Monster Empire

by Michael-Scott Earle

  The cave proved to be only twenty feet deep and lined with bright red moss. Halfway through the tunnel, there was a large hole in the floor surrounded by a narrow ridge that led to a small shelf. Water slowly dripped from the ceiling into the dark pit, and I pointed my flashlight down there to see how deep it ran. The water took ten seconds between the time it dripped from the ceiling before it hit the distant pool, and my flashlight beam barely revealed the water below.

  I continued exploring the tunnel and soon circled back to the main passageway. This new entrance was a bit of a tight squeeze to get out of, and I hadn’t noticed it at first because it was positioned between to extending rocks on the wall. It meant that the side passage was in a bit of a horseshoe “U” shape that intersected the main exit tunnel.

  Then I got an idea and wiggled backward so I was back near the pit.

  The pit would provide an excellent place for a booby trap, so I went back to the homestead and gathered the things that I would need. After I brought them back into the tunnel, I set to work covering the eight foot wide pit with thin branches, and then I covered them with the red moss that grew on the walls.

  If anything chased me from the underdark, I could lead them down the side tunnel, maneuver around the narrow rim, and lie in wait in the small alcove. If all went as planned, my pursuers would chase me across the pit and fall through the weak branches to their sudden deaths. I might not ever need to use the pitfall, but it had only taken me a half an hour of work, and I felt a lot better with it in place.

  Once I had finished the pitfall, I decided to add some feather spear traps near the entrance. After selecting two strong spring sticks, I sharpened spear points out of oak and attached them with Nika’s woven vine rope. Then I placed one tripline on each side of the entrance to ensure that no matter what way the monsters or underdark creatures went, they would be impaled by one of the springsticks. Then I marked both sides of the wall by the tripline with a kind of chalk-like stone for my own safety.

  Lastly, I added a tripline to the tunnel entrance set to a deadfall trap that would set off one of my M17 bullets. I didn’t want to waste any of my precious ammunition, but with the cave a half hour from our homestead, the use of one of the bullets was the best way to alert me that someone or something had breached the cave during the night.

  When I was content with my work on the underdark traps, I returned to the homestead to continue building the house. Between the home, and the defensive walls I wanted to put around our fort area, I determined that I would need about a hundred pine logs at least ten feet long and twelve inches in diameter.

  It was time to get to get all lumberjack on these guys.

  The felling axe was a great tool, and I only needed to sharpen it after every fifth tree I had cut down, by the time Nika came to bring me lunch, my arms were numb and my back was tired.

  “How many trees did you chop down, Ken Jewell?” she asked as we ate.

  “Twenty five,” I answered.

  “You must be the strongest man in the world,” she gasped.

  “Thanks,” I laughed, “but there is plenty more work to do. I have to take all the branches off and plane the edges. This will be more than enough for the walls of the home, but I’ll need a bunch more to build a wall.”

  “You must be the hardest working man in the world,” she purred.

  “Maybe,” I joked. “But the army got me used to doing hard work.”

  “Did they teach you how to build warrens in the army too?” she asked.

  “The army taught me how to build a lot of stuff, but the job was mostly about building bridges, blowing up bridges, fixing broken stuff we liked, and then blowing up other stuff we didn’t like.” I laughed. “The cabin stuff I learned from my dad. When I was seventeen, we built a log cabin for my grandmother to live in the backyard. Before that my brother and I used to build forts all the time.”

  “So, you come from a family of great warren builders?” she asked.

  “Yeah, kinda,” I replied.

  “Then your army taught you how to build and destroy things for war?” she asked as her green eyes grew wider.

  “Yeah,” I replied.

  “Oh, Ken Jewell,” she sighed happily. “You will be the bestest emperor in the entire world. It won’t take long, either. Maybe just a few years. I am so blessed to be the wife of such a great man. You are a wonderful provider, lover, builder, and general. Soon you will be a great father. I will do my part to be the bestest wife I can possibly be.”

  “That sounds great,” I said, and then I blinked a few times as I reminded myself about how crazy all this was. Just a few days ago, I had been about to die in Syria, and now I was about to be a father to a half-goblin-half-human baby.

  For half a moment, I almost freaked out, but Nika’s bright smile kept me rooted to the ground. This beautiful woman had absolute faith in me, and I knew that I wouldn’t ever let her down.

  After lunch, I started narrowing the logs with my side-axe. The blade was set on the left side of the haft for right-handed users, and it allowed me to make cuts that were closer to the surface of my target than a normal hatchet would have. I chopped perpendicular traverses every foot on both sides of the logs, carved off the bark, and then proceeded to plane them flat. When the day began to wane, I joined Nika for a second dinner, then collapsed into bed like one of my felled logs.

  In the morning, my muscles were sore, but I worked through the discomfort. Ever since I was about thirteen years old, I had exercised regularly, and the Army didn’t give a shit about over working people, so I was used to ignoring such growing pains.

  Nika asked if she could help me, but her bump was starting to become more pronounced, so I insisted that she just focus on the smaller branches while I handled dragging the beefier logs.

  Once all the wood was up to the site, I chose my bottom logs and carefully carved them to fit the foundation. While I worked, Nika went down to the riverbank and the dark parts of the forest to collect moss, and we used it to seal the spaces between the bottom logs and the stone foundation. I placed the center beam and built a support wall through the middle of the house to give us two rooms. It was more work, but I liked the design better than a single, opened-aired cabin. The added support would also help to strengthen the ceiling joists and support the roof. It took some work notching the corners of the logs and getting them just right, but by the time nightfall came we had half of the walls up.

  We finished the remainder of the walls the following day, cut out the doors and windows, and began on the ceiling joists. I elected to secure two logs together for each joist and connected them with a dovetail notch that sat on the center wall. We used a ramp and rope system to get the lumber up onto the roof and worked on the tables until yet another day had passed.

  “I have never seen a more beautiful warren,” Nika told me as we stood and admired our work in the light of the waning second sun. “How did you ever think of building something this amazing, Ken Jewell?”

  “Wait until it's done, it’s going to be nice and warm and dry,” I said. “No more sleeping under the stars at the mercy of the elements.”

  It hadn’t yet rained since I’d been on the new planet, but I didn’t know if that was strange or not. I was looking forward to it, since I guessed Nika hadn’t yet experienced rain, and I guessed that she was going to absolutely love it.

  All the days of working meant that we were starting to get low on food again. Fish were bountiful in the river, and I had caught two more hares, but seven days had passed since my return, and in another week I would have to go into town for more supplies. I wanted to buy a mule and a cart as well, and I needed to get a lot more food this time. The less I went into the neighboring towns the better, so I was looking to stockpile. I also needed some more tools, and real glass windows if I could find them.

  But first I had to get money, and that meant going back into the underdark again.

  Nika had been on me about getting her the exotic food th
at she and the baby craved, but I wanted to finish the house before I went back into the dark underbelly of this strange new world.

  The next day I started on the roof and built up the gables with the pitch of the roof in mind. I still didn’t know if it snowed here, but it didn’t hurt to be prepared. If I made the pitch too shallow, then the snow would collect, and there would be more of a chance of leaking, so I settled for a forty-five degree slope. Once my gables were mounted, and the dowels were in place, I used a rafter model to draw lines on the gables, then carved off the excess wood. Next, I nailed the roof truss, and attached the center beam to the ceiling joists and side walls.

  Another day passed and was spent chopping down the fattest oak I could find and sawing two foot slabs off the trunk. Once I had a half dozen quality pieces, I used my saw to cut out the hundreds of shingles that I would need. I managed to fashion all of my roof planks by the end of the day as well. By the time the sun set the following day I had nailed down all my planks and placed my shingles.

  All that was left was the windows and the doors, along with some touch up work, but before I could do that, I needed to get our money situation taken care of.

  It was time to head back into the underdark.

  Chapter 9

  “You look like a mighty goblin king,” Nika giggled while applying the last of my camo makeup to my face.

  “Thanks,” I said as I checked her work in my signalling mirror. “You did a great job.”

  “Can I help you put your pack on?” she asked, and I nodded as she reached for it.

  An hour or so ago, I went through my molle pack and took out the items that I didn’t think I would need in the underdark. Stealth and speed were going to be important on this mission, so I had removed most of the unnecessary items from the pack and I’d gotten the weight down to about thirty pounds.

  Nika strapped it on my back, and I tested its weight and my maneuverability by doing a few squats. Happy with the result, I grabbed a spear that I had made, and considered bringing one of the axes. The big axe that I had felled the trees with would come in handy against a larger opponent, but it would be cumbersome to swing. The side axe, on the other hand, was much smaller and considerably lighter, so I settled on that one and strapped it to my molle pack. I didn’t plan on being down in the underdark for an extended period of time, but I brought along two of my MREs just in case of emergencies.

  “Don’t forget this!” Nika said as she handed me her underdark grocery list.

  “This is a lot of food,” I said as I scanned over the strange items. “Does that say minotaur balls?”

  “Oh yes,” she said with a smile and trailed her hand down my chest. “They are a delicacy, and they are known to increase libido.”

  “Increase libido?” I asked with a laugh. “We have sex like twice a day, sometimes three times. You are insatiable, aren’t you?”

  “I am very satisfied with your performance, Ken Jewell, but soon you will have many wives, and the minotaur balls will be very useful.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh at that one. It wasn’t every day that your goblin wife reminded you to pick up some underdark Viagra so that you could have sex with other monster women.

  Man, I was living the life.

  “Are you sure you’re going to be alright by yourself?” I asked her before I set out for the cave.

  “You worry too much, Ken Jewell. I’m very sneaky and good at hiding, and you’re the strongest man I’ve ever seen. Everything will be perfect.”

  “Alright, honey.” I gave her a long kiss and hugged her tight. “I’ll be back before you know it.”

  “Good luck!” she called after me as I hiked across the ridge.

  A half hour later, I reached the entrance to the underdark and approached it with caution. There were no signs that monsters had emerged from the cave, so I turned on my flashlight and crept in slowly. Kobold tracks still littered the entrance, but nothing had set off the tripline attached to the deadfall trap, and none of the feather spear traps had been set off either.

  Deeper in, I took a minute to check my pitfall trap. I was proud at how well hidden it was. Had I not known it was there, I would have thought nothing of the pile of red moss that covered the sticks. The stuff grew everywhere, and my pitfall trap blended in perfectly.

  I headed back down the tunnel and began to map it out with my sharpie and the little book that Nika had stolen from the travelers. I already knew that this tunnel led to the hot spring pool where Nika and I’d first made love. Beyond that, it opened up to a variety of other tunnels that Nika and I had run past during our hasty escape from the kobolds.

  Moving further in, I stopped before two such passages. One of them looked familiar, but the other one was littered with the glowing mushrooms that Nika had asked me to get, so I decided to see where that one led as I picked the mushrooms. Nika had asked that I only gather the mushroom caps, and I collected a few dozen by the time I reached the end of the patch.

  I had traveled about a half a mile into the tunnel and guessed that I was about two-hundred feet beneath the surface given how the grade mostly moved downward. Once I drew the location of the mushroom patch on my expanding map, I ventured into the next tunnel.

  Then I saw all the bones.

  They reminded me of the basilisk den I had ventured into on the first day, and I sniffed the air and thought I picked up the faint smell of rotting meat. My first instinct was to turn back, but snake meat was high on Nika’s list, and I didn’t want to let her down. Maybe this den belonged to a smaller snake than the one who’d shed the skin that I had seen before?

  That was my hope as I ventured deeper into the increasingly creepy tunnel littered with countless bones.

  I gripped the shaft of the spear in my hand as I came to another junction. Two tunnels branched off from the one that I traversed, so I marked them on my map and followed my nose to the one on the left. The scent of death became more pungent down that dark hall, and my flashlight showed me the bones of many hapless creatures. About twenty feet into the tunnel I discovered two human skeletons who looked to have been swallowed whole and digested with their clothes on. They wore rags, and their bags had been reduced to tatters as well, but the loot and the tools that they carried survived the snake’s stomach.

  One of the dead men had been carrying a sword, and while the sheath looked to have been partially digested, the blade was unmarred. I slowly pulled the short sword from its sheath and admired the blade. The hilt was smooth ivory bound in leather, and the blade curved slightly like a cutlass.

  Happy with the find, I strapped the sword to my belt and went through the rest of the skeletons. I found two gold coins and five silver inside the tattered remains of what had once been a coin purse. Among the bones I found two rings as well. One appeared to be pure gold and held a large ruby. The other was entirely silver and marked with strange runes. I found a gold chain at the feet of one of the skeletons, and when I dusted it off and picked it up I was shocked by its weight. The thick, woven chain reminded me of something that a rapper might have worn, and I stuffed it in my molle pack while imagining all the supplies I could buy with it. A heartbeat later my happy daydreams were disrupted by a sinister hiss, and I froze.

  The sound had come from right behind me.

  I whipped around and came face to face with the biggest snake head that I had ever seen. It must have been the size of an easy chair, and as I looked into its serpentine green eyes, my body froze. The sudden paralysis scared the hell out of me, and I cursed myself for not remembering that in some fantasy stories basilisks could paralyze their victims with but a glance.

  The snake was about twenty feet away, and it surged through the tunnel toward me as I stared helplessly. Panic almost consumed my mind, but then I realized that I’d die down here if I didn’t move.

  And if I died, no one would be able to take care of Nika and our baby.

  I let out a primal yell and regained control of my body just as the snake was al
most on top of me.

  Instinct set in, and I spun around to run. As I turned, I thrust the business end of my spear back behind me and felt the tip connect a moment before the giant snake hissed. The weapon was ripped from my grip, and I shot forward like an Olympic sprinter.

  The thing sounded like it was right on my heels as I ran, and I knew that, at any moment, its massive fangs would sink into my shoulders. I would promptly be swallowed whole, and that would be the untimely end of clan Jewell.

  The cave suddenly opened up into a large den, and I leapt to the right a second before the basilisk struck. I spun in the air, landed among the bones, and brought my M17 to bear. The snake missed me, and its face crashed into a pile of bones. I remembered to avoid the beast’s hypnotic gaze and fired off three shots that tore into the side of its head. But I might as well have been trying to take down a whale shark with a slingshot. The snake didn’t even seem to notice the bullets, and it slowly rose from the pile of bones and turned its malevolent gaze my way.

  I avoided eye contact as I scrambled to my feet, ran to my right, and ducked behind a wide stalagmite. Then I traded out my M17 for my side axe and surveyed my surroundings. The den was more than a hundred feet deep and twice as wide. The concave ceiling rose and fell, curving around stalactites that dripped moisture with the slow and steady pace of sand falling through an hourglass.

  The basilisk pursued me around the wide stalagmite, but I wasn’t about to go running out into the open. Instead I followed the wide formation all the way back to where I had started and found the snake’s tail. The thing had to be at least thirty feet long, and I heard it sliding around the assorted stalagmites behind me.

  I needed a plan, and one quickly came to mind.

  I had seen a small nook on my way around the formation, and when I came upon it again, I shouldered inside and lay in wait with my pistol in my off hand. Seconds later, the slowly stalking basilisk approached. It hissed and slithered as its forked tongue tasted the air, and I began to regret my decision to hide in the nook.