Chương 12: A Pitiful Harbor of Pitiful Souls

LANCE found the harbor with little trouble. He perched himself high in a tree on a hill and incanted [Search]. From his high position, his System returned to him a bounty of information regarding the harbor; he saw the multiple entry points, the unloading stations, he identified the warehouses where goods and slaves were stored, as well as the number of bandits who called the place home. Dozens, but that number was about to be reduced. Moving down closer to the harbor, Lance found a solid tree and climbed it.

He willed his sword to morph into a crossbow. He knew, as per his oath, he should call out to these men and ask for their repentance, but in his heart, he knew how they would answer. He sighed, took aim, and pulled the trigger. BONE liked to toot his own horn. Any of his outlaw compadres who saw him knew right away he was the biggest, toughest, and meanest piece of shit to walk Murder Island. Except for their leader, maybe, but that would always the exception.

But when it came to normal outlaws, like him, no one came close! So, when he was assisting his men unloading the loot from a recent raid, helpfully whipping his men to action, and a man suddenly found himself with a shiny, new bolt between his eyes, Bone saw this as an opportunity. He drank down a defense potion — a 'dandy' as some more civilized people called them — and gripped his dirty, jagged blade.

"Tiss the Paladin we've been hunting!" Bone shouted.

"Take up defensive positions!" Bone did not stick around to take up a defensive position. He knew these men were as good as dead. If he wanted to take on the pansy Paladin, he would need to get the drop on the man. Lucky for him, holy boys rarely fought dirty. Now, he just had to find the holy boy. If he could convince the Paladin's head to take a vacation from its neck, that would earn him quite the payday from bossman. Blessedly, his battleaxe was quite the negotiator!

As he ran throughout the harbor shouting at anyone with a blade to start the search for the Paladin, he heard the screams of his men as their assailant continued to rain down death, a twizzling 'plop' barely audible above the cries of men, was his only forewarning against coming doom. And Bone did not care. He found his 'office,' a place he used exclusively to get to know the opposite sex better and waited out the carnage. Eventually, the Paladin would run out of targets outside.

When that happened, they would move into the harbor complex, and that would be when Bone ended their holier-than-thou life. Twenty-minutes later, his prediction came true — his men dying slowed and then stopped. Bone rushed from his office after downing a number of defensive and offensive potions, not to mention some 'manipulation' potions which would catch anyone off-guard. With his heavy shield in hand and spiked mace in the other, he left his office and presented himself for combat.

If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it. Outside his office, though, was silence. Where was the Paladin? Where were his men, for that matter? Many had been cut down by the Paladin's bolts, sure, but many more should've survived the assault from inside the warehouses. Men who should be gushing out, blades swinging, ready to confront the enemy! Why, he ought to...! Bone called for any survivors to join him outside and confront the enemy.

That was when he smelt smoke. He turned around and saw the building he had just come from on fire. The fire consumed the building quickly. Had he spent even a moment longer in the building, he would have been consumed too! That was when he saw the Paladin... covered in blood from head to toe, so much so, in fact, he couldn't even make out what armor he wore, and with a crossbow in hand, one that, before his very eyes, transformed into a blade, a fear struck through Bone for the first time in years.

"Stay back!" he yelled.

"Or I will knock that pretty little skull away from your pretty little neck!" To his surprise, the Paladin stopped. But only to speak: "Hail vermin! Do you accept the Salvation of Cannabus the Great? If so, then fall to your knees and repent your vile ways, and I will spare your life in exchange for a holy servitude contract!" A servitude contract? Bone knew what those things were — they made you servile in body and mind to a God, and you were forced to live your life in how that God demanded.

No ifs, no but, and certainly no wiggle-room.

"I would rather die!" Bone snarled. It was now or never — he lunged forward and swung his mace. It landed! Wait, had it? One moment, his mace made contact with the shield, then the next, it had glided over the Paladin's shield, as if the Paladin had pulled away at the last possible second.

"Very well! If death is your selection, then allow me to grant it!" The Paladin spoke. Then, in the same second, they moved with superhuman speed, and their blade had... what happened? One minute, Bone had been standing perfectly still, and the next, the world spun; the ground became the sky, the sky the ground. Everything whirled around him until, with a splat, he came to a stop, his headless body in front of him. Seconds later, death.

"Such a shame," LANCE muttered.

"I really thought he would listen to reason. No matter, I suppose. Now he's just another headless corpse." [Quest Complete: Slay Outlawed Entities (Medium): Reward: 1 Mana Grenade] [New Quest: Destroy Harbor] Lance accepted the new quest. He encountered many more bandits, all of whom were cut down by his blade, or shot through their head by his crossbow.

Slaughter such as this was unwelcome to him, but these low lives, these marauders, had long ago given up the right to peace if they were so keen on rejecting salvation. As he made his way through the harbor complex, Lance burned down every warehouse he encountered, though not before checking and freeing the spaces of captured folk turned slaves. And not before liberating many a bandit's head from their body. That was incidental, of course.

With only one building left to clear, it had looked like his campaign against the harbor was going to be a rousing success. That was when it, in the form of a massive spout of water, came crashing down on him. He whipped around in time to see a massive, multi-armed beast emerge from the sea, its many limbs shattering the many small one-or two-man boats while roaring murder at him. [New Quest: Kill Kraken]