Sword of Justice Part 11

So, in order to preserve my wrist I cut down to 5k words today.  I'm going to try 10k again tomorrow and see how it feels but I'm not confident.  Still, 5k a day is much better than my usual 2k so this is a vast improvement.  

Chapter 40: The Assault

I started down the street quickly as Justice started updating where all the guards were.  They were patrolling and occasionally one would look inside the wall but it was rare.  Of course, there were over one hundred of us so we had to be more than a bit careful.

The main road lead directly to the back of the keep and we started moving as soon as the long orc patrolling that section had walked out of sight.  I could have snuck to the keep by myself, but Justice’s ability to see around corners made it possible to bring the group with me.

There was only one point where we had to hide everyone, and that sucked as much as anyone expected it would.  A guard walked the other side of the wall and occasionally looked down the road.  Everyone ducked into alleys and behind carts, and from his angle and threw were not enough hiding spots for everyone.

I had my bow at the ready and waited as he glanced down the road, and waited a bit longer as the orc continued walking.

“He did not see us,” said Justice.

I relaxed, I was looking at the orc.  Justice was using a radar map and I didn’t fully understand how much detail he was getting, or what details he was looking for.  I suspected it was a combination of the lack of obvious signs of notice combined with a steady walking pace.  In any case I signaled and we continued moving.

The first hurdle was the change over from the street to the back of the keep.  While the orcs had been incompetent about their town building, they weren’t laughably so.  There was a gap between the walls and the nearest building, and that meant there was no cover.  Further, everyone was in armor and we were now close enough that just running across the space would alert someone.

The best scouts followed me over to the back fo the keep on my mark.  We snuck across the open patch when Justice gave me the okay.  The door was stout wood, with a small eye hole cut into it.  The kind that flipped back to allow a guard to see out without giving any degree of access.  The door, of course, was locked.

“Alright, what now,” whispered Joe when we got to the door.  That was easy.  I knocked.

The guard walked over to the door and opened the eyeslit.  When he did that I activated magical strike and jammed Justice all the way into the wood before dragging it across to the lock.  Nothing there was magical, and the lock separated just like any other metal against a magical strike, mind you pulling through hard wood required me to burn power and it was like pulling through clay.

I pushed the door open and stepped over the dismembered guard.  Justice did about as much damage as you could have possibly expected, and the guard had actually fallen into three parts because one of his arms was hanging down when I started cutting.

The second squad came over, then the third.

I nodded and Joe and the rangers moved over towards the armory while the armored troopers started towards the officer rooms.  I didn’t know what kind of security existed internally, but I knew our hidden assault couldn’t last too much longer.

They spotted the fifth group of soldiers.  Seven of them made it through the door when an arrow slammed into the shoulder of the eight’s man.  The heavy arrow shattered the bone and killed the man instantly.

The orc that shot him didn’t live long enough to do much though because one of our archers got him, and they began hunting the other orcs on the wall as everything started all at once.

The part of the assault force that didn’t make it dispersed as they were being funneled into one entrance which made for a shooting gallery.  I instantly started running deeper into the keep, turning the corner I spotted several confused orcs moving towards the armory so I started cutting through them.  They were unarmed and unarmored, and the attack was a slaughter.  I looked down the hallway where door after door was being kicked open exposing empty rooms.

“They aren’t here,” said Mitch looking around.

“Hit the barracks,” I said, and the soldiers responded rushing past me into the barracks.  Instantly the sound of battle filled my ears, but where were the officers.  I started moving down the fortress looking for targets when I spotted three humans cowering in the corner of the kitchen.

“Where are the officers,” I asked, but none of them responded.  I was about to get more forceful, when I noticed a tray piled with food and several flaggons of ale.  The door to the great hall opened up as a large orc stepped out and spotted me.

I slashed at him, and he moved back with supernatural speed so I burned dexterity.  Chasing after him, I was faster and drove Justice into his chest, twisting the blade as I yanked it back.  The orc tumbled back, dead, right in front of every officer in the fortress, and the massive orc that must certainly be Cogro.

“What is the meaning of this,” yelled the massive orc.  He was massive, far larger than any of the other orcs I’d seen, both in height and in weight.  He was a massive muscular ball of an orc who was easily pushing eight hundred pounds.

“Your time is done, foul orc,” I declared.  “For Justice has come for you.”

The orcs stared at each other for a moment and started laughing.  This lasted for several seconds until the main door to the hall opened up and a bloody orc stumbled in.

“Uprising.”

The orcs stopped laughing.

“Justice and friends.”

The officers started heading for three different doors, so I only happened to be in the way of a third of them.  The first orc ran in and attempted to tackle me, I sidestepped and applied Justice to the back of his unarmored skull.  His head went flying off.  The orc behind him stopped and stepped aside as another orc barreled through.

He was large and holding a large fire poker like a sword.  He swung at me and I struck the rod dead on, cleaving through it and his arm.  The orc screamed and I slammed Justice into his face.

“They are breaking out into the hallways, I suspect they are trying to get to their weapons,” said Justice.

“Are any of them armed,” I asked.

“They have different definitions of that term,” said Justice.

Just then an orc ran into the room wielding two knives.  The knives were virtually short swords by human standard and I chopped justice down hard towards his head.  I’d done that trick too many times and he used both blades to deflect the attack, driving me back as he continued pushing forward.

He slashed at me, driving one of the short blades into my midsection where the armor plate grated against it.  I brought Justice’s pomel down on his arm, then smashed him in the face with both of my armored fists.  That earned me a gap and I slashed only to have him dodge back with supernatural speed directly into the orc behind him.  He grunted as a long knife tore into his back, but not for long because I brought Justice down on his chest in brutal slash.

I cut his heart in half, and then pulled Justice back and burned power before thrusting the sword through the dead orc and the orc behind him.  I missed that orc’s heart though and he bellowed as I twisted the blade and yanked it free.

There were four more orcs outside the kitchen and two glanced at each other before running towards another exit.  The other two prepared for battle as I held my sword at the ready.

“There are three orcs cutting around the hallway towards the kitchen,” said Justice.  He couldn’t see through walls, but he could see around corners.  I stepped back and then cut back into the hallway where the bedlam was happening.

The orc officers hadn’t known what to expect, or that there would be human skill users.  When they started running into the halls the first few had become pin cushions as the scouts protecting the armory opened up as they ran towards the weapons.  They got several before the orcs disengaged.

The group running down the hallway towards the officer’s quarters found themselves totally unhindered, but when they made it to their rooms many of them found their weapons missing and their armor damaged.

Not all, unfortunately and as I turned the corner an officer wielding a massive greatsword spotted me and charged.

“Situational awareness,” said Justice and I glanced around then stepped back on pace behind a doorframe.   The orc changed towards me with his sword in front of him like a lance.  I burned power and deflected the strike and as the orc tried to pull the long blade back for defense it smacked into the doorframe.

I cleaved him in two, causing the sword to vanish.

Then I sidestepped as an arrow just missed me.  I threw the door shut before a second arrow buried itself in the door.  “They have bows!”

“We know,” yelled Joe from nearby.  “We can’t hold here.”  Everything went to hell so quick, all because orcs were playing cards.

“Get ready to pull back, Mitch is cut off,” I said.

“He’s still in the barracks, he’s not going to make it,” said Joe, and the six scouts still with him.  “And if we dont’ leave soon, neither will we.”

“Then pull back, if you go now there is a clear path to the back door.  I’m a knight, I have to at least try to save those men,” I said.  Joe looked at me and saluted.  He gestured and the scouts started pulling back to the rear door.

“We at least left them a surprise,” he said as he left.

“That was crytpically useless,” said Justice.

“Won’t matter,” I said throwing open the door and burning stamina to dodge the arrow that followed.  I ran towards the orc, at one point running up a wall before getting close enough to strike only for the orc to roll forward as he burned his own skill and loosed an arrow at me.

It smashed into my plate at close range but the shot wasn’t squre and the arrow simply gouged the side of my armor badly.

I surged forwards, swinging in sharp, powerful arcs in an effort to catch the orc as he dodged around.  I didn’t hit him, but once I caught his bow causing the string to snap.  The orc flung the bow at me before drawing two daggers.  I stepped towards him and three more armred orcs, one of which had a shield, turned the corner.

Emboldened the dagger wielding orc charged and I burned anotehr dexterity, dodging around him while slashing with my sword.  We both hit each other, my armor deflecting the strike effortlessly while Justice carved a line across his shoulder.

The orc winced, one arm useless, and I ignored him to continue running down the hall away from the other three orcs.  The barracks was close and I turned the corner to see five orcs trying to push into one of the entrances.

“There are two doorways into the barracks,” said Justice.  “Both are under attack by orcs.”

“There were three in the other keep,” I said.

“This keep is only nearly identical, that doorway by the fireplace is not present,” said Justice.  I wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing.

“Human,” bellowed Corgo, surrounded by orcs, “I will destroy you!”  The barracks had two doorways leading right into the mail entryway of the keep.  Corgo wasn’t so big he couldn’t fit through doors, but he wasn’t going to be rolling his way after me either.

“Not right now,” I said.  Maybe if he was alone I’d risk it, but here I wasn’t willing to make the effort mainly because I’d certainly die.

I burned two points of stamina, activating dex and power, then slammed into the rear of the group of orcs attacking the door.  One moment they were almost successful in pushing their way in, the next I killed two of them outright, wounded another and actually ran over the orc in the lead, who was promptly stabbed in the back of the neck where he fell by one of the human infantry.

Then we were sealed in as more orcs wielding more weapons came to the doorways.

“How bad,” I asked.

“Half the men are wounded, and the orcs are stalling us now while they get their armor on, when they get ten armored orcs to those doors we are going to fold almost instantly,” said Mitch, who was also wounded.

We were carrying hard based on the element of surprise, now that the orcs were getting back on balance we weren’t having nearly as much luck.  We needed to get out of here or get reinforcements.

Mitch thought for a second, “Can you cut through the rock?”

“No, even with magical strike solid rock is still over my skill,” I said comparing the heavy stones to the boulder I practiced Magical Strike on.  I could eventually chip through it, but it would be a process of hours and for stones as thick as these.  Assuming all the stones were the same thickness?

“Justice did you map the walls around here,” I asked.

“No, not in sufficient detail,” said the sword.  I walked over next to the fireplace and drove justice into the mortar twice, both strikes were solid thunks against stone.  The door was not here.  More details emerged on the map.

“Anything,” I said and I continued to drive the tip into the wall as I started walking around the room.  The fourth strike sounded wrong.

“This is thinner,” said Justice, showing me rocks covering a hole in the wall on the map.  Instead of a series of natural rocks cut into bricks, they were only a double stacked layer of bricks over a hole of some sort.

“Stairs down,” I asked.

“If we are lucky,” said Justice.

I drove my shoulder into the wall twice, and it did not budge.  “No half measures,” I said stepping back several steps before burning power.  I slammed into the wall as hard as I possibly could, causing a massive pattern of cracks to form that were vaguely shaped like a man.  Justice healed me and I stood up, preparing for another charge.

Then several of the injured soldiers reached the wall and started striking at it with hammers, maces and whatever else they had.  One smashed a spot with a hammer and a torso sized chunk of brick vanished into the darkness.

That was out way out, and unfortunately the orcs realized that instantly.  They went from making some rather low level attacks against the defenders at the doorways to a full court press to get out.

I started helping to cover one door, and Mitch and three other men started covering the other.

“Pulling out is going to be rough,” I yelled as the rest of the unit fled down the stairs into the darkness,” I yelled.

“I’m not trying to pull out, I’m covering the door so my men can get away,” replied Mitch.  “It has been an honor.”

I glanced back at the four men with me guarding the other door and realized they weren’t fast enough.  I could get away, if I was lucky, but there was no way they were going to get away.

“It is dark down there, lead them out,” yelled Mitch.

I felt cold, and one of the soldiers with Mitch went down.  He burned power and killed the orc but just then a fully armored orc stepped up to take his place.  There was a symbol of a boar on his chest and Mitch tried to hold him back.

The orc brough a massive ax down, cleaving the soldier in two and that door fell.

So did my door, they just broke and maybe I did do.  We all ran for the staircase down at the same moment as orcs poured into the room, many of them were armored.  I made it down the stairs, no one else did.

One of the orcs followed me down, tripping on the human sized stairs.  He tumbled down until he smashed to the bottom.  I followed him down driving justice into his moaning body.  Then it was dark, and quiet.

“Get torches,” yelled an orc in perfect profile.  I summoned my bow.

One returned with a lamp taken from the barracks, so I shot him.  The full powered orc arrow slammed into his side and he dropped the lamp where it shattered.  I shot another orc as he tried to figure out what was going on.

A lanky orc with his bow drawn moved to the top of the stairs, but it was pitch black down here.  I shot him in the eye while burning dex.  Then I shot the guy next to him in the knee, causing him to fall down the stairs.  Then the orcs pulled back.

As I stepped away a lantern exploded at the base of the stairs and the wounded orc started streaming as the fire leapt over him.  I found the remains of the assault force in the next room, of the thirty seven soldiers that began the attack in the barracks, only twenty three were still alive and all of them were wounded.

Joe’s scouts lost four, so we’d lost eighteen people so far just in the damn fort.  Someone laughed.

“What’s so funny,” I asked as someone found and lit a torch.  All of the men were smiling.

“We must have killed fifty orcs, any fight where they lose more than us is a good fight,” said one of the soldiers.

“Was this a good fight,” I thought finding a door and slamming it shut.  There was no bar, but there were shelves so I threw several of those behind the door, jamming it shut.

“We killed more of them than they killed of us, and the bulk of our forces remain intact.  This was a good battle indeed,” said Justice.

I looked at the wounded, and realized I recognzied more than a few of these men from marching.  It didn’t feel good.

Chapter 41: The Dungeon

The underground dungeon motif was overstated.  It was damp, it was dark, and it was cold down here.  Also there were a dozen or so orcs who had braved the trip down the stairs and were busily pounding on hastily braced doorway.

“Our options are limited,” stated Justice.  “We can have a brave final battle where the enemy comes and slays us and our men!”

“Or,” I began.

“Live and fight another day,” stated the sword.

“So, we should go,” I said illuminating Justice and looking around.  With scan I knew where were were approximately, it was just that the other keep didnt’ have a basement.  It was frankly kind of odd this place did, but what the orcs were using as a barracks may not have been initially intended for that purpose.

In any case we walked into another room and blocked and braced that door too.  Except it was made of iron, and it looked durable.  I tapped it with Justice.

“The rust makes it strong,” I said.

“If you say so,” said one of the soldiers and we continued deeper into the dungeon.  We weren’t into the bad part yet, you know where the torture cells and all that nonsense was.  We were in the long, shifty passages section which didn’t make a whole lot of sense but was still there.

“This could have been used for storage,” I offered as we passed another chamber.  We were moving downhill at a slight angle and the ground was getting progressively more moist.  The wounded soldiers were able to keep up, though a few were being carried along by their less injured friends.

The orcs were to the metal door now, and were beating upon it savagely.  There must be another way down here, but the place was obviously several stages beyond underused.  There were enough spider webs here to fill a halloween store though, and at least they hat that going for them.

We continued through two more doorways, shutting both behind us and blocking both doors with whatever I could find.  Justice continued scanning and eventually we found something.

“That’s a huge door,” I said walking over to the reinforced iron monstrosity.  I banged on it with Justice once.

“I don’t see anything behind it,” said the sword.

There were three massive rusted bars holding the door in place and I ended up borrowing a large orcish warhammer to strike at them before knocking them loose in a shower of rust.  After that it was just a matter of pulling the door practically off of the hinges.

“There is a passage out,” said Justice.  I looked at it and spotted a passage that had been cut through the side with water.  I dipped Justice in and found that it was straight shot to a pond about two miles distant.

“Can I collapse this safely,” I asked looking at the passage.

“Not from inside,” replied the sword.

“Alright, you have done enough.  Get out of here and regroup back at the river.  I’ll get back to the fight,” I said.  A few of the men hesitated and I shook my head.  “You are all wounded, you fought enough, you will recover to fight again.  The battle for Justice is eternal!”

They started down the passage, I didn’t see any pools where the Keep Aways liked to lurk so hopefully they would be safe.  That only left me trying to find a way back into the keep that didn’t involve running through dozens of orcs.

As soon as they were a suitable distance away, I used justice and power to collapse the entrance to the tunnel.

“Any structural damage,’ I asked.

“Not enough,” replied Justice and I found the nearest wall and leaned up against it before sliding to the ground.

“That was close,” I said.

“Yes, but you were successful.  The faster you get back to the army the better,” said Justice.

“Mitch died, they all died so that their people could escape,” I said.

“What did you think this was?  Their people are oppressed under the heel of those orcs, they want freedom and are willing to die for it,” said Justice.  “Are you not going to value their sacrifice?”

I stood up, “No, let’s go kill some orcs.  How did we do?”

“You have achieved level five, and are up to twenty in multiple statistics,” said Justice.

You are a level five Magical Sword Squire

Strength: 20 (+1) | Endurance: 18 (+1) | Agility: 20 (+1) | Reason: 15 (+1) | Logic: 14 (+1) | Willpower: 20 (+2)

Mana: 2* | Stamina 5

Skills: Dexterity (rank 6), Power (rank 5), Conditioning (Rank 5).  Utility skills: Smithing (rank 5), Salvaging (rank 3), 3 available.  Magical skills: Capacity (Rank 2) Battery (Rank 1)

Power, Initiate rank 5: Your strikes will be 50% more powerful, additionally you can spend stamina to briefly increase your weapon strikes impact by 90%.  You can exhaust one Stamina to increase your strike’s damage by 140% for 15 seconds.

Dexterity, Initiate rank 6: You are 60% more mobile, you can burn one stamina to briefly increase your mobility by 100%.   You can exhaust one stamina to heighten your ability to move by 1000% against one attack.

Conditioning, Initiate rank 5: You tire 50% less.  You recover your first point of stamina in 12.0 seconds.

Magical Skills

Capacity rank 2: You can learn one additional spell.

Battery rank 1: You can access the second tier of mana.

“What does that mean,” I asked.

“Twenty is the first tier of a superhuman characteristic,” said Justice.  “You are stronger and more agile than a human can biologically manage.”

I did a backflip, not because it was hard but because I couldn’t do one on Earth.  The trick was simple, uncomplicated.  No special practice required.  I realized I was superhuman, it was just I was fighting against orcs and they were stronger still.  When everyone is superhuman, no one was.  At least this might give me an advantage that I wouldn’t always be on the losing end of contests of strength.

“What about willpower,” I asked, trying to determine what that meant.

“If you focus on something, you can drive yourself to complete it,” said Justice.  I realized that was pretty much what I had been doing to get to the potion trainer.  I would have to be careful with that, if I focused on the wrong thing I might be blinded to everything else.

“You have also gained skill slots, one for magical skills and one for physical skills,” said Justcie.

“Swords,” I said for the physical skill.  I immediately felt it unlock and unconsciously realized I was holding my sword slightly wrong.  That was going to be helpful.

“For magical skills, you have increased battery to rank one,” said Justice.

“That was easier than I expected,” I said, checking out my mana.  The rings were now orbiting and rotating properly.

“With your heightened willpower, the actual challenge in manipulating your mana decreased significantly,” said Justice.

“So if I just waited, I wouldn’t have had mind blowing headaches for days,” I asked.

“You would have died,” said Justice.

No arguing that.

“Will I gain skill ranks faster,” I asked standing back up.

“Yess, your higher stats will allow your skill ranks in the relevant skills to increase more quickly.  Obviously power is strength based and dexterity is agility based, so your heightened skills will increase their development significantly.  Capacity is reason based, so that will still develop more slowly, but battery is willpower based.”

“I could handle that,” I said, stretching out.  I felt almost amazing, if I hadn’t been so badly beat up I might even think I felt good.  I checked my mana pool.  “Am I recovering faster?”

“You will now recover Mana every 30 minutes instead of every hour,” said Justice.  I spent a point and cast magical armor causing the dents and dings in my armor to buff out instantly, that included several points where the metal was digging into my flesh.

“Stamina,” I asked and Justice brought up Coordination.

“You have several choices, but I will show you the best two based on your fighting style,” said Justice.  “You can choose to commit a point of stamina to an ability that allows you to keep it active until you release the point, or you can take a second slot for quick recovering points.”

Swords, Initiate rank 1: Your strikes will be 10% more powerful, you can parry 10% faster and against 10% stronger strikes.  You can burn a point of stamina to double these effects for 15 seconds.

“Could I use that on power or dexterity,” I asked, considering the commitment.

“Just power, your dexterity ability is an instant reaction,” said Justice.

“Why would I need two points of fast recovery,” I asked.  Right now my first point of stamina recovered in 12 seconds and all other points recovered in 27 seconds.  This encouraged me to only use one point per twelve seconds to maximize results but there had been several times where I’d had to use more in a hurry.  It would be nice to clear those out faster.

“Sword Skill usually requires two stamina, some require more,” said Justice.  “If you use those you will have to wait until both points recover until you can use either again, and since you are using more than one you will have to wait the full timer on both.”

“But I don’t know any sword skills,” I said.

“Yet,” replied Justice.  “You will not earn those until your Swords skill reaches rank 5.”

That made the choice simple.  I allowed myself to commit a point of stamina and then used that power on Swords.  Nothing happened.

“Committed powers function as if they were two ranks lower,” said Justice.

“That was worthless,” I muttered.

“You will be treated as if you were using the skill constantly, this will allow it to level up more quickly rapidly offsetting the penalty,” said Justice.

“Assuming I survive,” I grumbled and looked around.  “There were other passages out of here?”

“Yes,” said the sword and I started following him.  I wasn’t thrilled about being low key tricked, but since my best weapon was a sword I was willing to play the long game.  After all, I could only imagine how effective Justice would be if I used a sword skill.

Chapter 42: Which witch is which?

I returned to the dungeon and began searching around for another path back to the courtyard.  Clearly there had to be one and clearly I had to find it.  I brought up the map and checked.  The dungeon clearly stopped just underneath the keep, which in turn was built into mostly solid rock except for that single passage which must have been some sort of an escape route.

There probably weren’t any passages that lead back up to the courtyard, but there might have been some passages that lead up to points in the wall.  Outside of the keep, the walls were mostly solid according to Zahir.  Mostly solid was not entirely solid, however.  I would find something.

“I think I hear something,” said Justice as I turned a corner and then immediately went to the wall.  There was a faint cackling in the distance.

“That sounds like people,” I said, banishing my armor back into storage.  It was impossible to sneak around in plate armor.  I crept over to the side of a room and slid Justice around the corner.  While he could see around corners, actually exposing the blade to the room gave a far more detailed map.

There were eight orcs in the room around a massive cauldron.  They were clearly trying to figure something out and failing miserably at it.  I looked at the minimap trying to figure it out and also failed miserably.

“I have no idea what they are doing, it may be a magical ritual,” said Justice.

Seeing as there was a place to hide, I crept into the room and bunkered down while the orc females stood around the cauldron.  Purple lights flowed out of the alchemical mixture contained therein, and the room became positively chilly.  A half dozen orc females wearing hardly any clothing were dancing in the background next to several large fires, and I could see three caged humans next to them.

A lone orc walked to the top of the platform, on her head was a wolf’s skull with feathers adorned through it as well as a black leather cape strewn with feathers.  The vile warlock orc held out her hands.  In one she dropped a handful of leaves into the cauldron and in the other was a staff made up with skulls of various small animals.  As the pedals fell, she began chanting in demonic.

“In the land of darkness, I call to  you, to grant the recipient of this ritual your maniacal powers, so that they may be uplifted and granted the powers of darkness, that they will recipient!”

She stood tall for a long moment, arms outstretched, then glanced around.

“I think you mispronounced it,” said a second orc reading a book.

“I’m certain I did it right,” she said walking over to the book, “See right there, <maniacal>”

“I’m pretty sure that is <magical>,” said the second orc.  “You’ve got to stress the g.”  The first orc looked at it for a long moment before exhaling.

“Seriously, I think we did the whole ritual wrong,” she said.

“Is that why Cogro got so fat,” asked a younger orc female who was dancing in the background.

“Yes Klortny, I’m sure it was that I mispronounced the demonic language and turned him fat, not that you were dancing a fertility ritual.”

“You said dance, I didn’t go to finishing school for demonic ritual dancing, I went to learn how to dance seductively,” said the orc, stomping her foot down and pouting.  “Why are we even doing this again, Cretta?”

Cretta was the ornately dressed orc, and she took off the headdress and then distastefully at her ghastly staff.  She left both on the table.

“Because if we complete the ritual, it will cleans the blood of the curse, and we can have normal children again,” said Cretta.

“We can try harder,” said one of the orc dancers, “Kiladet, what does a demonic dance look like, we just got those new books from the warlock?”

“I’ve skimmed a dozen of them, I think Kilva might have kept the actually valuable ones,” said Kiladet from her position on the table.  “I don’t see anything that fixes the ritual, just more ways to introduce errors.”

“This insane, there has to be another way,” said one of the younger orcs, who was still shaking her hips seductively.

Cretta shook her head, “We’ve been trying to fix this for years now.  We wouldn’t be doing demonic magic if there was another way.”

“My mother said it was because all of us are related to the chief,” said another.

“That’s just stupid,” said Kiladet, “Everyone knows the strongest blood comes from the chief’s own loins.”

“That’s not blood.”

“Shut it,” yelled Kiladet.  “All of this talk of inbreeding and genetic diversity is just new age nonsense.  We need to go back to traditional orc values and those will fix this problem!”

“We are summoning a demon,” said Klortny.

“Look, if you know a better way to get natural, healthy babies, I’m all ears,” said Cretta.  “But if you knew, you should have mentioned that about a week ago before Cogro got annoyed.”

“Was there a commotion upstairs,” asked one of the orcs.

“Probably, someone came down but I sent him away,” said Cretta.  “Seriously, if it doesn’t have to do with baby making I don’t see what the point of them even talking to us is?”

“Males are vexing but they do have a singular purpose,” said Kiladet.

“Speaking of the singular purpose, is Cogro’s purpose going to fix itself anytime soon, because it kind of went back inside his body when he expanded,” said Klortny.

“No amount of coaxing,” asked Cretta.

“There are five of us dressed in fertility dancing costumes, his favorite, and yet we are here doing this stupid nonsense,” said Klortny.

Kiladet’s head fell forward into a book, “I regret every day that I learned to read.”

“What male finds reading an attractive quality in a mate,” said Cretta.  “My mother convinced me it would be so I could manage lesson plans for my children.”

All the orcs stood for a moment looking around the room.  The fire under the cauldron was sputtering.

“Are we sure sacrificing the skill trainers is going to do anything,” asked Klortny.  “Because otherwise that one can make potions that really clear up your pores.”

“Obviously we were going to sacrifice her last, and also I don’t understand magical rituals, it was optional class in my finishing school, I only took it because the instructure was this hulk of an orc,” groaned Cretta.  “I spent most of my time staring at his pecks imagining our babies.”

“And he was gelded,” said Kiladet.

“So much quality orc male ruined by Grimdar,” sniffled Klortny.

Cretta shook her head, “That’s enough depressing thoughts for the day.  I’ll go find out what the blob wants, you take the skill trainers to the nursery and see about getting those skin care potions made.”

I stepped out, “I think not, I am a Knight and I bring Justice!”

“Eeeek, an animal,” screamed Cretta as she grabbed the ghastly staff and pointed it at me.  A purple bubble appeared around me and I was trapped.