Once they have left the city, which can now be done under the pretense of guild business, Nyx and Ralph begin making their way to the area the quest describes. Rooting through her bag, Nyx pulls out two familiar rings, the rings of flight, much to Ralph's delight.
"We're gonna fly again, master?" Ralph asks, smiling eagerly.
"As much as I would love to plod back to your filthy hideout on foot, I think flying there would be both more enjoyable and efficient," she explains, placing rings on both their fingers.
Now afloat, the two start to soar in the direction of the old Golden Goblin Gang hideaway. Arriving in about an hour, the duo lands at the foot of the gate where Majid, the troop's star mage, had vainly attempted and failed to defeat Nyx in a contest of magic.
"Ha... if I never saw this place again, it'd have been too soon," Ralph muses.
"Can't run from the past forever, Ralphy boy," Nyx derides, hypocritically. "Now, lead the way, and return your ring. I'm merely a spectator from this point onward."
"Of course," he says, pulling off and returning his ring, begrudgingly. Without another word, he starts heading down the trail, eventually taking a turn down a poorly defined dirt path.
"This is one of the paths that the perimeter guards used to use. It's only defined enough for people who know about it to actually find it."
"How riveting," Nyx yawns.
Ralph slowly leads the pair down the path until they reach two trees with the phrase "HERE BE GOBLINS" scrawled into them in blood-red paint. He turns into a path running between them, his gait becoming deliberate and stealthy. Noticing his shift in posture, Nyx turns herself invisible and levitates into the air. Not spotting his master's departure, Ralph continues through the foliage, staying alert and looking for any signs of suspicious activity. Eventually, he finds himself nearing a clearing where he knows the goblins have been making their nest, stopping himself just before leaving the cover of the trees.233Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPXAIWuK9bE
"This is probably where the goblins have been operating out of master Ny-," he pauses as he looks back, finding no sign of his teacher.
Figuring that she means to force him to complete the quest entirely on his own, he scans the clearing for activity. About 100 yards away, in the middle of a hollow within a hillside, he sees a small cave entrance, two goblins prattling at each other not far outside. Carefully, he makes his way around the tree line toward the left hill. Once at its base, he furtively climbs, trying his best to stay hidden and silent, his experience as a burglar paying dividends. At the top, he kneels and watches the goblins, who are about 30 feet below him, playing a game with dice made of bones, unaware of their stalker. They are poorly equipped, neither of them even having shields. Ralph assumes that they are simple watchmen, there to alert the rest of the nest of unwelcome guests, much like his bandit troop once did, due to a small horn beside them.
Remembering his new access to magic, he crafts an illusion of the sound of loud goblin squabble at the base of the hill. Below, the goblins react by perking their ears at the noise, looking at the corner of the hollow, with one grabbing a scimitar and one grabbing a short bow. Then, Ralph creates the image of a goblin beckoning the other two to come behind the corner, causing the guards to look at each other for confirmation before skeptically accepting the invitation. Ralph dispels the illusion and recreates it at the base of the ascent, after creating more goblin squabble. Confused, the two guard goblins continue to approach the illusion after rounding the corner. As they do, Ralph slowly and stealthily makes his way down the hillside, keeping his eye on the goblins, who are scanning the surroundings for ambushes. Just before they reach the mirage, he casts another spell, causing a bolt of energy to appear in and jettison from his hand.
Hitting the bowman, the bolt obliterates the goblin's head, forcing its body to fall limply on the ground and twitch reflexively. Shocked, the other goblin panics and attempts to run back to the cave entrance, but it's stopped by Ralph, who jumps directly in its path, making the goblin run into him. Looking up, the last thing the goblin sees is the sword that drives into its skull, which is nearly bisected, and the last thing on its mind is how shiny the gems on its guard are, before it joins its friend on the ground once Ralph pulls his sword from its head. Shaking, Ralph leans against the hillside to decompress.
Shit, shit, shit... disgusting... That could've gone so wrong... he thinks, nauseous from the smell and sight of the dead goblins and their blood. After taking a minute to collect himself, he marches to the cave entrance and picks up the horn.
If I blow this, a bunch of them'd probably come running. Maybe I can use that to my advantage, he thinks, his experience with traps during his tenure as a bandit bearing fruit. After positioning himself back behind the tree line, about 30 or so yards away, he prepares to fire another bolt of force as he frantically blows the horn, its disgusting taste pervading his mouth. As expected, in a few moments, five more goblins, which are better equipped than the bungling watchmen, three with swords and shields and two with bows, exit the cave, weapons drawn and at the ready.
Ralph shoots at the first goblin he sees, one of the swordsmen, the bolt caterwauling into and ripping off its shield arm. As the unfortunate goblin begins wailing in pain, the others scatter, seemingly hoping to make the sniper's job more difficult as they begin feverishly probing the tree line. Not wanting to be found too quickly, Ralph starts to move further down the perimeter after shooting another bolt, which impacts one of the bowmen, causing it to fall to the ground, bloodied. The remaining two swordsmen, noticing the point of origin, begin dashing toward the trees, as another goblin swordsman accompanied by a well-equipped hobgoblin carefully exits the cave, while the other bowman tends to his fallen comrade.
Shit! Ralph thinks, frustrated. More of them?! And a hob at that?!
Desperate to reduce his potential foes, he shoots another crackling shot at one of the advancing swordsmen, who blocks it with its pot lid shield, which crumbles after saving its wielder. Clenching his teeth in frustration, Ralph nervously readies himself to combat the fast-approaching goblins, which are nearly upon him. Once the one that still bears a shield, who arrives earlier due to not being slowed by the bolt, gets close enough, Ralph savagely brings his sword down, maneuvering it to avoid the shield and deal a fatal blow to the goblin. He doesn't have time to celebrate, however, as the shield-less goblin attempts to hack away at him upon its arrival.
Deftly contorting himself, Ralph is just barely able to dodge the blow as he watches the disappointed goblin scurry away before he can return the favor. Before he can act, an arrow pierces his studded leather and lodges itself into his side. Alarmed, Ralph searches for and finds the archer, who has reached the trees to find his friend in danger. Not wanting to be shot down from afar, Ralph shoots another bolt, which ripples through the archer's body, causing it to fall dead. Enraged, the swordsman returns to Ralph's side and makes another slice at him, this one connecting at his left leg.
Damnit! he thinks, pained by the slash. The goblin once again scampers away, but Ralph follows it and cleaves its head off its shoulders in retaliation. Looking up, Ralph sees the hobgoblin in the distance pointing toward him, screaming something, his goblin lackey already halfway to him, the injured goblins collecting themselves. Not wanting to get pinned down, he quickly dashes further down the tree line until he's about 50 yards from the cave entrance. Then, he shoots another bolt of energy at the sprinting goblin swordsman, who nimbly dodges it. Cursing his luck, Ralph prepares himself for its advance, entering a deceptive "Ward" stance with the sword pointed down at his side, hoping to catch it off guard. It reaches him quicker than he expected, furiously thrusting its sword.
It's sloppy... he thinks, remembering the graceful, efficient sword thrusts that his teacher had performed yesterday. Bringing his sword up to deflect the blow, he flicks his wrists to let loose a wicked chop on the goblin, whose shoulder is deeply penetrated. Shrieking in pain, the goblin weakly tries to slash his opponent once more, hoping to hit him while his blade is stuck in its shoulder, but it's stunned to find that its target has abandoned his sword and pulled away from its reach. Before it can process, Ralph quickly unsheathes a small hidden dagger, one which he had often used to threaten unsuspecting merchants, and plunges it into its skull, yelling "Die!".
As the goblin begins to fall, Ralph abandons the dagger and grabs his new sword, ripping it out of the goblin's body. His senses heightened from adrenaline, he hears the twang of a bow and instinctively ducks his head, causing a fatal shot to miss its mark, his head. Turning his attention back to his remaining aggressors, he is astonished to find the hobgoblin stabbing the now armless swordsman, but his gaze soon falls back on the archer, who is the more immediate threat.
Exiting the trees, he looses another energy bolt, but it slightly misses its target, which sends another arrow ahead of Ralph, predicting his movements. Panicking, Ralph stops himself just short of the arrow, nearly tripping from the inertia. Steadying himself, he launches one more bolt at the injured archer, whose torso is pierced through upon impact. Momentarily ecstatic, he quickly remembers the nasty-looking hobgoblin that he still must face and is unhappy to find his foe, now only about 20 feet away, charging at him. In a moment of clarity, he remembers something that Nyx had explained to him on the flight over to the bandit camp.
"Listen well, Riff-Raff! As you are now, you may only cast one spell – without resting at all, anyway – with my power, so I recommend that you use it wisely. I've given you access to the Shield and Hex spells, each rather useful in their own right under different circumstances. Hexing is excellent for multiple foes, since you can bounce it about the battlefield, but shielding, as you saw in my duel with Sylva, is very effective as well, as it can knock a single opponent off balance or foil the efforts of many, if only for a limited time. Additionally, you can now curse one creature per bout of rest. Don't forget it but use that wisely as well! Unlike hexing, you won't be able to bounce it around, but it's an incredibly powerful tool against the foe you choose to beleaguer with it. Save it for the big bad!"
Taking his master's advice, he makes a quick arcane gesture at the advancing hobgoblin, cursing it with nearly transparent wreaths of shadow. Not understanding the significance of what the human has just done, the fuming hobgoblin, reaching the warlock, skillfully swings its longsword at his midsection, smiling at the thought of slicing the spellcaster in twain. Foreseeing being mortally wounded by the strike, Ralph snaps his fingers and shouts "Shield!", emulating Sylva and Nyx. The attacking hobgoblin is visibly befuddled when his strike is met and stopped by a strange bubble of force, its smile twisting into a scowl.
Grasping a golden opportunity to strike, Ralph raises his own blade and unexpectedly strikes true, the sword slicing the hobgoblin through the smallest of chinks in its chain mail armor. Howling, the hob drops to its knees as its torso is bifurcated, pure hate filling its gaze as it glares at its murderer. This gaze breaks Ralph from his adrenaline high, causing him to sloppily pull his blade from the hob's body in disgust, which in turn leads the goblin to flop to the ground, wheezing and coughing blood. Wanting to put it out of its misery, Ralph plunges his sword into where he assumes its heart would lie, feeling the life drain from the body soon afterward. Paranoid, he scans his surroundings for more enemies, but he finds nothing but the corpses of the goblins he has slain. Worried that more might appear from the cave, he hobbles back into the trees, sitting against a large trunk to nurse his wounds.
Fuck... if he'd connected with that swing, I'd be the one lying dead on the ground, he thinks, the pain in his side and leg becoming more acute as the adrenaline subsides.
Carefully pulling out the arrow, he reaches into his satchel and pulls out some bandages and alcohol, applying them to the puncture after removing his armor, occasionally looking back at the cave entrance to ensure he is alone. After about thirty or so minutes of paranoid peering and recovering, he dons his armor and makes his way to the entrance once more, his confidence boosted by the lack of reinforcements. Entering the cave, he is initially met by a long, narrow tunnel, which forks at its end. Cautiously, he readies himself to strike at any new enemies as he goes down the right fork. It almost immediately enters a large room with tattered bed rolls and half-eaten food traipsed about the room.
This must've been where all the goons came from... Ralph reasons. Exiting, he now goes down the left fork, which contains another narrow passageway, which has another fork at its end, each path with an entrance draped by a frayed curtain. Stealthily, he creeps up to the right curtain, peeling it back to peer inside what it might hide. Behind it, he finds a slightly smaller room with a large goblin sleeping on a much nicer bedroll.
Must be the boss, Ralph figures, memories of his old boss's tendency to keep the best stuff for himself flooding his mind, causing anger to well up inside him. Gesticulating, Ralph softly utters "Hex...", placing a hex damning dexterity on the sleeping monster. Tiptoeing into the room, Ralph nearly jumps out of his skin when the napping monster suddenly jerks straight up, back to Ralph. Not wanting to miss his opportunity, he plunges his sword into the goblin, his hurriedness causing him to miss its vitals, though Ralph notices that the flesh around his blade has seemingly started to rot as he pulls it out of the monster. Startled, the goblin tries to kip up, but, perhaps due to the hex cast upon him, he fails spectacularly, falling prone on his back again, uttering a pained "Oof!". Almost bursting out laughing at the sight, Ralph attempts to keep his composure as he sinks his blade into the goblin's stomach, which elicits a yowl from the poor oaf.
"Bastard!" it yells, flailing at Ralph on the ground. As Ralph goes to finish it off with a mortal thrust, he's flabbergasted when the large goblin picks up a small, seemingly female goblin, which was hidden behind and beneath him until now, and intercepts Ralph's thrust by using it as a shield. Quickly, after unhanding the now dead goblin shield, it stands up from its prone position and disengages from Ralph, grabbing a scimitar in the corner of the room.
"I'll kill you, bastard!" it yells, fuming, racing back at Ralph and attempting to strike him. Ralph is deftly able to dodge the first sloppy attack, but he doesn't expect another to immediately follow, falling victim to a powerful slice to his left arm. Wincing, Ralph uses his still good right arm to deeply slash the unstable goblin across the stomach, causing it to fall to the ground once more, its final breaths filled with mumbled curses. Panting, Ralph backpedals against the cave wall, clutching his left arm.
If that thing had been awake, I would've been fucking done for... he thinks, counting his blessings.
Remembering the other room, he tries to soldier through the pain to ready himself for battle once more. Exiting the boss' tomb, he peers through a small hole in the left room's curtain, finding a room filled with crates and barrels. In the corner, he thinks he can make out a figure sitting in the darkness. Prepared for another encounter, he carefully enters the room and makes his way toward it, but as he approaches, he thinks the silhouette looks more human than goblin. Additionally, there is definitely more than one, with there appearing to be four or so such figures scattered on the ground. Sheathing his sword, he roots through his bag until he finds a torch and some matches. When the torchlight illuminates the room, he nearly gags at what he sees.
On the ground, which glows from the sheen of sticky fluid, which Ralph assumes to be a mixture of blood and semen, are three naked women and one naked man, all of them terribly maimed. One of the women and the man are leaning on each other, their eyes devoid of life and their bodies breathless, both riddled with scars and missing one arm. One of the other women is upturned onto her belly, her back scrawled with letters of an unknown language, likely the language of goblins, and her entire body covered in the fluid. Ralph can't tell if she's breathing or not. 233Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPcTfIkfP5Z
The last woman, the one whose figure he saw when initially peering into the room, is leaned against a crate, her body also covered in scars, etchings and fluid, her right eye damaged beyond repair. Her left eye still has life in it, though, and it's staring intently at Ralph, shaking and tearing up. The scene reminds him of last night's dream, which, combined with the stench of the cave, is enough to make him dry heave, his bad arm supporting him against a stack of crates.233Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnBfT6AXYDk
"Hel... -er..." she weakly utters, unintelligibly. Her utterance is enough for him to attempt to steel himself, realizing that he is the only one right now that can help the girl. Gathering his courage, he gets closer, kneeling beside her to hear the whispers.
"What, miss?" he asks.
"Help... her... dying... please... save..." she manages to whisper into his ear. Heeding her request, Ralph quickly but carefully turns the other girl onto her back, revealing both her eyes to be irreparably damaged, the wounds infected, and her breath to be rapid and shallow. Panicking, Ralph attempts CPR, as he doesn't know what else he can do.
"Stay with us, miss. Stay with us," he begs between attempts. But her breathing does not improve. Just as he is about to lose hope, he feels something being slipped into his satchel. Surprised, he darts his head around to search for a perpetrator but finds nothing. Checking his satchel, though, he finds two vials of roiling red liquid.
"Thank you, master..." he whispers, reasoning that his teacher is interfering on behalf of the women's health. After leaning her against a barrel, he opens one of the vials and forces her to swallow the liquid, her breathing regulating and infection disappearing almost immediately. Then, he does the same for the other girl, who is now crying tears of joy, mumbling "Thank... you...". Once she swallows the fluid, she's able to speak much more easily and even move somewhat, taking the opportunity to tightly hug Ralph and cry into his chest, her chest heaving as she breaks down in his arms. Ralph holds her, unable to imagine the depths of depravity she and her friend must have endured, and once she falls asleep in his arms after a while, he sacrifices his cloak and his outer shirt to clothe the women.
"Not too shabby, Playboy Ralphy," a familiar voice compliments from behind him.
"Master!" he exclaims, happy to not be alone anymore. "Thank you for giving me those potions. That one girl would've died if you hadn't..."
"Simply more items to run to your running tab, my debtor," she explains.
"Ah... that figures," he laments. "Have you been watching me this whole time?"
"Yes, I have. Although I am rather impressed at the cleverness and ingenuity you've demonstrated, I am somewhat disappointed at how boneheaded you were at times, like when you believed you could easily defeat all the goblins by sniping them from a distance. You are an incredibly lucky human being," she praises and admonishes simultaneously.
"In my defense, I didn't think there'd be that many, or that they'd be that well-equipped. But, you're right; By all rights, I really should be dead. Master, if I had died, what would you have done?"
"Absolutely nothing. You simply would've been another failed apprentice," she responds coldly.
"A-another? Is it common for your students to die like that?" he asks, worried about his current station.
"I have had 58 apprentices, including you. Twenty-one of them died in a manner like the one you nearly suffered. Twenty-four of them died facing tougher challenges. Nine of them attempted to use my power irresponsibly, so I broke the contract. Two gave up, so I broke the contract. One successfully graduated, and you're still alive, for now."
"I see... it's nice to know that the success rate is so high," he remarks sarcastically, before looking back at the victims. "Anyway, we should take these girls back to the city. Their... friends, too..." he says, looking at the girls and the corpses despondently.
"We? You are a funny man, Ralphy. I will give to you a ring of flight, but you'll be carrying the girls. I will, however, be so kind as to take care of the bodies," Nyx deigns, casting a spell. Inky black tendrils suddenly burst from her hands, connecting to the corpses, which are slowly lifted by the threads. Once on their feet, the corpses begin to shake, becoming animated once more as the tendrils assimilate into their bodies.
"M-master, what are you doing?!" Ralph asks, horrified.
"What does it look like I'm doing? I'm making the corpses move themselves. Zombies! Your orders are to march back to Vaxi as fast as you can, staying out of sight whenever and however possible," she orders. In response, the corpses begin briskly walking out of the cave.
"Is it... really ok to desecrate their bodies like that? That's just so morbid," Ralph observes, worried about the souls of the pair.
"Don't worry, Ralphenstein. It only affects the bodies, not the souls that have already departed, and as soon as I end the spell, they'll go back to being simple corpses anyway," she lectures, beginning to follow the zombies. "I'll meet you back at the guild hall, though I might be a while. Zombies aren't exactly that fast, you know. You should probably hand those girls to the town guard at the gates."
"Ah... just... please don't let the girls see them like that. I think they've been through enough," he says, cringing when he realizes the irony of his statement, the girls having severe damage to their eyes.
After about ten minutes, when he thinks the zombies should be out of sight outside, he gently shakes awake the half-blind girl. Her remaining brown eye reluctantly opens, and she momentarily tenses up, a look of terror coming over her face, until she realizes that the man above her isn't a goblin.
"I'm sorry to wake you, but since you're in... slightly better shape than your friend, I was wondering if you could hold onto my back so I can carry you both home."
"Home?" she asks, her memory returning, causing her to tear up once again. "That's right; We can go home now. Jack and Jill can get married, and everything will go back to normal, hahaha... Oh, but where have they gone? Did they leave without us? Tuar, do you know?" she asks, prodding her sleeping companion, who doesn't wake up, exhausted as she is.
"They... already left with a friend of mine. They're together and happy, just like they should be. You'll see them when we get back to town," Ralph comforts, not wanting to shatter the girl's denial.
"Great..." she says, smiling weakly, tears cascading down her face. "But on your back? That's silly. I'll just walk," she says, attempting to stand up. She gets to her feet, but her legs wobble and give out, causing her to fall onto her butt. "Oh... hahaha, I can't. I guess I'll get on your back after all. Would you mind crouching down for me?"
"O-of course," Ralph stutters, saddened at the sight of the girl desperately clinging to a false reality, turning and crouching down to give her easier access.
Sidling over, she wraps her arms around Ralph's neck and her legs around his torso. Turning again, he slides his hand beneath the other girl, scooping her up as he rises. Heavily weighed down, he maneuvers the girl in his arms to be able to slip the ring in his left hand onto his right middle finger, activating the ring, easing his burden when he begins levitating. He slowly navigates through the goblin tunnels, taking extra care to not ram his charges into the cave ceiling or walls. Once out of the cave, he takes flight, though he doesn't go as far up as he had with Nyx, not wanting to frighten the girl on his back.
"Are we... flying?" she asks, still dazed and confused.
"Yeah, believe it or not," Ralph responds. "If it's too much for you, I can probably carry you guys on foot."
"No, it's fine. It's totally fine," she replies, beginning to tremble, clutching Ralph more tightly. "By the way, what's your name? I'd like to know to whom I must address the new wedding invitation."
"Ah... I'm Ralph. Ralph Adamas. And you, miss?"
"Hostia Negatia," she answers. "And she's Tuar, my sister. Doesn't she have the loveliest eyes?"
"Yeah... they're beautiful," he lies. "Yours are too, miss."
"Thank you, though I seem to be having trouble with my right eye," she observes.
After about an hour and a half, during which Ralph endures uncomfortably "normal" conversation with the girl, who is still in denial, she suddenly goes deathly quiet, tightening her grip on Ralph. Before Ralph can inquire about the change in atmosphere, she begins speaking again.
"They're dead, aren't they, Ralph?" she asks, emotionlessly.
"Yes..." he admits. "They are."
"Ha... I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I can't send you that invitation, then" she apologizes, her breathing becoming more ragged. "Ralph, please... tell me that Tuar isn't actually hurt, even if it's not true. Just one more time. I want to believe it a little longer. I know it's cruel to both of us, but... I need this. Please," she begs, causing Ralph to gulp in anxiety.
"Tuar's fine, Hostia. The goblins didn't do a thing to her. Her skin is unblemished, her purity's intact, and her eyes... her eyes are still the lovely dark brown that you pointed out to me. She's in perfect health," he rambles, choking down tears of his own as he looks at the poor girl's mutilated eyes.
"That's... good to hear... I'm glad," she says, despondently, memories of Tuar's beautiful green eyes breaking the illusion.
Turning back the clock to when Nyx had just departed with the zombies of the departed lovers, we find her walking into the trees with the animated corpses. She walks about 30 yards into the woods before collapsing onto her hands and knees, retching uncontrollably onto the forested earth, shaking violently. The sight of what had been done to the goblins' prisoners, combined with the almost constant reminders of her past since the exhaustion before being transported hit, stirred within her long-repressed feelings of guilt. 233Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡD87e5DYKVJ
She had, in the past, ordered goblins, orcs, trolls, nearly every kind of horrific creature to do similar things to people, and she remembered how, back then, she reveled at the sight of the broken bodies and minds of the victims, how it brought her a sadistic sexual euphoria. In the cave with Ralph, she had to keep her composure through sheer force of will, not wanting him, her student, to see such a vulnerable side to her, especially considering how she acts around him. Disgusted at both her depraved past self and her current pathetic vomiting self, she rises from the ground, still trembling a bit, and continues walking with the corpses.233Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdOgTBHM4RI
It was Dolus, Nox, not you... It wasn't you... she thinks, desperate to convince herself.
ns 15.158.61.5da2
