Just because he's acting reckless doesn't mean you're going to, you're going to play upon your strengths and keep as far away as you can.

You ride your horse around the outskirts of the village, readying your bow the whole time. When you can, you fire at the Quillar attackers. As quick as they are, they aren't really paying attention to you and you manage to get in some good shots. A couple of head shots even.

At first they don't realize where the all the arrows are coming from, since Wessel is giving them a hard enough time with the chain lightning. You're sort of glad you decided to stay on the outskirts. Wessel is having such a "good time" blasting the Quillars, he's probably causing a lot more collateral damage in the process.

Eventually the Quillars start to retreat. This is when you get into a little more trouble as you happen to be right in the direction of where they're running! They still look scary and they get even moreso as they get closer. The worst has to be their shrieks. It's unpleasant to hear to say the least.

You ride out of the way, but your horse isn't fast enough and is peppered by quills. You catch a few in the leg yourself and you're thrown from the horse as it reels in pain, before collapsing.

Feeling the pain you scramble for cover behind a nearby rock. Fortunately the quills don't penetrate that. Most of them are content on just running away, but one straggler decides to try to get one more kill before leaving. That kill of course happens to be you.

The Quillar makes its high pitch shriek as it runs towards the rock. You don't have time to ready your bow before its high jumped over the rock and on the other side of you. You quickly draw your weapon and swing it blindly as you turn around. Luckily your blade catches the side of its head, killing it. At last you collapse from the pain in your leg.

While you're pulling out quills, Wessel and another Zalan soldier come to meet you. Wessel doesn't look any worse for wear, but the soldier looks very tired and obviously has wounds of his own.

"There you are, lying down on the job I see." Wessel mocks.
"Are you alright?" the other soldier asks.
"Yeah…Agh. I've gotten bitten in the leg by a Kobold before. Feels nearly the same except these quills go in a lot deeper."
"Glad you guys came when you did. We were just doing a routine patrol when these quill bastards came out of nowhere! They're getting bolder and attacking in greater number, we need more reinforcements."
"Yeah, well good luck with that. The Tulan border is the primary concern. Besides I'm here now, I predict that this infestation will be over soon now." Wessel boasts.

"Any…way. My name's Tylir. I'd introduce you to the rest of my squad, but they're all dead now. Even though it was the heat of battle, I couldn't help notice how well you picked off several of those Quillars with one shot. That was pretty impressive."
"Thanks."
"Hey! What about me? I'm the one who noticed you getting attacked in the first place! I'm also the one who saved your ass!" Wessel interrupts again, he's starting to get annoying at this point, but Tylir doesn't seem bothered by him.

"Everyone did their part. Okay, since I'm here I'll take you to see Captain Vhalat, I'm sure that's who you were sent to report to, oh and wizard while your skills may be appreciated here, I'd advise you to cut down on the boasting. Captain Vhalat isn't fond of it, and to be quite honest the other two wizards we had here were more experienced and they still got killed."
"Hmm, well perhaps they lacked the natural skill that I of course possess."

At this point you and Tylir just roll your eyes and get moving.

You travel through a couple of other villages and it's pretty depressing. You see stacks of bodies being buried in mass graves while most of other Retlad citizens look thoroughly defeated. A few look in your direction, but don't look too much, it's like they don't really expect you to succeed. Not exactly inspiring.

Soon you arrive in the town of Glaf. It would appear that the Zalan contingency sent here is staying in one of the bigger Retlad towns rather than the capitol. Ryan also says that the Quillar infestation is worse around here too, so the captain suspects that whatever lair they're crawling out of is nearby and can hopefully located and cleansed.

The town itself resembles a small Zalan fort rather than a proper Retlad town, as a sturdy wall has been erected around it. The people seem to look a little more hopeful though. Tylir goes on to say that he thinks that the Retlad citizens are actually starting to prefer Zalan presence especially since their on government has been pretty ineffectual about the whole invasion. The Retlad army has only focused on defending the capitol. The Retlad royals appear to find their lives more important than anyone else's.

Eventually you're brought before Captain Vahlat himself. He looks up from the map he's inspecting and addresses you and Wessel.

"Ah, I see the Empire has seen fit to send me reinforcements…wow, twice as many as I thought I'd get. Private Tylir where's the rest of your squad?"
"Um…dead sir."
"Of course. (sigh) So what's your problem private? Why is your leg wrapped up?" Vahlat asks you.
"Got into a fight with the Quillars sir." You answer.
"Oh?"

Tylir at this point interrupts and tells of what happened. Wessel looks like he wants to expand upon his deeds, but Vahlat's appearance is a little imposing and he was already warned once, so he keeps his mouth shut. Vahlat soon addresses you again.

"Well it would seem you two have already proven yourselves useful. A lot more useful that what passes for the Retlad army, but of course that isn't hard. Wizard, I certainly hope you don't intend to use this place as a chance to show off all the skills you learned in your fancy Nuro college. One of your predecessors did that as well, and as you can see he's no longer here. As for you, I hope that you can do a better job of keeping out of the way of the quills next time. Most don't get a second chance. Alright that's all for now. Our group is being housed for free at the Inn down the street. Free food as well, but don't go overboard, its being rationed. You want more food or anything else you'll have to pay like everyone else. I suggest though that you don't do any heavy carousing. This is a high alert situation and we could be going to battle at anytime. Dismissed."

You, Wessel and Tylir all leave at this point. Tylir goes on to show you where the Inn is and a couple of other places, but after today you just want to rest and retire to your room early. You rest your leg and begin practicing your lute. This puts you in better spirits.

6 months pass…

The Quillar invasion has nearly been eradicated. Most of the major lairs have been located and cleansed and you certainly contributed greatly to this effort. Besides your combat abilities, your tracking skills definitely came in handy a lot.

You've become somewhat recognized among Retlad citizens due to your actions and the lives you've saved. The word "hero" has been used a few times though you definitely don't think of yourself as one. In your free time you spoke with the citizens, a lot more than your fellow soldiers though. A few of them even convinced you to play for them when they noticed your lute. It took a little prodding, but eventually you gave in fully expecting to get booed, but to your surprise, you got applauded instead. Your playing didn't just boost your spirits it seemed. Whenever you could you played a little bit for people in what little free time you had. Never did you think that you'd be playing for any kind of audience, let alone an appreciative one.

It definitely hasn't been all sunshine though; you've seen a lot of people die. More than you ever wanted to actually. You'd made friends with Tylir shortly after your first meeting and he died only a couple months later. You'll be glad when every one of these Quillar creatures are all dead though, all they've done is cause misery.

You've got them on the run now though. You're preparing for an attack on another one of their lairs, when Captain Vahlat calls everyone to see him, he doesn't look enthusiastic about whatever it is he has to tell you.

"All right I'll be brief. As much as I hate leaving a mission unfinished, we're getting pulled out of here effective immediately. Major news is that Nuro has undergone a fucking disaster that needs to be put down like yesterday! All governments friendly to the City State of Nuro that can spare the manpower are to send help. We would be one of those. I hope the Retlad army is just competent enough to finish up what we started in their own country."

Wessel immediately pipes up upon hearing about this revelation.

"What happened in Nuro? What's going on?!"
"What's going on? From what I've been told a whole bunch of your kind raised a shitload of undead and unleashed a bunch of hostile demons on the place! The entire city was overrun. Reports are already stating that small packs of demons are running around the nearby countryside. Most likely in the direction of the Tulan Kingdom. Not sure what that means with our border war with them, but I only see it getting bloodier around there. In any case, our job is to head to Nuro, before the undead start following suit. I hope you're all ready for this, because this is going to be a lot different that fighting Quillars."

You look around and see a lot of fear wash over faces and rightly so. Necromancers have a bad history on your world. When you were little you still remember hearing the tales of the Great Lich Lord that existed centuries before you were even born. He almost took over the world. Those stories gave you nightmares as a kid. The possibility of having to face something remotely similar even on much smaller scale doesn't make you feel too well.

You letters to home (Retlad assignment)

Dear Mom,

This assignment is almost coming to a close I believe. We've got the Quillars on the run and wiped out most of their lairs. I've said it before and I'll say it again, I'd rather be fighting Kobolds!

Lately I've been able to play a lot more thanks to our severe lowering of the Quillar population. The people here are pretty nice, they seem to always want me to play for them. Didn't think I'd actually ever play for a proper audience!

I'm happy to do it though, it sort of keeps my mind off of the nastier things I've seen. I know I told you about how my friend Tylir died, a few months ago, but it still seems a little unreal. I mean other than Dad, I've never known anyone who I knew personally dying. And certainly not as violently as he did. I've seen a lot more violence in general though.

However, I guess I should've expected stuff like this to happen. I mean I am in the army! Sometimes the people call us heroes and stuff for killing the Quillars. Some guys like that annoying Wessel get a thrill out of it, but I dunno. I don't really feel like one. I just want to do my job and survive. And play if possible.

Well I guess that's it for now, give my love to the rest of the family.

Your son