Demonic Skies *On Hold*

Chapter 6 : Battle Between Giants

"Breiland, cover Marissa," instructed a burly dwarf wrapped in mail and furs to a towering ogre like man.

Breiland nodded and moved to cover a raven haired young woman adorned in white robes. Marissa was the party's thaumaturge. Having left the church, she still retained her connection to the Goddess of the Harvest. This allowed her the use of the holy magic granted by her faith and was a good deterrent to the undead. If she fell here, their party would surely fall shortly after. The small dwarf, Gwandolvir, naturally understood her importance and made to secure her position at the rear. So long as she stood, their chances of surviving dramatically increased.

Aidan continued to observe the party from atop the cliff as he swirled the glass of wine in his hand. "Ah, ah, how boring. Relying on the measly faith of an inexperienced priestess. So boring. Really boring," Aidan complained childishly before downing the rest of his glass.

If the party below could hear his words no doubt all would gladly strangle him. He dared to sit out the situation while eating and did nothing to help. Such a shameless man had never been heard of.

The two vanguards of the group kept most of the undead away with their spears as Marissa began to set up a sanctuary spell. This would create an area that naturally healed their party while simultaneously injuring the undead. Aidan looked with interest as a small undead skeleton charged through in hopes of killing the young priestess. However, he could only click his tongue when the orc bashed it away with his long meat cleaver like blade. As the small skeleton fell to the ground it seemed to turn to sand and was blown away by the wind kicked up by their constant struggle.

Aidan hummed out a tune as he continued to observe the struggles of the party. As a necromancer he felt compelled to cheer for the undead to tear the party life and limb. However, seeing the party had come to this dangerous region obviously unprepared made him want to cheer for them as well. Stuck between the two choices he decided to enjoy the success of both sides. Whoever won, won. Thinking this way he would cheer whenever blood was drawn or bone broke.

After tens of minutes of time the number of undead started to lessen and the party seemed to be on its last bit of strength. Aidan could feel the end was shortly approaching as a final wave of undead burst out of the forest and towards the party. The six fought admirably. Their teamwork was very well done. The dwarf and two vanguards held the front lines as the archer targeted the slower zombies from afar. The priestess continued to supply her spells from the rear while the guard Aidan assumed to be a half-orc continued to protect her. In the end, they had barely managed to hold on to a thin string of life.

One of the vanguards laid on his back as the priestess started on him first. He had taken two arrows and three heavy blows at the end and was hanging on barely to his life. The archer and Breiland began to comb through the undead as they had taken the least amount of damage. They had used up a lot of resources this trip and desperately needed to make up for it by looting the undead.

"Can't believe we made it," said a youthful vanguard as he exhaled exaggeratedly. His mail was littered with so many holes that the lower half had fallen off due to its weight. He wanted to cry over the loss.

The dwarf nodded gravely. "Got lucky. Can't believe we had the misfortune of running into so many undead shortly after that stalker. How's it look?!" Gwandolvir shouted to Breiland who was still combing the undead.

"Armor's shit. Some of the weapons are rusted over too. Got some weapons we can resell to the old man. How's your side look Ranir?" Greiland asked as he looked over at the archer for confirmation.

"The skeleton archer's things look sellable. Leather armor's good as shit. Some daggers and short swords are good. Found some gold on some of the zombies' and skeletons' possessions. Might break even if we're lucky," Ranir said with a heavy sigh.