Chapter 9: Comes to you, as to us all....

With no goblin in sight for leess, the now reunited Fools went inside along with their hosts to grab a bite to eat, something to drink, and discuss their current position. After they all had been thoroughly fed and watered, the Fools ovaled up to talk. Half of the group (Steven, Peace, and Beard) sat while the other half (Brant, Ryan, and Renee) stood to face them. Brant and Ryan were standing to speak with the Fools, Renee was standing because plate mail is uncomfortable to sit on the floor in. Ryan started the meeting.
“Okay gang, I know we’re all excited to see each other, but we have a towns worth of people’s lives on the line. While we were coming in, Beard was tracking their movements as best he could and estimated the force to be in the lower thousands. How they got that many goblins together and across so much land I will never know. What are we going to do? Or, more to the point, where do we stand in matters, and how ready are we for this? Rhubs?”
“A complicated question, sir.” Brant just couldn’t help himself now that Ryan had an actual rank. “We, Steven, Peace, and I, are already promised to lend our aid to the town of Parity and were dispatched out here to get our hosts here to aid in the fortifications. We have been in multiple skirmishes and at this point are getting near exhausted in the daily spell area of things. We might be able to go back to Parity as the six of us and raise the defense there, but it will be hard pressed. We really need the McErdan brothers here. What can we do, sir?”
“I’m not sure. And stop calling me sir.” Ryan said.
“Yes, sir,” Brant said almost under his breath.
“I can try talking to them,” Renee said as she levered herself off where she had been leaning against the wall. She walked over to where the brothers were sitting and began talking to them in hushed tones. That there was some kind of argument, everyone could see, but none could hear. This continued for a minute or two; all the while the other Fools were exchanging glances, before finally she came back over. “Its settled.” she said. “The McErdans will shield this place as best they can and come with us to Parity’s defense.”
“How did you do that?” Brant asked keeping most of his incredulity out of his voice.
“Well Guilt is a standard issue Paladin negotiation tool, not to mention they realized that they would have no where in under 15 leess to trade their farms goods anyways if we failed.” Renee said with a small smirk.
The spell took only a few minutes to set up and then set. The group all mounted up and began the trek back to Parity. They passed the first few leess relative silence. Now that there were stickier people than he, Brant maintained a position along with Steven to put their moderately trained Listen and Spot checks to good use, up near the front. Beard and Renee brought up the back with the casters bunched in the middle. Ryan was just slightly behind Steven and Brant. Brant heard it first, but it was Steven that discerned what it really was. They had heard a dull thudding sound, plodding ahead and off to their right. The two called a rest of the others and then went off to scout what it was. Steven found the tracks and then discerned what it was. They talked about what else it could possibly be but there was little to no doubt. They returned to the rest of the group, greeted by curious stares. It was Peace that spoke up first. “Well? What is it?”
Steven and Brant exchanged a glance, then nodded before saying simultaneously, “They brought a cave troll.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Beard muttered as he flourished his axe and rolled his eyes.
“We’re pretty sure that’s what those tracks are. What this means for our plans in the future, only time will tell.” Steven said sagaciously before mounting back up on his pony.
When they were only a half leess away from Parity they heard the clatter of spears on shields. The goblin forces were getting ready to attack. Brant signaled them to circle there horses and said, “Okay, guys, we need to bust in through the lines and get quickly repositioned inside the city to aid the militia as best we can. Paxus, do you have any more fireballs?”
“I have about two. Why?”
“I need you to blow us a hole to ride through. Think you can do that?” Brant asked with a small smile.
“I’d like to see them try to stop me.” Peace replied.
The group got reordered for the charge and then began at a distance-eating canter. As they cleared the last of the forest they saw the goblin forces surrounding Parity. It was a huge force that had besieged that little village. As soon as they saw the goblins, they broke into a gallop with Peace at the head. Peace had already begun to hold out the material focus for the spell and recite the incantation. If one had been observing this death charge from the side of things, it would have seemed like Peace’s impact with the back goblin happened with such force that a ball of shooting flames erupted form the collision. Just as Peace’s horse moved it’s front hoof to trample the goblin, Peace finished the semantic component to the spell and released it. It blew a swath of death and combustion almost all the way through the goblin ranks. By the time any of the other goblins had time to react, Peace had already shifted his position to the center of the group as Steven, Ryan, and Brant took point.
As they got closer to the front rank, Steven whipped out his bow, while Brant and Ryan unsheathed their swords. The goblins at the front turned to face this new threat only to have many of their number subsequently shot or cleft as the three cleared the rest of the way. They made it past the frontline and began to cover the modest intervening distance between the foes’ front lines and the hastily set barricades surrounding Parity.
They barely made it to the midst of the gap before Brant heard the twang of bowstrings behind them. The first volley of arrows reserved for the villagers had instead been fired at the Fools. With a wave and a word, a arcane shield was raised by Edir. Only a few got through, before the shield was up, and were caught by Renee’s heater shield on her back and by Steven.
The militia pulled the barricades apart for the Fools then dragged them back together. Dismounting before his horse had even stopped, Brant jogged up to Branwyn and saluted.
“Reporting as asked sir. What’s next?” Brant said with a breathy grin.
“Well bless my soul, so you have. And with even more aide than was asked for.” Branwyn said with a short laugh of disbelief. “What’s next you ask? Well I doubt there will be much fighting today. That’s too bold for a goblin by half, even if he does have a couple thousand of his closest friends. No, we won’t see any action but a couple of stray arrows till nightfall.”
“Well then I suppose we shall have to let our casters rest a regain their strength for the fun to come.” Brant said and started back to where his friends were dismounting and walking their mounts to the Inn’s stable.
Branwyn started forward and grabbed Brant’s arm. “Thank you, master bard. You may have just saved us all.”
“Don’t thank me yet Branwyn. We have a long night to go before we have thanks bandied about.”
Brant told the casters to gather their strengths about them and prepare for the night, then he went to his room at the Inn and allowed glorious fatigue overcome him before his anxieties could keep him up.

Chapter 8- Fools Errand

Branwyn looked the trio up and down (mostly down for Steven) and said, “Well you lads seem to be of some mettle. We need more men and you seem to be a good set of lads to get us some. The McErdan Farmhold is to the east of here, about 5 leess, and is a gathering place for the land holders to far out to get to town quickly. If you three go out there and convince them to come to town, we might stand a chance. I haven’t seen a goblin uprising this big since before the founding of New Union…” He finished as he walked away to help some militia men shore up a barricade.
Brant turned around and looked at his compatriots. Steven seemed nonchalant, Peace seemed to get a slightly cocky smile and a vacant expression for a second before he snapped out of it and said, “Sorry. Was just thinking of casting fireball at a long line of goblins. It would be good experience.”
Brant shook his head and said, “Alright then let’s try to help this people as best we can. Before we go we should all decide on an adventuring name for each of us. The townspeople already know me as Rubs so I’ll just change the spelling to make it look more like a name. How about we just use Drewcifer for you, Peace?”
Peace thought for a second, then said, “How about I use a different form of Peace, like Pax? We could make it sound cooler if we spelled it more Roman.”
“So… Paxus?”, Steven said sounding uncertain.
“Yeah. Paxus the mage.” Peace said with a nearly starry eyed gaze.
“What about you Steve? Are you going with an Angelhair or Saltsman derivative?” Brant asked of his long held friend.
“I’m thinking a Saltsman one. How about Saul for the first name and Tzmæn for the last one?” Steven said smiling in a slightly impish manner.
Brant stared at him for a few beats before sighing and muttering, “It’s going to be a long campaign. I can already see it.”
The three moved to their horses and levered themselves onto them. Brant checked his saddle girth on Brea as Peace and Steven got well and set on their steeds. He moved up into his saddle smoothly and looked at each of his compatriots equivalently. Peace looked at Steven, then back at Brant before saying, “What are you looking at us for? You’re the one who has been here for a month. Surely you learned more than just town gossip in all that time.” Brant started, he had not expected to be taking the lead anywhere, but there it was.
“Ok, then let’s head out with me taking front, Steven, you take back; and the squishy can stay in the middle…”
“Hey, I’m not that bad!” Peace interjected.
Brant continued as if he had not heard “… I’m sure it’ll come naturally but yell if something attacks and ride on if it doesn’t. We need to move quickly through a lot of territory.” Brant said, met with silent (more or less) agreement from both.
They left town at a mile eating trot, slowing to a canter while going uphill and letting the horses take their lead on the downhill. They were saving full gallop for real emergency. For the first leess, nothing seemed out of the ordinary, but after that, signs slowly became ever more prevalent of the goblin incursion. The three adventurers didn’t meet any trouble till they went around a bend in the road about 2 leess into their trip. The roadside was devoid of any underbrush or trees for about 50 feet to prevent ambushes, but the trees on the inside of the curve, obscured the three’s view from seeing the patrol of about a dozen goblins marching down the road. It was tough to decide who was more surprised, but it was Steven who recovered first as he aimed his bow and fired in one smooth motion, cleanly killing one of the goblins in the front rank. Brant knew that getting away from this engagement, while completely possible, would be difficult, and would just lead to more problems down the road; literally. He drew his bastard sword from its saddle sheathe and dismounted Brea at a run.
Now normally Brant’s style was to play a defensive game, drawing an opponent out, then taking advantage of a mistake, but with a rogue and a wizard, he was actually the least squishy amongst the group. This plus the time constraint led to Brant taking the more direct approach of continuing with the momentum from the dismount and charging into the front line. The goblins, having finally recovered from the shock, drew their weapons and charged the three travelers. The first goblin to get into Brant’s range ran full bore at Brant with a small battle axe raised above his head… only to take an arrow through the throat. Steven, it seemed, had taken a position off to the flank of the line of engagement and was picking goblins off as fast as he could reload. Brant adjusted accordingly and shifted to the other flank of the enemy, hoping to put the goblins in a pincer of attacks. The goblins on that end intercepted Brant’s attempts and thrust at his stomach with their short swords. Brant swept these aside, kept the momentum on his sword, and swung full on into their shields, knocking both of them prone. From out of nowhere a ball of flames blew through the enemy ranks, annihilating two whole columns. It seemed Peace had finally finished the somatic components to his fireball spell.
The remaining goblins decided that splitting their focus was the best way to progress, as two ran at Peace, three ran at Steven, and the two that had been knocked down plus one other, moved in on Brant. Brant swung a hard cut, cleaving right through one of the rising goblins and carrying on to land a blow on the other’s shield. While doing so, the third goblin slashed at Brant’s forward leg, scoring a nice little cut across Brant’s shin. Brant grimaced, but quickly replied with a full body thrust into the offending goblin, taking him in the chest. He recovered quickly from the lunge only to find that his sword was stuck in the goblin’s ribcage. The last goblin made several rapid fire attacks at Brant, which he only barely managed to parry due to the added weight. Putting his entire body into an upper cut swing, Brant finally managed to dislodge his sword and parry the goblins next attack. From here it was a quick beat, parry, riposte to dispatch the last goblin assailing him. He then looked about to see the status of his companions. Peace was busy warding a goblin off with only a dagger in hand. The other goblin that had been approaching Peace had a familiarly feathered arrow sticking out of his back.
Steven had put away his bow, and was now dual wielding a short and a long sword against two goblins of the three that had assaulted him. Deciding that Peace’s even odds put him at less risk than Steven’s uneven ones, Brant charged to his small ally’s location. By this time, Steven had started slowly giving ground until his was further into the wood. His agile movement and quick blades kept the goblins from surrounding him. Brant ran up behind of the goblins, yelling the whole way to attract attention. It worked. Both goblins allowed their focus to stray from Steven just long enough to allow Steven to capitalize on the distraction. He beat the goblin to his side’s sword, then stabbed the goblin in between him and Brant, in his exposed kidney. Brant adjusted his stance for this and then cleft the remaining goblin firmly through the neck. From here he turned to move towards aiding Peace, but Steven was already on the move. Steven whipped a knife out from his belt and threw it end over end, only to miss the goblin and graze Peace’s cloak. Peace, being slightly jumpy while fighting for his life, dove and rolled away from the goblin he was engaged with. Despite missing it, the goblin still hesitated for a moment before realizing he was the last of his entire patrol. He then began to run as fast as he could towards the wood line. Before either of the other two could change direction to give chase, a beam of liquid fire shot out in the intervening gap, melting a neat whole in the goblins torso. “You will not run away from me!” said a rather disgruntled sounding Peace.
“Uh, no. No, I suppose they won’t Peace. Are you guys okay?” Brant asked, chest heaving slightly as he caught his breath.
“Okay?” Peace said, sarcasm heavily added. “We each just got about six or seven hundred experience. We keep this up and I might just make some scrolls.”
“Huh?” Steven said as he looked up from the goblin corpse he was rolling for valuables. “Oh yeah, I’m fine. Only lost a couple of arrows. Little green bastards rolled as they fell and snapped the shafts off in their thrice-Vecna-cursed throats.”
Brant looked back and forth between his comrades in arms, and had to fight the urge to throw up his hands as he walked back to Brea saying, “Well as long as everyone is okay, let’s get moving.”
They continued another leess before hitting any other goblin resistance. This was only a group of seven or eight and the Fools were more alert this time. Steven downed two before the two groups even met in melee. Brant clove two from his horse and trampled a third. Peace was busy casting magic missile to clean up the rest. From there on, they met a group every half to quarter leess, till finally they were within a half leess from the McErdan farmstead and Peace ran out of spells as they finished a group of goblins moving on the farmstead itself it seemed. Brant had used all of his level 2 and 1 spells on heals and a Shout. The group conferred on its relative stores of spell power and decided that a hellride for the last half a leess would be for the best.
The ride, while made at a jarring gallop, was uneventful. They made it to a field, across which they saw a large farm house back dropped by an even larger barn and what had to be a curing shed. They made it halfway across the field before they were stopped by what appeared to be a sentry covered in mud. They hadn’t seen him for most of the ride, until he stood up that is. He recognized the lack of green skin and directed them to the farm house with a backwards gesture before he laid back down; crossbow in hand. The group continued and dismounted, tying their horses to a hitching post. Out of the farm house strode two men in their early 30’s or late 20’s. The older looking one was of medium height, with dirty blonde hair, and blue robes. The younger was slightly shorter, with black hair, and white robes. The younger spoke first, “Blessings of Ehlonna on you travelers. You must have crossed much goblin-infested territory to get here. I can only assume you were sent here from Parity. My name is Tywed McErdan, and this is my brother, Edir.”
“Good to meet you. It is always nice to see a disciple of Ehlonna out in the world.” Brant started. “My comrades and I have indeed rode from Parity and wish first for your neigh immediate aid to Parity, and second for a night to recuperate our resources and ourselves over all."
"As to a place of rest, you have found the best place for leess." Edir said in a very subdued and quiet voice. "The chances of my brother and I leaving our farm to the tender mercies of the goblins are substantially less. I am sorry."
"But, if you don't come into town, the militia will be overrun in next to no time. The number of goblins out there is horrendous." Steven said
The Fools kept making attempts to convince the brothers but eventually had to concede defeat. They went to bed, minds heavy with worries and thoughts. There were goblin attacks all night, but nothing to the point of actual worry. An hour after dawn, the goblins attacked the farmstead in force. The Fools reacted to the call to arms, and rushed out to meet the goblin hordes; working to defend the homestead of their hosts. The sheer numbers of goblins made it easier for Peace to cut huge swaths of fiery death, but harder for Brant and Steven to do much more than literally wade into battle and hold them back as they could. Edir, it turned out, was an abjurer of some substantial power, warded the dominant portion of the rear, allowing the vastly outnumbered defenders to focus on only one direction of threat. If Edir hadn't warded each of them, and Tywed hadn't healed them as necessary, the fight would have ended almost as soon as it started. The sun had only climbed slightly above the horizon before spells were starting to run out amongst the four casters.
Brant had slashed and struck his way back to where Tywed was under assault from 3 goblin warriors. Between bastard sword and mace, the three were dispatched without too much issue.
"Thank you Rhubs. Your assistance was of much use." Tywed said, wiping sweat with the back of his sleave.
"No matter, Tywed. I don't know how much longer we can stand up to this pressure. There are just to gods damn many of them." Brant said leaning only a little heavier on his point-planted sword than was intended.
"No, I know not how we shall survive this force, let alone survive through it." Tywed said with sadness heavy in his voice.
Suddenly from the East, a disturbance appeared among the goblin ranks near the forest. A shape taller than the goblins was swinging a giant battle axe through the unsuspecting back ranks as easy as Brant had chosen his dump stat (Constitution). Apparently one of the goblins finally landed a hit as the figure let out an inhuman yell and started whirling the axe at greater speeds around his body. It was then that a clarion call from a horn sounded and two figures clad in steel burst from the forest whipping their blades back and forth catching many goblins unaware and in the back of the head. It was only when Brant could discern the relative height of one of the riders that a smile broke out upon his face. "Well that works too." Brant said almost under his breath.
The goblins were thrown in complete disarray as the riders raked through their collumns of troops and the lone axe-wielder slogged towards the farm as an indomitable force. Between the surprise attack from their rear, and a morale boosted attack from the front, the goblins quickly realized that they had been routed and began to flee en masse. The wielder's axe fell in time to the arrows that Steven had begun to release into the retreating mass.
The three newcomers, fresh out of goblins on which to vent their spleens, rode/jogged over to where Tywed and Brant stood. Steven and Peace moved likewise, till all of the combatants were standing together laughing and saying their hellos. Brant walked over to the shorter rider and snapped a quick salute. "You are two days earlier than expected for such a heroic rescue sir. Your supposed to wait for the third day at dawn to come and join our little tea party." Brant said trying to keep a straight face but failing horribly after 'tea'.
"At ease, Master Harper." T-Rex said as he slid down from his warpony's saddle. " I decided to break with tradition, and save your sorry keesters.
The two moved forward to clasp forearms and quickly move into a full bodied hug.
"Good to see you guys. We've got other things to do right now though. Parity is going to quickly become besieged with goblins and is going to need our help. Its a pity Beard used his only rage for the day already."
"Oh, he has more than one now, but it was his last," Ryan said shaking his head.
"When did he use the first one?!" Brant asked incredulously. "Its only 7 or 8 in the morning."
"He was making breakfast for us and burnt the bacon. Renee had to wrestle the pan out of his hands before he started to trying biting through it. It only took a minute or two to beat it back into a useable shape." Ryan said almost too nonchalantly.

And Trouble Begins

Brant let his fingers dance across the lute strings, plucking out the hard and fast melody of “Johnny B. Goode”. Just as the kids of the 1950’s, the people, of whatever D&D time period he was in, were less than openly enthused. He had assumed something like this would happen, so he quickly followed this up with a sped up rendition of “The Maiden’s Willow Weeping” and “The Road to New Union”. These were received a bit more excitedly. For the night, that was all he played for them, but from then on he played a couple of songs every night. He would always chose a song from his memory’s repertoire and then fill out the rest of his portion of the night with songs that they were more familiar with. After a time, Brant began to gain a following all his own of farmers that had taken a liking to some of his songs. The trend was an appreciation for classic 80’s rock. It was unexpected and slightly disturbing to see a bunch of farmers try to sing along to “Pour Some Sugar On Me”. During the time he was off stage he spent equal parts of time practicing music for that night, chatting with any and all of the farmers that frequented the bars, and studying lore with Nester and Master Quick.
Brant’s month passed quickly in this way, till it seemed he had had very little other life before it. Finally, one morning Brant woke to Master Quick plucking some of “Johnny B. Goode”. She looked up when she noticed that he had woke and said, “Today I will be leaving you. You have learned all I can fit into a month and today you shall meet up with your comrades. If you will allow I have a few final words for you but you will have to see me off to hear them.” She finished with a bittersweet smile.
Brant got up and dressed in his original garb provided by Zeddicyme, with a certain feeling of solemnity. He got down to where Master Quick was sitting astride her horse and looked up to her expectantly. She had been looking off into the sky until he got there. She then looked down and started her words of advice.
“Young Rubs, mark me well. You have made much progress in the musical arts of the Bard, but now you must hear this, the words of my final lesson to you. As a Bard, you are everyone’s best friend. If you fail in this, you fail at your duty to your friends. You are first and foremost the best friend of your comrades. No, you do not have the most excellent capabilities to wield a blade into combat in the face of hordes, bend the primal forces of the universe to your will, remove pain and injury from your allies, or to sneak into the depths of some hold or keep, but you will be the second best at all of these and your abilities will make your comrades better at theirs. Your second job is to be the best friend of everyone else. You, out of all your comrades, have the time spent and the finesse to deal with everyone from a farmer in a pub to a king in his own throne room, from the guard of the jail cell you are in to the High Priest of Orcus. You are the go between, the “in” man, the envoy, and the diplomat. The barbarian has not the patience, the wizard has not the empathy, the rogue has not the social acceptability, and the paladin and marshal have not the connection with the everyman. You have what they do not and they likewise with you. You will be the best at going it alone but will be so much better with allies to aid you and be aided by you. This is all I have left to tell you, now go make preparations for your friends shall arrive today.”
“I understand, Master Quick, but where is Nester? I want to bid him farewell as well.” Brant said looking around for signs of his frailer tutor.
“He was called away on other business and had to leave suddenly. He told me to say his goodbyes for him. And with that, I will wish you all of the luck Olidammara can give you.”
Brant nodded in respect and waved as Master Quick rode off into the sunrise. He walked back into the Inn and ordered some bread, cheese, and a pint; he might as well start today as he intended to finish it, in revelry with his comrades. They would all probably stay for a night and then make a good start the next morning. He had just about finished the cheese that, while good, was hard, when a farmer burst in with torn clothing. Brant had seen this farmer several times and had spoke with him quite a few times. He was one of those well-meaning old men that would always exaggerate things just a bit past where they were believable. If one could be bothered to listen, Parcive would regale you with the tale of how he bested a full-grown owlbear in his youth. Everyone in the Inn, this being Brant and the Innkeeper, looked up at this noteworthy entrance. Brant got up first and asked Parcive, “What happened to you friend? Looks like you let your boy have a go at you with the sheep shears.”
“If there was one, there was a hundred of them. Goblins, all marching over the hill at me on my horse. I barely got into town alive. Rouse the militia, we’re about to be invaded!”
“Now calm down, Parcive. I’m sure things aren’t that bad. Maybe it just seemed like a hundred of them in the dim morning light.” Brant said trying to sound as rational and non-patronizing as he could.
“Pelor’s blood, boy! You think I’m crazy?! I was attacked and almost killed and you think I’m making it up! “ Parcive yelled.
“Well, if you’re that certain, go talk to Ol’ Branwyn. He’ll gather the militia and investigate.” The Innkeeper said barely paying Parcive any mind.
“I shall do just that,” and with that Parcive got up and walked out just as abruptly as he had entered and almost plowed over the elf in robes that was in the process in entering. It wasn’t until Brant heard the muttered, “Crazy peon” that he realized that the elf was in fact, none other than Peace.
“Drewcifer!”, Brant excitedly exclaimed while motioning him over.
“Brant! I’d heard you were frequenting this Inn, though why is another question completely.” Peace said semi-jovially and walked over and gave Brant a huge hug.
“Oh, hush up. This place might not look like much but the ale they serve here isn’t too bad. Speaking of which, Barkeep! Can I have a pint for my friend here? He just got off the long dusty road here and has a powerful need to get his thirst quenched.” Brant called out.
The Innkeeper, who was still beaming slightly from Brant’s well-placed compliment, pulled a pint and slid it down to where Brant was sitting. Brant handed the mug to his enrobed friend and watch the elf’s face go from skeptical to moderate approval.
“Now that you have something to lubricate your voice, why not tell me what you’ve been up to in the past month?” Brant prompted. He had spent a month learning how to pull people into a chatty mood and was using this training to the fullest; not that Peace was that reluctant.
“Let me start off by asking you a question. Have you ever wanted to be able to make fire at will?” Peace said almost conspiratorially.
“Only about everyday of my life.” Brant responded, half in jest and half with a fervor.
Peace raised his hand and gestured and swirled his hand. Brant watched appreciatively at the small bloom of flame that was then sitting in Peace’s palm. Another gesture and Peace closed his hand, extinguishing the fire.
“Other than that, I’ve been busy being the bitch of a crusty codger with heavy social ineptitudes. It was a lot of unnecessary menial labor before he finally started to teach me some useful things. Lucky for me he was an evoker. He understood exactly what I wanted to learn the most. So he made me wait the longest for those spells and instead taught me a couple of cantrips that make light and noise. Aside from that its just been a lot of studying. I actually didn’t get here on a horse. Rode in on a griffin, and then just asked around until I found someone to tell me where you might be. Now here I am telling you all this and am wondering what you have been up to?”
“Mostly doing this, just listening to people and learning the bardly arts. Though I have to say this is the first time I have ever been listening to someone who was being mugged at the time.” Brant said with a sly smile.
Peace looked around him in surprise to see Steven buying a drink with a coin purse with neatly cut strings. He looked over at Brant and Peace and smiled a little. “What gave me away?” he asked as he accepted his pint and handed Peace his purse back.
“Not much,” Brant said, “ if it weren’t for as much time as I have been spending learning to fine tune my listening skills you would have been totally unnoticeable.”
“Have to try again later then. So chaps… how are things in the sticks?” Steven said with a polite and interested intonation to his voice.
“Tell us first how the big city was. You probably have more to tell anyways.” Brant said.
“And pass over the copper you owe me.” Peace interjected.
Steven smiled and dug a copper out of his backpack while he started with, “Well I’ve only spent half of my time in the big city. The first two weeks I spent going through survival training in the wild. Actually the first week was training and the second week was mostly me demonstrating an ability to not only survive on my lonesome but to improve some of my skills on my own. That went over without too much of a hitch, though I gained a real big disliking for goblins and bugbears over that week. After that, my classroom was moved to the urban jungle. I spent the first week there just doing small cons and pick pocketing. I got enough in my takes to decently feed and house myself and my teacher. I also bought myself a nice set of thieves tools. This was good as my final test, that I was set upon, was to steal a dagger from an expert weapon smith’s shop. He kept everything well locked and even had a cursory booby trap on his weapons chest. It almost got me with a sleep dart but I dodged it well enough. From there I just started off towards here. Do you know there is a goblin problem in this area?”
“So I hear, but it shouldn’t be anything big though. The farmers say there are always a few goblins heckling the farms out on the rim.”
“Um, this is way more than a few goblins. It’s more on the magnitude of a few hundred goblins.” Steven said somehow not letting any incredulity into his voice.
Brant failed to match this feat as he asked, “Are you serious?”
“Well, if I can count campfires and guestimate how many goblins would use each fire, then yes. I am totally serious. If either of those is wrong, then I am less serious.” Steven replied.
“We have to get this village mobilized and barricaded. The goblins could be here any minute.” Brant said hurriedly as he dashed outside to see Branwyn directing militia to put up barricades and to station themselves equally throughout Parity. Brant did a quick count of heads and saw that there were only eight militia members and Branwyn himself. Brant turned to Steven and Peace who had followed him out of the Inn.
“Guys, there is no way a bunch of farmer’s militia can turn back several hundred . I can see their levels and they only have one level five, three level threes, and the rest are twos and ones. Besides that they only have levels in NPC classes. We are all level three PCs and we know more about the rules here than they do.”
Steven and Peace gave Brant a rather blank stare, until Brant said, “Look, I’ll explain later how I know this, just accept that this world is based off of D&D for right now.” They exchanged a mutual look and a shoulder shrug then nodded at Brant. Brant ran over to Branwyn and said, “Bran, me and my friends want to help. Is there anything we can do to help?”