Chapter 18 Chapter Fifteen On the Wings of Doom

They came here under the cover of a blizzard blowing from the eastern tundra to Ten-Towns.Ironically, the path they took around the Cairne's cone was the same path that Drizzt and Wulfgar had walked two weeks earlier.But the subgiants were heading south to where the human population lived, not to the tundra to the north.Although they are tall and thin, they are relatively small among the giants, but they are still a difficult team to beat. A frost giant led Akar Kessell's massive pathfinding party.Under the howling wind, no one could hear their footsteps, and they were walking at full speed towards the secret cave that the orc scouts had discovered on the southern foot of the mountain.There are only twenty monsters here, each carrying a large bag of weapons and food.

The leader is approaching the destination at full speed.It was Billin, a cunning and gigantic giant whose upper lip had been torn by the razor-sharp fangs of a giant wolf, leaving a perpetually eerie smile on its face.This kind of disability increases its power and influence, making those players who like to be funny add to its awe.Akar Kessell personally appointed it to be the leader of the Vanguard scouting party, although the Crystal Shard had previously suggested that the wizard send a more inconspicuous team, such as the people of Heafstad, to complete this task requiring wisdom.But Kessell admired Billing, and was impressed by the large amount of supplies this small group could carry.

The army entered the newly erected barracks before midnight and walked around to arrange sleeping quarters, storerooms, and a small kitchen.Then they waited, silently preparing to deliver the first blow in Akar Kessell's glorious campaign to conquer Ten-Towns. A half-orc messenger soldier would visit them every two days and pass on the wizard's latest instructions, telling Bilin where the next supply team was scheduled to come.Everything was going according to Kessell's plan, but Billing found that whenever the messenger came, its soldiers were more and more eager for the time to go to the battlefield, and even a little anxious.

Yet the instructions were the same each time: Hide here and wait. In less than two weeks, the giants, in the tense atmosphere of the cave, began to make noise.Subgiants are creatures of action, they don't know much about thinking, and their dull days inevitably start to disappoint them.They began to quarrel incessantly, and often fought.Billin was always nearby, the mighty frost giant who stopped the melee every time before someone was seriously injured.The giant knew it might not be able to keep the belligerent team at bay for much longer. The fifth orderly came to the cave one muggy night.When the unfortunate half-orc entered the hall, he was immediately surrounded by twenty disgruntled subgiants.

"What news do you bring?" one of them asked impatiently. The half-orc thought Akar Kessell was behind him, and glared at the sub-giant with blatant contempt. "Bring your master here, soldier!" it ordered. Suddenly a big hand grabbed its neck from behind and shook it violently. "We're asking you questions, Orc scum," said another giant. "What's the news?" Visibly tense, the orc roared at the giant who had attacked him. "You dare to touch me? The wizard will peel off your skin!" "I've heard enough!" growled the first giant, and its great hand stretched down to clamp the goblin's neck.It lifted the orc with only one hairy hand.The orc struggled painfully, but it didn't affect the subgiant one bit.

"Crush the scum's neck!" shouted a giant. "Get its eyes out and throw it into the black hole!" said the other end. Billing entered the room, and quickly passed through the human wall to find the cause of the commotion.The giant wasn't surprised to see subgiants torturing an orc.In fact, the captain enjoyed the sight, but he understood the dangers of angering the volatile Kessell.It has seen more than one disobedient goblin slowly tortured to death for disobeying orders, or simply for satisfying the wizard's perverted desire for pleasure. "Put down that poor fellow," Billing ordered calmly.

There were several complaints from around the frost giant. "Blow its head off!" a subgiant yelled. "Bite its nose off!" cried another. At this time, the orc's face was already swollen due to lack of oxygen, and he was almost unable to struggle at all.The sub-giant continued to hold it, meeting Billin's menacing gaze for some time before dropping the helpless victim at the frost giant's feet. "Leave it a poor life," the sub-giant growled at Billin. "But if it still dares to talk nonsense to me, I promise to eat it!" "I've had enough of this hole," grumbled from the back of the crowd. "There's a whole valley of filthy dwarves waiting to be slayed!" the voice reiterated at a higher decibel.

Billing looked around and observed that seething rage had spread to all the team members, threatening to bring down the entire hole in an unstoppable frenzy. "Tomorrow night we'll go out and see what's around," Billing replied.The frost giants knew it was a dangerous move, but if they didn't do it, there would be greater disaster. "Go out three at a time, no one will know!" The orc regained some composure, and heard Billing's proposal.It began to protest, but the giant's leader immediately silenced it. "Shut your mouth, dog orc," Birin ordered, looking at the subgiants who threatened the orcs before, and then smiled evilly. "Otherwise I will let my friends eat you!"

The giants cheered and patted each other on the shoulders of their companions, and they were good companions again now.Billing had promised to act, but his doubts about this decision were not at all dispelled by the enthusiasm of the soldiers.They uttered various dwarf phrases they had made up (two of which were "apple dwarf" and "bearded, flattened, and scorched"), each time eliciting enthusiastic choruses of agreement. Billing was very worried about what would happen if any sub-giant met such a small race.    Bi Lin only let the sub-giants go out three times at a time to patrol outside the cave at night.The giant leader thought it unlikely that dwarves would come so far north of the valley, but he also knew it was a big gamble.Whenever a group of people returned without incident, the frost giants would breathe a sigh of relief.

Just letting the sub-giant out for a walk outside the narrow hole boosted their morale tenfold.As these troops regained their enthusiasm for future battles, the tension in the cave dissipated.On the mountainside of Cairn's Cone they had often seen the fires of Kekkoni and Cadinevarou, Tamarin across the road to the west, and even Bryn Shander far to the south.Seeing these towns made them imagine the victory to come, and it allowed them to endure the long wait. Another week passed.Everything seems to be going well.Seeing how this little freedom helped his army so much, Bi Lin gradually became less nervous about this risky decision.

But when Bruenor told the two dwarves of the clan that there was good stone in the shadow of the Cairne's cone, they went to the northern end of the valley to see if it was worth digging.They reached the southern slope of the rocky mountain towards evening, and at dusk they camped on a large flat rock beside a rushing stream. This is their valley, and nothing has happened in years.They did nothing to warn. So when the first team of sub-giants went out of the cave that night, saw the campfire, and heard the chatter of the dwarves they hated, an accident happened.    On the other side of the mountain, Drizzt Do'Urden opened his eyes from his nap.He stepped out of the cave into the growing shadows, and found Wulfgar sitting silently on his usual high rock, looking out over the plain. "Are you homesick?" the dark elf asked casually. Wulfgar shrugged his huge shoulders and replied casually, "Perhaps." Ever since Wulfgar had come to respect Drizzt, he had been thinking a lot about the way his people lived, and it had troubled him.The dark elves were an enigma to him, a bewildering amalgam of great martial prowess and absolute self-control.Drizzt seems to weigh his every move with a high degree of risk taking and absolute moral standards as two sides of the scale. Wulfgar turned his puzzled eyes to the dark elf. "Why are you here?" he asked suddenly. Now it was Drizzt's turn to stare silently at the tundra before him.The first stars of the evening appeared, and their reflected light was visible in the eyes of the elves like deep pools.But Drizzt wasn't looking at them, and his mind had gone back to the distant past, to the dark cities in the great and complex caverns deep underground. "I remember," Drizzt said vividly, as the worst memories are usually vivid, "when I first saw the surface world. I was much younger then, Members of a large commando. We came out of a secret cave to a small village of surface elves." When these images flashed through his mind again, the dark elf didn't want to think about it. "Our gang killed all the forest elves. All the women, all the children." Wulfgar grew more frightened as he listened.The kind of attack Drizzt described was also likely the practice of the ferocious elk tribe. "My people are bloodthirsty," Drizzt continued sternly. "They strike without mercy." He stared at Wulfgar, to make sure the barbarian was listening to him. "They kill with absolutely no emotion." He paused for a moment, so that the barbarian could hear the weight of the words.Wulfgar was confused by this simple but unmistakable description of the grim slayer.He was raised and educated among passionate warriors from an early age. The meaning of these people's survival is to pursue the glory in battle and fight for the glory of Tapas.The relentless cruelty was incomprehensible to the young barbarian.There was a subtle difference, Wulfgar had to admit.However, the results of the dark elves and the barbarian attacks are similar. "The daemon goddess they serve leaves no room for other races," Drizzt explained. "Especially elves of other races." "But you will never be accepted by this world," Wulfgar said. "You know very well that humans will avoid you." Drizzt nodded. "Almost everyone," he admits. "I don't have many people who can be called friends, but I am very satisfied. You see, savage, I respect myself very much, without guilt and without shame." He had been squatting, but now he stood up, And began to walk into the darkness outside. "Come on," he ordered. "Let's have a good fight today. I am very satisfied with your progress in martial arts. Your courses in this area are coming to an end." Wulfgar continued to sit in thought for a while.The drow lived a life of material poverty and hardship, but he was richer than anyone Wulfgar had ever known.Drizzt stood firm in the face of irresistible circumstances, leaving the familiar world of his people for a world where he would never be accepted or appreciated. He watched the departed elf, now a small shadow in the dark. "Maybe we're not so different," he murmured.    "There are spies!" said a sub-giant. "How stupid! Come to reconnaissance and light a fire." The other end said. "Go smash 'em!" said the first subgiant to speak, and it began to walk toward the orange fire. "The leader told us not to act rashly!" The third reminded the other two. "We are here to observe them, not to smash them!" They came down the stony path as stealthily as possible to the little dwarf's tent.So the sound they make sounds just like rolling boulders. The two dwarves had already noticed something approaching.They drew their weapons for readiness, but they thought it might be Wulfgar, Drizzt, or fishermen from Kekkoney who had seen their campfire and were coming to join them for supper. When the sub-giant came near the camp, the dwarves were already standing there with weapons in hand. "We've been found!" said one of the giants, and it immediately dodged into the nearby darkness. "Shut up!" said the other end. The third giant, who knew the dwarves as well as the second, didn't know who they were, grabbed the second by the shoulders and smiled evilly. "If they've spotted us," it reasoned, "then we have no choice but to smash them!" The second giant smiled softly, raised the heavy wooden club on its shoulders, and walked towards the tent. The two dwarves were completely stunned when the sub-giant came towards them from a few yards away with some bouncing stones at their feet.But cornered dwarves are some of the toughest things in the world, and these two belonged to a clan from Mithril Hall that had spent their lives wallowing in the harsh tundra.This battle will not be as easy as the giants imagined. The first dwarf dodged a clumsy swing from the lead sub-giant, and then his counter-dwarf slammed into the giant's toe.Instinctively the giant lifted its wounded foot and jumped on the other foot, and the skilled dwarf warrior immediately hammered it hard on the knee and knocked it down. The other dwarf reacted quickly and threw it with a hammer with great precision.He hit the other giant in the eye, and it turned and flew out, crashing into a pile of rocks. But the third wisest sub-giant lifted a large rock before rushing over it, and threw it with great force.The stone struck the unfortunate Dwarf's temple, and his neck snapped, and his head hung on one side, and he fell dead on the ground. The first dwarf could have taken down the fallen giant quickly, but the third sub-giant came to him right away.The two kept attacking and dodging each other, and the dwarf actually had a slight advantage.This advantage lasts until the giant with the eye shot recovers and jumps in to join the fray. The two sub-giants dealt heavy blows to the dwarf in succession.He dodges for a while, but the next blow hits him directly in the shoulder, sending him falling backwards.The dwarf regained his breath quickly, for he was as tenacious as the rock he hit, but a boot thumped on him and kept him from getting up. "Stomp him down!" demanded the giant, wounded by the dwarf. "Then we took him to the chef!" "Don't do that!" roared the giant who was stepping on the dwarf.He spun his big boot down, slowly crushing the victim to death. "If Billin finds out that we have done something good, it is we who are brought to the cook!" The two giants really learned to be afraid when they were reminded that this would anger their cruel leader.They helplessly looked at their more cunning companions, trying to find a solution. "Once throw them and their disgusting stuff down a hole and pretend nothing happened!" Far to the east, Akar Kessell waited patiently in his remote tower.In the fall, the last and largest caravan of the year will return from Luskan to Ten-Towns, laden with treasure and supplies for the winter.Then his armies will muster and march forth with honor to destroy the poor fishermen.Just thinking about the easy fruits of his victory made him tremble with joy. Little did he know that the first blow of the war had been struck.