Miyako was not happy, at all! This was one more goblin in what seemed like an endless stream she had killed but every time she managed to drop one of the ugly green and brown vermin, another one was right there to take its place. She had found her coordination with the team needed a lot of work but no more than anybody else’s did.
Kyarako was currently out of daggers and had to rely solely on her steel claws to kill the ugly little monsters. She was in one way glad that she was the one who took this quest off of the bulletin this morning. If a less capable party had taken this job, they would have been goblin food! But, she was in that way solely responsible for their current circumstances.
She had arrived very early to the guild hall, as was her custom. Arriving early was something that hunters all tried to do. If you could get the meat to the stands and the restaurants early enough, they paid more and it also gave you a chance to go back out and pick up kills to fulfill lunch refill missions. It was far more satisfying to bring a kill to the hall and see which missions you could fill with it than having to go out after taking it and leaving the clients waiting on you.
She was there early and was about to take a hunting request when she remembered that she was in a full set of armor and belonged to a party now. She started looking in the area for parties and it wasn’t long till she found something. There was a tier three quest for goblin extermination that she snatched off the board.
When she thought back later she remembered that she had seen that request there for a bit. It didn’t mean much to her at the time but after they started the quest they figured out that they should have been a bit more cautious of it. What might have been a dozen goblins at the time the request was posted had become something a lot harder to deal with. It was now a goblin warband, complete with a troll!
Karen was not thrilled with the quest that she had been dragged into. When this was all over, she was going to have a long talk with the guild staff about updating the quests, if she survived. The troll was a real pain in the, well in the leg to be honest. Her leg had been throbbing for several minutes now and she was afraid there wasn’t much to be done about that and just hoped her leg would hold out until the end of the fight.
The troll was proving to be very difficult to deal with. Her new spear was a little heavier than her old one and that was throwing her off a little. This one was made of a much heavier type of wood and the head was a bit larger and sort of leaf-shaped with a cross guard right behind the head. Brogan had told her about the design a long time ago but she was only just now able to try it. She had to admit that it was a better design of spear but it would take some time to get used to and right now wasn’t the right time. She was worried about Ryuji too.
Ryuji had started the fight. He was literally the one that sent the first spell into the cave to flush the little creeps out. He was thrilled at first because it was a real fantasy staple to go on a goblin hunt! He had geared up with the massive blue-white fireball in a monstrous display of his skill and lack of knowledge.
The fireball flew right into the cave just like it was supposed to but it didn’t do what he was expecting at all. It turns out that the spell has to have fuel to burn and there actually wasn’t that much hydrogen in the cave. He had forgotten a very basic principle of chemistry; hydrogen is scarce in the atmosphere and he probably used most of what was present in the area to sustain the fireball on the way to the cave. The searingly hot flame almost completely disappeared once it entered the mouth of the cave.
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Ryuji was in shock as his spell fizzled and watched numbly as dozens of short green and brown terrors with wide mouths filled with rows, ROWS, of sharp teeth came pouring out like ants from a mound. It was a good thing that Karen shook him or he might have stayed there watching in stupid fascination as the little creatures overran his hiding spot. He came around and cast a stonewall spell at the entrance but all it did was block the middle of the swarm’s progress and crush a couple. The rest were at least forced to squeeze past the obstruction in the end of the cave one at a time.
With a horde of nearly thirty already outside the cave, it was time for the real fight to begin. Ryuji began throwing regular fireballs as fast as he could write them. Kyarako began deftly disarming herself of daggers at an alarming rate. Miyako had no ranged weapons and just asked that I not fry her as she charged into the left flank of the mass of confused and frightened creatures. That left Karen going in on the right and she was having a devastating effect on their morale.
That was when the goblins chose to show us, they had a couple surprises for us. A hole appeared in the center of the stone sheet as that area quickly disintegrated into sand. The very next second, a massive wooden club smashed into one of the remaining sides of the wall. The huge slab of rock flew up a few meters before crashing back down right on top of one of the less fortunate goblins. That was when the troll stepped out of the entrance of the cave.
The troll bellowed to make its presence known, as though the flying stone column hadn’t caught everyone’s attention. A moment later, a pair of goblin women, distinguishable only by their tiny, exposed breasts, walked out of the cave. They were each wearing the most iconic headgear he could imagine, an animal skull mask. They also had a loincloth made of tied-together bones and each was carrying a gnarled wooden staff with a gem socketed in the top.
Ryuji caught on rather quickly what their roles were. The one on the left had a red glowing gem in the tip of her staff. As for the one on the right, hers was glowing brown. He figured that meant one earth caster and one fire caster. He would need to get the two of them rather quickly.
Ryuji realized that he had an advantage since neither of the goblin casters knew he was there. He immediately began on a second-level fire spell. He would have to change the parameters to fit the situation but it didn’t take him too long, well actually it did. It took him just a second too long and one of the shamans noticed the spell circle. They both dove back inside the cave and Ryuji thought ‘that won’t do you any good now’ as he let loose with a firewall.
He had modified this one to be thinner and taller, or in this case, longer since he also turned it sideways. The sheet of fire hovered just a half meter from the ground and was ONLY four meters wide. Where it should have been four meters tall, it was instead twelve meters long. Only, it wasn’t!
Where his spell entered the mouth of the cave, it simply ceased to exist! That meant that the pair of caster goblin women were safe. That also meant that his earlier spell must not have died due to a lack of hydrogen but because of an enchantment that he could now see glowing where it was carved into the side of the cave mouth. None of that helped the goblins outside caught in his spell as they all began to crisp and screech. The troll also didn’t seem too happy about the flame even though it wasn’t being touched by it.
The next moment, Ryuji felt the ground under him shift slightly and tried to jump away. He fell forward as the ground gave way in a softened state right where he was standing before. He looked back and pulled his shoes from the soft sand. His quick reflex probably saved him a big problem as the ground was likely meant to swallow him.
He stayed low and peered through the bushes while looking at the battle unfold. Miyako now had a pile of dead goblins around her or rather goblin halves and pieces. None had yet landed a blow on her but he could tell that she was getting tired. Karen was facing off against the troll and her spear was a good match for its greater reach but she seemed to be favoring her right leg and was actively avoiding putting too much strain on it. Kyarako was out of daggers it appeared as she darted back and forth raking goblins everywhere and even scored a couple slashes on the troll, not that it noticed as its wounds closed right back up. He could see that both Karen and Kya were panting heavily so he decided what he could best do to help.