The sound of drums filled the air. Not the happy beating of festivity, nor the slow march of a funeral procession, there had admittedly been very few of those.
It was the sound of alarm, filling the air. And for a few moments almost nobody in town recognized it. Why should they?
The only time they had been attacked was by thieves come to fatten their own purses at the expense of others. Like merchants, but less savory.
Or was that the other way around?
No sieges had ever come to town, no ambushes, and their only other moment of panic had been when the forest giant had blundered into their traps, and neglected, had passed away in captivity.
The great beast had first been spotted by some fisherman. Bluescreen had been among them, spearfishing in the shallows by the estuary, and had seen the great beast surface out among the waves. The first few were not sure they had seen anything at all, so swiftly did the beast dive back down into the water. But Bluescreen had seen and had raced up the seawall for a better vantage point. From the height he could see the powerful beast swimming back and forth in the ocean near them.
He had, of course, sounded the alarm. The ripples in the water disappeared momentarily as something below caught the great beasts attention before it came back up in a rush of spray, cresting the surface like some primordial beast from a time before history. It's jaws snapped at a fish, catching it with lightning fast speed and swallowing it mostly whole. The rippling scales of the dragon shimmered in the sunlight, blue and green. Barnacles were attached to the creature along it's back, but the great serpentine belly was nearly pristine and shimmered in the late afternoon sun.
A great bellow escaped the beast as something else caught it's attention and it dove and broke the surface again near the southern seawall. It swam along it's length, as if investigating this curious addition and broached land on the shelf near the northern seawall, waves and spray crashing up against the hewn stone of the wall itself. Had it wanted to the beast could undoubtedly torn the wall itself asunder. But there was little reason to. The entire city lay open, cradling the estuary from the land side and the sea was the soft underbelly.
Both city guard patrols had formed a semblance of order and were positioned near the mouth of the estuary, not far from Deon's tavern. The roars of the beast sent most scrambling for cover. And shortly after a close inspection of the wall it rolled back into the ocean, in an immense splash and rapidly shot into the deep.
Bluescreen breathed a sigh of relief. Such a monster could easily have torn half the town asunder.
Another horn sounded from the southern wall and his gaze snapped up. The beast had made landfall and was exploring the landward side of the wall itself. There were people out there. Hunters, children, eager merchants.
He was torn. The guard was needed to protect the harbor. In an instant he decided and a call was put out for the heroes.
William was the first to answer. He was near the gate working out at the weight bench south of the barracks. Garrett was drilling the bowsquad on formations nearby.
The monk shot out the gate in a flash, leather armor creaking in the heat of the afternoon sun. The beast was spotted. A hunter had already taken a few shots at it and perhaps because it's brain couldn't comprehend the thought that something so small should defy a beast of it's magnitude, but the water dragon began heading away from the entrance. William gave chase but could not catch up to it. Out of the corner of his eye he spotted movement as he ran after the dragon.
A sudden tinny clanking filled his ears and a grinning Snu-Snu quickly outpaced him. She laughed as she ran by, hefting her greataxe.
"You must run faster little man! Or you will not catch us!"
The barbarian, almost miraculously, ran down the dragon as it was making for the open water again. She brought her greataxe down on it's tail, fully expecting to see the skin part and blood to flow. With a grunt and a dull thud the axe slid on the wet scales and only bruised the beast. With a sudden surprising ferocity the dragon turned and whipped out, slamming Snu-Snu to the ground. It's teeth streaked towards her but she rolled out of the way just in time. It occurred to her then that a beast used to eating anything under the sea would likely be able to bite her in half if it wanted to.
The dragon reared back again as she scrambled into a defensive posture, axe in front of her. The dragon lunged as she began her swing and almost miraculously she connected, bashing the dragon heavily in the head. The blow seemed to stun the dragon but to Snu-Snu's surprise the skin still had not given way. The armored hide was simply too tough. As the dragon struggled to regain it's bearings Snu-Snu tried raining blows on it but the dragons' tail lashed out and tripped her. The jaws clamped down on her leg, sharp teeth beginning to puncture when a sudden whistle-crack filled the air and a glass-tipped arrow shattered against the dragon's flank. Another arrow sped towards the beast's head and it was forced to dodge, the arrow glancing off the scaly skin.
And suddenly an ear-shattering yell split the air as the monk launched himself at the dragon wholeheartedly. William attacked it from behind, landing blow after blow in rapid succession. Individually the blows were insufficient to do little more than bruising, but between them, and another lucky shot in the head from Snu-Snu they managed to knock the beast unconcious temporarily. Glass and copper arrows fell like rocks from the sky, and axe and fist did what they could but few seemed to find their mark.
The beast regained conciousness and took a snap at William before trying to retreat towards the sea.
Furious at seeing her foe escaping the barbarian rushed in once more and in a scything motion bashed the water dragon in the head once more, knocking it down and disorienting it. The beast belched some vile smelling fluids and began to rise again but Snu-Snu was there and the dragon received the full force of the blow from the steel great-axe. The blow clearly did damage internally but did not break the skin so the barbarian tried again, and again. On the third fierce chop the neck finally gave way and Snu-Snu cleanly severed the head from the body, which thrashed and spurted translucent blackish-red blood all over.
She stood there and howled once, then looked at the others. Tired, sore, dripping in sweat and blood. And she grinned.
((Snu-Snu got the kill, and therefore the trophies. Assists awarded to William, who could simply not catch up with the dragon. And to Garrett (Along with some other unnamed hunters) Bluescreen, Snu-Snu gets the Dragon skull trophy and megabeast soul. Other rewards will be given by Count Innu.
Meph, here is an interesting tidbit. The water dragon corpse counts as a megabeast. The head, amusingly did not. It is possible to acquire more than normal from the beasts when body parts are severed. For example, it had two souls. A megabeast soul and a normal one (Since normal beasts have a soul attached to the head, which was disposed of in the butcher shop, while the dragon corpse had to be done in the cook guild.)
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Topic: ☼Choose your own adventure☼ Human Trade center (Read 14268 times)