Explorer of Edregon

Despite Golrim having explained everything and Vin knowing Curash was essentially an undercover agent, he couldn't help but flinch back and mentally prepare a mana-empowered Stone Shot the moment Curash appeared before them. The hunter looked no real worse for wear, but the same couldn't be said about Trod. The massive orc was missing most of the fingers on his right hand, and he had a crossbow bolt shot straight through his palm, as well as about another dozen peppering his entire body, including one lodged deep within his left eye. But even with all that, he looked as impassive and unfazed as ever as he gingerly held Waltz's unconscious body in those same hands Vin had personally witnessed snap a dwarf's neck like a twig.

"Curash!" Golrim grinned, looking like he was about to walk over and give the man a hug before glancing at Trod's massive frame and thinking better of it. "I see you've made a friend since we last spoke face-to-face. Mind introducing him to us?"

"This is Trod. He's pretty much the only reason I managed to actually pull off your insane mission," Curash spat as he glared at Golrim. "Four months of trying to keep the worst of our world's people all together, while slowly whittling them down without them realizing or running away. Do you have any idea how difficult these past four months have been?!"

"I wouldn't have given you the mission if I hadn't thought you capable of carrying it out," Golrim said, gesturing toward Phil. "Curash, you already know Vin and Scule, but this is Phil, the leader of Terra's combat classes. I figured it was only fair to warn you seeing as the man might attack you at any moment."

Up until that comment Vin had been staring at Curash, carefully watching the Hunter for any indication he might whip out his bow and start firing. But hearing Golrim's words, Vin glanced over at Phil and blinked at what he found.

The Challenger was so excited he was visibly trembling, and his knuckles were pure white as they gripped his sword hilt. Phil was staring unblinking at Curash, and Vin didn't have to guess as to the reason why.

Jesus, I knew Curash was a strong fighter, but he must be remarkable if Phil's Challenger's Intuition is registering him as such a powerful foe.

"I think we've had enough bloodshed for one day," Curash said, suddenly sounding exhausted as he glanced around at all the fallen bodies of the Red Dawn. When his eyes landed on the few Earther and elven bodies sprinkled into the mix, his anger seemed to bleed right out of him. "Not to mention I need to get started on hunting down those two members who escaped before they get too far away."

"You really think you'll be able to track them down?" Vin couldn't help but ask, still finding this relatively calm conversation with the man that had held Shia at arrowpoint and brought them back to a camp of bloodthirsty marauders rather difficult. If Curash hadn't led the Red Dawn straight into the trap like Golrim promised he would, they'd be having a very different discussion right now. "I saw them run, and they were pretty fast."

"I'll admit they're faster than me, but that doesn't matter. There's nowhere they can run that I can't follow," Curash said. "You know I'm a Hunter, but I never told you my actual class. I'm a Hunter of Men. I'll find them."

"It's probably for the best you're not here when we wake Waltz up," Shia nodded, motioning to a spot on the forest floor relatively free of bumpy roots. "Speaking of, would you mind putting him there, Trod?"

The orc turned to look at Curash, and when the Hunter nodded, he carefully placed Waltz where Shia had indicated. He seemed to struggle a little with his missing fingers, but not once did he look like he was in pain.

"Thank you, Trod," Shia smiled, earning a small grunt from the orc as she walked over and carefully looked the beastkin over. "Trauma to the head… Did you knock him unconscious?"

"I didn't have many other options," Curash frowned, giving the unconscious beastkin a strange look. "He came at me with the intention to kill. If he hadn't wanted me to know it was him that put me six feet under, or if Trod had been a fraction of a second slower blocking the bolt, I'd be dead right now. Waltz might never forgive me for everything I've done these past few months, but he's an old friend of mine. I'd appreciate it if you made sure he was okay."

"We'll get him good as new," Shia said, offering Curash a sad smile. "For what it's worth, at the very least, I forgive you for holding me hostage and bringing us to the Red Dawn. I get that you were stuck carrying out an impossible mission you had no control over and were just trying to use us to whittle down the marauders even further. Not to mention I see now you didn't just leave us to fend for ourselves."

"What do you…" Vin blinked, looking up at the nearly eight-foot-tall wall of green muscle that was Trod as it finally clicked. "Oh. You left camp so nobody could blame you when we escaped, but you left Trod behind in case we needed help. I guess that explains why he killed the dwarf over something so small."

"I did more than that," Curash sighed. "I had to take your weapons because it would have looked weird if I didn't, but do you honestly think I didn't notice your magical prosthetic? Or couldn't have come up with a better way to trap your Rogue than in an old birdcage? Trod was going to cause a commotion and give you guys a chance to escape and hopefully kill some members on your way out, but you managed to beat him to the punch."

"It's true. Was going to start a fight," Trod rumbled, nodding along with Curash's words.

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

"Well I'm glad you managed to rope one of the marauders over to our cause," Golrim said, looking the wounded orc up and down. "...though I'm not sure how Spur will react to bringing him back to camp…"

"I'll watch him for now!" Alka called out, finally walking over to them and craning her head back to take in the orc's height. "Oh man, you're a tall one, aren't you? Got any interest in helping me beat the hell out of a half-dozen trainees? You're like a Trunkback but better!"

Trod slowly blinked as he looked down at the black knight standing before him, clearly unsure how to respond to any of that.

"Alka, where were you?" Vin asked, looking at her blood-covered body. He'd seen the Slayer initially drop into battle right behind Phil, but had quickly lost track of her in all the fighting.

"I found her quite literally tied up," Scule chuckled, hopping up onto her shoulder as Reginald scurried up Vin's clothes and into his favorite pocket. "You want to tell him, or should I?"

"You know that whip-wielder you asked me to try and take out? Apparently, she had some sort of entanglement skill," Alka explained. "When she realized she couldn't hurt me even with her weird pain-amplifying abilities, her whip basically came to life and tied me up, giving her a chance to run. I was able to distract a few members of the Red Dawn and goad them into attacking me while I was down, but I'll admit I didn't really do much else during the battle."

"You seem oddly okay with that…" Vin said carefully.

"I'm a Slayer, Vin. A monster hunter," Alka shrugged. "I'd be rightfully pissed if a monster managed to do that to me, but a prestiged warrior? Why do you think I decided to leave my trainees out of this battle? Fighting high level people is drastically different from fighting monsters. Their intelligence is one thing, but far more than that is dealing with unique skills and abilities. It's why we lost so many people despite having such a perfect set up for an ambush and far greater numbers."

"Fair enough. Phil, are you going to be okay?"

"Yeah…" Phil took a deep breath in through his nose before letting it out of his mouth and all but forcing his hand to drop from the hilt of his sword as he tore his eyes off of Curash. "I'm good. We need to bring the dead back to Terra and report to Spur that the battle was a success. Trod will need to undergo the same truth-gem interrogation the rest of the former prisoners did before we let him out of our sight, however."

"Go with them, Trod, I can't have you slowing me down as I hunt down the last members of the Red Dawn," Curash said, clapping the large orc on the back. "Help them however you can, I'll be back eventually."

"Okay, boss," Trod rumbled, nodding toward the hunter while he stepped over to stand beside Alka. "Be careful."

Flashing the orc a weary grin, Curash turned and ran off into the forest, clearly having some indication of where he needed to go. Vin had no idea what a twice prestiged Hunter of Men was capable of, but he was glad Curash was actually on their side. Glancing sideways at the wounded orc, Vin cleared his throat.

"Uh… Trod. Do you need any help getting those bolts out of you?"

"No," the orc grunted, looking vaguely surprised, as if he'd only just realized he had a dozen bolts sticking out of his body. Reaching up, he grabbed the one lodged into his left eye, yanking it out with an unsettling pop before tossing it to the ground. "Need meat. I'll heal."

"Oh yeah," Vin muttered, remembering what Common Ally had told him the first time he'd seen an orc. According to the information he got from his title, orc biology was beyond strange. They were pure carnivores, but they didn't grow fat if they ate more than their bodies could handle. Instead, their bodies used that extra food to first regenerate any wounds, and then slowly added to their muscle mass.

Trod could literally regrow his missing fingers and eye by eating his own bodyweight in meat.

Granted, he also weighed quite a lot, which meant he was about to make one of the Chefs very happy.

Alka took Trod and began making her way back to town with Scule on her shoulder, and Phil started shouting orders, directing everyone to get things cleaned up and withdraw. Before Vin could decide where he could best help out, Smohl walked up to him, the older elf looking both tired and satisfied.

"Good to see the two of you made it through that battle unscathed," Smohl said, smiling at each of them. "I wanted to personally thank you both for giving us the chance to bring an end to the tree-cutters. Every couple of weeks they'd attempt to harm the forest, and they were often too fast for us to retaliate, fleeing the Sacred Forest before our warriors could get to them."

"Of course, Smohl, thank you again for your help. And tell Erik thanks as well," Vin added. "I almost hate to ask but… How many elves ended up falling during the battle? We thought it was around a dozen, but we didn't get an exact count."

"Our warriors are used to fighting defensive battles against Trunkbacks, and we've had some time to improve our levels since you last witnessed us fight," Smohl chuckled. "Sadly, we did lose ten of our own, but they would gladly have given their lives again knowing we succeeded in our mission. The destruction of the Sacred Forest's trees is quite literally the greatest crime our people have."

"Remember my level 30 Capstone I told you about, Vin?" Shia asked, laying a hand gingerly on a nearby tree. "One With Nature? Like I said, I can almost talk to nature, in a way now. The Sacred Forest told me that out of all the Red Dawn members, Curash and Trod were the only two that went out of their way to avoid damaging any of the trees. That went a long way toward me choosing to forgive them for everything."

"I suppose that makes sense," Vin nodded. "Well, now that things are finally over, I'm going back to town to help debrief with Spur. Want to come with?"

"I think I'm going to spend some time helping the other Druids repair the Sacred Forest," Shia decided. "While Curash and Trod were respectful, the rest of the Red Dawn did a number on the forest as they ran through it. I'll catch up with you guys later."

"Got it," Vin said, nodding to the elves as they went off to start fixing up the forest. "Well, Reginald, I guess it's just you and me. Want to help me give the report to Spur?"

A very loud, very fake-sounding squeak-snore began coming from his pocket, and Vin rolled his eyes as he started making his way back to town.

He didn't even know why he bothered.