“So, it looks like that's a slum on the outer edge of the city, probably low level goblins there while the higher levels have the better places deeper into the city? If we can confirm that, send the lower level groups to clear those areas at the start?” Eddie said.
“I'm more interested in those other buildings you can see deeper in. Can you describe some to me?” Charles asked.
Eddie recast his spell, the first duration having worn off, and started describing what he was seeing in more detail. When the spell was finished this time, Charles read back off the notes he'd made.
“So, it looks like there's a barracks. If that's the case I bet we see goblin warriors, or elite goblin warriors. Those are doable by a lot of the people coming along. That fancy place you described though? It sounds like a palace or something. That's probably going to have to be the goal for some of the higher level groups. Animal pens with wolves isn't horrible, but you did say they looked larger than normal? So maybe goblin wolf riders like the orc ones we saw?”
Eddie shivered briefly, looking over towards Lucky. He remembered all too well his cat's attack on one of the giant wolves that had been enlarged even more by a shaman.
“Yeah, let's hope not, or at least hope that they don't have an animal growth spell like the others did.”
“Eddie, are you having second thoughts about this?” Charles asked. “You don't sound all that sure.”
“Nah, just remembering Lucky's reaction to the enlarged wolves and hoping that doesn't happen again.”
Charles shrugged.
“Just tell her to guard you again and she shouldn't do that, right?”
“Theoretically, yeah, but she's a cat. That right there should tell you how much she'll listen.”
“I know how to get her to listen,” Tiana said.
She knelt down next to Lucky.
“Hey Lucky, we'll be fighting later on and I'm worried that Eddie will put himself in danger again. Will you stick close to him during the fight?” Tiana said.
Lucky swung her head to look at Eddie, cocked it to one side, then chuffed.
“See, she'll be fine Eddie, she'll stick right near you,” Tiana said.
“Did you just assign Lucky as my babysitter?” Eddie asked.
“Well, I figure if she sticks close to you, the two of you can keep each other safe. And I'm sure you'll think twice about running off to do something stupid if you know Lucky will follow you, right?”
The last word was drawn out and cut off crisply, almost as though it were a warning.
“Of course,” Eddie answered.
As Tiana turned back to Allie and Tamshir, who she'd been speaking with, Eddie gave her the stink eye and almost broke into laughter when he saw Lucky doing the same, or at least giving her the feline equivalent.
He bent over to pet Lucky and whispered to her.
“I feel the same way. Don't worry, we'll still get to fight later on and we won't just be clearing the low-levels on the outskirts.”
Lucky chuffed again, then stared towards the city as Eddie recast his spell for a third time and started describing more buildings to Charles.
They were there for about an hour before other adventurers started trickling in. Eddie grimaced when he saw Becky coming along with Cooper's group.
“There you are, you guys never even asked me about grouping up this time,” Becky said. “What's up with that?”
“Last I knew you weren't level ten yet,” Eddie said. “So I didn't think you'd be interested.”
“I'll have you know I'm level twelve,” Becky said. “I found a few other groups that needed a healer, or at least a secondary one, so I've been leveling some. It's easy when I'm at the bridge, I've been back in the dungeon a fair bit since we went.”
“Alright then, did you want to group up with us?”
Becky nodded.
“Yes, please.”
Eddie added her to the group, drawing the attention of everyone else and requiring Becky to repeat her explanation of gaining more levels without them. Allie rolled her eyes, and Eddie knew she thought Becky was going to hold them back. She'd said so in the past, but Eddie wasn't too sure it would be an issue. Regardless, it was too late now.
Around noon, Tiana spread out a blanket and this time Charles and his group did join them for lunch, unlike when they'd been clearing the mine and Rotthorpe. By the time they finished eating Eddie figured it was about fifteen more minutes until the raid officially started. When he mentioned that, Karl spoke up.
“Seventeen minutes, there's a countdown timer you can access.”
The road leading to the city was packed with adventurers by now and they'd had to set up for their lunch well off to the side, back in the trees. Now they rejoined the group, Charles going over and speaking to several of the respective leaders of the groups on the road. When he got back there were only two minutes left to go.
“I filled them in on what we found out and what we assume. Made recommendations also, but it's their call whether or not they listen to them. Just about everyone, if not all of them, have reset their spawn points to the temple, so they've got a relatively close, and much shorter than normal, respawn. Nothing else to do but wait for the raid to start,” Charles said.
~ ~ ~
Chapter Five
Aaron's personal phone rang. He picked it up and glanced at the caller then rapidly answered when he discovered that it was Lydia.
“This is Aaron.”
“Is this us? Did you launch without telling me?” Lydia said.
Aaron heard the furious clicking of a keyboard in the background.
“Is what us?” he asked.
“The network is getting slammed. It's like there's a DDoS targeting the network, and all of that is headed towards Greenshaw's connection.”
“It's not us, not our program at least,” Aaron said.
He checked and found that server AI-L was spiking again and had been for almost a minute.
“But it might well be related. AI-L is spiked again, and staying that way longer than it normally does,” he said.
“So, Loki's making his move?” Lydia asked.
“It looks that way,” he said. “I didn't quite expect this, but it makes sense with a little thought. You don't use a cerebral implanted computer without having a lot of defenses. I bet Loki's trying to overwhelm them and that's why all the traffic.”
Lydia grunted.
“Well, I'll do what I can to keep the network up and running as cleanly as possible. I still want you to let me know before you run the program though. Are we going to take advantage of this and run it while he's distracted?”
“I think we'd better wait until the traffic dies off. I'm guessing that he's not entirely in that other computer yet, and is trying to get more of himself in, or maybe into a more dominant position in it? I mean, why else would be be doing this? So, we wait until it stops and then run the program. If he does manage whatever he's trying then he'll be off guard and settling in to wherever he's trying to get to now. That'll be our best chance.”
“Remember it's a computer still. It won't take Loki very long to get settled.”
“I know, we'll just time it as best as we can and hope he's still distracted,” Aaron said. “So, please call me just as soon as the network clears up and I'll run our program.”
“Done, now I need to get back to trying to keep the network up and running,” Lydia said, hanging up as soon as she was done speaking.
~ ~ ~
Eddie looked over the mass of adventurers just starting to advance on the goblin town. Karl stood and stepped between the group and the town, then turned back to the rest of the group.
“Alright, we've come here to chew bubblegum and kick some ass, and we're all out of bubblegum,” Karl said, turning back towards the town.
Eddie groaned as Jern just stared at the scout, confused.
“Enough Karl, let's just go kill some goblins,” Allie said, cuffing Karl on the back of the head.
; “Hey,” Karl said, “what was that for?”
“A very good reason,” Allie said.
She started walking towards the town after she spoke. She'd decided they'd need the extra tank for this one so she was clad in her heavy armor, the large shield and double-bitted battle ax filling her hands.
Jern trotted for several steps to catch up with her while everyone else fell in behind, Becky taking her place in the middle of the group as she had when they did the dungeon.
Allie picked the pace up until their group was abreast of Charles and his group. Eddie barely caught a motion out of the corner of his eye, and when he spun he saw that Stalker was giving Karl a thumbs up.
Great, Stalker heard him quoting and is encouraging him now, Eddie thought. I mean, I do it too, but now may not be the best time.
The lead groups of adventurers, those who had advanced at a run, were now exchanging fire with the goblins from the outskirts of the town. Eddie pulled his bow and nocked an arrow, a normal one. As they continued to advance, he heard Allie asking Charles where he was heading. Charles just pointed towards the center of the town.
“The middle. I'm guessing Eddie was right and all the goblins on the outskirts are the low levels. I'd prefer to find a more equal fight, so the barracks, the stables, the palace. I'm heading for that general area,” Charles said. “There's at least two more groups that will head there also, if I know their party leaders.”
“Three,” Eddie called out, “we're not going to leave all the fun to you.”
Charles turned and gave him a grin.
“Okay, so at least three other groups headed there. Do we want to stick together like we did before or split up into our respective groups to cover more targets faster?” Charles asked.
Eddie pondered it as they advanced into the outskirts of town. A pair of goblins came charging towards their combined group and Eddie shot his nocked arrow, Ephram's arrow striking almost simultaneously with Eddie's. That goblin went down, but the second one made it to the tanks, Dominic and Tamshir holding their mana for later on.
Eddie almost pitied the poor goblin. It charged at Charles, who slammed it with his shield, sending it staggering to the side, right in front of Jern. The dwarf's shield struck the goblin, sending it flying back into Charles' path. The paladin's sword flashed out and a moment later the goblin was lying still on the packed earth.
Eddie saw that the goblins weren't attacking the groups with an even number of forces. Some of the groups were swarmed with seven to one odds, while others had only a goblin or two attacking them.
“Groups, reinforce each other!” Eddie yelled, as loud as he could.
In the midst of the fights, hardly anyone heard him, but Charles had heard him at least. The paladin stopped and did something before taking a deep breath.
“Groups, reinforce each other when you've cleared your targets!” Charles bellowed.
The sheer volume of Charles' voice left Eddie's ears ringing. A glance around showed that all the other adventurers had heard him as well, and most of them were responding by doing what Charles had said.
The exceptions to that were several groups that, like theirs, had their sights set deeper into the city.
Charles looked around at the battles, and the clear path leading into the city. Then shook his head and continued to advance towards the structures he'd mentioned earlier.
“You know, I forget that getting different groups of adventurers to work together is hard,” Charles said. “That's all your fault Eddie, your group meshes so well with ours that it's easy to forget how things normally work.”
“I'd imagine trying to get this many adventurers to work together is an exercise in futility,” Eddie said.
“Yeah, pretty much I set overall objectives for different groups and let them take care of it the way they want. Because if I try to get any more specific than that, things start to fall apart.”
“So, the definition of herding cats?” Eddie said.
“That, or just trying to get a flock of baby ducks across a highway,” Charles replied, softening his voice before he continued, “during rush hour.”
Eddie decided that he hadn't been intended to hear that last bit.
“Alright, looks like we've got something more than those low level goblins around the outskirts,” Karl said, pointing.
Eddie looked over to see a group of goblins in actual matched armor. Three of them, those in front, were mounted on the giant wolves, while the rest were in something resembling a formation behind them.
“Eddie, may I?” Becky said.
He turned to her and watched as Bubbles, her rat pet, started to grow. By the time he stopped growing he was the size of a large dog. Eddie's eyes went wide. The last time he'd seen this spell, it had been significantly less impressive. Then he realized what Becky had been talking about and turned to Lucky.
“Hey Lucky, you want to be the size of one of those wolves?”
The cat chuffed, then stared at Becky and nodded her head. The druid spoke a few words and gestured towards Lucky, who then started to grow. By the time Lucky finished growing she was actually larger than the wolves the goblins were using as mounts.
“That'll last about half an hour at my current spell level,” Becky said.
Eddie was just staring at his cat, who was now as tall as he was, even with her still on all fours. Lucky shook her head and chuffed again, a booming noise that drew the attention of the wolf mounts approaching them.
“Nothing for it, so let's get them,” Charles said, positioning himself between the approaching goblins and the rest of the group. Jern and Allie moved to either side of him, leaving Charles on point. Then they started to advance.
Lucky stayed with Eddie for the moment, eagerly eyeing the wolves leading the opposing forces. Eddie started shooting, targeting the riders on the wolves and Ephram seemed to have the same idea, although with a different wolf rider as his target. Dominic and Tamshir spoke for a moment, then Dominic started chanting, his hand pointed towards the oncoming goblin formation.
A ball of fire appeared several feet in front of Charles, then started rolling forward. A moment later a plume of dust appeared a few feet away just in front of the goblins. As Tamshir gestured, the dust settled into the path of the ball of flames. When the two collided the fire whipped itself into a frenzy by igniting the dust, as evidenced by the color of the flames changing from orange to a bright yellow, streaked with white.
The ball began to roll forward, picking up speed as it moved. Charles and the other tanks fell in behind it, breaking into a trot, more of a run on Jern's part, to catch up with it.
The wolves were agile enough to hurl themselves out of the way of the flame, but the formation behind them was unable to move as quickly, breaking apart, but leaving a whole bunch of burning corpses behind. Those who'd been trapped in the middle of the formation had been unable to get out of the way and Dominic had stopped the ball of flames atop them as the goblins tried to flee the flames. Now the ball had dispersed, having taken a good half of the formation with it.
The wolves charged, trying to go around the tanks, but Allie and Charles repositioned themselves. A wolf gathered itself to leap over Jern, but Lucky was faster, clearing the dwarf with several feet to spare and hitting the wolf with its weight positioned on its hind legs before it managed to jump.
Lucky bowled the wolf over, the poor rider on its back getting his leg trapped beneath the thrashing animals. Eddie fired at the rider, worried that even pinned the goblin might pull his weapon and attack Lucky. Two shots were enough to cease the wolf rider's movement for good and Eddie was sure that it had already been heavily wounded from the wolf falling atop it.
Meanwhile Lucky was on top of the wolf, all teeth and claws. She'd seated her jaws and her front paws and was raking with her rear claws, over and over. The wolf's thrashing had probably helped kill its rider, but the thrashing wasn't managing anything else. Lucky had toppled the wolf by locking her jaws on its throat, her inc
reased weight and momentum tipping it onto its side, and now she nearly had it disemboweled.
Eddie changed targets, convinced that Lucky was going to be just fine with the wolf. He switched to the remains of the formation that was now starting to charge towards the groups. Arrow after arrow went whizzing through the air, striking the goblins leading the charge. Finally he managed to drop one, then a second, breaking up the charge just before they reached the tanks. The goblins behind those dropped were slowed in their approach, either stumbling on the corpses or having to break to either side to avoid doing so.
With two tanks engaged by the wolves and their riders, Eddie continued to fire on those goblins that had been in the formation. Dominic and Tamshir had recovered from their earlier efforts by now and the occasional single target spell flashed by him, spears of stone or arrows of fire flashing out to strike the goblins.
Jern, the only tank not engaged with the wolves, turned to intercept the goblins.
“Little green men, nay, little green boys, come play with me. I desire a toy like the kitty has!” Jern screamed, gesturing towards Lucky savaging the wolf.
The goblins turned and rushed Jern. Eddie fired as fast as he could but the dwarf was surrounded in moments. As Eddie continued to fire into the mass of goblins he heard Jern shout something. Moments later goblins went flying in all directions. As the air cleared of the green bodies, Eddie stared at Jern, spinning like a top. His hammer was extended while he clutched his shield close to his chest. As Eddie watched, Jern came to a stop, shook his head, then took a slightly unsteady step forward.
Damn, Jern must've gotten another special. Looks nasty, but I guess it's got some drawbacks, Eddie thought as the dwarf staggered for a moment.
Eddie and Ephram were able to keep the goblins off the dwarf for the ten seconds or so it took him to recover. Much to Eddie's joy, most of the goblins Jern had sent flying away never even got back to their feet, otherwise the task would've been much harder.
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