By nightfall the goblin’s memories had led me to the outskirts of the camp. There was a small fence surrounding it and several pikes stuck into the ground with the heads of goblins, wild dogs, and a few humans stuck on top of them. I removed my shield and began sticking several sturdy sharpened sticks into the ground in front of me, along with some daggers, spears and crude clubs I’d looted from the goblin ambushers.

Finally, I removed my left hand and placed it next to my shield. I focused my attention on it for a few moments and it stood itself up, balancing on fingers like a five legged spider. I gently lowered one of the small spears into the gauntlet's opening and stored it where it could be easily accessed. I then placed the sharpened stakes and other weapons into the opening where the gauntlet had been. Finally I strapped the shield to my arm in such a way that my missing hand was hidden.

Dividing my attention between my main body and my hand was surprisingly easy. It wasn’t that I’d separated myself into two, instead it simply felt like two parts that were both wholly me. I walked on my fingers under the fence and into the camp. Then I started working my way in a circle, counting goblins as I went. Eventually I moved more towards the center. The camp was surprisingly orderly. The outside defenses were patrolled by goblins in pairs, the tents and storage were toward the center of the encampment where there was also a small storehouse of weapons and food.

As I made my way deeper into the camp, staying hidden became more difficult. The center was dense with goblins. Some were fighting, others sleeping, but a few that seemed larger and better equipped than the others were standing guard with far more proficiency than I’d expected from their kind.

After dodging around a group that seemed to be doing their best to pull one another’s teeth out I came to the tent in the center. It was large and made up of thick tan canvas and capable of holding as many as twenty goblins, though I guessed it was meant only for their leader. It’s opening was flanked on both sides by guards wearing genuine chainmail of medium quality. Above the tent was a banner of a golden dragon on a green field. Something about it drew my attention. It was familiar to me, but a cursory search of my memories brought only an impression of power and fear.

“What’s that?” said a high pitched voice behind me in undercommon, followed by a few other words I didn’t recognize. I must’ve picked up a bit of vocabulary from the goblin raider whose head I ate. I looked around and saw two goblins approaching, their eyes wide with curiosity and dripping with malice.

I scurried away, careful to avoid drawing any more attention and headed down an alley between the lordly tent and two smaller ones. The goblins followed me, arguing over whether they were about to enjoy some fresh rat or fresh spider. I drew them further away from the center of camp and was grateful that the other goblins were ignoring them, too wrapped up in their own petty squabbles and selfish ends.

Once I’d gotten them far enough away I stopped running and stayed still. The closest of the goblins approached carefully, and drew a small dagger to prod me with. After a few pokes he lifted me, eyeing the hole of the gauntlet.

It was at that moment I extended the spear I’d held in my essence and drove it through his eye and out the back of his head. As he fell I withdrew the spear and, taking advantage of the other goblin’s surprise I ran between his legs and launched the spear again straight into the back of his neck. He fell, struggling to breathe as he drowned in his own blood.

I decided then that I’d need to accelerate my plans. I made my way quickly back through the camp. Just past the central tent I found what I was looking for. Stone, Hrig, and Kyren were all caged in the center of the goblin’s pen for their riding dogs. They were bruised and bloodied, Kyren and Hrig were wearing roughspun tunics that must’ve been given to them. They were talking and I slipped between some sleeping dogs to hear them better.

“Lock is picked, but even if we got out of here we wouldn’t be able to make it out of the camp,” said Stone.

“I don’t see what other choice we have. We don’t know why they’ve taken us captive. For all we know it’s just an easy way to keep meat fresh. Kyren, would you be able to summon us weapons?” asked Hrig.

“No, I’m too foggy after that blow to the head. Casting spells would be dangerous for us.”

“What about Sevald? Do you think there’s a chance he’s coming?” asked Stone.

“I don’t know. They may never have noticed him and he couldn’t find us when he looked, or they did find him, but had to kill him. I doubt he’d have gone down without a fight,” said Kyren.

“Aye, he’s a good lad like that,”said Stone

“I think he’ll come,” said Hrig.

“What makes you think that?” asked Kyren.

“Nothing, it’s just a feeling. He seems like a reliable guy,” said Hrig.

“Aye, he is that,” said Stone.

“Hmm, we should probably prepare for when he arrives then. That may be our only chance.”

I felt something swell beneath my breastplate back at my main body. A new feeling. It was pride I realized. I felt proud that my companions considered me reliable, that they counted on me. After taking another moment to enjoy the new sensation I returned my attention to the task at hand. With reconnaissance done I could begin refining my plan.

There were roughly eighty seven goblins in the camp, which was manageable. My companions could initiate an escape at any time, but they were in danger due to their lack of armament, the damage they’d sufferred and Kyren’s inability to cast spells. If I did rush in and kill everything wantonly it was possible that the goblins would use them as hostages and block off any method of escape they may have, I would also possibly need to explain the fact that I can slaughter four score goblins without taking any damage beyond some dents in my armor.

I would need more than one distraction. I’d need to create a second diversion that would increase the effectiveness of me charging the gate.

…

I walked on my five fingers back toward the gate to the dog pen. I paused for a moment to use the spear to push open the latch. The dogs were asleep, but I was intending to make some noise that would wake them up. I made my way back toward the center of the camp while the rest of me started moving closer to the camp’s entrance.

It wasn’t long before I found what I needed. One of the camp guards was leaning against a small storage shed, his head downward, he was snoring. He had one hand holding a spear while the other hung loosely against his side. I crawled up to him and put myself over his hand. I adjusted myself to fit and flexed his fingers a few times, then his arm. I then firmly grasped his spear and started moving him toward the nearest group of goblins. He stirred as I did so, but before he could fully rouse himself I’d reached my target. I lifted his hand and had him drive his spear straight through the nearest goblin. The others looked up in surprise, the one whose hand I was controlling was wearing the same expression. I didn’t give them a chance to react, instead I pulled the spear from the other goblins chest and threw it, striking another of them through the leg. He let out a cry and it’s noise roused his fellows to action. They all jumped on the guard and I swiftly extracted myself from him, taking his hand with me.

As the goblins started fighting the guard more of them approached from around the camp. I found a straggler, leapt onto his hand while he was distracted and had him draw his dagger and stab one of those who’d piled onto the guard before he even knew what was happening, then I dissolved his hand and moved on. I repeated this pattern several more times as more and more goblins went to investigate. Soon, fights were starting that I had nothing to do with as old factions formed and opportunities to draw blood started putting them into a frenzy.

Then, the dogs came. Drawn by the sounds and the smell of blood the wild dogs had burst from their pen and headed into the fray. That was my cue to leave. I started crawling back to my main body, which was at the same time coming into the camp, right through the front gate.

…

There were two guards at the front gate. They were arguing and making gestures toward the commotion in the center of the camp. I assumed they were deciding whether or not to leave their post. I lifted my gauntletless arm and fired one of the stakes I’d sharpened from my void. It skewered the guard on the left and stuck him to the fencepost behind him. The other one let out a scream looking frantically around. When he saw me, he took off down the fenceline.

I waited, taking a moment to adjust my shield and sword. I wanted to be found, so there was no point in moving any deeper into the camp. Besides, I wouldn’t want to interrupt the goblin civil war I’d so carefully started. If I could get the exterior guards to engage me, then it would create the perfect opportunity for my companions to escape, but to a certain extent it was all up to fate and fortune.

When the frightened goblin returned, he brought ten others with him. They all charged me on sight, brandishing wickedly curved daggers and spears. I raised my arm and waited for them to close in. Just as they were about to reach me I fired another stake. This one pierced two through the chest and a third in the gut. I moved to the side and deflected a dagger off my shield before kicking another of them, launching him backward. I swept my sword, decapitating another. The remaining goblins all attacked at once, swept up in a mixture of fear and bloodlust.

Two spears shattered against me from the front, while two goblins jumped onto my back attempting to slide their daggers into the spaces between my armor plates. I swung my shield into the spear wielders and heard a crunch as they were knocked back. Then I stabbed my sword into the ground to free up my hand to grab one of the goblins off my back by the ear and haul him off, then I threw him to the ground and stepped on him. The other fell off of me and I retrieved my sword and ran him through before he regained his footing.

I looked at the remaining goblin. It was the same one who’d ran for help, he’d hung back once his allies had reached him. He turned to run, but unfortunately it was he who was surrounded. He ran right into my returning hand which extended its spear into him as he ran toward it, impaling him. I then waited as my hand returned to me and I had it hold onto the shield. I didn’t know if I’d need the opening to fire more stakes, so I wanted to keep it clear for now.

Something was off. I looked around and counted nine dead goblins. The one I’d kicked at the start wasn’t there. The kick must not have hit him hard enough to kill him. There was something else wrong too… I didn’t hear barking. What I did hear, was footsteps, undercommon, and the clinking of armor and it was coming toward me.

They came into view all at once. There were at least forty of them, far more than I’d expected to make it through the internal spat I caused. They’d recovered quicker than I expected too. Creating internal strife and backstabbing had been my profession not too long ago, I knew they shouldn’t have rallied so quickly.

The group parted, and a goblin that could only have been the leader approached. He was the largest of their kind I’d ever seen. He stood a head taller than even those that were riding the dogs. He wore chainmail over which was a tunic of green with a dragon in gold thread sewn onto the front. Even from a distance I could tell his eyes were gold and they shined in the dark like those of a cat. He was holding Hrig's massive axe, in front of himself. Something about him filled me with a strange mixture of unease and comfort. The essences I’d eaten were letting out a kind of instinctual fear, but the monstrous part of myself, the part that made up my core, actually felt drawn to him. Drawn to him in the same way monsters are drawn to dungeons and other places that appeal to their kind.

I couldn’t run. If I did, they may send out search parties and find my companions, who were hopefully a safe distance away by this point, but the head goblin left me with a sense that a fight would actually be difficult. I could slay hundreds of the run of the mill goblins without too much effort, but this one had a strange presence that I knew I’d need to take seriously.

Before I could think of a plan, the leader raised Hrig's axe and swung it in my direction, signaling a charge. The goblins that flanked him followed the order with enthusiasm, and started toward me with those riding wild dogs in the lead. I unloaded the remaining stakes and small spears into the onrushing forces before returning my hand to its rightful spot and taking a firm grasp on my shield. I braced myself and rooted to the spot I was in.

When the first of the dog riders hit me head on, I took his attack on my shield and threw him over myself using his momentum. Then I sliced through the side of one of the other dogs which caused him to tumble across the camp in a flail of limbs. After they were taken care of the rest of them descended upon me.

After that everything became a blur of teeth, daggers and blood. Weapons broke against me as I cut them down one after another. Just as I started to see holes in their attack something struck me with a force beyond anything I’d experienced before. I was knocked back and rolled through the camp collapsing two tents as I went. My breastplate dented and I took a moment to reform it, but it took far more effort than it should have. The strike had hurt me, I realized. It had damaged not just my armor skin, but the essence of what I am. The golden eyed goblin could actually kill me.

I rose to my feet and raised my shield. I was quickly surrounded again. Even if they couldn’t hurt me, they provided a tremendous distraction that would make another hit from their leader inevitable. Fate and fortune were no longer on my side it seemed.

Just as I tensed, ready for another onslaught, one of the goblins surrounding me collapsed. The others stopped, confused and looked at their fallen comrade. A small rock was lodged in the back of his skull. Just as I’d realized what happened another dropped and his fall was accompanied by two battle cries as Hrig and Stone crashed into them.

Stone swiftly smashed two down with his hammer, and Hrig leapt into the center of the fray wielding a massive claymore, her every swipe felling three goblins at a time.

“You focus on the big one, we’ve got your back,” said Kyren. I looked in the direction of her voice and saw a rock release from her sling, felling yet another of them.

Almost too late, I returned my attention to the goblin leader, ducking just as Hrig’s axe swept where my head had been. I slammed my shield into his chest to buy space and followed it with a quick downward strike of my sword which he blocked with the axe’s handle. He pushed my sword away and followed it up with a kick to my knee. I buckled, but used the momentum to roll to the side as he drove the axe into the mud where I'd just been. His kick had hurt me too, so there wasn’t anything special about Hrig’s axe, whatever was hurting me had to do with him.

I got to my feet and deflected an axe blow with my shield, risking a look at my companions. They were still actively thinning the goblins, though some of them had rallied from their initial surprise. I needed to go on the offensive. I began striking down at the goblin, quickly and without letting up. He blocked my strikes with the handle again, his body shuddering from the impacts, his feet sank deep into the mud as I swung down at him again and again.

He was strong, clever and capable of harming me, but he was also alive in a way that I wasn’t. I could keep striking forever without tiring, but he couldn’t and I began to feel his arms give way from my strikes. Finally, dropping my shield I took my blade in both hands and gave a final downward strike. He attempted a final block, but my sword cut straight through the axe's handle and my blade cut cleanly through his head and body before it caught too much bone to continue.

His gold eyes looked up at me again from each part of his halved head and for a moment I had an overwhelming desire to eat him. I wanted to know why he could hurt me, how he had the same pull as a dungeon and what lay behind those eyes of his, but even as I felt my faceplate open and the void within my shell start to reach out for him I heard a cry.

I closed my faceplate and looked in the direction of the cry to see Kyren being attacked by two goblins. I pulled my sword from the leader and threw it at the one closest to her. It flew through his chest and the other goblin, distracted by what had happened, was readily brained by Kyren using her rock filled sling as a flail.

I returned my attention to the leader, whose eyes were still somehow alive even as the rest of him was imobile.

“Interesting,” said a voice that felt impossibly large and strong considering the creature it came from. The halves of his mouth curled up in a hideous smile despite his body being nearly cleaved in twain, then he burst into flames. The heat and force of which caused me to step back. Before I knew it, the body had disintegrated.