I first reached into my bag and took out a glass vial about an inch long and a finger thick. Inside it a murky green liquid sat ominously waiting. I carefully removed the stopper and holding out my left hand cupped poured the liquid like syrup into it. I then carefully used a mix of [flames] and [gust] to create a spell that turned the liquid into mist. I held my breath when this started as I concurrently cast a normal [gust] spell to push the mist barely even visible into the next room. -
"Damned fog is getting blown in again. Can someone tell me why we don't just collapse that entrance?" an orc complained loudly.
"Because then we wouldn't be able to escape if the guards came for us." a nord snapped at the orc.
"Some.. ha ... somethings wrong!" someone screamed as their lungs started to fail.
I listened impassively as the room filled with gasping and ragged breathes before one by one the bandits fell silent permanently. I ran several cleansing spells over my left palm to clear away any residue from the poison that was left there.-
'Good thing there's no such thing as the Geneva convention here.' I thought as I walked into the room and eyed my handiwork.
All of the bandits were hunched over with bulging eyes and veins with most holding their throats as they died in terror and pain. I chose to ignore them for now and started to check the other shafts for stragglers. I found two mining a iron ore deposit and smoothly dispatched them with a single thrust of my sword into their hearts from behind. The final one I found was standing as a look out at the other entrance and died without even knowing how as I sent my blade through his neck severing the nerves there.-
Finally I moved up the wooden ramps that creaked and groaned under my bulk but held in the end. I spotted a moonstone vein and a couple orichalcum veins before leaving out onto the summit of the mountain. The bandit chief and his top two subordinates were up here eating when I appeared. They quickly stood up and drew their weapons angrily. The bandit chief was a large Nord with a full set of steel armor on minus the helmet and had a steel greatsword. One of his top people was a Nordic woman in leather armor with flames springing to life in her palms.-
The other was a bulky Orc man who was topless but had twin orichalcum war axes at his hip that were now in his hands. The chief and Orc charged me with loud battle cries while the woman started throwing firebolts at me. I raised my left hand and sent two Ice spikes through the woman's firebolts and then into her shoulders after that. She screamed at that which only seemed to piss off the chief all the more as his face turned deeply red and his veins bulged.-
'Must be lovers, or family.' I thought idly as I waited for the two close range fighters to reach me.
The Orc was up first as he swung both of his axes at my throat from different directions. I stepped back to let the blades graze the air a tiny distance from my flesh and pass by ineffectively. I then stepped forward and buried my swords tip in his heart as he stared at me in shock. I left my sword buried there as I hopped back to avoid the chiefs greatsword coming down where I was standing. -
The hard stone was broke from the impact but the chief ignored that as he angrily lifted the large weapon and swung at me again. I casually stepped out of the way and held out my right hand. My sword dislodged from the Orc's corpse and spun through the air and into my hand as I stepped sideways and parried the next swing of the chiefs greatsword. The steel weapon rent a deep gouge into my iron blade but that was fine as I lifted my free hand and grabbed the chiefs face.-
"BANG!"
His head was erased as I my spell erupted from my hand. His blood coated my arm and sleeve. I grimaced in disgust before sending an ice spike through the screaming woman's throat before she moved from grief to rage and did something potentially dangerous. I wasted no time at all after that grabbing that greatsword gleefully and feeding it to my own blade. The damage to my blade not only vanished but the metal itself shifted before my eyes to a darker shinier gray. The weight increased slightly as the blade grew an inch longer and more fitting to my bodies size.-
That was a new one for me as I always assumed the blade would stay the same size. Instead it appeared as though it would grow to match my bodies size so it never felt like I was using a sword like a dagger. Thanks to the greatsword being roughly worth three normal steel swords from sheer bulk I completed my swords change to steel in one smooth motion. After steel came orichalcum which I could also get started on thanks to the Orcs two war axes. They weren't even enough to shift my own sword a quarter of the way however as each tier higher the materials were the more it needed.-
I returned my sword to my soul after that and began the process of looting the bodies. I stripped the chief of his steel armor and cleansed it thoroughly before putting it away in my pack. I collected the silver and ruby band on his hand and it's matching other on the woman before heading into the mine to loot those bodies as well. Clearly this group was doing rather well for themselves as they all had at least steel weapons of various types.-
I ended up earning four steel swords, three steel daggers, one steel war axe, one steel war hammer, one thousand six hundred and eighty two gold and two bands of matrimony. Once I was done looting the bodies I torched them all and brought my toad up to the summit to make camp. I could have slept in the mine but I was less than thrilled at the idea of that after dousing the place with poison like I had. Instead I chose to commandeer the wooden shack the chief and his spouse were apparently living in.-
I of course tossed all the bedding and pillows before rolling out some fresh straw from the bail they were using and putting a few furs over it. I briefly considered going to the word wall not more than thirty feet from me but chose to put off any potential game changing revelations for in the morning as my toad and I settled in for the night.