The cyclops froze, fury radiating off of him in waves. He threw Lucas to the side and immediately charged at the mercenaries without even checking what weapons they possessed. Right as he was about to reach them, a wall of about 20 spears rose in formation, four neatly organised rows of five. 'These guys really aren't messing around!' Lucas thought in exhilaration, whilst also wishing he had come as prepared as them.
As the cyclops closed in on the formation, he jumped to avoid being impaled. The mercenaries immediately turned to face the cyclops, and reorganised their formation. The cyclops, realising his only two options were to fight, or flee, turned, and attempted to run towards the exit of the cave.
The mercenaries, realising this, began their chase, and immediately started their pursuit, some even putting away their spears in favour of swords. The cyclops was close to the exit, so close he could almost jump and be out, but just as he was going to escape, one of the mercenaries threw their spear and it impaled the beasts leg, crippling it.
The rest of the mercenary company immediately begin to sprint toward the cyclops, and upon impact was a brutal display of violence. By the end of it, Lucas saw one of the mercenaries carrying the head of the cyclops.
One of the mercenaries, a rather old-looking man, approached Lucas and asked "are you alright boy? It looked like that monster threw you pretty hard." It took Lucas a moment to realise the man was speaking to him, he was still recovering from witnessing that sickening display. "I-I'm fine, thank you sir." Lucas said as soon as he was free of his stupor. "No need to thank me kid, this bounty alone is enough for me to retire with."
Lucas stared at him in envy, just now realising how much he had missed out on.
Moments later, the man's comrades began to call him back over, and after saying farewell, they left. Lucas, realising he should leave to, got up and began to walk toward the exit. Sidestepping the cyclops' headless body, Lucas walked out of the cave.
Lucas immediately started walking back to his village, it was a small, desolate place, where everyone new each other. His village, however suffered from poverty as a result from a raiding party in the last civil war, that was why he had went to kill the cyclops, that money could help to rebuild his village, so that everyone could live their lives without having to fear starvation. Now, however, it appeared that him and his neighbours would be suffering for a while longer.
The entire walk 'home', if it could be called that, Lucas was bitter. He couldn't help but think that whilst his village was struggling to survive, his selfish lord was dining on delicacies every night. The Lord of Lucas' village, Lord Adam Stewart, was one of the wealthiest nobles in all of England. He earned every penny he made through plunder and tax, not having done an actual day's work himself.
The main reason the Lord of such a poor village was rich was that he could recruit soldiers cheaply. Everyone in the village wanted to leave and to find a better life, and being a soldier provided that. Lord Stewart exploited this, and immediately started recruiting farmers and peasants as soldiers, paying them virtually nothing for their work. Despite the villagers all hating their immoral Lord, many people saw it as their only option, so they signed up as a soldier.
Recently, tension in the kingdom was high, and there seemed to be two main coalitions of Lords, there were the Lords who wanted to give the people more rights, and just make life better for their tenants, and then there were the Lords who believed that they were better due to their lineage, the ones who still believed in the social classes that divided the country.
Lucas, a commoner in every sense of the word, was all for having more rights, only a fool wouldn't be, however, he knew that he would never get the rights he wants. Look at the last civil war for example, fought for the same reasons as was just explained, and clearly the peasants and commoner Lords lost.
Thinking all this on his way home, Lucas began to form a solid resolve. He knew that if another civil war were to break out, he would help his people however he could, even if that meant betraying his so-called 'lord' and joining the people's army.