Duty Session 200: Clearing Castle Eas

Orcs are a different problem than Goblins, but a big problem is still a big problem. It was investigating the latter problem in Mac Anu that Shiruba came across the requests to help clearing an area of the former problem. Seeing it also being sponsored by a familiar name (Baroness Wake) was enough to perk her curiousity, and put out a call for other people interested in investigating the matter as well. Or just to beat up Orcs. Who's going to complain about the chance to punch big ugly monster-men in the face, right? Especially when there's likely some manner of reward involved.

While waiting at the foothills the wolfen cait sith made sure her bow was tensioned and in proper order. Last thing she needs is snapping the string while they're out in the wilderness.

There's nothing like a good challenge! No matter how overwhelming the odds may seem, Kotono's always eager to take on a new challenge!

As soon as she arrives where Shiruba is waiting, Kotono looks around to see if others have joined. Upon realizing she's a bit early, the girl takes the time to stretch out, limbering herself up for whatever may lie ahead. Those who don't know her may be surprised to see the girl doing a full split on the ground as she loosens up!

"Hey, never hurts to be prepared!" Kotono would say to those who wonder why she's stretching.

Schneider has showed up for the quest, and nods a greeting to Shiruba and Kotono. "Ah, this castle again. So, orcs." He nods gravely. A small zephyr blows his long hair back dramatically, and he waits, hands on his hips, for more allies to show up. "I was here before," he reveals. "It is a bit tricky. And then again, the orcs like a fight as well, so let's oblige them."

This isn't one of the missions Kaydon has done, but Orcs are something he's quite keen on fighting. They should put up a decent challenge, and one that he can really let his Damascus Blade sink into.

He's not far from Shiruba for the moment, "Hey fearless leader, any words of advice before we storm the castle?"

    Yuuki stands at the bottom of the hill where everyone is meeting up. She's staring up in the direction of their destination-having done this quest before she knows where it leads-she starts up, "It's come to my attention that maybe, just possibly, though unlikely, that a small percentage of people out there don't see the Sleeping Knights as a fully fledged founding guild of one of the alliances. Claiming that we're too disorganized and spread out to be suitable for such a title."

    Yuuki pats the hilt of her sword as she goes on, "Unfortunately, Wake shot down my idea of tracking those people down and challenging them to a duel to beat some sense into them. Which is why I've summoned you all here today. We're going to prove them wrong by storming that castle!"

    Yuuki spins around to point towards the Knights, "You're going to prove them wrong!"

    Pause.

    Yuuki blinks, seeing herself pointing at just Verasyn and June. She looks around for a moment, looking for the rest of the Knights. There's none to be found.

    Yuuki blinks again, "Just you two?" She moves her pointing hand to scratch her head as she wonders, "Could have swore there was more of us. Did I send the invitation out right? I do recall getting distracted while I was working on the notification... Mmmmm... Nnnnghhhh..."

    "Oh well! Guess it's just us then."

    June waves upon seeing Yuuki. The short middle aged woman in her barbarian princess finest smiling widely. "Hey." she offers. Then switches languages speaking in one of the Tolkien elvish languages (Quenya) "Now Junie, don't over share, we don't over share, over sharing scares people off. Breath, you got this." which is said in an almost normal volume but obviously directed to herself.

    June grins "Don't worry, I might have been stuck in Ezzo without a way to level back up ... and with garbage gear that's as deleveled as I am... but I still remeber how to kick butt." she looks to the non-knights "I'm June, Junko, Arima Junko. I'm fourty, not dating anyone since the black wave..." she stops and knuckles her temple switching to Elvish again "Junie Junie no no no, don't over share, you're doing it again." she takes a deep breath.

     In Japanese "Please take care of me." she bows hands in front of her like she's introducing herself at a new job or school.

    Looking up from where she's perched on a nearby rock, a flash of crimson hair follows the movement of Verasyn's head. "Fewer's better anyhow. Too many bodies means less room to move around." The whetstone in her left hand is tucked away after one more stroke along the edge of her offhand blade, itself slid back into its sheath before she slips down, landing nimbly and stepping over to join the others.
    "Verasyn." The name's offered curtly with a little two-finger-to-the-temple salute, this girl clearly values directness. No oversharing here.

Shiruba tilts her head a little at The Champion as she gives a speech meant for a larger group. Then giggles a little and tries to muffle it with her hand before recomposing herself. "Taking some new recruits out to learn the ropes of Adventuring, Yuuki? I'll keep that in mind." She holds her bow across her midsection and she leans into a brief bow. "Shiruba Howlinger, at your service." She doesn't go into the whole Guild Leader title because it's not really relivant for a cross-Alliance group like this. "Don't focus on just the castle," she adds to Kaydon as she starts down the foothills and on the the designated route. "We've got plenty of ground to cover before then."

Case in point, it doesn't take long for the Party to come across a bridge over the river seperating the foothills from the higher mountains. Unfortunately, there's already Orcs here. Who apparently are tired of the unwanted company, because they are trying to demolish the bridge! "What the... these Orcs are smart enough to do that?!" Shiruba stops, but it's to get down on her knee for steadiness and take aim with her bow. "We need to stop them!"

Schneider grimaces as we spot the orcs demolishing the bridge. "Well, we can't have this, can we?" he asks, and calls out, drawing the water together, summoning from the lake nearby. It arrives in swirls, and sloshes together in vaguely humanoid form. The watery golem advances on the orcs, slapping them around, and spitting water at the fires they've started. Schneider sits back and watches, or possibly commands the elemental, fighting off the orcs and splashing out the fires until they can overwhelm it.

    "On it!" Without another thought, Verasyn raced forward to focus on the most immediate threat to the bridge, those sledgehammers. Cursing under her breath, she knew she wouldn't be able to put down the orc in time to stop that hammer from dropping so she puts herself between it and the target. Drawing both of her blades, she brings them up to try and catch the blow.

    Unfortunately for Vera, big orcs carry bigger sledgehammers. The blow knocks her clean off her feet, the girl sent rolling and her blades skittering across the ground. As she comes to a halt, she looks up, anger clearly painted across her face as she grumbles, "Well, this is off to a great start."

It's time to go and Kotono's ready to go too!

"All right, let's see what we're up against!" The girl says eagerly as they advance, frowning as they come to a stop. "Orcs? Ruining the bridge?" She shakes her head. "No way. That can't be allowed to happen!"

With that, Kotono gestures towards the waters under the bridge and summons up a geyser of water which she then directs at the orcs. "Sorry to rain on your parade!"

Orcs aren't usually that smart. Makes Kaydon wonder who's leading these guys, really.

Without the bridge, they'll be stuck on this side of the ravine and then, well, the duty will be over, now won't it? Kaydon can't have that, so he rushes forward, taking the fight to the orcs. He grabs one of the bricks they've already knocked off, and hucks it like a baseball at one of the orcs with a sledgehammer, knocking them in the head and sending them flying off of the bridge, "If the rest of you are even remotely smart, you'll run, now!"

    June looks at Shiruba and under her breath in yet another language, this time it's Dwarvish (Khuzdul). "I said I've been stuck in Ezzo, it's not like I'm a newb... just stuck on an island with nothing to do but eat cardboard and poke at walls of noise. Even if you are a cute pupper girl." She shakes her head and shrugs her shoulders a bit at the 'at your service' line. She can't help but smile and bow back. She starts humming 'Smash the Glasses' as she walks.

    When they spot the bridge and it's occupants she shakes her head "Really, just rude to keep guests out like that." she makes a few gestures speaking a quiet prayer under her breath until her hands glow with earthen energies. She lifts them both and slams them into the ground forcing the earth to rise up to support the bridge. "Won't last forever... summoned earth never does." She says before charging in to start wailing on orcs hand and foot.

    Yuuki looks a little disappointed that they won't get to unleash a big wave of Sleeping Knights against the heavily defended castle. Though Verasyn does make a good point, Yuuki adding in, "It's a lot easier to shine in smaller groups too! Though the big sixty man raids do have their fun parts."

    And Yuuki smiles as she notices June muttering to herself again. It's cute. Though Yuuki reassures her, "You'll do fine. A true warrior can take bad equipment and make up the difference with skill! I'm confident you've got this."

    Shiruba enquires about the 'new recruits' to which Yuuki corrects her, "Ahhhh, not exactly! June's been with us for agggggges. And Verasyn's been around a while too. Don't worry, they're good Knights."

    "Now then. Let's get this show on the road!" Yuuki starts marching up the path excitedly.

    As they arrive at the bridge, Yuuki is none too surprised to find the Orcs already trying to destroy it. Again. Who can have predicted that!?!?

    Yuuki decides to get creative though as she charges in. Perhaps surprisingly, she doesn't draw her sword. Instead, as one of the orcs at the front swipes at her with his own blade, Yuuki ducks in beneath the swing and elbow charges the orc in the gut. As it stumbles she grabs his arm, twisting it, forcing him to drop his sword. Yuuki then heaves, pulling the orc's arm to throw him off the bridge.

    Yuuki then grabs the dropped sword and starts running, just as a part of the bridge starts to crack under the orcs destruction. Yuuki leaps into the air, throwing the sword to embed into a wooden support. She then, stretches her leg out as she suddenly rockets down, light forming around her boot as she plummets towards the thrown weapon. With a skill boosted flying kick, Yuuki drives the sword through the wooden support and into a second one, pinning them together to add some support to the bridge to stablize it!

Shiruba was the party leader, but being she was primarily Ranged DPS she tended to lead from the back of the group. Simply because that was her most effective range. She gives the rest of the Party time to move into action. Verasyn tries to stall the demolishion orc, but at least gets him turn his attention and his hammer on her instead of the bridge for a bit. June brings up the earth to help temporarily support the bridge, and between the two of them it's enough of an opening for Yuuki a chance to maneuver into position to actually deal with the deconstruction.

Schneider and Kotono turn the water itself on the Orcs, blasting several off the bridge and dousing the fires they had been starting. In contrast Kaydon takes revenge on the bridge's behalf by using broken bricks to bash orcs off the structure. One of the few remaining Orcs turns and brings his hammer to bear... Only for the stone head to snap off as an arrow breaks the handle, smash onto of the Orcs head, and he's knocked off the bridge with the rest with June's thrashing.

"What a bunch of jerks," Shiruba comments as she joins the group on the bridge and heads for the other side. "This bridge is an artifact of arcitecture too. Shame they tried to break it! But no time to sit and enjoy the view." She points ahead with her bow in hand. "Onward!"

Onward leads them onto a mountain path that after some hiking leads into a canyon pass. Shiruba continues on until she comes to the landslide that smashed a gate and blocked off the rest of the canyon. She rests her hand on it a moment, then shakes her head and starts back to the group. "That's too thick and heavy to try and dig through. We'll need to find another way around." She looks to Schneider. "You said you've been here before, any ideas?"

Ashes to ashes and dust to dust. If you need navigation, in Kotono you trust! Right?

The girl looks around, before checking the ground carefully to see if there's anything she can figure out. "I think I've got something!" She says eagerly, although she's not entirely confident in whether or not she's truly found a path forward.

Kaydon has heard there's a secret passage from others who have done this challenge before, however he's not that great at looking for things. Still he's going to try, and so he uses his brute strength to haul bouders up and toss them off to the side, trying to see if the secret passage is behind one of them, perhaps. No luck though.

Schneider has helped the party get past the bridge, and he advances with the others. But now, it seems, the way forward is less cear. When he is asked about his experience here, but he says, "I've done it before, but I don't recall it very well. I think there was some sort of passage, but ... " He tries to summon an earth elemental, but the ground will not give one up, and he looks around, then says, "This way seems as good as any." But the way is not a secret way, but blocked off by an avalanche, it seems.

    The orcs are defeated, the bridge is saved! Quest complete.

    Oh wait, they're not here for the bridge. Still, Yuuki dusts off her hands after they've finished off the orc demolitioners, "And they say you can't fix a bridge by kicking it with a sword." Who's ever said that!?

    The group moves on. Soon their path is blocked by that landslide. Shiruba enquires with Schneider about before, to which Yuuki raises her hand excitedly, "Oh! I've done this one too! I know how to get through this!"

    Yuuki heads over, recalling where she helped find the secret passage last time. She begins searching that immediate area with her Search skill. It should be a simple matter to find it, since she already knows where it is!

    At least, if this isn't one of those repeatable quests where the devs programmed in randomized locations for quest components...

    June told to search does it the way she does it. She stomps her foot with a bit of earth magic, and tips her head like she's listening. Then again and again... and she's ... now covered in iron scales, her form more that of a smol minotaur rather than a middle aged librarian, and she's smashing a rock in frustration her iron hoof crashing into it until it's a pile of rubble and she's huffing and puffing, green mist drifting from her muzzle. After the rock is destroyed she stops looks at it, then looks to the party. "You're an idiot Junie." she says in Elvish.

    She sighs and shifts back to human adjusting her cloak. "Sorry... couldn't find anything and lost my temper." she says giving the party and apologetic bow.

    Verasyn huffed a little in frustration, mostly at herself. Her blades retrieved and shoved back into their sheathes at her belt, she stepped along with the group with her head tilted down a bit and mumbling to herself. "Been around a while, good Knight. Yeah." Still stewing as they make their way up the mountain, she stops suddenly. "What?"

    Kneeling down, she presses gloved fingers into a bit of soil. Tracks. Following them, they appear to lead directly into a snow drift but no signs of leaving it. "Hey, there's..." Turning to speak more directly to the others, the real discovery she makes is that she's wandered off a bit and everyone else has given up on the search and moved on. "Dammit."

    Resting her palms on the hilt of her blades to keep them from swinging around too much, she starts off at a brisk run, trying to catch up.

While it's not a secret passage with a bit of searching and some moving of rocks the group does find a path offshooting from the main pass through the canyon. Shiruba pauses a moment as she rests a hand on the rock wall and looks around. "This was probably a secondary emergency path for if there was problems... or to send soldiers down to trap those stalled at the gate. Works for us, good job everybody!" Her wolfen tail wags a bit as she leads the way up the path. It's a bit jagged and narrow, but it gets the job done.

The trek leads them to another blockade, though this one has been actually built in the way rather than created from a landside. It's also actively manned, as upon the Party approaching Orcs start leaping over the barricade to charge the group, or start firing at them from perchs on the rocks above with crossbows. Shribua ducks to the side and gets her bow up to try and deal with the enemy crossbowmen. "Spread out so they can't pin us with area coverage attacks, and find a way through. I'll supress their suppressing fire!"

Kaydon is not exactly at the best of his abilities right now, it would seem. He opts to blindly rush into the surge of Orcs. And sure he's good enough to take down several of them as they come down from the rubble and gate in order to crash upon the adventurers, but Kaydon's own skills are helping him hold his own until others can swoop in and assist him before he gets overwhelmed!

Schneider smirks at surpressing fire, and he says, with a chuckle, "That's not surpressing fire. -This- is surpressing fire." The spell he casts is unique, it seeks out each of the enemies, and sets them on fire. That part is not unique. What is unique is that it seems intended not to injure them. It does, but that's just incidental. What it really does is make them far more vulnerable to everyone else's attacks. Shots that might do a fraction of a health bar take off a good quarter. Minor impairments become magnified. And the orcs are screaming in pain as they burn, of course.

Sometimes, the most direct method is the best method of all. Especially when it involves using swiftness over strength.

Using her speed to rush past the orcs and strike before they even know what happened, Kotono zooms and dashes around them, hitting them like a kunoichi!

    June takes a crossbow bolt to the chest, and that's the end of rationality it seems as she shifts to her monster form. The iron plated minotaur form charging the gate. And then she's pounding on it, fist and hoof, horn and head. However she doesn't seem to be getting the better of the door even if none of the orcs seem to want to get close enough to try and stop her.

    Orc archers!? Pffft. Their arrows are no match for the Flash-erm-for Yuuki!

    Yuuki charges forward, finally drawing her sword as she weaves her way through the rain of arrows. Several come close to hitting her, but she's able to twist out of the way at the last moment, displaying some impressive reaction times and agility.

    Of course the supressing fire helps. And the supressing fire fire.

    Having used her quickness, Yuuki is soon within swording distance of the archers and so she starts going to town on them.

    "So much for the quiet approach."

    Taking a moment to assess the situation, Kaydon's head-on rush gives Verasyn just the opening she needs. With the orcs' focus on him, her blades find their marks, one after the other. More importantly though, a blazing torch is snatched out of an eviscerated orc's hand as it falls. With a twirl, she launches it into the barricade, sending it up in flames - along with the shrieks of immolating orcs.

    Taking a moment to appreciate her handiwork, she tilts her head to levy a sly smirk in Kaydon's direction. "Nice work with the distraction. Hope this makes up for the one with the sledgehammer?"

Shiruba's own take on 'suppressing fire' is actually a bit literal. Since she's shooting fire arrows at the crossbow orcs on the cliffsides, not trusting her shots at this low ground angle to be lethal on their own, so setting them on fire as well helps keep them from recovering and resuming fire. Most of the group charges headlong into a fight like the eager Adventurers they are. The Were Fangs are quick to draw the most aggro and get swarmed with enemies to mash, but that makes it all the easier for Kotono, Yuuki and Verasyn to get considerable hits in. Especially after Schnieder sets multiple orcs on fire and softening their armor. The fiery shock also weakens the barricade, to the point that a single thrown torch is enough to... well, torch it. It quickly crumbles into a pile of ash and hot metal.

As soon as an opening is made and most of the orcs are dead Shiruba springs to her feet and makes for the path again. "Let's move on before more reinforcements come!" But reinforcements aren't going to come...

Because the group gets to where the reinforcements would be coming from, first. The remains of a lakeside town in the castle's shadow have been turned into barracks, with only hastily erected fortifications because Orcs don't really care that much about keeping their own kin safe, compared to the effort put into keeping other people out. Shiruba motions to the rest of the group to spread out a little, and do what they can to deal with the orcs before they realize they have company.

Schneider nods to Shiruba. "Spreading out. We can do more damage that way." He's heading down to deal with the orcs in his own way, which relies heavily on, "GUNZENRO!". Which is to say, a liberal application of fire. Some here, some there. The barracks, shoddy and wooden, goes up with a FWOOSH as the dry fodder catches flame. More fire impacts any of them that have the temerity to attack us. Lots of fire, for them. "Boom for the Boom God," he says, grinning.

Kaydon grins at Verasyn after she torches the orcs and pulls a lot of the focus off him.

He gives a big thumbs up, "Thanks for the save there. Now lets go!"

And go he does, rushing ahead towards the barracks, his blade slashing. A lot less orcs here to deal with, so it's easier for him to go to town on them.

His weapon flashes, orcs fall before him, reduced to sparkles of data as they are deleted by his weapon.

    "Reinforcements!? Wait, why don't we stick around for a while? I could use the additional XP!" ut Yuuki's idea is ultimately overruled by the others all moving on. Yuuki follows on, sad at the lost opportunity to grind some additional spawns.

    Still, it's not a total loss as they actually manage to come upon the location where the reinforcements are situated. Maybe she'll get that XP after all! Though as Yuuki observes the broken down village, she spots a herd of goats milling about not far from the center of the orc fortifications. A lot of goats. Yuuki gets an idea!

    Shiruba motions for the group to spread out, Yuuki taking the opportunity to make her own way into the village. With a bit of help from her Impish Sneak ability she makes her way over to the goat herd. She sneaks up behind one, before whispering, "Go little guy and take your friends with you! It'd help if you could run over a few orcs on the way too." Yuuki goes to slap the goat on the rear.

    The surprised goat instinctively bucks, kicking its rear legs back.

    Yuuki takes a pair of hooves to the face, flying backwards to the ground. She groans, holding her face.

    The goat goes back to chewing on some straw.

Sometimes, you've got to turn up the heat! That cart of dry fodder looks like it could be useful.

With the right magic words, Kotono ignites a spell...

And the dry fodder becomes very hot! Too hot to handle no less!

"Sorry, I'm not the best cook, but that's not my problem now, is it?" Kotono says as she moves ahead.

    Where others reveled in the flair for the dramatic, others leaned on finesse, speed, and precision. Verasyn falls in the latter category.

    While the rest pummelled the encampment with death from above, she took it upon herself to cut off their escape. Availing herself of another torch, she took off around the perimeter, setting the fortifications alight to turn the orcs' camp into a prison. Before long, that ring of fire is complete, and any orc that chose to attempt escape became easy pickings for her twin steel blades while they burned.

    Upon spotting orcs to slay in a large area the already enraged bull woman with iron scales dives into the fray, punching and kicking, goring and biting. It isn't really what you'd expect from most God Hand fighters especially one focused on light and healing the way that June does. However she's gone and lost her temper and that leads to iron being quite brittle in the end.

Fortifications go up in fire. Barracks go up in fire. Orcs either die in the flames and buildings collapsing, or rush outside only to get brutally greeted by the more fire, swords, and angry bovine-monster-girls. Shiruba fires off a few flame arrows of her own, but in the entire conflageration set by half the group it's impossible to tell if they contributed or not.

Goats continue to not give a shit. Even for the great Champion, or the world burning around them.

"Shame to ruin most of what was left, but sometimes you just got to burn out the infections." Shiruba doesn't let it bother her too much as the group reconverges towards the center of town. There's no defining chamber like an interior dungeon, but it's pretty clear that two amazonian orcs that storm the square to meet them with blackened blade and flaming whip amongst deathly warcries are clearly some kind of Boss Fight!

"Incoming!" is the only warning Shiruba gets out as she leaps and rolls to the side to avoid a flaming whiplash, hustling back onto her feet and reaching for some of her special arrows. The ones that produce powerful concussive wind blasts.

Schneider looks on as the two bosses show up, the black metal and fiery whip drawing an interested Inspect, though there's not much he can discover without getting close enough to get beaten up. Which he'd like to avoid. A dark sort of aura forms around him, and he chants, "Brain, Brain dead. Obey your blood oath, come forth from the land of Avalon. Fire of Gehenna, become a fiery blast and burn everything around us! EXODUS!" What comes next is pretty awful, particularly for the two orcs, who are seared by the flames and set on fire with insidiously burning flames.

Hit and run, that's Kotono's game.

The girl goes in, strikes swiftly, then rolls away quickly. Lather, rinse, repeat.

"You can't hit a target that's faster than you!" Kotono comments as she uses her speed to her advantage as she takes on the bosses. "Strength isn't always the best solution!"

This boss pattern is interesting. Kaydon keeps his focus on the one with the blade, allowing the others to focus on the whip boss.

Kaydon has proven that he can go toe to toe with high tier bosses, having danced with one of the vampire queen's lieutenants alone and still managed to hold the focus, even if he couldn't do any damage.

This time it's different, he can damage this boss, his Damascus Blade cutting through her attacks and striking home multiple times. The big issue is those dual attacks, where he has to join with the others to evade the mechanics. But he'll do his part, until he can find a chance to smash the orc's blade with his blade breaking Damascus.

    "What was left will smell like orc for months. Better to just burn and rebuild." Grimacing at the thought - and of the whiff of burning orc caught by her senses - Verasyn only caught that warning a moment too late. That hunk of blunt metal collides with her head, sending her sprawled out in the dirt once more. Heavy objects don't seem to agree with her today.

    The form that went down wasn't the one that rose back up, however. What had been long red hair was now a flowing scaret mane, a lupine tail emerging behind her. And she was growling. One hand over her right eye to feel for that welt, the direwolf Were Fang glared at the orc who had assaulted her, launching into an attack of her own. None of the strikes hit home, likely due to being dazed by the initial cheap shot, but at least her distraction is creating openings for the others.

    By the time they get to the bosses June has managed enough control to use her prayers. "Oh light of the heavens, spirits of purity, empower this servant with the blazing light of your wrath. Let us bring light unto darkness and crush the minons of darkness under hoof." a blazing halo of light grows between her horns. Then she's off in a serries of stampeeding charges.

    Yuuki meets up with the others again at the town center. Her free hand is holding the side of her face, where the glow of red from damage is still lingering. Yuuki quickly remarks, "An orc got in a lucky punch." Thats her story and she's sticking to it!

    As the twin orc bosses make themselves known, Yuuki drops her hand from her face as she eyes the darkened blade held by one of them.

    Yuuki raises her own dark blade to point towards that orc, saying with a grin, "Nice looking blade you've got there. I wonder if it's as good as mine." As good as the Absolute Sword???? ... Well, possibly, since the poor relic weapon was reset by the Apocalypse.

    But you know what they say... It's not the size of the numbers that matters, but rather how you use it!

    And Yuuki uses hers well as she dives in to meet the sword twin, their two blades clashing repeatedly. Yuuki dances in and out of the orc swordswoman's thrusts and swings, parrying where she has to, taking some grazing hits when she can't, finding openings created by Kaydon and trying to make some for him in turn. But finally in a brief moment of opening, Yuuki tries to surprise the orc by using her free hand to unleash her own punch-because she was totally punched by an orc before and not kicked by a goat-before following up with a devestating stab to the orc's gut at the same time that Kaydon takes out her the orc's blade.

    Okay, Absolute Sword is still better. Especially now!

It's clear from the start of the fight that the duo orc ladies are indeed a Boss Fight, and an annoying one at that. Fights that involved two bodies and wearing them BOTH down is trying even on highly skilled teams.

That said, the team puts their all into the fight. The ladies' strategy seems to be to scatter the group and disorganize them so they can pick off individuals. That doesn't happen as they intend. Their attempt to split off and form two smaller fights is kabashed as Schiender unleashes explosive flame from one side while Shiruba pelts them with air infused concussive arrows from the other, forcing them to keep together in a single formation.

They instead utilize one of their tandem attacks, whip and blade alike whirling around madly.. Until Kaydon gets right up in the sword wielder's face, helping to knock her out of her pattern as they lock weapons, and then dealing with Yuuki showing her just why she is the Champion... and a surprise sucker-punch for good measure that dazes her long enough for Kaydon to seperate the sword from her grasp with his superiorly forged one.

Similar happens when Verasyn gets smacked aside, only to come back in her True Form and charge the whip wielder to occupy her even if she can't get in close enough to maul her. It leaves plenty of openings for Kotone to hit-and-run.. or stab-and-run in this case maybe. Throw in an bull-woman on a light infused rampage, and both orcs being too occupied with their fights to stop from getting rammed several times as June stampedes around the square.

It's not a fast fight, or an easy one, but in the end it is a victory for the Adventurers as both amazonian orcs are ultimately depleted of their health and disposed of, dissolving explosively into pixelated motes at almost the same time due to their unified status.

"All right! Mission accomplished!" Kotono spins her blades in her hands then strikes a victory pose. "I always love a good challenge and this was just what I needed!" She looks to the others. "Good job, everyone!"

Schneider grins widely when the orcs finally fizzle out. "That was pretty cool," he observes. "No damned orcs are enough to fight off determined adventurers." He gives Kotono a thumbs-up.

Kaydon is more than happy when the match finally ends, the group managing to bring down both of the orcs simultaniously and winning!

Kaydon spins his blade and sheathes it, "Excellent work, everyone!"

    June pants, green mist flowing from her muzzle with each deep breath. The bull woman covered in iron scales. She stomps her metalic hoof. "Well... that's a thing that happened." she says and licks her muzzle with a broad wet bovine tongue that is not covered in metal.

Once the orc pair is down and out of the fight Shiruba takes a moment to catch her breath. "Good job everyone. That's another area cleaned out. Let's collect whatever prize there is and head home."

    Left panting for breath when the orc pair is finally defeated, Verasyn looks relieved but clearly not pleased. "Yeah. Good work." Inspecting her blades for any damage, she sheathes them and turns back the way they came, tail hanging limply and still against the back of her legs.

    Yuuki pulls her blade free of the orc boss swordswoman before jumping backwards just as she explodes into pixels of light. Yuuki keeps on guard for any sort of second phase or resurrection mechanic, before relaxing as the quest is apparently completed.

    Yuuki sheathes her sword and then stretches, "Mmmmmmmmmm. Not quite as fun as storming the castle was. But still pretty cool. I think I liked these bosses better."

    Yuuki walks over to collect her share of the loot, before raising her fingers in a V shape to the others. With a grin she proclaims, "Victory!"

Yuuki then looks in the direction of the castle that they had actually come here for, rather than the broken town, "Hopefully it won't be long before we get to claim that ourselves. Then we'll have an awesome place to hang out. Whether Wake likes it or not! Right!?" Yuuki grins at June and Verasyn.

    Rousing from her gloom, Verasyn gives a quick shake of her head to dismiss whatever was dragging her down to offer a smile back towards Yuuki, made only slightly disconcerting by the display of a maw full of fangs. "I'm sure she'll love it. And if she doesn't... we'll make her like it."