Not wanting to be left behind with whatever was happening with Dawns Horizon Thomas quickly followed after Abigail. Checking his core, he was worried when he noticed it was rather low. His hasty blade coating technique still wasted a lot of mana. He would have to rely on just his strengthening technique in the upcoming fight. He hoped that would be enough to keep him safe.
When he caught up to Abigail she spoke in a hushed tone, “Glad to see you’re not a coward. We will do this fast and hard when they follow.”
Confused Thomas asked, “How do you know they will come?”
“I think I know what they are actually after at this point, that’s why. Plus, at their level only threat is the goblin lord and getting swarmed. They can flee from either truthfully. They know it.”
Nodding but before he could ask any more questions Thomas was forced to follow as Abigail picked up speed when they heard Dawns Horizon coming from behind them. Before they got close, she said “If it gets to dangerous retreat to the fallback location.”
He was curious and worried what she meant when she said that Dawns Horizon was after something. She had indicated a few times that Dawns Horizon wasn’t trustworthy, and they haven’t done anything to disprove that at this point
As they got closer to the open area with the tower in it, they ran into a few pockets of goblins. Sadly, for them they died before they could react to the sharp blade of Abigail. Just before the opening Abigail slowed letting Dawns Horizon fully catch up.
When they did, she said in a cold tone “We hit them hard, when the goblin lord shows we will kill it.” She picked up speed and burst into the clearing.
What greeted them was chaos, the hobgoblins were in the goblin camp at the base of the hill. They were thrashing the goblins to try and get them in order. The goblins though were trying to flee or hide inside the tunnels under the tower or the small huts they made.
Taking advantage of the chaos, Abigail made five swords from ice and sent them flying towards the hobgoblins. Thomas ideally noticed that they were shaped like actual swords, hilts and all. Thomas got himself as ready as he could, by spreading mana throughout his body. Instead of using his normal amount of mana he kept it to as little as possible. He didn’t have the extra mana to spare.
The ice swords flew true and killed five of the hobgoblins instantly. It had an even bigger effect than just killing those five. All the goblins truly scattered, by the time the group made it to the hill all the goblins were fleeing. Somewhere scrambling to get inside of the tunnels, but most where running into the surrounding woods.
The remaining hobgoblins didn’t last much longer, Abigail killing most but Dawns Horizon also pitching in and killing a few. Thomas ended up in the back of the group watching for anything trying to creep up from behind.
The battle was short, all the hobgoblins were killed so quickly and with such ease it made him question how strong the goblin lord could actually be. Would it even be able to put up a fight against the four of them? Thomas wasn’t delusional enough to think he could participate in the fight. He would struggle to win against two hobgoblins.
As the group approached the door leading into the tower. The huge door was thrown open and a massive green figure stepped out. It was at least eight feet tall, covered in rippling muscle, it was wearing the skin of a deer as a loin cloth. It had other pelts of slain mana beast draped across it; Thomas assumed in its attempt at clothing. Thomas recognized it for what it was, the goblin lord. In its hand was what he thought had to be a tree or at least part of it.
It swung it with bellowed war cry at the group. It rushed for them, faster than anything Thomas had fought before. Abigail moved even faster, she summoned a few ice swords and sent them flying towards it.
The goblin lord reacted by slamming the tree trunk into the ground and a wall of earth erupted stopping them. Thomas used the opportunity to back away even further down the hill. It was already clear from the first exchange that this was an opponent that was to strong for him.
Tristan in a voice of clear surprise yelled “Earth magic!” that didn’t stop them from rushing towards the monster.
The earthen wall exploded towards them, sending sharp shrapnel heading right for them. Everyone except Thomas did something to protect themselves. Steven created a barrier of water, Tristan raised his shield, Phillip leaped out of the way, and Abigail trusted her armor to protect her.
Thomas though, dropped to the group and covered his head trying to protect himself. He had no techniques to use, it was the only thing he thought would stop him from being hit. Luckily, being the furthest away and more downhill than everyone else saved him. The shrapnel flew clear over him.
When he looked up, he saw what true skill was. Abigail danced around the goblin lord as it kept trying to hit her, even the earth techniques it used she slipped around them. To Thomas it looked like she could predict what the goblin lord would do and would slip around every attack. She landed bloody gashes all across it, not only that but she kept creating openings for Dawns Horizon to help.
Phillip and Tristan weren’t as fast or fluid moving as Abigail, but they too were pouncing on any openings leaving cuts. Steven would throw water arrows aiming for its eyes, arm pits, wrists, and any other soft openings.
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That’s when Thomas finally noticed a problem, the cuts they were leaving weren’t as deep as they should have been. The goblin lord was using mana strengthening as well, that’s the only answer Thomas could come up with.
Getting worried about how long the four of them could keep it up, he started to look around for something he could do to help. Luckily it didn’t take long for the fight to change. Thomas had an involuntary wince when he saw Abigail land a clean kick to the groin. The goblin lord clearly felt that hit because it made a noise of pain and lashed out in a wild strike even faster than ever before. She slipped under it and landed a deep cut on it behind its knee causing it to give out.
It landed on its now useless leg but before they could use the opportunity to finish it Abigail yelled “GET BACK!” as she leapt high and backwards.
It surprised him that Phillip and Tristan didn’t hesitate and followed. The goblin lord made another war cry but this time the shout was accompanied by a large ring of stone spikes that fanned out from around it.
The yell was cut off as a massive ice sword pierced its chest. The blade was at least ten feet long and two foot wide. It went all the way through its chest to the hilt of the ice blade. Pinning the still kneeling goblin lord to the ground.
That killed it instantly, an exhausted voice came where the ice blade came from. “Let’s check the tower quickly then head back to the fallback point and camp there for the night.”
Tristan spoke up and said, “You go ahead we will recover out here, take Thomas with you since he didn’t do anything.”
Thomas could hear the scorn in his tone when he mentioned him. It didn’t bother him as he was still amazed by the level of skill he witnessed. Either way he caught up to Abigail as she approached the door.
When he did Abigail flashed him a half smile as they went in. Calling the first floor dirty was an understatement, it was truly disgusting. Piles of what looked like rotten meat while other piles looked like things he saw in the sewers. That was all he saw before the smell hit him.
The smell was even worse, Thomas gagged and almost puked. Eyes watering, he turned to dart back outside but was intercepted by Abigail and hauled up the stairs on the side. Breathing through his mouth to try and get the smell out of his nose but that caused him to taste the foul mixture. It took him a few minutes of deep breaths before he could handle it. Luckily the second floor wasn’t as pungent as he feared, the smell of the first floor didn’t fully make it to the second floor.
Finally looking around the second floor, he noticed that this one had what he guessed were trinkets or trophies. On one side looked like monster furs and skulls where others had swords and armor from adventurers.
That’s when he saw Abigail was on the other side of the room kneeling over someone. As he approached, he saw Abigail turn and look at him as she spoke. Her tone was cold and “It’s one of the missing adventurers, she’s barely alive.” She pulled out a bottle of something and poured it down the unconscious woman’s throat.
As Thomas got closer but before he could see what condition she was in Abigail pulled a blanket out of her storage ring and covered her. A pillow appeared next, and she placed it under her head.
Thomas finally got a good look at her face; she was elf her face was covered in bruises and cuts. Thomas finally spoke up. Asking the question that he already feared he knew the answer to. “What happened to her?”
A look of rage crossed Abigails face she explained saying “The worst thing that could happen to a woman. All goblins do it if they capture a woman instead of killing them. I will stay here and watch over her as the potion works, go up and look around the top floor. If you see anything suspicious yell for me.”
Thomas nodded and went up the stairs, there were only two things in the room. In the center of it was a podium with a symbol on it, slightly different from the one that the shaman had. The symbol was pitch black, and Thomas had a feeling it would be bad if he touched it. The more he looked at it the stronger the feeling of wrongness grew in his chest. Pulling his eyes away he inspected the rest of the room. The only other thing was a bed that was made up of more animal and monster furs. Poking around the room finding it bare other than some leftover meat.
The entire time he looked around the room he made sure to give the weird symbol a wide berth. He didn’t want to ignore what his instincts where telling him.
It didn’t take him long to inspect everything on the floor, so Thomas went back down the stairs to meet up with Abigail. When he got there the elf girl was still unconscious, he told Abigail about what he saw upstairs. She nodded and told him to wait there for a second as she went to see for herself. Minutes later she came back down.
Thomas asked “What was with that symbol, it felt wrong. I don’t know how else to describe it other than just wrong.”
As she walked closer, she said “That’s a discussion for later when we are back at the guild.”
He could tell from her tone that it wasn’t the time to push for answer. Letting the topic drop he looked back to the unconscious woman on the floor and asked, “Do you know who she is?”
She paused long enough to pull out a silver adventurers card telling him “Her name is Morgan Golshire. She is a C-ranked and from what I can tell has been here for only a few days. That’s probably why she is still alive. Her mental state won’t be the best when she wakes up so we should get her back to Les quickly. The healing potion fixed most of her physical injuries, but the mental side needs to be handled by professionals. She will probably be unconscious for a while; she had some serious injuries to most of her body. Let’s move out and get camp set up before dark.”
Thomas just nodded as Abigail picked up Morgan, she made sure that the blanket was fully wrapped around the woman. As they left the tower, they were greeted by Dawns Horizon waiting for them.
When they asked about what was in the tower Abigail waved them off explaining that they found nothing of value. She also told them they could go look for themselves if they liked. It only took them looking and getting a whiff of the first floor for them to agree it wasn’t worth it.
She didn’t explain who the person that she had was, Abigail stated that they needed to get back to the fallback and camp for the night. It was clear to everyone that Abigail wasn’t in the mood for small talk. The trip back to the fallback point they made earlier was quick without even seeing any other threats. Anytime a goblin saw the group coming it fled in the opposite direction.
As they walked back the realization that he had just survived the most dangerous quest he had ever been on sank in. Watching Dawns Horizon and Abigail fight and kill the goblin lord gave him a lot of ideas on what to improve on. It was clear that he needed to focus on learning more mana techniques. That final attack from Abigail was so strong that it killed it instantly. That was strength he wanted; Thomas knew he needed to learn what his mana type was before he started experimenting.
That was something to think about and maybe he could ask Abigail for ideas later. Right now, he just wanted to eat and patch himself up, the few injuries he had still needed to be cleaned and bandaged up. The excitement of everything almost made him forget the injuries he had gotten throughout the day, but the more relaxed walk back made him feel every single pain.