Bottled Slimes

Squad six stood in place for a couple of seconds. Their achievement was lost to them as they looked for other opponents. While they had thrown all their improvised spears, they still had their weapons. "Did-did we do it?" one asked. The Elves' corpses dangled by their ankles, dripping blood down. None of them struggled, and every one of them had a spear sticking out of them.

"Yes." Doevm said. "Good job." Before he could issue his next order, his men cheered and hugged each other. They praised the goddess like it was her that saved them, and not their squad leader. "Settle down," Doevm's voice was drowned out in the yells.

"Sir," Hopi came up to him. Doevm now understood why Wade didn't like to be called that. It felt foreign for someone he had known for so long to call him by a title. A big stupid grin was painted across his face. "We did it. Can't we relax and celebrate a little? The methods I picked up were amazing. We just wiped out three squads in less than a minute. I can't even fathom how lucky we were."

'Stupid Elf,' The Lich said. 'Luck had nothing to do with it. None of those spears should have hit. If it wasn't for me using wind magic to direct them in secret, none of you would be cheering right now.'

Doevm wanted to rebuke the Lich, but it was right. These men had no experience throwing spears. Not to mention how unbalanced each of them were. Without slightly adjusting their course, only a few of the spears would have hit. The Elves would have cut themselves down and annihilated their squad. The most disturbing thing was that Doevm didn't call on his magic, the Lich did.

Hopi handed Doevm his dagger back: "It worked just like you described it to Ashtehar. You just cut and it burns. It worked wonders when cutting into the tree branches. Without this, I would never have finished."

Some men ran up to Hopi and hugged him as well: "Thank you Hopi. You just saved all of us." Hopi didn't know what to do. He looked at Doevm, who simply shrugged. The soldiers surrounded Hopi and thanked him all at once.

'I guess a little celebration is in order,' Doevm thought. 'They did well. Even though my orders were strange, they followed them without question. As warriors, they have far to go, but as soldiers, they are ready.' For the first time since reaching the battlefield, he wore a stupid grin on his face. 'And now I just need twelve more squad leaders' heads. Of course, I also need to bring the heads of the Elves back with me as proof.' Something dripped on his wrist guard. He thought it was blood, but then he heard a sizzling sound. Looking down, he discovered that a small hole was there. He looked up. Instead of blood dripping from the still warm corpses, bits of molten flesh were. He cursed. "Get out of here now!" He cut the celebration short. "Move!" He grabbed his things, threw off his wrist guard, and bolted.

The soldiers were confused, but they followed their leader out the area. When they looked back, the Elves splatted on the ground, then melted with the sound of sizzling. Even Doevm's metal wrist guard wasn't immune. Most of the soldiers looked above, still thinking they were under attack. Some soldiers writhed on the floor. They had been unlucky. The acid was eating away at their insides. In a few minutes, they were puddles. Doevm had lost five men.

"Squad leader, what was that?" one asked.

"We're fine now, stop panicking. Those were bottled slimes. High priced Mercenaries often carry them around in bottles that explode upon their deaths. The awakened slime eats away at everything, even itself. It is a last resort so that no information is leaked about their employer. If you're dripped on, you're dead. There is no cure because it's more of an acid than a living being."

"Who would do such a thing?" Hopi asked. "And how can a slime live like that?"

"I don't know." Doevm lied. "They're products of the Mage Association, who likes their secrets. Let's go, we still have an objective." He turned around and hurried his men out. There was no need for a burial. There was nothing to bury. As they marched into the forest, Doevm fell into deep thought.

'That was an expensive operation. Getting our squad hit with the acid was probably just an afterthought. Who would spend so much money to get rid of me? Is there someone on my squad who pissed of a noble? No, they should all be simple farmers. None of this makes any sense.' He darted from tree to tree as he made his men count all the supplies, they salvaged from the acid rain. 'Then I had to go and use magic. While I didn't sense anyone, they could have simply sealed their magic like I do. While they can't sense me in that state, they would have noticed the tiny magic circles around each spear. I don't think my men noticed since they were hyped up on adrenaline, but I will need to ask them when we make it to the objective. We are late by an hour already. The enemy would have probably taken the point by now.' He pulled out the map and lead everyone according to it.

'There is a chance the other squads are in danger. While I can't imagine the enemy would hire three squads of mercenaries for each squad, it isn't impossible.' They spent a lot of hours cutting through the forest. The heat was one thing, but the bugs were another. With the amount of sweat they were all getting, they had to take breaks and remove pieces of their armor. Then the mosquitos would attack. They stuck their disease rattled mouths into their arms and drained their strength. After reequipping their armor, they set off once more. The atmosphere was the same as the end of the first mission. The soldiers, while they had experienced death of their comrades before, weren't immune to mourning. No, pain would be a constant friend in this war, whether it be physical or emotional.

"We're getting close," Doevm said to relieve the group. Then an hour of marching passed. "We're getting closer. Almost there." He reignited his downtrodden group's determination, even if they didn't really believe him. Passing a few more trees, the squad found one of the largest trees of the forest. A single one of its roots was twice as tall as a solder, and ten times as thick. The roots wrapped even around the trees in the area. Its branches extended everywhere within ten square miles. Doevm understood why this was a valuable target, it was a perfect lookout zone.

Since the tree dwarfed and pushed back every tree in the area, it allowed whoever was on top to see out a far distance, allowing them to prepare for an attack. Its thick branches could hold nearly an entire squad and not fall. Doevm guessed it could hold half of the base all by itself.

"State your allegiance!" someone said from behind the tree.

"Acrin Kingdom!" Doevm responded as he backed away and got into a stance. He cursed, 'They're already here. Now that I closed in, I can smell blood.'

A head poked above the root: "It's ok, stand down." A dozen more heads poked up. The bows loosened as men appeared behind the tree. They all wore the emblems of the Acrin Kingdom. "You must be squad six, we've been expecting you."

"We ran into some difficulties." Despite recognizing them as allies by their uniforms, Doevm didn't step forward. He instead asked more questions and backed away. "What is the name of your captain?"

"Marcus!" Frey followed behind the Acrin soldiers. "Same as you idiot." He smiled and leaned against the tree, puffing out his chest. "What took you so long? My men were here an hour ago. I was falling asleep waiting for you."

"We got attacked by three Elven squads." Doevm hugged and walked right past the proud idiot. "Five deaths, I would appreciate it if you let out tardiness go considering what we just went through." He said purely to destroy Frey's pride in getting to the objective first. He made sure to sound agitated, as if he knew the men who died inside and out.

"I-I" he stuttered just as he tried to think up an apology. Doevm just walked right past him into their camp.