With none of the pigs closer than a hundred yards when I started blowing, it was going to take them some time to charge across the field to reach us. Leaving me plenty of time to continue sounding the alarm, hopefully drawing a response from the goblin camp.
With my friend a few feet in front of me, I was sure that his larger presence would draw more of the charging swine to him. Looking over the field that was starting to gather a light fog in the twilight gloom, I could see that only the largest of the boars were making the charge across the field to confront us, while the rest looked to be retreating back to safety.
Unfortunately for us, only the largest boars still meant there were fifteen attacking. Trusting the bear to do his part to keep them off of me I continued to blow the horn, while the bear sounded off with a challenging roar that by all rights should have sent the pigs flying with the shockwave alone.
He succeeded in scaring off two of the smaller tusked monstrosities pounding toward us, but that still left us with thirteen to deal with. Or to put it another way we still had between three and four thousand pounds of angry muscle charging towards us.
When they made it to within a hundred yards, I tossed the horn aside and pulled out two of my bolos. Taking one, I started to whirl it over my head so I was ready to toss it as soon as they closed the range a little more. Sending my first one out to the right side of the charging pack, I quickly sent my second one flying to the opposite side. My first one had the greatest impact, wrapping around two different hogs’ legs. It tangled them up so much that their rolling bodies took out a third separate hog. My second was more of a failure and only managed to cause one to go rolling, leaving us with nine still coming.
At twenty-five yards left to go and no chance of all that weight stopping, I quickly bent down to pull on the rope I had left by my feet. As the seven spears, that were braced against the log Gaian had his paws pressing down on came up. I held the tips of them chest high while the pigs pressed on unaware of the danger that had suddenly appeared in front of them. Between the poor lighting and their even worse eyesight, they continued on unaware. The spears had a small log tied to them at the cross braces, but even with the extra weight holding them steady, when the mass of all of those pigs slammed into the makeshift barrier it was still driven several feet back despite the bear’s weight holding our end down.
But in the end, the sharp blades pointing away from us made all of the difference, as the bellies were ripped out of the center of the charging horde. Two of them managed to avoid the blades by dint of crashing into the bodies of pigs that were already impaled but the whole pack still came to a crashing halt as the bear continued to press down on the rear log that was bracing our crazy contraption.
The two pigs that hadn’t had blades driven into them started to stand up shakily only for the bear to charge forward and rip out both of their throats to remove the last of the danger that was here in this field for us. Taking my knife out I quickly cut the ropes holding the spears together before pulling them out and bundling them back up together for ease of transport. As I started hearing horns begin to blow from the direction of the goblin camp, I picked up the captured horn before sending it ringing again in answer. Blowing into it for another minute, I ignored the hogs that were still alive, pawing at the bloody ground their intestines had spilled out onto squealing in agony, asking to be put out of their misery.
It killed me to leave them suffering, but right now I wasn’t a hunter who had made a poor shot and was anxious to fix his mistake. Right now I was someone desperate to try and free his fellow humans and up against impossible odds, so I needed every distraction I could get. If I had to leave these swine alive longer than I wanted to, then that was the price I needed to pay and I had made my piece with it.
Hearing the horns starting to grow closer, I tossed my own aside again and gathered up the weapons we had used to take out the pigs. We started heading back to the goblin camp on an angle so as to avoid the goblins we had drawn out. Seeing the torches blinking through the woods it seemed that even though they were on their home ground, they weren’t content to use their night vision when they had the means to light their way. Or maybe they had some other reason, I don’t know, either way, I was going to take the W wherever I could find it.
Hiding in trees whenever the lights got closer, I was happy they were so eager to announce their presence, as made it easier to avoid the patrols charging to rescue the pigs. Although I did my best not to become complacent, we did end up stumbling into a couple of solo goblins who had gotten left behind by the lighted parties sent to investigate. Gaian was on top of it though and he grew adept at knowing how hard to hit them over the head to send them off to dreamland. So far he had managed to leave all of them alive judging from the lack of energy that was streaming up out of them.
Making our way back to where we had left our packs, I added the spears to Gaian’s packs as they were deep enough to hold them. Shouldering them on, we started making our way through the shoddiest parts of camp. From the noises, we could hear most of the goblins were still in the main part of camp screaming and yelling in celebration. Knowing we needed to thin the numbers out even more, I set down my pack to pull out a number of pine branches I had gathered when making my plans. Dipping them into abandoned fires I started tossing them into the grass roofs of the goblin shelters, watching as the dead grass started blazing up. Declining to sound the alarm for now, I started circling the outer edge until around a third of the camp had at least one hovel starting to catch fire.
With not much time before it was noticed, I pulled off my bear spray that I had carried for so long. Rolling it into an abandoned fire, we quickly made our way forward to hide in one of the hovels closest to the center of the camp. We barely made it inside before the canister finally sent a booming explosion ringing through the camp. Hearing the monsters go silent, the monsters finally seemed to realize that their homes were in danger of being destroyed. Hoping that they didn’t have an easy magical fix for the fires I had started, I peeked through the branches that made up the goblin home we were hiding in to get a better idea of the chaos we had caused.
The fodder goblins that had remained were running wild. It seemed they were not the brightest of tools when not under the direct orders of a higher evolved boss, they looked to have all of the intelligence of a doorknob, some of them even colliding into each other in the confusion. The archers and spear goblins weren’t much better as they went charging out to save their homes, but none of them managed to impale each other in the confusion which I found to be a little disappointing. The shield bearers seemed to be the most steady as they held their ground after a couple of shouts from the goblin leaders who had mounted their wolves. The three of them gathered up the ten or so shamans and half of the hundred shield bearing goblins to serve as their bodyguards, or at least that was what I was assuming, while leaving the remainder to guard the prisoners.
Giving them a couple of minutes to fully become engaged in fighting the fires I pulled out the second spear I had captured on this moon, the first being destroyed by the dragon after I had ruined its blade. Holding onto it with my left hand I made sure both my bowie knife and club were loose in their sheaths before pulling out several of the bolos and holding them in my hand with my spear. Breathing slowly to try and get myself into as meditative of a state as I could, I tried to pick out the cage that held the children. Spotting them it looked like I was mistaken, either there was a third girl who I hadn’t noticed or they had left the mother to care for them, pointing them out for the bear. I took another couple of slow breaths to steady myself before letting the bear lead the charge. This time we wouldn’t be holding back!
Twirling the bolo in my right hand, we stayed silent while trying to get as close as we could before announcing our presence. As soon as I saw the first of the guards begin to point excitedly in our direction, I began to let the ancient weapons fly. I was aiming low to entangle as many of the monsters as I could while staying close to the charging bear who lowered his head and ran through four of the goblins who had thought to join forces to stop him. These were lacking whatever magic that the shaman had bestowed upon their two fellows that had managed to give the bear pause earlier in the night, and he blew right through them, driving them straight through the wooden walls of the cage that held the children we aimed to free... One way or another.
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Avoiding the frightened children, he continued his charge until he had blasted out a hole on the opposite side before stopping and turning to trot back to join me. I, having some idea of what he had meant to do, continued behind him. I only turned when I had the walls of the cage to guard my flanks. Spear out I thought to hold off the following goblins but it seemed like my companion’s display of strength had them all frozen for the moment. As he returned to guard the hole he had made, I started to feel the exp of his kills streaming into me, fortunately with the large crowd around us it was the smallest of streams and barely shook me as I wasn’t able to maintain my meditation in all of the excitement.
Letting my spear fall, I quickly removed my pack and began passing the weapons we had gathered to the clambering adults. Starting with the spears Gaian carried before moving to the captured knives in my own pack so they could begin to cut themselves free. After passing out the bladed weapons, I moved onto the blunt, only holding back two of the clubs for the older kids. Now that I was closer I could see the girl looked to be around fourteen, while the boy was slightly younger, maybe twelve as he had yet to grow even the slightest of peach fuzz on his cheeks. Handing them their clubs, I was grateful that they didn’t show any fear of me, as I pulled my Earth made knife and began cutting the ropes from their necks. Freeing the smaller girl who I assumed was their sister, I set her on the bear’s back for safekeeping before finally picking my own spear back up.
Looking over to the other cages, all of the captives seemed to have freed themselves from their ropes. The ones with spears were threatening any of the goblins that looked to get too close, while the ones with knives cut everyone free, before turning those blades to the ropes that held the bars together. As the walls started coming down, I called to my friend and tossed up the boy behind his sister. While grabbing the eldest teen’s hand and pushing it to the bear’s side, directing her to stay with them despite the language barrier. As the bear turned to retreat through the other hole he had made and started lumbering to the deepest part of the camp. I lowered my spear as several shields dove forward to take advantage of our blocking force leaving.
With none of the mass of my companion. I instead aimed low, stabbing swiftly at their legs before quickly pulling the blade back so they couldn’t trap it. As the bear led the way towards the steep path that went to the cave I had spotted earlier from the trees, I hoped that the goblins weren’t able to quickly organize any archers to rain down arrows. It would be child’s play for them to hit us from the higher walls that they dug out of the forest floor to reach the opening in the ground. Wondering what would have caused them to make such a setup in the middle of their camp I could only hope that the majority of the tribe was still outside. Organizing the rest of the adults to follow the bear was hard. Wishing I could speak their language, I appointed the eldest of them as a leader and had him organize the rest of the ones holding spears to set up a wall to defend the narrow path that led deeper into the ground.
Several of the ones I had armed with clubs and knives, didn’t trust my plan and started to make a run for it. With too many to do anything about, I had to let them go and hoped they could cause enough confusion to keep the mob of goblins from organizing against us. Hopefully, their cowardice would at least be good for something, and they could buy us a little bit of time to get organized once we made it down far enough we had overhead cover. One of the spear wielders looked to join them, but those weapons were essential for my plan. So I quickly cut him down from behind before he made it even a couple of feet away from us. Pointing to another man to pick up the spear, I counted who we had left. Four women and sixteen men had decided to stay with the group, the women had the daggers and were at the back of the group while the men held the clubs and spears.
None of the dirtier prisoners that had been here before the latest group had left us. It had been all of the more recent arrivals. Wondering if that was because they knew how unlikely it was to make it into the forest it seemed like there was a fatalistic look in their eyes, like they were making peace that this was going to be their end and they were going to do everything they could to not be taken alive again. Two of them held spears, while one had a club, the final one was a feral looking woman holding a dagger, continuously testing the edge with her thumb, not even caring when she seemed to press too hard and began bleeding.
Retreating down the narrow pathway that had been hewn out of walls of earth, they soon rose high enough that we were no longer able to see the forest above. Several switchbacks later, we started to see it would soon open up to a large floor before narrowing back down to the opening of a cave.
As we slowly retreated down the path, we had to repulse several charges by the goblins but managed it easily enough. The narrow path only allowed four of them to come down abreast of each other with their larger shields out in front of them to hold off our blades. I had our spear holders at tail end Charlie in two rows, covering each other with the longer blades. With them facing the goblins, I had to have two of the club holders behind them, guiding them down with hands on their shoulders. As we retreated slowly down the hill they had carved the winding path down I heard Gaian roar from the bottom. I had told him to signal if he thought the air in the cave was good. My plan was to use the narrow confines of the cave to limit our front so we could whittle the goblins down with stone around us. Hopefully, that would keep them from overwhelming us.
At his signal, several of the rescuees turned to look at where I had us heading. As we saw him pass into the cave with the children, it looked like a shimmer of light had covered them as they crossed the threshold into the darkness. Immediately a muttering began to occur from all of the recent captives. The ones that had been there longer didn’t seem to care at all, they just continued caressing the weapons that they had received. The rest of them started to talk louder amongst themselves before one of the women shouted loudly at them. Coming up to me, I could see a mix of emotions crossing through her eyes, fear and sadness seemed to be the most visible, but I got flashes of anger although it didn’t seem to be directed at me.
She could tell I couldn’t understand what she was saying, and after a couple of more tries, she gave up. Holding out the dagger I had given her, she seemed to want me to take it. Two of the men added clubs to my pack while my back was to them and one of the men weakened the wall to give me an additional spear. I felt hands pushing me gently down towards where my companion had disappeared. I couldn't help but wonder at their strange insistence. I thought that maybe there might be a danger ahead that they needed me to clear out, but couldn’t figure out why they weren’t joining me unless they wanted the majority of the numbers to hold the goblins back. Were they just freeing up their hands to pick up weapons after one of their fellows had fallen?
Hearing shouting coming from farther up the path, it seemed like the goblin leadership had finally gotten the fires under control, and were not happy to see what I had done to their planned sacrifices. Screaming at me the woman began shoving me harder in the direction of the cave. When I didn’t move fast enough for them, it seemed like one of the unarmed men was going to start running down instead only to hesitate as the leader shouted at him.
I could see the unarmed man’s eyes growing wider as the goblins began to shout louder and the weight of their numbers began driving more of the bashers down onto our spears. When he couldn’t take it anymore and started sprinting for the cave, I was shocked to see the wild-eyed woman jump onto his back and ride him to the ground, driving her dagger into his neck and torso in an orgy of blood. As I began to see the killing energy rising up from him, I could tell it was on another level from anything I received from the goblins. Feeling a hand press on my shoulder, I ignored my small share that began burning a hole inside of me.
Looking into the sad eyes of what I could only take to be the children’s father. He spoke a few more words quietly to me and then pushed me down the hill. I stumbled a couple of times before finally taking the hint. Passing the woman who had seemed to come to life killing the fleeing man, I half expected to get a blade into my own back. But when I partially turned all I saw was her wave a farewell to me, before turning herself and rejoining the rest of the women. All of them were resolutely standing behind the wall of spears that were still punching into any goblins that were pushed too far by their fellows.
Turning and crossing the threshold into darkness, I felt a tingle run through me that let me know this wasn’t an ordinary cave.