HelloHound

I personally always enjoyed it when a story included other pov's and now I'm the one driving the clown car so beep beep

Captain Allen Hesperos is, admittedly, not suited for his rank. He is a branch member of the Phoenix family, and his father was owed a favor, and on it went. 

Despite not being suited for his rank, Allen was a decent soldier- he just never had an interest in politics and assumed that he would continue being a captain until he aged out or married whatever empty-headed lass his father deemed needed for the family. There was never any concern or irritation with this fact of life; Agus Hesperos would point, and Allen would follow.

Things went smoothly for the some-thirty years of his life where he aged, got a job, and listened to his father gruff about his inattentiveness to detail in his reports. Allen assumed that this would continue for a long, long while. The age of peace was set upon the land soon, with only fifteen more years to go.

Allen Hesperos was, like in many of his reports, incorrect, as he saw the most capable member of his squad have his head caved in by a rank-three demon. Still, it’s better for his father politically if he died without any wounds on his back. 

A slice to his abdomen and a dull throbbing to his head, he still held onto his sword and shouted incoherent insults as a private helped distract the demon. His squad got three legs, if they down the beast then it would surely bleed out and die next to their corpses. Of course, then his father would have to deal with the tainted ground and desecrated corpses- that is if they haven’t zombified yet, but that would be less of an issue that a still-moving demon.

The private, Simmons, is beginning to breathe high, squeaky breaths as the demon secretes even more miasma as it screeches out something in its hell language, then a stick hits the side of its enormous body, causing it to turn at some…kobold? Child? A small, skinny thing with wild hair as it shouts a single noise at the enraged beast.

Allen is collapsing against a nearby tree, sword still in his hand, as he mumbles out final words for him and his soldiers and a more quiet prayer of hope for that stupid child.

_____________________________________________________

Evidently, Allen doesn’t die. He should have died, much as he should have not gotten the job in the first place. But he doesn’t. In fact, based on the now blank canvas of his torso where scars were littered, he’s better than ever. 

“Seems like your luck held out, must’ve gotten a pretty good hit against the bug to cause it to run away like that. ‘Course we’re gonna havta look for the gut puddle the damn things leave behind.” Patricia, one of the brigade's more…eccentric soldiers, looked him over and was visibly surprised at the lack of wounds on his body before reaching on his armor and smearing the viscera over the exposed section of his torso. She winked before loudly announcing that he’ll live, but he better walk carefully for some time. 

Allen knew that he’ll probably be accosted for answers later but frankly he was glad she’ll wait until after he gets thorns out of his hair; Urthis knows how his helmet came off; he had vague memories, of pain and irritation about some thief after his coinpurse. As for how he survived, and how he healed so perfectly, he has some private thoughts. First comes the burial and allocation of the soldiers-of his soldiers- armor and goods. The families that were left behind.

Allen is very well acquainted with how many in the upper rungs of the army like to line their pockets, and as a sedate man never cared to fight them, but as he looks at the crushed head of a man who in all respects was better than him, he decides to be more proactive about what happens to these soldiers. He didn’t know many of their names in life, so he needs to know them in death.

Patricia, Dale, and Herb apparently found an orphan from the village that burned down, nearby the much smaller miasma puddle left behind by such a powerful demon. Despite not being very emotive, when Allen was reported the mess (or lack thereof) his eyebrows were firmly raised in surprise. The orphan wasn’t infected, if a little nonverbal, and thus was sent to Brunhilde’s dormitory.

A few days later, Patricia caught up to Allen on one of his patrols around the barracks and pulled him to an unoccupied corner as the more rebellious or stupid soldiers hooted in amusement. Patricia shoved his taller body against the wall and cornered him with a hand landing on the wall behind him.

“Alright, you’ve enough time to ‘recover’,” she makes a finger quote about the word recover, “now spill the jug about why you lived when Simmons didn’t.” Her golden-brown eyes glinted in the faint light and Allen fought the urge to look more deeply at them before thinking back to that day.

“I remember a goblin of some sort distracting the demon, running off, and then returning to shove a tiny hand inside my body as it muttered some words I couldn’t decipher.” He responded after a length of time. Patricia narrowed her eyes, causing Allen to hold his hand up beseechingly, “It’s true, either a goblin was tame or a dark mage healed me. Not even light magic can heal old wounds, but dark magic…” he trailed off.

Anything unknown and uncategorized by the empire was usually deemed as dark magic, but ever since the rift opened all those centuries ago and the subsequent banning of the mages assumed of opening it, it’s not gotten any better at figuring the odds and ends of that kind of nonsense. All magic was nonsense, it’s just a matter of figuring out which nonsense is tolerated in this era. Damnable mages.

“D’you honestly think that a dark mage saved your prissy ass? After what your family has done to them over the generations?” Patricia asked, bewildered. Allen averted his eyes, a common action in response to a question that would puff his father’s chest.

“Maybe the mage didn’t know it was me.” He offered, eyes now tracing the lines of a pale grey brick beside him. Patricia grabbed his chin and forced his eyes back to her own.

“Alright, so say there’s a saint among the dark mages that somehow can’t figure out your lineage from your damnable looks- now what? You going to let their kindness sit on the ground like spilled vomit?” Allen instinctively wanted to roll his eyes at the common sermon from the older woman, who was saved as a child by a man later accused of dark magic and burned at a stake. She always felt that the persecution of dark mages was an act by the upper echelons of the empire and that most mages were just people.

There’s a reason why Patricia never moved up the rungs of the ladder. Or, so she says.

But now, now Allen was saved by a dark mage. He may not be suited for his position, nor have earned it, but he is in a handy spot to pay back the debt. Eventually.

His father may be less than thrilled about this.