Chapter 1
Dirty, filthy job but it's gotta be done
Malachite and I staggered back home after weeks, or perhaps hours, or perhaps simply moments of fighting off the hobgoblin hoard that roused us that night. It was hard to say, as exhausted as I was how long it had taken, but at least it was finally over. The townspeople were safe, and we were headed home. Hanz, our remnant companion, merrily marched at our side, not feeling the effects of organic fatigue as we "ugly bags of mostly water" did. (Their words, not mine) Snarly, our youngest and smallest member scampered behind them, not having seen much action at all. He was strictly a close combat fighter and with all the options we had for keeping enemies from even getting to the top of the wall, he had little to do. It was fine, he wasn't put in danger and could at least be seen as there and ready to help.
We had been snuggled in bed after our date night- that is Malachite and I- when the alarm bells around the city started going off, and we reluctantly got up again to go see what was the matter. I expected a khi'teen attack at long last, in retaliation for what I had done to one of their encampments some weeks ago. But no. I had been surprised to see hobgoblins instead of the bug people at the walls, and took my place as a city defender. I was pleased to see Solara there as well, who nodded to me and went back to calling lighting down on the hapless creatures.
I'm glad she took my advice and brushed up on her combat magic. I expected Gloom cultists or elemental demons not just these little guys but it's good practice because believe you me, something like that still is in the realm of possibility.
We then spent a hectic and terrifying however-long-it-was defending the city. Hanz somewhat gleefully picking off hobgoblins one by one with their now- thanks to my magic- limitless beam weapon, while I rained arrows and spells down upon them thanking the angels that hobgoblins were not considered "one of God's creatures." I.e. they didn't have souls. They could be killed by the hundreds without even the merest twinge of guilt, long considered to be pests the civilized world could do without. Malachite meanwhile swooped and slashed, breathing fire and pouncing on foes like a dragon would. Our only interaction during the whole thing was when he swooped up to me and landed nearby.
"Do the thing!" he gleefully instructed.
"The thing?" I wondered, using my telekinesis spell to hurl several arrows away from me into the crowd of hobgoblins far below us. "I don't know of any thing you could want me to do."
"The fire thing, you know! Boom!"
"What, down there?" I asked, aghast.
"Sure. What do you think I've been doing, setting all those fires for?"
"Malachite, please. In the first place if I do that now everyone is going to know it was me that blew up that khi'teen encampment. I have enough problems, I still hear talk in the city about it, how the mage responsible should be found and questioned to make sure I'm not some dangerous lunatic running around. In the second I don't know if my magic would reach. Third I'm not disguised, it's bad enough I'm out here as myself, it's dark enough no one will get a good look, and forth if it hits the walls it could set them on fire and then we would have much larger problems!"
"Boy, you sure know how to take the fun out of things."
"Fun?" Is that what this is?
"With your 'logical reasons' that are probably well thought out and perfectly valid so I can't argue against them. Fine, no big fireballs for me tonight."
"You want great balls of fire, cultivate a mana core of your own and learn the spell," I told him. "I told you that you could if you wanted, and that I would help. Then it's your head on the line if it goes wild and something bad happens." Like you hit someone you love with it, and they aren't suddenly immune to fire like a certain someone turned out to be. I can still feel the terror I had in that moment, when I thought I had lost you to my own carelessness. Don't you see that?
He snorted. "Great balls of fire, good one."
"Just get out there." I planted a kiss on the side of his face and shoved him over the wall again. Of course he was pure muscle and I had the arms of a sapling, but he laughed and let me shove him.
"It really was like the days of old," Hanz remarked.
I tried to perk up enough to follow what they were saying. "What's that?"
"Tonight. It was almost as if my batteries were not degraded, allowing me to use my weapon as I did before the change. I really am grateful for that spell combination of yours."
"Oh sure, not a problem," I told them. "I'll refresh it in the morning, don't let me forget."
"I've already set three thousand reminders. Perhaps I could scale it back to only two thousand, I hated those pop-ups back in the day it's no different now. Perhaps one every few minutes is sufficient?"
"Whatever. Ah, we're home." I unlocked my own front door with my key and everyone shuffled into the main room. That little thrill still hadn't worn off, even at this early hour.
"Ah, are you, uh, going to, that is..." Malachite pointed to his room.
"Just get some sleep, big guy," I told him with a playful shove. "You're hard enough to wake up in the morning as it is. We'll talk 'arrangements' when I'm not dead on my feet. I'm going to my own bed for now."
"That's probably for the best," he agreed.
"Good nith all," Snarly told us, heading to his own room. "Thee you in tha morninth."
"We're doing the sewer thing tomorrow," I reminded everyone. "We've put that off long enough."
Malachite just groaned.
"More work?" Hanz said in a deep voice. "Move here, move there." They laughed as if they told the funniest joke in the world, though none of us did. "Nobody understands my jokes anymore!" they complained.
After a very late breakfast we got ambitious enough to head to the sewer and investigate reports of an infestation of slime creatures and general contamination of wells in the area. We headed down, smelling a different foul odor than the usual one- Snarly. I was disguised as a frog person, at least while we walked around the streets heading to the entrance the guard captain had told us about, but dropped it once entering the sewers. Reports were the area was clear of people, thanks to the slime creatures, so probability was low anyone would see me. My spiky headed "glory" returned, and I flipped a stone disk into the air and caught it.
"Light," I intoned dramatically, because that's simply what one did in times like this. The symbol on the disk vanished, and a ball of light behind my shoulder winked into existence. "Let's get this over with." At my back, Boline and Besom, the summons that I had called upon back at the house nodded and went invisible behind me.
We headed down a narrow stone passageway, the light as we moved revealing two rather large snakes in our way. Malachite took the lead, jumping in front and lighting the place up with fire. Is that the smartest thing to do, in a sewer? I managed to think but we didn't get blown to pieces and the snakes slithered off, further down the corridor. We saw them again, joined by their fellow snake brothers around a corner, but all took off when they saw Malachite. They weren't stopped by the grating that was there, but we were, so we backtracked and headed further on.
"There," Hanz told us, pointing. On the ceiling was our target, a pair of bright green slime creatures, or gumdrops hanging there, waiting to drop unto unsuspecting prey. Malachite lit them up with fire, causing them to drop.
"I think you missed," Hanz reported, firing their weapon. It punched through the poor thing and it slumped to the side. With a bit of reluctance I cast my wind needle spell on the other, wishing we could simply capture them somehow and take them outside the city. But who knows how many are down here? It jiggled as it was hit by two needles, but still went to attack Malachite. He jumped back a little and breathed fire again, clearly not wanting to engage the thing physically.
Ah, that's smart. I think they're slightly acidic, even he could be hurt getting that slime stuff on him, and I don't know if my repair spell would help his blade if some got on it.
It too went still.
We were now facing a choice, as there was a wall in front of us. A strange place for one, the sewer ran directly next to it so we could see around it easily.
"So phasing magic, or do you want to want to brave the sewer water?" I asked.
"Phasing!" everyone shouted. I stuck a finger in my ear and wiggled it.
"Okay, okay, you don't have to shout." I mentally willed the light around the passage as it couldn't exactly phase though the wall- or could it? I actually had no idea! But with it on the other side we would be prepared so I just left it, vowing to experiment with that a bit later. With everyone grabbing on we easily passed through the wall to the other side. Boline simply flying around and Besom not caring if they got a bit of sewer water on them. Right into a group of snakes, of course, which added to the gumdrop problem on this side of the wall. Malachite again breathed fire at them, trying to scare them off or actually kill them I wasn't sure, as he missed either way. I figured I would at least try to get them moving and thrust a palm foward. "Thrust!" I cast, making one skid down the tunnel and turn to leave. Hanz meanwhile had lasered one of the gumdrops that was making its way over to us, and Snarly hit one of the snakes that was nearby with the flat of his blade. "Go on, git!" he shouted, pointing. "We done wanna hurtcha!"
Suddenly, Besom appeared further ahead and shot magic down the corridor. It impacted something, as I heard a cry and shouting from down there.
"What's she shooting at?" Hanz asked.
"We better go check!"
They headed over there, taking the lead and pointing their weapon down there.
"Hobgoblins, three of them!"
Left over from the attack? Did they try to get into the city this way and are now hiding out down here?
"Better take care of them!" Malachite decided.
"Agreed."
"Wait!" shouted Snarly, but Malachite was already taking a deep breath. He expelled a gout of flame in that direction, filling the small space and the tortured cries of the hobgoblins echoed past us.
"What did you say?" he asked as the flames subsided.
"Somethinths not right!"
It looked right to me. Instead of counting three hobgoblins I counted two, it seemed in the narrow space of that corridor one had simply been incinerated. The other two were thrashing around, various parts of them on fire. It seemed one snake was wounded, the other was getting up again from where it had been flattened to the ground, missing the flames entirely. It seemed ready for more so while the one next to it slithered past us and headed to the trench with the water in it, Besom and I hit the other with a knockout blast. Besom of course because that's her only real attack, and me figuring the snake wasn't evil or anything. There was no reason it had to die down here.
"Whatever," Malachite told him, as he rushed off towards the hobgoblins. He slashed at the snake, scoring on it, but not cutting all that deeply.
Come on, first bears, now giant snakes? What's causing all these animals to get so huge?
We both fired our spells off again, and finally the snake collapsed to the side.
"Passageway is clear of gumdrops to the end," Hanz announced, walking back to us. "We can't go any further that way anyway. What's he doing?" They pointed to Snarly, who was trying to drag one of the hobgoblins towards the water.
"Help me put tha fire out," he insisted.
Malachite shrugged, took a few steps, grabbed both of the hobgoblins and tossed them into the sewage. "Happy?"
"Yeth. Now we juth have to wake them up."
"May I inquire as to why?" Hanz asked.
"They didn't 'eem thurprithed to see us, they 'eemed to be waiting for us," he explained.
"Interesting." Their head swiveled towards the door. "I hear voices beyond. Perhaps we should go around the corner? They may be more hesitant to attack if they find their guards missing, perhaps their assumption would be they simply stepped away for a moment. Finding us here standing over the bodies of their comrades would goad them into attacking to avenge their fallen."
"Well I'm not touching them," Malachite announced. "Look where they've been."
"You put 'em there!" Snarly protested.
"Yeah, because you said to!"
"Never mind," I told them both, raising my hands. "It's a simple matter, really." I dragged them out with magic and we all went around the corner to look them over. Casting a quick hygiene spell on both it didn't look good. One had both arms completely gone, it seemed he tried to block the flames that way and they took the brunt of the damage. What was left was charred flesh, ending at the elbow. The other had sensibly dropped flat, but perhaps not fast enough as his face was all messed up.
"What can you do?" Snarly asked. "I thried a healith potion on tha one." He pointed to the arm guy.
"I would need some kind of regeneration spell," I mused. "Healing now may at least save him, but even that may be beyond me." I'll tackle the one with the head wound first. He's probably worse off, the head being fairly important after all. I pulled ambient mana through my core and started casting, taking as much time as I could.
"What do you think it means, hobgoblins here?" Hanz asked.
"That attack just happened," Malachite reminded them. "They probably got past our defenses and came down here. They could have seen us on the wall, Orchid's magic does light things up pretty well, especially at night. And your weapon draws attention too."
"I suppose you gave them little time to react. Perhaps that is the whole story. They recognized us from our time on the wall, and would have simply retreated had we given them the chance."
"I guess we'll see."
I finished my spell and the flesh, at least most of it, reformed smoothy. He started waking up, and panicked, gibbering at us in orc or whatever language they used.
Snarly tried saying something to him, but it didn't sound like the same language, and he didn't get any more calm.
"We don't want to hurt ham?" Malachite asked, a confused look on his face. "I could go for some ham, is it lunch time yet..."
We just ate before coming down here!
"Hurt him!" Snarly snapped. "I thaid him, not ham!"
"No you didn't."
"Yeth I did! My draconic ith perfeth."
"It's barely recognizable. And I don't think they speak that?"
Ugh. I went over to the other one while they squabbled.
"Perhaps communicating with this one is our current priority?" Hanz suggested. "Calm him down, and whatnot?"
I shook my head. "In a second. I put that spell on and my healing effectiveness will go down. I'm going to need all the help I can get on this one. Just keep him quiet so I can concentrate."
"A difficult proposition, nevertheless I shall attempt it." They went over to the other one as well, trying to block his view, as the guy went crazy when I bent over to start healing his buddy. Again gathering ambient mana I cast, hoping I didn't backfire the spell and get myself hurt. The energies faded, and he didn't seem any better off. "Yeah, that's going to be a problem," I muttered. "Oh boy. Okay, okay, shut up already!" I turned back to the hobgoblin, who was being held down by Hanz while squealing and carrying on like he was being tortured. "He'll probably be the least threatened by you, Snarly," I decided. "Why don't you talk to him? The spell is touched based so come here." I held out a hand, reminding myself to do a quick hygiene again after this on myself, and with my other hand gestured for the translation spell. He touched me and I finished casting it, (a whole minute later) so he turned back to the captured, struggling little creature.
"Can you understand me now?" he asked.
"Yes I can!" the hobgoblin cried, ceasing to struggle. "Is Uglurk dead?"
"I don't know, who is Urgurk?"
"I am Grekgrek!"
"That's great, who is Urgurk?"
"Not Urgurk, he died in attack. Uglurk!"
"You mean that one?" He pointed to the other one.
"Yes. Where Urskip? Did he go tell others about hobgoblin saver arrival?"
"Uhh, yes? He must have, right? Orchid, is that one dead?"
"I think he's still breathing? He's in bad shape though."
"Yeah, his arms are off," Hanz remarked. "From now on he'll have to bite kneecaps."
"What that metal one say?"
"Never mind. He's not dead. What are you doing here?"
"Looking for hobgoblin saver. And now I find! Hurray! Now all can go home."
"What do you mean, savior?" he demanded. "You mean in the diamond mine? We saved you from that orc?"
"Orc orc!" grunted Hanz. "Orc orc orc orc… Orc."
Snarly rolled his eyes.
"No no," protested Grekgrek. "Groglorg saw mighty hero. Tell all tribe not to attack big person city when home lost, but all tribe not listen. Only us few. Tribe attack big person city, all get killed. Now have no home and no tribe. But savior real! Can get home back!"
"You mean Malachite, or Hanz?" Snarly pointed to each of them in turn. "Or I guess Orchid here?"
The hobgoblin looked at him like he was crazy. "Talking about you, savior, of course! You mighty warrior! Save what is left of tribe! Go see Groglorg, he tell you!"
I stifled a laugh as best I could. Wait, who?
"What's so funny?" Malachite demanded. "What's going on?"