"Sawyer, where the hell are you?" I walked, covering my eyes from the smoke coming out of the grill.
"I'm here, bloody hell, let's get back home," Sawyer said as he held a pistol in his right hand and covered his nose with his left hand.
The banquet stopped immediately as the gas stung our eyes and nose, much like bloody tear gas. We didn't know who did that, but it might have to do with a sabotage attempt.
The gas was coming from the bloody grill, someone must have thrown something in there. Using our skills, we managed to get out of the cloud of gas. The color of the gas was also yellow.
We headed to the guild office where we kept our horse. Sawyer rode the horse while I rode on the back. I pulled out my pistol in case any enemies came. I couldn't see jackshit.
We eventually arrived at the mansion and we immediately ran inside. At the entrance, a bandit immediately greeted us with a swing from his sword. Sawyer gave him a taste of his bullet as we proceeded inside.
The fireplace was still going, and most of our items were unscratched. Fearing that the clothing that we wore contained chemical agents, we replaced it with our ordinary combat uniform. We then wore our gas masks, the air felt much better with that thing in our heads.
I grabbed the white first-aid bag and grabbed two auto-injectors for nerve agents. Why did I do that? My hand began twitching on its own for some unknown reasons, so it was the best bet that it was a chemical agent.
"Sorry, it'll hurt," I injected the injector pen at Sawyer's neck.
He didn't protest, he just accepted that I stabbed him with a yellow mysterious pen. I then did the same thing with my own neck. If that was a deliberate attack and a bandit appeared out of nowhere, I feared that I hadn't seen anything yet.
I grabbed all four 200-round boxes and attached them all to my ballistic vest. I then grabbed my MG4 and loaded the belt inside the gun. Sawyer had worn his night vision goggles and looked outside the window for any hostility while waiting for me to prepare.
I packed the first-aid bag and carried it on my back. I nodded to Sawyer and headed outside with Sawyer leading the way. I followed from behind while covering his back. The night vision goggles would come in handy, sooner or later.
"Ready?" Sawyer asked.
"Ready."
"Flip your night-vision, we have 10 tangos waiting just outside," Sawyer peeked from the window.
I just nodded. I gave a hand signal to Sawyer to move to a higher position before engaging the enemy. We would check each other later using the radio communicator that we put on our armor.
Using the night-vision goggles, the darkness of the night disappeared and everything turned green, except for 10 humanoid figures that waited for us in front of the mansion. They were separated into groups of five people each.
They might think that the mansion was abandoned so they sat there freely, but little did they know, they were in Sawyer's scope before they even realized it.
"I'm in position, ready to engage," Sawyer said through the radio.
"Engaging!" I pulled the trigger of my machine gun and shot it at the enemies.
The bunch of enemies immediately turned into dead bodies as the hail of 5.56x45 mm bullets rained down on their unarmored bodies. The previously scary bandits turned into nothing more than a pile of meat.
"Moving downstairs, get the horse ready, Bell," Sawyer said.
"Sure, I'll get it ready," I said.
I moved outside of the mansion with my MG4 still on my shoulders. I embarked on the horse and rotated its head towards the direction of the ruined entrance. Immediately, pieces of glasses rained down on my head as Sawyer jumped from the broken window.
He landed on the first floor safely with his M16 on his back. He rode on the horse and I whipped the horse to move back to the village. A bunch of horse footsteps came from all over the place, dust came from the horizon.
"Cavalry? Of whose army?" Sawyer commented as he saw the horses in distance.
"I don't know, are they carrying flags?" I couldn't see the horses behind us since I was focusing on the cloud of gas that started dissipating.
"No, they look like barbarians," Sawyer said.
"Fuck, the village is under attack, again," I said.
We arrived at the village center. The gas was in the residential area behind the guild office, Sawyer asked me to drop him down here. I disagreed, Sawyer, needed to be mobile to deal with incoming threats.
"No, you take the horse, I'll go rescue the villager, I can't be mobile, you can," I commented.
"Sure," Sawyer said as I disembarked from the horse with the first-aid bag on my back.
Sawyer left the village center to deal with the incoming cavalry. I barged to the guild office to look for any survivor, Sumia, in particular. Then, I noticed her body crawling on the ground. She fell down with the door behind her opened.
I ran in her direction and grabbed the auto-injector. I pressed the injector on her neck and put her in a sitting position. She was lucky to be able to evacuate to the guild office, if not, she might get more of the gas.
"Alfie, is that you?" Sumia asked me. Her voice was very dry as if she needed water.
"Yes, it's me, how're the others?"
"Bad, they began twitching and some of them started vomiting blood," Sumia said.
Bloody hell, what the hell did the assaulters put on the grill? It poisoned everyone, without any exception, and it created this nerve damage and some internal bleeding. I needed to get in there quickly.
I closed the door of the guild office and began searching for survivors. There was no time, the gas might start dissipating, but it might be too late for those people who were near the grill. The amount of poison that they digested would be way too much.
I entered the cloud of gas with an auto-injector on the ready. The idea was to bring in people that could be saved and leave those who were already dead. I immediately stumbled across a body. There was a blood vomit right next to him and his eyes were open.
I put my hand on his carotid artery, with no pulse whatsoever. I checked his chest movement, it didn't move nor his nose was letting out any air. His eyes were static, even after I shone them with a flashlight. The person was dead.
I checked on the next person, she was laying on the ground. No sign of vomit, but her body was in quite an awkward position. I kicked her as hard as I could, but no response. I checked her neck, no pulse. I checked her nose and chest movement, but no breath. I checked her eyes, no response. This woman was also dead.
I looked at the grill that dissipated the thick smoke. I kicked the grill into the ground and buried the amber with dirt using my machete since I didn't even know what cause the gas to appear from the grill.
Walking down the road, I noticed a child twitching on the side of the road. I injected the auto-injector into her neck. She was still little, probably the age of 13 or something. I carried her to the guild office since it was unaffected by the gas.
"HELP! HELP!"
Finally, some signs. I ran in the direction of the shout. I suspected the person was still alive, but well, let's just see. The shout took me to one of the houses that were quite far enough from the gas. So what, her husband just came from the grill party?
I opened the door of the house with my LMG aimed to engage targets immediately. In front of my eyes, I saw a bandit aiming a sword right into two women, bloody hell, they had come from this direction as well??? I pulled the trigger of my MG4 and the bandit dropped dead on the ground.
"You're safe now," I said as I approached the family.
The kid and the mother retreated immediately once they saw me. Well, I wore a gas mask. Scary? I knew. Well, I had no time, this house didn't get affected by the gas, so I better left immediately.
"Whatever you do, stay. inside!" I shouted as I slammed the door.
Looking to my right, the cavalry was closer than I expected. I greeted them with a trigger pull from my MG4. The mounted cavalry dropped dead on the ground, but the cavalry behind them threw a bunch of bright-colored balls in my direction.
The bright-colored balls arched towards my direction and eventually, shone very brightly, like a sun. Illumination balls? I immediately moved out of the illumination and flipped my night-vision goggles up. I retaliated by shooting at them more before they got into their arrow firing range.
"Alfie, we have a problem, more hostiles are on the way," Sawyer said.
"I know, please, wait," I said.
Right now, I needed to think. I needed to save these people before the hostiles caught up to them. No chance of failure, if I failed, all of the people in this village would die, without any exception.