Ra’gut the goblin sped through the forest, yellow eyes darting all around. His brothers were killed? It wasn’t possible! They were hunters for the legendary White Fangs - the mightiest tribe of goblins, ascended to divinity by Polemios himself. Even if they were occasionally defeated by some great enemy here, they could always be resurrected by Great Ug’gut a short time later.
That monstrous being had killed their very essence, and snuffed out their souls. No, that wasn’t right either. He hadn’t simply snuffed them out. He stole them, and added them to that barely perceptible cloud of misery and discord that spread from the monster’s body like miasma.
The feeling it had given Ra’gut was familiar, he soon realized as his adrenaline and terror began to calm. In his youth, there had once been a persistent sensation of primal danger across this world, like a great bear watching from just beyond the campfire’s edge. Great Ug’gut had called it the ‘Gaze of Polemios’. It was the aura of Blödgard’s true master, once felt throughout the entire plane.
Ra’gut shook the notion from his mind, it couldn’t possibly be the same being. The god had vanished so very long ago. Even if He had returned, He would never grace such a lowly hunting ground to prey on ones so feeble as Ra’gut’s kind. Still, the familiar sensation nagged at him as he made his way back to his village.
He breathed a bit easier as the familiar thatched roofing and smoke from cooking fires appeared through the dense foliage ahead. Great Ug’gut would know what to do. There was a foreboding silence in the village. Normally the whelps would be running wild, fighting each other and upsetting the elders as the latter weaved baskets or scraped hides. Four thousand goblins called this sprawling village within the dense forest home, and they all seemed to be taking shelter in their tents and burrows. The gears in Ra’gut’s mind were turning, and his steps faltered just a bit. Had they been wrong to attack him? He shook the feeling, of course not! They were the mighty White Fangs, feared by all! To trespass in this sacred land was to become prey. Confidence restored, he loped quickly toward the village center.
The huge tent compound of Great Ug’gut soon loomed ahead, built all around the largest tree in the region, with many levels reaching up into its boughs. He sped on, their benevolent ruler would surely offer him hope!
The shaman queen’s staff cracked into Ra’gut’s skull a few minutes later. The goblin fighter scampered back, cowering before the trembling ruler as blood poured down one side of his face.
He had never seen the normally serene Ug’gut so furious. Her unnaturally beautiful features were twisted in outrage, and it was all directed at poor Ra’gut. She was tall, nearing five full feet compared to the usual three foot height of the of the typical goblin. Her thick, rust colored mane of hair reached her lower back and her body was sleek and muscular. Her outfit was scant - little more than a few strips of the choicest pelts embellished with polished bone beads. A necklace bearing a black talon the length of a dagger completed her ensemble. Her smooth skin was the vibrant green of oxidized copper, and her eyes were the color of yellow flames. He had never imagined the features he had so admired for his entire life could inspire such terror.
She could barely force the words past her sharp white teeth, sounding more like a hissing mountain cat than the dignified ruler that she was.
“You... ATTACKED him!?” The question had become a sort of chant with the frequency she shouted it, and the lashing staff had accompanied every recital. “Even the whelps sensed his return and knew to properly cower in their dens! But you, our sharpest warriors ATTACKED him!?” The staff flashed again, cracking the bone of Ra’gut’s forearm as he tried to block.
“But it... H-he was small as an orc! To trespass beyond the Bone Wall is to become White Fangs’ prey! Polemios is big as the mountains, Great Ug’gut says so herself...” Ra’gut stammered his excuses, and trailed off as he noticed the gold fires in Great Ug’gut’s eyes flare even brighter.
“Small as an orc?” Her whisper was calm, but somehow more menacing than her previous tirade. “His death aura fills this tent. It spreads to the ogre’s valley, and into the mountains where the red wyrm even now stirs after ten thousand years of slumber. How can my own descendants be so blind? The trees shiver, the beetles dig deep, the wolves tuck their tails and stifle their howls...” Ug’gut’s voice cracked a tiny bit, then rose into a familiar shriek. “And you ATTACKED him!” She raised her staff once more, but slowly lowered it. The rage on her face melted into a look of disgust at the cowering Ra’gut. “So be it. I shall have to beg His forgiveness personally. Begone from my sight.”
Ug’gut was left alone a moment later. Ancient memories percolated through her thoughts, drawing her back to the events that had brought her to the bountiful realm of Blödgard.
On that day, more than one million goblin slaves had fallen to the Al’miraj during the uprising in the mortal world. Ug’gut and four hundred other slain goblins had awoken here, in the shade of this tree. She had met Polemios then, his presence towering over the primordial treetops.
Impressed by their valiant struggle, he invited them to live and hunt in this vibrant realm. She and one hundred other goblins accepted the invitation, and forsook the goblin god Bauchan to stay here. Together they established the White Fangs tribe, so named for the daggers carved from the femurs of their wretched Al’miraj masters. Polemios had praised them for having ‘guts’ in standing against such overwhelming enemies. Because of that, every single White Fangs goblin carried the name Gut to this day.
The death aura of the distant ruler of Blödgard caressed her skin as she wandered through her old memories, and the thought of standing in the presence of its source for the first time since the Ascension of White Fangs made her stomach tie itself into knots.
If only there was some way she could be of use to him, and perhaps lessen the wrath he was sure to unleash upon her ungrateful tribe.
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I was confused, but not about to complain when no other enemies showed up during my journey toward the distant mountain. I could sense strong auras in every direction, but they seemed to be going to great lengths to not cross my path.
It was hard to gauge how much time was passing. The day and night cycle seemed to be way longer than what I was used to. It felt like four hours or so had passed since my fight with the goblins, but the sun had only moved a tiny bit. I climbed quickly through some steep, craggy foothills by leaping from place to place with very limited assistance from my wings. I made sure to stay topped off on Soul Energy as much as possible just in case I ran into something stronger than the local murder muppets.
I left the treeline below, and was soon forced to use my claws to climb the sheer faces of the mountains leading to my target. As usual, the big mountain was actually way further away than I originally estimated. It was also several times the size. I reached the summit of its tallest neighbor, and craned my neck back. Even though I was higher in elevation than any mountain I had climbed on earth, it was only about half the height of the big one.
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I decided to risk depleting my Soul Energy by flying up several hundred meters, and then gliding to land as high as possible on my target. After a couple quick hops and a neck crack I was sufficiently psyched up, and I crouched low.
I focused all of my natural strength into my bunched legs, and jumped as explosively as possible. Even after all this time, my mind still had a tough time processing the speed at which the landscape shrank below me. It’s sort of like zooming out from the street view of Google Earth a few clicks over the course of a second.
I didn’t even need to flap my wings (not like I was too scared and forgot or anything). I broke through the tops of the cloud cover and forgot my terror for a moment as my rapid climb slowed to a momentary stop. I had nearly matched the peak of the big mountain, the white marble ruins were much larger than I originally thought from my earlier perspective. It was actually a full scale monastery or fortress with a crumbling dome roof.
I didn’t want to waste any precious altitude, so I summoned a Soul Energy potion to each hand. I didn’t carry many of these on me as normally my base regeneration rate made the things largely pointless. Based on that, I had recently given most of them over to Sapphire for duplication and to serve as rewards for Adventurers.
My wings allowed for almost horizontal gliding, which drained Soul Energy at a fast but manageable rate (chugging a potion every eight seconds). Conversely, a single wing beat to regain altitude drained a horrifying amount of energy (I’m talking about half of my total Soul Energy), so I just accepted the fact that I’d be in for a climb after landing.
I was still gliding through the thick clouds when an enormous shadow ripped past me on the left from behind. There had been no discernible presence, a trait I had learned to associate with either the incredibly weak or the monstrously powerful. Given the situation, I assumed the latter. I didn’t need to wonder about the disposition of whatever it was, as a web of blue lightning crackled through the clouds. It struck me several times, but the Energy Nullification effect of my cloak absorbed most of the damage.
I retracted my wings as the flash faded, feigning a fall. A second later, I broke through the bottom of the clouds. I was close to my object mountain. As it stood now I would land a third of the way up even with a straight drop. My new friend took the bait, and I wasn’t really surprised when the huge head of an old blue dragon appeared from the grey clouds, followed by close to a hundred meters of azure scaled bulk. I resisted the impulse to use Appraisal. Soul Energy was too precious at the moment.
“Come on...” I urged in a soft whisper. “Eat the free snack, no need to use... Goddammit.” I swore when the dragon pulled up short, with an enormous magic circle appearing in front of its battle-scarred snout.
Hundreds of tornadoes, each capable of shredding every trailer park in Kansas suddenly formed in a massive area all around me. This was a rare gap in my defenses. Wind was a troublesome damage type along with Sonic that somehow skated right between the Physical Nullification of my chest armor and the Energy Nullification of my cloak. Even basic spells like Wind Blade could be a problem if cast by a strong magic user.
Given that each of these tornadoes were essentially made up of hundreds of thousands of max tier Wind Blade vortexes, I was in pretty deep shit.
Obviously, I was forced to drop the ‘helplessly stunned’ act. I thought about throwing Charon’s Call, but abandoned the idea immediately. There was no way of knowing if the spear’s return function would work in this Spatial Magic free place. My next best option was literally a long shot. I summoned The Gorgon, my oversized dark matter rail rifle. The last time I used this thing, a damage reflection effect had literally turned me into flying Gray soup.
The sixty second charge timer began, and I angled my body into a steep dive toward the most tornado free area. The ancient blue dragon was all too happy to let me struggle meaninglessly, simply calling down another wall of deadly twisters directly in my path. I invented a few new colorful dirty word combinations as my skin sprouted hundreds of bloody cuts, straight through my still pristine suit. It was a weird effect - blood was pouring out of my pant legs and sleeves without a single drop staining my clothes. As for how it felt? Ever spontaneously had a full body papercut? Can’t say I recommend it.
As awful as it felt, I was somewhat relieved to realize my regeneration could almost keep up. I could tolerate the tornado for a good forty seconds without needing to chug a healing potion. I noticed another thing as well, and the plan it sparked in my mind made me hate myself for even thinking about it. The tornadoes carried me up insanely fast. That would take the pressure off my Soul Energy at the cost of absolute agony.
I bit my already bloody lip and kept counting in my head as I tumbled up through the vortex. The Death Storm effect typically had a duration of twenty seconds, but if it was cast by a Boss (and all signs pointed to that being the case) then it could last over a minute. My hands were little more than bloody bone, and I imagined the rest of me didn’t look any better under my suit when I finally heard the high pitched sustained tone from my weapon. It was barely discernible over the roar of wind and blood rushing through the disfigured bloody lumps that were once my ears. My vision was a red blur, like trying to see through thick stained glass.
The world went deafeningly silent as the dragon’s spell suddenly ended. I locked my returning sight onto the enormous body, blocking out everything else. It was casting another spell, but that didn’t matter. I leveled The Gorgon, and squeezed the trigger.
Predictably, a concentrated, many layered barrier formed in front of the dragon’s head and chest. It could probably even deflect a shot from The Gorgon, and its vitals were all but invulnerable behind that wall. Unfortunately for the dragon, I didn’t give a shit about its vitals while we were fighting in the sky.
There was no sound as the dragon’s right wing suddenly exploded at the large joint nearest where it connected to its body. Then came the deafening boom, followed by a sucking wind as the atmosphere itself tried to right itself after the devastating projectile approached reality tearing speeds.
The silence was broken by a horrible shriek, and the dragon spun and tumbled toward the mountainside below. Blood sprayed wildly in an oddly beautiful spiraling cascade. I finally let out a sigh, but didn’t take my eyes off the falling dragon. That wouldn’t be enough to finish it off, and nobody could hold a grudge like those scaly pricks. I followed in a controlled fall.
My body was healing rapidly, and I equipped Grief Reaper as I continued to descend. I had yet to meet a dragon that didn’t also have a strong regenerative power. The death scythe’s Festering Wounds effect was about to cheese through yet another absurdly tough enemy.
The bulky beast impacted a wide ledge, sending a shockwave of energy and a plume of dust flying in all directions. I spotted a flash from within the plume, and jerked reflexively to dodge a blade of storm energy which was a combination of electricity and wind. It was a new trick in terms of what I had seen blue dragons pull, meaning this was likely an evolved beast. That was a passing thought as I saw something falling beside me, but drifting away slowly. It was my bare left arm, severed just above the elbow. I didn't feel any pain at first, the cut was too clean. My intact sleeve fluttered in the wind, with more dark blood flying from the end like an unattended hose.
I grunted and groaned as I was forced to unequip Grief Reaper in order to take out one of my more precious consumables. I landed as the green crystal vial appeared in my remaining hand. My arm would regenerate naturally, but I was honestly just sick of being in pain at this point. I downed the potion and prepared myself to dodge another attack. Instead, a voice cut through the still settling dust.
“Too many sins.” The dragon's voice was gravelly and deep, carrying like thunder. “Deserter, Pretender, Failure. It is either the Deserter and Failure, or pretending to be the Deserter and Failure. No matter which, I can only give it pain and death.”
“Its titles are actually just Confused and Lost. I don’t know who the fuck you are or where I am.” I retorted, flexing my freshly regrown fingers.
“Tell that to my stolen brood! You swore to protect them, to protect US.” The dragon’s voice carried such genuine pain that it gave me pause.
“Who do you think I am?” I asked, still holding my defensive posture.
“You really don’t remember?” The dragon snorted, almost sounding amused. “That’s good. You can die confused and helpless, just like my children!”
I shook the mysteries away, and focused on the things I could actually understand. The shadow loomed suddenly larger as the dragon launched itself at me. I raised Grief Reaper and prepared for the final showdown...
A strange slicing sound interrupted the moment, and the football field sized body collapsed instantly. Its head, roughly as large as a light truck rolled to a stop a few yards ahead of me. One blazing blue eye focused on me in madness and hatred for a few seconds before glossing over in death.
Just as I was trying to process what in the name of Ariel had just happened, something small and green with a huge mane of thick red hair was kneeling in front of me. A goblin? No way. She was, for lack of a better description, way too damn hot even by human standards to be a goblin.
“Please forgive this wretched goblin for interfering in your battle, and for disgracing the precious name Ug'gut that you blessed me with.” My face was a blank mask, too paralyzed by confusion for any expression. “That lowly beast dared to threaten you, an insult I could not suffer in silence. I have also berated and beaten the goblin that dared to survive attacking you.”
That answered one question, and raised about a thousand new ones. In the end I just rubbed my head and decided to do my best at playing along. I absolutely did not want to fight this thing. She was obviously crazy dangerous.
“Your actions have pleased me greatly.” I tried to match the serious tone. “Your loyalty is noted, arise Ug’gut.”
“Such words...” A tear streaked down her elegant cheekbone. “Please, allow this insignificant Ug’gut to serve you once more. The White Fangs are at your command, my great god Polemios.”
Oh, that guy again? Maybe Ogrun was actually onto something after all.