It was the pain in Lyle's legs and the smell of something foul that woke him up. A dull aching pain that jolted him from the involuntary slumber he'd taken part in. As far as the smell goes, it almost smelled like cow shit. He only knew it was that smell specifically because he had family in upstate New York.

Blinking away black spots still overcoming his eyes, Lyle hissed as he felt his ankle move, or rather something move his ankle. Either way, it sent sparks of pain up his legs, and it was taking all of his will not to just curse on reflex.

That's right…my dumbass ran right off that edge of that ravine…I tried grabbing onto… His train of thought led him to his hands, which allowed him to see his palms wrapped up in cloth that seemed barely holding together and of shoddy quality at best.

This, of course, led him to more questions when he finally shouted in pain when he felt his foot get pulled yet again.

Sitting up and wincing in pain at the bruises that were clearly on his back, Lyle's eyes widened when he saw what were two peasants at his feet while they were all inside a tent. They were two of the most horrific and in-bred-looking peasants Ulysses had seen today.

One peasant had what seemed to be a slack jaw and a crooked nose, with greasy-looking black hair doing little to improve his looks. The other, who was fidgeting with his shoe, was bald and seemed to be lacking a few fingers, not because they appeared to be cut off. They were missing as if they were missing, to begin with. One hand seemed to have three, while the other had four.

After another twist of his shoe and another jolt of pain, Lyle's patience finally ran out. As much as he would have liked to kick his leg out, the pain he felt in them forced the earth native to settle for shouting.

"Would you quit acting like you have a foot fetish and quit fiddling with my fuckin' shoe!?"

His shouting paid off because the two poorly dressed and rag-wearing peasants halted what they were doing and stared at Lyle wide-eyed.

The with the slack jaw spoke first. "She really was tellin' truth, wasn't she, Tobie? He's still kickin', even with his legs snappin' like splinters."

Tobie sighed reluctantly, letting go of the shoe. "Shame. These look and feel comfier than what them knights got."

"What you need em' for anyways?" the other peasant asked. "Your legs aren't workin' anytime soon. What use do you get for these?"

Looking at the legs in question, Lyle had to stifle a gasp at how true that statement was.

His legs weren't just bent at the shins and re-snapped into place by some hasty medical work. They were so heavily bandaged with splints that it looked as if a pitbull and a rottweiler just got done giving him the fade out of spite! He'd been so focused on the peasants fiddling with his shoes that he didn't realize just how sorry of a state they were in. Even trying to move his legs gave him little reward besides more sharp agonizing suffering, causing the earth native to hiss through his teeth.

"Heard from Ave how you fell from the ravine down east. Clearly not from Corroune, else you'd never fall from that height."

"Don't think he's from any o' these parts, Garland. Accent don't sound too brettish to me."

"Don't look brettish either."

"Should give you two some medals for figuring that out." Lyle grumbled, tenderly rubbing the upper part of his leg, trying and failing to get some feeling in it. "How long…Christ…how long have I been out?"

Tobie chuckled to himself. "Barely a day, I think. Thought you'd be out longer with your legs bent like twigs. You were moanin' when the lady of the hour had you slung over her shoulder like our harvest!"

"Or lack of it." Garold grumbled. "Say why don't you emm…lend us these boots o' yours. The fine lady was askin' us to watch over ye while we were out. It'd be a…a kind gesture don't you think?"

Tobie nodded with his slack-jawed grin. "The lady would give a thousand blessings for such a kindness!"

Lyle raised an eyebrow, unimpressed by the unsightly duo. Not even five minutes after waking up and his 'bedside doctors' were already haggling with him. Truly they could put the American healthcare system to shame with how miserly they were acting.

Then again, for all he knew, they were just puffing nothing but hot air and were lying about all of this. On the other hand, somebody made an effort to ensure that his legs weren't consistently in the 'L' formation, minus the morphine, which would have been appreciated.

Given how poor these peasants were, it was understandable why painkillers were a bit out of their expertise. Either way, before Lyle could get another word, the tent flap behind the two greedy peasants was suddenly flung open, and a young lady…at least Lyle thought was a young lady burst into the scene.

The best way to describe her without sounding offensive would be unkempt. If these two peasants were misshapen, this newcomer definitely would be washed down by his mom before being invited to the dinner table by principal.

She had messy and wild chestnut brown hair and equally chestnut-colored eyes that were narrowed as if tired or just in a perpetual state of irritation. Besides some freckles on her face, her other most defining feature was her big bucked teeth sticking out of her lips. It was almost bugs bunny comical with noticeable they were as if it dominated her entire visage besides the messy and tattered leathers and green coat she wore around her body.

"What's this I hear about blessings and boots?" She grumbled. "N' I don't remember asking either of you to watch this poor soul while I was out."

Both of the male peasants flinched, looking not too unlike a pair of kids caught with their hands in the cookie jar. "Just making sure the work of a young lady like yourself doesn't go to waste, Ave! Just making sure all is well with your patient."

"Along with whatever he's wearing, then too, I take it?" She nearly growled, stepping forward to the rapidly cowing peasants. "Bad luck it would be for you two if someone beat you to the punch on his effects, mm?"

Garold began to sweat visibly before shaking his head abruptly. "Lousy wench! This is how you thank us for looking after the needy and the weak as the Lady demands of us! If I we-

"You'll leave if you wish for the Lady's continued blessings. I'm sure she'll even smile upon you if you go back to shoveling your goat shit…or acting like you do these days."

For a moment, Lyle considered pulling in the winds of magic right then and there to cover his ass because it seemed at that moment Garold was going to try something out of sheer spite and outrage. When Tobie grabbed his arm and almost unnoticeably shook his head, the two instead settled for glaring at this 'Ave' girl and shuffled wordlessly out of the tent, tension mostly leaving with them.

Once she was confident, they left the peasant girl rolled her eyes. "No fuckin' better than goblins, the lot of them."

"They really that bad?" Lyle asked in an attempt at an icebreaker. This girl seemed a lot more…well Lyle wouldn't say trustworthy but oddly more approachable. Unlike the two malformed peasants from earlier who hid their greed inside their sleeves she showed her displeasure for all to see. He could work with that.

Ave shrugged. "I would trust em' less if they wore capes instead of rags. Bout' as much as I trust foreigners with broken legs as a matter of fact."

Lyle smirked. "You mistrust cases like myself so much you didn't leave me on the side of the road where people like slack jaw and his buddy could just leave me after taking the clothes on my back?"

Ave stared for a moment before approaching the earth native. "The lady would frown on such cruelty."

"Even if I don't worship the Lady myself and, in fact, don't really care for her?"

"Makes it easier to bring in the more devout followers, I see it."

Lyle smirked. "I personally don't see anything special about her besides her beefing up those knights of hers, but I digress."

"More's the pity for you…speaking of pity, I have to ask how you're legs got in such a pitiful state, to begin with."

"I fell, obviously."

Ave snorted. "Yes, but was it because you're a fool or because you were shoved."

"Getting personal now, don't you think?"

"Fixed your legs up when I didn't have to. Thought you'd be kind enough to think a lady deserves some light shedding."

"You're a lady? Coulda fooled me."

For a moment, Lyle thought he may have pushed the wrong kind of button when the girl briefly scowled, only for it to give way to a rueful smile. Glad to see she has a sense of humor.

"You have a funny way of thanking people."

"Ladies back home love it."

"Shame us brettish ladies are more refined for your ilk."

"Well, if I find one, I'll be sure to remember that, so thank you."

"Oh? But can you call yourself a man if you truly fell from a ravine when you were foolish enough to stray so close to? Or maybe that's what makes you a man in the first place?"

"Glad to see that my doctor has such a lovely bedside manner."

"How could I resist when I have such an accommodating patient?"

"Accommodating! I didn't know that was in the brettish peasant vocabulary?"

"I thought it would fit perfectly well with the tastes of the foolish and clumsy foreigner words."

Lyle was fully grinning now, an expression that Ave was now reciprocating, the ice thoroughly smashed apart by the two of them through a series of barbed insults that both knew the other didn't truly mean. After the latest one, Lyle couldn't help but let out a few chuckles that he quickly reigned in, thanks in small part due to the tremors of his chest causing his legs to move to his suffering.

"Back home, we say that laughter is the best medicine. In this case, I'd ask for you to reign that in for my sake."

"I make no promises...unless you tell me how you fell off that ravine."

"You strike a hard bargain."

Folding her hands under her chest, Ave tilted her head. "That's my price for not letting the wolves gnaw on your bones…or that white crow that was circling over your body."

Lyle was taken aback. "Seriously? A white crow sizing up my meat?"

Ave nodded. "Only reason I found you. The damn bird was cawing up such a storm that I felt I had to see why if nothing else but for my own sanity and curiosity."

White crows weren't something Lyle thought was an actual thing until now…then again, neither were the undead, bath water-sipping knights that legitimately got stronger from it, along with dwarves, beastmen, and god knows what else. The realization that this buck-toothed peasant girl just possibly saved him from not only getting an infection but his eyes getting pecked out made the young necromancer realize just how fortunate he was to survive or even just come out of that fall with all of his limbs attached.

Now that he thought about it, he was lucky that he had the forethought to get out that fight ali-

…Fuck…the fight!

Freddy! Wendel! SHIT!

In his hazy wakeup and being focused on the state of his legs, the girl in front of him, and his Nikes almost getting nicked by two greedy peasants, the consequences of Lyle's own blunders in the battle were now starting to catch up to his mind all at once.

I lost…I lost the fight cause I got too cocky. I didn't listen to Freddy, and everyone else like I damn well should have. Worry wormed its way into the earth native's mind as the worst-case scenario started permeating in his eyes. A complete collapse of the Barrow Legion's army. The necromancers getting slaughtered to a man. People like Freddy and Wendel dying because of his own hubris…The promises of a new Bretonnia to Rudy become nothing but words.

All because he didn't believe in the hype of the grail knights and the very real goddess that backed them.

Freddy warned him, and he ignored her, leaving the woman and the others to suffer for his incompetence.

A wave of revulsion and panic began to hammer inside Lyle's heart. Not again. He couldn't let people who counted on him down like that again. Not like this. Not when there were literal lives at stake once more.

His breathing began to get erratic. Images of Freddy and the others getting burned at the stake like witches in Salem filled his mind. If he got run off by those knights, what chance did they have? Did any of them even make it out of the battle?

Why didn't I think about this the moment I woke up!?

His panicked musings were halted when familiar yet irritating pain lanced up his right leg, courtesy of Ave fiddling with his bandages. Hissing in pain, the brettish peasant snorts. "If you would prefer I just not check to see if your leg needs to be cut off or not, you can just let me know."

Lyle was half-tempted to say something smart, but his recent thoughts smothered the embers of his good humor, causing him only to wince as the peasant fiddled with his splints and bandages.

He needed to get back to the battle-no. That would be suicide. Lyle controlled his breathing for a moment, while Ave was blissfully unaware of the sudden inner turmoil of her patient, the leader of the Barrow Legion considered the facts.

If Freddy were smart, she would retreat when the going went to shit. Maybe she would have to sacrifice their meatshield zombies and some of their skeletons, it could be done. But, how would they have been able to outrun the cavalry?…the very cavalry that was momentarily focused on Lyle himself!

Which meant that there was a chance. A chance that his legion could live to fight another day and possibly retreat back to Karak Ziflin suddenly alleviated the growing anxiety rising within the young man.

But how many losses would they sustain in a retreat? Did they lose any necromancers in the chaos? How long was Lyle himself able to distract those knights?

The earth native shook his head. There was no point in delving into what-ifs and what could be. The only way he was going to find out was if he went and found the state of this shit show himself.

In truth, he knew right away he didn't need this homely-looking gal to fix up his legs. An invocation of Nehek could solve his walking problem right away. The true problem was that he wasn't entirely sure how his 'doctor' would react to this. From what he'd seen and what Freddy had told him, performing necromancy was the equivalent of practicing a paganistic sacrifice ritual back home, so maybe it would be wise to wait until he was alone and leave the scene quickly.

Speaking of which, that evoked a different kind of question. "Would you have enough bedside manner to tell me where I am, Lady Ave?"

"I'm no lady. And you're in the village of Riffen…though, if you were to ask anyone outside of Riffen, it'd be that pimple near Castle Bastonne."

Lyle felt his eyes widen. "I'm…that close to the castle of the dukedom, huh?"

Ave rolled her eyes. "Oh yes, we get the privilege of being within a hair's breadth of our mighty lord's great fortress, which literally lords over us in every way you can think of."

"Sounds like the struggle is real."

"Yes. The struggle very much is real…though you sound surprised to be so close?"

"Did I?"

"You did…I mean, the reason you're here is to visit the castle in the first place, is it not?"

Lyle felt his palms get sweaty. "What gives you that idea?"

"You don't look nearly as poorly fed or inbred as my fellow peasants and me, and don't smell nearly as bad either. Didn't have any supplies or money on you, but maybe someone nicked you before you fell…speaking of which, you still haven't told me how that happened, or your name for that matter."

I probably won't if I can help it. "Sorry. I get a little tightlipped when people try to nick my Nikes."

"Nikes?"

"Brand of my shoes. People who made them."

Ave tilted her head curiously. "Are they…some kind of dwarven guild?"

Now THAT got Lyle's own curiosity. From his conversations with Rudy and other peasants he'd met up until this point, they seemed pretty darn ignorant of other races outside of their own, except for those who had been in military service. They simply weren't that worldly on account of them being attached to the land that they were born in, and Lyle had yet to see a woman so much as lift a weapon in Brettonia since he got her.

So how would this girl know about Dwarven Guilds? Even he barely knew who they were, thanks to a lovely conversation with a particular dwarf he was secretly planning on bedding.

Instead of making her more suspicious through specific questions, Lyle decided to humor her. "Nah. Human guild."

"From the Empire?"

"Nope. From my home country in the U.S. of A."

"I was wonderin' why you didn't sound imperial."

Ave was only further confirming his suspicions with that comment. Just who was this girl? Maybe I should be a bit bolder with my questioning. Then again, my objective shouldn't be to get her to be more suspicious of me and vice versa, and it's to get out of dodge immediately and see if my fuck up didn't sink the legion. Better to maybe let some mysteries die.

While Lyle pondered on what to say next to avoid raising any red flags, the tent's flap opened again. For a moment, the earth native thought that it was those malformed opportunists, but to his surprise, it was a child.

A child with one eye, sandy-colored hair, and rags. On the other side of his face, where there should have been another eye, was nothing but skin, as if there was never an eye there, to begin with. It took Lyle a great deal of self-control not to recoil in horror at such a deformity.

"Lady Ave?" The boy couldn't have been more than six, his voice barely above a whisper which nonetheless drew the attention of the worldly peasant.

Giving Lyle a glance for a moment, she moved to the boy and knelt next to them toward the tent entrance. A series of words were exchanged, far too low for Lyle to hear, but the result was the same. Once their conversation was done, Ave quickly turned to her patient. "Somethin's come up. This lil' one will keep ya company till' I'm back."

"Something? Come on now, you really gonna keep in suspense?"

Ave shrugged while smirking knowingly. "It's only fair, wouldn't you agree?"

Dammit, she has me there. If he could keep secrets, why couldn't she? Worse, since she wasn't leaving him alone, he couldn't give his legs a quick fix without this kid at least crying foul. Who knew how many people were waiting for him outside this tent? If there was anything, he learned from his ill-fated feast, underestimating a bunch of violent peasants was a quick way to the grave.

Sighing, Lyle gave a shrug of his own. "You're my doctor."

"Relax, foreigner. I may not be a follower of Shallya, but I'll not leave you suffering for long."

Lyle had no idea who Shallya was, but if this woman was aspiring to be one, she definitely could take lessons in the bedside manner department, in his opinion. Especially when she immediately vacated the tent without another word.

Very bold of her to leave me with a child…then again, she's assuming that I can't even walk right now, so there's that.

That and this kid hardly looked afraid of Lyle. Again though, why be fearful of a cripple. For all they knew, he was a foreigner who was dumb enough to fall off a ravine and miraculously survive…but perhaps they found that specifically suspicious.

"How'd you fall?" The child asked bluntly, staring at Lyle with a curious intensity that the young necromancer found disconcerting.

"Kid, didn't your mom ever tell you it was rude to ask a question without introducing yourself?"

"I'unno. She died during a beastmen raid. Didn't get to ask her."

The fact that the kid just said it matter-of-factly set a chill down Lyle's spine, especially with how unaffected they were by Lyle's lack of tact. It made the earth native swallow at the blatant admission of brutality that was so casually accepted around here.

"...sorry bou't that."

"Bout what?"

Deciding not to pursue this awkward line of conversation that Lyle was becoming increasingly uncomfortable with, he decided to approve and just answer the kid's question…as honestly as he could. "Got into a fight with someone," Lyle admitted. "Someone I thought I could beat in a straight-up fight when I didn't realize I had no chance, to begin with…"

"The person you were fightin' through you off?" The kid asked with fascination, leaning forward with childlike curiosity.

Lyle snorted to himself, shaking his head in mirth. "I wish." Scratching his head in embarrassment, he couldn't bring himself to embellish too much to the child. "I kinda just ran from him…and accidentally ran off the edge of the ravine."

"That sounds dumb." The kid bluntly admitted. "You sound dumb."

Oof. The worst part was that Lyle couldn't must an argument to refute his claim, right away, before coughing to himself and weakly smiling. "Maybe. But, I would say that my fight with him wasn't a complete failure. The fact that I survived means I live to fight another day."

"Maybe just to lose another day."

"You don't have much subtlety, do ya, do you kid?"

"Don't know what subtlety means. But, it doesn't change that you're kinda dumb."

Lyle stared at the kid, eyebrow raised but smile on his face. "Well, I'm still alive, aren't I?"

"Ave said you might never walk again."

"I'm a pretty fast healer. I think I'll stomp my feet on the ground soon enough, like in the past."

"If you say so, dummy."

He certainly doesn't pull back his punches…but maybe I can capitalize on that. "Y'know what, kid? Maybe I am a dummy…so much of a dummy that you can enlighten me a bit?"

"...Enlighten?"

"Teach me. Give me the lay of the land to speak."

The one-eyed child looked away. "I'm not that much smarter than a dummy like you. Only barely."

Lyle smirked. "Barely is still better than nothing where I come from. I mean that girl, Ave who was just hear. You can tell she's pretty smart."

Now he had the kid's attention, who was staring at him with interest. "Ave's nice."

"Smart too. Worldly girl, I can tell. Plus, she's not like your average peasant. I can tell she's been around the block."

"...what do you mean?"

"Well, I mean… I'm sure you've noticed, just from how much she knows. Just before you came in, she was talking about dwarves, this empire I've heard so much about. She does a lot more traveling, I'm guessing, than the average peasant. Or maybe I'm just off-

In a quick moment, the one-eyed boy darted forward to Lyle, brandishing a knife and holding it against the necromancer's throat, causing his eyes to widen and his body to stiffen.

Neither of them said a word. Lyle felt his breathing stop and wondered what he said wrong to put himself in this predicament on earth.

"Ave told me to watch you…so I'll watch you." the child said his one eye hardening. "Say that kind of talk of her leaving this village outside of this tent, and I'll watch you bleed out on the cow shit we shovel in this village."

…

For a peasant to leave their village without the order of their liege lord was a death wish for all who even entertained such an idea.

For someone like Ave, it was as easy as breathing, especially since Riffen's liege lord was more absent than anyone would openly admit. That and she knew that nobody in the village would snitch on her if given the chance.

…well of them anyways.

A few miles away from the village, Ave spotted a short tree stump, and quickened her previously leisurely pace through the small forest that she had skulked into. Once she had reached the stump, she simply sat on top of it, folding her hands and patiently waiting until she was satisfied.

Her satisfaction was met when without even so much as rustling the leaves a figure broke the sunlight that was coming through the leaves and trees. It was an immense man whose body was covered in a dark green rustic tunic and cape. The muscles of his body was easily apparent through these clothes as well as the thick beard and moustache that was on his face. His brow seemed to be set in a perpetual frown as he strode forward silently, with the skill of a predator.

Ave called out to the large man as he came closer toward her. "So the graverobbers lost then?"

The large man nodded. "That they did. From what I heard from our countrymen, Our esteemed duke goaded the leader of the barrow legion into some sort of duel and prevailed."

Ave rolled her eyes. "Just as the lady willed it I'm sure. Also what kind of fool would this necromancer be to challenge one of the best and renowned grail knights in all of the realm?"

"He couldn't have been that foolish. He did manage to overthrow Artois."

"Or just lucky." Ave grunted. It was criminal that she and her fellow peasants couldn't have been that lucky themselves. "This was the same necromancer spouting off that garbage about liberating us, was it not?"

"The very one." The large man nodded, leaning against a nearby tree. "Bertrand hasn't had enough time to see if any of this is true, but it's a necromancer, so…"

"So trust them as much as you would trust the average Brettonian lordling, got it…but I doubt you hear just to give me the results of yet another of our duke's glorious victories, Hugo."

The muscular, bulky man was silent for a moment, seemingly glaring off into the distance. Ave was about to ask him again until Hugo suddenly put two fingers to his lips and gave off a trio of quick whistles, folding his arms and leaning back against his tree, glaring.

Ave was about to speak once more but found herself frantically drawing a knife when a figure suddenly dropped between herself and Hugo Le Petit. She realized immediately that it was an elf, and for a moment, she thought it was a female elf, given how lithe they seemed, along with the long blonde hair with sprinkles of leaves and vines that came cascading down their back.

They wore a dark green vest and pants with a quiver of arrows strapped to their back. There were several knives attached around their hip, including near their calf, which allowed Ave to see that the elf was barefoot but that their toenails seemed almost sharp along with the nails on their fingers, giving this individual an almost feral appearance.

Seeing the elf gaze upon her with onyx black eyes that seemed to be both analyzing and looking down upon her in the typical elven fashion allowed Alve to see that his vest was open, which gave the view of his bare chest, showing that the chances of him being her was severely low.

"Tell her what you told me." Hugo grunted, looking away from the pair.

Ave, however, spoke before the elf did. "You didn't tell me you had contacts within that forest."

"Don't tell you a lot of things, much like you don't tell me a lot of things."

Ave felt her cheeks flush. "I tell you enough!"

The elf spoke this time, his voice bordering on melodious and androgynous but no less cutting and biting. "Did you tell him about the deal you had struck with a group of orcs from Massif Orcal?"

Ave's eyes widened, and her breathing hitched. Her gaze darted toward Hugo, who couldn't hide the disappointment on his face.

The peasant was quick to defend both herself and the people of Riffin. "It was either that or be butchered. I told you before, Lord Bastien was withdrawing more and more of his protection from us, and you lot couldn't come soon enough, so we had to take matters into our hands!"

The elf spoke once more, the gaze unimpressed. "Those very same orcs are coming to your village now, with over a thousand of their kind to reduce your hovel to ash."

Ave felt her mouth dry for a moment, an unpleasant feeling settling in her stomach. "You lie." she said almost on instinct. "Elvish lies, like my mom sai-

"He brought one of their heads Ave." Hugo grunted. "They're coming. They'll be at Riffen in half a day."

Dread was filling in the peasent girl. "Why?"

"Grom the Paunch." The elf answered. "The orc you've been dealing with, Ugbar Toof Toller, is trying to gather up a Waaaagh to dethrone him. To do that, he needs the support of goblins, and to do that, he needs teeth…or teef as those brutish, simple-minded green beasts like to call it."

"But…we give him plenty-

"And he's become impatient. He knows Lord Bastien cares not for you and your peoples' safety and wants to…cash in to speak on all of the teeth you have to offer. From there, he's hoping to become the new head boss in Massif Orcal. Whether he'll succeed is up for debate, but he's coming nonetheless."

Ave looked frantically toward Hugo, whose look of disappointment became that of sympathy. "I only have about thirty brigands with me. Not nearly enough to turn the tide of battle, however…if you could perhaps get everyone to flee-

"That would be a death sentence, and you know it! If not by the orcs who could outrun most of us by miles, then by the knights who would have us strung up for leaving our village! Bastien would love nothing more than to be rid of us!"

"The fact that you humans are willing to allow one another to be butchered by orcs speaks volumes of your kind's worth." The elf sniped.

"Say that again, elf!"

"I'll say a thousand times across multiple generations through you short-lifers, but I know it will make little difference. Whether you flee or run, my part here is done. He then nodded toward the larger human before turning away. "I've held my end of the bargain. What you do with it is your concern."

With surprising agility, the elf leaped up on top of a branch, climbing from tree to tree until he began hurtling himself toward the direction that, hopping from tree to tree with a litheness and speed that only someone of his kind could accomplish.

"What…what deal did you strike with him!?" Ave nearly shouted, her eyes ablaze with panic and fury. "What's going on, Hugo-

"Focus less on the minds of elves and focus on something you can do, lass, like helping your people right here and now. Me and my boys can help organize a retreat-

"Did you not hear what I said earlier? We can't outrun them! Whether it's knights or greenskins, we'll be cut down either way!"

"Then I'll go and make something of this mess myself if needed. You can sulk here if you want, but my boys and I will be going."

Gnashing her teeth together, Ave felt herself shaking. "...if you and Bertrand had come sooner with more of his brigands like I asked…this wouldn't even be happening. So many of my own kind wouldn't have missing teeth as we speak."

For a moment, Hugo said nothing, he turned away for a moment, not answering, before sighing deeply.

"Well, we're doing something about it now girl. My question stands here, or sulk if you want. We're here."

Without uttering another word, the bulky man moved forward with speed that was impressive for his size through the forest.

Ave seemed like she wanted to say more but ultimately settled for grinding her teeth and then moving to follow him back toward her village.

A/N: So just as a note, I've created an uploaded an updated version of chapter 1. I didn't change too much, as I just added new content to give better context to the story going forward, as well as fixing many grammatical errors.

Also thanks for the reviews, I greatly appreciated them thus far. I'll respond to some of them when I post my next chapter, and I want to especially shout out Potatofarmer 42 for their review. That gave me the swift kick in the ass that I needed to get this story into gear, and trust me, business picks up a lot in the next chapter as we see more fallout from Lyle's defeat. Keep laying out those reviews and I'll see you guys next time!