Jacques and Friends: Pilot Chapter
Jacques attacks is attacked by the Ogre
As the blue — almost purple woman’s club impacted Jacques’ ribs, there was a loud—perhaps deceptively so—cracking sound. He was sent flying unceremoniously like a ragdoll, and then skipping like a stone. His armour1 did its work and prevented the impact from being lethal but his ribs were undoubtedly cracked and he was in great pain.
After the initial impact of the purple2 woman’s club, Jacques took it upon himself to sprinkle some knucklebones on the floor and continued sprinkling them as he was being skipped like a stone before eventually settling into a relatively motionless pile.
He lifted himself off of his hands and knees with great difficulty before reluctantly taking a deep breath.
“Fuck,” he thought to himself as his diaphragm did its work and expanded his torso painfully disturbing his shattered bones and bruised musculature. He knew this pain was temporary, and although it wasn’t the first time he’d experienced it— if he didn’t pull himself together it would surely be the last.
Perhaps something had changed in Jacques, though. As he regained his composure, he realized that the thought of curling up into a ball and giving up hadn’t occurred to him once today. It used to be that doing these jobs and overcoming situations in which he was outclassed or outmatched by a superior opponent was just a means to an end, or a means to make ends meet. The often-nebulous promise of “something to look forward to” was the only thing that kept him going and got him off the floor. This time was different. He had the company of a new friend to look forward to, and if he could fell this ogre he was confident that he could finally know salvation from stagnation.
However, he couldn’t do it alone. He pressed the hilt of his tool3 to his temple in a meaningless (but often seen) gesture before calling out to his mates:
<<Olech, Jay, where the fuck are you cunts?! At this rate we’re all going to die! Head to the cave, I have a plan.>>
While sending his message, he held the breath he drew earlier and began channeling praana to his knucklebones. For a brief moment he reflected on the moments leading up to this current situation and smiled. He raised his eyes to meet the purple ogre who regarded him with the smug expression of a predator playing with its prey.
The Party convenes at Baerhaver’s Tavern
In the Free City of Bidhsop there was a well-beloved tavern frequented by many of the locals and by most of the travellers who passed through the city. A stone’s toss from Plaza Ensiferum and overlooked by the Mother’s Basillica, always raucous and rowdy but never offensively so— such was Baerhaver’s Tavern.
There were a group of semi-famous (or infamous) regulars who sat together in a remote corner of the tavern:
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Jacques, a handsome young human spellsword with a lithe build and long raven hair. Not particularly strong or fast, but exceedingly clever.
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Olessandr (oft. Olech), a middle aged human ranger who was occasionally employed by the city as a guard. His well-groomed appearance coupled with his musculature and greyed hair gave him a reputation as being something of a silver fox— however much to the chagrin of his admirers, he was happily and faithfully married.
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Dcheisie (oft. J.C, or Jay), a geriatric retired Elven wizard. He became something of a lecherous alcoholic after his last wife left him, and ended up tagging along with Jacques and Olech to earn some coin to settle his increasingly insurmountable tab with.
Together they were pouring over a list of job postings trying to find something easy and profitable (two descriptors that are generally mutex).
“I’m sick and fucking tired of being beaten and broken!” Jacques protested to Olech who was intently eyeing a hunting quest. “Why can’t we just do something like harvesting crops, or delivering a parcel for a change.” Jacques continued.
“Well, those are certainly safer— but they’re a lot more tedious and time consuming. Besides, it’s not like he’d be any help,” Olech retorted, gesturing towards Jay.
Olech knew that the last job had left a bad taste in Jacques’ mouth (literally and metaphorically)footnote:[Jacques wouldn’t be happy if we elaborated on this, so we won’t.] and was hesitant to press the issue. However, if he didn’t continue on, they’d be stuck without a job and everyone’s purses were becoming light.
“How about this one?” Olech said, pointing to a posting that read:
Recover the Lost Cargo: On the 2nd day of the 2nd moon of Winter a caravan carrying luxury goods was attacked by Ogres roughly 50 lyga due East of the border of Tajsha.
300 stone worth of goods is unaccounted for. To anyone who can secure the missing cargo, we will pay 6,000 gold.
Jay began to open his mouth— “I know what you’re about to say!” Jacques interrupted. “And you’re absolutely right, there are some damned sexy ogre women out there.”
Although Jacques hadn’t yet assented, Olech was grateful both to Ogrekind and to Jay’s base nature, as picking a job usually took several hours, if not several days.
Jacques wasn’t happy with the possibility of having to fight ogres, but he knew with 2,000 gold a piece him and his mates could live like kings for months. Besides, fulfilling a commercial request like this would surely do wonders for their reputation.
After a moment of contemplative silence followed by discussing the strangeness of ogres going after a caravan of luxury goods rather than food or alcohol, Jacques gave in and the party decided to take the job.
“Tomorrow morning, then?” Jacques said with uncharacteristic enthusiasm.
“Aye,” the other two replied.
Together the three men polished off their drinks and then began to gather their belongings and head towards the door.
The Party heads Eastward
The following morning Olech and Jay met Jacques in front of his humble shack. His shack sat atop a small 1km plot of land a few lygafootnote:[Leagues, roughly 5km or the distance that one can leisurely walk in an hour.] Southeast of Plaza Ensiferum, he purchased it with the endowment his adoptive mother gave him during his coming of age. Conveniently it was facing a major thoroughfaire they could follow Eastward to their destination.
Olech—being the responsible adult that he was—secured pack animals and a cart for them. They spent an hour or so checking their equipment and making sure that they were adequately prepared. Afterwards, they boarded their cart and headed out.
In order to get from the outskirts of Bidhsop to the location of the job, they first had to travel through the Big Thicket of Tajsha. And as they proceeded East it didn’t take long before their surroundings turned from dead or snow-covered trees to Autumnal trees bursting with colour and life. It was the dead of Winter, but the Big Thicket seemed to operate on its own sense of time.
The road they travelled seemed to be relatively well-warded for the most part, but there were major sections that had been unobserved for long periods of time—or at least since the last travellers had passed through—and so they were subject to the whims of the flux. It had probably been a few months since Jacques and friends had last travelled this way, so they were expecting to encounter some difficulty or novelty (or both) along the way.
The first 10 lyga ended up being particularly uneventful, and the three men sat aboard their cart killing time as they normally did during their commutes. Jacques sat in the back and alternated between reading periodicals he brought along in his satchel and staring into space— his mates would often remark that he looked lonely. Olech knelt and spent the journey completely still, in what some people would call an “animistic” trance— a different state of consciousness typically associated with Elves or extremely learned mages, not something generally associated with humans or simple guards/rangers. Meanwhile Jay was drooling over smut rags.
However, as they proceeded a little further along their path, they realised that the road had deviated pretty significantly from the usual route since the last time they took it. Olech took notice of something like a hamlet or small farm nearby and suggested that they stop there for the evening before continuing the rest of the way tomorrow. Jacques and Jay were amenable to this, and so they ended up approaching the location that Olech pointed out.
The farm was well-maintained
Footnotes
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An enchanted dridersilk robe he’d inherited from his adoptive mother ↩
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After being ragdolled by her, he
decided that she was entirely purple and not almost purple (out of respect)found a new respect for her and decided that she was entirely purple and not merely almost. ↩ -
The Dandy’s Pride. A usually empty hilt used as a magical focus. In melees such as these it can usually be seen
to beholding the glowing blade of a rapier. ↩