With the doggy knight and Jason coming to the rescue of Rina it left Lady Apisis at the mercy of the Satyr like creatures. The enemy in front of Apisis stabbed at her. She dodged, but one behind her swung its polearm at her, catching her with a shot to her side. The blow stunned and threw her off. Before she could catch herself another blow landed across her back, knocking her to the ground, pinning her there as the other 10 satyrs created a wall between the rest of the group and Apisis.

Xev motioned to the satyrs forming a blockade around the gateways, “Oh my, I don’t think I could handle so many at once.”

Jason and the dog knight have their attention drawn to the situation they have got themselves into. They looked to each other and then back to the satyrs. Without a word they charged the enemy line. The satyrs prepared to take the two, but before they could engage one of their lot fell over dead. Jason had thrown his dagger into the chest of one, surprising all of the creatures. Using this moment of confusion, Jason switched to the orc sword from the last dungeon . The heavy blade fell on the polearms of half the remaining satyrs with such force that it broke the blades off of them and turned them into splintered messes.

The dog knight at the same time once again summoned a barrier and used it to pin the other half of the satyr to the wall, clearing the way for him to attempt to come to Apisis’ aid. Had only moments to act before she would be stabbed to death. The barrier that had just been summoned vanished and a light began to be emitted from the shield. All of the satyrs stopped their attack on their respective opponents and turned towards the dog knight.

Jason shouted to Rina, “Heal Apisis,” motioning to her Apisis, before turning the orc sword over, aiming the edge towards the satyrs. Using all his might he swung the sword up toward the creatures, smashing it into them, slicing through their bodies killing 5 in one go. They dropped opening the way to get to Lady Apisis and rescue her from the enemies.

Holding her cross out to cast a spell Rina chanted, “Heavenly Mother, hear my wish.” The light of the cross’ gem glowed brightly. It green aura seemed to transfer from the artifact to Apisis. The abrasions all over body soon faded away and the lacerations from the carelessly dodged polearms sealed themselves. As the aura faded Apisis got up, using her swords to stabilize herself. She shook her head to clear the cobwebs from her head before springing back into action. The satyrs that were attacking her moved towards the dog knight zombie-like which left them open to an attack from Apisis. She made quick work of the two of them, her blades slashing through their necks cleanly.

The remaining satyrs that had gathered at the gateway were finished off in short order once they had been whittled down to a quarter of their initial number. It seemed that they weren’t well trained, relying only on the polearms that they had and team work. Once their formation was broken up it was no wonder that they were dispatched so quickly, but they were not all that were in this dungeon. Earlier, the wall had several times more and it was no doubt that those on the wall will be coming to backup the forces they had just defeated.

Now that there wasn’t an immediate threat Jason turned to dog knight, “Who are you?”

“Duk. We need to move before we’re surrounded.” the Tok`phane dog knight responded curtly.

“It’s nice to know your name but that’s not what I meant. Why are you here?”

“To clear the new dungeon. You?”

Jason was getting frustrated with Duk’s short direct answers. It seemed like Duk was giving as little information as possible to keep them in the dark. He had watched enough movies where some benefactor of the hero who spoke like Duk suddenly backstabbed them. This wasn’t a movie and he was of a species he hadn’t dealt with before, but character traits often were just exaggerated portrayals of behaviors and traits in the real world and those traits had logical reason behind them that should hold across alien civilizations and their social interactions. There was no way to know for sure, until it was too late, without taking the risk of believing he had no ill intentions.

Apisis sensed that Jason was becoming frustrated with Duk’s responses. After spending a night with them she thought that she was beginning to understand him to some small degree despite it being obvious that the mountain of things that she did not understand about these Humans was vast. With this sense she stepped in, “Lord Duk, I believe we have similar goals, however I feel that perhaps the question posed was not so much asking about your goals but whether we could trust you or not.”

Duk took a moment to think about Apisis’ words, “I can be. Can you be?”

Rina had been listening to the conversation quietly when she burst out, “Of course you can trust us doggy! We’ll make sure you’re well fed. Just don’t bite us!”

“Why would I bite you?” Duk asked confused by the little girl.

“Well, I’m satisfied. For now. Let’s find cover,” Jason said making his way past them onto the main road. He looked down the roads for any signs of more satyr like creatures, but they were still empty. “It’s clear. We need to move and prepare to take these guys out.”

The group moved deeper into the castle town. The streets were empty of life, but they looked lived in. Lived in recently. So recently that carts and stalls full of produce seemed to have been abandoned only moments before the party came upon them with fruits, vegetables, and meats looking freshly harvested or butchered. There were even still some stalls that had fires lit and delicious treats baking over the open flames. For all intents and purposes this was a living, thriving, city, much like the Goblins village. Jason and his group were invaders to these people who had done nothing wrong save for protecting their own home from people who sought to do them harm. Jason wondered whether they would have to kill all of the creatures in the town to clear it or if there was some other way. He didn’t want to kill more innocents, design to be killed or not. They had to have thoughts, dreams, and aspirations too he thought, but in the end Jason would do what he needed to do to survive and to save his friend if he could.

The party had quickly put ground between themselves and the gateway. They now heard shouts and noise coming from where they had been and heading towards them, prompting the group to seek out a place to hide. They took refuge inside a nearby building that looked like a place of residence. Luckily, there were no satyr creatures inside, but just like the streets it looked recently evacuated in a rush, likely to seek protection within the inner walls of the keep. They hurried into the residence and settled into the shadows.

The satyrs creatures passed by the residence as they scoured the town. One looked in through an open window, but seemed to see nothing and continue on. A few voices could be heard as they communicated between each other before moving on. The party let out a breath of relief that they had successfully avoiding getting into another fight where they were at a disadvantage. They relaxed too early. The door opened creaked open and two satyrs stepped into the shadows from the light, carrying large rocks ready to chuck at any enemy that they came across.

The two stone chuckers looked around the room, looking for any signs of the party. They were getting close to spotting one of them. That’s when the door was pushed shut causing the creatures to turn in surprise. At that instant Jason and Apisis shoved blades through the satyrs necks, slicing through their windpipes and making it impossible for them to call out for help. Their rocks dropped to the ground followed shortly after by their bodies stripped of life. The bodies weren’t long on the floor though, they were quickly absorbed into the ARMS devices of the party and placed into the individuals’ storage.

More satyrs chatted outside the door of the building. One began to open the door, but then they stopped. There was more chatting and then the satyrs suddenly ran away from the building, letting the door swing shut. As soon as the door once again blocked out the light the party came out of hiding, preparing to continue towards the keep. The door slammed open, a satyr with a polearm pointing towards the party, before shouting out, calling for others.

Duk rushed the satyr creature, smashing him into the wall, opening the pathway out of the building, Rina followed at him while the creature was off kilter. Jason stayed close to Rina to ensure her safety and get away from the building as quickly as possible. The satyr found its balance and attacked the next to attempt to exit, Lady Apisis. She ducked under the attack, closed in on the satyr, cutting slashing through its robes, using her blades to penetrate into the core of its torso, before continuing out the door. Xev sauntered out last after everyone else had escaped. She seemed to not be worried at all about being caught by the monsters that should surely be on their way back to check on the shouts of their fallen comrade.

The party darted across the way into another building. This building was multileveled, providing more room to hide. They made their way to the top floor, finding that there there were steps up to the rooftops. Taking a quick look around to see if it was clear, the party exited onto the roof and crossed over to others, quickly moving towards the keep. Along the way they spotted several of the patrols searching the town for them. At first they were careful and hid as well as they could, but after the first few times they decided that it was only wasting their time to be wary that the satyr like creatures would spot them as they seemed to never look up.

Before long the party reached the roof of the building closest to the inner wall. The problem was that there was no stairwell or ladder down. They had gotten so far but now they were essentially stuck. That is until Duk leapt from rooftop, landing ungracefully on the ground. He then summoned his barrier and placed it horizontally above his head.

“Jump down,” Duk called out as loud as he thought he could without attracting attention.

Jason jumped down first using the barrier as an extra landing to keep from jumping from too high. Rina followed after, jumping from the roof to the barrier to an awaiting Jason to catch her so that she didn’t injure herself. Duk await for the last two to jump down and braced for their weight only to be surprised when Xev landed next time him easily and Lady Apisis floated down. He shouldn’t have been surprised by this, but he was so caught up in helping to solve the problem he completely ignored the obvious abilities of these 2 companions.

The party regrouped, preparing for the next phase of their trip into the dungeon, bypassing the inner wall, and making their way into way beyond, the castle keep, where no doubt large amounts of treasure awaited them. Of course, more than likely, there were also the probably of some enormous monster there to protect said treasure, but those things would have to be dealt with as they came to it.