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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lars Frehse" data-source="post: 343240" data-attributes="member: 1674">Strange Bedfellows- part 2As soon as they were back on the Corrada Corridor, they picked up speed. Occasionally, they overtook caravans, but even though Donnangar usually hid his head with the hood of his coat, their horserat and the dire wolf attracted more than enough attention.Then, one night, they camped together with a heavily guarded caravan. As the night dragged on, and some of the guards got bolder, their captain challenged Donnangar to a fist-fight. The Orc was reluctant at first, but when the human started throwing insults at him, he shrugged and accepted the challenge.The two opponents unstrapped their weapons and got out of their armor and after the merchants and guards had formed a circle around them, the captain of the guard started to throw punches at Donnangar. He was a massive man, and almost as burly as the orc, but as he was swinging wildly at his opponent, Donnangar dodged each and every blow. He didn’t even raise his arms- his fists were dangling on his sides as he was moving with the grace of a cat and nimbly shuffling his feet.The human got more and more furious as Donnangar was outwitting him with a sly smile. But then the warchief seemed to get tired of the fight, because now he was shooting his hammerheadsized fists at the human. After a quick combination, which made the captain’s head fly around like a piece of wood in a storm, Donnangar hit him in the stomach. The human doubled over and broke down, breathless and unconcious for now.The fight was over, but Torn saw one of the guards to his right pulling a knife from under his coat. Donnangar was facing away from them at the moment, and the mercenary moved forward in order to attack him from behind, but Torn grabbed the man and shoved him back.For a few moments, they were staring at each other, but then the human backed off- apparently he didn’t have the guts to attack Torn. He put his knife back under his coat and sneered in broken Ledean:” Yeah, youse Orcs always shtick together…”.Torn grinned and nodded: “You know, that is actually correct.”As Torn turned to gratulate Donnangar, Niklas adressed the guard: “Hey, you know that my pal just saved a life, don’t you?”The guard spat and looked up to the monk:” Yeah, saved the filthy orc’s hide, he did.”.“No, actually, I meant he saved your life. You saw that orc fighting? You don’t think you would have had a chance, do you? Not even with a knife…”Some of the other guards were now grinning openly, and he only said:” Whatever”, as he left the campfire and disappeared into the night.For days, they rode on, and now the nights were getting colder, signalling the end of summer and the coming of autumm. As they were getting closer to Mithril, the number of patrols they encountered grew from day to day. Some of the Vigilantes and Paladins they met knew Donanngar, but even those who didn’t recognize him used Corean’s gift of detecting evil and they looked into his heart. Since they saw no evil in him, they all let him pass.Eventually, they reached Mithril. They approached the single massive gate to the city, and even from there, they saw the gigantic form of the namegiving Golem. Dwarving even the biggest structures of the metropolis, the Mithril Golem stood upright in it’s eternal guard. It had been crafted by Corean himself, and after the construct had helped imprisoning Khadum at the bottom of the ocean, it had walked back to the shore where it was standing ever since. Later, the worshippers of Corean had built a city around it, which had attracted thousands and thousands over the time.After they had passed the Paladins at the gate, which had made certain that they were truly the masters of the direwolf and the horserat, they found an inn that accepted their steeds. Once inside, they went to the large complex that was built around the Mithril Golem: Corean’s temple. There, they went to the small monasterie of the “Fists of Mithril”.They were greeted warmly by Brother Juverus, an old monk who happily greeted Niklas and his friends and handed them their reward after they delivered the books which Brother William had given them back in Durrover.Ben and Niklas stayed in order to look for maps or travel logs of Thalien, hoping to find out where “Hor’ Kung”, the ancient Orc city was located. Meanwhile, Torn and Trepat headed down to the harbor.Mithril was divided into two parts: Temple City and Harbor City. In Temple City, beautiful multistory houses made of marble were there rule. Here, under the shadow of the golem, the priests and paladins of Corean were living along with the rulers of the city, who usually came from their ranks. Harbor City was a lawless sprawl. Here, the poor and destitute were living, as well as the middle class and the succesfull merchants. The houses were mostly made of wood, and small alleys and sidestreets were crisscrossing the district.As they reached the harbor, Torn saw the Blood Sea for the first time: The whole ocean had the color of Khadum’s blood, and they weren’t quite certain whether the salt they were smelling was simply the mundane salt of the ocean or if it was the salt of the titan’s blood…Clouds were darkening the sky now, and rain was falling down as the wind picked up and was blowing landwards.They walked from ship to ship, asking whether they could charter it for a trip to Thalien. Most captains told them off right away: There were pirates lairing in the toe islands and the waters between Mithril and Thailen were dominated by Pisceans, evil fish-creatures who had been transformed by Khadum’s blood. And even those who were ready to take the risk waved off when they found out that one of the passengers would be an orc.As they were about to give up hope, Trepat and Torn approached a middlesized sloop which was being trimmed by what appeared to be a crew that consisted solely of forsaken elves. The most striking feature of the ship was a figurehead, which was carved in the shape of a willowy, pale-skinned, sad eyed elf woman.Both stood in the rain and looked at the ship and it’s busy crew, as an Elf who was dressed in elaborate and expensive velvet and silken clothes approached them:” A beauty, isn’t she?”.Torn didn’t know whether he meant the ship or the figurehead, he nodded in agreement: “Actually, we are looking for a ship. Do you know the captain?”.The Elf smiled warmly:” Of course I know him! My name is Ith’laen Khemaitas, and the Ghost maid, which is the name of the vessel you are looking at right now, is my ship.”</blockquote>

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