What am I missing? Yuusha wondered while Sizarbob did his little speech about monstrous humans and pollution of nature. If the goblins are that concerned about waste and garbage, then what do they do themselves? Do they have active garbage collectors, landfills and sewage systems? Don’t make me laugh!
And sure - they don’t seem to be all that dirty, considering the circumstances. But they always smell so bad! Is that just their natural odor? But it doesn’t seem bad to them at all? Like, I’d get if they were just used to being dirty all the time. That would kind fit in with the standard RPG goblin archetype. Are they really some sort of nature lovers? On top of all the other things? Really? If it wasn’t for their shaman-kept, ancient head-collecting traditions…
Yuusha took a few steps back as Sizarbob, Sorzak and all their goblins charged at the bridge. Well, your move, wizard girl.
Finally, the young girl did something. She raised her staff and shouted aloud in a voice that could only belong to a cute teenage girl, “Еняов немеле етидир ем!”
Same language as the farmers, after all, Yuusha noted, though he wasn’t prepared for what happened next.
First, the current of the river, that separated goblins from the girl and the second part of the town, slowed. Then the water surface rippled. Three ripples formed, with a small water bubble at the center of each of those. The bubbles grew rapidly, expanding in size and rising like half-translucent, water trees out of the river. But those were no trees. They had a humanoid shape, with a rather big belly. It hurt to look at them as they kept changing different shades of blue and reflecting sunlight. Three water giants.
Two of the giants rose to be at least eight meters high. The other third one was hardly higher than three meters as it was twice the girl’s height and took position close to the wizard. Of the other two - one stepped out on the goblin side of the river and stood at the start of the bridge, the other – slowly walked in the direction of the biggest threats, the two hobgoblins.
Yuusha was at first surprised that the river was not emptied after producing such behemoths. Ah, that's why she slowed the current - to feed the elementals without losing her defensive position.
“Water sorcerer!” Sizarbob shouted to the other goblins. “Stay out of river!”
Without hesitation, Sizarbob and Sorzak attacked the water giant that moved at them, but their slashes simply cut through the water elemental’s leg doing seemingly nothing. The water that was separated away from the rest of the body by the iron blades flew just a couple of meters sideways before smoothly returning back to the elemental’s form.
In response, the elemental formed a club in its hand that was twice the size of either hobgoblin and swung it against Sizarbob. Sizarbob dodged the attack sideways. The water club hit the earth, but just as the water club began to burst it retained its form. Sizarbob and Sorzak swung their blades and cut into the middle of a club, separating the upper part of the club from the rest of the elemental’s form.
The separated water lost its form and flew into the air, defying gravity, separating further, taking shape of about two dozen birds. Yuusha would have no idea what kind of birds they could have been even if they were real birds instead of rough watery silhouettes, but, at the very least, he could tell that they were slightly smaller than the doves, that used to bombard his school’s bus stop.
It was also at that moment that Yuusha saw black clouds gathering in the distance, moving fast towards the town. That's not good in a fight against a water mage, he concluded the obvious as the wind picked up.
The small goblins meanwhile tried to attack the second water giant by the bridge, but it simply swiped the goblins away like flies, with each swing of its own water club. The goblins didn’t appear to be harmed by the attacks all that much. All it seemed to do was knock the goblins back and disarm some of them, with the added effect of making them wet. But the dexterous goblins were quick to pick up their weapons and try again, albeit with similar results.
Oh, crap, I hope she can’t do any lightning type of magic, Yuusha thought remembering one of the most basic of the standard elemental magic system combos. That being that water greatly amplified electricity damage.
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The water birds meanwhile turned around for a dive in the direction of both the large orange hobgoblins and the smaller green goblins.
“Яов о дел!” The wizard girl shouted.
As the water birds closed in on their targets they turned to ice, increasing in speed.
“Shields!” Sizarbob commanded his warriors.
You do remember that about half of them don’t have shields, right? Yuusha thought and watched as the ice sculptures descended upon the goblins in icy fury.
Sizarbob and Sorzak crushed the birds that flew at them mid-air with their massive blades. Yuusha half-expected Sizarbob to catch one with his bare hands.
The other goblins were not as lucky. The good news for them was that they were small nimble targets and about half of the ice sculptures missed their mark. The bad news was that the other half didn’t. The wooden shields that some of the goblins did have and raised for protection were violently shattered into splinters. By the end of it, it didn’t matter if the goblins had shields or not. A few dropped dead and never moved again, with an ice tail sticking out of their chests or throats. Several more writhed in agony - impaled deep in their stomachs, arms or legs.
Surprisingly, those that got hit straight in the head might have survived. Nearly all the goblins had helmets of worrying quality – leather, wood, and armor. Three of the four goblins that were hit on the head got knocked unconscious and didn’t move, but one goblin somehow managed to stand up. And he was the one without a helmet! The ice bird simply burst into pieces against his skulls like the wooden shields did an instant before.
What are their skulls made out of? Yuusha wondered in amazement.
Still, the goblin loses were substantial from just one attack – at least ten incapacitated in one way or another.
While Sorzak dealt with the water giant, Sizarbob witnessed as his comrades fell. His eyes bulged red and he grit his teeth, turning to look at the other side of the river - at the source of his losses.
“Archers!” Sizarbob growled in fury. “Turn tiny sorcerer into hedgehog!”
The goblins with bows wasted no time in drawing their arrows and nocking them. But only a few goblins got to fire before the water giant swept them to the side. Out of those arrows, only one flew directly at the girl.
The wizard stood still as the arrow approached her, but, just before it could pierce her face, the water elemental standing beside its master swiftly extended its watery appendage, knocking the arrow off course.
Wait, are we actually going to lose this? Yuusha found himself worrying for the simple goblins who had finally found their match in the form of an apparently high-class wizard. Wait, “we”? Since when? I deliberately went out of my way to stay out of whatever trouble they were causing as much as possible while staying alive! So why did I say “we”? If the goblins fail here I could just back away, and start all of this over from scratch! Is this some Stockholm syndrome bullshit?
For about a minute the fighting between the elemental giants and the goblins went nowhere. Sizarbob and Sorzak traded ineffective blows with one of the water giants, though to their credit they both managed to avoid being hit by it. Meanwhile, the other giant was playing gatekeeper at the bridge.
At one point the water giant grew two additional arms, using the water from its big belly to push back the swarming goblins. Its shapeshifting abilities did little to no actual harm to the goblins without support from the wizard but worked phenomenally well when it came to preventing a single goblin from passing.
If the water elementals aren’t doing any damage without ice magic, why not just rush through them? Yuusha thought while overlooking the battle.
Apparently, Sizarbob thought the same thing and after dodging another attack from one water giant, rushed at the other one and shouted to Sorzak “Follow me!”
The water giant was not happy being ignored and, sacrificing its massive body, rapidly extended one arm in an arc around both hobgoblins, to stop their charge. Sizarbob, being Sizarbob, charged through the watery arm, popping it like a giant water balloon. Sorzak followed not far behind, running on a freshly made giant puddle.
Oh no! Yuusha realized why the fighting was going nowhere and rushed in to try and save the closest thing he had to an ally in this world. What am I doing? Again with the damn, heroic-
In a matter of two seconds, the water giant at the bridge collapsed its massive size to form a three-meter high wall, which in shape was closer to a cube than a wall. Sizarbob only picked up speed preparing for another locomotive charge-in.
Stop, you muscle-bound fool! Yuusha only now passed the first goblin and had no chance to catch up to the sprinting champion. If I shout out now, will he even hear or understand- ah, too late.
Just when Sizarbob was a couple of steps away from his target, the water cube vomited itself violently all over Sizarbob, Sorzak and all the goblins that were near. At that moment the water giant that the hobgoblins were fighting before also lunched its body into the ground, splashing itself in the direction of the further goblins, turning the area around the bridge into a lake, that even reached Yuusha, if only up to the ankles.
“Яов о дел!” The girl commanded and in a couple of seconds, all the water turned into rock-solid ice.