Chapter 8: Ch.8: Battle at Goblin Cave

Things were going just according to plan. The wooden materials and all kinds of rotten meat were set alight just outside the cave, smoking out any that may be inhabiting it. My group was set on a wider perimeter than the enormous bonfire, more so we wouldn't burn ourselves or poison our lungs with the fire and smoke. We waited with patience and nervousness as the first group came charging through the entrance with cloth masks tightly wrapped around their faces, previously dampened and soaked in all kinds of herbs to allow them some breathing capabilities through the thick cloud of smoke that quicky enveloped the entrance.

Like ghosts charging through the mist they made a run for it between the ranks of the second group. Taking a breather to unwrap the masks and prepare themselves for battle. This was going to be a long and bloody day, but it would be better than seeing their homes burning in the middle of the night. Soon, the first signs of intelligent activity came. Shrieks and cries of agony as the foul smoke seemed to have finally creeped in deep enough to wake the goblins up.

"Here they come, stand your ground and make sure to aim low!" Korvak shouted from the front. He was wielding that mighty spear of his, while I was stuck with a pitchfork and a wood-chopping axe at my side. 

"First group, gather yourselves and join the second group! If any goblins make it through run them down, no stragglers!" I shouted, in all technicality I would be the one in charge, but Korvak had way more experience than an amnesiac woman, so I acted as more of an officer of sorts.

With impatience the farmers lifted their pitchforks and other agriculture implements. The first group took out their knives and held their plank shields just behind. Many of them would be overwhelmed, for sure. The sheer numbers that would soon come charging at us forty-or-something militia would be more than enough to run down the village in a single night, so the effort we put here would determine if they lived long enough to see another summer in their homes.

And as the realization that we really were about to fight at least a hundred goblins came, they too ran through the smoke. Greenskin humanoids of the size of a child shouted all kinds of gibberish as their eyes and nose were assaulted by the foul flames and smoke of the rotting carcasses outside their temporary home.

"Hold your ground!"

And the first wave came. Like madmen trying to stampede through a crowd they tried to jump, sneak by or just attack blindly as they tried to run away. In turn they were impaled by pitchforks and rudimentary spears, cut down by cooking knives and small rusted axes. Their numbers were sporadic, ten at a time, other times twelve and later on groups of twenty.

The first farmers to fall were part of the second group. Without shields, they were open to attacks while facing multiple greenskin running at them at the same time. From the twenty or so farmers forming the second group, in the span of two hours we were reduced to ten. Three had died and the other seven were too injured to keep fighting, and they had been dragged back to the first group.

The goblin massacre started to pile up corpses of its own, risking to catch fire by the giant bonfire that still roared not so far away from the small mountain of corpses. But as their numbers started to dwindle and the farmers started to gain confidence, the ground started to shake and the gravel that made up the entrance of the cave seemed to almost be jumping up and down.

"What in the-??!!" The exclamation left my mouth before I had the chance to even realize what came running out.

The entrance of the cave split open as a giant creature emerged from the hole in the earth, a massive monster with thick hide, two tusks protruding from its mouth and one singular raging eye roared at the farmers, provoking many of them to just straight up run away. I immediately looked at Korvak, and before I realized, he had already charged at the monster.

"Fuck!" I shouted as I followed him.

The goblins that remained could be handled by the first group, but no one else seemed to brave the encounter against the bigger monster, so I decided to follow Korvak and try to aid him. He jumped just as the thing leaned down to try and grab another farmer, grasping onto its tusk and delivering a singularly powerful stab directly into the side of the thing's eye. 

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As he did that, I rushed to the monster's leg and thrusted the pitchfork as far as it would go into the thing's ankle, trying to weaken it so it would be harder to move. It was quite a big creature, so it would make sense for it to be clumsier than other bipedal animals out there. Turns out, my approach was well-intentioned, but badly executed. With the pain that hit it as Korvak stabbed right through the side of its skull, not piercing deep enough to kill, the monster lifted its leg and kicked in my general direction.

I managed to somewhat dodge out of the way, but my left arm was hit in the process and let me tell you, having your arm broken by a cyclops was not a good experience to go through. I was launched several meters away, rolling through the bloodied dirt as Korvak continued to fight the creature I decided to call a Cyclops.

"Die, damn you!" Korvak yelled, retrieving his spear and landing a secondary hit, temporarily blinding the cylops and leaving him room to let go of its tusk and get back into a better position.

He took a look around himself, there was no other goblin rushing out and those that did were already dead. Only the cyclops remained, and it was too big a foe for the village to handle.

"Run away! Fall back to the village and don't look back!" He ordered the farmers, who, already wishing to run away from the earlier massacre, did as they were told and ran.

But I didn't. Or it was easier to say I couldn't. Something at the back of my mind was yelling for me to run and help him instead, that I would regret this moment for the rest of my life if I turned my back on him. So, despite having a broken arm, despite knowing him for what would amount to a single weekend, I decided to rush in to help.

The cyclops had used the opportunity made by Korvak turning away to try and dive to catch him, and so I sprinted as fast as my legs could go. My working hand grabbed the axe from my side and I jumped over the creature's thick arm, directing myself in the air and striking that cyclops as hard as I could directly at the center of its beady eye. The thing seemed to almost pop into different kinds of bodily fluids, and the cyclops physically recoiled from the pain.

"Finish it, Korvak!" I yelled, my hand still trapped inside the thing's eye.

"On it!" He responded, running past me and evading one of its flailing arms in order to jump onto its back, lifting the spear with both hands and lowering it with incredible strength.

The blade pierced directly into the cyclops's spine, and with a twist to make sure the wound was as nasty as it could be, the creature finally stopped struggling and both of us took a moment to breath in the fresh air of victory.

"That...We...We did it...We actually did it!" He yelled, but by then I was already falling to the ground.

The adrenaline had worn off, and the pain was a bit too much for me to handle, especially after pulling a stunt like that for the first time in my life. But well, we did it. We defended the village and defeated the creature that seemed to have brought the goblins all the way here, now I could rest right? A broken arm wasn't a deadly injury after all.

Right?

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