I pointed at the ogre and called him out before picking up the hobgoblin's hatchets and swinging at anything that mistakenly came close or let me get close. A new wave of enraged roars filled the air before the dusty stone ground suddenly shook. Moving with the strength to weight ratio that only a maturely evolved magical creature could have, the ogre had slammed one foot on the ground with enough strength to threaten my balance in order to leap over the dozen or so yards of goblins between us and land several yards behind me.
"Fuck," I growl as the rest of the front line catch up to engage the goblins, chucking my hatchets almost blindly at the ogre's torso. One struck handle first while the other struck blade first but even then there was only a shallow gash under the ogre's healthy and bulging pectoral muscle. The ogre never even flinched, just looked down at itself and then bared its mouth of six-inch fangs at me as if it were smiling.
Using all of the strength that I could quickly muster while reaching for my sword, I bend at the knees and jump a little while raising the sword with the hobgoblin's body up and then chopping forward in the same motion to sling the dead body free from my sword.
I never expected it to even pass near the ogre, just something to keep buying time as it took its first step toward me, but the body actually struck them in the midriff with a large splash of valuable fluids. The ogre actually had to take half a step back after being struck with about two hundred pounds of body hitting him with the speed-force of a small car. Now, armed with a heavier weapon, I felt a little better about having been an idiot.
The ogre, however, just felt angrier after having its dead kin thrown at him with roughly a thousand pounds of force. It was already stepping into reach with more than five feet of length in each arm. However, after lightly hopping back another two yards or so, I was in perfect range to cheat once again.
That is correct, relying on the blindly confident and wild nature of ogres I lunged lightly forward into another chopping ax throw of my sword. Even though the ogre actually reached out to try and intercept my weapon, knowing it was about to get hurt, the ogre was not fast enough. Just like the hob, the blade dipped down and sank at least ten inches into the ogre's gut.
My sword had actually pierced through the smaller hobgoblin, but the much larger ogre was an obviously different story.
Dropping into a crouch to pick up the sabers I had let hit the ground a few moments ago, I swiftly dash forward and feint a lunge to one side of the ogre who had staggered back two steps from the sword throw. When the ogre shifted its balance to backhand swing one thick arm through the air on that side, I dove and rolled under his arm to the other side. Ending the roll on my feet, I launch myself up from the ground in a near sitting position and ram the saber in my left hand up into the ogre's right armpit.
Letting go with a slight push, I spin myself to the side in the air and tuck my body to roll through the air as the ogre roars and retaliates by kicking at me. With a vitality much higher than Protectors of the same rank and a much lower sense of pain, the ogre was hardly bothered by the sword in its armpit beyond the fact that it had to use its other arm to grip the hilt of my big sword.
"Like hell you will!" I suddenly find myself yelling with no small amount of worry as the ogre draws the sword from its own body, leaping forward into a spinning back kick that connects the heel of my foot with the pommel of my sword. The sword that had once been pulled most of the way out was now buried half of the way through the ogre's body.
Dropping once more into a crouch upon landing when the ogre once again tries to kick me, I let the leg sweep several inches over my head after being aimed at a body still in the air before ramming my remaining saber up into the back of the ogre's knee.
Rolling swiftly away and to the side as the half-ton ogre's body begins to buckle from the loss of strength and balance when its foot comes back down, I smile slightly as one hand feels the wooden group of a stone hatchet on the ground. A quick glance revealed the location of the second hatchet and both were soon in my hands within the same second. Then, I was rushing up from the ground once again.
This time I simply stood up really fast with a slight lean toward the ogre. Having been repeatedly wounded despite its incredible strengths, the young ogre had lost its confidence and was now raising its good arm to try and defend itself. Instead, I sidestepped while chopping up and to the same side with one stone hatchet.
Even if the materials had decent MP by being from this world and were pretty sharp for being made from a super dense glass, the ogre's forearm was still covered in an inch of skin and the thick meat underneath was even tougher. With my strength and moving weight behind the stone ax, I could only sink the blade less than two inches beyond the skin and nothing vital was hit. On the other hand, the ogre was once again wounded despite trying to defend itself.
Sidestepping back the other way and turning the second hatchet around to swing its blunt pointed stone side in the same fashion, I catch the wounded ogre behind the jaw under its large pointed ears and stagger it to the side. Once its already precarious balance was upset, the wounded leg still carrying my saber buckled and the ogre toppled sideways to the ground.
Bravely straddling the ogre's arm to its body while raising my hatchets, I brutally chop down about the ogre's neck and shoulders. No sooner was one large hatchet being raised when the other was slammed down. In a single second I could almost bash into the ogre's ichor gushing body three times. In two seconds I could easily achieve five merciless blows.
In five seconds, I stood up without ever having managed to fully decapitate the ogre.
There were still more than a dozen goblins gathered around two wounded hobgoblins, but the others had managed to loosely encircle them while Eliza casually picked off goblins with her bow. Now that the ogre was dead, the remaining enemies seemed to deflate with the loss of hope. For a moments as I looked around while dropping in blood, I was surprised.
Not even the starving and sick goblins or trollkin from my previous mission SHOWED defeat, they fought til the fight was over while these guys were steadily looking for somewhere to run to. I only had a pair of hob hatchets in hand but even these stained weapons seemed to be enough to keep the remaining enemy looking everywhere but my way. One goblin made eye contact with me when I started forward and actually started screeching like a wounded monkey before bolting.
An arrow intercepted it from the side once it broke ranks, entering its upper ribs behind one arm and burrowing deep down into its body. It fell after taking two more steps and then stopped struggling. From surprise to numbness and now… I actually felt bad for these guys. This was my job… but it was just a job.
The two hobs remaining were the pregnant ones Ms. Gwyn wanted to preserve and the remaining goblins were also fairly small, scrawny, and just generally young. Then, a thought occurred to me. "Stop! Where are the rats?"
"The scouting team were idiots," Ms. Gwyn replies after everybody had stopped tightening the circle on the remaining creatures. "They scouted the early morning, morning is when the goblins let the cattle graze. Right now, they're in a dugout on the other side of the camp. Since they're already contained, we're going to make sure they're secure and cash in on live contributions."
"These are all that's left, should we catch them?" I ask curiously, not just for the sake of increased contribution points.
"Should we have caught HIM, too?" Ms. Gwyn counters with an arched brow, nodding toward the dead ogre's thickly pooling body in the background.
Smiling with a slight shake of my head, I say, "If I had waited for better timing I could have kept it busy to capture at the end, but this moment would not be happening while it was still alive. But… I did not like the way it looked when that last one died. It looked at me… and chose death."
Ms. Gwyn actually snorted suddenly when fighting back a fit of laughter but quickly regained her composure. "That's a good thing, but I see your point. Frank, Fred, support Malcolm as he captures the remaining goblins. Emilia, take your brothers and check the security on that rat corral in the back. Lizzy, be a dear and take Karen and my husband as escorts up the other side of the valley to do some scouting. If you see any valuable agriculture and wildlife, bag it while we still have time. I'm going to go enjoy the view by the waterfall, come get me when you're all done."
With that said, she promptly turned around and started walking downstream. Eliza soon led her personal team away and then Emilia did the same, leaving me with the tankers and a group of goblins who were all following different people with their eyes. Fred took a long coil of paracord out of Frank's bag before saying, "They've all given up, now, just grab one and toss it here. Once they see that it doesn't get killed, the others will relax a bit."
"Are they really… safe?" I ask incredulously, having never been part of a group that claimed living creatures. As long someone from Earth was carrying or dragging the monster, it could be brought to Earth before the portals re-stabilize.
"We've done this a few times before," Frank reassures me with in deep but mumbling voice. "Usually with smaller groups, but it was almost trending about a year ago."
"Catching live monsters is how our weapons and tactics have gotten where they are today," Fred confirms like a knowledgeable teacher's assistant in a lecture. "Its not just about field testing in a territory. Just go up empty handed and if one puts up a fight just slap it hard enough to knock it down and the others will learn a lesson. If they try to team up on you, we're only like ten feet away."
Accepting their advice and experience with a slow nod, I carefully put down the hatchets I intended to take home with me and quickly hopped in front of the group of goblins. They all backpedaled in different directions and a few of them even fell from my swift arrival. When I reached down to grab the arm of a goblin that had fallen in front of me, another still wielding a flint knife stabbed at my hand.
Twisting my wrist to turn my arm as I flick my elbow only slightly out of the way, I snap my arm back and turn at the waist to backhanded slap the offending goblin in the side of its head with enough force to make its feet leave the ground. Before it even landed, the others had stiffened with fear. I unceremoniously grabbed the arm I was reaching for and turned to toss the one-twenty-pound goblin along the ground toward Fred and Frank.
After a second of rolling over there, the goblin was quickly grabbed by Frank and expertly hogtied by Fred. It struggled a little, but the process only took about half a minute. Then, that goblin was rolled almost gently off to the side and the tankers called for the next.
Just like that, we bound and then face masked eleven goblins and two hobs with extending bellies. The hobs did not look like they would give birth at any minute, but it was definitely passed the point where these female hobs could fight properly. Out of curiosity to test their intelligence as a higher evolution, I point at one hobgoblin and gestured for them to come by waving a hand toward the ground in front of me and pointing.
"What'cha doing there, gob-whisperer?" Fred asks with a laugh while the hobs look at one another fearfully. Then, silencing both tankers' laughter, the hobgoblin I pointed at dropped its stone spear and took a couple of slow and hesitant steps forward.
Next, it did something that might well have traumatized me if not simply tarnished my reputation for life.
After finally arriving in front of me, the hobgoblin looked back at the other hob before turning around and getting down on its hands and knees. Then it began lowering its head and raised its rear. "NO, NOPE, NUH-UH, NEVER, NO..." I start yelling at the top of my lungs, hurriedly jumping back and away from the hobgoblin who was exposing some of the ugliest body parts I had ever seen.
Fred and Frank were silent when it was actually happening, but after it started positioning itself on the ground they just started yelling in terror and shaking each other despite being two grown-ass men. After seeing and hearing my reaction, though, they started laughing hysterically and shaking one another even harder. Then, my reputation was officially ruined. Frank cried out as I fell while running toward them, "NO, ITS THE GOB WHISPERER!"
Now the pair of tankers were literally rolling around and the ground laughing and wheezing while hugging themselves to try and control themselves. Thankfully, the hobgoblin had stood up uncertainly while I crawled to the tankers for help or else things would have gotten much worse. Because, only a few seconds later, the swiftly running Emilia and company breezed through the camp to our location.
"Wha-..." she was starting to say when she finally skidded to a long stop on the granite valley floor, but then she actually took in our positions and behavior. "Why are our shields dying and the heavy swordsman is still cowering behind them?"
"That hob just tried to rape the poor boy, give us all a break," Fred says after finally managing to hold back his laughter for a moment, actually sitting up to share a look with Frank. Then, soon after replying, he began laughing all over again and fell back to the ground with his fellow tanker.
*