"Ten."

Impatient as always, Mitra was, alas it was still probably better in this case. Men like these rarely stood down, as evidenced by him loosing an arrow even after being stricken, out numbered, and out matched. Poor wretch, blinded by darkness, his death would be swift, though Jax could not promise it would be painless.

"Wrong choice," the knight informed the archer, as the sudden twist of his axe hand would alert his partner he was ready to strike. With a heavy step to the right, the axe lunged at the man from the side. In this way Jax had offered the left lane of attack to the reaver so that she'd have a clear path to the enemy.

Jahan sat still in the tree, still in unimaginable amounts of pain and losing more and more blood by the second, no matter his best efforts in holding a decent-sized bandange over it. Jahan felt himself getting weaker, probably from the loss of blood, or from a loss of adrenaline from when he shot the first arrow. That felt like a billio- no, a septillion years ago at this point. He watched the girl from earlier and his "savior" do battle with that annoying archer from before. Turns out Herlewin was an archer, too, and apparently, Jahan could learn a thing or two from him, as he saw the arrow pierce right into that annoying archer girl's shoulder. Right after falling on his face, too. Impressive, though, he did get hit immediately after. Jahan almost yelled out in celebration, if it wasn't for the fact that he was kind of supposed to be hiding. And he felt kind of sick. Didn't account for that other pesky archer, wherever THEY were, but can't have EVERYTHING you want, especially when sitting in a tree slowly bleeding out.

Jahan attentively watched the battle from the tree, completely immersed in the action, scared and excited at the same time, when suddenly the yell of a young woman shocked him out of focus.

"Toby? Toby!"

Jahan nearly had a heart attack as he heard the call. Wh-what does she means by T-Toby?! He thought, so scared that he stuttered in his thoughts. W-wait, Toby... these horrible people are after Torbicans... T-o-r-b-i... Remove the R... Replace the I with a Y... HOLY CHEESE CURDS, IT'S A BANDIT SPY LOOKING FOR HIDING TORBICANS TO KILL AND THEY THINK I'M ONE OF THEM, I'M DOOMED! Jahan could tell that the sound was nearby, so he could grab his bow and arrow and just shoot the spy and maybe nobody would notice. But Jahan's mind was too clouded with fear to move, so he just chose to just take what was coming to him. Oh, I should've never been involved with this, master would that this is foolish, I'm sorry master, I'm couldn't get your healing, please forgive me, I'm so sor- Jahan ran through all of the things he wanted to think last before hearing "Don't worry, boy, we will save your village," from the same voice, this time right below the tree. "...Phew" was all Jahan could muster saying in relief. She's going to help me, thank goodness, finally something will go my way as long as I just sit here and wait... Hmm, that's a nice change of pace...

Shunk, shunk. Herlewin hadn’t seen his arrows hit their mark, but he knew the sound of a wooden missile piercing flesh anywhere. Or… at least, he thought he did? He was pretty sure he had heard it a couple times since this nightmare of a morning began, but it was hard to think straight with all the pain-fueled adrenaline running around his system. Anyways, the impor-

Shunk

Oh, there it was again. It sounded a lot closer this time, too. It certainly felt closer. Glancing down, the acrobat saw that his leg wound had been joined presently by an unfashionable piercing in his side. Jolly. Honestly, if that girl wasn’t busy being entirely unphased by his dramatic speeches, she was actively booing his performance by throwing pointy little sticks. Still, she wasn’t the toughest audience member Herlewin had ever met, and he was sure he’d win her over eventually. Or maybe she’d die first. It was hard to tell, and there wasn’t a lot of time to consider the ramifications of either outcome.

Herlewin contented himself with a quick glance behind his shoulder to confirm his enemy’s position before setting an arr- oh. He didn’t have any arrows with him, did he? There was the one stuck in his side, but the acrobat wasn’t going through the pain of plucking it out of himself again: As much as he hated admitting it, he’d probably faint if he tried. It appeared that, once again, the young showman would have to improvise.

Making a dive for the nearby fallen tree branch, Herlewin extracted the grappling hook from the wood as his momentum somersaulted his body along the ground. At the end of his roll, the acrobat set the hook itself to his bowstring and let it loose on a trajectory towards his heckler’s face.

Mitra's brow furrowed as her axe grazed the enemy, leaving a wound much less grievous than she would have liked. She then proceeded to plant her hand over her face as the archer took a shot, missing by an almost unreasonable margin. Jax took the opportunity to spring into action. The reaver barely held back a grin as the knight charged, noticing the subtle avenue he had left for her. On his cue, Mitra dashed past both Jax and the archer, swiftly flanking the enemy. She was quite fond of this maneuver, and was absolutely tickled to have the opportunity to use it twice in one day. As she slipped past the archer, Mitra twisted around, lashing out at his left oblique as she returned to her stance.

Alborz had finished the reaver. He allowed him self a brief moment of as he spoke to himself.
"Why must they fight back? You could've lived." With a sigh Alborz heard a cry of pain. He pulled on Ignavus's reigns and took off towards the sound. He flew overhead taking a quick look before flying back and landing near Herlewin.
I must help this poor archer Alborz thought as he spared a glance to Herlewin.
"Ignavus give us some cover." Ingavus took in a deep breath before exhaling a thick smog around the two. Alborz knew it was simply to buy time but this archer needed some kind of cover or he'd get himself killed.

Barrett sat, huddled up, between the roots of the ancient pine from which the dejected branch laying by his side had fallen. He had made no effort to conceal himself beyond this, but he looked enough the part of an organic growth that neither the female archer nor the boy wonder she was tormenting noticed him. This was good. This was very good. As long as there were no arrows coming his wa- whoa!

Barrett shuffled back with a start, barely muffling his cry of surprise. His eyes widened as the daredevil dope sailed towards him, bloody shaft protruding from his side. Arrows spent, the idiot was still trying save the day by using his cursed grappling hook as a weapon. His grappling hook, sun eclipsed! The kid had guts. And if this circus continued they would soon be staining the pavement.

Fortunately for him, the archer had earned himself a spot in the clergyman’s good graces. He was just so, so… pathetically entertaining. It was comedic gold. And in that moment, that was payment enough for Barrett. He wanted to see this kid live some more. That would make his eventual death all the more hilarious. Healing this one came with the added bonus of ignoring whatever poor sap the princess was blathering on about, so really, win-win-win. What a day. Clearing his throat and waving his staff around aimlessly, he half-whistled, half-mumbled an accompanying rhyme.

Light n’ sun, blessed ones
Wot shield the world from darkness
Hear me plea, comfort me
‘Nd save this wretch’s carca- ghaAaak!

Barrett was blinded and his prayer cut short by the sudden and altogether unexpected appearance of a dark cloud of choking black smoke. Tears filled his eyes as he clutched his staff and buried his face in his cloak, barely able to breath. What machination of these shadow-casting bandits was this? Curse them and their smoke! They could all go jump in a- snort.

A snort?

Then he heard it. The scraping of claws on cobblestone. The unmistakeable flap of giant wings. It was the wyvern. That wyvern. The one that he had seen earlier. It was here, and it was less than ten feet away from him, and there was nothing he could do about it.

His first instinct was to run. But where? In one direction lay a mouthful of swords loyal to those he had been ticking off since morning. A miscalculation on his part, that, he admitted to himself. To either side was conflict, and to go back in the direction they had come was tantamount to suicide if he was running blindly. For all he knew another archer might have circled around to ambush them from behind, using the smoke as cover. The only options were to wait, and to look like a tree. Thankfully, Barrett was good at both those things. He froze.

Several things happened in rapid succession, leaving Helle unsure of the appropriate course of action.

Grappling hook boy didn't seem to know when to stop; despite his injuries, he attempted yet another impressive feat of acrobatics and, somehow, managed to pull it off. In the process, he managed to earn himself yet another arrow wound.

On the more fortunate side, more allies had appeared to combat the other archer--they seemed more competent than the veritable children that had already tried to lend her assistance. With the matter of the other archer in hand, Helle could turn her attention completely to her archer without worry.

Or, well--she would have been able to, except as grappling hook boy shot his grappling hook at the archer, a cloud of thick black smoke billowed out of seemingly nowhere and Helle was blinded. She blinked rapidly to clear the tears blurring her vision, trying not to breathe deeply, and cast around for the source of the obstruction. Her search was fruitless; whoever had created the smoke had obscured themself along with grappling hook boy.

Well, Helle was at a loss. There were too many elements in play here and no communication between any of them. If she tried to strike the archer, she could well be caught in the crossfire when grappling hook boy or whoever had created the smoke tried to attack. She couldn't help but feel frustrated; she'd just come within range and she'd been eager to rid herself of the nuisance that was the archer. Her impulse was to just go for it, ignoring any potential danger, but she had to admit she was perturbed by the sheer amount of chaos on this battlefield.

In the end, her sense of self-preservation and logic won out over her aggravation. Helle remained where she was, still in a ready stance, deciding to get a better grasp on the situation before she made a move.

Mitra felt emboldened by the turn of the tide in their favour. Her spirit soared with the thrill of the battle, her target was in the perfect position. Her breathing slowed as she leapt into the air, deftly spinning her axe as she herself spun to meet her target. Even time seemed to slow as Mitra concentrated on her attack, striking the archer’s oblique swiftly as she landed gracefully. The archer howled in pain, for the wound was quite severe. Blood immediately began to gush from the wound as the archer froze in shock.

That moment of shock was all that Jax needed as he lumbered forward with his own offence. A mighty swing of his axe was all that was needed to leave the archer within an inch of his life.

Jax: 30/42
Mitra: 42/42
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Enemy Archer: 4/41

Mitra – Critical!! 20 damage
Jax - Hit! 11 damage



The grappling hook flew through the air awkwardly, and most unfortunately, it did not hit its mark. Before the enemy could retaliate, however, the shadow of a wyvern flew overhead. The wyvern was a majestic creature, an off-shoot cousin of the more well-known dragons, though those were long extinct. Ignavus, in particular, was a marvelous creature, his amber scales glistening in the sunlight. The colour was not common among wyvern-kind.

On command, Ignavus did as commanded, a thick smog exuding from its maw as it circled the group below and approached the ground. Alborz, Helle, Herlewin, Barrett and the enemy archer were shrouded in darkness as the smog enveloped them. Their vision obscured, they could barely see a few feet in front of themselves. This was fortunate for young Herlewin, as another hit would not have done him any good. Unfortunate for Herlewin however, was that Barrett’s healing had been interrupted.

Taking advantage of the cover, the archer attempted to put some space between herself and her assailants. Of course, because she could not clearly she where she was going, she did not realize that she had walked closer to Alborz and his wyvern.

Herlewin – Miss!
Alborz – Skill: Wyvern Breath Turn 1 of 2
Helle – Skip turn
Barret – Action interrupted
Enemy Archer - Move



Amelia & Jahad skip this one, though Jahad can make note of the wyvern and at the other end of the marketplace.

Herlewin's heart sank as his hook spiraled wildly past its target. He realized only after the fact that, in his desperate attempt to rid the town of a threat to the villagers' safety, he had flung his only hope of escape far out of reach. It really wasn't his morning.

He looked the enemy archer dead in the eye, ready to accept whatever fate her formidably terrible aim could manage to bestow upon him, until a cloud of smoke billowed in from behind and prevented him from seeing much of anything. The loss of vision didn't particularly bother the acrobat (at least in regards to the growing list of "things to be incredibly upset about" that he had accumulated since his skipped breakfast). What really got him worried was the smell. See, Herlewin had - in his younger days - a regrettable few close encounters with wyverns in rival circus acts. They were nasty underfed beasts, and they would snap your hand clean off if it got so much as an inch away from their ravenous mouths. The smell of their breath was all too nauseatingly familiar, and so the young archer quickly added "being eaten alive by a bandit's wyvern" to his impressive collection of painful events to look forward to before lunch time.

That is, until the smog cleared enough for him to see the flying mount's rider, the sight of which - for the first time since he had gotten out of bed - filled Herlewin with a sense of relief. This was the armor of an imperial soldier! The cavalry had arrived, and they would all be saved! Huzzah!

Mustering the strength to speak, the archer asked the knight if "Please Sir Gentleman sir, might I catch a ride?"
He really hoped whoever it was would say yes. It was time to exit stage left.

Mitra did her best to stifle a cackle as the archer's flesh parted before her blade. Jax's own attack landed less than a second later, and their opponent began to look rather pale. The reaver addressed her compatriot.

"I'll finish up here." She said matter-of-factly. "You should get back and help the others."

Mitra wasn't sure how everybody else was faring, but she did know that it would be a waste to focus any more than one combatant on this horribly injured bowman.

This was alright. Everything was going to be alright. Except maybe that archer kid. He was probably going to die. But everything that mattered was going to be alright. This was alright.

Over and over this mantra circled Barrett’s thoughts as he made plans for escape. He winced at every scream and clang of metal, but thankfully the clamour of the encounter next to him seemed to be moving in the other direction. Good. Now if only this cursed smoke would dissipate – Barrett gave a small wave of his hand, hoping to clear the air – then he could get out of thi- gheck!

Smoke in the eyes, smoke in the eyes! Shadows, that hurt! But there was no need to panic. Panic was the thinking man’s enemy. The key was to stay calm, stay calm and take long, deep breaths. Deep breaths were key to maintaining a sharp mind. Deep breaths.

“Sun be darkened!”, he screamed, sputtering and coughing as tears streamed down his face and smoke filled his lungs. He had had it. Curse these bandits, curse the overgrown furnace chicken that had blinded him, curse the rich pests and curse the ground they all walked on! Gah!

...

And there he had it. The solution to every problem now facing him, all thanks to his unparalled mental discipline. Every way was blocked off, yes. Every way but up. So up he would go. The lowest branches of the massive pine were some way from the ground, but he was Barrett Ansgot, guardian spirit of the forest. He knew the ways of trees, how they tended to grow and where the best footholds and grips were most likely to be located. Finding a way up, even without the use of his eyes, would be child’s play.

His hands caressed the bark, urging it to reveal its secrets. Still coughing, and with a stream of constant muttered curses flowing behind him, he tucked his healing staff into his robes and made his way up the giant tree. Deftly, deliberately, spider-like fingers at home in the wooden crevices. With any luck, his hand would soon meet a sturdy branch upon which he could rest safely while he watched the chaos unfold below.

Jax complied with the reaver's order without a word. He didn't want her to hear his suddenly shaky voice, as ashamed as it would be. The sudden extra power that had knocked their foe to the ground was in part due to her. The vicious blows of reavers still haunted him, and it wasn't the first time he'd become spooked by his partner and almost endangered her. But it was not to be dwelled on anymore now than any other time as he was a knight and had a job to do.

The princess would surely hear the clanking platemail and know her ally had arrived, but for the benefit of, who he could only assume was Toby he announced himself anyways, "Miss Amelia, Jax reporting in. If the young master should require assistance, please allow me to help."

The knight braced an elbow against his stomach and held out his hand usually reserved for his axe, making a stepstool to his shield, raised above him for use as a platform. He had done this before as a town guard, and he let the mundaness help to steel himself once more.

Mitra gave Jax a sidelong glance as he wordlessly left to rejoin Amelia, then sighed deeply. When she looked back at the archer, he still hadn't moved to attack yet. Slowly, she raised one of her hatchets to point at the man. And then she surprised herself.

"That wound in your side is deep, but it didn't damage anything important. If you attend to it soon, you might survive. So here's the deal. You can drop your weapons, run away, and live, or you can try to be the first to land a hit on me today. I don't particularly care what you go with, but I'm going to need you to make it quick, so..." Neither the reaver's gaze nor her weapon wavered as she spoke. "You have three seconds to comply."

Alborz looked at the poor archer. He knew the archer was injured but he needed to stop the enemy. Then he got an idea.

"Drink this." He tossed Herlewin one of his tonics from his saddle bags. "It'll dull the pain. I'll make a good distraction but once the smoke clears I need you to get in cover. Take it easy. You've done your best citizen."

Alborz took a deep breath. He prepared himself for the upcoming strike as soon as the smoke cleared he would attack. He tightened his grip on Ignavus's reigns. Ignavus knew the routine his mouth began to water slightly. As soon as he could see the enemy ignavus was to pounce. Usually the enemy would be to surprised to react in time. So there they stood eyes open and wings spread ready to strike. All they needed was a target.

Helle waited for the smoke to clear, hands tight on the hilt of her longsword. Out in the open as it was, the smoke couldn't hang around for too much longer. At least that was what she was telling herself, to resist the urge to go wandering blindly through it and into danger. Standing still while she was still in the middle of a fight made Helle deeply uncomfortable. Sometimes one had to wait for the right moment to strike; Helle could understand that. She would endure trading glancing blows until her enemy was worn out if that was what was necessary. But even in that test of patience, at least she was doing something. Tense with nervous energy, Helle drummed the fingers of one hand against her longsword's hilt and shifted from foot to foot, glancing nervously around the small area that she could see clearly.

Though it was frustrating to be in this position, she could at least take comfort in the fact that her enemy (enemies?) were just as blind as she was. If the archer girl happened to wander into her, Helle would be prepared to take her by surprise. This temporary irritant would pay off in the long run. In the meantime, while she was blinded, Helle could at least keep an ear out to see what she could hear.

What she heard was an unfamiliar voice yell something--she assumed it to be a man's. Judging by his tone, he was just as frustrated by the smoke as she was, and he seemed far enough away that she doubted he'd run into her. That meant there were at least five people in the area: Helle, grappling hook boy, the man who'd just yelled, the archer girl, and whoever had produced the smoke.

Significantly quieter than the man's exclamation, but closer by, Helle recognized grappling hook boy speaking. She couldn't quite catch exactly what he said, but he didn't seem to be in any distress--though Helle wasn't sure if she could make a sound judgment based on that. He had given a strange dramatic speech after getting shot in the leg, after all.

Thankfully whoever he was talking to, who must be the source of the smoke, replied calmly. Helle focused in on the newcomer's voice, and managed to catch the end of his sentence: "You've done your best citizen." She allowed herself to relax slightly. That was two people definitely on her side, one uncertain but probably not a threat anytime soon, and just the archer girl to worry about presently. Referring to grappling hook boy as 'citizen' meant that he was likely a soldier, so Helle was confident that once the smoke cleared the battle would be in hand.

Helle considered whether she should speak up and alert the newcomer to her presence. That would tell archer girl where she was too, but Helle doubted that her aim would be very accurate in the midst of all this smoke. Besides, she'd feel more comfortable if everyone was aware where everyone was--and what was a soldier doing here, anyways?

Cautiously moving in the direction she believed grappling hook boy and the soldier were, Helle called out, "Hey--you're a soldier, right? You made this smoke?" Helle breathed in and immediately regretted it, as she'd only gotten herself a lungful of smoke. She let herself cough once, then continued. "Is anyone else coming? There are a few other people fighting the bandits but any help would be appreciated." She held back from telling him the exact numbers, as she couldn't be sure whether any villagers were fighting back and she wasn't certain whether she could confidently count archer boy and grappling hook boy's various antics as 'fighting the bandits.'