Cheep!?

 Cheep!?

Chapter 93

Niko’s first warning that something was coming their way was the clack of something like pebbles hitting the stone of the walkway. Niko dipped his head low on reflex, dodging the small projectile that whistled past where his head had been. 

Without waiting, Skye fired several arrows down the hallway, the scraping and clattering sounds that followed indicating they’d missed. Still, nothing else came at them, and Niko couldn’t help but frustratedly realize that he could only vaguely smell whatever had attacked them.

“They disappeared around the corner,” Skye called out, “I think it was a probing attack.”

“Did you get a look at them?” Ronald called back, several paces behind their scouts. 

Skye shook her head, “Only for a moment. We’re moving forward now, so be careful about the sides.”

The teams that were helping to guard the teamsters formed up a little more solidly along the sides, holding any shields they had a little bit higher. Niko chirruped in annoyance as they moved forward, spotting several rounded objects laying at the corner ahead. Even without approaching, he could clearly tell that they were simply rounded stones. Apparently the Dawr Goblins were using slingshots, or something similar. 

‘Unless they can throw rocks that fast,’ Niko contemplated the possibility sourly, ‘I don’t think that can kill me, but I’m sure it’ll hurt like peck.’ 

Skye slid up alongside the corner first, noting the small abandoned projectiles briefly before dismissing them. Niko slid up alongside, as did Sasha, and the trio did their best to keep each others’ blind-spots in view.

“I see nothing,” Sasha began, “I smell them, though it is… vague. I know they are ahead, and to the left, but I smell nothing down the right hallway.” 

“Same. They must be using something to mask their smell down here. Or the water is interfering, I don’t know for sure. Skye, do you see anything?” Niko iterated Sasha’s words to Skye while keeping a watchful eye on their surroundings.

“Tracks down the left and straight, nothing down the right.” Skye said while chewing her lip. Without warning, she began forward once more, taking the straight route.

“Not the one with no tracks?” Niko asked with confusion, “I thought we wanted to avoid them.” 

“Two reasons,” she whispered, “We don’t have time, and I don’t know if these Dawr Goblins are smart enough to fake tracks.” 

“You’re concerned that the right path is a trap.” Sasha nodded along, “That is fair. My kin have dealt with these creatures before. They do tend to be devious little blighters.” 

Skye nodded at that and the trio returned to silence, slowing their forward advance just enough for the group to get through the intersection behind them without putting too much distance between them. Niko heard Ronald calling out groups as they went, making sure no one was taking too long to check corners. They needed to move forwards, and the quicker they did that, the better.

Niko stiffened as another sound entered his ears, and this time he pushed essence into his lungs. A projectile grazed his side, this one blazing a trail of heat in its wake, and Niko answered with a Carrion Call, blasting his voice down the tunnel as loudly as he could. The essence it carried writhed with tones of bewilderment and confusion, along with the hefty stunning potency that came from volume, both in energy and sound.

Mid screech, several more projectiles hit the walls all around them, their attackers suddenly shrieking, thrown into disarray by Niko’s rapid counterattack. Looking down the hallway, he could see a dozen pairs of red eyes, as well as the silhouettes they were attached to. They were small enough creatures, or at least half of them were. The rest of them were taller, but no less lanky, yet one thing stood out about them that Niko couldn’t help but to notice.

Each goblin was armed with a bow, with a quiver of arrows strapped to their backs clumsily. Rough armor that could, generously, be called leather rags adorned their bodies, save for the one in the middle that Niko pegged as something of a leader for the group. 

That specific goblin suddenly fell to its knees, gurgling, as a pair of arrows sprouted from its neck and utterly ignored the crude leather cuirass it wore, penetrating deep into its chest. ‘One down, I guess.’ Thought Niko as his talons scratched against the stone, already mid-sprint forwards. Sasha was right besides him, both knowing that seizing the initiative in any battle was a massive advantage.

The dozen goblins, now shy of a leader, howled and uttered a tongue alien to Niko. They spoke in sharp, babbling tones that he didn’t understand, but he guessed that they were besides themselves with confusion and shock. That was only amplified when they realized that their leader was dead, and by the time they were able to respond, he and Sasha were already in their midst. 

Much like Niko expected, Sasha hit them like a cat-shaped blender, long claws shredding through poor armor and readily eviscerating two of the goblins in front of her. Niko, not to be outdone, hit his own targeted pair with his claws, raking them forward and into a heap along with three more. The goblins struggled to catch their companions, or to step out of the way, but Niko didn’t stop charging. With his sharp beak and talons, he made quick work of them. Though, one of the larger ones, an apparent tier two, had managed to get a rough shortsword up and swing it against Niko’s side.

His feathers briefly flared with essence as he angled his body to the sword swing, driving the strike wide with a glancing blow. In a heartbeat, Niko counterattacked, stabbing the goblin through the skull with an empowered beak strike. The rush of combat and essence filled his veins, and Niko spun about, looking for the next contender. 

Instead, he saw another pair of goblins that were already downed with arrows in them, and still more gutted by a wide-eyed, hackles-raised sabretooth. Niko then realized that he, too, had his feathers lifted in a threatening posture. He took a brief moment to force himself to relax. That done he could still feel an oddness in his head, like a burgeoning headache, or pressure, ‘Lovely, why not add a headache to my ever-growing list of aches,’ Niko complained mentally, but turned his attention to his companion.

“You good?” Niko asked Sasha, who did a quick check over of herself.

“I seem to be. And you? You appear to be bleeding.”

Niko clucked in surprise at that, “Say what? Oh, so I am.” Niko looked over himself before quickly realizing that the first hit at range, likely an arrow, had skimmed him. A minute amount of essence laced the edge of the wound, likely from a goblin’s essence-pattern-enhanced shot. He sniffed the wound while pushing his essence through the area, forcing the foreign essence out of his body.

“Poison, I think,” Niko clucked disdainfully, “Not sure what kind though. Doesn’t seem strong enough on a glancing blow, though.” 

Sasha chuffed at that, mirthfully, “You’re surprisingly unbothered by being poisoned. Are you resistant?” 

Niko cawed low and shook his head, “Definitely not. But I do know an alchemist.” 

“Ah… Yes,” Sasha blinked thoughtfully, “I do suppose that would help.” 

“What’s this I hear about poison?” Skye asked as she approached, still looking around and listening for any more contacts, “Ah, arrow?” 

Niko nodded, as Skye waved back to Ronald, “Can you ask Mithel if she has a general antidote for Niko? Might wanna get a few ready, the Dawr are using poisoned arrows.”

“Sure!” Ronald called back, before moving back into the caravan a bit. 

The trio moved forward, slowing only as Dachna came forward with an antidote delivery and a quick few questions for Niko about the nature of the poison. Frankly, he wasn’t feeling much more than a low burn and perhaps slight numbness, but he couldn’t be sure if that was a good indicator of anything. Still, Niko imbibed the antidote, while Skye kept her own share, along with Sasha’s, as the Sabretooth had no way to hold onto anything at the moment. 

That prompted a quick round of questions in Niko’s mind that he had to refrain from asking. Namely, he wanted to know if perhaps there were crafters in the beast kingdoms, or if they wore anything like packs or slings to help them carry things around. That was, of course, assuming they carried things around, but Niko doubted that a society of sapient beings wouldn’t have need for the ability to do so. ‘And… Well, frankly it’s hard to carry things without thumbs. How does that work? Just essence manipulation or something like that?’ 

Niko shook his head slightly, ‘Focus on the fact that there are goblins with bows and arrows around first. Everything else later.’ 

The tenseness of the party increased with every hallway and intersection they cleared, paradoxically worsening the longer they went without any contacts. It was true that there were teams down here trying to clear out areas of the waterways, but nobody believed that their mission was going so well as to have culled their numbers so thoroughly. Especially not Niko, given what Gram had informed them of. 

“Is it just me or… You know what, nevermind.” Niko began before his subconscious nearly went into an apoplectic rage at how he’d very nearly flagged them. He would very much rather keep his ominous statements to himself just then. Skye and Sasha didn’t ask him what he was saying, and if he didn’t know any better, he’d have said that Skye looked just a tiny bit relieved.

‘Then again, she does know what jinxing is, so maybe she knows exactly what I was about to say.’ Niko mused to himself, before hearing distant noises from down an intersection. Skye held a hand up the moment he was about to check if anyone else had heard it, and the slight reproach in her gaze made Niko cringe apologetically.

Yet, nothing more happened, the noises remained distant, but fierce, as though a fight was brewing elsewhere. Skye frowned, “Keep going forwards, I’m going to report this and come back.”

Niko and Sasha nodded before doing as directed. The sounds of running water filled the background, but Niko could still hear the ever rising and present sound of conflict in the distance. ‘Is it the tunnel?’ He wondered, but quickly disregarded that, ‘No… We’re getting closer, but not that close.’ 

By the time Skye had returned, they’d moved past another hallway. The half-elf then told them, “We’re picking up the pace. If they’re fighting elsewhere, then we might have a good window of opportunity to blitz through.” 

“Fair plan,” Niko nodded approvingly, “Maybe the tribes are fracturing?” 

Sasha grinned–a mildly terrifying look in the dark– and said, “All the better. Goblins are fractious at best, so if they’ll do us the favor of culling themselves, that would be a welcome surprise.” 

“You figure it’s because they know they’re trapped and are disagreeing on what to do?” Skye asked Sasha, “I figure you know more about them than most anyone else here at this point.”

“Regrettably, your guess is as good as mine,” Sasha shrugged and flicked her tail irritably, “I’ve never accused Dawr Goblin of being perfectly predictable. Dumb, irritable, incredibly violent, but not predictable. For all I know, they don’t even care about the fact that they’re trapped. Maybe they had a disagreement on who would be for dinner.” 

Niko nearly paused at that, “Sorry, you said ‘who’ would be for dinner?” 

“Cannibals to the last,” Sasha confirmed, “It is said that clutches of goblins suffer more mortalities from within than without.” 

“Blight me, that’s horrible.” Skye mulled with disdain, “Goblins, I swear. They’re walking atrocities.” 

The trio agreed on that tacitly, and continued onwards. Niko wasn’t alone in being able to hear the sounds of battle grow louder still, the sounds now flooding in from every side passage. The column formation behind them was moving much more rapidly now, and Niko noted more instances where Ronald or another high ranking member had to shout someone back into place after they had moved too quickly, or out of formation. It was tiresome to always maintain security, but the threat of an arrow to the neck was enough to keep most people alert. 

‘Doing wonders for me, at least,’ Niko groused, his mood growing more dire with the mounting violence all around them. He could almost swear that he could hear voices farther away, but they were in tones and tongues he didn’t understand. With every passing minute, he felt his headache grow, a low drone up into a constant nagging.

“I’m beginning to wonder if that poison has some kind of headache inducing component.” Niko finally spoke up about it, noting that it wasn’t going away, but getting progressively worse, “Not sure if the antidote did anything to it.” 

Concerned, Skye moved back to the convoy to Mithel, both to inform everyone of the potential caveat to the poison and to get something mildly stronger. Niko drank another concoction, this one for pain primarily, but only mild. Any more and it might dull his senses too much.

And, considering they were now at the hallway that was their destination, Niko figured he would need his wits about him as much as possible.

“Great Mother, I know they said they expanded the hole, but that’s something else.” Skye murmured, looking upon an open gateway that was far wider than it had been before. The stonework and collapsed dirt had been replaced with granite stone, seemingly formed in fluid pieces to brace the opening. Seams of other minerals ran through the granite, coloring it in rusty red, green, and orange. 

“Now I see why they abandoned the idea of just collapsing it,” Ronald commented from alongside them, looking down a rough but workable ramp that led into what was now a much wider tunnel that led down either side. He hummed as he inspected it, “Looks like they churned out the earth entirely. There’s no more Earth Wyrm residue on the walls.”

Ronald shook his head at that, before shouting to the group, “Alright, so far we have been exceedingly lucky, but let’s get this done. I don’t want to test fate.”

Niko stepped off to the side as the various groups got to work. Thokk moved out of the way as well, allowing the teamsters and local geomancers to get to work. Niko also watched a group of them try to move the granite earth, but was disappointed when they seemed to fail to move it much more than a few inches. 

“Why can’t they move it?” Niko frowned, watching them move down the left and right side tunnels far enough away that they were able to work with the earth much more easily. 

When Skye voiced the question, it was a nearby geomancer that answered, “The earth in this area has been saturated by intent infused essence, probably by the Dawr Goblins. We’ll have to push that essence out of the material to work it, or let it dissipate naturally. We don’t have that kind of time, and it appears to be the work of at least tier three goblins. As much as I’d like to sit here and try to close it up, that’s just not going to happen with the numbers we have here.”

Niko nodded in thanks to the geomancer for the explanation, and watched him go. Most of the Wyldwalkers were in position near the entrance, as were the other guard teams. Even while paying attention to their surroundings, Niko privately kept an eye on the construction team. Geomancy, apparently, was not especially difficult to grasp the beginnings of, but mastery was a different question. Carts that had been loaded with bricks, clay, and loose dirt followed after the geomancer construction team, going down the left tunnel. Given that the terrain down the tunnels was– as feared– essence-infused, they were going to use what they’d brought with them to seal one side. Both tunnels apparently would lead deeper into the underground and eventually link up, but the left one was much more difficult to traverse. 

Ordinarily, that would mean they would want to block the other one, but in this case, the poison they wanted to use would be better suited to the relatively wider and clearer right tunnel. Camille, Crowe, and Oum, along with whomever they had with them, would fight in the underground and disengage towards the left tunnel that was being sealed. They would then be extracted by the geomancers who would make a temporary opening for them. While they would be notified when the poison was deployed, the essence devices they had would not be nearly sufficient for long term exposure. Anyone or anything in the tunnels would receive progressively worsening, up to lethal doses, of a weakening poison. 

Niko didn’t know what it would do to someone, exactly, but it had been made exceedingly clear that if one of the tanks were to rupture, that they were to immediately leave it behind and get as much distance from it as possible.

Mithel was with the group that went to the right, consisting of alchemists, and the teamsters who were helping to put things together at the hectic direction of said alchemists, as well as the geomancers who were helping put up fortifications around the delivery device that was being constructed. They also worked on extending those fortifications a safe distance back towards the waterways. Another group of guards moved with them, blocking the tunnel further ahead of them temporarily. They expected more goblins to come through as Crowe’s group ranged farther ahead, trying to hunt down enemies beyond those that Greenleaf’s population could handle. 

If there was anything that Niko liked about the situation, it was the fact that the essence down here was richer, it filled his lungs like the first breath taken after having to breathe through a mask for hours. ‘After all this, we’re definitely going to a higher tier area. I like Greenleaf, but this is for the birds,’ Joked Niko, immediately followed by, ‘Ah, man… that was a bad pun. I’m so pecking tired.’

No one bothered breaking out to camp, as they could potentially be faced with battle at any moment, yet everyone was simultaneously nearing their wit’s end. Niko could plainly see it in the ways that people looked around, a handful jumping at shadows, only to stop and take a deep breath. He could sympathize, because the noises were…

“Hmm?...” Niko stood up straighter, head swiveling side to side in alarm.

“What?” Skye tensed, nocking an arrow, but only pulling slightly, trying to find what Niko was detecting. 

“The battle sounds, they’ve stopped.” Niko cawed, feeling his feathers rise again, a now familiar sensation that seemed to hint to him that something was very much wrong. 

Skye listened for a moment, before realizing what Niko was talking about, “Everyone alert! Expect company imminently!” 

The groups scrambled, taking the half-elf at her word, while Ronald asked quietly, “What’d you hear?”

“Nothing, that’s the problem.” Tersely, Skye said, “Whatever the goblins were fighting, they’re done now.”

“That’s not disheartening at all.” Dachna murmured, “Should we set up the mines and such, then?”

Ronald paused, looking back at the alchemists that weren’t nearly finished, before turning back to Dachna and answering with a nod. Aloud, he shouted, “Combat teams, deploy your mines down the halls. Double time it, and for the love of all that’s good, do not put them within ten paces of each other!” 

The teams moved rapidly, with the ranged fighters waiting at the entrance to the underground. Others dragged empty carts over before tipping them over or setting them to the side to form barricades, the memory of arrows flying through the dark fresh in mind. Niko stayed close beside his companions and watched the preparations continue, even as he felt his skin crawl.