As the massive sword struck down, gouging the boar’s side and almost driving it to its knees, the world seemed to vibrate with power for a brief moment and I was certain I could taste the sharp scent of ozone in the air. Reflexively, my tongue flickered out, taking in the air and parsing the Astral Power around us, savouring the curious taste, metallic, yet sharp and tingling. Before I could consider the elements used, and the magic in general, the boar managed to push through the pain from the sudden attack and demonstrated that it was far from breaten.

With a great heave, it forced its massive body to move, blood spurting from the deep wound, ignoring the two large fighters with their shields who tried their best to keep the beast contained and focused on them. But it was having none of that, as its body moved, so did its head, the tusks trying to skewer the fighter with the greatsword. With a blink of my eyes, the sight in my left eye was overlaid with Lenore’s sight, allowing me to see and gauge the power of magic applied to the person about to be struck. There was some magic on them, but the power seemed to be mostly spent, possibly on the attack they just made. Unless I misinterpreted what I was seeing, there was no way they would remain unharmed from the attack.

Bullet Time was a wonderful skill, allowing me to consider the circumstances and come to the conclusion to keep watching, without acting, even though I only had a few moments to think. Sadly, Olivia didn’t have the skill, or maybe she had and had decided on another course of action, as right before the person was struck, her voice began an incantation, demonstrating me that magic didn’t rely on the chant, but possibly on a conditioned reflex in reaction to that chant and the trained will. A curious observation, but more important was that, despite her chant only ending after the person was struck, the shield her chant created made it in time. A golden pane of power manifested between the person’s stomach and the boar’s tusks, taking the hit, negating most of the force and shattered all before the chant was ever finished.

A side-effect of her casting that shield-spell to protect the fighter from harm was that her staff started to shine like a torch for a brief moment, the golden glow very much disrupting our concealment. It was one thing to hide a few, mostly stationary, shadowy forms between other shadows, especially when those forms didn’t do anything to draw attention and there was a fight with a giant boar that very much was attracting anyone’s attention. It was a whole other trick to try concealing a staff that was glowing with golden, divine light that mirrored the shield placed around a group’s main combattant. A trick I couldn’t even begin to pull off, especially not without preparations, which I didn’t have.

Realisation brought a frown to my face, knowing that we would have to engage with them in some manner and the frown deepened when I noticed that while the boar had struck the sword-wielding figure, the figure had managed to somehow bring one arm back, taking the blow with a metallic vambrace. They still got knocked down and away, but I was almost certain that they were far from defeated.

While that figure tumbled, struggling to regain their balance and some semblance of a combat-stance, their companions reacted to our appearance in their own ways. One of the heavy-fighters exploiting the opening left by the reckless attack of the boar, burying her axe in the boar’s chest, likely breaking some ribs. At the same time, the other warrior moved to cover their companion and now, with the boar having somewhat moved out of the way, I was able to see those two heavies more clearly, and realised that the one with the spear was male, the other female. At the same time, I wasn’t sure of their race, though I thought that they had some orc-blood. Their skin, with its deep earthy tone and their tusks made that almost certain, though the size of their tusks compared to their bodies made me wonder what other blood they had. My guess was either troll or giant, both races known for their impressive physique.

Further back, the centaur launched yet another arrow into the boar, though I couldn’t detect any skills, while the dwarf was gathering Astral Power for some sort of spell.

“Olivia, want to tell me what that was about?” I asked quietly, uncertain how to proceed. Their group was obviously wary of additional enemies, even though Olivia’s actions were far from hostile or threatening. A part of me wanted to simply fade back into the forest, but that would only leave us with potential trouble, if they managed to track us. Alternatively, murdering them was possible, but the longer I travelled Mundus, the less inclined I felt to casually murder the natives. It just didn’t feel like a game any longer.

“Acted by reflex.” she admitted, before continuing, “I’ll talk to them. Adra, join me?”

Exchanging a quick look with Sigmir, and letting the confidence oozing through our bond soothe me, I gave Adra a nod, pulling the tattered concealment back together, hiding Sigmir, Rai, Ylva and myself. With Lenore hidden within my Hallow, that left Adra and Olivia out, while they stepped forward, Olivia’s single hand raised, her staff held in the crook of her other arm. Adra had her spear out, though casually held at her side, not in any sort of combat-stance.

“We seek no conflict!” Olivia called out, letting the other group decide on their action. Privately, I calmed my mind, readying myself to conjure up a cloud of mist, to cover Adra and Olivia, just in case things went south. I was reasonably certain that Sigmir, Ylva and Rai were ready to intervene, too, each of us using their own methods.

“I’ve got this.” the heavy warrior muttered to the greatsword-wielder, while pointing his spear at us. Now, I had a little more time to study the greatsword-wielder and was still uncertain what I was looking at. Long, light-brown, almost blonde hair, smooth and almost glowing in the dim light of the forest, finely-chiselled facial features, lightly tanned skin and a slender yet muscular physique that reminded me of Adra in addition to pointy ears very similar to my own ears. So, an elf, but that was all I could tell so far. Cautiously, I channelled some of the Darkness-Magic around me to add the property of concealment to a use of my Observe-ability, as knowing who and what we were facing was half the battle.

Focusing on the elf, with the massive sword, a blue box appeared.

Wood Elf, Level 82

Even without any further intervention from us, and despite on of their warriors being on guard against us, the battle against the giant boar ended quickly. The massive wound caused by the greatsword, and the subsequent opening that the axe-wielding heavy-fighter and their archer had exploited, cost the boar a lot of blood. They didn’t let up, they pressed every advantage they had and within a few seconds, the boar was staggering on its last legs, as blood soaked its coarse bristly fur. The greatsword crashed down once more, and I could feel some more Astral Power vibrating out from the impact, and the boar fell, a blue box appearing in front of me, telling me that we had gained a pittance in EXP for the participation in a battle. That prompt brought a soft curse to my lips, as I wasn’t sure if our help had reduced their share of EXP gained, which might cause tension further down the line.

With their foe dead, the axe-wielder moved to join the other warrior who was covering us with his spear. Neither Adra nor Olivia moved in any aggressive fashion and I noticed that the greatsword was casually held, while the wielder looked almost bemused.

“Well, hello there.” the elf called out, stepping up to their frontline, placing a hand on the male’s shoulder.

“I doubt they seek to harm us, if they did, they wouldn’t have shielded me in the first place.” they said to their companions, before looking at my two companions, raising their voice to make sure everyone could hear them.

“Greetings, Adventurers. You say you don’t seek conflict, so let us talk instead.” with those words, they stepped past their companions, the greatsword still held casually.

“My name is Phraan, and these are my companions, we are sometimes known as the Oakenrocks. Whom do I have the pleasure to address?” they asked, and I noticed that despite Olivia having taken the lead in talking, their eyes seemed to be fixed on Adra. Further back, on the other side of the clearing, the Centaur and the Dwarf became visible, the Centaur clearly female, while the lack of beard on the dwarf hinted at it being another female, but I couldn’t be certain. Well, if there was a beard, I couldn’t be certain either, but that was dwarves for you. Not that it really mattered.

“The name’s Olivia, I’m afraid our group doesn’t have a fancy name to go by. It’s nice to meet you.” Olivia replied, stepping forward in a gesture of goodwill. It made me wonder, did I want to leave my nicely shaded cover and step into the open, or did I wait and see how things played out.