>>5798520With the rapidity and elegance of a man half his age and twice his worth (at least, based on your previous assessments of the man), and a grace that rivaled any elf, he leapt forward. The goblins, confused as they were for a moment, were quick to respond to this sudden burst of lethality, flanking and probing his weak points… but he presented none. He twirled and parried, disarmed and delimbed, hacked and slashed, stabbed and thrusted. He pushed the goblin gang back to a man, a human dervish in this barren desert landscape. In a brief instance, you saw the aged adventurer as he must have been before you were born—when he met your mother—and you began to understand what the elfmaid must have seen in the man.
This… THIS was a swashbuckler!
When your father was done, panting for breath from the exertion…
>8 for morale…Well, so too were the goblins. Surprisingly few were outright dead, though at least three had lost fingers, one a hand, and another a whole arm. Between your father, Muffins, and the Ashurati who had abandoned your party, four more were dead outright—or dying, at the very least, but your trained eye told you that there was little hope for the one who was half-way to the afterlife even WITH immediate attention.
They’d had enough. They scattered and fled, forsaking their loot and their brethren to escape Rudolfo’s wrath.
“Holy shit,” you said, finally daring to breathe.
“That,” your father said, reclaiming his hat, dusting it off, and replacing it upon his sweaty brow. “is how it is DONE, ey wot?”
You couldn’t’ help but nod… But then, your eyes fell upon Pearce, who had himself fallen upon the rocky sands.
