Getting close to the end on this one. It is improved, methinks. Much improved.
The good news was, the monster hadn’t been sent to find them.
And that was it in the good news column. The monster was a mutated centipede of some kind that was about as long as Liz’a was tall, it had incredibly nasty-looking teeth oozing something that would probably dissolve whatever bits of her it touched, and looked like it would go through all of her charges in roughly enough time that it would take all of them to scream. A regular Imperial patrol would probably be able to hold it off without losing more than one or two soldiers, but one-on-one… “Would just have to do,” Liz’a thought grimly as she bore down on the filthy creature.
At least this kind of monster didn’t make noises when it fought. So, all right: two items in the good news column. That was so much better.
The centipede struck first, with an alarming burst of speed that didn’t surprise Liz’a but alarmed her quite a bit; she took the strike on her shield, then instinctively dropped it before the centipede’s head could burn its way all the way through the tough plywood and metal. The Centurion swung her sword hard into the centipede’s side as it was briefly fouled up in the new hole in her shield, and was rewarded with a brief spray of foul-smelling blood. A drop or two landed on her cheek, and it stung like the very Devil.
“If I fall,” Liz’a said almost conversationally to the five priests just now scrambling away out of the way of the fight, “scatter and run east.” And then she stopped worrying about them. There was a fight in front of her, after all.