Dungeon of Niflheim

“Master, we’ve run into some trouble.” Sounds of combat and frantic grunts could be heard all around Findlay as he spoke. The offensive team under Findlay was ambushed by a large group of goblins and the situation was rather dire.

A couple minutes earlier

As they travelled throughout the caves, the offensive team split up whenever they met a fork in the road so as to save time in mapping the room. The main group with Findlay eventually came upon a large cavern wherein he could finally stretch his back and stand tall. Unfortunately, the ceiling was high for a reason.

“Huuuuuuuu” Findlay took in a deep breath as he stretched to his full height, his shoulders cracking as he did. Grateful for the opportunity to feel unrestricted in his movements. Being forced to constantly crouch and frequently bash your head on uneven, rocky outcrops was not pleasant. Therefore, when Findlay reached the large cavern like space, he instantly took advantage of the free space. His troops though slightly less after splitting up at a few forks in the road were still quite a force to be reckoned with, so he felt no need to be that cautious, believing that whatever attacked them could be endured with their current numbers or even be beaten back. This wasn’t just blind optimism or arrogance, Findlay’s own strength along with the number of E-rank monsters by his side made this almost assured. Shame that Gobuske wasn’t one for attacking through regular methods, especially not in this room.

They’d been attacked in ambushes a fair few times and although Findlay’s team suffered little damage the attackers suffered less. The small annoying and intricate tunnels that spread throughout the room allowed the goblins to attack and retreat at any time. As time went on it seemed as though Gobuske was learning and becoming more adept in his attacks, not good news for Findlay, but for the moment manageable.

In such a large cavern Findlay could see none of these small tunnels and couldn’t help but breath deeply in relief but he didn’t let his guard down.

“Everyone move out and keep your eyes and ears open!” Findlay loudly ordered as he led the vanguard, ready to dish out some mayhem. The frost dwarves with their heavy duty shields had half their numbers at the front and half at the back, protecting the squishier monsters in the middle. The large group moved in a march, not too quickly and not too slowly. They kept their guards up, weapons held close and bodies tense. Their eyes watching for any sign of movement, particularly low to the ground where most ambushes happened to them. This however was a mistake.

Suddenly once the majority of the offensive team were in the cavern, Findlay heard something in the distance, the twang of bows, and a lot of them.

.....

“Shit! ambush!” He roared and tried to give orders to his squad but was too late, the arrows arrived, piercing into a bunch of his soldiers. A couple goblins even lost their lives instantly.

“Shields up!” Findlay quickly gave the order and all the frost dwarves, and the goblins (those that had them) raised their shields in the air, forming something akin to a turtle formation, protecting the other monsters and themselves from the deluge of arrows. However, the damage was already done, 2 monsters dead for sure and another 5 or 6 injured, a rather heavy loss for a single volley.

The ambushers didn’t stop and continued to launch their arrows towards them, but the shields held true, blocking several arrows each.

Findlay given his strength didn’t need to block or even avoid the arrows, as long as they didn’t hit his eyes or other vulnerable places, they wouldn’t cause any damage. He stood up tall and watched from where they were attacked. On either side of the cavern was a tall ridge with no access from their current location. He could see close to twenty goblin archers, ten either side, firing from up high, increasing their arrows penetrative strength.

Crack!

He grabbed an incoming arrow and crushed it in his hand while looking towards the ridge line with anger. The distance was substantial both in height and length, getting to these archers would prove difficult, he’d likely lose a great many men only for the archers to retreat into their tunnels.

“Dammit, hold the line, I’ll be back!” Findlay gave orders to the frost dwarf that acted as his second in command before launching himself towards a set of archers.

“[Ice bolt],” he summoned his magic for the first time in this war, two large ice bolts were summoned before him and flew through the air at his targets. The goblin archers, though shocked by Findlay using magic to attack them from a distance were prepared. Before the bolts reached two of the goblin archers they dodged to side, narrowly escaping death all while a hob goblin -likely the leader- spoke to a couple strange looking goblins by his side. The same happened on the other ridge. 4 strange looking goblins came up to the ridge line, each cloaked in dark robes that gave off a strong medicinal smell. Their mouths were covered in some sort of mask, and they had mad looks in their eyes. Held by the four were large, rounded flasks with some sort of green liquid inside.

Findlay couldn’t tell what it was but felt that it was dangerous, he picked up speed and casted another ice bolt, aiming now for these two goblins in front of him.

“[Ice bolt]” at the same time he casted his magic the four goblins tossed their malicious looking flasks into the air. The two in front clearly aiming for Findlay while the two at the other ridge aimed for a group of frost dwarves.

These two goblins weren’t quite so lucky as the archers, Findlay ice bolt skewered the two of them, launching their bodies into the back wall and the two flasks launched at him were shattered by his axe before touching his body.

The green liquid spilled out to the ground, smoking, and sizzling on contact, it released a strong gas. Findlay breathed in some of the gas and his face instantly blanched.

‘Poison.’ with rapid movement he retreated away from the green puddle. His troops were in danger. Though his body could mitigate the effects given his strength his soldiers wouldn’t be so lucky.

Smash smash

The two flasks of the other strange looking goblins landed on the shields of some frost dwarves, the liquid quickly pooling down and landing on their bodies, releasing a foul smell.

“Ahhhhhhhh!” The frost dwarves whose bodies’ were in contact with the stuff started to scream in pain. The green liquid felt like acid on their skin, burning them. Those nearby breathed in the fumes and started coughing violently as the gas burned their lungs and oesophagus. They were forced to lower they shields and a weak point in their formation opened up, exactly what the hob goblin leaders were hoping for. They both gave the order, and the goblin archers continued their barrage, focusing on where the two flasks landed. While the remaining weird goblins moved back into cover, their job was done.

The next volley of arrows all landed in the general vicinity of the flask’s landing point. The two dwarves screaming in pain were quickly silenced as were another two frost dwarves who were holding their throats in pain. Four E-rank monsters dead just like that.

Findlay grinded his teeth together as he quickly jumped in front of the arrows and activated his skill.

“[Slash]” a beam of energy escaped from his axe and slashed apart the oncoming arrows like they were fragile twigs.

“Retreat, full retreat!” He quickly ordered his forces to fall back from the cavern back to the tunnels, that way they’d be out of view of the archers.

Back to real time

“I see, so you’re hunkered down at the moment unable to proceed?” Frost listened to Findlay’s report and frowned as he heard what happened. He really wasn’t a fan of poison and had little to no counters for such things.

“For now, yes, the archers are too high up for anyone but me to get to so until I can take them out, we’re stuck here.” Findlay replied with a clenched fist. He just lost a good chunk of his forces while only being able to kill two opponents before having to sound the retreat.

“How are those that were infected with the poison? Will they live?”

“The worst of the bunch were killed by arrow fire, the remaining afflicted were far enough that they only lightly inhaled the fumes. They’re coughing and, in some pain, but that’ll ware off.”

“Good, you did well to order a swift retreat. Having them exposed to that poison for any longer would have resulted in a much more serious situation.” Frost nodded and praised Findlay for his quick thinking. “What about you? are you alright?” Findlay took in a strong whiff of the stuff, yet he seemed fine.

“I’m alright master, thank you. My body is strong enough to fight the stuff, only got a light tickling in my throat, nothing else.” Findlay tried to appear confident and determined but his anxiety and shame could be seen in his eyes. He felt he let Frost down, that he was too arrogant and caused the deaths of his soldiers.