Yet another wave of greenskins slammed against the raptors’ shield wall as that loudmouth in the background egged them on.

“Broadfang! Arrow formation!”

A powerful, clear voice called out to the physically and mentally exhausted warriors from behind. The line reacted entirely on reflex as a pair of them stepped back while their allies sidestepped to fill in the resulting gap like a steel curtain. The ones that split off then knelt down next to each other and raised their massive circular shields over their heads. There was a bang and a scrape as Hesk landed one armored foot on each shield, followed immediately by both of her subordinates launching her forward as if they were springboards.

The Hero of the Sword, who incidentally was wielding a spear simply because she personally found it a more effective tool of war than the one in her title, landed amidst the sea of orcs by stepping on one of their faces.

“Spiral Slash!”

There was a flash of red as her tribe’s secret weapon drew a perfect circle around her, cutting down every greenskin within its reach. Hesk pushed forward towards the warlord, striking with the Orc Poker in short rapid thrusts at the savage vermin around her. It ripped through flesh, bone and air alike, producing a gruesome sound that was almost like a hymn of carnage. It was certainly music to Hesk’s ears as she carved her way towards her target. She didn’t even need to stop and finish off the ones she had struck down, as the Orc Poker’s specialized venom made the greenskins’ very flesh fall off their bones in disgusting, bloody lumps.

Unfortunately this also meant the soldiers that followed in her wake were now wading through swamp water filled with rapidly decomposing orc bits, but they didn’t have a choice in the matter. Their Paragon and Hero would not be able to push forward if the Broadfang phalanx didn’t cover her rear. They advanced in a narrow wedge-shaped formation, widening the gaps that Hesk made in the enemy horde. They could not advance very far into the sea of orcs without suffering heavy damage, but they and their allies would suffer far greater losses if that warlord was not eliminated posthaste.

Which was something the extra-large orc wanted to avoid if at all possible. It wasn’t like their intent was a mystery, especially since he saw the lizardfolk use this same tactic to eliminate another of his peers. Granted he was a bit late to the party and didn’t see exactly how it went down, but saving his own hide came first. Not because he was a coward, but because the Green Tide in his head constantly reminded him of his importance as a leader and living relay station. That was why he decided to fall back. Even though his blood boiled with excitement at the thought of fighting that shiny-armored lizard at the very front, backing off and letting the ‘scalies’ be drowned by the Green Tide was the more strategically sound option.

What he failed to realize, however, was that Hesk and her comrades were ultimately nothing more than a distraction.

A skull-masked shadow darted out of the shallow waters behind the orc just as he turned to run, producing so little noise that it was impossible to hear in this chaotic battleground. There was a flash of metal and a whisper of ‘Backbiter’ as the assassin’s twin daggers ripped through and completely severed the monster’s spine at his waist. The warlord let out a roar of pain and shock as his legs gave out and he began to fall backwards, only to have Kaede leap up and slam her needle-like knives through both of his ear holes and into his brain. She clambered on top of and leapt off of his still falling body, striking down a couple of grunts that had their backs turned towards her as she made her landing. She then proceeded to move rapidly through the gaps between the orcs, slashing at them as she ran by like some sort of ghostly serial killer while moving towards her allies.

Once Kaede was past their lines, the Eight Tribes’ forces fell back and rebuilt their ranks under the cover of another collective Psychic Blackout. The Spell’s effects would stick around for much longer now that the last of the warlords was finally dead, giving the fighters and casters alike some much needed breathing room. Hesk took this chance to fall back far behind her allies so that she could take a moment to recuperate. She had spent over two hours ceaselessly killing orcs and chasing warlords, and needed every chance to rest that she could get. Even if her body had a lot of stamina and endurance due to her being a Level 89 Warrior, it also demanded a lot of energy in order to perform as well as it did.

Wearing armor made from a relatively lightweight metal such as mithril helped with that, though not as much as one might imagine. Hesk’s Physical Conditioning Skill, available to most fighter-type Jobs at Level 60, greatly reduced the burden that her equipment had on her body. In fact, she probably would have been in better shape if she had shown up in her adamantite armor set instead. The orcs were most definitely not pulling their punches in this fight, and having the extra weight would have kept her from being knocked around whenever she took a hit. The only reason she didn’t bring it was because of the terrain, as she would have constantly been sinking into the swamp’s soft and muddy soil.

And if Hesk had a choice between fighting the orcs or fighting the environment, she would pick the former without question.

“Good work, mud-breath,” Kaede commented in a cheery manner. “Bit of a slowpoke, but you make an excellent amount of noise.”

Hesk took a deep breath to center herself, then looked up at the nosferata standing upright on her shoulders.

“Get off.”

“Nuh-uh. The water’s filthy.”

“You literally just swam through it to ambush the warlord.”

“That was then, this is now.”

Having very little patience left, Hesk grabbed the masked girl by the ankle. She tried to slam her face-first into the mud she seemed to hate so much, but the Hero of Death somehow slipped out of her grasp mid-swing. She did a flip through the air, landed on a half-rotten tree trunk that was poking out of the nearby waters, and sat down cross-legged on the driest part of it she could find.

“Better luck next time,” she said nonchalantly.

Hesk let out another sigh. Dealing with this wannabe jester was nearly as exhausting as exterminating a thousand orcs, though in a mental rather than a physical capacity. She could not wrap her mind around how someone with such a lax attitude could be so capable. Then again, much of Kaede’s competence could probably be attributed to her being one of Keira Morgana’s former students, the self-proclaimed Crimson Blades. It may have been an odd thing for her to admit to given that their patron deities were at odds with one another, but Hesk couldn’t help but feel a certain kinship with the Hero of Chaos. Though the two of them had vastly different methods, means and motives, they both shared a powerful drive for self improvement.

That was the conclusion Hesk had come to after briefly sparring against Keira shortly after the Hero conference ended. It was a given that the cat-eared woman had talent since she was chosen by a God, but her blades were tempered by discipline and wisdom far beyond her years. She didn’t blindly rely on physical ability, reflex and Skills, but fought by trying to constantly outsmart and out-think her opponent. Hesk had suspected that Keira might have fallen into the pitfalls of arrogance and overconfidence that typically came with rapid growth in Levels, but that friendly bout put those concerns to rest. It was evident that the numerous and varied adventures Keira had been through had turned her into a veteran combatant. She could even give Hesk a run for her money when it came to orc killing, despite the fact that the raptor had been doing that nearly every day for over a decade.

It was therefore rather disheartening that Kaede, who was arguably the closest thing Keira had to a peer, was such an insufferable child.

“Why don’t you go make yourself useful and help clean up this mess?” Axel’s Hero hissed while gesturing towards the fighting in the distance. “We need to cull those beasts and retreat before another warlord makes an appearance.”

“C’mon, you really think a fourth one will show up?”

“I may not be certain, but I know it is unwise to prolong conflict with the orcs more than necessary. Or would you rather I contact Morgana and ask of her opinion on whether you should slack off or not?”

Kaede’s body visibly stiffened at those words, after which she sheepishly climbed down from her perch and stepped into the brown water with a couple of wet plops. She mumbled something along the lines of ‘spoilsport,’ then practically ran off towards the frontline. She leapt into the confused mass of brain-scrambled orcs and began swinging her daggers, cutting into spines, skulls and hearts with each fluid motion. It was actually quite impressive how quickly and cleanly she could eliminate targets that were not capable of adequately fighting back. Impressive, but also slightly detestable.

“One little, two little, three little savages~♪

Four little, five little, six little savages~♪

Seven little, eight little, nine little savages~♪

And there’s still a hundred thousand to gooo ~♪”

Admittedly she could probably do so without singing that ridiculous song, but Hesk had more important things to worry about. Like the fact that there were far too many warlords around. This may have been only her second scourge, but she had studied past conflicts with the orcs extensively as a child. Though they often butted heads with one another, Ranked Up greenskins cooperated with one another on occasion. Stronger warlords dominating weaker ones and forcing them to serve as lieutenants was significantly more common, which was most likely what Gutzstompa had done to all of these.

However, this particular band of orcs was not large enough to warrant so many of them in one place. The only way that would happen normally would be if the ratio of warlords to grunts across the continent had become two or three times higher than normal over the past year, which was extremely unlikely. It was far more feasible to assume that they had been told by their boss to gather here, though that raised an entirely new set of questions. The fact that one of the three warlords that Hesk saw in this skirmish was a Necromancer only added to the peculiarity of the situation. Granted, he wasn’t a very good one, but the Hero felt confident there was no precedent for such a thing in the entirety of the Eight Tribes’ recorded history.

Seeing as how her fellow soldiers had the situation under control for the moment, Hesk decided to leave the battlefield and return to their staging camp at the edge of the swamp. She wanted to contact her allies and compare notes, as she had a feeling this overabundance of Ranked Up orcs was not her problem alone. Not just her fellow Heroes, but her superiors in the local military needed to be informed as well. She would have reported immediately, but she hadn’t brought any Comm-crystals with her since the fragile items would have undoubtedly gotten smashed up in the rough fighting.

As Hesk moved one foot in front of the other, however, she began to feel something was off. She froze in her tracks and looked at her half submerged legs, noting the tiny ripples coming off of her armored greaves. The swamp water was hardly still due to all of the soldiers, medics and support units moving around her, but this wasn’t caused by any of those. It was her armor, vibrating. And now that she was standing perfectly still, she was able to grasp why it was doing that.

The flooded soil underneath her feet was rumbling.

“Diggers!” Hesk shouted frantically at the soldiers around her. “Send word to all points, we have incoming diggers!”

But it was too little too late. It was mere moments later when house-sized cones of rock suddenly erupted from the stagnant waters. Two, five, nine, fifteen - they were starting to pop up faster than she could count, all over the battlefield. The cone-tipped rock formations then crumbled like eggs, revealing that their interiors were both hollow and filled with orcs.

“WAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!”

Chaos enveloped the battlefield all over again as hundreds upon hundreds of greenskins began pouring out of the ground and into the raptors’ exposed back line. The magic users didn’t just wait to be slaughtered, however.

“Meteor!”

“Ground Spike!”

“Freezing Comet!”

“Dark Explosion!”

“Whiteout!”

“Earthquake!”

“Inferno!”

“Chain Lightning!”

Powerful Spells tore through the swamp once more, ravaging the tunnel exits the orcs were spilling out of with a multitude of elements. Many of them were collapsed and sealed off almost immediately, but there simply weren’t enough Casters on hand to handle this many incursions. Nor were there enough foot soldiers and Psionics to stem the Green Tide on two fronts. Demonic familiars and conjured elemental guardians were sent out to engage the newly arrived orcs, but that was like tossing pebbles against a flood. The only thing that seemed to be holding its own was a tamed hydra that mostly just threw its enormous body weight around.

Looking at the whole picture, it was fairly evident the enlightened forces would have to retreat. The orcs would surely kill or capture many of them in the process, but it was better than being completely wiped out. Which was almost an inevitability at this point, as the warlord that orchestrated this subterranean ambush would surely show up to empower and direct the rabble. Hesk was never much of a ‘big picture’ sort of woman, though. She was no general, strategist or logistician. Even if she was lauded as a Paragon or a Hero or whatever, in the grand scheme of things she was nothing more than an excellent foot soldier with some flashy titles.

So she did the only thing she was good for - she fought. Hesk relentlessly attacked her enemy, and she would continue to do so until either someone stopped her or there were no more orcs to kill. The latter of which seemed unlikely to happen anytime soon, as the greenskins instinctively piled on top of her. She was a Natural Enemy of Orcs - one who had butchered over twenty thousand of their kind - and as such was immediately recognized as a major threat to the species’ continued existence. Thankfully the Perk had some more practical effects beyond making her a target. Not only did it boost her combat effectiveness against them, but it also restored a tiny portion of her HP and MP with every greenskin she slaughtered.

Which, considering the body count she was racking up, came out to a rather obscene amount. She slaughtered the orcs so rapidly and thoroughly that their corpses began to form a tiny island. One that was continuously expanding, as the raptor understood she had to stay as mobile as possible in order to avoid getting literally buried beneath the savages. Luckily there were no trees or vines in the immediate vicinity, so the greenskins found it difficult to leap onto her from above.

There were more orcs, though. There were always more orcs. Few people understood that better than Hesk. Every muscle, every joint, every fiber of her being was constantly in motion, for she feared that she would lose the instant she let herself relax. Granted, ‘victory’ was not something she expected to achieve under these circumstances, as the battle was already lost. The bright yellow flares that signaled the retreat were practically impossible to miss against the cloud-covered sky. The only reason she was even still alive was because of her anti-orc Perk and spear working in tandem to keep fueling her genocidal killing spree. There was no telling how long she could keep this up before her fatigue caught up with her, but she would be damned if she let herself fall to a bunch of savages that couldn’t even hold a sword right.

“Hold it, boyz!”

A rough, rumbling voice washed over the area. The grunts suddenly stopped throwing themselves at Hesk and backed off to a distance of about eight meters, where they formed a perimeter of sorts. The raptor secured her footing as best she could on top of their slaughtered kin and took this opportunity to take in her surroundings. Giving the monsters something to focus on had given many of her allies the chance to regroup and fall back, just as she had hoped. She still had some energy to spare if she wanted to make a run for it, but before that she had to deal with the big one that had inevitably shown up.

As it would appear, however, things were not that simple.

“Well,” Hesk mumbled. “Fuck.”

Because the orc that confronted her wasn’t just ‘a big one,’ but the biggest one.

“Wot we gotz here, den? You’z dun look all dat tuff.”

It was Gutzstompa without a doubt. Leering over the rest of the orc filth, he stood at nearly five meters tall, held a weapon that looked like a weaponized tree trunk and was covered head to toe in spikes, skulls and chains. It was a spitting image of the one Gux had conjured during the meeting, though he was significantly greener and much more intimidating in person. That latter part was likely because he had killed enough raptors to earn himself the appropriate Slayer Perk, but Hesk refused to let her fear show.

“Bet I can still carve your heart out!” she hissed back while readying her spear.

“Ghrrrnnn!” the orc half-growled half-groaned while clutching an old chest wound. “I knowz dat pointy stikk. Datz MY pointy stikk!”

“Hah! Keep dreaming, beast! My clan’s had it for generations!”

“It gotz my blood in it! Dat makez it mine!”

“Then come a little closer, and I’ll happily put it back where it belongs!”

The surprisingly civil conversation was then rudely interrupted by a cloaked skull-masked figure that burst out of the water. Kaede leapt at one of the fodder orcs and used his shoulder as a stepping stone as she jumped even higher. Gutzstompa turned his massive frame around with a yell of ‘Wot now?!’ at the disturbance, but he wasn’t fast enough to catch the nosferata within his field of vision. She darted past his upper back and slashed at it with her daggers as her momentum carried her forward. She landed in the bloodied swamp and scrambled her way over to Hesk’s side as the orc turned his attention towards the two of them in a slow and deliberate manner.

“Iz dat all you gotz, humie?” he taunted with a snort. “You’z gon need more den sum fancy tricks to kill me!”

It was no mere boast, as Kaede’s attack had barely even scratched the surface of his skin, though not for a lack of trying. That was simply how ridiculously hard his body was. That said, it wasn’t as if she didn’t have something else up her sleeve. Or on her finger, for that matter.

“Hesk,” she whispered, “stick close to me.”

The raptor followed Kaede’s uncharacteristically serious advice and glued herself to the assassin’s back as best she could while minding her tail. A thick black mist then began pouring out of the skull-shaped ring underneath the younger woman’s right glove, instantly enveloping the two Heroes and hiding them from sight. The lump of smoke grew in size until it was bigger even than Gutzstompa, who was already backing off from the unknown phenomenon.

“Get movin, ya gitz!” he shouted at the other orcs. “Get in dere and stomp ‘em good!’

“WAAAAAGH!”

The greenskins let out another shout as they rushed towards the mystic fumes, but they had no chance of stopping what was about to happen. The ominous mist solidified itself into the shape of a massive figure wrapped in an elegant cloak sewn out of pure darkness. The only things visible inside the blackness of its gold-rimmed hood were two intensely glowing white points. It raised its skeletal hands high above itself, its ring-adorned finger bones grasping onto the handle of a heavily bejeweled scythe.

*SHWING SHWING SHWING*

The ornate blade was then swung three times in rapid succession, sending out ripples of concentrated death through the air with each wide, sweeping motion. Several hundred orcs fell over in an instant as the invisible waves passed over them. They twitched, spasmed and made gurgling noises, but they were already dead. Their souls had been so beautifully and cleanly severed from their flesh that their bodies had yet to fully realize their absence. Even these reflexive motions ceased after a few more heartbeats. When the hooded reaper dissipated seconds later, Kaede and Hesk were greeted by a horde of completely still orcs that had died without suffering a single scratch.

“What… was that?” the raptor asked warily.

The full answer to Hesk’s question was that the Hero of Death had unleashed the power of Mortimer’s Divine item, a ring called the Collector’s Loophole. Well, technically it was a former Divine item, as the relic had lost much of its power since the fall of the Adams Theocracy. Not the part where it would either permanently bond with the user’s bones or kill them if they weren’t a nosferatu, though. Those ‘security features’ were in there by mortal design and still very much intact. The deterioration made it so the ring could not be used freely, and instead had to be charged through the act of killing things. Lots and lots of things. Only once it had seen enough death would it be able to unleash its primary function, which was to conjure an avatar of the God of Death himself. This macabre manifestation would then instantly snuff out the lives of anyone below a certain HP threshold. There was also a limit to how strong a death-charge the Collector’s Loophole could hold, meaning that certain beings would need to be sufficiently softened up before it could claim their lives.

“A gift from my boss.”

However, all of that was entirely too much of a bother to explain even if the two of them weren’t in the middle of a war zone, which was why Kaede summed it up as such.

“Oh. Don’t suppose you can use it again?”

“Not a chance.”

What the nosferata had used up just now had been fueled by roughly one thousand and two hundred lives, which she had ‘collected’ over the course of the past four months of adventuring. Yet that wasn’t enough to even faze Gutzstompa. The orc warlord’s absurd vitality had allowed him to resist the instant death effect with no negative side effects, and was currently kicking at the orcs at his feet as if to confirm that they were no longer alive. He was also the main reason why Kaede kept her words so brief, as there were more important matters to discuss.

“So, I’ve got good news and bad news,” she whispered to Hesk. “The good news is that I made it impossible for that thing to recover HP with one of my Hero Skills.”

Though she did fail to do much to Gutzstompa with her initial attack, doing damage to him was not her main goal. Her intention was to place the Fatal Promise upon him, which she managed to do if the faint red light pouring out of the cross-shaped mark she left on his back was any indication.

“The bad news,” she continued, “is that I did that because I thought my other Skill told me he had just under ten thousand HP. Looking at it now though, seems I missed a digit.”

In her defense, those floating stick-like 1’s were kind of hard to see even without looking at them through a layer of filthy swamp water.

“I don’t get what you’re saying, Kaede.”

“That orc has ninety six thousand HP.”

Hesk swallowed audibly when she heard that mind-boggling number. Was such a thing even possible? Or was this another of this girl’s games? No, that wasn’t it. Kaede goofed around, but surely she wasn’t stupid enough to joke about something like this. Besides, there were other, more pressing concerns that Hesk needed to address at this point in time.

“Don’t suppose you have a backup plan of some kind?”

Such as how they would even begin to tackle this abomination.

“You could say that,” Kaede nodded. “There’s this secret technique of the Morgana family that Keira taught me.”

“Secret technique?”

“Yeah. It’s risky and requires some fancy footwork, but it just might work.”

“Good enough for me. What do we do?”

“See how the big guy’s still confused by what just happened to his minions? We can use that to our advantage.”

“Alright, but how?”

Kaede sheathed her daggers beneath her soggy cloak and turned to face Hesk. Though the raptor could only see the bright red irises of the nosferata’s eyes, she was left with the distinct impression that there was a confident smile underneath that skull mask.

“Run.”

Hesk barely even had the chance respond before Kaede darted off, skipping from one orc corpse to the next as she hotfooted it out of there with all due haste. It was ultimately hard to argue with the validity of that ‘plan’ though, so the Hero of the Sword chased after her all the same. Even if it was somewhat cowardly, the battle was already lost, so there was absolutely no merit to fighting an orc with kraken-like vitality with just the two of them. Things might have been different if her phalanx was still intact or if she had any form of magical support, but neither of those things were present. Her comrades were already either dead or gone, and under these circumstances Hesk preferred to join the latter rather than the former.

Unfortunately for her, Gutzstompa wasn’t about to give her a choice in the matter.

“Oi! Come back here wif dat pointy stikk! RRRAAAGH!”

The orc slammed his massive club into the swamp floor, sending a destructive tremor towards Hesk. It kicked up mud, water, blood and corpses alike as it hurled towards her like some sort of subterranean missile, catching up to her in seconds. It made the ground beneath her feet heave, quake and split apart as it opened up a chasm-like hole around her. Hesk was unable to get out of the way in time and fell into it, her vision filling with mud and water as the swamp rushed in after her.

Hesk scrambled to her feet, throwing off her helmet so she could wipe the filth from her eyes while cursing her own incompetence. She really should have known better. Of course the monster that made that underground ambush happen would have some sort of earth-moving Skill. It was a surprisingly common ability among warlords too, though this was the first time she’d seen one this well developed. Even if it was hardly the only ‘first’ she had experienced during this campaign, and the weirdness of it showed no signs of letting up. Though, if her gut feeling was right, there was a good chance none of that would be her problem after a little while.