Michael watched as the fireball Ollie threw smashed into the center of the lizardfolk. When it exploded, there was a brief flash of light, and they were evaporated. Not just burnt to a crisp, but completely removed from existence. Michael healed his eyes to clear the damage the flash of the explosion had done and charged into the midst of the distracted monsters. The lizards and their magic wouldn't be a problem thanks to Ollie, but most of the horned men were still alive, though disoriented.

"I will cleanse this village in the name of Bruntus!" he roared as he raised his mace and divine flame enveloped it. He no longer needed to dedicate his actions explicitly to the gods, but in this case he felt it was important that he made an exception. He reached the first of the horned men before he was able to get back onto his feet and ran him through, shifting his mace into a sword as he stabbed at him.

Another of them ignored the weapon at his side and attempted to ram Michael with his horns, but Michael caught the blow on his shield before shifting his sword into a mace and smashing it into the beast's thick skull. The blow wouldn't kill it, but the holy fire that came with it would.

A third pointed at Michael with his spear. "Aur-ma! Aick na fu!"

"Fuck you too, buddy," cried Ollie from the roof making a chopping motion with his staff that sent down a cutting spell that removed the horned one's arm at the elbow.

Michael ignored the one that lost its arm to catch a sword blow from another on his shield and deflect a separate spear blow with a parry of his mace. He channeled the pain of the literally disarmed monster into the spearman causing him to clutch his arm in pain. While the spearman was distracted, he turned his full attention to the one with the cleaver and slid his flaming sword between his ribs before twisting around to cut down the spearman before he could recover. When he was done with them he turned to deal with the remaining spearman, but found that he was already dead.

One was attempting to flee, yelling "Aur-ma!" As he ran, but before he could reach the treeline Ollie pointed his staff and a bolt of lightning flew from it and struck the beast in the back causing his body to launch forward into a tree and crumple into a singed wreck.

Michael took an extra moment to check his surroundings, and when he saw that no enemies were left he let the fire on his blade fade and shifted it back into a mace which he buckled back onto his waist.

Ollie jumped and gently floated down to the ground. He shook his head. "Not quite what I was hoping for when Pyotr described it."

"Let's check the buildings. I want to make sure that they don't have anyone trapped and alive here."

Ollie nodded and they began going from building to building. They carefully checked corners and kept their eyes and ears open for a potential ambush, but none came. They also found no one alive in any of the houses, though they did find several dead.

Once they were sure there was no else alive Michael moved to the still burning corpse on a spit and started to kick dirt onto the fire before Ollie raised a hand and whispered something causing it to extinguish.

"Thanks," said Michael as he carefully removed the body from the spit and placed it on the ground. He burnt himself doing it, but healed it after the body was down. He couldn't bear the sight of it on the spit and refused to wait for it to cool. After that one was retrieved he began walking to another corpse and dragging it over to place beside the other one.

Ollie caught onto what he was doing quickly and began to help. He used his magic to make the bodies float gently over to where he could lay them down. When he was done with all the bodies outside, Michael went into the buildings and homes to grab the bodies he'd found within them as well. Once they were all laid out next to one another he counted only eleven.

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"That's not nearly all of them. There were more than fifty people here last time."

"Do you think they got taken?" asked Ollie.

Michael looked at all of the horned men and lizardfolk corpses and shook his head. "No. If I had to guess they evacuated. Most of them probably got away and these that we're seeing held them off so that they could get away. They worshipped the Lord of Diligence after all. They were definitely prepared for this kind of thing."

"That makes sense given all the traps." He paused for a moment. "Should we see if they left anything valuable behind?"

Michael shrugged. "We should, they wouldn't want it to go to waste. I don't think we should stay too long though, we don't know if more horned men or lizards will show up." Michael paused, realizing he didn't feel the dread that came with sensing a nearby rift. Considering he could sense them from miles away that wasn't good. It could mean that enough of them had made it out of rifts to establish a real foothold in the woods around the lake of beasts. He shook his head, at least Swandia seemed to be doing what they could to prepare for that.

Michael and Ollie started to go back through the houses, taking some preserves, moderately stale bread, dried meats, and a hefty supply of their caffeinated tea. They also found a few small stashes of gold and silver in the homes of those who had died. They were mixed in with dried goods, flint and tinder, cooking knives, and a number of other small useful tools.

"Go bags," said Ollie.

"Guess Bruntus is also the god of preppers."

"If only they'd stashed a bunch of AR15s and ammo as well."

"I mean, they'd probably blow up the second you touched them."

"True, but give Marcus just one of them and we could probably solve a lot of problems very quickly."

"I think Marcus with an automatic weapon here would grow into a problem all its own."

Ollie chuckled. "True, but better the devil you know."

Once they were done scouring everything, Michael returned to the bodies and began digging graves. He'd found several shovels in a tool shed that made the job relatively easy especially with his enhanced strength and Stamina. After Ollie had taken a few moments to eat something away from the corpses, he helped too, his magic allowing him to do the job even more quickly.

Once the bodies were all buried Michael bowed his head.

"Bruntus, please honor these brave men and women who served you even until death. Grant them the peace that comes from a life of good works." He kept it short, knowing that they needed to get moving soon and that it's what they likely would've wanted. He could feel the gods' warm acknowledgement. They'd been quieter since he'd gained his consolidated Champion title, never silent, but never clear. It was as if they were focused on things far away, though he still felt their eyes on him.

Michael and Ollie made their way back through the forest and back to the main path. It was much quicker now that it had already been cleared, but it was still nightfall by the time they'd reached the main path. They marched for several more hours, activating their nighteye to keep moving. It would be foolish to rest too close to where they'd just fought off so many rift creatures.

Eventually they stopped and made their way carefully through some brush, Ollie using his magic to let them float over most of it so that they didn't make a trail. Once they were far enough in, he flattened a circular area wide enough for them to raise their tents. They ate some of the dried food that they'd just recovered.

"I was really hoping for barbecue and a good root."

Michael nodded sympathetically. "Life is full of disappointments. You didn't get to have a 'root' and I'm stuck with someone that barely speaks American."

"You know I could blow you up, right?"

"See, now you're talking American."

Ollie shook his head and went to sleep first since he had the second watch. Michael sat quietly as he listened to the chirping of crickets and the occasional movement of animals through the brush. He pulled out the portraits of his family that Davi had given him, creating a small mote of light to look at them with. It hurt to look at them, even more now that the man that had drawn them was dead, but he committed them to his memory anyway and thanked Veras, the Goddess of Love, that he could still feel them with him. When he finished his prayer he tucked them away in his pack, wiping wetness from his cheeks before he dismissed the mote of light and focused on his watch.

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