Battle erupted in an instant.
Crossbow strings hummed in unison with the first volley. More than a dozen bolts flew at once, burying themselves in the charging Swamp Sisters.
Yet they still did little good. The guards inside the outpost had clearly received greater blessings than those at the entrance, and their armor was heavier.
Some bolts bounced off reinforced ring mail. Others pierced flesh but drew only a few drops of pus, doing nothing to halt their advance.
Soon, the first rank of Iron Price mercenaries was forced to drop their crossbows, draw their scimitars, and raise their round shields to meet the charging followers of Ghaunadaur in close combat.
The drow mercenaries were certainly skilled fighters. Most wore chainmail and carried round shields and scimitars, employing an endless array of vicious tricks, from sneaky strikes at the hands to throat slashes.
But such wounds meant nothing to the Swamp Sisters, whose flesh had mutated and whose entire bodies were transforming into monsters.
Even with their noses sliced off or their wrists hacked halfway through, their ooze-like tissues quickly closed and reformed, leaving their fighting ability completely unaffected.
Blessings and mutations prevailed over skill.
Soon, the battle line suffered its first casualty. A broad-bladed cleaver took off an Iron Price mercenary's head, and blood gushed from her neck, splashing all over the companion beside her.
Meanwhile, at the center of the battlefield, the cleric of Ghaunadaur wearing a single-eyed circlet and holding a staff covered in writhing tentacles had clearly found her target.
"You hypocritical, lying priestess of the false queen!" Ghaunadaur's cleric shrieked, raising her staff as its tentacles writhed with her voice. "Fear my lord's power, then become food for the formless!"
A priestess of Lolth never feared a challenge from a heretical cleric.
Tristana's lips moved