As the party finished examining the entrance from a distance, they started silently walking closer to it. However the closer they were the more they tried keeping next to the walls. After slowly creeping for a while, they reached the gate and could finally sneak a peak at what’s inside.

Henry was at the front so he was the first one who had a go at it. As he peaked out and threw a glance at the inside of the room, he immediately noticed that it was much bigger than most dungeon spaces. The room’s size was almost as big as four big living rooms combined, while the largest ones they encountered previously were only about bedroom sized.

The interior itself was nothing special, just the usual grey dungeon walls and ceiling, with no decoration on them at all. Inside the middle of the room however, was a wooden dining table with some stuff on it and six chairs next to it, in them sat 6 decently geared hob goblins wearing worn leather armor and some iron weapons. They were creating a lot of noise and chatter while they gambled and talked with one another in an unknown goblin language.

Unfortunately or maybe fortunately, the most eye catching thing wasn’t them, but a shabby throne made of wood standing at the far back of the room. On top of it sat a slightly larger hob goblin, equipped with chain mail armor, next to him on the right there was a big steel sword, radiating some kind of Mana and a giant tower shield on the other side.

Thankfully, although the hog goblin on the throne was facing the gateway, he had his eyes closed and didn’t notice Henry peaking out his head. Due to that he was able to immediately step back after observing the entire room without being seen.

Looking back behind him, Henry saw the members of his group intently staring at him, with curiosity hidden in their eyes. He quietly motioned them to follow him as he retreated further away from the gate. When they were some distance away, he finally spoke.

“It is just like we have guessed. It is a boss room. The room itself is about several times bigger than the usual ones we encounter and rest at. As for the enemies, we have six well equipped hob goblins sitting at a wooden dining table, spending their time leisurely doing their own thing, and also the hob goblin boss sitting on a throne behind them, he seems to wield a powerful sword, which might even be magical, and an enormous tower shield, not to mention that he has decent chain mail armor, for a hob goblin that is almost too good..

After hearing out everything Henry said, all the party members had furrowed their eyebrows. When some time passed, Tera was the first one to speak after Henry. “It is not impossible, I would say that it is even quite doable, but right now I think we are all quite exhausted, so we should first find a place to rest and discuss our plan and what to do.

No one, including Henry, disagreed, so the party left in search of a camping spot. Soon enough they found one and did their usual routine as well as speak about the matter at hand, in the end ending up agreeing to the fight, after which they went to sleep. Like this they spent their night right until the next day, which would be filed with many difficulties as well as tragedies, unfortunately the group hadn’t know that at this time or maybe things would have gone a bit differently.

The next morning they were already back at the gate. They have checked inside and nothing much changed, making them let out a sigh of relief. When everyone was done with gathering their resolve, Henry’s face hardened as he began speaking.

“Okay, we are all rested now and in fighting condition, I hope everything will go as planed.” Since this was the first time fight for most of the group, they were a little nervous and didn’t fully well know what they should be doing, so the plan had to go accordingly, or the morale would plummet.

“Just like we decided yesterday, Sarah, Ariel and Tera will begin the battle by launching some ranged attacks at the common hob goblins, but only once, after that we will charge in while you watch, if the boss involves himself, you will have to immediately attack him, if not, save you energy until we finish our fight and then attack the leader together. Camila will stay hidden until we begin battling the boss and Brendon will stay back to support us if we are in critical dangers, but it is best if you don’t reveal yourself if you can help it.”

The plan was simple, but effective, so everyone understood what they had to do. They took several minutes to collect themselves and then they finally attacked. Ariel stood besides the two women as he casted his spell. However, these hob goblins were on a different level than the ones they met before. Even though it was a surprise attack, Tera only managed to hit ones shoulder, while out of Ariel’s three ice spears, one hit into the chest of a hob goblin, killing it immediately, one was blocked by a hand which was right now bleeding profusely, the last one was blocked with an iron buckler.

Sarah’s spell was less deadly, but it hit everyone leaving several large and painful acid wounds on their bodies. Erna and the others except for Camila charged in like promised and engaged the hob goblins, Camila, who managed sneak in and was currently waiting for the moment to attack the boss. The back line was, like told, observing the leader.

Thankful, after noticing the invaders and shouting something in goblin language, he simply sat there, doing nothing. Due to that the two mages and the archer also didn’t need to do anything, so and simply conserved their strength. On the front however the battle was still raging on. Even with one dead, the hob goblins weren’t in any panic and acted accordingly.

Erna faced off against two of them, one with a spear and the other with an iron sword. With her wind magic casted on herself she was extremely quick and her rapier danced around the opponents. Although she couldn’t land any decisive blows, she left countless smaller wounds on them and only the onlookers from the side could see the dangerous levels of blood that was dripping from the two hob goblins.

When the melee battle hit the 3 minute mark, the two goblins, who were quite skilled and were holding out decently well against her, started feeling faint, which let Erna land several good blows. From then on, it all went down hill for the hob goblins and soon only two dead bodies were left laying there on the floor.

As this Erna’s drawn out fight was happening, Vor was clashing against another hob goblin who wielded a two handed great sword, similar to Vor himself. Naturally, it was quite a different battle from Erna’s, since the two of them relied mainly on strength and experience.

Their battle was much shorter and simpler. It basically concluded in several clashes, ending with Vor knocking the hob goblin’s weapon out of his hand and then swiftly decapitating him. Unfortunately, while the two managed to finish their fights quite easily, Henry was having a harder time.

He was most excellent in defending, but lacked the attack power so he was severely suppressed, but thankfully after Erna and Vor finished their hob goblins, they helped eliminating the ones attacking Henry. With that none of the grunts were still alive and only leader was left.

Honestly, the whole thing happed way too fast and the hob goblin boss was unable to react, when he finally snapped out of it, it was already too late and all he saw was hob goblin bodies littering the ground. His eyes immediately turned red and he roared in fury while shouting something in the goblin language, as he took his sword and shield.

The party was frightened merely from the power in his roar and involuntarily heaved a deep sigh, since they knew that the real fight will start only now.