Chapter Fourteen
Looking over at the pile of chopped off limbs, I was grateful that they didn't seem to be growing into their own new monster, or making any effort to recombine with the main body. With one good thing going for us, that still left us with a load of problems to dig through. The first big one being, all of my stuff was a little over half a mile away, and I was getting more nervous that the dead goblins weren't the only creatures around that would love to steal my stuff. Looking up into the sky I sent a quick thought out to the universe, that is not an invitation to send some Fiends after my remaining equipment. Second, the bear and I were both covered in the blood and slime of that freak; not to mention the previous goblin ‘dirt’ and blood. None of that could be that great for the wounds that we, well mostly he, had. Thirdly, we had a Troll torso that was doing its best to grow back all of its extremities, seriously what kind of BS evolutionary lottery win lets you grow back a head!
My ally was still laying down, either it had gotten cut up worse than I thought by the troll's knee spikes, or it was just content to let the monkey keep playing with the puzzle while it rested. The good news was that the limbless chest didn't seem to be able to grow back its appendages instantly. It had been close to five minutes now I guess and it had only made major progress on its right arm, which had grown about halfway back to its elbow.
Everything else was only closed up and had slightly bigger or smaller nubs on them that indicated the growing back process had begun. God what I wouldn't give for a working clock, I really hated myself for always being content with a cell phone and never caring enough about the status symbol, I had always considered it an expensive timepiece. Had it really only been five minutes since I had taken off that first arm or was that just the come down? Was the adrenaline spike just messing with my head?
Making a decision, I realized that I wasn't willing to lose all of my supplies. This was going to be bad enough with them, and without them I might as well just take a long walk off of a short cliff. Decision made, I dragged the torso over to the bear before walking back to grab my ax. Quickly chopping through what had regrown for the right arm and all the nubs that had left. Luckily the bones hadn't seemed to solidify yet, so it was easier to take the limbs off than the first time. I told the bear on the off chance it had any ability to understand me. “Alright big boy, I’ve got to leave this here with you. Don't try to eat it, but if any of the limbs get too big before I get back, you are going to have to gnaw them off yourself.”
Seeing some confusion in its eyes and worried that it might think I wasn't coming back, I reached over to scratch its ears and said. “Don't worry, I'll be back.” In the obligatory Schwarzenegger voice that dads must use with that phrase, “I've got better things to eat anyway, just keep this guy immobile until I get back and we can figure things out.” Cursing myself in my head for a fool, I set down my ax next to the bear in an effort to show him that I would return. Walking over to where my knife lay I picked the blade back up, still all covered in monster viscera. I wasn't willing to return it to its sheath, so I just held it in my hand as I took off back up the hill once again at a gentle jogging pace.
Quickly making it to the top, I turned around and saw that the bear was content to maintain its vigil over the still active torso. With a small wave of my hand, I sucked in some more air, and continued my jog across the wide ridgeline. Running back to where I had left my pack and sledge, what seemed like days ago, but in reality was probably less than half of an hour. Looking around once I was there, I was relieved to see that everything was still where I left it. Unwilling to give myself one more thing to clean, I picked up my pack as gingerly as I could and gently tried to set it down on top of the seaweed that covered the fish. Picking up and putting the ropes around my shoulders, I did my best to move quickly, while still being careful enough not to tear the canvas that made up the bottom of my makeshift sled. Maintaining a steady pace back towards the other ridgeline, I still kept up the scanning of my surroundings. Not wanting to be surprised by anything while I was encumbered. Not that I wanted to be surprised by any more mythological creatures at any time, I would just prefer to face them without one hundred plus pounds of supplies tied to me.
Making my way back yet another time to the ridge that overlooked the immense valley, I had to stop myself from taking in the majestic view. Looking down to the first bit of flatland I saw that the bear was standing up and gnawing on the body. Apparently it had either gotten hungry, or more likely based on how I was smelling right now something on it had grown to a worrisome size. Unwilling to leave my pack, even if it was technically now within sight of where I would be going, I picked it up and slung it onto my shoulders after quickly shrugging out of the ropes.
Knife still in hand, I did my best to make my way down the hillside, to wear the demon spawn lay. Having made it down, managing not to faceplant, I quickly made my way over to where the two titans were, and upon closer examination I saw that things weren't as bad as I had thought. Just the right arm had gotten to a worrisome size, and the bear seemed to have gnawed most of it off, with what was left only hanging on by a few strings. As I went to take my pack off, before I got started finishing off what Yogi had started. The bear's stomach finally revolted at the task that had been asked of it. Jumping back, I managed to avoid getting hit with the torrent of bile that shot out of the bear's mouth, and washed over the troll. Apparently despite being able to eat old fish, week long dead whales, sea lions and whatever else bears managed to come across. Not to mention all of the garbage they were happy to dig through, troll meat was where it drew the line!
As he backed up, continuing to cough and gag, I backed away as well. As bad as the smell of troll was, mixing it with the bear bile caused it to combine into a truly terrible concoction. Between being a chef and a dad, I had smelled some truly awful scents in my life. From messy blown out diapers, being vomited on, or in the case of restaurants which held the previous number one spot. Finding a container of chicken hearts and livers that had been found forgotten in a corner of the walk-in. With no label on it, I had no idea of how long it had been there, or what it was. So I, in my infinite wisdom, had cracked it open. I truly cannot use words to describe how bad that smelled, but crushing the lid back down, did nothing to get it out of my head.
Somehow managing to combine sweet and cloying, with the sour of old rancid roadkill. I now found myself looking back at that as a fond memory as I began dry heaving myself. Stumbling back a safe distance, I maneuvered myself downwind to remove my pack, while glaring at the bear. He looked back at me unapologetically as if to say, “Hey stupid, I had to taste it! You, you hairless monkey, can use tools.”
Acknowledging how big of an ask I had made I looked back at the torso, the legs hadn't even gotten to regrowing the hamstrings yet. The left arm was still a nub, and the neck had only just managed to close itself up. So shrugging out of my pack, I set it down a safe distance away from the pile of gore that had only gotten more disgusting, as the bile mixed down into the slime and blood.
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Unencumbered, with only my knife in hand, I started up the hill for the third time in the last hour. I don't know if it was the adrenaline or if the energy of this world was seeping into me, but I felt that I was moving at a brisker pace than I would have normally expected after the day's activities. Or maybe it was just my overactive imagination. Making it to the top, I just pulled on the ropes to my travois once more, instead of putting the ropes on with so little left in its trip, before beginning my final trek back down the hillside. Dragging it down the gentle hillside over to where my pack was, I removed the ropes and reached into the sea weed to pull out one of the bigger fish I had there, tossing it over to where the bear lay. I bent down once more to pull a second one, walking over to the bear I said, “Thank you, Brother. You did a good job, and you don’t have to worry anymore. I'll figure this thing out… Just sit back and use the fish to get the taste of that out of your mouth. I'm well aware that without you that monster would be chowing down on me right now.”
Laying the eel down in front of him, I went back to my pack once again and began stripping out of my boots and clothes. Getting down to my boxers I took a minute and decided that with only the bear around I cared a lot more about keeping them blood, gore and most importantly smell free than my modesty. I quickly removed them as well, clothing safety now assured. I picked up my knife, walked back over the surprisingly spongy turf like grass to get my ax. Doing my best to breathe from my mouth I went back to hacking the legs and remaining arm off of the troll.
Tossing the nubbins into my growing pile of limbs, I set my knife and ax down and started looking to find a spot on the grass clean of blood and gore. First wiping my hands clean on it before then cupping my own nubbin and eggs. I then proceeded to roll around in the dirt and grass, willing to trade that for gore. Standing up somewhat clean, I could only hope that when the remaining bits of bloody mud on me dried, it would be easier to brush off. At least most of the smell was now gone. Walking back over to my pack I gingerly pulled a fresh pair of boxers on, careful to keep them free of the remaining mud and gore. With my feet being mostly clean as well, I pulled on my socks and boots, unwilling to risk a fight barefoot if more goblins showed up. I left the gaiters in the dirty pile to deal with later.
Going over to my pack, I pulled the rag I had used earlier out of the bag that held it to protect the rest of my gear. Walking over to the sled I picked out a couple of the larger leaves of kelp that looked tougher than the rest. Taking them with me I went over to my knife and ax and started the process of slowly cleaning them of the blood and guts that covered them. Fortunately, they hadn't begun to dry yet, further impressing on me both the reality of how adrenaline can compress time.
Also how insane the magic that the troll possessed that allowed it to grow so much of its body back this quickly. I was now much happier in my decision to leave my gear behind before starting the big fight. I was sure that had I taken the time to go back for it, the little green giant would have quickly filled out to the point where Yogi and I would have been even now finding out just how bad the inside of a monster's stomach smelled.
Using the wet kelp to scrub the blades of my ax and knife clean of all of the blood and gore, I tossed the now inedible pieces over to the pile of limbs before drying the blades with my rag. Examining them closely I was happy to see that they didn't seem to be damaged, despite my taking so long to clean them off. Some stories had the goblinoid genus of blood as being acidic and I was grateful to scratch that myth off of my growing checklist of what was true or not in this new universe. Finally all clean and shiny again I finally returned them to their homes, now grateful that I could have them with me, instead of being forced to leave them on the ground when I needed my hands.
Not being happy with my previous setup, I removed the belt from my pants on the ground. Belting it with no pants, not being willing to dirty one of my two final remaining clean pairs, I moved the ax sheath to my right hip in front of the bear spray before putting my knife sheath on my left side.
Armed if not armored, I walked back over to the bear to check and see how he was doing. He seemed to be happily enjoying his fish and not being willing to test how far our truce was going. I decided to graciously leave him to enjoy his meal alone. With a quick glance to tell me that it wasn't yet time to reprune the troll again, I decided to quickly check on all of the goblin corpses to see if they had anything of use. Walking first over to the shaman, as gamer logic, book lore and just plain common sense all told me that the most powerful creature was my best chance of finding out what the creatures of this world found useful.
Looking down on the monster, you wouldn't have been able to tell that its soul had been drained from it’s body. Suck dry to slowly power the spell that it had been looking to send towards the bear. I was still confused as to what happened. It had looked to be what I would have basically called a fireball, only instead of fire it had seemed to have been empowered by the evil draining of the small goblin's soul. What drove such a creature to happily give its life and soul to cast such a horrible spell, I couldn't begin to understand. While I am familiar with cults on earth and how even normal people could self-destruct their lives in different ways, my disconnect with them was nowhere near what it was with the tiny little goblin.
I had seen its face and while I know you are not supposed to subscribe human emotions onto other beings, the only thing that I could see radiating out of its eyes as its soul was removed, was happiness. How can you feel your soul being ripped away and be happy? Even if you were willing to kamikaze yourself to take out your tribe's enemies, this didn't seem to be that kind of situation. There was no rest of the tribe here that you were protecting. Who sacrificed their life and soul to hunt a bear? And if it was forced into it, I would have expected fear and pain to mar its features, not happiness.
Before I could further get lost of what drove goblins to happily sucide themselves to empower their betters’ spells, I let it go. I decided to just keep that in mind for the future encounters every story I had ever read, assured me was coming. What was more important, was trying to figure out what would turn a fireball into a portal to hell. That couldn't have been the shaman's intent. I was still convinced that the purpose of that spell had to have been to kill the bear. Either through draining it, which still rang wrong in my mind, or immolating it in fire. There is no way that the shaman intended a chain reaction that would wipe out it and the rest of the hunting pack.
They might have been willing to sacrifice one if they thought the bear was worth it, but even insects won’t sacrifice an entire group to kill something unless the nest was in danger. And if they thought the nest was close enough to be in danger, then we should have been swarmed by even more goblins by now in an effort to keep that nest safe. Convinced I was right about that, I continued that train of thought. So if it wasn’t supposed to be changed into a portal, then it must have gone wild when the shaman started losing its own soul to it. Either the shaman hadn't fully cut it off, it was intended to drain just the bear's energies to possibly open a portal and garner support from the demons. Or it had been summoning the fire from the other dimension and turned into a portal after the massive influx of life from all of the remaining goblins.
I loved solving puzzles and I really wished to declare this one solved, but even though my gut was telling me it knew the right answer. I didn't want to lock myself into a wrong assumption and use that to base my future decisions. So for now I would just keep those two guesses in the back of my mind as being a higher probability, without letting me get locked into a mindset that I knew how the world worked.
I really didn't want to send myself down the wrong path.