Only two hours later in the afternoon I tied the adult kobold's leading rope to a large warped pine tree that seemed to grow five feet up, a few feet to the side, another few feet up, twice as far to the opposite side, and then thinly angled up into the air for thirty feet. Since the tree was only about a thousand pounds from the ground up I wanted to take it home with me. It was visibly hybridizing and MP rich.
Its bark shimmered with heatwave-like MP radiation that said it was higher in grade than the surroundings and in the spaces between the pads of bark grew an odd glowing green moss from the ground up to the top of the first curve. The needles growing from its few branches were vibrant blue with speckles of green here and there and gave off an oddly metallic and earthy scent rather than pine. It was just a weird looking tree with a lot of mana.
The kobold did not seem to mind being tied to the tree about a hundred yards away from an old barn, but there was not much it could do. Bernard and Lucinda were both left by the tree as back-up for Poniard and I. Poniard and I simply walked right up toward the rundown farm. Pretty soon, the occupants took notice.
A couple of large and darkly colored hammerheads appeared from around the corner of the barn building and several other neighboring places. Soon, the curious serpents began exposing more of themselves as their raised their heads on long necks and cocked their heads to get a better view. Prey was knocking on their door and they were ready to answer.
Three heads and necks swiftly became three bodies slither-running to the fence while we were still more than sixty yards away. The ruined fences were already trampled down in this area so they posed no resistance to the passage of the almost horse-like reptiles. Their missing heads around the barn were just as quickly replaced by even more curious spectators.
Tapping Poniard's shoulder at forty yards when the reptiles were only twenty away, I break into a run right for the leading reptile. Its response was to draw its head back on its serpentine neck as it finished closing the distance. Like with my second charge at the kobold, I dropped low into a slide just before the serpent struck forward.
Passing safely under the serpent's head, I punch up into the soft underside of its throat to crush the inside and roof of its mouth. Fluids gushed out from between its bared teeth almost instantly. Another stiff-arm punch of both hands shove the serpent's body up away from me as it lost balance and fell to the side.
Another serpent's head struck down at me from the side as soon as the first was out of the way, opening its mouth wide to chomp six-inch fangs down around my torso. Even though the beast had seventy percent of my upper body in its mouth and was crushing me with enough force to eek the air from my lungs, its teeth still could not reach me. It was very nearly bearable as I anticipated the third's strike and withdrew my arm over the head of the serpent biting me.
When the other's open mouth smashed sideways into the ground, I swung my arm down and back in a vicious hammer-fist on the top of the serpent's head. Dirt and grass sprays from its mouth as it was forced shut and the weak reptilian skull started to give from just the one blow. However, before I could deliver a finishing strike the serpent holding me finally found the strength to raise my body up off of the ground.
No sooner was the underside of its head exposed from the ground before I struck, swinging my free arm down and around to ram the hard-capped ends of my fingers into my own back. Through the softly scaled and thin flesh under its chin. The reptile began screeching and loosed its jaws as the other reeled backwards from its concussion.
Even though I did not need to rush just yet, once the beast's jaw slacked off the slightest bit I punched my trapped arm against the roof of its mouth to force its jaw open. Tumbling out onto the ground with my fingers still hooked in the serpent's chin, I drag its head to the ground as I pull myself into a kneel and start pummeling the top of its head. Three punches was all it took for my fist to break through into its skull and mouth.
The others at the barn were now starting to come out to play so I rushed at the remaining wounded serpent. It barely even noticed as I jumped up over its slouching and dragging body to land knee first down on its head. Two beasts had died to crushed skulls in roughly a minute while the third was drowning in its own fluids and still twitching on the ground.
With eight more bodies running passed the fence, I call for Poniard and hold up two fingers in the air before drawing my current big sword. In response to those two fingers, Lucinda and Bernard both shot their snipers down the length of a serpent's body apiece. Less than two seconds later as the distance was under half of what it was previous, what was once eight serpents became four with Poniard riding the back of my coat.
Feinting a charge with my big sword raised overhead once the first serpent nears striking range, I chop it down early and release it somewhat early in the swing so that it rotates forward for more than ten feet before burying itself point first in the serpent's broad chest and shoulder.
Drawing my ivory swords as Poniard launches himself almost ten feet up in the air from my back, I sidestep into a backward hop out of the next serpent's way while jumping into another one's path while it was still drawing its head back. While I was busy turning into a preemptive backhand slash that whipped through the cheeks and jaw's of the serpent's rushed strike, Poniard nimbly land on the other's head in its blind stop with both daggers in hand.
Both daggers were promptly buried in the back of the serpent's neck and base of its skull. Poniard was becoming pretty proficient at targeting the spine and similar vulnerable areas. However, what he did next surprised me.
Left alone and alive, the slowest reptile was no longer trying to find an opening from the back but instead slowly backing away. While I was reaching for one of my revolvers to finish things quickly, though, Poniard held up an open hand by the gun I was drawing in order to stop me. Then he just looked at me and said, "Good job."
"Alright, I'll tag you in this time," I say with a proud smile, giving the goblin a high-five before wiping my one dirtied ivory sword clean on the sleeve of my coat. Then, while Poniard walked forward alone with his poniards flicking back and forth from gripping the hilt guard to gripping the hilt proper, I went to retrieve and clean my borrowed word.
Seeing that it was only facing one opponent that was much smaller than itself, the serpent became a little brave as Poniard approached and stood its ground. Then it started coiling its head back. Poniard's only response was to switching from walking in a straight line to make short side shuffles as to be somewhat unpredictable.
Once he actually entered the range of being struck by the serpent, though, Poniard started feinting a shuffle and then shuffle in that direction. When the serpent saw this feint it shifted its body ever so slightly to one side. The second time Poniard performed this short-stop, the serpent struck. Having goaded the serpent into anticipating the following follow-through, Poniard was more than capable of jumping back instead of forward.
Then, the nearly four-foot goblin jumped straight up in the air so that his feet reached higher up than my head. After recovering from its failed strike, the serpent had only seen Poniard jump back and missed his aerial retreat. After losing track of Poniard ahead of it, the serpent started scanning to one side.
It was around the time the serpent turned its head seventy degrees away from Poniard that he finally landed from his super jump. By the time the serpent started withdrawing its head and whipping back around, Poniard had already lunges across the distance. Stabbing one poniard down from overhead into the beast's front left shoulder, my goblin pulls himself up even as the serpent roars and rears up on its hind legs.
Riding the throwing weight of the serpent, Poniard expertly whips his body around onto its back with a twist of the deeply buried dagger. Once seated, Poniard plants his second dagger right into the serpent's spine. The serpent's body almost immediately started slumping weakly to the ground. Then he retrieved his first dagger with a second twist that made the dying beast exhale sharply before driving that dagger into the other side of its upper spine.
Moments later, the beast went silent and Poniard retrieved his daggers. Next, he looked around for a moment before softly calling out, "Si-Pon!" Appearing as if from the air itself, the bird blurred into existence a few feet away from the goblins. Then the two began talking in more native tongues.
After a few back and forth exchanges, Poniard seemed satisfied and the bird went off to start digging in the ground. Poniard then walked up and asked, "Heartsss?" "What? Yeah, go ahead and do the works. But, uh… can you tell me what's going on over there?"
Looking down at its bloodies hands, Poniard seems to be struck dumb by my question before looking around as if for help or inspiration. Finally, he spoke in the most coherent manner I had ever heard from a goblin while responding to a question. "Soon, me big. Me big, sit lizard."
"Oh, okay, you want to ride it…" I realize thoughtfully while awkwardly looking over at the DEAD body. "Umm, I don't know if you're going to understand what this means, but… that thing is dead. You killed it. When you kill things, they die."
Pointing over at the busy bird, Poniard says, "Sifu, speak Si-Pon." Then, he simply walks up and draws one of my ivory swords from my own damn scabbard before walking off to saw open one of the serpents. Like it was completely normal or something!
That was it, Poniard would never again eat a human heart as long as I had any control over it.
"Save me one," I decide to say instead of scolding the goblin, taking the use of my sword as a show of familiarity as I turn to walk away. Now that he was done digging, Si-Pon was currently pecking small rocks into even smaller gravel and fine powder. "What's the plan?"
Looking up in the direction of Lucinda and Bernard who were still hanging back with the kobold, Si-Pon says, "You've been teaching Pon-pon- quite poorly- how to use different elements. I am teaching Pon-pon how to use their natural element. Pon-pon uses death magic to attack by converting living flesh into dead flesh, this is how you turn a dead enemy into a weapon."
"Necromancy," I realize with a soft whisper. "I think I was told about this, but not much. If we save this for another time and beast, though, we can use a death stone from a natural revenant field. If that matters."
"That would be next best to having me," Si-Pon replies with a tilted nod of its head, as if admitting that it would be of use. "On the other hand, you have me. I can give Pon-pon the… mana… they need to perform the rite without such a… catalyst."
"But does Poniard have the ability to sustain such a being for such a long period of time?" I argue worriedly. "I mean, even if you turn the magic off and on the body will rot in between uses. Lucinda will NOT like the smell."
"That is the other part for using a death stone, as a… core," the bird replies, once again taking a short break in its pecking. "I'm working on making a core, Pon-pon and I will fill the core with ambient death energy, the core will sustain the body. If you let me work, I'll go catch the heavy insects for you."
"I can let you work but you should remember it might not be allowable for us to do this, you could get us relocated by making some kind of super monster or any number of things," I reply with a tightly-lipped smile. "If we keep the body as it is, it'll be fine enough because I am licensed for housing and tending these things while alive but if it gets bigger or more teeth, we'll have trouble."
The bird actually had nothing to say to that for a few moments, then it literally shrugged its wings and said, "Then, if we change it's body we will just make it smaller. Will this work for you?"
"Hobgoblins are not that big, anyway, and Poniard is a mage so they'll probably remain small," I agree before clapping my hands. "You do that, I'll go see about cleaning the bodies."
"Don't touch them yet," the bird says abruptly. "As weak as it is, your unaffiliated mana will disturb the process. No, you have no affinity. No, that does not mean you'll be a weak mage. Let me work and I will show you how to be a great mage."
"Yessir," I say as one whole word before abruptly turning and walking away toward Poniard.
"Save one," Poniard said as he walked up, his face dry to show he had yet to eat himself. "First one. Sifu one."
"Good job, Poniard," I say while gratefully accepting the heart before awarding the goblin a head pat and walking away.
"They're going to summon a demon, call the director," I casually inform Lucinda and Bernard after making my way back to where the kobold was sitting tied to the warped pine. Holding the heart out to the kobold that had assuredly watched all of my fighting, I point to the heart and says loudly, "H-are-t. Heart." When the kobold started reaching for the heart in a slow and hesitant manner, I withdraw it a bit and point again. "Heart."
The, I point to the kobold's mouth before pointing to my own and saying, "Heart," again. The kobold seemed to get it this time and breathed out a heavy 'h' sound that came off kind of like 'hat'. "H-are-t! H-ARE-T!" I decided to try again.
Even though it tried to sound all three parts out, it just came out sounding like 'hot' so I gave up and gave her the heart to eat. "Good enough," I say while pushing my luck, deftly placing my hand on the kobold's head. The kobold immediately stiffened in shock and probably fear, but then I just rubbed its thickly furred head like a dog before walking away.
*