Chapter 40

Earth
Hillside Lake Dungeon, Ontario
August 17, 2019
20:08 EDT

I couldn’t see what Ben was unhappy about. As on the previous floor, we were standing up on a platform overlooking the room. This time it was a straight shot to the other side rather than a curving room, though the end seemed to be pretty far away. A kilometer at least. Judging by the goblins appearing and disappearing in the long room, there also seemed to be a number of possibly large rooms adjacent to it.

“What’s up?” Mason asked, looking at Ben.

“I’m not a hundred percent sure, but I think this is a gauntlet. You see the goblins walking into rooms and coming out of them? You can consider each of those barracks, likely holding hundreds, if not thousands of goblins inside. I don’t have any binoculars, but I’m guessing if you looked across the room you would see a floor boss or something waiting. We have to make our way up those steps to stop the gauntlet. The longer we take, the harder it gets.”

“Well, we don’t have binoculars, but I do have something better,” I said before beginning to transform.

About a minute or later I was done. Spreading my wings, I jumped up onto the railing. It only took a second to balance myself and then I looked across the room. It was my first time switching to this form, but I was amazed by the distance at which I was able to see, as well as the clarity.

Sure enough, as I looked across the room I saw a group of hobgoblins sitting around a fire. They looked as though they were only a few dozen meters away, rather than the kilometer or so I knew they were. There were six of them sitting there, each of them apparently doing a task of some sort.

The warrior was dragging a whetstone across the head of his axe, as did the assassin beside him with one of her daggers. Next to them, an archer was fletching arrows and depositing them into his quiver. There were three casters, though I had no idea what they were, besides the one with the gnarled staff. He was clearly a druid, though the others could be mages, shamans or even a necromancer for all I knew. There was simply no way of knowing without engaging them.

“Aww, pretty birdy,” Anja said as she stroked my back.

I turned my head to peck at her hand, but it was already gone, a mischievous little smile on her face. I flew a short distance away and then shifted back to my human form before relaying what I’d seen.

“I doubt one of them is a necromancer, you usually see the signs of that. They’re either shamans or mages, though the former is more likely. Goblins aren’t the smartest of creatures,” Ben explained.

“So how do we deal with this?” I asked, walking over and placing my hands on the railing.

“Regular goblins will probably be the first thing we meet but they’re fairly weak, so we can probably just ignore them for the most part. We should just sprint past the first few rooms until we start facing hobs. Even then, we should just kill the hobs and keep moving. If we get bogged down, we’re going to be in serious trouble. I doubt Teleport works in this room, so we can’t just teleport to safety.”

“They shouldn’t attack right away, right? That should give you some time to summon your elemental and they’ll probably avoid it like the plague, which will give us some breathing room. Besides, I’ll be able to roast any that are near us since I’ll be in my dragonkin form.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Mason said. “I’ll also summon my elemental and send it out ahead of us. It should be able to clear a path for us.”’

With a strategy in mind, I shifted into my dragonkin form and waited until both Ben and Mason had summoned their elementals. Since the elementals wouldn’t last forever, we started moving as soon as they were ready.

There were few goblins milling about, but they swarmed out of the adjacent rooms as soon as one that was moving between rooms noticed us and cried out in alarm. Heedless of the danger, the lone goblin charged forward, only to be crushed below the earth elemental as it moved forward.

Mason and I were right behind it, cutting at any goblins we could as we advanced, while the twins were doing the same just behind us. Their jobs would be to take care of the first few hobs we came across, though Anja would also be keeping Precognition up as much as possible in case there were assassins around.

Ben was at the back with his fire elemental, making sure that we didn’t get attacked from behind. I had looked back once to see that the goblins were avoiding it as much as they could, instead deciding to go for Ben, without having any luck. Especially when the fire elemental could simply wave one of its large ‘hands’ over Ben’s Mana Shield and set any goblins around him ablaze.

[Stop!] sounded in my mind, the source of it being Sonja. [There is a trap just ahead!]

[Where?] I asked as I cut through two goblins in quick succession before turning my attention to one of the hobgoblins that had appeared.

[Just in front of Mason’s elemental. I’m seeing a thin aura that cuts through the room, so we’ll have to trigger it before we can advance.]

I narrowly avoided a slash from the hobgoblin, dodging to the side while thrusting forward with my cutlass. The attack found its mark, but it wasn’t life threatening. Raising my leg, I kicked the hobgoblin which had the effect of pulling my sword free, while also completely crushing his chest. It was impossible to tell that there was a trap in front of us as I turned, the interlocked brick floor looking the same, as did the walls and the ceiling.

[Alright, Ben. You’re up!]

I moved back to take his place, while he took mine and began summoning a skeleton to walk forward and trigger the trap. While he was busy, the fire elemental did little than just stand there, but it did block a decent part of the room, leaving me to cover the rest. All of the goblins coming from behind us were the regular variety, so it was very easy to take care of them.

“Holy fuck!” Mason exclaimed from behind me.

I breathed in before exhaling, sending a jet of flame towards the goblins charging towards us. Some of them tried to dodge, though none were fast enough to get out of the way. Knowing that I had bought some time, I turned and looked to see what got Mason to react like that.

I was confused by what I was seeing at first. There was a wall that had sprung up out of nowhere, though it had bits and pieces of goblins sticking out of it. Upon closer inspection, I saw that it was actually an insane amount of spikes. They shot out from both walls, the floor and the ceiling, and interlocked together, totally blocking our progress forward. I could already see them being pulled back into their hiding places, though it seemed that it would take a while at the current rate.

[Let me know when we can proceed!] I said as I turned back to the goblins who were coming up from behind us.

Between their fellow goblins being on fire, and the fire elemental standing beside me, it seemed that the rest of the goblins hadn’t wanted to move forward. Now that most of those fires were out, they renewed their attack. While breathing fire did buy me a little bit of time, it also allowed the waves of goblins to stack up, and now there were hundreds of them charging towards us. We would also likely see the same scene ahead as the traps receded, though there would be hobs mixed in.

Ben suddenly reappeared beside me and his elemental began moving forward.

[I thought you said movement skills wouldn’t work, ] I said as I cut through a goblin and turned towards another.

[No, I said that Teleport probably wouldn’t work, ] he replied. A moment later meteors started falling from the ceiling, crushing any goblins who were dumb enough to run under that spot. Which was a lot of them.

Since they weren’t needed in front of us, the twins turned and helped Ben and I clean up the goblins who were charging towards us. We knew that the elementals wouldn’t last too much longer, so we wanted to clear as much of them from behind us as we could before proceeding once more.

What seemed like ten minutes later, Mason finally called me back to the front. With Ben and the twins covering for me, I blinked forward as the spikes were about five or six feet away from receding completely. Goblins were already firing arrows at us, or launching rocks with slings, but they just bounced off our Mana Shields, or the earth elemental’s body.

There were truly a mind-boggling amount of goblins in front of us, and we still had at least half a kilometer to go, if not slightly more. So many goblins bunched together was an opportunity that I couldn’t pass up. This time when I breathed in, deeper than I ever had before, I felt something different inside my chest. Focusing on that feeling, I exhaled.

This time it wasn’t a jet of flame that was projected from my mouth. It was a cloud of extreme cold. After realizing that I had learned how to breathe something other than fire, I began turning my head, sweeping the freezing cold breath from side to side. The first few ranks of goblins, the regular and hobs alike, were frozen completely solid, their faces a visage of surprise, fear or anger.

The goblins further back weren’t faring much better, either. Some were shivering uncontrollably while others seemed to have varying levels of frostbite. I turned to look at Mason, the smile dropping from my face as I saw him. His teeth were chattering while his arms were crossed in front of him. There was actually frost on his eyebrows and what looked like a small icicle forming in his left nostril.

[Are you okay?] I asked, concerned.

He was looking at the goblins in front of us and turned when I started sending. [Warn a guy when you’re going to do something like that. You may not be affected, but it’s fucking freezing in here now.]

[It wasn’t planned, I just learned how to do it. At least know I know not to use it around friendlies.]

He seemed to be doing better and was no longer shivering as much, the suit probably providing a decent amount of protection. [Well, time’s a wastin’, ] he said, at which point the earth elemental began moving forward.

Goblins fell over and shattered into pieces as the earth elemental plowed forward, clearing us a narrow corridor through the ranks of frozen goblins. After jumping up and down and flexing his arms, Mason channeled mana into his halberd and followed after it. I turned to look at Ben and the twins, to see that they were still battling the endless horde of goblins that were behind us.

[Time to go, guys!] I called to them.

[Be right there!] the twins replied as they started a fighting retreat with Ben right behind them.

I waited until they were in the corridor being formed before turning and joining Mason who was beginning to fight the goblins that hadn’t been frozen. I used Blink to catch up and then took the left side while he took the right.

I breathed in again, this time focusing on breathing fire rather than extreme cold. My control and power seemed to get a bit stronger each time I used it, so I was able to maintain the jet of fire and sweep it over the goblins for a longer amount of time. It still wasn’t that long, at only five or six seconds, but it was enough to take out at least a hundred goblins in that time.

We ended up making it another hundred meters or so before the magic holding Mason’s earth elemental ran out and it collapsed into a pile of rubble. The room also got a tad darker shortly after, so I knew that Ben’s elemental had dissipated as well. Mason quickly moved to the back and Anja joined me as we slowly made our way down the long room.

I was occasionally able to breathe fire at the goblins, but couldn’t do it all the time as my throat got sore if I used it too much. That left us to use our normal abilities and weapons, but it was enough. Anja was like a demon, disappearing and reappearing all over the place. Each time, a goblin’s head fell from its shoulders or it simply collapsed into a heap.

Things did end up getting more difficult at around a hundred meters away from the base of the steps, as hobgoblins were the only ones coming out of the two or three adjacent rooms. They didn’t come out of the rooms as quickly as the regular goblins did early on, but the constant stream of them was enough to stop us in our tracks.

We were completely surrounded by goblins and it looked like we were in trouble until I had an idea. Turning back, I put a hand around Sonja’s waist and lifted her up while turning to do the same thing with her sister.

[Jonathan what... ?]

[Hold on! Mace, Ben, activate Mana Shield and follow me!]

With a twin under each arm, I lowered my head and began sprinting through the goblins in front of us. Goblins moved in front of me to try to stop me, but the combination of Mana Shield repelling them and my sheer size and weight meant that none of them could. It really reminded me of playing football in highschool, barreling through the opposing team’s defense with Mason next to me.

Before I knew it, I was climbing the staircase two steps at a time. Looking up at the top I saw the six hobgoblins standing there, though they turned and walked back as if inviting us up. I set the twins down and spun around as soon as I had reached the top. I was surprised, and relieved to see that none of the goblins below had so much as set foot on the first step. It was as if there was a barrier preventing them from following us. That didn’t stop them from shouting something up at us in their native language, but I soon saw them dispersing to go back to different rooms.

Glad that we didn’t need to worry about the goblins behind us, I lowered Mana Shield and turned back towards the six hobgoblins with whom we shared this platform with. It seemed as if the twins were waiting for me to turn, as they each delivered a soft slap to the respective side of my face.

[Next time let us know before you do something like that, ] Sonja said with her sister nodding, though not adding anything.

I shrugged, [We needed to move and that would’ve delayed things. I’m not sure if you noticed, but we were completely surrounded.]

[We’re not saying we aren’t appreciative, it was quick thinking. Just let us know, first, ] Anja said. [We could’ve attacked you if we didn’t know it was you.]

[Alright, alright. If a situation like that comes up again, I’ll let you know before picking you up. I think I would rather get the two of you Mana Shield as well, because then you could’ve just followed behind us. Now do you mind if we turn our attention to the matter at hand, ] I finished, gesturing to the goblins in front of us.

They nodded and spun around.

It was one thing to look at the goblins from over a kilometer away, and another from up close. The warrior that had been sharpening his axe was shirtless, his muscular chest being covered by scars of various sizes. He had a set of leather bracers and pants, though his feet were left bare, as was common for goblins, it seemed.

The female hobgoblin next to him was clad in dark leather armor, and seemed to have some sort of mask or ability that hid her face from view, absorbing the light almost as if her face was a black hole. There were two sword pommels sticking out above her shoulders, as well as two smaller pommels that could be seen peeking from beneath the shroud she wore.

The archer was garbed in something similar to the assassin, though it was more green than black and went without the shroud that the assassin wore. He used a type of bow I had never seen before, but Sonja identified it as a reflex bow. In addition to the quiver on his back, he also had one on his hip, which was something I hadn’t noticed earlier.

The three casters were all dressed differently and there were two males and one female. The female wore the least clothing of any of them, having a simple strap of cloth that covered her breasts, and a loincloth to cover the rest. She was wearing quite a bit of jewelry, though they seemed to be made out of bones and feathers, for the most part. She had some sort of charm in one hand, and a short walking-stick like object in the other. Ben said he thought she might be a shaman, but we would have to wait and see.

Both the druid and the unknown hobgoblin were dressed very similarly, the only difference being their staves. The druid’s staff had a gnarled head on top of it, looking almost like he was using a very old root as his staff, while the unknown hobgoblin was using a straight, featureless staff. The only decoration on it being the cloth grip about halfway down it’s length. Ben couldn’t make heads or tails of the unknown hobgoblin, which meant that we would need to be wary of it during the fight.

We decided to change things up when engaging this group of hobgoblins. Rather than have Mason or I go after the druid, Anja would deal with it. Between Precognition, Stealth and Shadowstep, she’d be able to avoid the vines the best out of any of us, as well as keep an eye out for where the assassin would strike. Sonja would take on the warrior, while also keeping an eye out on the unknown hobgoblin, since she would be able to react the quickest.

Mason would work on the archer since he had a longer reach than I did, and that longer reach would make the archer spend more time dodging and less time attacking. That meant that I would be dealing with the shaman, which probably wouldn’t take very long and would allow me to help out wherever I was needed. Along with buffing the rest of us, Ben would pretty much be a floater, helping out where he could.

As soon as we were ready, Mason and I ran in, using our respective movement skills to close the distance. For me that was two quick blinks, but for Mason that involved running for a bit longer. I had actually appeared behind the shaman with my second Blink only for my sword to connect with a staff rather than the shaman’s neck. Looking over, I saw that the wielder of the staff was the unknown hobgoblin.

His intervention allowed the shaman to move away, and she did, but not before buffing the hobgoblin that had saved her, first. He grew just a tiny bit larger, and his staff began putting off a soft white glow. Pulling his staff back and going through a quick routine that looked an awful lot like something that someone who practiced martial arts would use to intimidate. He even raised his hand, palm up, and waved me forward.

I indulged him, using Siphoning Strike with one sword and following it up with Quick Slash from the other. He managed to dodge both of them, parrying one to the side while sidestepping the other and actually hit me in the back with his staff as he moved around me. Spinning, I attempted to land a hit or two, but they connected with nothing but air, the hobgoblin being nowhere in sight. What there was, was an impact to the back of my head. My armor absorbed the brunt of it, though it still stung a bit.

Rather than put up Mana Shield as I normally did, I activated Precognition instead. Spinning again, I saw that he was standing where he was when we waved me forward, and was in the very same stance, hand raised in front of him and all. Going on the offensive again, I launched a series of attacks that the hobgoblin successfully dodged, though I was looking for an opening.

It didn’t take me long to find it thanks to Precognition, and I immediately ceased channeling mana into one of my swords while reaching to my waist and pulling out the handle for my spear. Quickly channeling mana into it, I thrust forward to where I knew the hobgoblin was going to appear, though it didn’t strike its mark as I was expecting it to. I had seen it impaling the hobgoblin’s heart, but he managed to dodge out of the way somehow, if only slightly, causing it to lodge itself in his gut instead. It had been a strike using Barbed Spear, so it meant that the hobgoblin would be bleeding for the rest of the fight, barring some sort of intervention.

With my spear still stuck in the hobgoblin’s chest, I stopped channeling mana into my cutlass and activated my shield, this time hitting him with a Shield Bash. He didn’t try to free himself from my spear, instead raising his staff to try to ward off the attack. It didn’t work as well as he had hoped, as he couldn’t move as freely as he was accustomed to, and because I had put so much force behind the strike. It struck with his neck, stunning him and nearly knocking him over, my spear being the only thing keeping him up. With the time I now had, I ripped my spear free before thrusting forward once more, this time hitting my original target.

The hobgoblin choked up some blood as my spear shredded his heart, and soon ceased all movement. With one down, I scanned the room to see where the shaman was, only to see her dead not too far from where the druid and I had been fighting, an arrow sticking out of one of her eyes.

Sonja was still fighting the warrior, though he had a few broken arrows sticking out of him, and seemed to be bleeding quite a bit, while she didn’t even have a scratch on her. Anja was battling some vines as she was fighting the druid, but she wasn’t getting bogged down like Mason and I had.

Speaking of Mason, I turned to see how he was doing just in time to see the head of his halberd cut clean through one of the limbs that made up the archer’s bow. Quickly pulling his halberd back, he started a sweeping motion, letting go until his hand was holding onto the very end of his weapon. The archer tried to dodge, but wasn’t fast enough. While Mason’s halberd didn’t knock the archer off his feet, it was in prime position to do so, thanks to the hook on the opposite side of the axe head. The hook captured the archer’s foot, which sent him to the floor with a quick pull from Mason. All it took after that was a quick thrust from Mason, and that was half of the hobgoblins dead.

Realizing I hadn’t seen the assassin since the fight started, I looked around the room until I saw her fighting Ben. Or trying to, at least. She was wielding what looked like two short katanas, though I didn’t know what they were actually called. I was sure that Anja would fill me in on them later, but I didn’t dwell on them.

Watching the fight, I saw that while the assassin wasn’t doing any damage to him, he also wasn’t doing any damage to her. Every time he would finish casting a Fireball, she would have already moved. He also didn’t have any abilities that did damage in an area around him, so the only other option he would have is casting Meteor Shower on himself. That didn’t seem like something he would want to do.

I had no doubt in my mind that the assassin would be dead if she had been fighting Mason. With so many abilities that can knock people down, or back, she wouldn’t be able to dance around as freely as she was currently doing.