As the brothers relaxed on the floor, the excitement from the battle slowly easing away from them, Gordo took a quick search around the room, looking for treasure and loot. Gathering all the items off the corpse, he piled them all up in a neat pile close to the center of the room, then continued on in his search. Other than some cupboards set in one wall, the room was quite devoid of any type of furniture, so it didn’t take him long to complete this task.

In the last cupboard he found a small, locked wooden box, about the size of those you would get with the purchase of shoes. Having no method of opening it, he lifted it to his ear and shook it, hearing the welcoming , but muffled, sound of coins rattling around, and the tinkle as they collided with something made of glass. This made him halt his agitation of the box, for he suddenly was concerned that he could break whatever lay within it.

Returning to the little pile of goblin loot he had already placed on the floor, he gave it another search, this time being more thorough, hoping to find the key to the little casket. Eventually, after he had turned inside out every possible item the goblin captain was wearing, he finally located it, hidden away in a secret compartment in the money pouch it had been carrying. “Sneaky little bugger.” he muttered to himself, looking at the small bronze key he now possessed.

As this was really Shan and Garals party, he handed to box and key over to them before returning to the goblins equipment. “Let’s see what we have here,” He mused aloud, so the others could hear him. He picked up the sword and examined it. “ A steel longsword in pretty good condition. Got a damage factor of four to fourteen damage. I can’t use this, because of my lousy strength, but you could Shan, you want it ?” He looked up and Shan nodded at him. Gordo handed it over and took the next item. “A small wooden shield, you said you wanted the that, didn’t you Garal ?” already knowing the answer, he tossed it to the dwarf.

The next item was the goblins tusks, the description he couldn’t read, for it had that unidentified tag attached. Not knowing what to do with them, he returned them to the pile and picked up the next item, a crude and unadorned bronze ring. He could read this items description, which informed him it was another ring of intelligence, this time with a plus two bonus. “Plus two intelligence ring, I could use this if no one else wants it ?” he actually more than wanted it, for he needed to boost his intelligence so he could get a mage class next, but didn’t want to seem too eager or desperate.

“Take it, Neither of us are mages and intelligence items are just a waste to us. Its not worth that much if we sold it. If you can get use out of that, then feel free, but if we get any strength or constitution magical items next, then we have first choice on them, agreed ?” Gordo showed his agreement at Shan’s words by placing the ring onto one of his free fingers, leaving with six for any future finds.

“Okay, what’s next.” He started to say, looking at what remained, but halted when his eyes took in the tusks he had been looking at previously. Picking them up, he again examined them, to check that what he had seen before was not just an error, or mirage. No, he was right, for now the unidentified tag had gone away and he could see the description.

Lucky Goblin Tusks, Guard Captain

Congratulations, you have found some lucky goblin tusks. These items are magical in nature and will allow the possessor one stroke of luck at a time of their choosing. The quality of luck obtained will be determined by the complexity of the situation that the luck is to be used in. Luck comes in two forms, good and bad, so be prepared if your stroke of luck turns out to be against you.

His expression on this sudden and unexpected change to his examination ability, combined with the unusual description he had read, didn’t go unnoticed by Garal. “Hey, what’s up, you look like you have bitten into a lemon and can’t decide whether its sweet or sour. Something wrong with those tusks ?”

“Maybe, but when I first looked as these I couldn’t identify them, but now I can, and I don’t know why. The description is pretty weird as well, I’m not sure what to make of them.”

Garal chuckled in amusement. “It’s the ring, Gordo, it increased your intelligence, didn’t it. Intelligence is the stat that helps identify items, and they didn’t include that information about intelligence in the bloody manual.. Putting that on must have made you reach the minimum to identify the tusks.” He paused at that, a puzzled expression crossing his face. “How did you get your intelligence that low, everyone starts with enough intelligence to at least identify tusks.” He shook his head. “Not important, nor is it my business… Anyway, those tusks should say something about luck, something to do with good or bad. Does the description read something like that ?“ Gordo nodded an affermation. “Well, that perfectly normal. The tusks are a joke item, no one actually uses them, and prefer to collect them. I think there is a place in town that will reward a player if they hand in a full set, from guards tusks to king tusks. They are a rare drop, so getting the set is going to take quite a while. We have a couple already, so if you are not going to collect them, could we have them?

With a flick of a wrist, he sent them sailing towards Garal, who, as quick as a snake, snatched them out of the air and made them disappear into his bag. “All that’s left is the coins the goblin was carrying, you want me to divide it up.?”

Shan, who had been working on the small casket shook his head. “Just wait until I open this, it should also contain some coin. We will divide it all up together…Damn locks stuck, probably rusty.” He grunted as he strained to turn the key, which gave way suddenly, flipping the top of the casket up. Looking inside, his eyes open ip a little wider. “Well, well, well… this goblin was a right little hoarder, wasn’t he.” And poured a stream of coins into his palm, an occasional glint of some colorful crystal interspersed the metallic flow. “Drop those coins in here, Gordo, and I will get the system to do an autosplit for us.”

Autosplit was a party option that would equally divide up the gemstones and coins equally among all party members, with each not necessarily getting exactly the same things, but it would equal the same value. Gordo’s split was a couple of small purple amethysts, one small green emerald, five gold, six silver and thirty one copper coins. Not a bad haul indeed. Selling those stones off would gain him enough to acquire the mage class he desired. He eagerly placed them into his pouch.

“Before we take a look down those stairs, we have about an hour left before the update patch, so do we continue on, or do we want to take a break and come back after the patch ? I don’t want to be caught out by a coding error while we are in combat.” Shans concern was not unfounded, for a faulty patch during gameplay had ruined many players progress over the years, and the Energetic Entertainment coders would have to be infallible, an impossibility in itself, to release a patch without containing some errors.

Gordo’s mind had already been made up for him, he couldn’t leave, “I’m staying online. “he pronounced as if it was a choice he was making, and not a statement of fact. “You two take a break if you wish, but, personally, I’m pretty eager about continuing.”

The brothers huddled together, quietly discussing their options. Obviously in disagreement as their voices gradually rose higher and higher. They got so loud that Gordo was worried they could attract the attention of the monsters on the level below. “Shhhh.” He interjected into their conversation loudly, one finger pressed against his lips, a sign he wanted silence. Both of the brothers scowled at him, but ceased their bickering. “Keep it down, will you, or I think the decision will be made for us.” He pointed at the stairway, indicating his meaning. “Either stay, or go, just do it quietly, will you.”

Shan threw his hands up into the air in surrender. “All right, damn you, we’ll continue. Don’t blame me if something goes wrong.” He snatched out the steel longsword he had looted, and practiced swinging it about in the air wildly, working off some of his frustration.

“Now, how we will proceed is this way. The goblins will obviously be harder on the next floor, so we will have to be more organized on how we approach a combat situation. Garal has a shield now, so he should lead, and block any attack from the front. You, Shan, have a nice new longsword, and hopefully have improved your skill to a useful level. You follow close behind Garal, but slightly to his left. That way you will be able to support Garal from behind, and have a clear shot over his left hand shoulder. I will follow you, but slightly to Garals right. That way I will be able to slip past him and hopefully manage to get in a surprise attack from the right. Sounds basic and simple, and it is, but will serve us in the tight quarters that the tunnels will give us. If we proceed slowly, and check all offshoots first, the only way an opponent can approach us is directly head on. If we see an open cave, or room, we will have to rethink our method of attacking.”

Looking up after his string of instructions, he saw confusion on their faces, and sighed. “Look, I know it’s not the brightest of plans, but we are a short party, we really should have more members, but we are stuck with just the three of us. This way if we are surprised from the rear, the weakest member gets attacked first, that’s me, leaving you two time to retaliate and hopefully extricate me before I get killed. Garal will guard us from a frontal attack, using his shield, allowing us time to support him, and the staggering effect will let you insect any paths to the left while we wait, and I will inspect any paths to the right. If either of us detects anything down a path, then we decide which way to progress from that point. Simple, ugly, but effective, with each of us having a set duty to do without all of us bumbling along and duplicating what one person could do.” He saw understanding dawning across their features. “Most of the goblins should be about the same type and level, so to make things go faster, we will each take it in turn to loot the bodies, with the looter keeping everything on the body he loots. If something extra special is found, or something magical, we will worry about the division of these items when we have completed this level. Garal can have the first body, Shan, you can go second, and I will have the third. We repeat this order of looting until we run out of goblins.”

“Sounds okay to me.” said Garal, and Shan followed with his agreement with his brothers words.

The cave at the bottom of the stairs proved to be an anticlimactic moment, as they entered it, prepared for battle as they were, only to find it totally devoid of anything resembling a threat. It was a normal cave, cold, damp and dark, and the air held an aroma of rotting fish. Only one tunnel lead from this area, making their first decision very easy.

They advanced down the tunnel until they reached the first division in the path, this one leading off to the left. Shan ducked down it, and a moment later reappeared, shaking his head. “Dead end.” It wasn’t until the third side tunnel that there was a change in their routine, Being on the left again, Shan stepped into it and disappeared. He was gone for about two minutes when he suddenly returned, running as if his life depended upon it, and it did, for two well-armed goblins were hot on his heels.

As he skidded to a top before running into the wall opposite the side tunnel entrance, Garal quickly swung around, and positioned himself in the entrance, blocking the goblins from exiting it with his shield. He barely moved as they smashed into him, his legs braced against the impact, and staggered back , their health bars losing a slight amount of points from the contact. In a swift move, Garal swung is axe in an overhead arc which terminated in the collarbone of one of the goblins. The leather armor it wore took the shine off the blow, but it was still powerful enough to force the goblin to its knees, its heath bar dropping by fifty percent.

The second goblin, of which now Gordo could see was a corporal, took the opportunity to swing his blade at Garal, managing to skip it off the surface of the wooden shield and into his upper arm. From the way that Garal reacted, or not reacted as was the case, it was obvious to Gordo that whatever equipment Garal was using didn’t include a pain feature. “Fucking developers.” he muttered, thrusting his sword through the space to Garals left, managing to spear the tip of his blade into the goblins neck.

“What ?” asked Garal, distracted by Gordo muttering right next to his ear, allowing the injured goblin in front of him the chance to lay another successful strike past the shield.

Shan, on the other side, must have heard him, for he hissed at Gordo and told him to shut the hell up as he took the head off the first goblin, still on its knees from the axe blow, with one clean swing of the sword. The remaining goblin turned to run at this point, but didn’t make it far as the following weapon blows quickly stripped its life away. Other than a few minor nicks from the goblins, they had come out of this relatively unscathed. Shan glowered at him, not prepared to forgive his faux pas by distracting a own party member at a crucial moment, but only said “Nothing else down that tunnel…. So, which body do you want Garal ?”

The next encounter went pretty much along the same lines as the first, except this time it was Gordo who pulled the goblins towards the party, and consisted of three of the corporal goblins. During the battle one of the goblins had managed to score a hit past Garal, and get a thrust in on Gordo, giving him a deep cut along his sword arm. From the way his health bar kept dropping, five points at a time, he knew he had picked up a bleed debuff, but had nothing to staunch it with, so he just let it run its course. By the time the debuff had completed hits course, his heath bar was showing he had one hundred and twelve health remaining, a loss of thirty eight.

The loot from his turn at a goblin wasn’t that good, gaining him only a pair of corporal tusks and a handful of coppers. Ah, well, he considered, at least the experience gain will help, wondering what his levels were now, but deciding against stopping to check.

They continued on down the main tunnel, regularly pulling in small goblin parties from the side tunnels, and dispatching them without much trouble. Other than the goblins, there didn’t seem to be much else to loot, for all that they usually found was rough bedding furs, and trash. Gordo had managed to acquire a pair of rough fur gloves from one of his goblin corpses, along with a variety of coins, but nothing really valuable or useful. His health bar had been rising and falling through the battles, but seemed to always stabilize somewhere in the region of a hundred health, irritating, but not dangerous.

Finally, they reached a point in the main tunnel where they could see bright torchlight ahead and the tunnel seemed to open up into a large cavern, the air full of the smell of woodsmoke as it blew into their faces, and full of the noise of creatures moving about. They stepped back afew paces and came together in a huddle, heads joined in the center.

“We have a couple of minutes before the patch is installed, and I think this is the last cavern. Unlike the last time, the real Boss Monster should be here, god know what it is, but it must be greater than a Guard Captain, a goblin Sergeant at the very least, maybe even a Lieutenant.”

“Do all goblins have army titles ?” asked Gordo.

“Yes they do, goblins are a militant race, weak, but numerous, but once you finish with the army ranks, they then have noble ranks, and those are tough buggers. You only find those in major goblin nests. I want you two to wait here while I scout out the main cavern ahead. I want to see what sort of numbers we are looking at before we enter it.” He lowered himself down into a crouch and made his way forward, placing every foot carefully before moving the next one. It wasn’t long before he was back, and they huddled back up to hear what he had seen.

“Not going to sugar coat it, but it looks nasty in there, real nasty. Saw eleven goblins in total, two conscripts, two guards, three privates, three corporals and a sergeant. We have only faced up to four corporals at once, so far, and while that was a fairly easy battle, eleven at once could pose a major problem. Anyone got a suggestion ?”

Gordo had an idea, but didn’t know how the others would like it. “I think I have one.” he said in a whisper, “but first I need to know how good you are with that bow of yours.”

Shan looked at him in surprise. “My bow ? Pretty good, but I only have standard arrows with me, they won’t cause much damage, unfortunately.” As they had been battling in close , confining spaces so far, he hadn’t considered using it up to now, but Gordo’s remark had started him thinking.

“Well, I think you could get two shots off, maybe even three, before they get to us. If we go back about ten foot, the walls are a little closer together there, and I think that would be an ideal place to stand our ground. If Garal and I get prepared there, you could sneak just far enough forward to take a shot or two at one target. After that, you could quickly retreat to a place behind us, and when they charge us, we will hold them here while you get off another couple of shots into them. If they are spread out, they may not all arrive at once, giving us a slight chance to whittle them down a bit and hopefully making them a bit more manageable.”

Shan considered the plan, seeing a few little things about it that concerned him, like the fact he may get killed before they could rescue him, and also they may organize before attacking., but he couldn’t come up with anything better. Gordo had been right when he said the party was short, it was short another fighter and a spell caster, something that they needed now, but obviously were not going to get. “Can’t see anything else we can do, so I suppose that what we will have to do.” He agreed reluctantly. “In for a penny, In for a pound, as they say.”

Gordo and Garal retreated to the part of the tunnel where the walls came in a bit closer and prepared themselves, while Shan once again crept forward, this time with his bow in hand, arrow knocked. They lost site of his as he went round a a slight curve in the tunnel. From where they stood, they could hear the sound of the bowstring snap as Shan let off his first arrow, followed with seconds by another snap Looking at each other, they tensed up waiting for the enemy to appear. A third snap of a bowstring could be heard, quickly replaced by the sound of running feet.

Gordo almost jumped when Shan belted around the curve towards them, surprised even though he had been expecting it. He was almost to them when the goblins started to appear in his wake. The air was suddenly filled with the sound of a giant gong and everything changed into a monochromatic scale, the walls about him expanding out, then snapping back into place instantly, the running figure of Shan freezing in mid gallop only to suddenly speed up unnaturally as he shot past them thought the space they had left for him between each other, then all the colors snapped back into place. Next to him he could hear Garal retching and something warm splashed onto his leg. He, too, felt violently nauseous from the effect, but it passed as quick as it had arrived. The patch had been installed.

This unnatural effect wasn’t isolated only to the players, for the goblins staggered in their forward charge, their speed diminished, slowing down in confusion, with one of them even falling forward into the tunnels floor. As Gordo registered all this, an arrow flew over his shoulder, striking the lead goblin in the throat. It flew backwards, knocking the one who was following it, over, and they both landed in a tangle of arms and legs.

Garal, in a moment of mad inspiration, took this opportunity to charge the goblins, swinging his axe in a wide sweep, which struck one across the head, and continued on along its path, to sink into the next ones arm Gordo had been caught off guard by the Garals sudden change in plan, but quickly recovered and followed him forward. He could see two goblins were down, but was only able to locate another four in the tunnel ahead of him. He wondered where the rest of them were, secretly wishing they never showed up.

As he ran past the two who were on the ground, he thrust his blade between the shoulders of one that was lying face down and yanked it out to swing at another that was preparing to thrust its blade at him. His sword removed one of the goblins ears, as well as a portion of the skin on that side of its head, but was unable to avoid its blade, which slid though his bicep in agonizing slowness. His whole arms went numb, thankfully stopping the electrifying stabs of pain that had preceded it. Luckily, it wasn’t his sword arm, so he retained control over that, and took the opportunity to return the favor to the goblin by stabbing his blade upwards, piercing the jaw from beneath, the blade grating along bone as it punched upwards and into the monsters brain pan. It dropped instantly, dead on arrival as it arrived at the floor.

Turning quickly to protect his injured arm, he raised his sword to attack the next goblin, but found there wasn’t any remaining on their feet, all were down, dead, or dying. The dying were being quickly put out of their misery as Garal smashed each groaning body with his axe, fury on his face. In the sudden cessation of combat, Gordo could only stand there, looking at the bloody corpses strewn about, then slumped to the ground himself, his fatigue at maximum.

Shan stepped carefully though the bodies towards Gordo, and sat down next to him in the closest clean spot he could find, then patted him carefully on one shoulder. “Good plan. Pity we didn’t stick to it, and luckily only half of them chased me.” Gordo didn’t even have the strength to lift his head, and just groaned to himself, causing Shan to laugh. Shan took a vial of purple liquid out of his pocket and handed it to him, “Here, drink this, it will help you with your fatigue.”

Gordo fumbled with the cork before he finally managed to pop it out. He lifted it to his lips with an arm that was trembling at the effort, and poured it down his throat. The taste of the liquid on his tongue was reminiscent of summer flowers, leaving behind a faint aftertaste of honey. Warmth ran down his throat, and spread outwards, filling his limbs. It was a pleasant warmth, and left tiny electric sparks in its wake.

“Just stay there, you should be right as rain in about a minute, so don’t move until then.” Another pat on the shoulder followed, then Shan forced himself to his feet, and went off to see if Garal was okay. As he lay there, Gordo couldn’t help but glance at the tunnel, fearful the remaining goblins would arrive while they were so helpless, well, while he was helpless, but the tunnel remained empty.

“Where are they ?” he spoke aloud, but also to himself. “Where the hell are they ?”