An army of marauding Orcs attacked. The guards weren't enough to hold them off, and they managed to get into the city.

Backup's on the way, however...
______________________
West Freeport was pretty much ruined. Burning buildings, dead bodies everywhere, and the fight was still going on. Many adventurers had joined the fight, but the Orcs were too many and too powerful. The Orcs were winning.

A group of 15 armored and armed men and women suddenly jump off buildings and walls, surveying the carnage. A Barbarian, clad in legendary armor and weilding the Blade of Strategy and the Blade of Tactics, walks up to the guards' makeshift fort they managed to make out of things lying around- Barrels, crates, and the like.

The large man shouted to a guard who was cowering behind a crate, "Why aren't you fighting with your comrades?"

The guard replies nervously, "W-we're waiting for re-reinf-forcements." The large man guesses that the guard is a new one, probably a temporary one- Just given the weapon and armor, and told to fight. Drafted, he believed the word was.

The large man shouted, "Tell the captain... Reinforcements have arrived."

A young half-elf, clad in mis-matched armor, some Banded, some Bronze, and some of the chain mail from Velious- Ry'Gorr, is it?- surveys the carnage nervously. He takes his two axes out of their holsters. One looks like it's made of silver, the other looks more primitive, like it's made of polished granite.

A Dwarf walks up to the Half-Elf. "Somethin' wrong, Ruien? I would've thought ye'd be more eager to jump into a battle like this."

"It's... It's just that... I'm no longer a Warrior. Just a mercenary. Like you." Ruien replies.

"Aye... I know how ye feel, friend..." The Dwarf replies. He looks around the carnage- There's an Orcish wolfrider charging at them!

"'Ey, Ruien! Heads up!" The Dwarf shouts, readying a battle axe larger than he is.

Before Ruien can turn around, the wolfrider has gotten into melee range, and hacks at him with its greatsword. Ruien jumps back, getting nicked by the blade. He swings both his weapons- First, the silver one in his right hand, then the granite one in his left hand. He manages to kill the wolf, but the orc jumps off, raising its greatsword above its head.

Ruien takes this opportunity, and letting out a scream of rage, swings the granite axe at the orc. The axe begins to glow, and Ruien feels stronger, more able to fight. The orc is stunned, giving him another opportunity- A head shot.

Ruien doesn't miss this one either. He swings the silver axe at the orc, cutting its head clean off.

"Hey Khazmon!" Ruien shouts, looking for his Dwarven companion. There he is- Fighting an Orc shaman. He should be fine.

All of a sudden, Ruien feels a sharp pain in his back. Whatever it is, it pierces his armor.

He hears a scream of rage, and a cracking of bones. Suddenly, he feels as if he's being healed- He is. A cleric is standing over him and the corpse of an orc, bloodied morning star in hand.

"Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Thanks."

Ruien rushes back into the battle, his wounds healed.

"My name is Kira and this is james." The one in the robes steps foraward and takes off her hood revealing a blonde girl with dark blue eyes.

-Guards
-One level 60 Warrior
-6 level 30-51 Warriors
-7 Rangers
-Ruien (15 Warrior)

[ 10-20-2001: Message edited by: The Last Strider ]

Or is it?
__________________
Suddenly, a large orc steps onto the battle field. He's wearing thick plate mail, and wielding two longswords. Everything is glowing, probably magical.

"Baratus!" the orc shouts, looking for the leader of the mercenary company.

The large warrior finishes hacking the heads off of two orcs, and turns around.

"Ahh... Gnasher. I should've known you were behind this."

Gnasher opens his mouth to speak, but the large warrior interrupts him. "Don't bother, I know what you want. Let's get it over with."

With that, Baratus puts his blade of Strategy and blade of Tactics together. There is a brief flash, and the swords merge into the Jagged Blade of War.

The orc lets out a scream of rage, and charges at Baratus, both longswords raised. He slashes at Baratus, who jumps back. Baratus retaliates, but the orc blocks with one longsword and swings at Baratus' legs with the other. Baratus jumps to avoid the blade, and kicks the orc away, striking again. The orc dodges, and Baratus' blade sinks deep into the ground.

Before he can pull the sword out, the orc tackles him, takes the sword, and lifts it above his head, standing over Baratus, readying the blade for the killing blow.

"I've waited years for this moment... Master," the orc says the last word with more hate than the rest of the sentence.

"Sir!" Ruien shouts, and tackles the orc off of Baratus. The orc kicks ruien off of him, and into a wall. Letting out another scream of rage, the orc jumps towards the stunned Ruien, with the Jagged Blade of War still in his hands!

But just as he's about to bring the blade down, he goes limp. A glowing blade has been stuck into his back and through him.

"You alright, Ruien?" Baratus asks.

Naitachal finishes off the last fighting orc on the battlefield, the rest are fleeing, being picked off with bows by the rangers.

"Who... Who was he?" Ruien asks, confused about the orc's use of the word 'master'.

"I'll explain later. For now, we've gotta clean up this mess, and get our reward," the warrior says, dragging an orc's corpse towards the gate. "And thanks for helping me back there."

"good job everyone"

A well-built wood-elf swung his sword around, slicing through one of the seven orc warriors that had rushed him. He quickly jumped after his swing, barely avoiding getting his legs chopped off by the biggest of the warriors. He finished his leap by rolling a few extra feet then hopped off the ground and spun to face the orcs. All six grumbled something then dropped their weapons. Kaladeyn was so surprised by this that he stopped whistling the song Verses of Victory and frowned at the group of attackers. His frown quickly turned back to surprise as the six orcs drew throwing axes from their hips, took aim, and let fly. Kaladeyn let out a yelp and dived to his left, using his sword as a shield to deflect the closest axe. The orcs yelled again, picked up their weapons and charged. Kaladeyn heaved a barrel up off the ground and chucked at the two closest, knocking them down. He swung his glowing sword through one, kept spinning and decapitated another. The two remaining orcs turned and barked something at him. A happy grin set upon Kaladeyn's face as he took a deep breath and bellowed back at them, using the magic in his voice to kill them.
"Well...that was easier then I thought." He muttered, wiping his Singing Short Sword clean of orc blood.

Kaladeyn quickly set off through the city, checking alleyways and buildings for rogue orcs. His search brought him to what appeared to be a group of mercenaries. Kaladeyn watched with great interest as a tall barbarian dragged a dead orc body along the ground.
"Well that's not something you see everyday." He said quietly, sliding his sword into the scabbard attached to his back. He glanced around, muttered a silent prayer to Tunare and followed after the group.

Up high in a tree in the commonlands near where the battlefield was there perches a Half elf, He is somewhat short, has shoulder-length black hair, and wears Ry'gorr armor on his chest, and legs. On his wrists are Dark wood bracers. His hands and feet are bare...

Keiran knocked back another arrow on his bow, lovingly named Skydarkener, and sent it flying through another fleeing Orcs head. Smirking as he saw an Orcish Lord. He grabbed another Bone arrow and silently stuck the orcs head to a nearby tree, leaving its body a few feet away.
Jumping down from his perch 20 feet in a tree he surveyed the area around him. Humans and their Ilk were congradulating each other on their success in holding back the orcs. Considiring for a moment he went over to join in the clebration...

[ 01-15-2002: Message edited by: Siliddar ]

After growing bored of cutting down the orcs, he started to walk towards the gates. As he walked closer he could hear the sounds of celebration in the city, and noticed the light of flares and fireworks reflecting off of his Blood Lord's armour.

He entered the city, looked to his sides and noticed the aparent lack of guards. He smirked.

"This is going to be...fun" he said