ALL NOVEL Ch. 50 Weapons Testing
The goblins came in the dead of the night. It was predictable, unimaginative, and lacked creativity. There was no War Chief to lead them and even their hobgoblins were low-leveled. They came as a screaming swarm while they raced over the piles of junk around the hospital. Santi still had a smile on his lips as the morph weapons rolled down his arm and pooled into his hand.
He watched as the saber formed. The blade was razor thin and lacked the heft of his old blades. With a twitch of his wrist the blade severed the first goblin in half. Santi watched as the blade drank in the blood. The weight of the blade grew infinitesimally, barely enough for him to tell.
Three more died in the time it took him to blink, each movement of his wrist a deathblow. The rest of the fighters were killing the goblins at nearly the same speed, their skills allowing them to chop through the line of goblins like they chaff.
Santi flexed his willpower for a moment and the morph blade switched out. The silvery blade straightened and remained paper thin. The hand guard melted into the hilt and became a crossguard. He wasn’t practiced with the long sword like he was the saber, but he still knew the basics.
His brain knew the movements but his muscles didn’t have the memory. Even with the advances to his stats it was clumsy swings and parries. It didn’t matter. The blade split skin with every touch, sliced bone as if it was cheese, and took life with every movement. A sense of power radiated through him as he wielded the morph blade.
The attack only lasted a few minutes, the horde destroyed with speed and power. Broken bodies were piled up all around the doorway to the lobby. The dead hobgoblins had been the most dangerous, but even they were too weak to stand up against the recent levels everyone had earned.
“Any injuries?” Santi asked around. Now that Justin was gone, Santi was taking up more and more of the little things like talking to the other fighters. It was his job to begin with but he hadn’t done it.
It was a round of negatives as they had managed to fight off the horde without a single injury. It was a good morale boost for them and while none had managed to gain any levels from the low ranking goblins. For them to fight and win like that after taking the losses they had was a great way for their spirits to rebound.
It’d be a long way before they were battle hardened veterans who’d be able to fight their way through the integration and the invasions that would come. The kernel was there. It just needed to grow and be improved on.
Tank, Chloe and Rayleigh walked up to him while he walked the line of survivors. None of them had taken part in the fight, staying behind as a group ready to come forward to plug any breaches. Thankfully they hadn’t been needed but it was good practice. Keep the heavy hitters in the backline ready to come and deal with any unexpected difficulties while the lower leveled fighters gained experience.
“No problems?” Tank asked.
“No, they were weak. I have a dumb idea,” Santi said as he looked over the corpses. The power of the morph weapon was whispering to him. It was a dumb idea, but so had been clearing out the kobold rift by himself.
“You want to tackle the goblin nest by yourself,” Chloe stated. There was no question in her statement. The other two just nodded along as they stared at him. Maybe they knew him a bit better than he thought they did.
“No one else is in good enough shape to help me. This is a sign of weakness,” Santi waved his hand over the ramparts of the dead.
“Explain like I’m a toddler," Tank said as he crossed his broad arms and settled down with a patient look on his face.
“We, this camp, is a direct threat to the goblin nest. Whatever boss or monster is in command of that nest knows it. This is the best they could send against us to try to destroy us. They’re weak. We’ve destroyed their ability to get the elixir which was boosting their stats, we’ve killed their War Chief, and have now destroyed two hordes. The nest has to be weak. I’m the most powerful fighter we have, I have the knowledge to disband the nest, and I have the weapons now to do it.”
“There wasn’t a monster in charge of this nest, why do you think there’s a directing intelligence at the other one?” Chloe asked after Santi finished.
“Goblins and others like them are hierarchical. The base goblins obey the hobs, the hobs obeyed the troll-kin, and the troll-kin obeyed something.”
“That troll thing took the entire camp working together to kill it. Why do you think you could kill whatever it is that was in charge of it?” Rayleigh asked. All three of them were looking at him curiously. For the most part they accepted what he had to tell them without asking too many questions.
“I leveled a lot since then. I’m vastly stronger since then and have a powerful weapon. The troll-kin was dumb and built around strength and vitality. While it was powerful against us, the appropriate skill set would make a beast like that fairly easy to kill. The leader of the nest probably has that skill set.”
“That skill set being?” Tank asked.
“High intelligence and magic. Probably has fire magic or maybe an enchanted weapon that it can use to scare the troll into obeying.”
“Lots of assumptions there, Santi. What happens if you’re wrong?” Tank asked.
“I die.”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought you were going to say. We risk losing our best fighter and the most knowledgeable person about what’s going on because we are impatient. We’d be good in two or so days, probably, then hit the nest properly.”
“And in two days when the nest has managed to respawn scores of goblins and maybe replaced a few ranks of the hobgoblins?”
“Where are they getting the materials for themselves by the way? They’re just appearing out of nowhere or?” Rayleigh trailed off.
“How many dead bodies have you seen? Or pets?”
“They’re reconstituting flesh to make more of themselves?” Rayleigh sounded horrified. As she should be.
“Close enough. At least for as far as I understand. I mean, even on the fifth floor, there’s not that many bodies up there. Compared to how many were taken. The initiation spawned monsters and the goblins found that farm and used the animals there to build up their number. Then they started on everyone else.”
“Alright, I’m okay with you dealing with this,” Tank said suddenly. His face had somehow paled as Santi went on on the System’s version of recycling.
“I want in,” Chloe said. Rayleigh nodded in agreement.
“You’re both in shit shape, no offense,” Santi would have liked to have the whole team with him but the two girls would slow him down. He was going to go with a speed run and neither of them had the necessary stats to keep up with him.
“We will give you a distraction. We’ll find a defensible spot and poke the nest. Try to pull them away from you while you go at it from another direction.” At least Chloe had a plan. Aside from the inner guard around the heart of the nest, there shouldn’t be much the nest could throw at them that’d be a threat. Even in their weakened state.
“Chad should go with you too. Give you some range and let him get some experience while he’s at it. If you’re involved with me clearing the nest in anyway it should give you an achievement or at least rope you into some of the experience I will earn.”
“Go and find more than just you three. I’ll be leading everyone else home. There should be a few who are willing to keep fighting. Santi, don’t fuck this up and die.” Tank was mad. If it was the state of the world, the current situation, or his friends on their way to throw themselves in harm's way, Santi couldn’t tell.
“We go at first light. The place is in the middle of a pasture and I don’t know if there’s a good spot for you to fort up or not. If there’s not a good spot, I’m going to say you kick the nest and run.”
“We’ll play this safe. I’m tired of seeing these little red bastards everywhere. They’ve killed our friends. It’s time they all die.” Venom dripped from every word Rayleigh said. Chloe nodded in agreement, wrapping her arm around her friends shoulder and the two moved out to try to find others who were willing to risk it all.
“Santi, don’t die. We need you,” Tank whispered, just loud enough for him to hear it.
“I don’t make promises. If I fall, just keep going. Level and gather more people to you.” Santi wanted to tell him more but the damned geas stopped him from giving more detailed plans.
“I’ll see you off in the morning then,” Tank said, walking off to go find a soft place on the floor to sleep. Santi knew there was no sleep in his future, not until the nest was destroyed.