[HQ Ignorance] Scene 109: The Entrance to Hell

[Nicolas Hughes]

He saw no pursuit, heard no scratching of claws digging towards him through the rock. He allowed himself to pause for a moment. It seemed that he was safe, the Sword was safe, at least while the spirit wrapped itself around him like a cloak of darkness. At least for now.

His training told him to leave, to take the sword to its destination as if it were a message to be carried. Which perhaps it was, in a way.  Yet he had gone through a lot to keep that elf alive and he did not want to give up unless he had to. For a soldier who has escaped an ambush there are options, he remembered the dull lectures well enough. 

If the fight was close he could turn the ambush against the ambushers - they did not know he was there and a surprise might swing the odds against them. A glorious option but chasing after glory had caused him nothing but pain so far, anyway he knew that for all his bluster his fighting skills were little more than barely competent. 

Another option was to wait and take the ambushers by surprise later, to sneak after them and wait for an opportunity to regain his comrades. That might work with sane opponents but these were chaos monsters, who was to say that they would not eat his companions before he could rescue them?

Reasoning alone would not answer this conundrum for him and there was no time for the divinatory powers of his chess-set. With a heavy heart he slowly started skirting around the ambush site trying to assess the situation, had the ambushers shown their full hand or did they have more in reserve? Was the Fourth keeping the fight close enough that one unexpected strike would turn the matter? Had the gopher people fled utterly or were they lying in wait - whether for harm or for good? His keen mind raced as he tried to work out from the pattern of the attack where the weakpoint might be, he fingered the embossed lettering on his tome and listened to the subtle whisperings of the essence within as he tried to find an opportunity.

He knew that he could not, would not, risk losing the sword for if he did then the world was doomed. Yet he would not flee without giving his comrades some chance of rescue.


OOC: Probably tactics (13) augmented by keen mind (13) and the tome's Enhance Understanding (17)