*Clang* *clang* *scrape*
'I knew it… It made it worse!'
At the front of the battle, Olivia was now locked in a deadly fight with two fighters, and it was clear to see, they knew what they were doing.
Back and forth they traded blows, where while Olivia gave good on her own, the two guards were playing to their strengths, and dealing some good hits that Olivia was barely defending against.
The guards that were giving her a hammering were not unscathed. The shield wielder had already received two wounds, both coming from Lyrika's arrows and was feeling the pain from Olivia's heavy hits on his shield.
Each time she managed to find an opening, she never managed to strike at his person, his shield was always there in the nick of time. It was keeping him safe, but both he and his shield were deteriorating with every hit.
The shield was almost concave compared to how it originally curved outwards like a shield normally did. Before long, it was sure to be unusable. On top of that, with each strike, she could physically see him straining against the brunt of the attack, shocks going through his arm. It was getting to him, as he started to hang back and dodge a lot more as the battle went on.
But while this was the case, it didn't seem to dampen his enthusiasm for the fight, always finding a way to get involved and really push her back.
The former archer, now short spear wielder, was a trickier one. While one side of his body was locked in place by the potion that Philly had shot at him, it didn't hinder his ability to be deadly with the spear. It also didn't stop him from dodging out of the way of every attack she made at the man.
He managed to get a good few hits on her, but most of the time she managed to evade or block his attacks, meaning his spear only ended up scraping through the side of her body or ripping some of the skin of one of her arms or legs. During the fight however, there had been a couple of times where they had punctured her skin, causing her a great deal of pain, but she was still standing and able to keep fighting back.
But as time went on, Olivia was receiving way more damage than she was dealing.
…
Olivia couldn't see what was happening with Philly and Lyrika, but the sounds of shouting and cries from behind her told her that they were winning. Something she couldn't say about her battle.
As before the shield wielder hung back and Olivia took the chance to get a blow on the spear user, but he was out of the way before her swing even got midway.
This was followed by his spear coming right for her midsection, to which Olivia pulled back, and brought her Morning Star across her chest. She parried his hit, sending it just skimming across her side. But before she could even try to counter, the shield user was suddenly in front of her and lunging with his sword.
She was almost skewered then and there but managed to twist her body and the Morning Star downwards after the parry, knocking his sword off course.
She staggered back and was almost hit by the spear yet again, but somehow managed to dodge in time.
After this, however, she was hit by an attack she hadn't seen before.
The shield user flipped his sword, holding it upside down. But rather than attack her with it like that, he brought his sword-wielding hand behind his shield and braced himself…before charging forward.
She hadn't stumbled much, so the distance between them was short. So short, that she had little time to do anything to stop the man, leading to her receiving his shield head-on. The hit didn't do much in the way of hurting her, but it locked her limbs a little, as he caught her with her arms across her chest.
He kept pushing forward, holding her in place, and Olivia could tell that this was not good. She tried to move to the side, but he kept up with her, keeping her behind his shield…which also obscured her vision.
Which made her miss the reason he had done this in the first place. Where just behind him, out of her sight, the spear wielder came up by his side and lunged at Olivia. Sending his spear right into her side.
"Ahhhh!", she cried out from the attack.
This wasn't like the close shaves from before, and it was much worse than the other times she had truly been hit. His spear was embedded in her side by a good amount, and the man was now trying to pull it out.
She was in a lot of pain, but the part of her brain that was still thinking things through realised what she needed to do.
Like an arrow, the spear this man was using had the iconic arrowhead shape. The metal tip of the spear had a very sharp point but was also broad at the base. With the amount they had been moving, if he pulled that out now, it would do a lot more damage than it currently had, tearing through her muscles on the way out.
So, with that knowledge of how arrowheads worked in mind, likely from some Historical documentary or something, she let go of the Morning Star with the hand closest to the wound, and quickly took a sudden step back.
While pain shot through her as the spearman pulled while she moved, it was just enough of a shift against the shield for her to pull her hand free and then grip hold of the shaft of the spear.
It was now a tug-of-war contest, but Olivia already knew the winner. Both were using just one hand, but with her superior strength…it was no contest. It would have been nice if she could have punched the man as well, but he was just far enough away to be out of reach.
So, with him locked in a futile attempt to retrieve his spear, the only other question was how to deal with the shield user.
His tactic had worked well…but it left him stuck in this position. He could pull back, but that was likely going to end badly for either himself or his partner, as it would allow Olivia to attack again. Not that he even knew this yet, as he was probably still waiting on her to go down from the spearman's attack.
So, while he was stuck pushing against her, while she kept the spearman in place, it would be a case of seeing who lost their energy first and gave up.
Or it would have been had Olivia not realised that she did happen to have one leg remaining and free for use, the other being on the side of the spear wound and not one she wanted to move right now lest the spear be embedded further.
And she also happened to have a very nice target right in front of her.
Putting all the weight of her body on the leg that was currently rammed with a spear, she swung her other back, and kicked, or kneed more likely, right in the prime target of the man in front of her.
"Ahhhh!"
The man cried out, his legs buckling, as he felt the pain assault an area that may change his prospects of ever becoming a parent. He fell backwards, as his lack of concentration meant Olivia could easily push him away. Now on the floor, one hand still kept hold of the shield, but his other was covering and trying to protect his crown jewels, crawling backwards as he did. It would seem he was still coherent enough to realise this was still a fight and could easily be attacked given where he was.
The spear wielder saw him go down and started to panic. He yanked as hard as he could, but luck was not on his side, as he could not pull his spear from Olivia's grasp.
Olivia, her hand now free, quickly swung her Morning Star at the spearman, hoping to finally hit the man…but like him, there was no luck to be had. One-handed, her swing was not as powerful as it was with two, and so ended up being slower as well. The spearman easily saw this and moved out of the way, having to let go to do so.
This meant Olivia could now let go of the spear as well and get back to wielding it with both hands, while the spearman went back to his other profession of archery, taking out a handful of arrows that were not glued to the quiver.
He charged, swinging the arrows down with all his might. Olivia moved to block, stepping as she did, but the current and previous wounded reared their heads. She staggered and lost some of her balance as she did. She managed to block, but not so much block the arrows themselves. With her Morning Star just out of place, the man ended up flinging his arm at the metal shaft of the Morning Star, meaning there was just enough leeway that the arrows ended up being lodged into her arm. While not as painful as the spear, it still hurt a lot. But thankfully, it was not just herself that ended up in pain, having heard him cry out as well.
Smashing your arm against a solid metal pole is only going to turn out one way…and it's not the pole that's going to lose.
He let go of the arrows and stepped backwards. His arm fell limply to his side, probably broken in a few places from the hit.
What was funny, maybe even ironic was that if he had not rushed and attacked out of rage, he would have been able to use those arrows for their intended purpose. When he looked down at his limp arm, his other ended up breaking free from the hard shell that was covering it.
The look of surprise and shock on his face was priceless. But it did not last long, as the sight of a Morning Star coming right for his, wiped it off his face and sent him flying to the side. She managed to remove the rest of the shell from his side, but also likely broke his arms for good as well.
But before she could cheer in victory, the sound of a very injured shield user standing up could be heard. The look on his face told her that he was pissed, as you can imagine.
What made matters worse though was that before she could get a move on and take him down as well, he pulled out a potion of some sort, and started to chug away at it.