Ziphora touches the body with a jolt of electricity, making everyone move faster.
Grash takes the hammer-smack in stride.
"Hah! Excellent! Fight! GRAAAARRRR!!"
His drumming accelerates, and somehow layers multiple beats overtop one anouther.
Oh, and almost forgot; Grash votes TRAMPLE SMASH!
TRAMPLE SMASH... confirmed.
Ziphora sighs, knowing her crazy brothers tendencies, and trample smashing is probably the way its gonna go. She agrees to trample smash, since she doesn't want to spoil their fun. Hey sibs count for something, right?
The minotaur charges forward and takes a swing at Ziphora.
Your dumb heads snap at the targets near them.
Then you suddenly surge forwards, sending those in front of you tumbling out of the way.
And I forgot about this... tomorrow. Sorry.
The dragon, amazingly enough, evades you as you surge forwards, but the hobgoblin and the goblin do not.
Switching to a more surpriseable opponent, Beachhead lashes out at General Gordru, ducking and weaving to confuse her as he attacks.
"Raising an army is pretty impressive! You should feel proud of what you accomplished! Good job!"
Beachhead votes for a tail swipe at the metal hobgoblin.
Ziphora manifests an empowered lightning horn then stabs the general with it. Thrice.
Beachhead tears viciously into the hobgoblin general, but she's a tough one--she refuses to go down.
"Focus on the body, not the heads!" she orders.
They inflict grievous wounds on your hindquarters, but they swiftly start healing.
Whatever Grash was trying to say is muted by his attempts to pound the hobgoblin on the head with his drum, while somehow still maintaining two different musical performances.
Grash votes SUPLEX! Or, failing that, BODY SLAM!
Beachhead votes for a tail swipe at the metal hobgoblin.
Grash votes SUPLEX! Or, failing that, BODY SLAM!
Ziphora votes "SUPLEX!" because it sounds more fun.
With the third stab of her horn, Ziphora downs the hobgoblin general. The minotaur snarls in rage and attacks her in vengeance.
His rage makes his strikes inaccurate, however, and only one hits.
Grash beats on the goblin a little, his target having gone missing.
Your dumb heads spread their attacks around.
You body hesitates a moment, then floats slightly up in the air, whirls about, and flies at the dragon with forelimbs extended.
+???
The dragon avoids your awkward attempts at... whatever that was, though.
"We just killed a bunch of minotaurs! Ugh! Fiiiiiiine."
Beachhead kills another stupid minotaur.
Beachhead votes for the body to fart out noxious fumes.
Beachhead tears ferociously into the minotaur, causing many grievous wounds, but not killing him.
The dragon sees an opportunity and flies to one side, then breathes a line of acid that hits all of your heads except Beachhead.
This kills one of your dumb heads. The goblin goes for another of them.
He does enough to kill another of your dumb heads.
Ziphora manages to partially dodge part of the dragon's breath, but is still burnt by the acid and collapses on the ground.
Grash narrowly dodges the worst of the acid. Still thumping his drum, he lunges for the goblin, an inarticulate roar emerging before he tries to bite savagely.
Grash also votes BACKFLIP + BODY SLAM! While being slightly saddened that SUPLEX! didn't work.
Surprised that these creatures didn't give up when he slew their general, Beachhead unleashes his full compliment of attacks.
Grash completely misses the goblin. The minotaur goes for Grash.
He *also* completely misses. Your two remaining dumb heads focus their attacks on him.
They finish him off, and he goes crashing to the ground.
Your body, confused by the two impossible commands, stands and does nothing.
With two of his three big distractions gone, the goblin decides that its chances of avenging the general are pretty low. He steps back and vanishes from sight.
The dragon, subsequently, decides it doesn't want to be the sole focus of your attacks and takes off.
Beachhead lets out a mighty roar in triumph.
Beachhead votes to have the body walk towards the army.
"Let's go talk to whomever is in charge of the horde, now. After us, I mean."
Grash gives a loud victorious roar.
He then agrees that they should go and let the army know who's in charge now.
There's actually several hobgoblins waiting as you turn towards the army. It seems like they were watching. They... punch themselves in the chest as you walk towards them.
"General," one of them says to you. "What is your command?"
"Send a messenger to the human army and tell a human named Sir Tolgrith that we need to talk to him.
"How many troops are left in the army? Where was the army first mustered?"
Beachhead addresses Zip and Grash.
"So, you guys agree that keeping this army here is a terrible idea, right? Humans are way racist.
"I'm thinking we need to take this army, maybe some of our lizardsouls, and go conquer something. It has something for all of us: Grash gets to have a constant war hard-on, I'll like that we get better hunters and sources of food than what Sir Tolgrith's lackadaisical efforts are managing, and Zip is going to appreciate that we are ensuring that these two armies stop fighting each other.
"We can even conquer in the queen's name, if we want."
Ziphora pushes herself out of the body, none too worse for wear. "Actually," Ziphora corrects Beachhead, "Even we have an army, we shouldn't be using it to conquer others. And besides armies are made of individual people, who have life and aspirations. Maybe its better to ask them what they would do if they were not at war? We could declare the war over, and everyone gets to go home safe to their families..."
Pacem suddenly appears out of nowhere, on top of Ziphora's head. "Yeah I agree, love and peace for everyone!"
"Under three thousand warriors, with a few beasts left and about six thousand elders, children, and other non-combatants," the hobgoblin replies. "We're retreating from the war in Molthune and Nirmathas."
"I think everyone should go back to their friends and families!" Ziphora announces cheerfully. "Make peace, not war!"
Then a thought occurs to her, "Do you and your families have a place to stay?" She asks the hobgoblins.
"No. That was the idea of trying to take the Vale."
"We’ll need to find you a home then."Ziphora answers.
Grash thinks of something.
"Why dinnae ye have homes? I be guessin' ye did, and then somethin' happened. Of course, this vale does seem ter get attacked a fair bit, so havin' an army around would be useful... so long as ye can get yer own food somewhow."
"We lost the war." The hobgoblin seems to prefer short, direct statements to long explanations.
Ziphora can't think of any good places nearby off the top of her head. It's possible somewhere in Varisia would work--it was mostly unclaimed by humanoid nations--they'd just have to deal with the giant tribes and other dangers, first. Oh, and travel through lands claimed by Korvosa, which might not approve of an army of hobgoblins.
They're apparently already running away from Nirmathas, which rules that out. Nidal is right out of it. There *might* be some other valleys and such here in the mountains that could work... honestly, Bloodsworn Vale is about their best bet for hundreds of miles. Though it does seem a bit small for a population of thousands, it's at least defensible.
"Hmm, how about you become our tenants?" Ziphora suggests. "You rear goats in the mountains, cattle in the valley, then pass us a couple every week or so and in exchange you can live in those mountains and valleys."
"I can't have people going around like rootless vagabonds, you know."
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The hobgoblin army settles into the vale--somewhat to Sir Torlgrith and the lizardfolk's dismay, but with you around to, ahem, 'mediate' any disputes, everyone reluctantly agrees to it.
And thus ends our tale, with the Great Hydra triumphant over all their foes, Lords and Lady of the Hydra's Vale. Whether in days to come they used their new army to spread their dominion, or whether their valley became a place of unusual piece between species, this tale does not tell. But it is for this reason that what was once called Bloodsworn Vale is known even now as Hydra's Vale. The rest... can wait for another telling.