After witnessing the terrible spectacle of an innocent woman being fed to the oversized spider, the serious nature of James’ situation had fully sunk in. Still, he refused to give in to terror. "My friends are strong, they won't leave me here." he told the prisoner named Paul, who was the man that had saved him from being chosen as the sacrifice earlier.
"I hope that's true kid, but unless your friends happen to be a whole army, I don't know how much they can help us," Paul responded with a sad smile one his face, handing James a piece of rock-hard bread. James tried to bite it but could barely crunch off a small corner.
"P'tuhh! It tastes like sawdust!" he complained while trying to scrape the chewed piece off his tongue, then handed the remainder of the bread back to Paul.
"I know it isn't very good, but it’s all they give us. When you get hungry enough, you'll learn to eat it," Paul replied as he accepted the food back from the boy.
James hadn’t spoken much with the other prisoners; most of them were so depressed and terrified that they didn’t want to talk, either. He understood how they must feel—living in constant fear of death, with almost no hope of survival. But James didn’t feel that way. He knew that help was coming, even if Paul didn’t think it was possible.
While the two talked, a group of goblins walked up to the cage dragging a sobbing young woman behind them. There was blood dripping down the young woman's legs and her clothes where ripped around her chest and groin. The creatures carelessly tossed the distraught girl back into the cage, tied to door locked, and left.
One of the other prisoners, an older woman, removed her coat and wrapped it around the girl.
"What did they do to her?" James asked angrily.
"You would rather not know the answer to that question, I promise you that." Paul responded with his head lowered in shame.
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Lucius knew the moment he saw the cage that he’d found his target, even if he couldn’t make out the faces of the humans from such a distance. He had mistakenly assumed that finding James would be the hardest part of the rescue, but that turned out to be wrong. After seeing the huge number of goblins in the village, discovering the dangerous hobgoblins, and witnessing the number of humans held captive, he realized how complicated this mission actually was. He could probably sneak into the village and steal James away. Even if he was discovered when he took the boy from the cage, he stood a good chance of outrunning the creatures, even while carrying James on his back. The problem was that doing so would mean leaving the rest of the captives to die. In the past, he would have told himself that it wasn’t his responsibility; after all, he could barely take care of himself. Things were different now—Lucius knew that he was one of the highest-leveled humans on the planet. Even if someone else had surpassed him, that still made him one of the few capable of doing something about situations like this.
"What if I can't do it?" Lucius second-guessed himself for a moment before pushing the doubts to the back of his mind. "I'll do my best to save everyone. If things go wrong, I'll just focus on saving James."
Now that he’d made his decision, Lucius needed a plan. He would never be able to escape with so many weak humans if the goblins were chasing them. He needed a distraction. Scouting the area around the village again, he focused on finding something entirely different. Lucius moved from one warehouse to the next, scouring the district until he found what he was looking for. He eventually reached the nearby port, where Sense Danger released a burst of warning in his chest as he crossed an invisible boundary.
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"Found you!" Lucius followed the sense of danger toward the water’s edge. There, around a large crane, rested four of the pale-armored turtle creatures he’d fought before. These creatures had a powerful sense of smell, so he could lure them without breaking his stealth.
Lucius tore a strip from the bottom of his shirt, tied it around a rock, then hurled it toward the turtles with all his might. The distance was a bit far, but Lucius hadn’t thrown anything since upgrading his strength. He’d intended for the rock to land near the turtles and draw their attention. Instead, it shot out of his hand like a bullet, crashing into the face of the largest turtle monster and shattering the rock. The beast let out an angry roar, startling its companions. Unable to identify the threat, the creatures began sniffing around, quickly finding the strip of shirt before slowly searching for his trail.
Lucius kept his distance and watched. When he saw them begin running in his direction, he knew he had succeeded. Taking off at a run, he chose a route easy for the large creatures to follow, heading straight for the goblin village. It only took him five minutes to cross the distance with his speed. As he neared the goblins’ territory, he slowed down, moving with as much stealth as he could afford, and made his way to the area where he’d seen the captives.
When he reached the cage, he felt a rush of conflicting emotions. He was overjoyed that James was alive and well, but furious at the miserable condition of the other captives. It was obvious they’d been terribly abused, and Lucius could see signs that some of the women had been violated by the creatures. "Unforgivable," he thought as anger burned in his chest. While he waited for the creatures following his scent to arrive, Sense Danger activated again. This time, the warning was so intense it took him a moment to realize what it was. "That's something I don’t want to fight," he thought, glancing toward the source of the feeling.
A hobgoblin, taller than the others and with rippling muscles bulging under it's fur pelts, emerged from one of the larger goblin huts. The creature held a ritual dagger in one hand and a staff in the other, both carved from bone. Its head was covered by a dark totem mask, depicting a demonic face. Decorating its hut were rows of spiked heads lined up on each side—some hobgoblins, others human.
Through effort, you have raised Sense Danger to level 4.
Lucius felt his stomach clench as the hobgoblin seemed to look right at him. But in the next moment, the creature’s attention was drawn by an angry roar. Four large, armored turtle monsters barreled into the village, trampling goblins as they passed. When the hobgoblin saw this, he casually raised a hand to his mouth and whistled. Lucius watched as the largest spider he’d ever seen scurried up to the hobgoblin from a fenced-in area behind him. The hobgoblin leaped onto the spider’s back in one swift motion, shouted at the goblins around him, and charged toward the invaders. "He must be the boss." Lucius guessed, because as soon as the powerful creature spoke the rest of the goblins quickly responded, all following him towards the scene of the battle.
Seeing his plan working, Lucius waited a few moments to allow the slower goblins to join the fray, then approached the captives, observing the cage that the goblins had created. It wasn't much, the door was held shut by nothing but a bunch of primitive ropes wrapped up in knots. It wasn't actually the cage that was keeping the humans trapped here, it was the threat of death if they tried to escape.
Lucius took one last glance around him before lifting his sword up over his head and swinging down hard at the ropes on the cage door, as the ropes dropped to the ground Lucius released his stealth, becoming visible to the people inside, "Listen up! If you do exactly what I tell you, you might live!" He shouted.
James jumped to his feet, a wide smile taking over his face at the sight of Lucius. He looked cockily towards the shocked face of Paul who was sitting beside him, "Told ya!"