Arrival

[NPA]

_The short-ranged orcs let their swings carry them into downward tucks. Keyfie's foot lightly grazes over the axe-bearer's scalp, but at least the wind spear attack digs in a short distance above the sword orc's tailbone. They recover to spin around and try to pinch their prey between lateral swings. At this point, the one that Keyfie hit first has taken his polearm back up and charges in for a complimentary thrust._

[Keyfie]

Gritting his teeth, Keyfie tightens his grip on his swallow as he feels the orc start to spin. Keyfie waits for the right moment before rapidly expelling the compressed air around the tip of his swallow, resulting in a wind blast that pushes him away from the orcs and hopefully the orc into his comrade's weapon. Keyfie lands on his feet and quickly grabs a rock and holds up his hand before using average power to send it speeding at the polearm-bearer's good eye.

[NPA]

_The brief burst to an already weakened point on the sword orc throws its posture worse, crumpling it as it attempts its spinning strike. With their target shooting some distance up and away, the orcs still prove to have some decent reactionary skills: The sword-wielder tucks toward the axe-wielder, who restrains himself enough that the inertia of his swing amounts to little enough that he wraps his arm around the sword-wielder harmlessly, the edge of his axe coming to a halt just as it meets the sword-wielder's epidermis. He lets his ally collapse in pain and exhaustion. The sword orc is still alive and breathing heavily, but he is taking a moment to muster his energy. The polearm orc only blinks to the rock attack and keeps charging, clearly undeterred, and performs a powerful, angry thrust toward Keyfie's stomach. The axe orc supports by flanking to, again, Keyfie's left. Both of them look angrier than before, not that they previously looked happy. It's probably because they're tired of their target's positioning antics and wish that he would just stand still and die._

[Keyfie]

Keyfie sucks in his stomach while smoothly retreating while he focuses on moving south. Keyfie infuses his swallow with wind-enhanced edges using a moderate amount of power. He quickly counter flanks to the right and attempts to strike out with a rapid ten-hit combo aimed at the polearm-bearer. Three slashes to it's hands, four stabs to the neck, and two stabs followed by a horizontal sweep to the knees while Keyfie's feet was still in the air.

[NPA]

_The polearm orc reacted to Keyfie's retreat by bringing his weapon upward and shortly jumping forward suddenly, intending to ram the end into the target's face. Keyfie was far too fast, though, and his attack left him very open. He had just enough time to start to turn his head with the distinct look of "Oh, shit!" in widened eyes before dropping. He didn't budge after that. The axe-bearer didn't hesitate in its approach, drawing around to Keyfie's left. The sword orc had caught his breath right as the axe one needed him, so the latter gave the former a small grunt and a look, then they both performed an attack that allowed them to rapidly slide across the ground while crouching and holding their weapons in front of them horizontally. The blades are about at the level of Keyfie's ankles when the attack starts, and the sweeps are fast enough that he'd only drop down for the blades to connect mid-shin if he didn't react._

[Keyfie]

Reorienting himself midair, Keyfie focuses a severe amount of power into augmenting his swallow with a massive amount of energy before holding the swallow in front of him horizontally. With a blast of air from his feet, Keyfie rockets toward the sword orc while rapidly twisting himself clockwise to cork-screw toward it. Upon impact, he generates a wind explosion that further damages the sword orc while propelling him into the same attack against the axe orc.

[NPA]

_Keyfie's first energy-expensive, flying dash attack resulted in his swallow connecting with the outstretched sword from the side, batting it out of the orc's hands. That didn't really matter, though, because Keyfie's attack continued and ripped into the orc, slashing it to pieces. The explosion of wind further shredded the body, then the axe orc caught the same fate from behind. His dash attack had a brief cooldown, so, even if Keyfie hadn't been performing his attacks very quickly, the axe orc would have been powerless to spin around and . . . well, okay, he was totally powerless. The ambush had turned into two fragmented orcs and one that is unconscious and possibly also dead. The sword orc's fragments . . . Well, where they had been (I mean, some had just been blasted into the ground with the wind burst, but, you know, they're everywhere.) had a sphere, one that looked just like the kind that is used for many purposes in Final Fantasy X, floating just above the ground. The polearm-bearing orc also had a small, roughly sewn, leather pouch with two blue fangs inside it._

[Keyfie]

Breathing rather laboriously, Keyfie scans the area for any immediate danger. Once satisfied, he collects the leather pouch before thrusting the end of the swallow into the back of the pole-arm orc's neck to make sure it was dead. Afterwards he goes to the floating sphere and reaches out for it. "What have we got here?", he says to himself raising an eyebrow.

[NPA]

_The sphere broke apart into small, magical wisps that swirled around each other, then zipped outward and dissipated. In their wake was a small, light blue potion in a spray bottle. Conveniently, this one had a commonplace, white label taped across the front: "Pleasant-Smelling Ether"_

[Keyfie]

Keyfie stores the items away into his knapsack before shouldering his possessions. He turns to face the village and makes his way there, keeping a more vigilant watch on his surroundings.

[NPA]

*_A wild stantler appears! It takes a look at the bloody mess of a mage that Keyfie is, casually looks away, looks back at Keyfie, and scampers off with no fucks given. Nothing else of note happens on the way back, though a sprig of rosemary comes handily into view, just a few steps right from his direct path toward the village, right next to a small, fresh-looking sage bush. For those that aren't from a desert, by "small," I mean that its diameter is about the size of your face._*

[Keyfie]

Always happy about finding useful herbs, Keyfie stops by the plants to collect them and tosses them in his knapsack before continuing to his destination. Taking a quick moment to look back at the beautiful field he was leaving. "I'll have to remember this place for when I need to stock up." He says to no one in particular as he goes on toward the village.