[NeoRealm] Chapter 26 - To the Docks? (Patreon)

After the group accepts his quest Ross nods, “Good, now get out of here. The quicker you leave the less they will be able to prepare for you.” As he is say this, he isn’t just sitting at his desk though. He stands up and walks towards the door and his voice goes quieter the closer he gets to it. Then he yanks the door open. To everyone’s pleasant surprise the young man is actually still standing at attention a small distance away from the door. Ross turns back to the group, “Well looks like you might have a bit of time to get there ahead of them. You might want to run though, it’s a distance to the dock.” and with a wink and nod he shows them out.

Taking his advice our team decides to make haste so a short goodbye and they are off. As they rush through the streets, their enemies seem to have given up on stealth. Everywhere they pass either loud whistles or occasionally flares of magic pop up.

It doesn’t take long before small groups of thugs try to block their path. Avoiding them won’t be an option this time. They do run past the first group but the next has started to block the road. Luckily this is distracting them a bit. Rosha picks up a bit of speed while drawing her daggers. As the elf closest to them looks up she slams her back into him before slipping past him with a duck and a spin. The elf stands there for a moment before falling over. A tendon in his leg cut. With that James is able to run through the gap while Jason just vaults the blockade.

Next group though isn’t going down that easy. The blockades are set and five thugs are at ready. At the forefront a dwarf stands in a piecemeal set of iron armor. To his sides a couple of elven mages are at ready. Finally off to one side barely in the shadows are a couple of small men that might be some form of kin. They seem ready for some sort of set piece fight. Not wanting to give them that the group just charges straight in.

Jason in front this time, leading with a flying kick at one of the elves. A glowing bubble pops up around the elf in time. The bubble shatters but it stopped his kick long enough to let the elf dodge, or that was the plan but James’s whip sword comes in catching his leg. With the elf now on the floor and out of the way Jason continues over him. Then he uses the barricade to jump at the other elf, completely ignoring the dwarf. Not expecting a kick to the back of the head the other elf isn’t able to dodge and gets knocked out.

While this is happening Rosha takes the time to ready her bow and aim it at the two in the shadows. Not wanting to be sitting ducks the two scatter. With a smirk Rosha quickly swings her bow around and takes a shot at the dwarf instead. While the arrow does just clink off his helm the dwarf closes his eyes in reaction. This gives James a chance to get into melee range. His whip sword retracting back in time for him to take a swing.

The conscious elf takes this time to cast a spell from the ground. An array of glass shards shimmer into existences before streaming towards Rosha forcing her to duck and roll. Still as she comes up to her feet her back is covered in slashes which start to bleed. Using the momentum from the roll she continues forward while taking out a dagger. With a quick action she attaches the single dagger onto the bow before whipping it around taking a slash at the elf. As the blade approaches the downed elf, he tries to crawl backward to avoid it. However Rosha does something and the string releases from her end and the dagger whips forward. This unexpected speed lets her slash the elf’s neck. Following through she continues to swing the now spear around and once it is pointing at the dwarf grabs it with her other hand and thrusts.

Jason on the other side has finished off the downed elf and is about to join her in the attack. However from the shadows the two men from the other side jump out at him. Jason had already committed to attacking and is unable to stop at this point. Just in time though he swings his arm around and slams it into both of the short swords that are coming at him.

*-7* *-6*

Massive damage numbers pop up over his head but the blades are stopped by his bones. Using the force Jason rolls backward away from the fight. With this Rosha is able to take over tanking the dwarf while James blocks the two men.

Jason luckily didn’t need the potions during their boss fight. Pulling one out he pops the cork and downs the whole thing.

*+12*

It manages to bring him almost back to full. No longer taking this fight lightly Jason approaches the dwarf. Rosha is holding him back with her spear when he gets there. Not stopping at all or fearing the dwarfs sword and board he wades right in. The dwarf stabs at him but Jason will have none of it. He just grabs the sword.

*-3*

With his other hand he wrenches the shield to the side and kicks the dwarf in the face. As his head snaps back Jason thrusts, a knife hand strike right into the exposed throat. While not killing the dwarf it takes him out of the fight. When the two remaining guys see their last teammate fall they quickly disengage James and fade into the shadows. With nothing blocking them the group doesn’t even wait for the victory screen before they start running again. As they rush off Jason’s hand stops bleeding.

*+1*

The group is almost halfway to the docks. They hadn’t seen any other groups though a few abandoned barricades means a big battle is likely ahead. At least that is what their enemies had planned. Likely would have worked too if the groups target was the docks. They can see a big group not to far ahead but the thugs can only be disappointed. The group slows to a walk and with a calm wave our group turns into the Church of Truth.

 Things I wanted to mention but didn’t:

One of the two men was a ratkin but the other was a halfling. In this world halflings aren’t just hobbit reskins which is what they originally where (or at least they were after D&D was forced to rename them because of a lawsuit over calling them hobbits directly). They were originally human sized shadow elementals. After getting caught in the normal world they slowly condensed into a more mortal form. Of all the elements the shadow is one of the farthest from mortal (what with how shadows aren’t actually a real thing but rather the lack of light so it takes magic to make real). This caused a bit of shrinkage to happen and by the time they were fully mortal they ended up like someone took a human and scaled them down. Though they do keep some of their shadowy abilities.