Desert Mission: The Three Mercs (Sashti, Tyrion, Tumalihr)

[DukeWolfRein]

There is a wonderful place near the center of the Shashallah Desert, or maybe it's the East, or the West, who can really tell in all this goddamn sand...Anyways, somewhere in the Shashallah Desert there is a small Oasis that holds the freshest water in all of Strophya. It is upon this Oasis that we find the three main protagonists of this story. They find themselves in this pocket space of beauty and tranquility, far from the noisy cities and busy towns of Strophya. This particular Oasis has palm trees around the lake in the middle of it, five palm trees to be exact. These trees are all sporadically spaced around the lake and most are the perfect length to set up a hammock. Next to the lake, about a few feet away is a rather big boulder, a boulder..let's say 30 feet high, well really 30 feet and 5 inches but that's not important right now. The Boulder juts out from the ground, casting a long shadow upon the ground in which one can relax and take in the sight of this wonderful paradise.

Yes, all of these things are there for our heroes to enjoy, however, they were not. No, instead they were currently being bombarded by several arrows from the 70+ strong Goblin Warband they had stumbled upon. This particular Warband were named the Unholy Riders, and they rode on Janoths and specialized in cornering caravans and catching them when they least expected it. Of course, this meant that they had waited until the three Mercenaries had found the Oasis to strike. This is where our story starts.

Sashti watched as the sand flew around, the many goblins that surrounded them causing up a small sandstorm, keeping themselves hidden from them. Every shot had to count, that was something that he knew was not optional. He looked to his right and saw Tyrion, the Tiger stood tall and ready to strike. He was also the jack of all trades in their trio, something that Sashti admired, but he knew he would also leave them should anyone present him with more coin. Hell, he'd do the same if the coin was offered to him. Tyrion stood with his back against the boulder, arrows flew by him, barely missing him. Sashti turned to his left and looked at Tumalihr, the Ifrit Mage that had also joined them. Sashti didn't think much of him, he seemed fresh in his eyes, something about him seemed off too. Sashti liked to dig into the history of those he traveled with, and Tumalihr was still an enigma. The man barely said anything, and when he did speak it was short, quick sentences.

He took one more peek around the boulder through Tyrion's side and nodded "Very well Gentlemen, I believe the time for hiding behind cover has passed. I will see you both when the sands settle." Sashti began to squat, his legs bending completely as he prepared to jump. He watched as an arrow flew by the side of the boulder and his tongue shot out like thunder, grabbing the arrow mid-flight. He grabbed it as his tongue retracted and nocked it before jumping high in the air and past the boulder's top. He spun in the air and landed on top of the boulder, dodging a few arrows upon landing and send the arrow he had caught flying into the neck of a goblin. He moved down the sloped front of the boulder, sending arrows flying as he moved. Goblins and their mounts fell as his arrows met their mark, yet there were far more misses as the sand kept them covered. A goblin screamed and ran at Sashti, sword held high in the air to strike against him. The Frog placed his bow across his back and sent his tongue flying at the Goblin, catching his hands and taking his sword from him before running forward and running him through.

Sashti looked around and noticed that a group of ten goblins had surrounded him. He smiled and sent the sword flying at one of them, the goblin flying off his mount with the blade deep in his skull. He ran forward and kicked one down before dodging a couple of arrows and slashes, his tongue once more lashed out and grabbed one of the smaller goblins and swung him in a wide circle, knocking the other ones down before sending him flying to the side and against the boulder, knocking him out. His bow made quick work of the four that were down on the floor before a Janoth leaped at him. Sashti ducked down, letting the beast jump by him and then sending one of the blades from the down goblins at it, killing it. There came a warcry and the last four goblins ran at him. Sashti jumped up high once more, his hand nocking an arrow as he flew into the air and releasing as he reached his highest point, taking out one of the globins and hitting with such force that it went straight through to his Janoth as well. He shot one more Goblin down before landing and then picked up a spear and sent it flying, taking one of the goblins off his mount and leaving him impaled in the sand. He broke the mount's neck and looked up at the last of the goblins from the group of ten.

The goblin ran at him, but instead of running with his feet he ran at him in all fours. Sashti barely dodged the goblin as he launched himself at the frog. He barely had time to turn before his face was met with a fist and he stumbled back. The Goblin let out a shrill cry "Now you'll see what Rik can do to ya! Rikabrik ain't afraid of no frog!" Sashti growled before jumping high up, but the goblin was already throwing daggers at him. He barely dodged them before landing and being rushed once more. The Frog moved aside at the last minute and sent his tongue flying out,it flew straight and past the Goblin's shoulder "Ye missed me! Stupid frog!" Rik raised his dagger, ready to cut Sashti's tongue off when a spear pierced through his back. Sashti smiled as he let go of the spear with his tongue and retracted it. The Goblin dropped his dagger and walked forward a few steps "Rikabrik...don't...lose..." Sashti looked at the Goblin and grinned before raising him up by his chest plate, their faces inches from each other "Neither do I, big guy." He cracked the Goblin's neck and took his daggers before turning around and going back into the fight.

[Deleted]

Tumalihr just nodded in reply to Sashti's words. He prepared himself and, once the Frog Man had hopped over the rock outcrop, he pivoted around the side of the boulder and channeled his magic into his right hand. He reached out and launched a crackling bolt of electricity into the area where he thought the enemy was. Whilst he did this, he rotated and rolled to the side, dodging all of the arrows that were fired back at him. As he came back up from the roll, he began to channel more magic into his left fist. He ran towards the dust clouds of enemies, and saw a large group of mounted goblins before him. They were using bows, but one of them yelled something in their guttural tongue, and the rest of the group took up the cry, charging him with swords out. He held out his hand, and once the enemy was but a few meters from him, he released his magic, causing the front row of enemies to catch flame and burn in the raging inferno that he had summoned.

Tumalihr stepped back, and heard steps behind him. Too late, he realized, that there were more enemies behind him, and he would have to deal with them. He turned and narrowly dodged the sword that came at him, before he stepped into the surprised goblins guard and smashing his fist into the little beasts skull, breaking it's neck. He then grabbed the sword from the dead goblin and pivoted again, to face the regrouped group before him. He dodged the first goblin that charged him, and cut him down. He took a few glancing hit's from the rest, and as they turned to charge again, he released his spell, causing the group to go up in a pillar of flame. He looked towards Sashti and saw him cut down another goblin. He nodded in the Frog Man's direction, before turning to face more of the goblin horde.

[Deleted]

Tyrion growled, "We're not getting paid enough to deal with goblins," before he ran out, sword drawn and and held in both hands at his left side. He charged into the brunt of the sandstorm, it didn't bother him, his fur protected him where tender flesh would of felt the sharp sting of flying sand, he had to squint his eyes, but his ears found his prey easy enough. Goblins were noisy, they screamed and jeered and cackled, Tyrion hated that. Through his squinted eyes he found one of those mounted and ran up so he was nearly to the shoulder of the beast, the goblin yelled some unintelligible gibberish, undoubtedly an insult and aimed a heavy mace at Tyrion's head. The mace never reached Tyrion, as he had already been in motion, Tyrion's sword flew up on a diagonal arc and sliced through the Janoth's head and took it clean, the sword continued its deadly arc and cleaved deep into goblin's abdomen, stopped only by its spine.

Tyrion grunted and pulled his sword through heavily and dropped it into neck of a goblin which had charged at him thinking it had an advantage as Tyrion's sword appear stuck. The goblin was cleaved in two from neck to armpit, the weight of the sword did most of the cut, making it a mess and Tyrion was sprayed with Goblin blood which smelled of rotten fish left in the desert. Tyrion let out a fierce roar, which froze nearby goblins in their tracks. Tyrion charged forward and passed through the cloud of sand that had kicked up.

He opened his eyes to find himself surrounded by three mounted goblins, two quickly moved to flank him either side of him, the one in front of held a spear too fine for goblin make and wore a suit of rusted chain mail, marking him as their leader. Tyrion charged forward in a ploy, the goblins on his flanks, thought to have an easy kill with an enemy who had their back exposed. They were too stupid or too confident to charge without making a noise and screamed with eager bloodlust as they charged spears posed to pierce tiger flesh that they'd never taste. Tyrion leapt off the ground, clearing a full ten vertical feet, he twisted powerfully in mid air, as only cats can do, his sword followed and cut across the eyes of both riders blinding them permanently but not killing them, their mounts carried them past.

The victory was short lived as sharp pointed steel into deep into calf, and sliced a painful exit as Tyrion continued his mid-air twist, and landed, his injured collapsing under him and sending him onto his back, his sword yanked from his hands back the impact, he was at the mercy of the goblin leader.

[DukeWolfRein]

Sashti ran at two more goblins, digging the daggers deep into their chests before lashing his tongue out at a mounted one and pulling him towards him, driving a spear into his skull. The Frog looked around and noticed a flash of magic, easily recognizable as Tumalihr. The Ifrit was burning Goblins left and right, driving them back. He nodded at Sashti and kept fighting, which was the first acknowledgement he had received from the Ifrit since they had started their ride into the desert. A group of mounted Goblins came out of the sand cloud from where Sashti could barely see. All this sand was causing his usually moist eyes to dry up and make it difficult to see past a few feet. He had been drawing the Goblins towards him so far, but this group appeared almost out of nowhere.

His bow came up and he let go of three arrows that met their mark before a spear was thrown at him, missing by less than an inch. Sasthi lashed out with his tongue, grabbing the neck of a Janoth and breaking it, causing the Goblin on top to fall to the sand, cursing the Frog. Two more spears flew at him, barely missing as he once more jumped up and examined his options. He was surrounded, and the minute he landed they would be on him once more. His eyes settled on the goblin he had knocked off and he removed the Goblin daggers he had taken earlier. The landing came with such force that the daggers tore through the Goblin's midsection, leaving his guts spilling out of his back as Sashti raised him and dug his hand deep into the corpse, covering it wiht blood and guts. He backed up against the boulder, the other Goblins running at him, he was quick and his writing was sloppy at best but it would do. The sigils were red against the stone as Sashti smiled and brought his hand down on them full force, his voice carrying over the battlefield "Rock Spike!" The Boulder began to glow and finally it exploded into long spikes of differing sizes. The Goblins stopped as the spikes hung on the air. Sashti nodded and extended his hand forward, the Spikes flying at the Goblins and past them, taking out quite a few of them before coming to rest at random points in the sand.

The Frog looked around and noticed the cloud of sand almost gone except for one group that had been missed by the Spikes. Tyrion was over there, but he was on the ground. Sashti ran towards the group, aiming his bow at what seemed to be the leader. The arrow flew but he was too far away to really aim, his eyes could barely see anything but blurry shapes at this distance. He cursed under his breath and hoped that Tumalihr would get to him before the Leader could strike.

[Deleted]

The goblin leader lunged the spear forward aiming to finish off the wounded Tyrion, but was stopped. Knocked from his mount and ngulfed in flames the leader managed only let out a high-pitched squeal as his skin boiled and blistered and his lungs were reduced to ash by the searing heat. Tyrion shielded his face from the intense and sudden heat.

Tyrion looked to see the source of the flames, only to see the Ifrit, Tulamihr, hands aglow with magical energy standing over the now ashen corpse of the fallen leader. Tyrion let out a low growl of dissatisfaction, that Ifrit had come between him and his prey, and though Tyrion was at a disadvantage, he was confident that he’d have been able to kill the goblin before it had the chance to inflict any more damage.

Tyrion stood up and put pressure on his wounded leg, there was a sharp and sudden pain, enough to cause a small bit of recoil, but Tyrion was quick to put pressure on it, the pain came again but this time Tyrion was prepared and assessed the extent of is injury.

He determined it was nothing more than a flesh wound, the goblins aim was poor and the strength behind the blow was lost to it. The wound bled steadily and would need to be addressed as soon as the situation would allow.

Tyrion drew his broad sword, his great sword lay only a few feet away but Tyrion knew better than to try and retrieve it while he was injured and enemies were near.

[DukeWolfRein]

Sashti's tongue polished his eyes, the redness fading slowly as he threw water into them from his canteen. He regained most of his sight and looked around. The Goblin Chief went up in Flames as Tumalihr touched him. Sashti was almost in awe at the amount of punishment the Ifrit had dished out. He saw Tyring regain his footing and take out his broadsword ready for another wave of Goblins. Sashti hopped towards them both and landed between them, his new daggers in his hands as he looked at the remaining Goblins. "Alright Boys, time to finish off these bastards. Shouldn't take too long, it's only 20 or so." The Frog hadn't noticed until now but his eyes had not been the only thing affected by the Goblins and the Sand, a wound adorned his right side in crimson, and another cut spread down his arm. He supposed he hadn't noticed with all the adrenaline of fighting, but now he could feel them.

The Goblins shrieked as they went up in flames from Tumalihr's blasts, but they all came to a stop and faced the three of them. The Tiger to the Left, Tumalihr in the center, and Sashti himself minding the left flank. If there were three individuals that posed a threat to Goblin-kind and anyone that had a hit against them, it was them. On their own they had taken down small batallions of different races, they had destroyed mages and secured many a sacred magical relic. Sashti had once climbed all the way up The Peaks just to wipe out a whole entire Orc Stronghold, just to be able to eat the next day. Tumalihr had once gone against the three most feared Bandit leaders in the Shashallah Desert, coming out victorious and with many riches. Last, but not least, Tyrion had taken on enough Goblin Warbands on his own to make the very saying of his name a curse in the Goblin language of Jikkri. Indeed, on their own they were forces to be reckoned with. Together, they were Death itself.

Sashti watched as the Goblins screeched at them but would not come close. The dust had settled as they had stopped moving, and only 15 stood agains the three of them. Their leader was a charred corpse and their brothers were all scattered about currently being devoured by the Janoths as they were not under the control of their masters any longer. Sashti smiled and let one of his daggers fly, hitting a Goblin off its mount and down to the sand. The others stopped screeching, looked at their fallen brother and up at the Mercenaries.

"Boo"

Screams rose into the air as the remaining of the Warband rode away as fast as they could from the Oasis. The feasting Janoths looked up and ran away as well, following after the Warband, because if there was something a Janoth knew, it was that if Goblins were scared, so were they.

[Deleted]

Tyrion let out a deafening further expediting the flight of the goblins, hunting instinct, adrenaline, and anger told him to go after the goblins, to hunt down and rip out their throats and, had their flesh not tasted as putrid as rotting fish left in the low winters sun for too long, have himself a feast.

Yet reason and the sharp pain in his leg from the drop of adrenaline prevented him from acting. Tyrion first looked for his sword, and found it only by the glint of the brass-handle, the shifting sands had seen to quickly swallowing his discarded sword. Tyrion limped over to where it was, leaving a small trail of blood as his wound continued to bleed, the fur around the wound had already become thoroughly matted, helping to staunch the flow of blood.

Tyrion reached down and drew his sword out of the sand with some care as not to cause any unnecessary abrasion. Dried goblin blood and sand mixed together ran down the length of the blade. Tyrion gave his sword two swift downward chops, which saw the worse of it thrown off. Content but not satisfied, Tyrion returned the blade to the open leather sword sling on his back and made for where they had made camp, intending to patch his and any of his comrades wounds when he got there.

[DukeWolfRein]

Sashti smiled and walked back to where they had set up camp. He couldn't help but chuckle as he saw that the camp itself was untouched by the goblins. He felt the wounds around his body and shrugged, it would be a case of using some simple medicine and everything would be okay. He looked over to Tyrion and nodded his head "Hey, how's the leg?" Before Tyrion could answer, however, there was a shrill cry and a goblin popped out of the sand, a spear held firmly in his hands. Sashti turned and saw as the spear went straight through Tumalihr. The Ifrit aimed his hands as if about to cast a spell, but nothing appeared to come out. The Goblin twisted the Spear and took out his knife, jumping across Tumalihr, the blade meeting with his neck and slicing it before he ran at Sashti and Tyrion.

Sashti took his bow and aimed, this Goblin was far braver than the usual ones. The Frog let the arrow fly and hit the Goblin's shirt, sending him flying against a tree and getting stuck there. Sashti walked towards the tree and grinned "Seems like we have a new companion." The Goblin looked up at the Frog, his look doubtful of whether the Frog was being serious or not. When he realized that he was, he dropped the knife. Sashti nodded "Yup, stick with me and you'll be alright. What do you like?" The Goblin shrugged with a whine. "Food? Gold? Gore?" The Goblin seemed to think it over before nodded at all three. "Then that's what you'll get."

[Deleted]

Tyrion continued to limp towards the oasis, his leg had stopped bleeding for the moment, the dry heat and blowing sand had quickly formed a rough scab over the wound that would need to be washed to prevent infection.

Tyrion approached the waters edge and slowly sat down so that he was parallel with the water on his left. Tyrion quickly dipped his hand into the surprisingly cool water, cupping it as he withdrew he brought the water to his lips and gentle drank the half mouthful that had managed to not leak out from the side of his hand. He repeated this twice more before he twisted his body and cupped both his hands together to get a larger draw of water, this he used to clean his wound.

Lifting his injured leg up, Tyrion placed his cupped hands underneath where the wound was and then lowered it, pressing the leg gently into the water that he still held cupped. The blood and sand easily dissolved and washed away on contact with the water turning it the colour of rust. The bleeding began anew, no longer held back by the dam of dried sand and blood, turning the water from rust to a dark scarlet.

Tyrion slightly winced as a throb of pain came from the bleeding wound. He moved quickly after that, his hands, experienced at treating quickly went through the pouches on his rear, producing a suture needle and medical thread and began. Tyrion quickly strung the needle and began to stitch up the wound which was deeper than he had first analyzed it to be and ran around the inside of his leg, getting shallower towards the exit until it was the cut was no more than a glancing blow in seriousness.

Tyrion growled and winced as his sewed out the wound, but it was quick work, years watching his mother and practice on dummy targets had made his hands well experienced for the task. The pain was not something he was used to, his flesh had barely known the kiss of sharp steel, his body mostly unmarred except for slight scars on his arms from long nights spent training, scars that had almost all be faded away.

Tyrion put away the needle and thread and withdrew a wrapping of gauze, and tied it tightly around the sutures as a way of keeping them clean. Tyrion stood up and put weight on his leg, there was some tenderness as he did, but he was more than able to stand and fight without handicap.

He quickly stretched and cast a fading glance back towards Sashti, enough to see he had pinned a goblin against one of the four palm trees, but not enough to see any meaningful detail.

“Would you hurry up and kill that thing?” Tyrion called back “The caravan is waiting and I am eager to be done with this job and to get some food that isn’t Janoth jerky.”

Tyrion walked towards a particularly high dune towards his upper right, there he knew the caravan would be waiting, sheltered and hidden from the heat and goblins in the shade of it.

[DukeWolfRein]

Sashti laughed as he heard Tyrion call out to him. He grabbed the Goblin by the back of his shirt and carried him over as he walked back towards the Caravan "What shall I name you then? If you even have a name." The Goblin looked up and thought for a moment before nodding vigorously, almost in anger it would seem. "Tharuk!" The Frog let out another chuckle "Of course, Tharuk it is. Just know Tharuk, should you turn on me, I will be forced to finish what was begun today. Now come, I would see us to Food and drink."

As the Frog entered the place where the Caravan stood in camp he let the Goblin down. Tharuk looked around and followed the Frogman closely, almost as if he wanted to turn into the shadow of the beastman himself. Sashti looked to the driver and nodded "The Goblins are gone. I believe our next stop should be Herrtikuk." The Driver nodded and ordered for the rest of the Caravan to begin preparation for the journey ahead. Sashti himself walked towards Tyrion and smiled "I hope you are in better shape when we reach Herrtikuk. Wouldn't want an Orc to take advantage of unfortunate wound and sever your head from your shoulders." Tharuk let out a small chuckled as Sashti walked away from the Tiger. He licked his eyes once more, the desert heat drying them. How he hated the desert.

~~~End of Quest~~~