The plan is made: You'll hide Alisra in the forest then go looking for your parents
Check the house first
13. Though your mind is cluttered with worry, you quickly determine that you cannot afford to just stand around hoping that your parents will turn up. The stampede that had just charged through here had left everything in disarray. A lot of your livestock had died. Chances were that other families had suffered similar animal casualties. The amount of smoke in the sky made it clear that yours was not the only house that had been set ablaze. Something horrible had happened while you were away. You had no idea what; but you knew that just standing around doing nothing wasn't an option. However - bringing your sister towards potential danger wasn't an option either. There was no guarantee that you could help your parents at all.
Your sister, on the other hand, you could keep safe. If anything had happened to your parents, you could make sure that your sister didn't share that fate. After surveying the scene, you quickly determine that the best place for Alisra is away from it all. You haven't even let her lift her head to see what had become of the lambs and the chickens that couldn't keep up with the stampede. Shaken but determined, you turn away from home to walk back into the forest. With the stampede having already passed, you convince yourself that the immediate danger had already passed. The forest is far from the blaze that is your house - for flames to reach the trees, they would have to cross patches of rock and dirt.
You hide your sister in the forest. You pick the sturdiest looking tree and set her down beside it. She'll be far enough away from home to avoid having to see the destruction - but she'll be close enough to hear your voice when you return to call her name. She stares up at you as you set her upon the ground, her eyes wide with worry and damp with tears. Of course she was afraid. Why wouldn't she be? A child caught in the midst of chaos was helpless without someone to look after them. This was your attempt at keeping her safe while you went looking for your parents. If you found them alive - you would come back and get her. If you found them but they were not alive... Then hopefully you could find an adult that you knew.
Regardless of what choices you made, neither you or your sister were going to be entirely safe. As much as you wanted to keep her with you, you didn't want to risk getting her hurt. So you take a deep breath as you place your shaky hands upon her shoulders, mentally bracing yourself for the hardships that are to come.
"Alisra. I need you to stay here." You issue the command to your sister, watching as her anxious expression contorts to a mixture of fear and confusion. She reaches to grasp the front of your shirt as you remove your hands from her shoulders. As much as it pains you to do so, you must pry yourself free of her grip as you prepare to turn back for home.
"I want to stay with you!" Alisra pleads in turn, her voice hardly louder than a whisper but still laced heavily with desperation. You force yourself not to look her in the eye as she continues to stare up at you. As she makes additional attempts at clinging to you, you find yourself being forced to be more firm. She has to stay here. You cannot allow her to follow.
"A-Ali, sweetie... Listen to me. Something bad happened. Something really bad. I need to go find Mum and Dad. You have to stay here, where it's safe. Stay right here and wait for me. I'll come back for you as soon as I can. Okay?" You do your best to explain the situation to your sister without having to share too many details as to what had happened. You've tactfully brought her to a spot where she wouldn't be able to see any of the animals that had been flattened by the stampede. A spot with a wide, sturdy looking tree with obvious white marks on its bark. The tree stood out to you, so you would know what to look for when you came back. Your sister proceeds to timidly tug at the front of her shirt, tentatively stepping back against the tree.
"You promise?..." Alisra asks, her voice strained now. She sounds as though she's trying not to cry. At this point, so are you - because you're absolutely terrified. All that you can do is clench your eyes shut and nod.
"I promise. I'll come back for you." You reassure your sister. When you open your eyes again and dare to look in her direction, all that you see is the image of her sitting at the base of the tree and burying her face in her knees. You let loose a shaken breath before starting back towards home. All the while you mentally dread that you may have made a poor choice by spending so much time doing this. The house had clearly been on fire when you walked back into the woods, but the blaze hadn't yet overtaken the building entirely. You feared the house would have been reduced to ash by the time you made it back. If not for your exhaustion from running earlier, you might have been able to sprint back towards home.
The best that you could manage was a jog. You weren't moving nearly as fast as you would have liked, but you definitely weren't being slow. You burst past the woods as you made your way back home. Seeing as the fencing to the field had already been destroyed, you made your way across the wreckage, doing your best to keep from tripping all the while. Once or twice your foot found itself snagged by the wire fencing. The staff that you found earlier made itself useful by helping you catch yourself. When you felt your foot fail to lift from the ground, you managed to stabilize your body by planting the bottom of the staff firmly on the ground. By the time you made it across the field and back home, you were able to see just how far along the fire had come.
The blaze seemed worse from the front than it did the back. The majority of the roof was on fire. One of the walls had completely burned down, with one adjacent wall well on its way to suffering the same fate. As you hastily make your way around the building, you find that the wall at the back of the house, where the back entrance resides, seems to be mostly untouched. An unwarranted sense of relief washes over you as you look upon what seems to be a viable means of getting in and out of the house. That relief quickly begins to fade, however, when you realize that the door is shut. No one in their right mind would remember to shut the door behind them if they had rushed out of a burning building.
If your parents hadn't managed to escape through the front door before the wall burned down, then they most definitely hadn't used the back. By this point, your worry for your parents has grown so intense that it's legitimately making you feel sick. The blackberries threaten to make a second appearance. The amount of willpower taken to keep them down despite all of the stress may as well have been enough to help you push a boulder up a hill. The back door led straight into the kitchen, where you had last seen your parents. The main room, where your father would have taken his nap, was just a few steps from there. You could make the bold decision to check inside. Just to make absolutely sure that your parents weren't trapped in the fire.
Or you could play it safe and check elsewhere. If the fire had progressed this much then chances were that you wouldn't be able to help your parents, even if they were still trapped inside. If by chance they had gotten out and were looking for you, then they must have gone to neighbors to see if any of them had seen you. That would certainly be the more appealing of the two outcomes.
The choices to make grow more risky. Will you check inside at risk of yourself, or will you check elsewhere at risk of them?
The choice is made: You'll check inside your burning home, at risk of your own safety
14. The risks prove too great to take the gamble. You dare not risk losing your parents' lives following a blind hope that they had already escaped the flames. Your body reacts on its own. There is no hesitation. Not a moment is wasted further pondering the potential options. You blindly reach to grasp the handle of the back door - only to recoil at the heat which sears your palm. You pull your arm back, clenching your hand shut in a feeble attempt to dull the pain of your burn. This incident only causes a momentary falter. Desperate to get inside and confirm whether or not your parents have been trapped in the burning building, you quickly change your strategy. You take a single step back to give yourself some ample distance.
Then you bring your leg up to slam the bottom of your foot against the middle of the door. When that fails to bring the door caving in, you adjust yourself once more to kick it again. Then again. Then again. You don't bother to keep track of how many times you drive your foot into the sturdy wood of the door. All you care about is getting the door to open. Your leg aches and your lungs burn from breathing in the heated air around the house, but you remain determined. In time the wood snaps free from its hinges. The door falls into the house from the force of your final kick. Ash flies into the air as the door hits the ground, sending you into a coughing fit as you cannot help but inhale it during your gasps for breath.
Despite the heaving of your chest, you press on. Behind the door there remains a chunk of your home which has yet to be claimed by the flames. You step inside, assured that there would at least be a clear route back to safety in the event that the fire progressed further. Sweat seeps from every pore in your skin, yet it brings no relief as the heat of the flame quickly sends it steaming away. You enter the remains of your kitchen. Evidence of your parents having been in the room is easy enough to spot. Fallen cooking utensils lay scattered on the countertop and on the floor. The table is a mess with the remains of your father's unfinished breakfast, his cup knocked over and on the brink of falling to the ground.
The evidence shows promise of them having left the scene in a hurry. You begin to hope that your parents have managed to escape the burning building. You press on only to make absolutely sure that they have gotten out. Your arm is brought up to your forehead in a vain attempt at shielding your skin from the heat as you approach the flames. Fire creeps further onto unscorched territory with every passing moment. You force yourself to walk directly to the mouth of the fire, where two thick wooden beams struggle to retain their integrity as the flames consume them. Your eyes water from the blistering heat and you come to legitimately fear that your hair may catch fire.
When you lean forward to check into the next room, which has been engulfed in flames, you do so with incredible speed. A split second is all that you need to confirm that your parents are not trapped in the flames. You do not see them. Nor do you hear their screams or smell the telltale scent of flesh being charred by flame. You practically throw yourself backwards whilst avoiding the fire. You find yourself dropping the staff for a moment while you pat down your hair and clothes, fearing that the embers might have clung to you somehow. Your skin burns so bad from the heat that it feels as though you've caught fire. After patting yourself down all over to put out the flames that may or may not have grasped at you, you retrieve the staff once more to make a hasty retreat.
As much as your lungs hate you for it, you run out of the house. The hot air burns your throat and lungs with every breath, but you succeed in getting some distance between yourself and the burning building. In the safety of the open air, you fall to your knees and struggle to catch your breath. Your throat is dry to the point that you fear that it may crack and bleed. In this moment you remember the waterskin strung up on the side of the pack which you carry around your shoulders. Hastily you fumble to retrieve it. Your fingers struggle with the knot which holds the waterskin in place, but you ultimately succeed in prying it free of its binds. After removing the cork from the end, you press the mouth of the waterskin to your lips and lean your head back.
Relief washes over you as the water runs down your throat. The beverage reinvigorates you - if only slightly. You drink your fill before returning the cork to its proper place, and then you tie the waterskin to the pack once more. You've confirmed that your parents have escaped the remains of your burning home. From the looks of the kitchen, they must have rushed out as soon as they realized that the fire had started. You struggle to get back to your feet, exhaustion threatening to overtake you - but you cannot allow yourself to rest. You need to find out where your parents are. Alisra needs you and you need to be fast about this. Again the staff becomes your support as you take a moment to collect your thoughts.
You begin to wonder if it would be better to keep looking for your parents alone or to go back and collect Alisra and do so together. However, before you can really take the time to make this choice, semi-familiar noise catches your ears. Very faintly, you hear the sound of shouting. You're so far from the source of the noise that it's hard to tell for certain - but it sounds a lot like your father. He isn't calling your name or calling for your sister. He sounds as though he is shouting at someone. Angrily and loudly, given that you're able to hear his voice over the crackling of the burning building only a short distance behind you. Perhaps he was confronting whoever it was that had started the fire. Maybe he was getting after someone for causing the stampede.
You cannot know for certain. The only thing there is to be certain of, is the fact that you can hear a man yelling somewhere in the distance. The voice might be coming from your father - or it might be coming from someone who knows where he is. Alisra will have to wait hidden in the forest for just a little while longer. This is the most promising lead that you've got. You cannot afford to walk away from it, for fear that whoever you hear may leave before you get back. Then, as you start towards the source of the voice, you feel something tug at the pit of your stomach. A sense of dread overwhelms you for a moment, as the whispering voice of the staff begins to echo in the depths of your mind once more.
This time around, you struggle to grasp what was said. The words uttered into the depths of your mind were words of warning. The staff itself appeared to be warning you to be careful of the next choice that you made. The commotion you hear in the distance may not be just a casual scuffle. The little voice clawing at the back of your mind warns that it might be smart to keep yourself from being noticed as you approach. At the same time, you've already discovered that the voice seems to utter absolute nonsense, based upon "Grasping Brambles" meaning absolutely nothing.
So the real question is - will you heed the warning of the voice, or will you do as you see fit?
The choice is made: Ignore the voice and do as you see fit
15. The strange voice that you have heard has already proven to fail you once, so you see no point in listening to it again. As is, you need to find your parents as quickly as possible, and the voice you hear in the distance sounds quite a bit like him. There is no time to be wasted listening to disembodied voices whispering nonsense in the depths of your mind. So you start in the direction of the shouting, moving as quickly as you can possibly manage given your growing exhaustion. You only encounter more destruction along the way. The dirt roads you've memorized now lay in ruin, making it almost impossible to tell them apart from the rest of the ground. Grass patches lay trampled into the dust.
Neighbors' homes have also been swallowed by flames, and some of their houses seem to have been burning for longer than yours. Some houses are so far along that all which remains of them is a smoldering pile of charcoal. The further you go into the destruction, the louder the shouting grows. You catch on to the sound of additional voices - also male - and confirm without a doubt that it is your father that you hear. Your journey leads to a difficult trek uphill, made only slightly easier through the use of the staff. As you draw closer, you begin to hear more. There is a loud, rhythmic clanking echoing in the distance. To you, the sound resembles that of children having a play fight using wooden swords.
The sound only confuses you, as you can imagine no reason for it to exist at this moment. The town lay in ruin and people may very well be trapped inside burning buildings. Just as you begin to wonder why on earth anyone would be having a play fight, you drag yourself over that final elevated step to lay witness to the reality of the situation. The fight you hear is no play. The shouting you hear has been your father screaming at the unknown assailant. At that moment you freeze from the shock of it all, staring at the scene as it plays out before you. Your father, beaten and bloody, has engaged in a brawl with a warrior cladin black and red armor. The armor radiates heat, causing the air around it to warp and ripple as if made of water.
Their helmet is made in the image of a boar, retaining a humanoid shape but decorated with multiple sharpened hooks designed to resemble tusks. The warrior stands at an unnatural height, making him tower over your father. You would swear that they stand at well over seven feet tall. The sword in their hand glows red-hot. Despite their terrifying appearance, your father maintains his fury and refuses to back down. He attempts to fend this horrifying warrior off using a pitchfork. The rhythmic clanking is the sound of heated metal striking the wooden pole of the pitchfork. Were it not for the metal rod hidden within the wooden pitchfork pole, you have no doubt that the warrior would have cleaved it in two by now.
Your petrified observation of the fight quickly makes it clear that your father is outmatched. This destructive stranger engages in the fight purely for play - but this playfight is far from innocent. You watch as your father is pushed and shoved repeatedly. His every attempt at attack was easily avoided. More than once you see your father find himself left entirely unguarded against an attack. Yet the Scarlet Boar punishes this opening not with a kill strike, but with a minor wound meant to humiliate your father. You hear this warrior laugh throughout their brawl. The fact that they are playing with your father is made perfectly clear just by watching the fight. Where your father puts every ounce of his effort into an attack, the warrior laughs the effort off and reacts as though he's playing with a small, angry child.
Your legs refuse to move as you lay witness to the scene. So entranced are you by this brawl that you almost fail to notice the events playing out in the distance. Only when you hear the desperate cry of your mother do you fully comprehend all that takes place before you. In the distance far behind the battle scene, you finally notice a massive carriage being filled with people from the town. While you cannot see your mother among the group of women being pushed into its metal frame, you can most definitely hear her calling out to your father. Some bizzare animal covered in flames is hooked up to the carriage. Due to how far away it is, you cannot make it out. Given its size, your assumption is that it is some sort of accursed flaming oxen.
Your father calls out to your mother as she and the other women are shoved into the carriage. In that moment of distraction, the warrior proceeds to throw their leg out. Your father is dealt a quick and unforgiving kick to the chest. He is shoved a few feet back, where he lands square upon his back and is left gasping for breath. Despite his wounds and the pain that he must be in, he has refused to release the pitchfork that he has relied upon during his brawl with the Scarlet Boar. Panic completely overrides your system as you realize that the fight has come to its conclusion. Having finally ended their twisted game, the warrior sets out to execute your father. Your hands tremble as you watch the monster casually approach your father.
The warrior comes to a stop where your father forces himself to kneel. His hand still clings to the scorched and jagged pole of the pitchfork, and his other is used to cover his chest whilst he continues to try and breathe. Your father remains entirely without defense as the assailant raises their blade with both hands, assuming the very telling position of an executioner. They mean to cleave his head from his shoulders, you can tell by their stance. Tears quickly overwhelm your eyes as you stare upon the scene, feeling utterly helpless as you witness the scene unfold. Then the jolt comes again. The staff you clasp tightly in one hand pulsates once more, and the energy created by it sends mystic energy coursing through your body.
Once again the mysterious voice echoes in the depths of your mind. Many different words race through the back of your head. An urgency overwhelms you and you quickly find yourself clasping the staff with both hands, eyes locked upon the event that unfolds within a hundred feet of you. You know not what comes next. All that you know is whatever may happen, it did not happen without some attempt at intervention.
The voice has uttered many words into your mind in rapid succession. What will you utter - what will you do?
The choice is made: Cast Barrier
16. You make your choice in the split second that you have to weigh the options racing through your mind. Only one option seems viable when it comes to protecting your father. In the instant that you've settled on it, you take action. You move to bring your staff directly in front of you, now clasping it in both hands as your eyes lock on to your target. You squeeze the wooden object tightly in your hands, digging your feet into the soil as you take a deep breath.
"Barrier!" You shout, calling upon the magic of the staff. A blinding white light proceeds to shine from the various glowing rings which line the magical object. Energy courses through your body, sending you stiff and rigid as the spell takes effect. What you witness is a sort of rippling light flow from the staff in the direction of your father. As the light washes over his body, you can do nothing but remain in place and hope that the spell has properly taken effect. The Scarlet Boar takes notice of you as a result of your shouting, though he makes no move to end his assault on your father. If anything, your appearance seems to have awakened some sort of monstrous spite in them.
They swing their blade harder in the direction of your father. Your stomach lurches from the fear coursing through you as the weapon draws closer to ending his life. To your immediate relief, the spell works. The blade bounces off of the invisible magic barrier that you put up around your father, knocking the Scarlet Boar off balance and causing their grip on their weapon to loosen. As the tip of the blade falls towards the ground, your father takes his chance to react. Still gripping the pitchfork, he screams in the direction of the beast that had almost slain him. To your shock your father takes his weapon and shoves it upwards. The thin metal prongs of the pitchfork pierce the armor of the invader.
Your father drives his weapon clean through their abdomen until the prongs emerge through their back - and he continues to shove until he has pushed his enemy off their feet. As he knocks them onto the ground, he takes his heel to shove it against the back of the fork. For a split second it looks as though he's attempting to dig with a shovel. Yet all this motion does is allow him to shove the pitchfork ever deeper into the Scarlet Boar's abdomen, likely crushing their internal organs as they are pinned to the ground. The assailant lets out a series of grunts as he is taken down, ending in a pained shout as he is left helplessly pinned on his back. Your father takes a moment to spit upon their masked face, his shoulders shagging from exhaustion as he turns to face you.
Immediately he rushes towards you, arms weakly outstretched in search of your embrace. You react immediately, forcing your exhausted body towards him so that you can throw yourself into his arms. Tears roll down your cheeks as you bury your head in his shoulder, your emotions finally catching up to you now that the shock of the event has had a moment to fade. Dozens of questions race through your head, and no doubt dozens race through your father's head. Your home hadn't been in ruin when you left this morning. When your father last saw you, you weren't a mage. All of this was jarring and distressing but there was no time to start asking questions. There was still the issue pertaining to your mother, dragged off and locked away in a giant carriage with the other women of the town.
You and your father seem to have this thought at the same time, because as you pull away from the hug you both turn to look towards the carriage. The flaming ox has only just started to walk, intent on taking the carriage away with all of the women trapped inside. A single warrior clad in the same armor as the one your father had defeated sits at the front of the carriage, commanding the beast through the use of a whip. While the cart is in fact moving, it is being pulled very slowly. Now that you have a moment to focus on it, you can see that the entirety of the carriage is made of metal - likely to reduce the chances of being lit on fire by the flaming ox. This is important because it means that the singular beast is only able to pull the carriage along slowly.
So there is at least some time to think of a plan. Your father looks at you, unarmed and exhausted. You know that he cannot even attempt to fight another one of these warriors. Not with how badly battered he had been left after battling one of them with the pitchfork. Had you not managed to intervene, he would have been killed. You see in his eyes that he knows this. He is looking to you for guidance. Looking to you to make the plan, as you're now the only hope for salvation that he can see. At least now you have a moment to breathe and collect yourself before you act. If there are additional warriors to deal with, none of them are around the carriage. Reducing numbers one by one would be best, though you hardly have the energy to do much.
If you could manage to deal with the warrior on the carriage, you could get all of the women and children out of it and make a bee line for the forest. Everyone's homes were already clearly in ruin. There shouldn't be any qualms about leaving behind personal items, when practically everything was guaranteed to be ash by this point. At least by going that route, you could get everyone out of town and away from these invaders before they had enough time to react to your escape. Maybe. This was all a theory - a blind hope that you could somehow achieve more than you had already managed. Alisra was still waiting for you in the forest. If you could get everyone out and get back to her, then everyone could run.
The real question was how you were going to pull it off. By now you have confirmed that you could use magic, though you know not your limitations. You could attack your enemy from a distance. Get him to dismount the carriage and distract the warrior while your father goes to free the people trapped inside. Something flickers in his eyes as these thoughts cross your mind, making it seem as though he's already come to understand the plan you're developing. Honestly, that seems to be your only viable option if you wish to save your mother as well. The only other alternative is to walk away now to have a guarantee at rescuing those you've already saved. Your father and your sister.
So, the question now is - what will you do? Will you intervene and stop the carriage to try and save everyone, or will you secure this small victory you have and save only your sister and your father? The choice is a difficult one, but it is one that you have to make.
-The choice is made: Take the risk and try to save everyone
17. Neither you nor your father are willing to just walk away. The guilt of abandoning everyone would eat you alive if you failed to at least attempt and rescue them. Thus the attempt is to be made. You eye the flaming beast which drags the carriage along. You take a moment to study the one who commands the beast. You examine the carriage itself. You take your time to ponder the best potential plan, taking note of every possible means of intervention. Ultimately you decide on what seems to be the most simple solution. You and your father lock eyes for a moment. He ultimately has little idea as to what you intend on doing. You take a deep breath, feeling the energy of the staff flow through you once more as you prepare to cast another spell.
"Grasping Brambles!" You utter, holding your voice firm as you lock your eyes on the carriage. You hope that this time around, the spell might work - and that it might work the way that you think it will. For a few seconds after the words leave your lips, it seems as if this particular spell is a dud. You can feel the distressed look of your father's gaze as he stares at you. However, your dismay is quickly replaced by relief as the effects of the spell abruptly make themselves known. A massive, writhing tangle of bramble vines abruptly bursts from the soil beneath the carriage. The vines twist and tangle beneath it, coiling around the wheels and even climbing partway up the side of the carriage to grasp at the windows.
The people trapped within the carriage let out all manner of startled, confused, and terrified noises as these massive thorny vines wrap about it. Meanwhile, the carriage itself is brought to a complete stop. The flaming oxen pulling it along stops the instant that it encounters this massive resistance. The carriage driver reacts to the sudden stop in turn by trying to beat the flaming creature with a whip. When this does nothing to get the animal to move, the warrior then turns their attention to the carriage itself. They take very little time to discover that magically enchanted brambles have tangled themselves around the carriage. Little time is taken from there for them to notice you and your father standing in the distance, watching the scene unfold.
Needless to say, the carriage driver quickly concluded that you and your father were the source of the obstruction. That was all that it took to coax them out of the carriage seat. Neither you nor your father had any idea what to do from there as you watched the Scarlet Boar leap out of their seat and draw their weapon. You weren't equipped to be getting into any fights. Your father was too exhausted to attempt another fight - and he was entirely unarmed. The natural instinct was to try and keep the distance between yourselves and the warrior, who was now moving towards you at a quick pace. You look to your father. Your father locks eyes with you for a moment, before looking back towards the warrior.
You feel his hand on your shoulder. He shoves you behind him quickly. Despite his exhaustion - despite the fact that he was entirely unarmed and without a means of fighting back - your father was still fully intent on doing everything in his power to protect you. You were his daughter after all. His first born. Those trapped inside the carriage now shout at the two of you to run. Though you cannot hear your mother through the chorus of voices, you are certain that she is calling out for you to escape. Yet as the warrior closes in and your father prepares to taste the pain of the weapon, all that you can do is freeze. The warrior proves much more intimidating up close.
Your legs refuse to move as you watch them reach for their weapon; another blade which seems to radiate a flaming aura. Your father stands firm and defiant as the blade is raised. Then... Nothing. The blade isn't brought down to attack your father. You and your father stand absolutely petrified and confused as the warrior falls deathly still just a step away from where your father stands. The shouting heard from the carriage has gone completely silent. What follows is an incredibly tense moment where no one moves or makes a noise. Then the warrior drops. They don't make a sound. They do not sway or stagger. They simply fall forward. Your father side steps to avoid having the warrior fall on them.
As his armor-clad face meets the earth, you realize what had transpired. A single arrow sticks from the warrior's back, buried between his shoulder blades. Someone, somewhere, had arrived in the nick of time to act as your silent savior. With that single, well placed shot, they had dealt a fatal blow. The ungodly sound of a pig squealing draws your attention elsewhere. As your eyes pull away from the fresh corpse of the warrior, you quickly realize that what you had mistaken for a flaming oxen was, in fact, a massive flaming boar. The enormous swine squeals loudly as your saviors rush upon the scene. You are more surprised upon discovering that your saviors are, in fact, Goblins.
Their tell-tale green skin is easy to spot against the tans and yellows of the landscape. You and your father stare in disbelief as the small creatures swarm the massive swine, throwing some sort of green substance at it to douse its flames. Whatever it is that they've armed themselves with, it sticks to the flesh of the flaming creature and immediately smothers whatever fire it lands upon. While some of them douse the flames, others rush to try and unhitch the creature from the carriage to prevent it from trying to escape with its prisoners. That particular course of action quickly becomes dangerous as the boar is freed from its restraints. Once free, the enormous beast charges forward. Goblins leap in every possible direction to avoid being trampled.
At least one of them failed to move in time. You can do nothing but watch in abject horror as the Goblin is very obviously stepped on by the oxen sized boar. You don't even have the chance to question if the poor creature survived being stepped on or not. For whatever reason, the boar proceeds to charge directly towards you and your father once it has gotten away from the Goblins. The ground literally shakes from the weight of the heavy beast as it sprints in your direction. Every step it takes leaves the ground full of steaming holes. For a split second, your father turns to look at you, as if expecting you to have some sort of a plan. Were it not for the intensity of the situation, you would have questioned why he expected you to have all of the answers.
You had honestly been reacting to the problems as they arose this whole time. However, given that there's a massive creature running towards you that is now at least half on fire, the obvious course of action is...
The choice is made: Just... Shoot the giant pig in the face
18. As you look from your father back to the massive, flaming boar which charges towards you, the course of action you take proves rather surprising. You could call it a reflux. Your legs refused to move as the best made its way to you, and so you reacted in turn without much thought. Energy courses through the staff as you stare at the boar. The top of the staff produces a pulsating glow. Then you blink, and in the very short period of time between your eyes closing and opening back up, something strikes the enormous swine in the face. In the time it took to blink, you had missed whatever it was that you - or more accurately, the staff - had just done. You only manage to catch the sight of some sort of glowing blue substance splatter across the creature's face.
Regardless of what that substance was, you are left feeling particularly tired. Your father is forced to pull you out of the way as the scene plays out. The boar, upon having something hit it in the face at high speed, lets out a pained squeal. The creature's voice is so loud and resonates at such a pitch that it is legitimately painful to listen to. You know not if you had managed to damage its eyes, but the beast shakes its head violently as it charges - if only for a split second. As the boar shakes its head, it accidentally points its snout to the ground. The boar's massive tusks dip into the earth. When your father grabs you and pulls you out of the way, it is to prevent you from being crushed as the boar is suddenly flipped over onto its back.
Then the beast is sent skidding across the dirt for a dozen or so feet before coming to a stop. At which point the flaming pig does not return to its feet. You watch, bewildered, as the massive creature only succeeds in flopping onto its side before going mostly still. This event had taken place over the course of only a few seconds - and it was quite the dramatic sight to behold. You and your father tentatively approach the enormous creature as it lays upon its side in the dirt. Some of the Goblins rush up from behind you, armed with waterskins filled with that peculiar green slime and chittering loudly in their native tongue as the pig is eyed cautiously. The Goblins ultimately do nothing else to the creature.
That dramatic flip had most definitely caused some sort of a fatal injury. You watch as the beast lay before you, steaming blood spilling from its mouth as it struggles to breathe. The smell that rises from its smoldering hide proves nearly enough to make you heave. Despite being a fire elemental, this animal is in no way immune to the flames that it produces. Now close enough to observe it, you watch how its flesh blisters and sizzles beneath the fire that its body produces. The result of this is an overwhelming stench of charred pork and burnt hair. As the beast quickly dies from the internal injuries sustained by its flip, the fire which coats its body quickly burns out. What is left behind is the badly burnt corpse of a giant pig.
Once the fire burns out, the Goblins respond to the body by showering it with water. Not with the slime contained in leather pouches, but by dumping water all over it. You and your father barely succeed in keeping the contents of your stomachs in check as you witness what water does to the corpse of the creature. Burnt flesh slips and slides from meat which had been left untouched deep beneath the surface of the flame. The meat beneath, however, still seems entirely cooked - but it appears to dissolve as the water washes over it. Over the course of a few minutes, you watch as the remains of the beast are reduced to little more than a pile of meaty, rotten slime and charcoal - which drips from the bones.
Having grown acutely aware of your growing disgust, a pair of Goblins respond in turn by coaxing you and your father away from the scene. The two turn away from the pile of rotten slime to reach for your hands. You are each taken by the wrists and led away from the grotesque scene - at which point, upon locking eyes with your mother, the Goblins need not supervise you further. Your mother rushes to you and your father, bellowing with relief at your survival as tears roll down her cheeks. She wraps her arms so tightly around you that breathing suddenly becomes difficult - but neither of you care. Your face is littered with small, motherly kisses as your father wraps his arms around the two of you.
As touching as this reunion with your parents is, it is not left even slightly private. In fact, you and your parents are quickly swarmed by the other women and children of the town. Two dozen or more people total surround you, all of them blurting out worried inquiries as to where their husbands, brothers, and fathers might be. You, unfortunately, cannot answer any of these questions. Equally as unfortunate is the fact that your father can offer answers. None of these answers are pleasant. Everything is so rushed. So chaotic. Everyone around you is either screaming out their grief or quietly sobbing whilst clinging to their friends and loved ones. All of the questions asked narrowed down to one simple inquiry; what had become of all the missing men?
The reality that your father conveyed was that they were all dead. Or at the very least, he had personally witnessed the demise of many of the men who had perished. Like him, these men had been fighting for their lives whilst trying to rescue and relocate their missing wives and children. Like him, these men had been played with like training dummies, until they were inevitably slaughtered without mercy or remorse. He had seen many of them fall. He had seen every corpse be picked up and taken away somewhere, but he knew not what was being done with them. As painful as these answers were, they only proved to spark the arrival of even more inquiries.
Why had these warriors invaded the town? What was being done with the bodies of the dead? What were they planning on doing to all of the women and children that they had been attempting to abduct? You had none of the answers. Then, the pair of Goblins which had remained nearby to keep an eye on the group raised their voices.
"We know the intentions of this army!" They utter, speaking in unison - forcing their voices louder so that they might be heard over the symphony of voices. This revelation, surprisingly enough, sparks silence as opposed to further chaos. All eyes, including your own, fall upon the Goblins. The intent is obvious. Everyone is waiting for the information which will, ideally, give everyone the answers that they seek. One of the two Goblins proceeds to shake his head and sigh.
"We know it. We will tell you. But we cannot stay here. Soon, more of these people will come. We must clear out of town - we must cross the river and destroy the way across once we arrive on the other side. When we've escaped the threat and delayed their advances, then we will answer any questions that you have." The Goblin explains. For a moment, this explanation appears to strike something of a rebellion. Women begin to raise their voices to demand answers. The arrival of other Goblins from even deeper in town, along with the citizens that they have managed to rescue, is what ultimately encourages obedience. Your group quickly joins up with the other groups, accompanied by an entourage of Goblins armed to the teeth with all manner of weapons. Through all of the chatter, it becomes clear that the Goblins have a specific path that they seek to follow - because it is a path that leads them directly to the bridge that will take everyone across the river.
That path takes everyone in a direction rather far away from where your sister waits alone and frightened in the forest. Through all of the chaos, you have not yet managed to let your parents know that she's alive and unharmed. You obviously cannot allow for her to be left behind to fend for herself while these warriors invade to complete the destruction of your home.
What are you going to do?