Jack sighed, seeing the humans rise up from the ground and aim their weapons at them. He was tired from walking throughout the night, and was in no mood for this. He was going to just kill them quickly when something caught his eye, something he had not seen before that gave him pause.
Most of the humans wielded crossbows, something that vampires had never adopted into their warfare, and wore simple traveling clothes. Two of them had common swords, but it was the four of them hanging behind the others that caught his eye. They were aiming large, iron tubes at them, and Jack had no idea what these odd weapons could be.
The wind changed direction, the human's scent hitting his nose with some other scents he did not recognize. One scent was foul, and he wrinkled his nose at it, knowing that it had to be some kind of poison; clever, dip their cross bolts in poison, so that even hitting an arm or leg became fatal. The third smell was just as foreign to him as the weird iron tubes, and he could not figure out what it could be.
He drew his sword, confused to these new sights and smells as one of the humans stepped forward, grinning at them as he leaned his sword on his shoulder and looked at all of them, stopping at Jack and admiring his armor, or how much it would sell for. The man, darker than the others with a large nose and a scar going through his left eye and taking its sight, pointed at Noelle and spoke, his voice rough like he was parched and uncomfortable on the ears.
"Been a while since I've seen a dark elf. Let's take it nice and easy; drop your shit and back off, and no one has to die."
Noelle glared, taking her stance and making her answer clear. The rest of them followed her lead, Jack eager to taste human blood for the first time; they were just running low on blood, and he saw no reason why they should not take what they could. The man shook his head, going tsk tsk tsk before raising his arm and making a gesture.
Jack frowned, wondering what the human was doing, when a loud bang filled the air and assaulted his ears, and his eyes grew wide as he saw an iron ball fly towards him. It was fast, very fast, and with how distracted he had been by the loud sound, he barely had time to move, making the iron ball hit his left shoulder instead if his chest.
He gasped loudly as he was nearly thrown off of his feet, his shoulder exploding in pain and blood as the iron ball tore through it and out the other side, pelting the grass with his crimson blood. He barely kept his balance, looking at the mess that was his shoulder, the pain so strong that it nearly numbed his thoughts like ice cold water. He has felt pain before, but this was different, and he looked at the humans, seeing one of the odd iron tubes with smoke flowing out of it. The man gaped, and Jack realized that the human was surprised at how well he handled the shot.
That was the first time he felt fear grip his heart in a long time, and he did not give them the chance to fire off anymore of those odd weapons. He charged forward, using much more speed than he normally would, and in a second had killed all four of the human's with those terrifying weapons, his shoulder screaming louder at the sudden movement. as his blade danced and drenched itself in their blood.
The humans turned, eyes wide as they realized four of them were already dead, before all hell broke loose, the rest of his group attacking as well. Jack stayed where he was, the pain from his shoulder making it hard to think, and watched as Drake grabbed one of the humans, picking the poor fool up and swinging him at his comrades, turning the man into a weapon as he beat the other humans with him.
Noelle showed no mercy, her spear flashing out and killing someone every time it did. The man who had threatened them before turned to flee, wise enough to know when the battle was lost, but he cried out in pain and fell as one of Midnight's arrows hit him in the back. The man struggled for a bit longer before growing still as his blood began to stain the grass around him.
It was Elaine that Jack was the most surprised about. He saw two of the bandits flee as well, and before they could get five feet, the ground beneath them glowed bright gold before mana shot upwards. He watched it with wide eyes, the pure mana devouring the humans faster than flames would, until there was nothing left, no evidence that anyone had been there before.
He turned and found Elaine, smirking before falling to one knee and gripping his shoulder; the pain was immense, and he was sweating a lot as he waited for the others to reach him. Elaine ran towards him, and he saw that his blood had splattered at her and hit her in the face. She held her hand above his shoulder, and as her hands began to glow with her golden mana, he sighed in pure relief as the pain began to fade away. It took longer than usual, as it was a large wound, but after a few minutes it was healed, his pauldron having a large hole in it, revealing his pale, scarred skin beneath.
He searched his sword belt until he found a clean rag, wiping his blood off of her face and thanking her before turning, seeing that Midnight had already began searching the bodies, picking up the iron tube and turning back to them, an evil look in her eyes.
"This is fascinating. A weapon that even Jack was unable to dodge, and tore through his armor with ease. It was also very loud, and the sound alone made me freeze up for a second. If you look at the humans, they have their ears stuffed with some kind of wax, most likely to protect their hearing. That must be why the leader signaled instead of just telling them to shoot, as they wouldn't have heard him. The weapon itself is-"
Jack stopped listening, knowing that she was mostly talking to herself and would go on for quite a bit. He sat on his rear, his heart just now slowing down from the experience as Elaine knelt down in front of him. He raised an eyebrow at her, the elf placing her hands on his face and turning his head, as if she was checking for more wounds.
"That weapon was...scary. It was so loud it made my ears hurt, and when it hit you...and your blood hit me...I thought..."
She began to tear up, clearly having been worried about him. He smiled at her, trying to make her feel better as he decided to keep how badly it hurt from her, or how for a second he feared for his life. He simply placed a hand over hers, seeing how much larger his hand was as he spoke.
"Fear not; I will not die that easily, no matter how powerful the weapon or person is."