In my frantic attempt to save myself from the horde of Khornate Berserkers that emerged from Horus knows where, I had momentarily forgotten about the two adventurers I had grown accustomed to adventuring with regularly since my arrival on this backwater planet. As anyone who has been ambushed by those bloodthirsty demigods can easily attest to, one can hardly afford to let their mind be swayed by any distractions when fighting a Chaos Space Marine. Not unless they want to end up like most people who end up witnessing one in battle, either an unrecognizable red smear or torn into so many pieces that it would be easier to carry their remains away in a bucket than a body bag. Even then, survival is up to luck more than anything else when fighting the Chaos corrupted Astartes. My repeated triumphs against them are certainly a testament as to how futile it is to rely upon one's skills, rather than whatever unnatural forces entertain themselves with my repeated near death experience.
It was my worry for Priestess and Goblin Slayer, more so the former due to her likely being dragged to help the armored idiot and unwilling to let him go alone out of pity or a suicidal desire to assist him in his mad quest to exterminate all goblins, that made me issue the order to Jurgen that would end up coming the closest to getting me killed all night. As my aide rushed over to the Trukk so we could try to save my companions native to this world from an enemy they likely had no chance against, silently carrying out my will without question when I gave him the order as always, I tried my best to maintain a calm facade as I addressed the other adventurers before they could relax their guard now that the immediate threats to our health was dealt with. I didn't know whether or not there were any more dangers prowling unseen nearby, Astartes or otherwise, and I didn't want my sudden departure to be blamed on any potential disasters that would arise once I left everyone who had yet to flee back to Frontier Town to their own devices.
After having risked my neck by making the incredibly stupid decision to face several Astartes in melee combat, the last thing I wanted anyone to think was that I abandoned the Farm, and Frontier Town by extension, to annihilation when I was actually trying to save a life that wasn't my own. If my reputation was going to be left in tatters, then I was going to damn well make sure it was something I did or didn't do rather than a simple misunderstanding. As someone who had made a career out of such misinterpretations of my intentions, I knew exactly how important it was to stay on top of any such potential inaccuracies surrounding the motivations for my actions in order to spin them in my favor.
"Stay on alert, people. The night is not over yet." I instructed them, taking a moment to inspect the teeth of my chainsword to ensure none of them had been damaged after having sheared through several pieces of ceramite armor, albeit damaged ones.
A few of the teeth were noticeably chipped, but it was nothing a visit to the local blacksmith couldn't fix. I don't know how that Squat blacksmith could repair weapons made out of adamantium when the planet as a whole lacked the tools necessary to forge the sturdy alloy, but I suppose that goes to show that the reputation Squats had as master craftsmen wasn't just for show. Even far removed from the Imperium or those Leagues of theirs, they still could work wonders that even a cogboy would have to appreciate, albeit begrudgingly.
"Damn, do you think there might be more of those armored giants showing up?" Heavy Warrior asked, sounding tired but looking no less ready to spring into action because of it.
"I don't know, which is exactly why I need all of you to monitor the area around the Farm while I'm gone." I told everyone, making a show of myself as I slotted a fresh power pack into my chainsword and revved it to max for a second.
"Oh, and where exactly are you running away to, Commissar Cain?" Spearman asked, trying his best to sound like a bigger arse than I already thought he was and barely managing to succeed.
Having grown all too used to that idiot's antics, I knew he wasn't trying to goad me into an argument, no matter what the all too punchable expression he wore suggested. Instead, much like many of the troops who had served under my command in the past, he was merely putting on an obnoxiously brave facade to hide the fear lying underneath his bravado. Having done the same on more occasions than I could ever hope to remember, I decided to give the fool a break and not call him out on it considering how he miraculously wasn't dead after distracting a Khornate Berserker for me.
"I need to check on Goblin Slayer. I can hardly imagine that whatever plans he had to deal with the Goblin Lord and its nest are still intact now." I grimly stated, "We need to send someone to check on him to make sure everything is still going well with his part of the plan, and I could hardly force any of you to blindly run out into the forest without knowing what is out there when I have a much faster means of reaching him."
"Oh, fuck." The spear wielding idiot gasped, finally dropping all pretenses of being the stalwart hero he pretended to be as I mentioned how Goblin Slayer could potentially be in danger if he wasn't already ground into a meaty paste yet.
"Then you're taking us with you too." High Elf Archer demanded, with Half-Elf Scout nodding in support of her fellow xenos, "Orcbolg and Priestess are our party members too. There is no way we are just going to sit here and do nothing while he might be in danger."
"As much as I would enjoy the extra company, I'm afraid I will need you to stay here with everyone else." I told her, doing my best to pretend I was against the idea of having a couple of extra bodies to throw at any more Goblin Champions or Chaos Marines I found, "You two are the best scouts we have available to warn the adventurers here of any more approaching threats in case the goblins rally for another attack on the farm. Without you here, there's no telling what else might ambush us before the night is over."
I wasn't being entirely disingenuous with my words, as the Eldar women had far better senses than the other high ranking adventurers present by far. As much as I wanted the xenos to serve as meat shields for me should I find the need for one, they would serve both myself and Frontier Town far better by monitoring the woods around the farm for any more unexpected arrivals. The part where if things went ploin-shaped with Goblin Slayer and I ended up being chased by whatever massacred him and Priestess, and I needed a place filled with people I could trust to kill whatever was pursuing me, or at the very least, slow them down while I got a greater headstart as I continued running for my life, naturally went unsaid.
"Besides," I added, gesturing towards Dwarf Shaman who was presently rubbing some sort of medicinal paste onto Lizard Priest's visibly bruised side from where one of the Traitor Astartes had miraculously struck him without caving in his chest, "I think your other partners need you more than I do."
Both of the Eldar women winced at the sight of what I sincerely hoped was a superficial wound on the giant abhuman's torso. Half-Elf Scout quickly ran off to assist the Squat in tending to the enormous mutant's wounds while High Elf Archer looked between her party and myself before muttering something under her breath before glaring at me with a murderous look in her eyes.
"Fine, we'll stay here and do everything we can while you're away. You had better not let anything happen to Orcbolg, or I swear to Khaine I will make you regret it." She snapped at me.
"You have my word that I will do everything within my power to save him and Priestess if they are in danger." I hurriedly told her in an attempt to placate her.
High Elf Archer, satisfied with my noncommittal answer and restraint in pointing out that Goblin Slayer wasn't the only one I would be attempting to save, ran off to join her hybrid counterpart as Lizard Priest was hauled up to his feet and started to make his way back to the farm. With the most annoying of the adventurers dealt with, I then turned to the remaining silver ranked adventurers to issue a few last commands to them quickly as I heard Jurgen start to drive over to my location.
"I think this should go without saying, but Frontier Town needs to know that more than goblins showed up at the Farm. One of you needs to contact the Adventurers' Guild, Frontier Town's Guards, and anyone else who will get off their arses and make themselves useful in case anything else shows up tonight." I told them, dropping my usual air of unshakable self-confidence for a moment and being perfectly honest with them for once, "We got lucky that we were able to take down those Chaos Marines without any casualties and I would prefer we not rely on luck a second time tonight. I don't care who you send or how you go about doing it, but make sure someone with the power to do something in Frontier Town knows we need help and actually sends some our way."
"I have… already… taken care of that." Witch purred.
"Good." I said, not questioning how she managed to do so without taking so much as a step away from the rest of us.
I knew as much about the magic casters of this planet as I did about the psykers I served alongside in the past, while also trying to maintain a healthy distance away from the later for both of our sakes on account of Jurgen, but I knew enough that magic casters were not nuttier than your typical tree loving rodent or predisposed to succumbing to the corrupting power of the Warp like psykers were. The only thing I could say for certain about the mages, clerics, and priests of this world is that whatever gave them their powers, it had nothing to do with the Warp or Chaos. The way they didn't instantly suffer a stroke after coming into close contact and my aide, quite unlike how psykers would either start violently convulsing or go mad thanks to his innate talent at disrupting their powers when he approached them, disregarding the comments made in regards to his pungent aroma that drove away most people, was proof of that. Anything beyond that though was something only the Holy Ordos of the Inquisition could figure out, if they ever find where this planet is, but I digress.
Before I could say anything else, the revving of the Trukk's engine filled the air around us with a mighty roar as my aide flew towards us as fast as the orkish vehicle could go, slamming on the breaks and coming to a screeching stop as the transport's tortured brakes locked up the wheels, causing them to shower us all with clods of dirt as the vehicle slid across the ground and stopped mere centimeters away from me. The other adventurers had all made a valiant effort to get out of the way from where my aide was steering, whether out of a primal desire to avoid ending up like most obstacles in-between Jurgen and his destination whenever he was behind the wheel or from fear born through experience after having rode together in a carriage he drove on our way back from Frontier Town Governor's estate. I honestly couldn't blame them for making a run for it either way, as I myself had frozen in place knowing my aide would likely park far too close to comfort and that any evasive maneuvers I took could easily end up turning me into a smear on the Trukk's front bumper. That he had cut the stop far too close for comfort, more so than usual thanks to the poor quality of the orkish deathtrap's brakes, didn't help matters.
"Ready to leave whenever you are, sir." My aide phlegmatically announced, throwing open the rear driver's side door to allow me a quicker entry into our vehicle.
I hurriedly climbed aboard and took up my usual position at the pintle mounted heavy bolter, clutching onto it for both the comfort the armor piercing weapon provided me before we started our suicidal charge towards the unknown and as a means of keeping myself standing once my aide inevitably started driving with his usual haphazard disregard for shrubbery, pedestrian vehicles, and pedestrians themselves, treating them as only minor inconveniences our Trukk's wheels could easily overcome, much like with the Salamander tanks we typically commandeered for ourselves.
"Alright, Jurgen. Let's show that Goblin Lord that he messed with the wrong adventurers!" I declared, less so for my aide's sake and more for the adventurers present, in case they held any lingering doubts as to whether I was truly abandoning them to their fates like I would have assumed in their position.
The Trukk immediately lurched into motion and I barely caught myself before my skull rammed into the heavy bolter as slowly I became accustomed to the breakneck pace my aide usually drove at, leaving the Farm and most of our worries until now behind us and instead trading them for the unknowable dangers we were foolishly headed for at full speed.
What an ork vehicle lacks in stability, fuel efficiency, basic safety features, and general comfort, it more than makes up for in sturdiness and speed. Despite lacking headlights to navigate through the thick foliage of the forest around us, Jurgen was able to drive ahead with little worry for our surroundings aside from making sure to avoid careening into the occasional tree as thick as our Trukk, as everything else in our way ended up trampled underneath our tires or stuck in the bumper until it was dislodged and replaced by the next piece of debris to take its place. Standing up by the weapon attached to our transport's roof, I lacked the protection the bowed windshield guarding the driver's seat and passenger compartments offered, having to use the heavy bolter in front of me as a makeshift shield as countless branches and the occasional startled member of the native wildlife flew past my head as we tore through the forest far faster than we could have done so by foot.
Had either my aide or I known exactly where we were trying to go, I'm sure we would have reached our destination in no time. Instead, thanks to Goblin Slayer being annoyingly vague with his instructions and obtuse at sharing information as always, we were driving blindly through the forest hoping we could stumble upon him and Priestess before anything else could, without accidentally running over them once we did find them. Had it not been for the wide path the army of goblins left behind in their march from the nest for their farm, we might never have been able to find those two in time to save them. Instead, we were left following a poorly defined trail in the middle of a moonlit forest with barely any idea of where we were going or whether or not the route we were taking would even lead us to the monster we were pursuing.
Up until this point, the Goblin Lord had displayed a degree of intelligence and understanding of tactics that rivaled many of the commanders I've met within the Imperial Guard. Whether that is a compliment to the cleverness possessed by the depraved little xenos or an insult against the frighteningly high levels of incompetence found in the Astra Militarum, it was hard to say. Regardless, as clever as the Goblin Lord might have been, it thankfully lacked the means of hiding the traces of hundreds of its fellow vermin as they marched towards the Farm. That wasn't to say that the Lord was dumb enough to take a straight route to the place he intended to attack if he didn't intend to flee. If it had full confidence its assault couldn't be thwarted in a way neither of us could have ever expected, an act I found begrudgingly relatable, it wouldn't have taken the winding path Jurgen had been following.
With as many times as I had to stop myself from being flung off of the side of the Trukk, I could tell that the Goblin Lord made a modest attempt at hiding its tracks by looping back on the route it had taken several times to make it difficult to trace where it had originally came from. At least, I hoped that the number of times we tread the same ground was intentional. Had the Goblin Lord truly been stupid enough to get lost on route to the Farm while still being capable of rallying together an army that could easily raze Frontier Town to the ground without Goblin Slayer noticing it or my own attempts to assemble an army of adventurers to halt its advance, then I shudder to think of what a truly intelligent Goblin Lord would be capable of.
How long Jurgen had been pursuing the Goblin Lord's tracks was hard to ascertain, as neither of us were in any mood to check our chronometers when we were as likely to stumble upon a horde of goblins as we were another Khornate Berserker, although in my case it was more because letting go of the heavy bolter had an uncomfortably high chance of throwing me from the vehicle if we hit anything or came to a sudden stop. Instead we focused on what we did best, my aide driving the Trukk with all the mastery of an ordained Magos of the Mechanicus and the delicacy of a drunken Ork while I put on a brave face and tried not to think too hard about what we might stumble upon once we reached our destination, so I didn't end up making the call to turn back before we knew how much danger we were about to throw ourselves into. With every passing moment, I grew more and more worried that we were going to show up too late and that our desperate pursuit would all be for nothing.
It was only by the grace of the Emperor that by the time my nerves had been worn down to the point where I was seriously considering whether or not to call off our search, we finally came upon a clearing that led to a large cave nestled underneath an enormous tree. Even as far as we were from the cavernous depths barely illuminated in the distance, I could tell that we had found the nest we had been looking for. There weren't many places a Goblin Champion could hide undetected, let alone a pack of them, and the cave my aide was driving towards at full speed certainly looked capable of fitting more than one of the xenos behemoths in it at a time.
It was as I was starting to worry about why my aide hadn't yet started to slow down when we had finally found where the Goblin Lord had fled to that we found both our quarry and part of the duo we had been intending to rescue, and my blood ran cold at the tragedy unfolding before me. Goblin Slayer was putting up a valiant fight against the Goblin Lord but, having seen the foolish boy fight a great many goblins before and sparred against him on a few occasions to get a better idea of his skills, I could tell that he was fighting a losing battle against the xenos standing a head taller than him. I couldn't tell where Priestess was hiding nor did I have any presence of mind to spare for her when I saw the Lord knock Goblin Slayer to the ground with a fierce blow from its axe and split the armored fool's shield in two.
The boy hit the ground hard, and I could tell from the way he went down that he wouldn't be getting up in time before the Goblin Lord had a chance to finish him off. Knowing that it would take too long for Jurgen and I to disembark the Trukk in order to stop the Lord from killing that brazen fool and that the pintle mounted bolter I was clutching onto was just as likely to hit Goblin Slayer as it was the xenos at our current distance, I gave my aide an order I knew he would be all too happy to comply with.
"Jurgen, ram the frakker! " I shouted over the roar of the Trukk, desperately hoping we wouldn't be too late to save the reckless idiot.
"With pleasure, sir." I heard my aide reply as he started to barrel straight for the Goblin Lord.
As shocking as it might be to believe, despite the numerous times Goblin Slayer's insistence of going on a crusade against goblinkind that even an Astartes would be proud to partake in, with all the dangers it entailed, I held a great deal of respect for the lad both professionally and personally. Reputation concerns aside, I had no desire to watch a dedicated twit like him perish in such an ignominious way since he managed to actually do some good in the galaxy for something other than some simple praise or the perks that often came with it, quite unlike myself. Had it been any other native from this planet in Goblin Slayer's position, excluding Priestess, I wouldn't have thought twice of tearing both them and the Goblin Lord to pieces with the heavy bolter I gripped onto tightly as we barrelled towards the latter.
Despite Jurgen's best attempts to disregard the uneven terrain on our approach to our target, I could tell that nothing short of a miracle from Him on Terra or one of His saints could save Goblin Slayer now. Even at the furious speed we were barring down at, disregarding the few shrubs and occasional patch of uneven terrain that rattled the fillings in my teeth whenever we drove over them, we wouldn't crush that xenos frakker until it had already parted my adventuring compatriot's head from his shoulders.
As the Trukk drove closer to the vermin Jurgen and I were determined to squash underneath our treads, it became painfully obvious that we were not going to make it in time before the Lord executed the boy. Even so, neither Jurgen nor I were in any mood to simply sit around doing frak all while it happened, my aide somehow managing to get our transport to go faster than it had before while I let out an ear splitting roar of 'WAAAAAAAAAAGH!' in an effort to distract the greenskin menace for even a second in the hopes it would be enough for us to save Goblin Slayer.
It should come to little surprise as, given how stressful the past few hours had been, in combination with the urgency I believed the situation in front of me was, that I had neglected to wonder about Priestess' whereabouts at that exact moment of time. From the way I saw it, she was in no immediate danger unlike Goblin Slayer. Whether that meant she was safe or already dead, I couldn't even begin to guess, but firmly wanted to believe the former over the latter knowing how surprisingly resourceful the girl could be at times.
It was only when an enormous barrier of light emerged from nothingness in between Goblin Slayer and the Lord and stopped the boy from being executed in front of me that I was far too relieved to panic about the consequences of the girl's uncanny timing to reveal her presence meant for me. Apparently, from what little I've been able to gleam from the after action reports filed by Priestess and Jurgen, as no one else has been willing to divulge the specifics of what happened immediately afterwards, the armored madman had been planning to get his arse handed to him on a golden platter so he could lure the Lord into the only means of guaranteeing a kill on the green bastard he could think of. My appearance to rescue him before he could pull off the finishing touches on his plan had apparently come as a shock to him, although I doubt it was greater than my initial horror at being faced with a frakking wall with no room to stop the Trukk in time.
I can't remember much of anything that happened afterwards until the next day when I was finally in the mood to piece together what exactly happened, but what little I do remember involves the tortured screaming of the Trukk's brakes, Priestess shouting something at Jurgen and I, and a brief moment of weightlessness as I was thrown from the Trukk as it crashed into the Protection miracle the girl cast before I too slammed into it without the added benefit of carapace helmet my aide was wearing before everything went black.
The first thing I realized upon waking up after falling unconscious from the crash was that I wasn't dead. The reason for this was the almost immobilizing wave of torment that washed over me as I raised myself off of the bed after having been apparently carried to my room while I was unconscious. The next was that, despite having escaped with my life, I had suffered more than a concussion as I inspected the sling my right arm was wrapped up in. The bindings were crude, effective, and had a distinct layer of grime that could only have come from Jurgen placing it on me. A cursory attempt to move my injured arm revealed exactly what I feared, that it was definitely broken and any attempt to adjust it would be rewarded with another shot of agony racing up the wounded limb.
I bit back a hiss of pain as best I could and slowly stood up and made my way to the door, staggering the entire way before I could prop myself against the wall with my good arm. I didn't know where Jurgen was, but I was ultimately thankful that the first thing I woke up to wasn't a breath full of his concentrated halitosis as he waited for me to regain my senses. Judging by the sounds of revelry coming from outside my room, I had a pretty good idea of where he was and why he wasn't being saddled with the mundane job of nursing me back to health tonight after having triumphed over impossible odds alongside me once again. Wanting to see if my aide was getting the credit he rightfully deserved and feeling that the best medication for my current sordid state of affairs was getting blackout drunk, I didn't hesitate to open up my door and see how far the Adventurers' Guild was into celebrating a job well done.
Unsurprisingly, the tavern area of the Guild was as lively as I had ever seen it. Kegs of various amasec were lined up against the wall where the entrance was located, no doubt delivered by Fox upon hearing about my success, many of which were likely empty given the number of voices drunkenly singing that blasted song some bard wrote about me a while ago. My own personal gripings about tonight's choice of entertainment aside, I was happy to see countless smiling faces milling about below the balcony railing outside of my room as I looked over the many adventurers who likely wouldn't have been here without my assistance as I scanned the crowd looking for my aide somewhere among them.
"Everyone, a toast!" I heard High Elf Archer shout as she stood up on a table, the rest of the crowd falling silent after having been given another reason to down a mug full of amasec or in the hopes of seeing her clothes revealing more than they already had, given how disheveled they had already become.
Apparently the xenos hadn't learned her lesson after the last time she got drunk. It was nothing another hangover or two wouldn't fix in time, but the state of her clothes made it difficult to look at her inhumanly slender features that would have ordinarily held my absolute attention, had they belonged to a human. Her fellow xenos wasn't much better, although she at least had enough presence of mind to make a token attempt to preserve her modesty while trying to pull her kinswoman down from the table with little success.
"To our victory, to the farm, to our city, to our adventurers, to the weirdo who's always going on about goblins, and to all the dummies who stay with him despite it all. Cheers!" She exclaimed, before chugging the contents of her mug in a single go and then promptly collapsing in a drunken stupor as her odd toast earned her a chorus of shouts and a couple of chuckles.
Although I wanted to raise my voice and argue against the last part of her declaration, I refrained from making a scene and instead followed the eyes of the crowd to see where Goblin Slayer and my other regular party members were. Unsurprisingly, they were sitting at our usual table in the corner in the back of the Guild alongside the other less human members of our party and Cow Girl who had apparently decided to join us for the celebration. I couldn't help but notice that Jurgen was strangely absent, until I peered down directly below me to see him sitting at the bar filling out paperwork for our quest alongside Guild Girl as the other adventurers kept a wide berth away from them. A small chuckle escaped my lips as I saw Spearman glaring at my aide, no doubt upset that the attentions of his crush were being stolen as he nursed his mug of amasec, oblivious to the affection stare of his partner who was all but draping her lascivious body on top of him.
It was as I was starting to make my way down to the ground floor so I could sample some of the amasec I had bought for everyone in advance that my appearance in the Guild had finally been noticed, and by none other than Priestess, which made stopping what came next all but impossible.
"I want to make a toast of my own too. To Goblin Slayer for letting us know about the Goblin Lord before anything too bad could happen." She said, occasionally stuttering and slurring her words in a way that made it painfully obvious that she had reached her limit of drinks some time ago as she raised her mug towards the armored fool beside her before directing it towards myself and Jurgen at the other end of the Guild, "And to Commissar Cain and Gunner Jurgen for being the ones to lead the defense of the farm and putting down the Goblin Lord."
With my already slim hopes of being able to drink myself unconscious dashed in an instant, I braced myself as a flock of adventurers composed of both experienced veterans and rookies alike surrounded me as they clamored for the tale of my heroics and congratulated me for doing frak all without knowing better.
I tried to brush aside their praise with my usual show of humility and attempt to downplay my own actions, but every attempt led to even wilder speculations and rumors of what transpired between me and the Goblin Lord, as well as those of the Chaos Astartes, grew wilder and wilder with each one I dismissed.
"Please, save your praise for someone who deserves it, like those of us who are not able to enjoy the spoils of our victory." I told them, hoping that turning the energetic air around me towards a more somber direction might allow me to make my way over to my companions in peace.
For a second, it actually worked, and I had only just managed to break free from the crowd before even more congratulations was thrown my way for recognizing the achievements of those that perished at the farm. Once again, my attempt to brush off the praise being sent my way only ended up with me showered in more of it. Ordinarily, I would have welcomed such appreciation of my nonexistent bravery, but tonight I simply couldn't be bothered to care about anything the hopeful fools were saying about me. I was just about to drop all pretenses of civility and tell my adoring fans to frak off for being so much of a nuisance that I couldn't enjoy so much as a simple drink to myself before a familiar odor greeted my nose, the sound of half-drunken dry heaving welcomed my ears, and the crowd parted with a sudden urgency as Jurgen started to clear a way for me with his presence alone.
"Alright, that's enough. You're bothering the commissar." Jurgen barked at the crowd, brandishing his meltagun in the least threatening way he could, which wasn't saying much given it was a melta he was holding. "Let him make his way over to our party in peace."
Whether it was out of a desire to appease my aide, escape his noxious scent, or from being convinced through his words alone, as unlikely as the latter was, a path to Goblin Slayer, Priestess, and the others soon cleared out and allowed me to hobble my way over to them in relative peace. Jurgen, as observant and ready to assist me as ever, subtly wrapped an arm around my back and made a token attempt to push away at the crowd on our sides as he let me use him as a support to lean against until I was finally able to take a seat at the table across from Goblin Slayer, Priestess, and Cow Girl, the latter of which were staring at me in a mixture of guilt and awe.
Priestess' reaction was fully expected, if unwarranted. The girl no doubt felt responsible for my injuries, and from what little both she and Jurgen were willing to divulge with me in the next few weeks, coming uncomfortably close to killing me with that miracle she cast to save Goblin Slayer. As for Cow Girl, her attention was split mostly between the man she had apparently known since they were children and the young blonde clinging to him in a way that would have been suggestive if anyone other than Priestess I was doing it. The brief look that she did shoot me, conflicted as it was, gave me all the thanks I needed from her for the part I played in saving her farm, not that it stopped her from voicing them anyways.
"Hey, Commissar Cain, I just wanted to say thank you for everything you did for us today. Not just me and Uncle, but them too." She said as she nodded her head towards my two party members, giggling as she watched Priestess try to help Goblin Slayer from hurting himself as I finally noticed he was wearing a sling not unlike my own.
"Oh please, even if you weren't a friend of Goblin Slayer, I would have done everything I did for you and more." I told her, emphasizing the word 'friend', making it all too clear what I thought about their relationship and causing the buxom girl to blush at my teasing, "And since we are friends, whether thanks to everything that has happened or through our mutual acquaintances, please stop with all of that 'Commissar' nonsense and just call me Cain."
"Oh? Okay, C-cain." Cow Girl said, her blush getting slightly brighter as she nervously called me by name rather than using the nickname the local culture insisted she address me by.
"See, how hard was that?" I chuckled as her blush deepened even more.
"Anyways, if you'd excuse me." I continued, adopting a more business-like tone and addressed everyone at our table as I stared down Goblin Slayer and Priestess, "I would like to have a word with these two in private for a moment."
"Hah hah, sure thing, Commissar Cain. Be sure to come find me when you're done. I've got a little something to share with you if you're in the mood for some real drinks." The Squat said as he gestured to the gourd tied to his waist, no doubt filled to the brim with that delectable Squat made amasec I had come to adore as of late.
Lizard Priest followed his abhuman companion as he departed, only to make a slight detour to assist Half-Elf Scout pick up High Elf Archer from the table she had passed out on. Cow Girl looked conflicted about leaving, no doubt too worried to leave her crush's side, but a quick nod of Goblin Slayer's helmet was all it took to convince her that he would be fine without her. Jurgen almost joined the others, but I quickly stopped him from leaving his seat before he could depart.
"Not you, Jurgen." I told him, trying my best not to show my annoyance at the way both Goblin Slayer and Priestess had started to sit straight up and how much the latter was trembling, "I'll need you after I'm done talking to these two."
"C-c-cain." The girl stammered, "I am so, so sorry about-"
"About giving me all the credit for saving the day?" I interrupted before she could make a scene or make me feel guilty if she started crying. "Well, you should be since all we did was run the bloody Goblin Lord over when you did all the hard work of setting up a trap for it and clearing out its nest while it was away."
Priestess and Goblin Slayer both wore a dumbfounded expression upon realizing I wasn't going to chew them out for the disaster today's quest had turned out to be… for now. That could come later, and although today was meant to be a day of celebration, there were still a few matters I wanted to go over with them so I could fully enjoy myself without worrying about anything else trying to kill me tonight.
"You're… not mad?" Goblin Slayer asked, sounding unsure as to whether or not I was taking the frak with him.
"Oh, I am still PLENTY mad about you forcing me to take up the defense of your home without giving me any warning." I fired back, unable to help myself from smiling a little bit at the way he flinched knowing there was another lengthy lecture in his future, "But that can wait for later. The party for our success, on the other hand, well we only have one night to celebrate before we have to wait for our wounds to heal so we might as well make the most of it."
"After the two of you kindly explain to me why the crowd behind me made it sound like I slayed the Goblin Lord in single combat, that is." I explained, gesturing to the few idiots who were still looking to ask me to regale them with a fabricated tale of my heroics, who were thankfully being kept a safe distance away from me by either my aide's ever present odor or the fact he had yet to let his meltagun out of his grasp.
"Oh, right. That." Priestess sheepishly laughed.
I waited for her to explain herself further, only to witness the girl try to hide underneath her hat out of embarrassment as I looked to her for an answer that didn't come. Thankfully Goblin Slayer, as blunt as ever, came to both of our rescue.
"It's because you killed the Goblin Lord." He stated, as if it were only natural that the work he went to cutting off the Lord's escape route or clearing out the remainder of its forces was hardly worth mentioning when we both knew that was a load of groxshit.
"Really?" I asked, unwilling to believe what I was hearing for a moment.
"Y-yes, Cain. We told them the truth, that you and Jurgen crushed the Goblin Lord when you came to find us." Priestess elaborated when it became clear that the armored idiot at her side wasn't going to be giving up any more details without being forced to, "I… don't really know why, but for some reason they all got the idea that you fought the Lord in a duel and beat it even after we explained what really happened."
I pinched the bridge of my nose with my good hand as I came to the obvious conclusion as to what likely transpired when those two gave their account of what happened to the Goblin Lord. "And let me guess, the more you tried to explain what really happened, the more modest they thought you were being on my behalf?" I inquired, knowing full well how a little bit of humility went a long way into making people see your actions as being far more altruistic and impressive than they actually were.
"Yep." Jurgen answered for them, having grown as accustomed to this cycle of inflating my overblown reputation as much as I had and, Emperor bless his simple minded naivety, still believing I was every bit the stalwart hero everyone else saw me as despite it all.
"Maybe they would listen to you if you told them what happened from your perspective?" Priestess suggested, looking slightly baffled as to why I didn't sound too happy about stealing the spotlight from the real hero beside her.
"I'd try it if I didn't know it wasn't bound to make things worse." I shrugged as I forced a smile.
"Huh?" The girl sputtered in confusion.
"You'd be surprised the kinds of things people will say you are capable of the more you try to deny the rumors they make about you, or how much credit they'll give you compared to your partners when the people you work with look like they sleep in their own filth whenever they're not on the job." I carried on as I gestured towards Goblin Slayer, "No offense, by the way."
"None taken." Jurgen answered for the armored fool, who only bothered to nod in acknowledgement of my statement than make any attempt to refute it.
If I didn't know any better, I'd say he was happier being able to live without worrying about the spotlight and notoriety that came with the fame of my own reputation weighing down on him. Having come to know the boy quite well in the short time I had been adventuring with him, I had a feeling that he had intentionally left out his own contributions in his fight against the Goblin Lord for this very reason. A person could hardly be expected to fight as many goblins as they pleased when they had as overly glamorized a reputation for heroics as myself.
"Well, I suppose that answers that question then." I said, as I finally took a draw from my mug and savored its fragrant aroma before the strong flavor assaulted my lips, "But there's still one thing I want to know."
"What's that?" Priestess asked, sounding far more relaxed than she had previously now that she knew I wasn't angry with her.
"Where the hell is the help I sent for when Goblin Slayer told us about the army of goblins coming for us?" I wondered aloud.
As if on cue for the delivery to the punchline for the worst joke imaginable, the clamor of numerous hooves and armored bodies reached my ears from outside the Guild. I instinctively dropped my mug, not caring that I had spilled the contents of it all over my greatcoat, as I used my good arm to bring up my laspistol and aim it at the door so I could greet whoever or whatever barged through them appropriately.
You can only imagine my shock when, instead of another bunch of goblins or marauding Heretic Astartes, a pudgy man in the gaudiest suit of golden armor I had the displeasure of laying eyes on since arriving on this backwater planet waddled into the Guild with a familiar face following our prospective savior closely behind. The gilded figure looked at the festivities he had interrupted in apparent confusion as the young woman behind him, none other than Noble Fencer, whose expression quickly soured as she turned her attention to the man in front of her.
"I told you we were going to be late if we waited for you to find your armor before coming here, father." She chided the armored figure.
The rotund knight chose that exact moment to remove his helmet to reveal the chubby, sweat stained face of Frontier Town Governor who looked moments away from passing out from whatever rigorous effort it took for him to don a set of heavy armor that, upon further inspection, looked a dozen or so kilos too small for him. The man visibly brightened up as he unclasped the tortured piece of leather used to keep his chest piece where it should be as it clattered to the floor and presumably stopped cutting off his circulation.
"Well… shit." The nobleman cursed in between gasps, before scanning the crowd and locking eyes with me.
"Ah, Commissar Cain! I guess I have you to thank for me and my men no longer being required to ensure my territory's safety?" He guessed.
"So it would seem, Lord Governor." I replied, unsure of how exactly to address him.
"Ah, forget the formalities, my friend. Anyone who saves my daughter, to say nothing of the people I am sworn to look after, in my absence is someone I would be pained to treat as anything other than my equal." He said as he made his way over to the open seat beside me, maintaining a good distance from my aide as he passed by Jurgen.
"If you insist." I shrugged, unable to discern why he was insistent on acting so informally with me despite having only completed a single quest for him, "With that said, I think it might be best to put any men you brought with you to work and have them keep watch alongside Frontier Town's Guards in case anything else happens tonight."
"But of course. I've already told them just that until I give them further instructions of what they will be doing tonight." He informed me, genuinely surprising me with how there was more than just thoughts of stuffing himself full with rich food and amasec in that pudgy little head of his.
Maybe he wasn't nearly as much of an incompetent fool as I initially believed him to be.
"In any case, since I'm already here and am in need of a quest report to know exactly what happened here, why don't you share your exploits of what happened? I'd much rather get a first hand account from the Hero of Frontier Town himself than whatever basics the paper pushers feel I should know." Frontier Town Governor requested before flagging down Padfoot Waitress to bring all of us another round of amasec.
"See what I was talking about?" I asked Priestess and Goblin Slayer, harkening back to my previous discussion with them.
The young girl let out a chuckle that was met with confusion by her peer, Noble Fencer, as Goblin Slayer nodded as if I had given him some sort of sagely insight rather than having some fun at Frontier Town Governor's expense.
"See what now?" The man asked, oblivious to how he was more than likely going to end up doing more for my image after tonight than I could ever hope to achieve for myself as I started to recount a lightly embellished account of everything that happened at the Farm and with the Goblin Lord as my audience sat in rapt attention, listening to my every word and never doubting even the wildest claim I made until the very end, when I excused myself under the pretense of getting some rest so I could recover from my injuries faster.
None of them, not even my own companions native to this planet, doubted my tale, and why should they? To them, I was every bit the hero the bards and Guild made me out to be. Who was I to crush the illusions they had woven for themselves, outside of giving them much more grounded expectations of what I could do when working alongside them?
It was with the heavily misguided thought that this was the worst I could possibly hope to encounter on this planet being taken care of by my own hand that I was able to drift off into a pleasant amasec fueled slumber until the inevitable consequences of drinking as much as I had that night came to rear their ugly head when I woke up the next morning. Had I known just how wrong I was, I don't think I would have slept quite as peacefully knowing what I knew was lurking on this planet far enough away that, while it wouldn't be a problem for me in the present, the same could not be said about the trouble I would run into in the distant future.
Author's Corner:
Quite unsurprisingly, Cain has once again triumphed over impossible odds and saved yet another no name settlement from total annihilation. As if anyone here was expecting something different to happen.
Sarcasm aside, I want to give an update about what will be happening in regards to this story for a moment. To be as brief as possible, I will be putting this story on hiatus for at a while, somewhere around six months I'd say, and continue to focus on my other ongoing story and possibly entertain one or two of the other ideas that have been floating around in my head on an irregular basis so I can finally force them out of my mind and focus on writing this one again. This story will not be abandoned as I do not rely on an unhealthy amount of self-loathing for inspiration like another certain story of mine, so don't fear...
CAIN WILL RETURN.
Almost everyone: (On the unabashed Astartes slaughter)
In a 'fair' fight between an Astartes and an unaugmented human without plasma weaponry or other powerful armaments, there is no possible way the human should win by W40K standards. This is why I want to remind everyone here of one of the events of one of the segments featured in Intermission- Promotions and Premonitions. Those berserkers Cain fought were not fresh off of the drop pod, far from it, especially in the case of the one that died fighting insectoid monstrosities the day prior.
Also, spoiler warning for light novel 12 chapter 5, but a Chaos Marine, specifically an undead/Chaos corrupted blueberry boy, makes an appearance and is taken down by a party of 3 silver ranked adventurers. If a couple of adventurers can take down an Ultramarine, undead or not, I think twice that number can survive a brief encounter with a Khornate Berserker.
The Disquieting One: would've preferred Tyranids, honestly, but I suppose no one has the kind of firepower to stop that. hell, maybe some of the GS gods could actually be Chaos Gods in disguise
May I once again refer you to the previously referenced chapter in case you are curious as to why certain elements of the story seem odd or have not made an appearance in the main story yet? Things are more closely related than they might initially appear and I have not forgotten about these fellas. Not in the slightest.
And about your Chaos Gods theory… the manga seems to entertain that idea as well.
longlongmaaan: It would be incredibly funny if, by the time Cain and everyone got where GS and priestess are, they find them all fine and dandy, not even knowing the chaos marines were a thing.
You weren't too terribly far off here. Wouldn't exactly call Goblin Slayer's position 'fine'... but it was certainly better than Cain's by the time the Goblin Lord was dealt with.
Well, that's it for me… for a while. Thank you all for supporting this story for as long as you have and I will see y'all again in the future. Until then, cheers.
