Chapter 73: Valkyries
The Valkyries.
Mainly in the composition of the original warrior maidens of the Elf King's army, the Valkyries possess the most experienced and skilled elves of all of the Dark Forest. They take pride in being peerless warriors.
As they march, further north of the Allied Kingdoms, they make their deeds as a murderous group of freedom fighters of mysterious renown. Slavery camps are hit, and elves are given refuge telling them of a paradise in the Dark Forest.
Their operations are so perfect even to this day, they only exist within rumors. News of slavers dead, and convoys missing reaches the ears of influential people, however, they do not know who the perpetrators of the attack are.
With this, Lafira manages to protect the elves while doing her 'good' deeds far from the prying eyes.
Lafira, the berserker elf is especially a fearsome character among the Valkyries. With her lead, they set off a chain of events that forever changes slavery… in effect, empowering the various mercenaries loitering around because of the lack of war.
Slave merchants are seeing a decline in profit, and slave owners are most fearful of the mysterious forces targeting slavers.
Though they are mere women, Lafira's band of 'always' angry elves dare confront humanity within the shadows. With firsthand experience from her days under his majesty's shock retaliation, Lafira continues to terrorize and rescue elves in a similar manner.
However, instead of attacking unknowing villages, this time, Lafira applies her knowledge to a more objective target— the convoys. Hitting the convoys carrying elf slaves is their specialty.
"Molotov!" At Lafira's screaming command, the bottle of wines blazing on its top rains in a parabola. They strike the horses, consuming their rider in the blazing fury of flames. The licking tongues of the flames render the heavy armors of the escorts useless. The damage is severely potent to the cluster of escorts guarding the rear.
From atop the tree, Lafira jumps eager for bloodshed. She brings her dual axes down to the most dangerous character of the convoy, a mercenary of his later years giving commands to his people.
"E-elves! It is the elves!"
"It is elves all along, fuck!"
"Get away from me!"
"F-fight back!"
The mercenaries, escorts, and the civilian-class people including the merchant devolves into more chaos as the first elf makes its appearance. Lafira tenses her limbs, her silhouette is like the shadow of death. It only takes her a blink of an eye for her steel to touch the mercenary leader's neck.
As Lafira's axe drives itself to the mercenary leader's neck, blood spurts out in a frenzy dyeing Lafira's cheeks red. Her axe chops off the mercenary's head, guillotine style. Suddenly in the middle of the formation of the escorts, Lafira fearlessly pounces for her next prey like a wolf among lambs, her eyes gleaming a savage red.
"DIE!"
Arrows fly from everywhere, and traps spring up out of nowhere. The arrows strike the knees, limbs, and non-fatal parts as if on purpose to torture its victims. Traps in most unlikely places appear as if waiting just for that moment. Spikes on a small pitfall dig on the toes, slightly cut-off trees falling down just to crush those below it, and ambushing elves carrying their steel from above the trees or below the dirt and grass.
It is a one-sided slaughter.
"Do not spare one! No mercy!" Lafira screams as if it is a war cry as she dismembers the rich-looking human who has all kinds of jewelry on his person. A clean cut from the shoulder severing the arm, a horizontal swing as if chopping off a tree, and a despairing hammering to the head using the blunt of the axe.
No longer are the elves pacifist, as their newfound brutality is something that can even contend with an orc. Among the demi-human slaves, a charming middle-aged half-elf, Corun, shivers as he watches all of the slaughter from start to finish.
"I… I scared. by them…" The orc, Jom-ar, Corun's friend, comments in his always broken sentences.
"Oooh, there is a pretty one here…"
"Bah~ he is a half-elf… What is so good with that?"
"That's bad. Elves are elves. There is no halfsies…"
The elves talk among themselves bickering, and while ignoring the slaughter that they cause, it appears as if this is an everyday thing to them.
Lafira clangs her steel catching the attention of the idling elves buzzing around the cage of the captive slaves like flies. "Clean up."
At her command, the elves organize themselves. They collect the loot from the weapons, armor, and gold pieces of the dead. The jewelry from the rich merchant owning the convoy is given special attention as the elves didn't spare even the golden tooth embedded in the merchant's jaw.
After the cleanup, Lafira gathers the slaves to a corner and addresses them. "I am Lafira, commander of the Valkyries. From henceforth, you are 'properties' of the Elven Kingdom of the Dark Forest."
Corun pales at the mention of Dark Forest. However, he has no say in this.
Lafira concludes the matter fast as she decides the fate of the slaves. Already forgetting the half-elf and the rare orc, she relegates her job to the Ratatoskr who is accompanying them. "Get them to the Dark Forest. Take the horses and load them onto the wagon. Do you need escorts as usual?"
The Ratatoskr wearing a hood shakes his head. "No. We should not waste manpower at times like this. You are free to do as you like, commander. The old alchemist has a new product. A stasis pill. It is a much more potent pill than the basic sleeping pill, and with this, I can bring them to the Dark Forest without much problem."
Lafira gives the Rataroskr a nod of approval.
After supervising the transition, Lafira immediately brings her Valkyries west to take a rest at a temporary camp set by Pilgrims. The Valkyries arrive at the Pilgrims' camp by dusk.
The Pilgrim, an old elf, with braided hair welcomes them to the cave that already has the basic necessities from the bonfire, gathered food, and comfy quilts they can sleep with.
"Greetings to you, old Pilgrim." Lafira nods her head in acknowledgment of the Pilgrim's welcome.
The Pilgrim reciprocates the greeting with a simple nod. Moreover, he has information to share. "I have orders to disperse. Commander of the Valkyries, her Highness, Princess Kara Glt Zorun commands you to not make contact with the Western rebellion group as information about their suspicious affiliation has come to light. We fear that they might be fake rebellions. Her Highness wishes for you to focus on reconnecting with the elves."
Lafira nods at the Pilgrim's words. "Please tell her highness that I shall do as she commands. And please tell her, thank you for turning a blind eye to my arbitrary rescuing of the elf and demi-human slaves…"
As a Valkyrie, and as per Her Highness's initial commands to her, it is her unit's highest priority of unifying the elves by connecting to them. However, Lafira is stubbornly insistent on rescuing the elves that she can reach while journeying for the several elf forests around the continent. In her own words, she is not content with just connecting with the elves.
The Valkyries' active attacks on human slavers have their dangers, but Lafira argues that as long as she can do it 'perfectly' just like how his majesty, the elf king likes it, there should not be any problem.
Because of Lafira's stubbornness, the Elf Princess has no choice but to show her full support lest she loses the Valkyries to the humans.
In essence, the Valkyries' main job is actually not attacking the human slavers, and rescuing elves, but simply to work as diplomats for various elf villages. Lafira has met up with four other elf villages already. Lafira manages to persuade all of them, and in the duration of their travels, the Valkyries have hit up more than a dozen convoys already. None of the convoys manage to live to tell the tale.
At the moment, the 'Valkyries' still have no names or faces. They are an urban legend that serves as a reminder to the salvers that they cannot be 'masters' forever.
Gnawing on a piece of jerky, Lafira addresses the Pilgrim. "Please ask her highness that the Valkyries wish to expand their numbers. My requirements are simple, they have to be women…"
There is a reason why Lafira is specifically asking for women elves. It is not out of tradition, that Valkyries can only be women, but a request in order to maintain a 'disciplined' army. After cleansing themselves with the Berserker Potions, the most uniform side-effects to the Valkyries aside from being overly angry at times is the increased amount of libido. It will be troublesome for them if they have a male elf within their ranks.
The Valkyries skillsets focus on flexibility both physically, and mentally. They are more effective assassins, rangers, and ambushers in terms of anatomy. As a 'woman', they don't have glaring disadvantages, unlike human women. This means that it won't hurt to have an army of composing purely of women.
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