9 Not Dead, Yet
The winds calmed down and all that was left was carnage. Hundreds of bodies laid around a single mage and the ground turned red.
The stench of iron and guts covered the air, accompanied by the sound of heavy breathing and painful moans. Not all of the people died, those who did not instantly die were covered in cuts and slowly bled to death.
Among the hundreds of corpses laid a man named Henry. He was covered in blood and the remnants of what used to be leather armor. Hundreds of cuts covered his body but he still breathed, he's not giving up on his life, not yet at least.
The beautiful mage sat on her majestic horse while covering her nostrils. She's the one who caused this, but looked more disgusted that she should have been.
As she sat there, a lone fighter approached her. The fighter looked like a true paladin and wore magnificent mythril armor that covered most of her body, ever her face was hidden.
The magician looked at her and as she opened her mouth to speak up, several figures raised from the bloodied ground.
They huffed and drank the blood off of the ground all while ferociously trembling. As they finished feasting on guts and blood of their dead allies they noticed the two people looking at them. As they picked up their oversized weapons they roared with intense violence and madly charged at the onlookers.
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Am I dead…?
My body hurts thousand…no, million times more than I ever felt before. It hurts so much my head is spinning and I can barely feel my sense of touch.
I only hear weird sounds…roars and shouts coming from all around me. Is the fight still going on…?
"Die you filth!" someone shouted.
It sounded like a womanly voice, though I'm not sure…
Giving up equals guaranteed death…so for now let's open my eyes…I can't. It's too hard to do anything…am I really alive?
I move my arms and try to feel around me. I'm in water…or something. Has it rained? That does not matter right now…where's my… Ah! Here it is…on my hip, in the pouch. The expensive potion I paid a fortune on. A onetime thing, I hope it actually works and I've not been scammed.
I unbutton the pouch and take out a small glass bottle, though it resembled more of a jar than a bottle.
I uncork the small glass jar and slowly drink the contents. Every time I move an inch enormous pain attacks me, but I drink it successfully.
Surprisingly it tastes like jam or marmalade…though it's very watery. Now, all I need to do is to lay on the ground, until I heal…though it's hard to do so on this wet soil…
After struggling a bit more I can finally open my eyes. Everything is red…the ground is red…corpses are littered around as if they were trash.
I can see silhouettes in the distance…the mage. I have to kill her. Wielding that power is too much for such a pampered bitch.
I rise onto my feet. The pain is barely tolerable, but somehow it's better than before. Whether it's the potion or adrenaline it does not matter.
What matters is doing what I need to - living. For that, I need to get rid of 'that'.
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Three black figures were fighting a single warrior. The warrior was equipped with white mythril armor and had an enormous kite shield, which too was made from mythril.
A War Troll roared and swung its human-sized mace downwards. The warrior raised its shield, slowly bent to rearrange the center of gravity, and took the attack head on.
An enormous bang resonated across the shield and the surroundings, but instead of the warrior getting ripped apart the attacker let go of the mace and grabbed its arm as if in pain.
"Die you filth!"
The warrior cut into the neck of its opponent who then slowly fell to the ground limply. The other two contenders ran with their full strength.
"Milady, will you end it, please?" The fighter addressed a beautiful female on a horse.
She just nodded, raised her exceptionally pricy looking staff and after muttering something the two running figures fell to the ground as if their strings were cut.
"Pfuuuu…that was a good exercise." The fighter said as it took off its helmet and looked around.
The person in question was an elf beauty with tied-up blond hair. She wore mythril armor that showed off exceptional craftsmanship and had a symbol of a crowned tree.
"Only tired after defeating seven trolls, are you?" the horse riding beauty said mockingly, before adding even more "maybe I should increase your training?"
"Please stop joking around, milady…by the way, you only defeated three of them." the paladin beauty shot back.
"Oh come o-"as she was about to say something a whoosh sound went through the air. An arrow went straight for the riding beauty, but bounced off of something.
The both elves looked towards the shooter and saw a man standing there. He had an old dented helmet on his head, but brown hair could be seen, accompanied with a very young, even innocent looking, face…though it was showing a pained expression at the moment. The lone man was dressed in something that used to be leather armor and as he moved bits of the chain mail fell to the ground through the open slice marks that encompassed his whole body.
He stood in a pool of, presumably his own, blood, while slightly swaying from one side to the other.
"Princess, it would seem that you left someone alive. Maybe increasing your training should be the priority here?" the paladin said with a surprised voice, she tried to make it sound sarcastic, but wasn't the brightest one to do it successfully.
"But I used Windstorm! It's a high-tiered spell if you didn't know! Only the trolls managed to survive that! How is thi-"
The princess got cut off again with another arrow flying towards her. It once again bounced off of her. Except this time, the shooter spoke up.
"Y-you magical bitch! Can't you see this is a battlefield? It's not a fucking picnic!"
The 'bitch' in question froze in place after hearing those words. She was gripping her horse's reigns tightly while the paladin started to slowly back away. When her friend, an enormously talented mage, got mad…all that she left was destruction.
The mage gripped her staff even stronger and raised it towards the sky. It shone as bright as the sun, but before she said the 'magic word' another whoosh sound came.
She was calm. She had a special magic item that created a barrier around her which protected her from ranged weapons, well…that's how it should have been.
The white tipped arrow shone and flew towards her, but missed her face by an inch. A small cut appeared on her cheek as red liquid began to flow down.
Her face went pale, the magic from her staff dissipated and she stood still, not moving an inch.
If it went even slightly to the side…she would have died. This was the first time in her lifetime she almost died…
With the sound of a drawing bow, her flow of thoughts stopped…there's no time to chant magic again…she's dead.
An arrow flew…closer and closer…her face movements stopped, her life flashed through her eyes…
*BANG*
A white wall appeared in front of her and blocked the arrow. It was her friend and her shield…
"What are you doing?!! Have you lost your mind?!" her friend angrily shouted at her, which made her brain start functioning again.
She raised the staff, focused her magic…another arrow came, but was blocked by the shield.
She chanted "[Wind Slash]" and an invisible blade of wind flew towards the shooter.
That's it. She lowered her staff…that man is going to die.
But, completely opposite to her expectations…The man, completely driven by instinct, jumped to the side of the invisible blade. He dropped his bow and drew his white sword. The sword sizzled as it made contact with the blood streaming from his arms…and then he charged.
He ran. Surprisingly fast according to the magicians eyes. But it was slow to the eye of a 130 year old paladin. The princess' shield moved even faster, as if using teleportation magic she appeared behind the attacker and swung the hilt of her sword towards the man's head.
It was a direct hit.
Enormous sound, even stronger than the one made by a troll, resounded and the dented helmet split like a chestnut.
The man face painted in red…but he wasn't done. He pulled out a hidden knife and threw it towards the mage. The paladin, stuck in combat with him, could not move…but she didn't need to.
The knife approached the mage with impressive speed, but before it made contact, invisible energy bounced it off trajectory and made it miss.
The mage pointed the already shining staff at the man and slowly said "[Wind Slash]"
This time, the man could not dodge, and the slash cut his abdomen wide open. Guts and blood spilled, the man screamed in pain and fell limply…it was over.
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What a bliss…
Is what I'd say if I was surrounded by beautiful elf women, which I'm not. Actually, it's quite the opposite.
I'm in a dark dungeon, chained to the wall, surrounded by no one else but rats.
How did I get here you might think…? Well, that's obvious. You just have to curse and attack a mage, a princess, all by yourself.
"What was I thinking?!!!"
Why, just why would someone, I, do that? It must be the potion, yes, it'll blame the potion…
So yeah, I've spent…who knows how long in here. An elf from time would come down and clean my injuries, accompanied by a guard of course.
If I remember correctly, that b- … princess tried to disembowel me alive, so how am I alive? Even in my original world healing something like that would be troublesome…magic is it? I guess it's magic, anything can be done with magic, right?
As the thoughts just did not stop inside my dumb head, I heard footsteps.
It must be someone else, since my injuries were treated recently…must be the torturer, huh. I guess elves aren't the same as I read in books. They aren't the peace loving species who show mercy before anything.
Well, I do deserve some kind of punishment…
HELL NO I DON'T. I was gutted alive, twice in fact!
A sudden noise of the metal doors unlocking and opening slowly went through my cell. I keep my mouth shut, in case it's the idiot princess.
What came in is…an idiot, perhaps, but not a princess. It's the other person who just watched me getting sliced open multiple times.
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"I trust you know why you're here?" the paladin asked as she was looking at a parchment in her hands.
"No, do you wish to elaborate?" A brown haired man answered with a mocking voice.
"You're a prisoner of war, should I call the torturer?"
The man gulped and stayed silent.
"Well then," with a hand gesture the paladin or an interrogator rather, ordered two elven guards to bring in a table and a chair. "how about you start with your name." Then, she casually sat down, and rested her head on the table.
"H-Henry. Henry Renner."
"Umu, umu, and?"
The man looked at her with a confused look, which he made on purpose to annoy her.
"Tell me who you are, where you worked, where you lived. Everything."
"Mercenary, no home, 22 years old, no girlfriend or relatives." The man said as he grinned.
"Only 22 years old? Aren't you an infant…? Well, I guess that's normal for humans… What about status?"
"Status?" Henry asked, this time with honest confusion on his face.
"Special skills, your mana pool size?"
The man thought for a moment before answering with "no idea".
"Ahh, you're pretty useless aren't you? Why did I even bother asking her to spare you…" the paladin muttered before noticing movement from the prisoner.
"Stop. You can't escape, not from me at least."
"Listen, paladin. I know nothing, I'm just mercenary who works for money, let me go and I won't tell anyone about this place."
"Fufufufu, that's not how it works. Also, call me master, since you're my slave from now on."
"Wha-"
"Shut up. Here, sign this with your blood, if you want to live that is." She then unchained the man and gave him a piece of paper with a knife.
The man looked at the parchment, then the knife, lastly the woman.
"Alright, come." She said.
With these words the man jumped at the woman and aimed for her neck.
The paladin instead spun around the man and without holding back smashed his head into the table. A blood spatter went all over the table as it split in two.
"Now. Sign."
The woman smiled and gave him the paper once again. Then, the man, unwillingly, signed the paper, which turned into dust and disappeared when a mark appeared on his neck.
"Fufufu, at last, I'll have a live dummy for practice." The woman said with a slightly evil sounding giggle.
