A week had passed since my harrowing encounter with the two Ogres. The xenos and abhumans who hired us frakked off to do their own thing, not that I particularly minded watching the xenos leave to parts unknown, although I do miss Scaly and the Squat even as I write this. Since they departed Frontier Town my day to day life had been very peaceful, relatively speaking of course. Without several kingdoms begging us to do their bidding for a very respectable payment, my party had gone back to our usual routine of hunting nothing but goblins day in and day out until we finally grew tired of wading through tunnels filled knee deep with dead greenskins..

I wasn't particularly upset that we were once again killing small fry by the dozens despite how I make it sound. I will never be one to complain about fighting against an enemy that is hopelessly outgunned against me and still charges forward without any semblance of self-preservation. With that said, you can only trudge through so many goblin nests in a row before the entire experience starts to wear you down. I did my best to hide it, but I'm sure Goblin Slayer was able to see the crack in my façade which was truly surprising given his usual lack of regard for anything that didn't have to do with goblins.

At least, that is the only explanation I can think of for why he decided to take Priestess on a quest without Jurgen and I other than stubborn stupidity for having overslept one time.

I'm honestly quite surprised that not only did he leave us behind but also went to the effort of taking Priestess with him. I never pegged Goblin Slayer as the type of person to risk taking a non-combatant along for one of his hunts, but knowing Priestess, she probably forced him to take her along on his quest so he wouldn't be adventuring alone again.

Although the girl hardly gives off the impression of a stalwart companion, she is perhaps the most protective of our party's individual members. While I am sure some of it has to do with her time in the local churches and all that would entail, there has to be something else convincing the timid young woman to dive into the nests of some of the most depraved creatures on this planet without batting an eye.

Maybe she has a crush on the armored idiot, or perhaps she has a stronger will than I give her credit for. No matter the reason, Priestess never ceases to surprise or impress me. Hopefully her insistence on rushing headfirst into danger alongside Goblin Slayer doesn't get her killed one of these days, because I have a feeling she could earn herself a reputation that rivals my own at this rate.

But that's enough about people who thought it would be best to let sleeping Commissars lie. What would have been one of the best ways of staying alive within the Imperial Guard left me feeling fairly hacked off and I wasn't in much of a mood for musing about the future or anything other than what I would do with my unexpected and unwanted free time. As incredible as it sounds, I wasn't much of one to enjoy wasting away my days in relative luxury on a backwater planet, especially when 'relative luxury' meant sticking my thumb up my ass doing frak all.

As most of my colleagues within the Commissariat would attest, boredom is the second greatest danger to a soldier on deployment, the first being whatever enemy we happen to be fighting. Drunken brawls, petty felonies, over-priced joy girls, and the always entertaining attempt to remove oneself from the genepool, the latter of which is best observed from a distance measured in kilometers whenever a heavy artillery regiment is involved, are only some of the troublesome situations I've observed men and women in my current position get themselves into when waiting for something productive to do.

While I would like to pride myself on being more responsible than the men and women underneath my command, the only difference between them and myself is that I was always careful enough to never get caught. Even back in my days at the Schola Progenium, I was always looking for ways to entertain myself in ways the instructors would never approve of. Driving them insane by cleaning up the evidence afterwards when they knew I was guilty as everyone else was merely a bonus.

Perhaps it was my growing boredom, a desire to relive some of my highly fabricated glory days from the past, or a brief bout of utter insanity that drove me to accept the first quest offer I received once Guild Girl noticed I had been left behind. I honestly can't recall what was running through my mind when I accepted the request to party up with a few other adventurers based within Frontier Town, but I remember my regret after learning who would be one of the people I would be working with.

"I'll be in a party with Spearman?" I groaned, not bothering to hide my disgust with that pompous idiot after having spent far too much time listening to him blather about himself for hours on end during our last quest together, to say nothing of all the times I've caught him boasting about his accomplishments in the early morning while waiting for the day's quests to be posted.

Guild Girl, a victim of his constant attempts to flirt with her, gave me a sympathetic look. "Yes, but both he and Witch wanted you and Gunner Jurgen to join them on a quest and said there would be no one better than the two of you to help them out." She said, struggling to remain professional as she gave me her spiel.

My expression softened up knowing I would be working alongside the always lovely Witch, but not enough to make the idea of spending time with that frakking idiot of hers any more palatable.

"Well, I might as well get this over with then. I can only imagine what they have in store if they need us specifically." I sighed as I made my way over to the unlikely pair and allowed Jurgen to stay behind to continue talking with Padfoot Waitress while I heard the details of our quest.

As soon as the two of them noticed I was heading their way, a small look of disbelief washed over their faces. Spearman's expression was tinged with a small hint of resentment, likely owing to how my own reputation was starting to overshadow his status as "The Frontier's Strongest" or whatever he called himself, while Witch let a small smile creep up to replace her usual stoic appearance. If a woman as sensual and lightly clothed as herself gave me that look, I would have done whatever was asked without hesitation as there was only one thing she would have wanted from me. Thankfully she only had eyes for another, or else I might have needed to ask Priestess to spend a night in the room Jurgen and I had converted into our office. Instead, I gave her the greeting a past associate like her deserved.

"It's nice to see you are still doing well, Witch." I nodded to her.

"And you… as well, Commissar." She purred, the words dancing through the air like the smoke pouring from her.

"Have you gone on any exciting quests since that job Frontier Town Governor gave us?" I asked her, enjoying Spearman's mounting annoyance as I continued to ignore him.

"Yes… but nothing like… slaying an Ogre." She replied.

"Oh, I would hardly call a couple of Ogres and a few hundred goblins 'exciting'." I told her, as I suppressed the shiver that ran down my spine after being reminded of how badly my party's mission could have turned out thanks to those monsters.

"Alright, that's enough bragging. We've got better things to do today." Spearman grumbled, earning a teasing laugh from his partner.

"I couldn't have said it any better myself, Frontier's Strongest." I agreed, further antagonizing him by bringing up his own embarrassing title. "So, what is this quest you need me to join you on?"

Spearman winced and sucked in a deep breath before speaking. "Yeah… about that, we don't actually need youto join us, Hero of the Imperium." He started to explain, looking suddenly downtrodden at how his attempt to rile me further wounded his already damaged pride at having to ask me for help.

"Come again?" I asked, not yet seeing what he was getting at.

I wasn't trying to add insult to his already injured ego but merely intending to clarify what he meant. Any humiliation he suffered was purely coincidental.

"We kinda need someone to act as bait for some bandits that have been attacking carriages and, well, neither of us know how to drive one to draw them out." He hurriedly continued. "We could hire someone to do it for us, but we are not going to put someone in danger like that so we figured-"

"You could find an adventurer who does know how to drive a carriage to act as bait since they can defend themselves once things go ploin shaped." I finished for him. "I take it you've asked Guild Girl to recommend you someone who can be your bait and she suggested us?"

Spearman gave me a guilty smile as I came to the obvious conclusion. He then ruffled his hair and let out a sigh that might have sent the present female company swooning if she wasn't already used to him. "Yeah, that's pretty much it. I understand if you don't want to put your friend in danger, but Jurgen is the only person we can trust to do this and we figured you wouldn't exactly be happy about his role in this quest."

"You're right." I informed him. "But we're still going to accept your offer."

"Ah, I understan- wait, you're okay with it?!" Spearman stammered, clearly expecting me to refuse.

"I'm going to ask my aide if he is willing to act as bait for us, and tell him not to drive like he usually does so he can pass off as a hapless merchant, but I'm confident he will be willing to do whatever we need him to do. He is reliable to a fault." I remarked, thinking back to the numerous times he and he alone had saved my life.

"I will be shocked if he declines to help if we were to ask."

"R-really? That's great." Spearman sighed with relief. "And here I was worried you would refuse."

"Why's that?" I inquired

"Well, the two of you kind of have a reputation for hunting nothing except for goblins alongside that weirdo…" He explained, leaving no question about who he was talking about.

"Yes, and said weirdo also left us behind today after we didn't meet up with him when he arrived." I muttered.

"Believe me, we aren't as goblin crazy as Goblin Slayer is. We only want to help this land out as much as we can until we can return home." I assured him, before thinking back about how enthusiastic Jurgen typically is on a goblin hunt. "Well, I wouldn't mind a change in pace from hunting nothing but goblins."

"I'll make sure you won't regret this, Commissar." Spearman said, offering me a handshake which I begrudgingly accepted from the fool.

"Oh, I am sure I won't." I agreed, letting the idiot make one final attempt to stroke his own ego and squeeze my hand for a moment before I returned the favor until I could feel the bones in his own start to shift underneath the pressure of my grasp.

"That's enough… you two." Witch sighed, shaking her head as her partner pulled his hand back and started to nurse it with what little dignity he had left. "We have… a job to do."


Our plan, if it could be even called that, was incredibly simple. Jurgen, who was currently driving a carriage Spearman and Witch procured for him without any guards, was acting as our obvious bait while the rest of us trailed behind him from a safe distance and looked for anyone preparing an ambush.

In all honesty, I wasn't expecting much to come from this attempt to lure out our enemies. Anyone with half a brain could tell that Jurgen was obviously not a merchant because no self-respecting trader would travel alone, without any hired protection or visible weaponry, and be bold enough to venture through known bandit territory on top of it all. Not even an Ork would be so gullible to fall for such an obvious setup, but then again, the people of this planet do seem to be incredibly oblivious to similarly obvious things around them so maybe someone as naturally cautious as me was the true oddity in all of this.

Regardless of my own dismal thoughts about our chances of luring out our targets for this quest, we were all still prepared to engage our targets with everything we could muster against them. Spearman carried his ornate namesake tightly as he trailed behind me while Witch tried her best to mirror him, her ample assets and revealing attire making it quite difficult to remain low to the ground to avoid exposing herself to us rather than our enemies. I was the most heavily armed out of us three, clutching my laspistol in one hand with my other hovering over the scabbard my chainsword rested in, but none of us were as prepared for a lethal encounter as my aide was.

Although he was pretending to be a merchant, and making a very half-arsed attempt given how his 'disguise' merely consisted of wearing a simple tunic and cheap jewelry on top of his flak armor that even the most casual observer could see through, he still had both his lasrifle and meltagun tucked behind him. Lacking any cargo for any prospective bandits to steal within the covered wagon he was currently driving, yet another mark against the ingenious plan Spearman devised for us, my aide had plenty of room to store his weapon inside for when things inevitably went ploin shaped. Whether or not he would end up needing to use them was another matter entirely.

Considering how we were likely facing bandits who were armed with little better than whatever swords and bows they could steal for themselves with maybe a sorcerer or two amongst them, if incredibly unlikely, I alone would be enough to handle them. While a laspistol was almost as useless as a flashlight against some of the more vile monstrosities I've faced down over the years, a single lasbolt was more than enough to take down most humans if they weren't heavily mutated or Chaos tainted. Of course, this is referring to people wearing armor specifically designed to protect against modern weaponry and not the archaic types employed by the people of this primitive world.

Once we found the bandits, eliminating them would be a trivial matter as long as they did not have a daemon or some local xenos abomination under their command like an Ogre, and even then I was confident we could massacre them with ease. I told Spearman and Witch this myself, and although the former was inclined to believe I was merely bragging, the latter took my word at face value.

"I hope… to see you in action… soon, Commissar." She whispered, trying her best to keep her voice down as we followed my aide in relative silence.

"Oh please, just because he can take out a couple of Orks on his own doesn't mean he's anything special." Spearman fired back at her, earning a small laugh from his partner.

"We'll have plenty of time to show off soon enough." I told them in an attempt to quiet the two of them down.

"You know, I've been wondering something, Commissar." The frakking idiot continued, missing the unsubtle hint his companion picked up on. "How 'close' are you and Gunner?"

"I beg your pardon?" I muttered in confusion, feeling that something was slightly off about the way he phrased his question.

"I uhh… I don't want to make it sound like I am against whatever is going on between you two, but me and a few of the others back in the Adventurers' Guild were kind of wondering what kind of relationship you two have." He explained. "I mean, you're are almost always together and when you're not, it looks like Gunner is out trying to run an errand or do whatever you ask of him, so I was kind of curious is all."

I nearly laughed at what he was implying, but thankfully was able to choke down the chuckle that almost broke away from me. "He's my aide, just my aide." I informed him.

"We both started out as strangers to each other assigned in the same regiment during my first deployment, fresh from cadet training. I happened to save his life and somehow became something of a poster boy for our regiment despite being an officer meant to maintain morale, carry out all disciplinary actions, and other menial tasks that should have made me almost as hated as our enemies. Instead, they treated me like a hero if you can believe it. Anyways, as a token of appreciation for saving his life and a few other minor achievements I earned myself in the process, Jurgen became my aide and we've been working together ever since. We've saved each other's lives more times than either of us can count, so I suppose you can say we have plenty of reasons to be friendly with each other."

"The fact he can manage to find me the best hotel rooms and bars to spend a night in also helps." I jokingly finished.

"Really?" Spearman hummed, seemingly convinced. "That sounds a lot like how me and Witch met. And here I thought the two of you might have been a little more than friends."

I didn't even attempt to hide the shiver that ran down my spine at that thought of being in a relationship with someone as unhygienic as Jurgen. "I could say the same about you and Witch." I replied in an attempt to start thinking about anything else.

"Huh? What do you mean by that?" Spearman asked, leaving me a little amused at what appeared to be some shyness on his part.

It was only when I noticed the growing blush on Witch's face that I realized he was actually as oblivious if not more so than Goblin Slayer. I gave her a moment to speak up and, after she decided it would be best to hide from any embarrassment by using her large hat to shield herself, I decided to see how far I could go until she finally spoke up on the matter.

"Oh, don't be so modest, Spearman. The two of you are both young, beautiful, and spending so much time together that I thought-"

"We're not like that." Spearman quickly interrupted before I could finish teasing his partner, catching me off guard with just how fast he was to stop me from making any more speculations about whether or not their partnership had any 'benefits' the Adventurer's Guild wasn't privy to. "I respect Witch as my partner and she's the best magic caster I've ever met. I wouldn't be so stupid as to try hitting on her just because of her looks. I value her more than that."

"And if the two of you weren't in a party together?" I inquired, seeing if the blabbermouth would carry on any further.

"I… never really gave it much thought." Spearman muttered to himself, proving that for all of his vocal dislike towards Goblin Slayer and insistence they were nothing alike, the two of them were just as oblivious to the romantic feelings of those around them.

"That's enough… gossiping." Witch huffed as she clung to her partner a little closer than before, acting quite girly despite her more mature appearance and typical attitude. "We have bandits… to look for."

"Ah, of course. We don't want them to hear us and scare them off." I agreed, mentally filing away this little discussion for later in case either of them ever asked me for a more personal favor. The two of them had obvious chemistry, and I'm sure Witch would be thankful if I were to help the idiot she pined after start chasing someone who didn't shut him down at every attempt to impress them.

Following that uncomfortable chat, our conversation came to an abrupt end and we proceeded to follow my aide in complete silence as we delved deeper into the forest along the route Spearman wanted us to take. Anyone with half a brain would have been suspicious with the convoluted route Jurgen was taking at our leader's insistence, as the only logical explanation for his erratic driving would be if he was drunk, lost, or looking for trouble, and he certainly didn't look lost and was driving too carefully to appear drunk.

I kept my thoughts to myself after voicing my concerns the first time which were subsequently ignored. It was difficult not telling Spearman in particular that his self-assured 'foolproof' plan was flawed once dusk started to approach, but just as I was about to do so our obvious bait carriage stumbled across an even more obvious trap. Thank the Emperor we discovered it when we did, because another couple of minutes and we would have needed to set up camp for the night to avoid blindly running into the bandits we were looking for.

Laying there in the middle of the road was a single tree that showed signs of having been cut down recently. The lumber ax embedded in the middle was an almost comical giveaway, one which made Spearman feel all too vindicated that our opponents were somehow less inconspicuous than he was. Still, as far as traps go, what it lacked in subtlety it made up for in effectiveness. The path Jurgen was leading the carriage through was incredibly narrow, leaving no opportunity to turn around and find another route around the roadblock, meaning he would need to move the fallen tree on his own to proceed. If I were to take a guess, it would have taken him an entire day to move the obstacle out of his way on his own and maybe an hour at the most with the rest of us helping out. That was more than enough time for even the most inept bandits to launch a successful attack against a sufficiently distracted and underprepared merchant, which is exactly what they proceeded to do the moment my aide came to a stop.

A bunch of poorly dressed bandits who looked like they crawled straight out of a cheesy historical reenactment that no one but the planet's populace would have cared about emerged from the suspiciously large number of shrubs positioned around the downed tree and stuck carriage. One of them managed to take his bush with him, making me groan in disbelief that we hadn't managed to notice them any earlier despite their horrendous disguises. I suppose that is what happens when you are more interested in putting an unsuccessful day of bandit hunting behind you with idle chatter while still on the job.

Unfortunately for these bandits, despite pulling off what should have been a flawless ambush, they had no idea how badly outgunned they were. Amongst the dozen or soI could see approaching our bait, only one of them was armed with a bow while the rest possessed swords and spears of varying quality. Jurgen, obviously feeling that there was no point in playing along with the charade and seeing no reason to wait for backup against a force so woefully prepared as they were, reached back into the carriage to grab his lasgun and hosed down the archer on full auto as he was the only one present who could pose even a trifling threat to my aide.

The effect his initial barrage had, much like the screams of his target, was immediate and incredibly satisfying to witness even if it only lasted for a passing moment. Whatever confidence the bandits possessed faded in an instant as they froze in shock at the unexpected display of firepower one of their own fell victim to. Feeling that there wouldn't be many bandits for the rest of us to take down if we stood there as shocked as our targets at this sudden development, Spearman and I charged the bandits before Jurgen single handedly completed our quest for us. Witch stayed behind, a natural decision given her lack of weaponry and sorcerous nature.

Although she was perhaps the first magic user I have ever felt comfortable being around, that didn't mean I wanted to frak around long enough for her to unleash any magic while I was nearby. That was why I made sure I fired into the crowd of bandits as I ran, managing to blow a hole through one of their heads and incapacitating another with a lasbolt that nearly removed a leg.

Half of the bandits were too busy trying to find cover as my aide started leisurely picking them off at a distance, leaving the remainder to try and break through Spearman and I so they could live to fight another day. Unfortunately for them, two veteran soldiers and Silver Ranked adventurers were too much for them to handle. Spearman lived up to his title when he cleaved clean through the sword of the first bandit to try and run past him, mortally wounding the man as his weapon dug into its victim's chest. The next bandit who tried to take advantage of the moment Spearman took to free his weapon was surprised to find that our blowhard had the skills to back up his bragging when the spiky haired idiot ripped the bandit's weapon out of its owner's hands and nearly caved the man's face in with a single punch.

As for the trio that figured it would be better to take me on than the heavily armored idiot, they fared little better than the bandits Spearman took care of. The first one, who tried to hit me with his sword, dropped dead before he could take a single step forward when I planted a lasbolt between his eyes while the one behind him suffered a similar fate as I fired off a burst into his chest. The other bandit was smart enough to stay far enough away from his companions so I couldn't draw a bead on him before he drew within striking range with his spear. If I hadn't been carrying my chainsword with me, then he might have struck me down and managed to run far away enough for Witch or Jurgen to avenge me.

Instead of dying an ignoble death like an unprepared adventurer or soldier, I quickly pulled my chainsword free from its scabbard and flicked the activator to its highest setting in one fluid motion. The roaring of my blade's teeth filled the air around us in an instant as I swung my weapon in an attempt to parry the shaft of the spear sailing towards my face. Due to the poor craftsmanship of the bandit's weapon, my chainsword broke through it with ease before biting down into the soft flesh of his torso and continuing to tear through him.

The bandit let out a short, agonized scream that only stopped when I finished bisecting him and his torso dropped to the ground after soaking my greatcoat with his blood. I groaned thinking about how long it would take to wash up my uniform and hoped the tailor I hired to make me a spare would be finished by the time I returned to Frontier Town, as unlikely as it would be.

The ambush ended as quickly as it started when the final bandit fell dead at my feet. Spearman was looking at me in shock as I walked up to the wounded bandit and put the poor sod out of his misery with my laspistol. Apparently he thought I was the kind of hero who showed his enemies mercy, and it was with a small sense of satisfaction that I twirled my laspistol in my hand before returning it to its holster while I walked past him with his mouth still hanging open in surprise.

"Well, that was a fun little scuffle. It's a shame it was over so quickly." I mused loud enough for him to hear as I sheathed my bloody chainsword.

"Holy shit." He muttered in response as he realized my reputation, overblown though it may be, was not entirely unearned.

"Jurgen, do you need any help cleaning up your mess?" I asked my aide as I checked up on him.

He spared me only a passing look while patting down the bandits for any valuables, an act that was surprisingly commonplace in this world despite being frowned upon by most others.

"That won't be necessary, sir. The only thing these guys had of value were a couple of coins and a map." He replied nonchalantly as he looked at the tattered remains of the archer and wisely decided it wasn't worth checking to see if the half-melted corpse had any salvageable equipment or supplies on it.

"Let me see that map for a moment." I told him, my palms tingling at the thought of what it might reveal.


The map, while largely illegible thanks to its inept owner and likely creator, gave us a detailed enough impression of our immediate surroundings. In the few minutes it took for us to realize what exactly we were looking at due to the map's shoddy assembly, Spearman helpfully pointed out how several of the map's markers corresponded to the locations of known attacks on merchants, both successful and failed, as well as another location that was isolated far away from any roads or trails going through the forest.

"Well, it looks like we've found our next destination." I sighed, knowing where we were bound to be headed off to next.

"Yep. We can't complete our quest until we know we've cleared the area out completely." Spearman agreed. "No better way than to give them a wake up call they'll never forget, right?"

"Hmm, that might be the smartest thing I've heard you say." I told him, not expecting him to suggest something so reasonable as a sneak attack due to his usual brash attitude.

"Oi, what's that supposed to mean!?" The idiot barked back.

"That means you… are greatly surpassing… his expectations for you." Witch managed to somehow say with a straight face.

"More than you can ever imagine." I sarcastically agreed.

Her façade finally faded into a pained look as her partner enjoyed the praise he received, believing it to be completely genuine. I made sure to put myself between Spearman and Jurgen as my aide started snickering to himself, preventing what surely would have turned into a one-sided shouting match if the idiot had noticed. I allowed myself a small smile as I let Spearman have his moment and took Witch's jab to the arm in stride as she huffed at me, finally breaking her usual calm and collected appearance for once without looking any less attractive in the process.

"We should get moving, Commissar." My aide chimed in once he finally regained control of himself. "There could be some traps along the way that could slow us down. Don't want to waste what little sunlight we have standing around."

Jurgen gestured up at the dwindling sunlight above us. Judging by how little of it was left, we probably had less than an hour until we were navigating solely by moonlight and whatever lamps, illuminators, and spells we just so happened to prepare for tonight. None of these were exactly ideal for navigating a bandit infested forest undetected.

"Ah, of course. The bandits waiting at the camp will probably realize something is wrong when those of them we eliminated don't come back soon." I agreed, seeing no way of worming my way out of this unexpected development to our quest.

Without anyone else seeing a reason to hesitate and Spearman finally choosing to remain silent instead of making a fool of himself once again, the four of us headed towards the supposed camp marked on our stolen map in silence. Not wanting to waste a spell to illuminate our surroundings for a brief time or expose our presence with an illuminator, I begrudgingly led our party as I was the best suited to navigating the rapidly approaching darkness thanks to years of navigating an underhive city in my childhood. My paranoia was screaming that this was a horrible idea but, lacking any other better plans, I continued to lead us to our unaware enemies while wondering what horror this planet would surprise me with next.


Special thanks to Tireless Traveler & Doc43Souls for beta reading this chapter!


Author's Corner:

I hope no one minds a little break of pace from the usual goblin slaying you were expecting. While Cain prefers working with Goblin Slayer and Priestess, he is by no means exclusively associating himself with those two.


Comments:

kukuhimanpr: cain finally lost it. never thought i'd see cain reprimanding gs like a drill sergeant.

Don't forget that Cain is not only supposed to act like this with the regiments he is attached to, his tendency to lead by example being a remarkable exception to the trigger happy Commissar stereotype, but he does eventually become a Schola Progenium instructor. A few drill sergeant dress downs are to be expected, especially after nearly being burned alive.

Mewfour123412:Oh shit there's an actual eldar

Orks, Cain, and Jurgen aren't the only things from W40K to have arrived in the Four Cornered World. Whether or not anything else has made its way over and will become a problem or not is something only time will tell, same goes for how many and which types of Eldar have made this world their home.


Once again, thank you all for reading and I hope to see you all again in the future!