NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ankh-Morpork Guard" data-source="post: 4040202" data-attributes="member: 10079">Chapter 560: PrideThe snap-hiss of Master Ral’s lightsaber suddenly igniting cut through the silence created in the moment of discovery of the Vong trap.    “Master?!” Tobias started to turn to look in surprise at the immediate drawing of his Master’s weapon, but one of his ears caught a sound that was far more important. A fast moving buzzing sound and it was getting louder...    Reacting as best he could since the Force did him no good, Tobias twisted away, tilting his head just enough that the razor bug didn’t take his face off, instead cutting a long gash across his left cheek. Though he was trying to become a natural at simply remorphing a small wound like that without a thought, Tobias sure wasn’t there yet, and the buzzing of more razor bugs coming at them definitely didn’t help him.    As Tobias quickly drew his own weapon from its place at his belt, Master Ral moved to stand in front of the young Alraxian. Just like all Vong and their ‘technology’, the razor and thud bugs being thrown at them could not be felt in the Force. There was no screaming alert of danger to tell a Jedi were his lightsaber should be to deflect an attack and where to move to simply one. Instead, it was required that the Jedi use their eyes and ears. This was, of course, very difficult. Many Jedi were killed due to their reliance on the Force, which simply became a crutch and an outright weakness with the Yuuzhan Vong.    But Master Ral was a Jedi Master for a reason.    No, he could not feel the incoming razor bugs in the Force, but he had not neglected his other senses as some younger Jedi did. Aware of Tobias’ exact location behind him, thanks to the Force, Master Ral swung his lightsaber in an expertly timed arc that cut down three incoming razor bugs, then shifted to the side in time for another to fly straight between his body and Tobias’.    “Stay close until that ship sets down!” Master Ral called sharply over his shoulder to Tobias, who had just activated his own lightsaber and turned to see the at least six of the Yuuzhan Vong charging for them.     Before Tobias could say anything, his ears picked up on a buzzing sound again. This time, however, coming from behind them...or rather, in front of Tobias since he still had his back to his Master and the approaching Vong. The rain hadn’t eased up at all, meaning that trying to spot the tiny, semi-intelligent bug coming back around at them was extremely difficult. Focus on the sound.    Louder...    Louder...    Getting closer...    ...LEFT!    Tobias didn’t see it, but just swung his blue-green blade in an upwards arc to defend his entire body, hoping his ears weren’t lying. There was a fizzling sound as the blade went up that was much louder than the odd sound created by the rain hitting the blade, and he knew he’d got the thing.    “Forward, Tobias!” the sharp voice of his Master caused Tobias’ body to move before he’d even registered the words.    Spinning around, Tobias saw only two of the Vong warriors approaching. One coming straight for Master Ral, and the other for Tobias, both with their large amphistaves at the ready. They were actually being what might be considered ‘honourable’, which was almost worrying as Tobias had never heard of this before. A dozen Vong and only one came at each of them. Was that a sign of respect or overconfidence?    There was no time to answer that question. Master Ral took a single step forward, ducking low under a swing meant to remove his head from his body, then swung his own lightsaber to take the Vong’s feet out from under him. The powerfully built warrior was not fast enough to dodge this attack, and soon both of his legs ended at the knee. When he hit the ground with a heavy grunt, the blue-skinned Jedi Master inverted his blade and drove it straight down into the warrior’s neck...ending the ‘fight’ before it had started, then bringing his lightsaber up at the ready position just as a new warrior charged for him, spewing words in the Vong language that could only have been curses.    Tobias, however, did not make such quick work of his warrior. While he did manage to step back to dodge a quick horizontal slash at his torso, Tobias’ counterattack was simple and predictable. He took a firm step forward to close the gap between himself and the Vong and thrust his lightsaber straight for his opponent’s chest. But the warrior seemed to be ready for it, his amphistaff spinning back around and easily batting Tobias’ bright blade off to the right.    Suddenly wide open, Tobias was barely able to duck under a horizontal slash aimed straight at his neck. Instead, it only took a few of his hairs with it. But now Tobias saw an opening, and used all his strength to jab his left elbow right into his opponent’s gut.    This did not, however, have the desired effect. Instead of the Vong reeling back from the strike, Tobias’ elbow screamed in pain from the impact against the very durable armour all of the Yuuzhan Vong warrior wore. And before he could even make an exclamation of pain, Tobias’ legs were swept out from underneath him.    The world spun and before Tobias realized what was happening, his back hit the muddy ground. For the briefest of moments, Tobias’ eyes went blurry. The moment his vision returned to normal, he saw the sharp tip of an amphistaff coming straight down towards his face. Reacting as fast as his body would allow, Tobias rolled in towards the warrior’s feet, feeling the tip of the staff graze his shoulder rather than his eye.    And then Tobias saw an interesting opening directly above him.    In that moment of surprise for the Vong warrior where his amphistaff was forced into thick mud rather than flesh, Tobias swung his still-active lightsaber at an unarmoured section of his opponent. There was a sudden cry of anger and pain from the Vong as Tobias’ lightsaber took off the warrior’s right hand The amphistaff stuck in the ground still, Tobias was able to jump up to his feet as the Vong stumbled back just a few steps.    But when Tobias got to his feet, he was not greeted by an unarmed opponent. Just as he was bringing his lightsaber up into a defensive position in front of him, Tobias saw the Vong warrior remove a small, dagger-sized amphistaff from what might have been a belt.     “K’lthrek Jeedai!” the Vong’s tattooed and viciously scarred face matched his voice perfectly. And just as he finished speaking, he dove forward to take Tobias by surprise.    Tobias saw another opening, as it was obvious the warrior was now reacting out of anger and not choosing his attacks wisely. In one simply motion, Tobias twisted to his right, avoiding the dagger strike easily, and then brought his lightsaber down to take the warrior’s head off.    The cut was clean and met with no resistance.    But knowing that there were countless other warriors ready for him, as Master Ral was still a blur of movement off to the side, Tobias had no time to celebrate his victory. Quickly bringing up the blue-green blade in front of him again and trying to ignore the hair matted to his forehead by the rain, Tobias looked up to the group of Vong a few meters away, ready for his next opponent.    [Take cover immediately!]    The Knight’s voice in Tobias’ head suddenly changed everything, and it took only a slight glance upwards to see why.    “Master! DOWN!” Tobias relayed the warning and then took the only cover they had, dropped right into the mud.    Before he hit the ground, Tobias caught sight of his Master, a blur of motion stopping only to drive his lightsaber straight through his opponent’s upper torso. The second he removed the blade, without a single question as to what Tobias had just yelled, Master Ral also dropped to the mud.    Just as Master Ral hit, there was a series of loud, pulsing sounds that weren’t like anything either of them had ever heard before. But those were suddenly drowned out by violent eruptions of trees, mud, metal debris, and Vong as the shots hit their targets with amazing accuracy. This sound, too, was drowned out by another. But this one Tobias knew very, very well.    It was the unique, almost humming sound that Kanyaks made in an atmosphere when they were about to take off. Pushing himself up to his feet, Tobias ran over to his Master and, with his free hand, grabbed the Omwati’s robes. Helping to pull Master Ral up, they both ran straight for the Kanyak that was hovering just a half meter above what was left of the Yuuzhan Vong warriors. Though the circular hatch was open, showing the cream-coloured interior, there was no one standing there to wave them in. In fact, the Knight didn’t even urge Tobias to move quickly. He said nothing at all.    Not that anything needed to be said.    In a matter of seconds, Master Ral and Tobias were inside the ship, their lightsaber deactivated and the hatch irising closed right behind them. Due to the inertial dampers, they were not thrown against the wall as the Kanyak quickly took to the sky again, but Tobias did hear the thrumming sound in the hull around him that indicated the engines were working as hard as they could.    Through heavy breathing, Master Ral eventually said, “You did well, Tobias.”    Suddenly feeling odd that there was no water hitting him from above anymore, Tobias couldn’t help but glance up slightly, “We should...should get to the cockpit.”    His mind was still focused on the fact that they weren’t out of this just yet.    Marix would have been proud of him.Sorry for taking so much time to update. Bit of a hectic time right now and its probably going to continue for a while. Going to do my best to really stick to this better than I have been, though. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></blockquote>

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