by Dakota Krout
Hans was playing with his foes, three of them were trying to land a blow while he moved scant inches at a time, learning their attack patterns. He decided that he had a good handle on how they moved and attacked, so he drew his own weapon and killed the three with a quick spin and a rapid stabbing. Taking a moment to survey the battle, he turned just in time to soak his front in a wave of blood and gore.
“Oh, come on! This is exactly why I didn’t want you to be using that oversized killing machine in here!” Hans bellowed at Tom.
Tom looked at the clean-freak with an excited grin, “I had been under the impression that you wanted me not to use this for fear of draining my Essence. Now I understand why you were so adamant!”
“Did we get them all?” Dale ground out, trying to focus on his team was difficult when a foreign body was embedded in his flesh.
“We did. Hold on, Dale.” Adam dropped into a crouched position next to his team leader, working feelers of Essence into the inflamed flesh around the arrow. When he had closed off the nerve endings, he carefully pulled the arrow. As he suspected, it had a barbed head. He started digging with a small dagger, increasing the flow of blood from the wound. “Drink a potion, Dale. I can’t heal you at the same time as performing surgery.”
“Evan, you mind?” Evan stepped forward, uncorking a bottle and pressing it to Dale’s lips. Dale gulped it down as Adam moved away, the pain suddenly returned as the Essence stopped flowing. Dale shot a bit of the potion out of his nose as he choked.
“What a nice place to sit and cultivate for, say, ten minutes?” Dale laughed a bit desperately. The others chuckled, sitting down. Hans decided he would rather look around the area and began exploring the perimeter, taking Evan with him. Tom finished collecting the armor and weapons used by the Mobs, and sat down to cultivate as well.
“What are these things?” Dale sniffed with disgust as the last of the bodies began turning to ooze.
“They look a little like Goblins, but they are so much bigger and well balanced. If all Goblins looked like this, they would likely be accepted as a sentient race instead of a monster race.” Rose told him with hope blooming in her words. She had a soft spot for creatures with multiple races in their heritage.
“Then what do regular Goblins look like?”
Hans came back just then, “Goblins look, sound, and smell like sickly children who drank too much and can’t control their bowels. They are generally hated by all of the races, and used as a warning against mixing the bloodlines.”
“Oh, so that is why people act so poorly towards half-breeds? That’s too bad.” Dale didn’t catch the look Rose sent his way. She couldn’t tell if he was being serious or an asshole. “They can’t choose their parents, after all.”
“Pretty much.” Hans nodded, “By the way, Evan found a likely spot for mining, so… mission accomplished?”
They could all hear Evan’s pick swinging now, as well as his cheerful chanting. A low layer of dust started rolling toward them after a few minutes, but it usually vanished before it got too close. There were benefits to mining in the dungeon.
“We simply sit and cultivate? No fighting, no real guarding?” Tom looked around at the nodding faces. “I… hmm. I will try not to be bored.” He focused on the pattern he had been building in his Center and continued to cultivate. They sat that way, working hard to build their internal Essences, when a dungeon Goblin poked its head in through the wreckage of the gate. “It appears they are re-spawning.”
There was another small battle, this time the defenses worked in Dale’s group’s favor, as their archer could not find a way to target them. The Goblins had to enter only a few at a time, and were cut down quickly. Soon, the group was back to cultivating, doing their best to ignore the sounds of rock shattering behind them. Hans spoke up, “It appears to be about a thirty-minute time frame for the Goblins to return. I don’t know why it takes longer down here, maybe they are harder to create?”
They fought another two groups before Evan came back, smiling broadly and coated in debris. “I think I’m gonna like this floor a lot.” He was dragging a pack full of raw metal chunks, so much so that he could hardly move.
“Eh. Maybe we can put that in our sacks for you?” Adam offered, looking at the hoard of metal. “I don’t know how you’re going to get that up the stairs otherwise.”
After some good-natured arguing, Evan accepted the offer and they split up the miner’s goods. They attacked another fortification to see if it followed the same layout, and ended up having a much harder time of it. These Goblins were prepared for the group and didn’t bunch together behind the gate. When Tom smashed it open, they poured through the wreckage at him, ensuring he was hard-pressed for several moments until his team came to the rescue. There were additional archers who took up position on the walls, firing down at the group.
Dale had a hard time fighting while dodging arrows, but Hans weaved in and out of attacks as though he were out for a casual stroll. Rose focused on killing the ranged snipers, while Adam kept an eye out for anyone getting injured or enemies getting too close. Evan watched the team working together to take down the enemy, their bickering and friendly jibes put away for less dangerous times. He was impressed, and when the last Goblin fell he applauded them before running off to check for metals in the wall.
The team sat down to relax, breathing deeply and preparing their bodies for an influx of Essence. They were just at the twenty-five-minute mark when Tom suddenly looked up, gasped in pain and began sweating black filth. His eyes dripped tears of blood and blackness, and his breathing became ragged.
Dale leapt to his feet, “What’s happening? Is it poison?!”
Tom couldn’t answer, but Hans gripped Dale and pulled him back. “He’s breaking into the D-ranks. This is going to be difficult, we can’t expect him to be able to move himself. All of his mind is turned inward. Someone grab him and put him in a defensible location. What shit timing! Move!”
Dale figured that the others had been covered in filth from him before, and it was time to return the favor. He gripped Tom under the arms and dragged him toward the one-man mining operation. He had to adjust his grip several times; the black goop was slippery. There was a light trail of the substance leading to Tom when he was settled against the wall in a seated position.
“They’re coming!” Hans shouted to the team. At the previous location, when the Goblins had tried to take back their fort, they came stealthily. Or tried to at least. Here, they were sprinting down the path, howling at the top of their lungs. “What? What is different?!”
Dale had a sneaking suspicion that there was a reason that this small Goblin hoard was intent on their position. “Cal, you are a cheating asshole!”
~Cal~
“Screw you!”
The dancing had a similar effect to what I did, which was to collect the unrefined Essence in an area and use that for incantations instead of personal Essence. I didn’t know why Humans, Elves, and the like didn’t use this form of incantation. Either they didn’t know about it or they thought it was primitive. Either way, I was just glad they limited themselves.
The dancing and chanting grew in franticness, culminating in a wave of combined air and infernal Essence. A dark form congregated in front of him, then drifted toward the battle. Hans saw
it first.
“Wraith!” He shouted in a light panic, “Enchanted or Inscribed weapons only! Adam, a celestial barrier on me, now!”
Adam began weaving his staff in front of himself, chanting a bit. Huh, maybe they do use a similar technique… I looked at the Essence around him, but all of the Essence powering this working was coming from Adam. It seemed like a waste to me to just ignore all that loose Essence around yourself! Adam finished just as the wraith joined the battle. A glowing barrier sprang up around Hans, wrapping him in light. The wraith moved at the speed of darkness now that he was in attacking range. Insubstantial claws pinged off of the light, and Hans started retaliating just as fast.
Hans's daggers were slicing tiny slits into the fabric of darkness the wraith was made of, and blood-like blackness was dripping to the floor. Each time the claws of the wraith touched the light, a mind-bending amalgamation of celestial and infernal colors was released. The colors drew the eye to them, and the mind of the beholder turned toward insanity. This was the light of chaos.
Oddly — at least to the team of adventurers — the Goblins ran as the wraith died. A few stragglers were cut down, but the general consensus was that they didn’t do too badly. The humans, and half-human, sank to the floor to recover. They were filthy, covered in blood and gore. They tried to figure out why the Goblins had run, but decided that it was because the wraith died. They waited another thirty minutes, getting tense as they expected another attack. After an hour, they were getting concerned that something was different.
“Go tell Evan to stop attacking the wall. I’m done for today, that wraith took most of my willpower to defeat.” Hans directed Adam.
“What would have happened if it had been free to attack you?” Dale wondered softly, not sure he wanted an answer.
Hans rolled his arms, stretching a bit as he stood. “They drain you with each attack. They latch onto your Center and pull. They suck in Essence to continue to exist. Even if they die, if they have landed a blow there is now a hole in your Center that leaks Essence. All of their victims die, and usually fairly quickly. Luckily, Adam is a cleric that is a cut above the rest.”
Adam came back at a run, “Tom’s gone.”
Heh. About time they noticed.
~Twenty~
Dale’s group scrambled to get into formation and follow the trail of the long-retreated Goblins. They had Evan filling Tom’s position temporarily, mainly because he was well-armored. Quickly moving through the room, they were easily able to follow the trail of sludge that dripped from Tom. They came upon the large fortified area that was home to the floor Boss, and stopped a good distance away.
The walls had patrolling Goblins, armed with powerful-looking bows. The doors were wood banded with iron, a far cry from the simple wood structure the others had at their entrances. Evan grunted, “Now what?”
Dale shook his head, “I don’t know. We need to get in there, we need to help-“ Hans covered Dale’s mouth, he had been getting a bit loud at the end.
“What we need,” he stared into Dale’s eyes. “Is to not panic. If he is dead, charging in in an act of vengeance isn’t worth getting ourselves killed. If he is alive, we need to make sure he stays that way, and that means a plan.”
“First off, how to get in. Now, we could try and scale the walls, being as sneaky as possible. If we can get in there without anyone noticing us, we might be able to…” Hans stopped talking as Dale was shaking his head.
“It won’t work. I’m sorry to say, they already know we are here.” At Dale’s words, the Goblins on the wall stiffened, then gave up the pretense of watchful ignorance, focusing on their location.
“Well piss. Anyone else have a plan?” Hans griped.
Rose thought for a moment, “Why not do what we’ve been doing?”
Hans sighed, “In case you haven’t noticed, we are currently missing our giant ginger door-knocker.”
“Forget the door.” Rose grinned for the first time since discovering Tom was gone. “Let’s go through the wall.” She hitched her thumb at Evan.
~Cal~
Dang, these guys are good! I couldn’t blow my cover of neutrality by telling the Goblins what the adventurers were up to, so I was relying on their training and willingness to die repeatedly. That would surely be enough to stop a few D-ranked and a C-ranked… I sighed. My Goblins were going to die.
I glared as the adventurers put their plan in motion. Rose fired an arrow, killing one of the archers on the wall. This drove the other archers into cover, and they began firing wildly at the location the arrow had come from. So much for training and willingness to die. While they were hidden from view, the humans basically waltzed up to the wall and began marking out their plans for a new door. Every time a Goblin tried to get a look, an arrow either impacted them or sailed by their oversized noses. When Evan reared back for a swing, there were three dead Goblins already!
The pickaxe came crashing against the thin wall, blasting open a dwarf-sized hole. The Goblins started toward the breech in the wall, but were driven back as a hail of arrows and throwing knives came through. Evan took the opportunity to smash another section, creating a large hole and actually collapsing the entire section of wall, killing a few Goblins as they either fell into Hans's blades or as stones rained down. Evan took some damage from the falling rock, but his stout frame and heavy armor made the pain laughable. At least he would need to work some dents out. Nothing like creating a minor inconvenience for someone! Take that! … Yeah!
Hans and Dale rushed into the compound like avenging angels, throwing themselves recklessly at the defenders. Dale had a new fighting style that was upsetting for me to watch. He dodged, but so poorly that I was sure he was about to have his blood splatter on the floor. Instead he clunkily avoided attacks and threw punches that were poorly placed. His blows would have been entirely ineffective if he didn’t have his Inscribed battle gauntlet on. This allowed him to turn weak punches to non-lethal areas into deadly attacks.
Hans was a different story entirely. He was fighting with a rage and speed I had never seen him use before. Actually he was screaming as he repeatedly stabbed a Goblin.
“Where is he?” *StabStabStab* “Where is my student?” *StabStabStab* Hans was furious, and when he attacked his knife entered and exited a body three times, so fast that it looked like just a single blow. It appeared that he was no longer holding back, no longer trying to teach the others. He never stopped marching toward the center of the fortification, though he was moving at a measured pace instead of sprinting.
An arrow flew at him, he caught it and whipped it back, treating it like a throwing knife. It hit the bow of the Goblin, shattering it and ricocheting into the Mob’s neck. Did he do that intentionally, or was it luck? …Either way, no more arrows at Hans. Mental note there. A Warhammer-wielding warrior ran at him, and Hans shot forward and delivered a kick to it. The kick chunked the poor Goblin. Let me explain, the kick was from his Inscribed boot, and blasted the surprised Goblin into three separate chunks of flesh.
I mentioned to Dani. She had a different opinion.
“Since he is going all out, way above the level of the Mobs, can I too?” She was hovering near the floor Boss.
Dani had full control of the Boss now, and was standing up. At seven feet tall, this Goblin Amazon was at least three times as strong as the other goblins, and would usually carry a Warhammer in each hand while wearing standard armor. Right now, we were moving quickly to get ready for a too-strong opponent. I activated a Rune on th
e throne that the Goblin normally sat on, and her armor crumbled away. A quick yet expensive way to undress. A stone slid aside and a large chest shot up from the opening. She opened the chest and pulled on the body-hugging chainmail inside.
A double set of battle gauntlets finished her preparations. These were a bit different than the ones Dale wore, as these had large blades that reached to the massive Goblin’s elbows and extended past her hands. Hans walked into her area right as she finished equipping her weapon, and a throwing dagger punched through her armor and into the muscle on the right side of her abdomen.
Dani roared in pain, and turned to face the enraged Hans. She hissed at him in true Mob style, “Die worm!” With that, she activated the Inscriptions on her weapons and armor. The shiny but easy to damage armor — made of pure aluminum — had a column of Essence move through it. It glowed bright silver for a moment, before darkening slightly to a silvery-purple. Her weapons did the same, but the right hand darkened further as infernal Essence raced along it. The left handed blades sprouted fire-Essence-fueled-flames along their edges, and she charged.
Hans had a moment of surprise that almost cost him his life. He threw another dagger at such high speeds that it vibrated the air in its passing. This hit the armor above Dani’s knee and bounced off without a scratch. She kicked her leg forward, adding a bit of a spin as she struck him in the face. His surprise kept him from dodging fully, but his attempt allowed him to keep the bones in his skull from fracturing as he sailed across the room.
Hans had barely regained his footing when Dani was over him, stabbing downward with her flame-coated weapon. Hans weaved away, but the intensity of the flame scorched his skin, causing blisters to form on his neck. He crouched and then pushed upward, lifting Dani off the ground and tossing her to the side with an ease that his size made questionable. While she scrambled to her feet, he attacked with his blades.