by Edward Brody
I continued down the path, turned around one last time, and gave the Great Beast the middle finger when I made eye contact with it.
The lion roared loudly, filling the canyon with a sound so terrifying, I tensed up and kicked my slow walk into my fastest run possible.
Chapter Thirty-One
2/21/0001
I breathed a sigh of relief when the poison finally wore off. My health bar had settled at 60%, and I was out of potions and bandages. I really needed to invest in a healing spell.
A healing spell, a defensive spell, and something that would help me level up my Mentalism branch faster; I needed a lot.
I sat down on a rock off to the side of the path and peeled open the food ration I brought with me. Per usual, the ration was unappetizing, but it gave me a full belly, and I knew it would help with my natural health recovery.
You are well-fed! Stamina and Vitality increased by 15% while this effect is active.
I felt a bit lonely as I sat there, and I started thinking about all the things I had been through since entering Eden’s Gate. I wasn’t lonely because I was alone on a hidden mountain path, per say, but rather brought to feel lonely by my distance from—and the failures that I had experienced with—Rachel, Keysia, and Adeelee.
I had no idea where Rachel was, Keysia had basically dumped me, and Adeelee’s father had more or less forbidden us from being together. In a short period of time, it seemed like I had gone from having three possible love connections to having a single very remote one—Rachel. Was that even a possibility?
I had been clueless about Rachel’s whereabouts up until I entered the Eternal Ravine and finally received confirmation that she was somewhere in Eden’s Gate, but I was no closer to finding her since the first day I had entered the game. I missed her—I really did—but was there any chance that she missed me? If I had gotten so close to Adeelee and Keysia, what were the chances that a girl like Rachel hadn’t found someone new? Virtually zero.
Upon entering the game, I had been an average guy with below average skills when it came to handling women or social situations, but Rachel was a beauty and a social butterfly. If I had my guess, she was probably already in a guild and had countless men—Reborn and NPC alike—throwing themselves at her. Would I be brought to feel like more of an idiot if I were to find her only to discover that she had completely moved on?
At times, I had felt like Keysia would always be there waiting for me no matter what I did, but that obviously wasn’t the case. And while I had previously thought Adeelee was unattainable, I had somehow managed to break down boundaries to some degree. She had crossed the sacred line from friend to something more, that was no doubt, but our ‘almost relationship’ unraveled just as quickly as it started.
I wanted to go back to Mist Vale and talk to Adeelee—to see if there was a way for us to be together even though I wasn’t an elf, even without her parents’ permission—but I also wanted to try to have another talk with Keysia to see if she could find it in her heart to forgive me.
I wasn’t sure what to do really, what path to take.
I couldn’t bear to lose Keysia forever, but I was also scared of missing out on Adeelee. And I knew I’d never completely forget about Rachel… not until I found her, not until I knew she was okay. I needed closure.
“There.”
“There.”
“Over there!”
Sharp, raspy voices started chattering all around me, and I jumped to my feet to see small humanoids descending the surrounding mountains. They had red, wrinkled skin, large hairy ears that pointed almost straight up, and a tuft of gray, frazzled hair on their heads. Each was between a foot or two tall, wore brown cloth armor, and had sharp, tiny climbing pickaxes in each of their hands. Picks were also attached to the tips of their leather shoes, and they jammed the picks and pickaxes in the mountain to help themselves quickly climb down.
Name: Hobgoblin Mountain Dweller
Race: hobgoblin
Level: 23
Health/Mana/Stamina: 135/135/400
Status: unknown
The hobgoblins were climbing down on both sides of the canyon, and when they reached a relatively safe incline, they unstuck their picks and slid quickly down the side of the rockface, whilst simultaneously equipping the slingshots that were fastened to their belts.
I held my hand out to start blasting at the creatures, but then I remembered my first encounter with the keemus in Addenfall. I knew that attacking without assessing the situation out of fear could lead to some unpredictable consequences.
I kept both hands held out, just in case the hobgoblins struck, but as they surrounded me, they merely loaded their slingshots with rocks. They weren’t mindlessly trigger happy.
I counted twenty hobgoblins when they had all reached where I was standing. They circled me quickly and aimed their weapons for my head. Their small stature was unintimidating, but their rough and tough faces gave off a menacing appearance.
“Why are you here?!” one of the hobgoblins asked in a croaky, harsh voice. “How did you get up here?!”
“I climbed,” I said.
“No one climbs!” the hobgoblin shouted. “Magic! You wear the color of the mee-gee guild. You must have used magic!”
“Mages Guild,” I corrected. “And I didn’t use magic. I climbed.”
“You killed our elementals!” one of them yelled. “The mee-gee killed our elementals!”
“Killed ‘em!” another shouted before hocking and spitting on the ground.
“They were your—?” I started before taking a hard rock to the back of my head.
I lurched forward from the strike and winced, before turning around and pointing my hand towards the hobgoblin who fired. “What the hell!?” I yelled. “Stop it! Listen!”
Another rock slammed into the side of my head from another direction. I stumbled a bit and gritted my teeth.
“Stop!” one of the hobgoblins yelled. “Hold your fire!”
“Damnit,” I cursed as I rubbed my head. Each shot had bitten off 5% of my health.
“Our elementals keep the mountains safe!” a hobgoblin said.
“Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t really have a choice… I had to kill them to move forward.”
“Forward where?” the hobgoblin asked.
“The Wastelands…” I muttered.
The hobgoblin snickered. “The Scourge will kill you, human!”
“I know,” I said with a nod.
The hobgoblins looked at each other and chattered something unintelligible. They were all smirking as if amused by the answer.
“Do you want tribute or something?” I asked, thinking back to how I could generally appease the keemus. Perhaps the hobgoblins were much the same.
“Tribute?” one of them asked. “Tribute to what?!”
“Never mind,” I said, shaking my head. I motioned my hand towards where I was heading. “Can I just continue on my way? I’ll try not to kill any more of your elementals.”
“There’s no more elementals that way,” the hobgoblin said. “You’ve nearly reached the Wastelands.”
“Then what do you want from me?” I asked.
The hobgoblins again started looking at each other and chattering unintelligibly. When they finished, they all stared at me, and one said, “Show us your boom.”
“My boom?”
“Boom!” one of them yelled. “Show us your boom!”
I slowly reached behind my waist and raised an eyebrow at them. “My boom…? Do you mean my ass?”
They all started laughing in distorted, wheezing laughs. Several of them lowered their weapons and pointed at me with their fingers. One of them even turned around and pulled its pants down, showing me its tiny, wrinkled red bottom.
“Not ass, idiot!” one of them said, snorting. “Your booms!”
I scratched my head and put a hand on my chest. “My boobs? I mean… yeah, okay, but there’s not much to see.”
The hobgoblins burst int
o laughter again, and one of them fell to the ground, rolled, and pounded its first on the ground as it cackled to the point of tears. It was odd, how the nasty, dangerous looking faces of the hobgoblins had suddenly softened, they all looked more like ugly children more than anything.
“Wait,” I said. “I’m confused.”
“Boom! Your booms!” One of the hobgoblins slapped its hands together and quickly spread them apart. “Your boom, boom! Show us how you kill our elementals!”
“Oh,” I said, feeling silly that I hadn’t caught on earlier. “My magic?”
“Yes!” the hobgoblin said. “Show us that magic. What you use to boom!”
“Okay,” I said. I held both hands out in front of me and started channeling a Firebomb.
The hobgoblins watched in awe as the magic formed between my palms.
When it was just large enough to cause a decent amount of damage, I said, “Stand back…” and the hobgoblins all cleared away to give me some room.
I tossed the Firebomb at a nearby boulder, and when it hit, a large section of the rock was blown away, throwing tiny shards in all directions.
“Boom!” one of the hobgoblins yelled.
“B-b-boom!” another yelled. It pulled its slingshot back and fired a rock at the explosion point for no apparent reason.
I rattled my head at them. “Yeah, well that’s how I killed your elementals.”
“Good boom,” one of the hobgoblins said.
“Okay,” I replied and motioned my hand back towards the trail. “Can I pass now?”
“You can pass,” the hobgoblin said.
“Thanks,” I said with a smile and started to take a step past them.
A tiny stone slammed into the back of my head.
“Wait!” one of the hobgoblins yelled.
“Damnit to fuck!” I shouted, rubbing the painful spot where I was struck. “Stop hitting me with those rocks or I’ll make you all boom!”
The hobgoblins all took a step back and gasped in unison, but almost immediately realized their overreaction and the fact that they still significantly outnumbered me. They pointed their loaded slingshots back at me, anger in their eyes.
“You can pass if you help us first,” one of them said.
I sighed. “What kind of help?”
“We need your boom!” the hobgoblin explained. “Help us boom, and you can pass!”
“Help you boom?” I asked.
“A rock blocks one of our caves. Boom it, and we will let you pass!” the hobgoblin said.
You’ve received a quest offer: The Boom Dilemma!
The mountain hobgoblins would like you to blast away a rock blocking one of their caves.
Reward: 5,000 XP, freedom of passage
Do you accept this quest? Accept/Decline
The mission seemed relatively simple, so I quickly accepted.
“Fine. Where is the rock?”
You have accepted the quest: The Boom Dilemma!
“There,” one of the hobgoblins said, pointing towards an impossibly high cliff. Several of the hobgoblins put away their weapons and started using their picks to climb back up.
“I can’t climb to that.” I groaned and shook my head. “I mean, maybe I could try if you give me some climbing gear like yours.”
“Wait, human!” the hobgoblin barked. He grabbed his throat and pinched hard before expelling a loud, distorted, birdlike sound. “Ca, ca, ca, ca, ca, carrrr!”
A moment later, a rope ladder dropped from the top of the cliff where he had been pointing, but all the hobgoblins ignored it, choosing to climb with their picks instead.
“For you, human!” one of the hobgoblins said, before he slammed his pick into the side of the mountain and started climbing himself.
I walked to the rope, gave it a safety tug, and started to climb, having no idea where I was going or what I was going to find.
Chapter Thirty-Two
2/21/0001
It had been nerve-wracking to scale the loose, swinging rope ladder so soon after my fall, but I safely reached the top after a few minutes.
What I found at the top was a small, flattened area around twenty square meters wide. The mountain continued to rise far above the leveled space, and throughout the mountain wall were several tiny cave openings, just big enough for the hobgoblins to fit inside. Several miniscule ladders and man-made slopes connected each cave, and hobgoblins were moving up and down and going in and out of caves, carrying items between them.
Outside was a single scaled down vendor stall with a hobgoblin standing behind it, peddling food. The vendor and the other hobgoblins who were seeing me for the first time ducked or ran when they saw me.
It was an entire organized settlement of hobgoblins it seemed, and it made me wonder what exactly hobgoblins were. Goblins, by comparison, were much more aggressive and stupid and hardly seemed capable of creating a community like the hobgoblins had. If anything, goblins seemed mere slaves or pets to the orcs rather than advanced humanoid creatures.
When the hobgoblin who had given me the quest reached the top, he wasted no time pointing me in the direction of a boulder that lay at the base of their village. It was a small boulder in comparison with others I had seen in the area, but it was easily four or five times the height of any of the hobgoblins.
“There, there,” one of the hobgoblins said. “Boom it!”
As I walked towards the boulder, some of the other hobgoblins in the city who had dared remain outside with a human ambling around ducked into their caves for protection.
“So, you just want me to destroy this?” I asked.
“Yes!” the hobgoblin said. “Make it boom, mee-gee!”
I looked up to the mountain that was rising above us. “Did it fall from somewhere up there?”
“No, no,” the hobgoblins said. “Mountain troll.”
“Mountain troll?” I questioned.
“He likes to throw rocks, and this one landed on our home!” the hobgoblin crossed its arms. “Our elementals keep the troll away!”
“Okay, okay,” I said. “Well, whatever… Just stand back, and I’ll handle it.”
As I started channeling a Firebomb, the remaining hobgoblins who had scaled the mountain with me ran back and out of the way. I channeled a baseball sized bomb first, tossed it at the boulder, and rocks flew everywhere on impact, leaving a large chunk of the boulder missing.
I knew that the first Firebomb was probably not big enough to clear a boulder of that size, but I was trying to avoid doing any unintentional damage to the hobgoblins’ home.
I channeled another Firebomb, this time allowing it to grow two or three times the size as before. I grabbed the ball with both hands and yelled “Stand far back!” before lobbing the bomb at the boulder. This time, the explosion was much more powerful and caused the base of the boulder to drift when it hit. The spraying rocks flew so far that one of them toppled the food vendor’s stall several meters away.
When the dust cleared, only a third of the boulder remained, but given the damage that had been done last time, I was hesitant to cast another bomb.
“Is everyone okay?” I asked, looking around to make sure no one had been hurt.
A hobgoblin behind me was cowering but said “Yes! Make it boom, please!” before sticking his fingers in his ears.
“How about this?” I said as I walked up to what remained of the boulder and started shoving.
The remaining piece of boulder was quite heavy, but when I put all of my weight into it, I was able to slide it slowly across the ground. I pushed and pushed until the boulder reached the side of the cliff and gave it one more firm shove to send it over the edge.
The boulder thumped as it bounced off the side of the cliff, but ultimately boomed when it hit the ground and shattered into several pieces.
“Boom!” I said comically and smiled.
The hobgoblins looked over the mountain curiously and cheered in their hoarse voices.
You have completed the quest:
The Boom Dilemma!
You have gained 5,000 XP!
“Thank you! Thank you!” one of the hobgoblins said.
I noticed that many of the hobgoblins had peeked out of their caves and were stepping outside when they saw the boulder was gone.
Behind where the boulder had been was another hobgoblin cave, but this one was a bit bigger than the others.
“Finally,” a hobgoblin who had emerged from one of the caves said. He looked much like the other hobgoblins, but his hair was a bit darker than the others and he was wearing a belt that had small leather bags dangling from all sides. “I can finally get to my wares!” He sauntered straight to me, and when he was right under my nose, he knelt to one knee and said, “Thank you for your boom!”
“Don’t mention it,” I said. “As long as you let me pass through here, I’m fine.”
“Of course,” the hobgoblin said. He got up and looked to some of the hobgoblins that were standing behind me. “We will give this human passage, right?”
Another hobgoblin, obviously older judging by his sparse grey hair, stepped forward and hobbled as he walked with a cane. “How did you reach this place, human?”
“He killed our elementals,” one of the climbers said pointedly. “That’s how we knew he could boom.”
“Oh…” the old hobgoblin said, frowning angrily. “Please do not do that. My elementals hinder the few who find this pass, but it also protects us from the mountain troll.” He placed his fingers on his chin. “Hmmm… Now that you’ve helped us with the boulder, would you like to help us defeat the troll?”