Lore/Story Slap Squad - Mercenaries For Hire - Ætheria

Hey everyone, and welcome to my newest project: Slap Squad, a ragtag team of mercenaries who, well, go out and kill things. Really excited to see where this progresses.

Spoiler: Page 1

Derrik
Being in the desert was miserable.
Now, don't get me wrong, I like the desert. But sometimes, with the heat, and eexhaustion, and sand, it made for a very dreadful trek. Klaen and Asha seemed as miserable as me, and as he always was, R showed no emotion. I actually considered the idea that he might be a golem or construct, but none of us were brave enough to take his helmet off to find out.
We were here on our latest mission: to collect some mysterious artifact from a temple in the middle of the desert. At this point, we were getting these things on a weekly basis. There seemed to be a lot of "ancient artifacts" in the desert. Or anywhere, really. What was up with that? It was like the gods had up and decided to throw as many powerful items onto the land as they could, like seeds or something. It was rather strange, but hey, gold was gold, and we got a lot of it for missions like these.
We were a mercenary team, one of the most renowned in the continent, called the Slap Squad. Asha was responsible for that horrible name, by the way. I would never come up with a name like that. Hunters, Nobles, even Kings came out way for the tasks they didn't want to get their hands dirty with. They might not like it, but for us, we had lived like this since childhood. It was in our blood to work.
Somhow, that mercenary work of killing and looting turned into aactual missions. Go recover this artifact. Go kill these monsters. We slowly became one of the richest mercenary bands out there, and here we were with our biggest job yet. This was all or nothing, and it was an offer we couldn't pass up. So, here we were. The soon-to-be greatest mercenaries in the world. The Slap Squad.

Spoiler: Page 2

Asha
I fiddled with one of my arrows at the campsite, bored out of my mind. There was absolutely nothing to do at this time in the day, and I just didn't have the energy to do any physical training. Derrik and Klaen were currently racing around the campsite like a bunch of horses on drugs, and even R was up and working, lifting a massive rock he had found that was easily the size of one of out tents. Bunch of show-offs.
Normally I would have aat least something to do, but I had left my fiddle at the mercenary station. You might wonder why a member of a serious mercanary group would play the fiddle, but I had to do something during my free time. I saw we're a serious group, but if my squadmates chasing each other was any indication, we were anything but.
I decided to study the map of the Lost Citadel for the fiftieth time. The Lost Citadel was the location of the artifact we were after, the Stone of Wishes Apparently the stone was said to grant the wishes of whoever had it in their possession, but if you asked me, I'd say its a bunch of bull****. But as long as the monetary gain was worth it, I was all in.
According to the map, the citadel was just several miles west of here. We could reach it in under a day, but right now we needed to rest before taling on the Dungeon. I was about to study it yet again when I heard the sound of a trumpet outside, followed by a loud war cry. On its own, the war cry wouldn't have been odd, but the trumpet call could only have been sounded by Klaen, whi kept it on him in case of attacks. I smiled a fearsome grin, and grabbed my long bow and quiver. Finally, some action. It was go time.

 

Bump, page 2 finally added

 

oh wow yay UwU

 

Their special attack should be called THE Beach SLAP