The tale of Nokigon

Nokigon heard the solid rumble of hooves behind him.

He had quickly rode to Mortifera, told Gothic what was what and gathered a small army. Then, him and three hundred knights rode north, planning on attacking a small horde of Blood Reavers. Scouts kept constant update on the various factions' movements- especially the aggressive ones- and it had taken Nokigon precisely thirty seconds to find a nearby army. He had been following ever since.

Suddenly, the column turned a corner and the horde came into sight. Nokigon grinned broadly. Things were going well so far. 

He roared the order to advance, and set his spurs to his own horse. He sped up gradually; he could taste the scent of victory in the air. The Blood Reavers were starting to panic; they were running ever faster, casting increasingly frequent glances over their shoulders as they run faster and faster in their ranks....

Wait a minute. In their ranks?

Nokigon could see that there was something wrong. As the orcs were panicked and running, not one of them had fallen out of their line. And not one had dropped his sword, or some other weapon. 

Nokigon could smell a rat. There was only one thing for it.

"HALT!!!" He roared, in the voice that was trained to carry over the noise of a battlefield.

His men respected him greatly, and immediately halted. And a damn good thing too. The Blood Reavers chose that exact moment to whip around and thrust. The air directly in front of the horses suddenly became a forest of deadly spikes, as the Blood Reavers snapped into a painfully obviously rehearsed movement.

Nokigon cursed mentally. He realised that he had been careless, and the orcs had been expecting him. He called the order to retreat, and regroup, but as he turned around the full extent of the horror of this situation was revealed to him. Whilst he had been distracted, another, even larger army of Blood Reavers had came from the bushes around the corner, and had Nokigon flanked between two opposing forces. He closed his eyes briefly, allowing to let himself sink into the depths of this situation's horror. It was every commander's nightmare- flanked between two superior forces- and no way out. And then he snapped into action.

"DISMOUNT! WE'LL FIGHT IN A SHIELD WALL!"  Nokigon bellowed, and not one knight even thought of disobeying. Within seconds, the horses were in the centre of a tight shield wall, with the 100 knights on each side grim and determined. Nokigon sighed. They would sell their lives dearly.

But then came the sound of bowstrings.

From the woods come a huge hail of arrows. The orcs were taken completely by surprise. They were vulnerable, and Nokigon saw his chance.

"CHARGE!!!" And with a curdling war cry he mounted and in seconds had his forces galloping towards the startled orcs, stil being decimated by the storm of arrows. It was not long before the orcs, pushed to breaking point by this completely unexpected attack, broke and ran. Ran for their lives. And even then, the arrows did not stop. They were harassed, and harassed, until not one orc was left alive.

Nokigon turned away from the slaughter, and faced his savours.They were coming out of the forest, and although the mottled green cloaks they wear camouflaged them perfectly they were much more conspicuous in the open. They all held bows, and wore some other weapon- usually a sword. There was about three hundred of them.

The leader stepped forward, and flung back his hood. He had jet black hair, with white streaks. He had a scar on his lower lip, that to Nokigon's experienced eyes seemed to have been made by a dagger cut. There was no other scars, which gave a clear message to Nokigon- this man knows when to duck. His eyes were a deep, soft brown, with an unmistakeable light of humour in his eyes.

He held a bow, made out of pure yew. It had clearly been shown a lot of love and attention. At his side was a sword, and Nokigon could just see the glint of a blade hidden up his sleeve.

"I am Belthazor, Captain of the Rangers of the North. Guarding the borders of Wolgast. And you are?"

"Nokigon. Captain of the Palace Guard in Mortifera. I must say, your intervention was very timely and welcome. But why did you intervene?"

Belthazor flicked his eyebrows up. "The Blood Reavers posed a threat to Wolgast. It is my job to eliminate that threat."

Nokigon smiled slightly. "Well, I'm on a... mission, I suppose, to exterminate the Blood Reavers. And your assistance would be most helpful."

Belthazor was shaking his head. "That would be to leave my post. To leave Wolgast unprotected. I cannot do that."

Nokigon knew that there was no point arguing with him. "Well, I thank you again for saving me and my men. I hope that circumstances never mean that I am forced to face you on a battlefield with a sword in my hand."

"No. I would regret that."

Nokigon, on an impulse stepped forward and slapped the man on the back. They stepped away, neither realising that this would spark a friendship that would last until they were grey and old, until they had grandchildren and the days of their youth were distant memories in the setting sun.

Nokigon mounted his horse, and called the order to ride on. Meanwhile, Belthazor and his Rangers were already invisible in the green forest. 

And another:

In the previous skirmish, 7 Knights had been put into a small wagon, where they would be returned home and buried in the Graveyard of Mortifera. A further 3 had been put out of action by injuries, and maybe 14 had been injured lightly. All in all, a pretty impressive sum after killing a good 700 orcs. 700 less to fight!

Nokigon looked back in his saddle, and surveyed the his little army. After his skirmish,word had been sent to him that reinforcements were coming- about five hundred knights from Keppen, captained by Doom, and then- this is where Nokigon got his big shock- King Sigurd had sent 300 knights from the Council of Illyriad's Royal Guard- the elite, of the elite.

Those knights were the greatest in Illyriad. They were handpicked. None of them was Nokigon's match (Nokigon was actually the sixth most prominent swordsman in Illyriad), but they were still fearsome warriors. Nokigon felt awed, and extremely proud when he thought of the immense responsibility placed into HIS hands. Nokigon could see a promising future ahead.

He frowned slightly. The knights should've arrived an hour ago. So where were they?

Another hour passed, and Nokigon was seriously worried. He turned in his saddle and called for the army to turn around. He would find them himself.

After a long ride, Nokigon turned a corner-and groaned. Doom had clearly been careless.

The Blood Reavers had heard about the reinforcements. They chose to do something about it. Around 1500 orcs were standing between the two armies- spears at the ready. 

Nokigon cursed, then roared at the top of his voice to ready. Even the troops across from the blockade heard him, and they all saluted. 

"AIM BOWS!" All troops in possession of a bow, crossbow, etc aimed their weapon carefully at the pure mass of orcs. "FIRE!"

The mass of arrows shot through the air, and fell gracefully to fall upon the orcs. A good three hundred fell. 

"FIRE!" Another 100 fell, but the orcs were starting to form a tortoise, a well known military defensive move. It made them almost invulnerable to arrows- but it made them almost blind. It was an opportunity that couldn't be missed- Nokigon just hoped that Doom would follow his example.

Without a word (that would alert the orcs to his plan) Nokigon started to ride. He kept up the steady rain of arrows in an attempt to disguise his plans, and he saw in relief that Doom was following his example. He continued riding, throwing away his crossbow now and steadying his lance. He aimed the lance dead at a crack.

About 10 yards away, the orcs realised what they were doing and broke out of the tortoise. But they had no time to get in a defensive formations, and so were in an even more precarious situation when the knights struck.

Nokigon could physically feel the shock running along the ground. The heavy battlehorses hit the more or less defenceless orcs like a hammer, and the entire front line or orcs was thrown backwards. The knights kept moving, riding and slashing and cutting, until suddenly Nokigon, at the tip of a wedge of knights, broke through the blockade. He had breached them, and moments later Doom did the same. He looked back, and raised his eyebrows at the devastation behind him.

Almost all of the orcs were broken forms on the ground. Nokigon quickly looked, and reckoned that for every fifty orcs one knight had been killed- which is a very impressive figure. However, there was one small group of about 12 orcs standing around the standard of the Blood Reavers- and they weren't about to surrender. Nokigon and Doom, in identical movements, galloped towards them.

They didn't stand a chance.

About 5 minutes later, Nokigon was carefully wiping the blood off his blade, when a shadow appeared above him. He looked up. It was Doom.

"Where are we off to next then?"

Nokigon stared into the distance. "I think we should take the fight to them this time. We go... to Gajik Hinor"