Chapter 235: Bad Roll

Sanchez spit a mouthful of blood on the ground and cursed silently to himself as he dragged Lillian through the alleys of a Frost Giant city.

He definitely had a knack for being in the right place at the wrong time.

An hour ago, his team had split up to hunt, and he had gone with Lillian, his team’s cleric, and three lower level warriors who had advanced during the Third Trial.

They had enough experience that Ogres weren’t going to be an issue, and two of them had the Rifleman specialization, so they weren’t worried about being overrun. But then the trial ended, and they got the System notice that a "Final Challenge" was being implemented.

Then, his small team was here, but not the other ten people who were standing within two hundred metres of them.

And they didn’t come with his Personnel Carrier or the Assault Speeders.

"I don’t think I can keep running." Lillian whispered, panting with exertion.

"Just a bit further, we’ll keep it at a jog, but we’re almost out of the city," Sanchez whispered back, holding his ribs where a strike from an [Ice Spike] had grazed him.

"How do you know? Fuck, I couldn’t even resurrect them. Do you think they’re back at Marimgar?"

"We can only hope. I have no idea where we are right now, but we can’t stay here. There is a frozen river on our right, and I can hear running water, so it’s either leading to a waterfall, or the river runs under a city wall and the ice is being broken.

Trust me, I’ll get us out of here."

The second that they had arrived in this place after the announcement, the Frost Giants were on them.

The warriors put up a valiant defence, for all of about ten seconds before they were crushed into paste. And then Sanchez grabbed the healer and bolted from the city square with the Frost Giants in hot pursuit.

They had escaped through a warehouse, and temporarily lost their pursuers, but the Frost Giants had brought out Giant Hounds to track them down.

That was why he was leading the way out of the city.

If they stayed within the walls, they would eventually be found, and if they were found, he did not have enough firepower to keep them alive. Not in an entire city full of Frost Giants.

Angry yelping came from their right, only one street away, and Sanchez reached into his inventory to pull out a bit of raw boar meat. It was saved to roast later, so they could have a nice stew while working, but today it would help cover the scent of two sweating humans.

"I know this is going to gross you out, but reach under your robes and rub this all over your body. Don’t wipe off the blood. The boar is a strong scent, and it will help mask ours," he whispered as he pulled the Cleric down another side street, headed for what he hoped was an exit to the city.

Lillian was too terrified to argue, as Sanchez did the same for himself, then tossed both pieces of boar meat into the window well of a nearby basement.

The blowing snow would hide the meat in under a minute, and with a bit of luck the Giants would think that they snuck into a basement to hide. That would throw them off the track for a few minutes, buying precious time to make it out of the city.

Two corners later, they were at the river. And that’s where things went bad.

There was a public park along the inside of the city wall, between them and the water, and the moment that Lillian had stumbled at the end of the alley, a child had heard her.

The boy, no more than two metres tall, tiny compared to the adults, raised his hand and began to speak. Sanchez couldn’t let that happen.

A single shot of the Pulse Rifle put a hole in the pale blue forehead, and they were running for the river.

"Put on your helmet and pray that your suit isn’t ripped. I will pull us out again in two minutes," Sanchez warned.

The helmets that went with the light composite Battle Armour didn’t come with any breathing oxygen, but both of them had added masks with air filtration during the dust storm. That actually gave them a minor rebreathing function, as someone had realized, good for a dozen breaths if it was fully clogged.

Like, if you were underwater.

As they reached the edge of the water, shouts rang out all around them, as the hounds and the Frost Giants both realized their prey was in the open. But Sanchez blasted a hole in the river ice, and grabbed Lillian tight as he jumped in and began to swim.

One-armed swimming might not be too effective, but it was propelling them through already fast-moving water, and Sanchez smiled under his mask as he saw the shadow of the city wall pass over them.

The Frost Giants had to know where they were going to end up.

But there was no gate out of the city anywhere near the point where the two of them had exited, and that would buy them some time. The speed of the water suggested that the Frost Giants’ city was in a mountainous region, so if they could make it far enough from the city, they should be able to hide somewhere.

That was as far as Sanchez had planned.

Lillian began to frantically tap against his side as her air ran out, and the Sergeant aimed his rifle upwards to blast a hole in the ice for them to escape.

Powerful arms threw them out of the water and onto the river, revealing the sight of snow-covered mountains all around them, and trees right up to the river’s edge.

"Catch your breath. I’m going to set a fake trail, and then we’re going back in for another trip."

"Must we?"

Sanchez nodded. "They’re going to be looking for where we came out. I will set a path that looks like we left the river, and then we will go back under. It will delay them for likely half an hour, and give us enough time to get away.

It’s a trick that the special forces use when we’re being tracked at a beach head.

They’re going to realize the path is fake pretty quickly once the dogs lose the trail, but they will take some time to trust that we’re gone, and that we didn’t just find a way to hide our scent."

Lillian nodded, silently thankful that the battle armour came with basic thermal controls, so she wasn’t freezing, despite the ice forming on the outside of her armour.