"It's a pack of six," Emilia reports while looking through a pair of night vision goggles. "Do we take them or see if competition comes?"
It was currently closing in on midnight and the pile of carcasses we left out for bait were starting to draw in nighttime predators. The 'pack' in question was a group of large bipedal animals that kind of resembled pics with round flat noses but they were covered in fur and had bodies like a bear with two opposable digits on either side of their six-digit paws. They honestly looked like pincers from how they pinched together as well as toward the other 'fingers'.
Most important of all, from the backs of their forelimb elbows grew long spurs of actual ivory.
Ms. Gwyn, who had come out of her tent and joined Emilia, Eliza, and I in the sentry tower, when we shook a cord attached to her tent with a bell, simply says, "We don't have time to wait and more bodies will bring in more prey. You guy's tag 'em and we'll go bag 'em."
"Far right," I say while adjusting the goggles affixed to my helmet so that I can aim down my rifle.
"Far left," Eliza says right after, nocking a large headed arrow and drawing it back while aiming at the far left pigorilla
"The big guy in the middle is all mine, then," Emilia decides since only the two middle bodies were left for her. Now that everybody had their targets picked out, it was simply a matter of waiting on Emilia to countdown when we took out shots. As soon as I heard the 'z' from 'zero' I flicked the modded burst setting for my rifle on and loosed a rough triangle of three .300 rounds flying into the ribs of my pigorilla.
Keeping pace with my jumpy trigger speed, the others all shot as my own gunshots rang out. The pigorilla I shot was no less than a thousand pounds and had a body as tough as an elephant. However, when that triangle of lower D bullets struck the exposed upper ribs of the large animal its body was staggered from the force of the blows that stayed within its body.
Even as the beast started to turn and drop to all fours for a retreat its legs were going weak and it stumbled to the ground. My second target was already turned around and starting to run when I squeezed my back trigger. The burst-fire setting was still on so not only did a pair of drilling slugs whistle loudly through the air but so, too, did a broad triangle of recoiling shots.
I pulled the trigger again as soon as I saw the first shorts hit, punching holes through the creature's haunches and slugs in the meat of its rear. It tried to turn and change direction, but that only gave me the opportunity to flick the barrels an inch or two to the side and fire just in front of them. The second set of shots from all barrels ripped through its lower front side and it started stumbling down the hillside.
Emilia's larger caliber rifle and shotgun combination did not need the same double-taps that mine did, but she also did not have a burst setting so she had to pull her back trigger the entire time for full power. Eliza, though, could accurately fire three arrows a second. Using large one-pound headed arrows, they were like cannonballs that punched holes right through.
"Alright, I'll go get the others and we'll bring them in," Ms. Gwyn says while heading for the ladder down to the ground.
"Dress them on site, it'll draw their attention to us more to do it here," I say quickly with a small shake of my head. "And wake Poniard, having him while outside camp is better than having night vision."
"These are predatory animals, they'll be higher in grade than what we killed today," Ms. Gwyn stops to argue. "If we leave the bodies out there, the bones and stuff will be ruined and those can be high-dollar items. Your own armor is more ivory plating than polymer!"
"We can collect the bones when they're picked clean and there'll be plenty more than just their bones," I inform her seriously. "The extra time it takes to drag them back and forth is time we won't be baiting animals, which means your version of optimizing profits per product will cost us in overall products. Besides, they're all going into a grinder anyway."
At first Ms. Gwyn started to argue but after opening her mouth and working her aw wordlessly for a moment all she could say was, "I see," and leave.
"That wasn't rude, was it?" I ask after a minute of silence when she had left, looking to the other two night sentries I was on duty with.
"Rude," Eliza says with no hesitation at all.
"Just because you were right doesn't mean you weren't rude," Emilia says to answer my question while scanning the area for any other signs of wildlife. "You just need to work on your delivery."
"Ah… thank you," I say a little awkwardly, now feeling bad for how I had spoken to Ms. Gwyn. I had not meant to be rude about it but the last part just kind of came out that way. I will just have to try talking to her about it tomorrow.
The three of us kept watch for the better part of half an hours while Ms. Gwyn and some of the others still awake when out to take care of the animals. Later on in the night it would be our job to handle these tasks but for now we could make use of anyone awake. Of course, they will probably wake up from our gunshots anyway.
After taking part in cleaning up the mess of what was measured at middle D grade animals, Poniard joined us in the sentry tower after having already slept since dinner. Now, he was still noisily munching and slurping on hearts that were about the size of is face. I could not even begin to fathom how he could fit all of it in his tiny body no matter how much of a belly he had developed.
It seemed like God Himself had decided to step in and prove me wrong after what I had said to Ms. Gwyn because there were no signs of life anywhere even half an hour after the new bodies were cleaned. "It's our one-AM right now," Emilia informs the rest of us after checking her watch. "We might as well start taking shifts, too, or we won't be worth a damn tomorrow. Who wants first shift?"
"I'll take it," I say simply, knowing it would probably take me a shift just to fall asleep again since the nap I took after dinner. "I'll wake you guys if more than one anything comes up, if only one or two comes up you'll wake up on your own."
Then, as if God Himself were waiting for me to be left alone, a large body came slowly trundling up the hillside to the right of camp. It was another pigorilla creature but this one was bulky where the others were fat and stocky. This one even seemed to be several inches taller than the others just while on all fours.
Unlike the group of pigorillas that walked right up and started eating, this one sniffed around the large piles of bodies for a moment before grabbing one skinless body and dragging it to the side. This body was the smallest pigorilla that had come up and was the first to die from a giant arrow nearly decapitating it. Now that I thought about it the little pigorilla was probably still an immature animal and it was probably that thing's child.
As if my thoughts had connected the dots for the animal as well, it stood up on its hind legs to a true height comparable to a troll and threw it head back to loose an insanely high-pitched wail of a roar. The strength of this creature's voice was incredible, I could feel the vibrations of that sound like static on my skin from over fifty yards away. The others all awoke immediately but when they reached for their guns I held their shoulders to stop them.
"It's just one," I tell them calmly, quickly following Poniard who had all but jumped down from the sentry tower after hearing the roar. While he went to our tent to fetch his spear I just ran straight for the closest gate while carrying the big sword I had left by the bottom of the ladder. Shooting would have been simpler but bringing the spiritually wounded beast closure by being up close and personal seemed like more fun.
The pigorilla both saw and heard me coming before I even reached the two-layered log blockade of sapling spears aimed outward. They dropped down onto all fours from their sustained roar and started charging forward at full force, throwing all caution to the wind. For a brief moment, the fifty yards between us seemed to stretch on for a mile as I leaped over the blockade.
But then, just like that, I had ran forward a few steps while unsheathing my sword and only had time to let the scabbard fall away before the pigorilla was in range.
One big meaty paw with a middle pad almost as big as my face was already being raised to swat my smaller body down like a fly. My sword was drawn back to one side behind my body in a side-slashing ready position as I simply picked my feet up in mid-stride. Forward momentum carried me low over the ground as I contorted at the waist, starting my body turning before unleashing the pent up tension and strength in my arms by swinging full force into the turn.
What started as a forty-degree turning of my weight became more than a full spinning slash from sheer arms strength even after colliding with the pigorilla. My target was not the body but instead the arm it struck with, meeting its paw in the air with the angling blade that made the point of my sword. Once the front 'point' at the base of the second edge dug into the pad of the pigorilla's paw, that arm was done for.
Initial contact with that front point caused two different areas of cutting edge to start sliding into meat while the angle of the blade allowed for the follow-through of energy while cleaving in. My sword cut straight through its paw that was bigger than my entire head, splitting its arm down the middle from claws to just an inch or two below its wrist.
Enough blood to be life threatening was flowing freely from its divided paw as the beast roared shrilly in ago, but its body was so huge it would probably take ten minutes for them to bleed out even with that wound. Landing on my knees on the overgrown hilltop, I slide easily through mashing weeds and grass before stopping several yards away. The pigorilla was also trying to slide to a stop while turning around, but with only three legs its in-motion balance was ruined and after turning its rear its front body tumbled to the side.
Poniard was now coming within reach of the fight, but even with one leg mangled it was still not an enemy that I could let my goblin fight casually. I bolted up to my feet and dashed forward, closing the distance to the pigorilla in two gliding steps before thrusting my sword out ahead of me. Still not upright on its feet, yet, the pigorilla could only roll aside to escape.
Even at the cost of rolling over its injured arm and howling furiously, the pigorilla narrowly evaded the plunging thrust of my sword while the top edge of the sword neatly trimmed a patch of hair from its haunch and even took some meat with it.
By now, though, Poniard was close enough to throw his tiny body high up into the air while the pigorilla was fully focused on me. Just as the pigorilla was once again trying to get up, Poniard landed on the middle of their back and used all of their falling weight and strength to plunge the long narrow blade of his spear down into the beast's spine. Sadly, this blow was not enough to kill it but the back legs were once kicking for traction were now completely limp.
Desperate to survive even though it had become a paraplegic, the pigorilla tries to roll from one side to the other with and claw at Poniard with its remaining good arm. However, I had already jumped more than ten feet in the air to fall over and ruthlessly chop down on both their head and arm as I fell. My sword passed cleanly through and buried itself in the dirt.
"Good job," I say proudly while holding my hand up toward Poniard who was heroically sitting and posing on the pigorilla's back.
"Good job," Poniard parrots, briefly glancing at my upturned palm before turning to look back at camp. When he felt certain he was not being watched, even though he certainly was, he swiftly and stealthily reached out to slap my palm with his own before going back to posing. As if he really had a reputation to uphold!
However, as we were celebrating by gutting and dressing the beast Poniard suddenly went deathly still and quiet even while feasting on a heart the actual size of his head. Then, he promptly stood up beside me and did something I never saw coming. Poniard clamped a bloody hand over my mouth and hissed lowly under his breath the way he did when silencing the other goblins.
Every fiber of my being was suddenly on high alert as I moved only my eyes while looking over at Poniard. The heart they were eating was now lying on the ground and in that hand was their still bloody spear. Instead of looking at me Poniard was looking out over the surrounding hillside while bearing his teeth with his ears pressed low to its head.
These were clear signs of fear and anxiety but Poniard's gaze kept shifting so frequently that I could tell they were still searching for the source of their alarm. After a few seconds of silence, though, I suddenly heard something like the slow stretch and pop of pulling something like a root or rope up from the ground. Just like that the both of us wordlessly jumped up and onto the higher ground of the pigorilla's half skinned body.
The exposed fat and meat on the surface was hard to grip at first but a brief moment of grinding my heel into the meat secured my footing. With clawed feet, Poniard did not even have to do that much. However, the situation did not change much because I still could not see any enemies despite the same noise coming from several different places at once.
After only a few more moments of the sounds growing louder and more numerous I soon found the source of these noises as a patch of ground nearby suddenly hills upward with the sound of tearing roots. As soon as I saw a large misshapen bony hand claw its way up out of the ground, I scooped Poniard up under one arm and just started running back to camp.
I did not stop to care about the pigorilla, I did not care to look back as more breaking earth sounds creep up in my wake, the only thing I gave a damn about was moving my legs and keeping a tight grip on my goblin.
"What the hell is going on?" I could hear Emilia shouting down from the sentry toward while aiming down the length of her rifle, trying to pick a target as it emerged from the ground.
I had heard stories about portals with old ruins or places of the sort where real nightmares would come to reality but those were usually C or higher grade portals. However, here I was in the upper end of the second lowest grade and there were what probably counted as second lowest grade enemies of the worst kind. The undead.
"It's a revenant field," I call up to her after throwing Poniard over the fence before leaping and diving over the spikes of the blockade. "EVERYBODY TO ARMS! THIS IS NOT A DRILL, GET UP AND GET READY TO FIGHT!"
*