One Moo'r Plow

There was only mild interest as I lumbered into the Verdant dawn’s camp, nearly bissected body slung over my shoulder and covered in blood. Many gazes turned to me, only a few stayed. Movement flowed all around me, headed in random directions as armored figures swarmed like ants. Uneasy gaps were left between the green liveries of the baron’s men and the many-coloured mercenaries of the Verdant Dawn. Tension’s sickly sweet scent poked through the odour of blood that engulfed my form, in part due to my own wounds.

Mostly contributed by the cadaver over my shoulder.

I passed vaguely familiar faces as I stomped through the camp, searching for their commander. People who had perhaps introduced themselves to me, but who’s names I had forgotten. Their faces however, those I remembered.

The spunky woman who had brashly told me to slow down with the walls stood off to the side, a lone still figure in a sea of constant movement. Her arms crossed, she regarded me with a hidden expression. People parted before me on the merit of my size alone, yet few bothered to stare.

I had just carried a dead body into this camp, and nobody could be bothered to care.

Raffnyk’s eyebrows raised and he grunted a greeting as I dumped the carcass before him. The man’s helmet was sitting lopsided on a table, serving it’s grand purpose as a paperweight. One hand rose to greet me, a feeble gesture from an otherwise slumped posture.

“I would inquire where that corpse was made,” he grunted and waved around. “But you can see that I have other matters at the forefront of my limited attention.”

“Good morning to you too.” I picked up a full cup of liquid, smelled wakebrew gone cold and handed it to him. The man sighed, looked at it with loathing writ on his face and drained it all with a single gulp.

“Any more of that vile shitewater and I’m going to throw up. There is also the distinct possibility my heart will explode.”

“Coincidentally,” I grunted and looked around. “When was the last time you slept.”

There was a pause in movement, halfway through the task of turning over another page, quill frozen in midair.

“That is a splendid question.”

There was no further answer, only the sound of paper nearly being stabbed through as his hand descended.

“Sometime before that dwarf teleported in, screamed about an awakened dungeon, stole a horse and fled.”

“And then disaster saw fit to visit its presence upon me once more. Apex at the peak. Dungeon entrance revealed and promptly half-buried, monsters getting out. Abominations. Elf’s up there right now, reshaping the landscape so we can erect proper defenses and attempt to entrap whatever spills out. Worst is yet to come.”

He spoke in a fast, blunt tone, little emotion in his words.

“Laughed when that tiefling told us there was a dungeon up the slope. No merriment about it now.”

He finally took some interest in the corpse at my feet and leaned forward for a better view.

“Anyone I’d know?’

With a sigh and a seat taken on a very flimsy chair, I relayed the ambush and following events as best I could. Raffnyk listened diligently throughout, scribbling words on a fresh sheet of parchment as I talked. Eventually, words ended as I reach the conclusion of my recollection. He nodded, half-stood and spat at the corpse.

“To the pits with him and all his ilk. Scum.” Tired as he was, there was venom in the otherwise friendly man’s voice.

“Word of the dungeon spread this quickly?’ I grunted.

“Possible. But this isn’t right next to some bustling city. Could be he was nearby and heard.” He paused again and glared flatly at the corpse. “Could be he was on his way to this camp to try his luck on us. Fate is never certain in the presence of these lunatics.”

“Keep whatever armaments and relics there are on this body. The kill was yours, and the world is better for it. No one will dispute it.”

“You just believe me?”

A sigh dragged itself from Raffnyk’s throat as he flipped over a stack of paper and revealed a rounded stone beneath. It glowed with a soft viridian sheen. Beautiful as it was, I could not see how it was relevant to the situation.

“Truthseer stone.” he grunted. “I’ve dealt with so much possible deceit, lies of omission, false promises and other forms of hogwash that I’ve given up on otherwise guaging the truth and its nuances. Any official or person in place of importance will have one of these discreetly tucked away. The presence of lies causes it to fade and die. What I know of you aside, this is the brightest it’s been in the past several days.”

Well that explained several things.

“Understand that perhaps this is perhaps the best news I have received all day. That and not having to deal with that blood-thirsty monstress Ironmoor keeps in his employ. Insofar, she has been mercifully absent from all these proceedings and I am instead dealing with his slightly less arrogant guard-captains.”

He gestured, and my gaze followed his hand. Outside the camp, soldiers were hewing down tress en masse, all headed up the mountainside. Teams of horses carted lumber, and where they were not enough, the soldiers did it themselves.

“We require walls. Stakes. Trenches. Pits. Traps. The entire area around the dungeon’s maw must be sealed off, fenced in and watched at all times. The bulk of our forces will be moved up the mountain to be stationed on full guard.”

He gestured back into the camp, and I watched heavily armored and armed groups moving in and out of the open gates.

“As we speak, all of my killteams are conducting wide-scale operations on and around the peak. With the Apex mercifully absent after fleeing the dungeon, we must scour the area of all monstrous life. With the dungeon’s threat, there can be no other distractions.”

He slumped back, sweat wiped off his face as the afternoon sun broiled down.

“And here I endure. Endless reports, paperwork, reassurances to superiors, gauging our inventory, ordering fresh supplies, requesting help from adjacent orders, trying to find godsblasted healing supplies anywhere, gathering provisions, trying to find blacksmiths to move here so I might repair weapons and armor for my men and women. Sending letters begging for more coin before we run dry.”

He stopped halfway through a sentence and looked up at me.

“Healing.” His tone became somewhat excited. “That milk you sold to my troops. That could heal wounds. I’ll take your entire stock and every ounce you can give me. Now. Double anyone else’s offer.”

I winced at that.

“I am, unfortunately, currently dry. Used it all.”

The hope left his face and some vestige of buried emotion crept up as Raffnyk struggled to control himself.

“I can, however, produce more at a consistent rate.” I reassured him. The human grunted, pulled a bag of coins from beneath the table and slid them across to me.

“Down payment. Get me as much as you can, as soon as possible. I have more faith in you than that wretched alchemist.”

“Alchemist?” I queried, and followed a quivering finger towards a large tent halfway across the camp.

“Forgot his name. Some royal alchemist of other balderdash from Hullbretch. Promised me as many Fleshknitters as I could I pay for, hasn’t produced anything yet. I swear on Itlayis’s benevolent name that if cannot bring me results soon I’ll have him driven up the mountain buck naked and covered in tar.”

That was a harsh promise, but I knew Raffnyk to be a man of his word, for better or worse.

“I will go see if I cannot help resolve this issue.” I promised and stood. Raffnyk thanked me, then glanced between me and the body lying before his table.

“I’d offer you a bag to carry that, but we are also in perilously short supply of those. Leave him here, and I’ll have on of mine strip the goods from him and bundle them up for your convenience.”

With a nod of thanks in return, I lumbered across the camp, eyes locked on the large grey tent he had indicated. A small, bald man who I recognized as the resident alchemist of Hullbretch was within, in an argument with a much larger, burlier man I assumed was said quartermaster. Try as I might, I could not remember his name, so I simply skirted around that issue.

A hand clapped on the man’s shoulder caused him to startle as I gazed down at him.

“We meet again.” I rumbled as his irritability turned to fright and back to relief.

“God’s Above, you are the face I had hoped to see!”

“Minotaur.” The quartermaster grunted from behind folded arms. I had never met the man, but it seemed my reputation preceded me. Or the man had simply made a very astute observation as to my species.

“What troubles are present here?”

The short man threw his arms up in frustration as he began to recount to me all his woes, his ideas on how proper supply chains should be run, and lack of any potential ingredients or regents for him to create fleshknitters with.

Through it all, the quartermaster simply shrugged, his face set in stone and expression disinterested.

“And what do you need to rectify this issue?” I cut him off midway through another rant. “Rather than expound upon your woes and how they affect your life, propose to me a solution.”

“Well, I was just getting to that,” He huffed. “But that acid you sold to me. Wonderous thing. With the proper tools, I could extract and make several more batches of fleshknitter drafts from its compounds.”

“So you need more of it?”

“Well, yes. But I imagine something in that stock must be exceptionally rare and difficult to acquire. It was extracted from monsters, was it not?”

“Let’s go with that.” I nodded. “I may perhaps have more on hand, and a way to produce even more in the future.”

“The god’s Above I’ll take all that you can give me!” He all but crowed.

“...Today, perhaps?” He continued.

“Fine.” I grunted. “Have the coin ready upon my return.”

Problem resolved, I turned and strode back to Raffnyk. True to his word, there was a sack that shifted and clanked next to a half-naked corpse upon my return. Efficient.

“The loot is yours.” he grunted after I had explained his supply issue could be rectified soon. Well, one of them. “I would chat for a while longer, but I have so much on my plate, and this mess has only yet begun.”

I pitied him, I really did. But no force between heaven and earth could make me take his place. With a farewell, I took my bag and set off.

Not a dozen steps had passed when someone yelled at me.

“Minotaur!” The orc I remembered as Stonefang beckoned me closer. He reeked of blood, sweat and tiredness as I approached. Open wounds glistened sickeningly over his wound as he stood, leaned against a wooden post.

“Money to be made for one of your talents.” he grunted as I drew near. “Killteams would be glad to have one of your kind among their ranks right now.”

He spoke true. Battle was Garek’s element. The heat of combat, the thrill of slaughter. I suspected the coin would be secondary in motivation if the old soul was still within this body.

But not mine. I sadly shook my head, told him I had other things to take care and set off back down the mountain, his eyes on my back until I had left the camp.

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