Hit Them Where It Hurts

Grande. A peninsula located at the northernmost corner of the great continent, Alphyggdra. Surrounded by vast bodies of water, the land expanses of Grande were covered mostly with trees and foliage. Shaped like an egg, it was connected to the mainland via a bottleneck that was surrounded by bays on its opposite sides.

The road system of this land was also pretty simple. Starting from the entrance to the land, the road traveled straight right until the center and then branched into three more directions. It became a crossroad situated right at the peninsula's center and each of the four directions leads to different notable locations.

Towards the south, the area around the bottleneck stood a mighty fort that controlled the entry and exit from the peninsula. It was named Fort Benning, with the new lord named Klein Gora at its helm.

Built near the sea, a village was situated on the eastern side of the peninsula. Its perimeter was surrounded by tall wooden logs that acted as its walls. Fishing at the sea, foraging for nature's blessings in the wild, and planting seasonal crops were the main sources of living here.

To the west was a broken sanctuary, a temple of some sort from the old times. Nobody knows when it was built, nor who was responsible for it. It was mainly used as a campsite for foragers and trappers in the woods, a safe shelter to pass the night.

Lastly, towards the north was the familiar hill with a cave at its footing. Once a coal mine, the new lord started to convert it into a prison. That was until recently when it got obliterated under a greenskin raid.

A day and a half has passed since that raid on the Prison Grande. The place was still in ruins, both flies and ravens litter the place full of decaying corpses. But on that expanse of time, several developments have already happened outside.

On the night right after the raid, the warden lost track of the stranger he was after so he altered his course and went straight to Fort Benning. He informed his lord Klein of the situation and received immediate treatment there.

The village folks who escaped from the prison and returned to the village were nowhere to be found. Their homesteads were left empty. Traces of urgency of leaving can be found in every household - some even left the food on their tables untouched, pieces of cloth left lying on the street, open doors and windows, and much more.

Several dead bodies of guards can be found all around the village. Their uniforms indicated their affiliation to Fort Benning, soldiers under the leadership of the fort's lord.

The presence of greenskins has also risen on the patches of wood on the entire peninsula. As their voidgate remained undiscovered, the threat of the impending destruction they brought only escalated in time.

On the first morning after the raid at the prison, the forces stationed at the fort finally made their move. Several groups of soldiers were sent out to scout the possible locations of the voidgate. But at the end of the day, only blind skirmishes and ambushes can be recorded under their progress, aside from a few cases of unfortunate casualties.

Now, back in the present - the sun tickled the land with its early morning light. On a small clearing in the middle of the woods somewhere on the eastern side of the peninsula, the second morning after the prison raid...

*** Hit Them Where It Hurts ***

"Fallen Leaf Art: Necro-Sylvan Conjuration."

A black-haired young man chanted as he stood at the center of goblin bodies on the ground. All of their head was either blunted with deep cracks or pierced with short knives.

A few seconds has passed after the young man said that. His body remained still on that spot as if he was waiting for something to happen. "It still won't work," he uttered to himself.

At his back was also another young man. The morning wind brushed through his white hair which made it dance around. Crouched near the dead bodies of the goblins, he retrieved every single knife planted at the top of their heads. The ones scattered on the ground were also included and all of the weapons he collected were put away on a thick sack made of animal hide.

As he picked up the last knife, he noticed that the material the blade was crafted into wasn't metal, but a sharp flint. Several crude daggers he collected were also made this way. This idea made him think of something inside his head. The black-haired one noticed him lost in deep thought, so he asked him what was up.

"What are you thinking right now, Shiva?"

"A lot... actually."

"We can spare the time to talk about it. It's not like we're rushing things here," Leif said as he sat down at the top of a goblin's cadaver like a stool.

"That's one thing I was also thinking about. Even though you said we're not rushing things, I feel like we've done a lot in just one and a half days."

"Uhuh... Why do you think so?"

"Well... First things first, we scouted the perimeter of the prison back there - in the middle of the night."

"Yes, so we can secure that place to rest for the night. You don't know if there was a second wave after that one."

"Except when we finished, we didn't rest right after that as you filled my head all night long with your battlefield sermons."

"Yes. I can see you've listened well yourself - following a lot of things that I've said. You're definitely growing stronger in a lot of aspects now."

Halted by his words, a subtle smile manifested at Shiva's lips - his spirits felt a little rejuvenated at Leif's praise.

"Thank you for that, but that's not what I'm trying to say here."

"Go on then," Leif said - his attention solely focused on what Shiva was talking about.

"We went to the village early in the morning yesterday and saw everyone wasn't there - except the dead bodies of fort guards who monitored the place."

"Well... The absence of the boats on the docks might mean they have already escaped - somewhere not here," Leif answered his statement, but Shiva couldn't help but continue worrying for the village folks.

"Uhuh... That might also be true but..."

"It's not like worrying for them will help them now, wherever they are. The best thing you could do now is to pray for their safety, right?"

Enlightened, Shiva nodded his head with Leif's advice.

"Also, we have almost scouted the northern half of the land - and we did that in just a day!" exclaimed Shiva as his sense of absolute disbelief filled his words

"Mhmm... pretty slow in my opinion, considering the amount of roaming goblins we encountered along the process."

"That too! I think we might have killed almost three dozen of them yesterday."

"Because if we won't, then they'll take the initiative to control the land. That's an environment I wouldn't want to put you in considering you're still familiarizing yourself in the battlefield."

"Is that so?" Deep inside, Shiva felt guilty for some reason as he heard what Leif had said.

"Don't worry now. See that blade in your hand?" Leif's hand pointed at the flint knife resting on Shiva's hands.

"Yes. I'm also wondering about this earlier. This group of goblins has four of them. But on our prior encounters with them yesterday, they didn't use these knives."

"What do you think?" Leif posed him a question.

"They're improvising... they're pretty intelligent to do so..."

"Yes. Goblins may not be strong, but they are no fools either. They're cunning - that blade is a proof of it."

"Then aren't we in trouble if this fight goes on?"

"I don't think so. It's quite the opposite."

"Why?" Confused, Shiva was clueless as to why Leif was thinking so positively about it.

"Once, they were equipped with weapons of metal - but we killed a number of them and robbed those weapons off of them yesterday. Their resources are now depleting - so they're now resolving to use such crude tools. Our hard work yesterday is now paying off. Since this is just a skirmish in a small area - resources are something scarce here."

Shiva's eyes widen at Leif's claim - they brimmed with shock of his knowledge. But Leif was still yet finished stating his thoughts.

"If you do look at it, this battle is just a game of resources. The ones who are going to benefit the most from this would be the forces at the fort you mentioned to me last time. The guards who we spotted yesterday were them right?"

"Yes, I'm sure of it," Shiva confirmed.

"Right. As we took out in play the quality of weapons the goblins had, we successfully tipped the balance of advantage to them."

"I didn't think of that far..." said Shiva as he glanced at the flint knife he was holding on.

"What if they went back to the prison? Won't they scavenge that place for weapons again?" Shiva asked him.

"Don't worry. When you were sound asleep the night we stayed there, I hid every weapon I could find at that place."

"You what...? How could you think that far ahead?"

"It was a plan I devised from the beginning. Afterall... To do something that would irritate the enemy is something I like to do." Shiva remembered a similar scenario happened - the one involving the stranger as they hid under the table.

"Somehow, I'm feeling a mix of emotions seeing how great you've been doing until now. I've thought of you as an easy-going person back then but..."

"How rude of you... I can also get serious when I put my mind on something, you know." Leif grumpily responded. Shiva remembered how deadly Leif could get once serious - like that on the goblins inside the cave. Unnerved, his first thought was to clear his message that Leif misunderstood.

"No, I didn't mean to offend you... It just feels so different to me to see you in another light."

"Hmm... I'll take that as a compliment then."

Leif stood up, his hand held the silver compass pointing towards the west.

"Where to?" Shiva asked him as he lifted the sack of weapons behind his back.

"West again... The compass points there often..." Leif's brows met in the middle. Curious, he paused for a moment to draw another conclusion that he kept inside his head.

"It told us every time the location where a group of goblins are... What a strange compass indeed," Shiva commented on Leif's tool.

"As long as it points me to somewhere interesting, I won't complain however strange it may be."

TAP!

The compass closed, its purpose for today was already fulfilled. It gave the two their destination for the day - towards the west.

"Are we going to do the same yesterday?"

"Yes. Avoid the guards, kill the goblins. Collect every tool on the battlefield then hide it somewhere."

"Hit and run, got it," confirmed Shiva as he tied around a black bandana on his head.

"Yes. Hit and run."

The sun had already risen by the time the two decided to go and continue their endeavor. Like a third force acting independently between Fort Benning and the goblins, the two roamed the land siding neither with the two.

A two-man force who hunted those who once struck them first.

"Come Shiva..."

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"Let's hit them where it hurts."