<center>Dyleshar: The Taint
Chapter 1: The beginning</center>
A brown haired noble looked out his bedroom window at the town below. His deep Blue eyes staring intently at the scene below. He was prince Darwin of Relanguard and he was very deep in thought. A heavy rain was coming down causing the usual hustle of activity to come to a halt. Only the few desperate peddlers remained on the streets selling their goods in any condition. This rain had an ominous aura. Something was definitely going to happen. Suddenly his thoughts were shattered as a lone messenger charged down the path to the castle, blood flowing from an arrow wound in his shoulder that had not been treated for several hours. Darwin smiled, something had definitely happened.
He marched into the throne room with a heroic grace to find the ministers in distress. He hadn’t been the only one to see the messenger.
Then the great door flew open with a loud crack and the messenger walked in and muttered two words, “The goblins!” before collapsing on the ground.
Then they heard it faint at first but growing louder every second. The chittering cries of a goblin mob. Darwin rushed to the nearest window and looked out on the village but nothing could be seen, “But it’'s so loud. How can they not be here yet.”
Suddenly one of the ministers cried out and pointed a finger towards the south far off on the edge of sight a mass of green and black flesh moving ever closer. The king cried out, “Signal the men. We’re under attack.” Three peasants ran up the stairs to the great bell tower atop the castle and wielding a hammer the size of a log rang it three times.
The entire town paused for an instant and then even the few desperate peddlers ran for shelter. All the soldiers sleeping in their quarters awakened and scrambled into action charging through the rain to the barracks to prepare themselves.
<center>***</center>
A single man watched from high atop a great hill a mile from the town. He smiled as the mass of goblins advanced on the capitol of Relanguard. They will not be prepared, How much fun it would be to see their faces when they realize the goblins are working as a team. He moved his hand across an amulet around his neck, how fortunate it had been to ““acquire”” it from a
passing spell weaver. The power to control goblins was truly great.
Little did he know he too was being watched. A lone spy watched from the bushes eying the amulet greedily. Even if he couldn’t use it, it would fetch a very nice penny on the black market. He reached into his pack for a firemaker. He realized there were many weapons that were less dangerous to himself that could do as much damage but there was nothing like the thrill of watching one explode. Just as he was about to light it something struck the spell weaver in the back.
<center>***</center>
The goblins were charging towards the castle like a food starved wolf ignoring the town when suddenly they all stopped and looked around disoriented. It didn’t take long for them to begin assaulting the town. Jumping through unboarded windows and ripping their way into as many houses as possible. Then they noticed the soldiers coming and a couple hundred broke away from the village to engage them. The soldiers looked on in fear, “There must be thousands of them. We don’'t stand a chance in direct combat. Fall back to the castle.” But one lone warrior decked in the emblems of a paladin could not take this thought and charged forward his spear reflecting the fierce determination on his face. A few soldiers were inspired by this and charged in to join him while the rest charged back to the castle with mutterings of fools going to get themselves killed. The goblins cheered and charged forth but before they could get within range of this riding warrior they found themselves impaled on the end of his spear. After the first twelve fell the rest fell back and the warrior looked on at the beasts cowering before him. And then they started throwing stones. There aim was very poor but with their numbers aim didn’t matter. The great warrior raised his giant kite shield to protect him from this onslaught but his horse was spooked and began retreated from the goblins who cheered as they took herded the soldiers back to the castle. The warrior jumped off his horse now the only soldier left and charged into the goblin mass discarding his spear for a sword and attacking with extreme fury.
<center>***</center>
The pub had been quiet. Dolgan liked it when the bar was quiet. But something had just interrupted the quiet of the bar. Several terrified villagers had just run in seeking cover screaming of goblins. A few warriors stirred at this news. One warrior appearing to be from one of the Rykeishan clans stood up, “Maybe Relanguard will live up to it’s stories after all. I came here to have fun. Anyone else feel like killing some goblins?”
Another warrior looking similar to one of the classic samurai but with a strange rogue like ronin look to him stands up, “One can never have too much practice.”
Dolgan just sat there. As long as nothing happened to the bar he didn’t care what happened to the town. Then a goblin jumped through a window and charged for the liquor cabinet but before he could get close he met a bottle in the face and flew into a lantern knocking it’s flaming contents into the liquor cabinet which incinerates the goblin as it explodes. Dolgan sees the bar light on fire and rises to his feet, “Let’s go kick some goblin ass.”
The door to the bar gets ripped off it’s hinges and goblins start pouring in drawn by the smell of beer. The terrified civilians run up to the second floor to escape the goblins completely ignoring the now rampant fire. Dolgan throws his now broken liquor bottle into the goblins then draws a large scimitar and charges at the goblins now pouring in through the windows. The Rykeishan warrior and the Ronin take the huge stream of goblins coming in the door. The fire continues to spread.
Suddenly a loud crash is heard as a warrior in a strange scale armor crashes through the roof bringing a huge amount of rain water down with him dousing most of the fire. You can hear a woman’s voice yell, “Nice try Salis you’ll get your jump right next time.” The warrior groans and uses his lance to prop him up then get’s tackled to the ground by a goblin. A woman jumps through a window wearing a strange battle dress and kicks the goblin off of Salis. “Get up a battle’s no place to take a nap.” And lifts Salis up again.
Salis drives his lance through another goblin and smiles, “Thanks. Terra.” Terra looks at the huge army of goblins who’ve cornered the warriors in the room and then puts her hands together and opens them, “Fire bomb.” A giant fireball shoots out of her hand and explodes in the middle of the goblin group sending them scurrying out of the tavern but causing the fire to start up again. Then the hole in the roof and the fire’s work cause the stealing to start creaking. The warriors run out of the bar as the roof comes down crushing the goblins inside. As the warriors get out the can see the goblins running away from the town and heading towards the castle
<center>***</center>
The ministers are running around like madmen while Darwin looks at them baffled, “What’s the matter. Why did the soldiers fall back?”
One of the ministers looks at Darwin, “Sir there are too many goblins. We need to take the defensive.”
Darwin stares at him, “But what about the townsfolk?”
The minister just shakes his head, “There’s nothing we can do.” Suddenly the sound of battle can be heard outside the palace walls. Darwin run’s to the top of the tower and looks out below at the mass of goblin’s outside the castle. seeming to flow up it’s walls their tiny hands able to grab cracks that no normal man could ever hope to. Soldiers were dropping rocks while archers rained arrows down but the goblins were still advancing.
Then Darwin hears another man walk up to the tower stairs and turns around to see a wizened man with a staff. “Patrick. what are you doing here. Shouldn’t you be helping the wall guard.”
The old man smiles, “I am here to help the wall guard. Step aside.” Darwin moves to the side and the old spell weaver steps to the window. He holds his staff out and lighting suddenly falls from the clouds wiping out all the goblins at the walls. But before the soldiers can cheer the goblins manage to burst the castle gate open and start pouring in. Patrick frowns, “I suppose I must return to the throne.”
<center>***</center>
The spy remains absolutely silent as two Asylian spell weavers approach the corpse, “Hmm. to think this Garvan fool thought he was able to obtain my amulet by his own skill. If I had not allowed it to be stolen he would never of obtained it.” The spell weaver leans down and grabs the amulet from the dead spell weavers neck.
The second spell weaver looks at it, “To think these Relanguardians had no idea of the power they were blindlessly protecting. It’s a shame they’ll have to blame the theft of the Relan key on Garvan. After all the spell weaver here did attack them. And we’ll be hailed as hero’s for coming to their aid.”
The spy suddenly jerks and the Spell Weavers both look at him. The one with the amulet snarls, “You fool. He heard your babbling. Kill him.”
The spy jumps to his feet and begin’s running towards the town hoping to get away. The spell weaver charges after him snarling in rage. The spy moves very fast but has trouble gaining ground because he’s constantly dodging fireballs from the spell weaver. Then the spell weaver hits him in the back and he grimaces then looks around, “Ha is that the best you can dOH SHIT.” He notices his backpacks on fire and quickly pulls a knife from his belt and cuts the straps causing it to drop the ground. The spell weaver charges at him passing over the pack which chooses that exact moment to explode with the strength of fifteen firemakers. The spy gets jolted foreword by the blast and falls unconscious as he slams into a house.
<center>***</center>
the goblins flow into the castle quickly incapacitating every soldier that stands in their way. They then charge into the throne room where the only man standing there is Patrick. The goblins charge foreword at full speed and slam into an invisible wall. and fall to the ground coughing up blood while their peers trample them and begin hammering away on the wall with their tiny weapons. Patrick continues to hold his concentration. but eventually the wall falls and the goblins start to charge for him but never make it. Darwin jumps down his rapier ready and holds them away from Patrick, “You will not hurt him.”
The goblins surround them and Patrick looks at Darwin wearily, “You should of run your majesty. don’t get yourself killed for an old goat like me.”
Darwin smiles, “I don’t intend to.” And slashes at the goblins. The goblins lunge at them and one of them goes high and almost drives his little dagger through Darwin’s head when an arrow pierces it’s skull sending it flying.
The great Paladin warrior is standing in the doorway over the corpses of several goblins panting heavily with a royal archer standing beside him. The warrior continues to engage the goblins but his vision is starting to blur from exhaustion. Then the wall opens up and twelve spell weavers come through. They put their hands foreword causing the goblins to explode. The spell weavers look around, “Tell his majesty Asylia sends it’s regards for this plight. The Garvan’s cannot be allowed to use such fowl tactics” and brake up to destroy the goblins in the rest of the castle.
Patrick looks at the dead goblins and sits himself down, “Thank heaven.” The paladin continues after the spell weavers and the archer grabs his arm, “Sir Percival it would do Relanguard no good if you were to collapse from exhaustion. You must rest yourself and protect prince Darwin. I’ll go after the goblins.” Percival looks from the retreating spell weavers to Darwin and nods his head and takes up a defensive position of the throne room while the archer takes off.
<center>One hour later</center>
The remaining soldiers are running around the castle eradicating every last goblin. The Asylian’s had left a few minutes ago saying their work was done. Darwin looked around the scene of exhausted soldiers and cranky ministers and then a thought came to him, “Has anyone seen father?”
Everyone in the room suddenly stops and an eerie silence follows. The ministers look from one another puzzled and then the soldiers start running around the castle frantically yelling, “Has anyone seen the King?”
OOC: Think I got all the spelling errors.
