Witch of Fear [Mild horror, Isekai High Fantasy]

Nethlia, Inferni.

Blood pounded loudly in Nethlia’s ears as her heavy boots cracked the rotten wood. The adrenaline of rage coursed through her veins in a heady rush as she charged across the rickety bridge. She licked her lips in anticipation of the death to come. For once, no nerves shook her limbs and mind; she was cold and sharp like ice.

Nethlia focused ahead. The crash of the drawbridge had rung the proverbial dinner bell and down the boughs came a green tide; crashing, gnashing, and smashing. Roaring, Nethlia jabbed out with her pole-hammer like a lance; the piked end spearing a surprised goblin. With a swing, the impaled foe was flung away, clearing those around it in a spray of blood. 

Under her booted heel, skulls broke.

With iron and aggression, a walking omen of violence pushed into the horde of greenskins before they could gather into any sort of meaningful defense. Twisted pleasure faltered before Nethlia’s might. Blunt force trauma proved a cure to wretchedness.

Nethlia rushed past Ekrus, the captain holding his own with fury at his side. The swings of great axes cut down swathes of foul foes like a woodcutter before a fresh forest.

As her team had observed, there were hundreds of goblins within this blood-soaked keep. While they were monstrous in nature and beholden to their otherworldly desires, they weren’t without tactics; the fort served as a prime example. If they were to gather upon the bridgehead in any sort of formation, it’d make it a far more costly affair to cross. As such, it was up to her and her team to prevent that from happening.

A streak of purple magic whizzed over Nethlia’s head, courtesy of Autumn. The bolt of fear striking upon a goblin archer resting above, sending it squealing and tumbling down before a booted stomp sealed its fate. Yet more hateful Redcaps came to fill its place. 

Nethlia took a moment to admire the witch. 

Autumn stood proud and defiant as she held her wand aloft. Dark eyes flickered back and forth, calmly scanning the battlefield. Behind her drifted a thick curtain of long silken threads of black, fluttering in the wind and rain, while a dark and brooding hat perched atop her head like a mountain. She’d come a long way from that shivering, twig-filled wanderer that’d crept into Nethlia’s tavern late in the night. Yet, Autumn's fingertips still quavered and her dark orbs unveiled a guardedness when she thought nobody was looking. 

One would have to be a fool to miss the oddities surrounding the witch; her so-called language magic, a strange lack of knowledge, the weird terms she used. It was clear the witch was from far away. 

Nethlia came to the unsettling conclusion that Autumn was most likely from across the sea, beyond the demon continent. She couldn’t be from the continent’s south; she was far too friendly and non-judgemental towards other races. If she was from the human continent, then things made a lot more sense. However, if it was true, it left Nethlia in an awkward position as very few of those nations had any sort of goodwill with the Inferni; the Bearmaw Tribes were a prime example.

There was one other radical explanation: perhaps Autumn was from another, hitherto undiscovered continent. If she was telling the truth about being abducted by the fae, it was possible she’d traveled further than anyone had guessed. 

Nethlia dismissed her whimsical thoughts and concentrated again, focusing on the battle. Spotting movement by her feet, she kicked out and her boot-heel collided with the skull of a goblin attempting to hamstring her. The sounds of snapping bone accompanied the creature as it rebounded to crash down dead.

A shield of bone and iron intercepted a rusted glaive as it descended towards Nethlia. Nelva slid into formation beside her berserker captain. The Lepus chevalier was quick like lightning; her iron blade dancing out like a viper’s bite, leaving behind sizzling fae-bane wounds. She turned towards Nethlia, face hidden by a grim bone helm. 

“Captain.”

“Thanks.” Nethlia grunted as she smashed her pole-hammer into the face of another goblin. “We need to keep the goblins from forming up; we’ll be in trouble if they form a pike wall.”

“Agreed. They're a lot more tenacious than I’d expected.” Nelva slammed her shield into the face of a goblin before her quick blade beheaded it. 

Nethlia stepped forward into the opening and swept her pole-hammer through the horde, carving a path into the tide of green. Her hands never rested and her feet never stilled. Pain didn’t faze the berserker, only stoked her ever-present anger, building it to a billowing inferno that steamed the rain falling across her tight muscles. Another sneaky goblin tried to cut her low, only to be driven into the roots by a nail-driving swing. 

Already the bark underfoot ran slick with goblin blood. 

The carnage perpetrated by the berserker attracted the attention of the bloodthirsty goblins and they rushed together at her with rusted pole-arms. Threatening jabs forced Nethlia back, but before she could retaliate, a white flash cleanly severed the blades from their hafts. The goblins stared in shock and confusion as their weapons fell apart. Another series of flashes left them headless.

“Need help there, captain?” Liddie asked with a smirk. Loosely held in her hand was her mithril blade, the white-gold metal awash with blood. 

A rumbling growl bubbled up in Nethlia’s throat; affection, admiration, and annoyance mixed into a confusing concoction in her chest. Growing up she’d heard all sorts of stories about the war-hero and meeting her didn’t disappoint; she had such a natural charisma that provoked something animalistic inside the berserker. Nethlia wanted to just grab the pirate by the throat and smash her into a wall. 

She was unsure about what would follow; fucking or fighting.

“Appreciate it.” Nethlia managed to growl out. 

Liddie grinned as she shuddered beneath the noise. 

Another streak of purple fear whizzed over their heads, kicking a loitering goblin archer from its nest with substantial force. The pair watched as the screaming goblin sailed into a wall, crashing with a splatter, and fell silent.

Liddie whistled. “Looks like our witch is growing stronger.” 

Our? Nethlia wrestled down her possessiveness and grunted in affirmation. From behind them came a euphonic beat of musical magic. A rush flowed over Nethlia; her limbs tightened, her already powerful biceps bulged, and she felt lighter, faster as the magic infused her with greater strength and speed. Glancing beside her, she saw that Liddie and Nevla both were likewise buffed by the bardic troupe; their limbs growing a tad more defined. 

The trio grinned as they laid into the Redcap ranks with renewed aggression and power. 

An iron pole-hammer came down in a crushing, bone-breaking blow before thrusting out to catch the next goblin off-guard. As Nethlia retracted her weapon back into a guard, a witch’s whispered warning crept into her mind. 

[Bugbears above!]

Turning her gaze skyward, Nethlia spotted the thirteen of the creatures bounding down the boughs, shaking the branches with each leap. 

The beastial goblinoids were no less ugly than their smaller cousins; only the twisted fever dreams of a mad artist would liken them to bears. Shattered teeth and pointed tusks sat within a bared grin; lips pulled back in a snarl. A pair of yellow, beady eyes glared out from above a flat, crumbled nose and beside a pair of bat-like ears. Fur matted with grime and blood clung tightly to the beast’s corded muscles as it stood tall like a demon or man. Its muscular arms hung like long clubs down to thick, furred feet, ending in keen claws. 

Each Bugbear bore rough, moldy leathers as armor and heavy clubs of rotten wood and rust as they bounded down the boughs, roaring and hollering as they went. The demented bears crushed the slowest Redcaps beneath their massive paws without care as they descended; their minds were only on the prey below.

Nethlia tightly gripped her weapon as a toothy grin affixed itself to her lips. 

As the first of the repulsive Bugbears landed on the slick roots it was met with the furious roar and axe of Ekrus. He charged into the fray with a body slick with blood—both his own and of those he felled. Like a meteor crashing the two met in a thunderous clash. Not far behind came his two sons and they too engaged with the descending Bugbears with singing axes. 

Ten Bugbears still came on, backed by a horde of Redcap goblins. 

With blood singing a rhythm of carnage in her veins, Nethlia braced herself for the onrushing monsters. She was not alone; Nelva rested her sword upon her shield to one side while Liddie swirled her razor-sharp blade on the other. Nethlia believed that between them, they could handle three, possibly four, of the Bugbears. Ten was too many. It’d be too many for even a fully gold-rank team on their lonesome in a reasonably open battle like this.

Luckily they weren’t alone.

[Duck.]

Nethlia obeyed the warning without hesitation, an instinct honed from many intense training sessions at her insistence. Beside her, the others did the same just in time for a volley of whistling arrows to scythe overhead. The hail of arrows robbed the charging monsters of their momentum; scores of murderous Redcaps sprouted feathered shafts from their tattered chests. Crumpling to the ground, they lay down forevermore.

Rising from her crouch, Nethlia glanced over her shoulder. Les Lames Du Crépuscule had finally arrived to fortify the bridgehead, engaging the wave of greenskins that poured down from the boughs above. A shield wall bristled with spears that archers hid behind, pelting the goblins up high. Green bodies fell like the ever-pouring rain before the ranged assault. 

Three knights, armed and armored in bone plate over iron chain, detached from the group alongside Captain Arsit to intercept four of the Bugbears. 

Only six monsters now threatened the two teams. 

Nethlia took the charge to meet the beasts still staggered by the arrow volley. Not only did Nelva and Liddie follow her into the fray, but a blade bard did too. Gérôme smiled as he held a slim, glowing blade at his side. 

Just before the fighters clashed with the monsters, the back-lines unleashed their magical might. Arrows of light pierced and burned into the furry hides as a rune detonated into a cluster of tangling vines, locking the Bugbears in place. One monster was unfortunate enough to get a face full of caustic potion; it screamed in pain as its eyes melted. The one Nethlia targeted staggered as a bolt of purple punched it in the jaw just before she hit it like a runaway Agoroth.

Roars of pain and outrage accompanied heavy hammer blows; flesh split and bones cracked behind the brutal hits. The sound rattled Nethlia’s skull, but it only spurred her to hit more, hit harder. Yet it wasn’t content to just be her punching bag; razor-sharp claws and violent swings rained down upon her and what she couldn’t dodge laid into her armor and flesh.

Blood flowed freely down her side; the pain ignited the built-up rage inside. 

Crimson aggression overtook her vision like a bloody film. With a roar and a hammer-strike she conveyed her discontent to the Bugbear’s jaw. Teeth shattered and were driven further into the twisted beast’s skull. A gurgled whimper escaped its throat. Another dominant blow cracked its ribs as she laid into the monster, driving it back. 

The false-bear struggled against her strength with might of its own. The berserker dodged back from a wild swing before driving her pole-hammer into its side. It staggered into another blow, courtesy of the other end of her pole-arm. Snarling, it tried to swipe out at her with brutal paws, but the berserker was too quick, and all it got for its troubles was another crack to the ribs. 

Grinning through the blood, she taunted the beast; it responded with a pained roar. 

Purple splashed across the distracted beast’s brow, sending it staggering once more. Her prey’s weakness sent the berserker into a fury and she swung her weapon with all her might. The iron hammerhead crashed into the Bugbear’s temple and dropped it to the roots below, dead.

Steam rose from the berserker's tense muscles as she inhaled the foul air with heaving breaths.

[Strike left!]

The berserker obeyed. 

She pivoted left and swung, barely registering what she was swinging at. Iron whistled through the air. The blind strike crashed into the sundered abdomen of another foul monster, cut open by an iron blade. Roaring in pain, the Bugbear detached itself from a bone shield it was trying to wrestle from a firm grasp and reared back. 

Suddenly, a white-gold cutlass punched through the back of its open maw. It blinked confused and in pain before the impossible sharp blade split it in twain. A mass of butchered meat fell to the root and stone with a splat. In its place stood a winsome demoness, grinning at the pair. Behind her her own foe lay butchered, guts steaming; its tough hide doing naught in the face of the mithril blade. 

“T-thanks for your help, Captain.” The Lepus chevalier beside the berserker said. 

Turning towards the sound, the berserker took in her ally’s state. The Lepus chevalier wasn’t looking too hot; one long bunny ear lay limp and blood-coated against her helm while her bone armor was festooned with deep scratch and rents. 

The berserker grunted, unable to find the words as anger and possessiveness pulsed. 

A deafening boom interrupted them. Magical lightning lashed down from the darkened sky amongst chanting rhymes and beats; a spell song unleashed. The remaining few Bugbears died under the payload of magical retribution; their bodies were nothing but burnt husks.

The berserker glanced around in the sudden silence that lingered behind the explosion. She gazed at the bards behind her, panting from their exertion; the elven leader gave her a tired nod that she gruffly returned. All seemed to be going well, so obviously that’s when things went to the hells.

On the berserker’s waist the hex-proof charm snapped.