The Hobgoblin Riot: Dominion of Blades Book 2: A LitRPG Adventure

by Matt Dinniman

  Gretchen took the trigger and Jonah manned the looking glass. We found that Gretchen’s expert-level longbow skill gave the tower a damage bonus and Jonah’s high observation skills increased the tower’s range. Also, the presence of all three of us, officers in the war party, increased the damage of all the defenses in a 100-yard radius.

  We didn’t want the invaders to know which towers would be armed, so we waited until they were in the Catacombs before we shot a test fire. We watched from the safety of the roof as the two flamers spouted their long tendrils of flame across the park. I made Nale and Tiatha switch towers with one another so the second tower could benefit from Tiatha’s longbow skill. Satisfied it was the best we could do, Gretchen, Jonah, and I went up to test fire our tower.

  “This is fucking awesome,” Jonah said, moving his telescope around. The blue fire crackled in the air, filling the world with the scent of burning plastic.

  Your Siege Defense skill has risen from 1 to 2.

  “Yeah, for you maybe,” I said, grumbling as I gingerly placed another live round in the hopper.

  “You realize you’re the only one who can actually see what’s happening,” Gretchen added.

  “Oh yeah,” Jonah said, smiling sheepishly. He was like a kid with a new gaming console. “Well this is just the first wave. Assuming we survive, we’ll try to find better towers for you guys next time. The lightning towers seem fun. The mortars might be cool also. There’s also one called a ‘Ladies’ Choice’ tower, and I want to figure out what it does.”

  War Party> Invaders are emerging from the Catacombs.

  War Party Admin> Calculating casualties… 112 casualties. 460 invaders remain.

  “Man, they’re half dead already,” Jonah said. “Maybe they’ll be whittled down to nothing by the time they arrive.”

  “Maybe,” I said. “They seem to be tiptoeing around most of the traps. I think this Prince Kankan guy knows where they all are. The next few miles are mostly towers and a single barracks, none of which are armed. They have to get past the Hell Gate which is the only obstacle between here and there. Once past that, and we’re up.”

  “What’s the Hell Gate?” Jonah asked.

  Gretchen and I looked at each other, both of us realizing at the same time what we had to explain to Jonah.

  “It’s kind of fucked up,” I said finally. I’d never actually faced it, but I’d watched videos of it. There was so much in this crazy maze I’d forgotten about this part.

  Gretchen sighed. “It’s in the fifth castle, which is the one castle you have to fight through. They call it a castle, but it’s more like an arena. You go in, and this enormous statue of a doorway raises into the arena from below. The Hell Gate. It opens…it opens to the Lake.”

  “What,” Jonah said, stiffening. He’d spent almost a full day down there before. I shuddered every time I thought about his ordeal.

  “Yeah,” I said. “You enter this giant-ass room, and the gate thing is right in the middle. The door pops open, and these fucked-up monsters come out. There’s one for every member of the party. Each one is a demonic version of something you’ve killed before. It’s random. It could be the rat from the tutorial or it could be a level boss. So if your party has 1,000 people in it, 1,000 demons pour out of the gate, and each one will be different.”

  “You can also just run through,” Gretchen said. “If you’re lucky, and the summoned monsters are mostly lower-level stuff, and it’s not too crowded, you can just run past. They will stop chasing you once you get back outside. You gotta get there, though. The arena isn’t that big, and it gets crowded. ”

  “Jesus,” Jonah said. “Can we use that door to travel to the Lake on our own?”

  “Uh,” Gretchen said. “I don’t know. Why would you want to do that?”

  “I’m just wondering,” he said.

  “The Lake is a big place,” Gretchen said. “Each deity has their own world down there, so even if you could manage to get through, you’d probably just get lost and eaten by something.”

  This was the second time Jonah had alluded to wanting to be able to travel freely to the Lake, and I had no idea why.

  “Anyway,” I said, “They just need to fight their way through that, and they’ll be on us. Most parties get through it okay, I think. It’s more time-consuming than anything I think.”

  We spent the next half hour making sure the others knew the plan. Random trap notifications appeared, but the casualties were thin, usually just one or two hobgoblins killed each time. By the time they approached the Hell Gate, 430 hobgoblins still remained.

  Barely five minutes passed before we got the next message.

  War Party> Invaders are emerging from Castle Five.

  War Party Admin> Calculating casualties… 0 casualties. 430 invaders remain.

  “What the fuck?” I said.

  “That hell gate thing sucks,” Jonah said.

  “Hmm,” Gretchen said. “Maybe it wasn’t armed. We’ll have to take a look at it.”

  We returned to the plasma tower. I spent the time playing with the War Party menu while we waited for them to arrive. I could send messages to all the individual arrowed characters. I sent out a group command for everyone to converge on the Riot Castle as soon as it was safe. I told Raj to say safe and to remain where he was for now.

  Raj: Raj is a scout! I will tell you when new armies approach!

  Gretchen: Are any of the people with you warriors? We will keep some with you to protect you.

  Raj: They all stay with Raj. None of them are arrowed, so Raj protects them! Raj is a soldier now!

  After that, Gretchen spent some time looking through the menus. Eventually, she said, “It looks like only those already in your party and the mercenaries for hire have been arrowed. I thought that list was a little thin. That means there are many, many thousand more NPCs in the country of Libri that have not been conscripted. We’ll have to promote some to sergeant and order them to go on arrowing raids. We need to be more aggressive than we were in Harmony.”

  I remembered the white jackets in Valisa and how they’d rushed through the market, arrowing everyone they could find when the burning fleet threatened the city. This was the same thing. A mass arrowing was sure to cause panic. But what choice did I have?

  “Here they come,” Jonah said.

  Popper Note 13

  “They’re gathering at the edge of the garden, by the blood fountain” Jonah said, giving us a play-by-play of what was happening. “I think their plan is to just run through. Wait, they’re doing something.”

  “What?” Gretchen asked.

  “Everyone is jumping in the red fountain, one by one. They’re jumping in and out.”

  “What the hell?” I said. “Why are they doing that?”

  “They’re running!” Jonah said.

  War Party> Invaders are entering the Gardens.

  This was maddening. I stood poised over the ammo hole with nothing to do until the tower’s ammo ran out, and then I’d have to wait another ten seconds before I could spring into action. I couldn’t see a thing.

  “Statues are activating. Whoa, those things are scary. There’s a dude riding a Pegasus, and he’s skewering them with his spear. There’s this other guy with his hand over his eyes, and he moves his hand, and a laser shoots out. They’re getting fucked up.”

  Poppy: Tower one, go.

  Granger: Firing now.

  Despite us being a hundred meters or so away from that first tower, we could feel the heat emanating from the spout on the top. The fire roared as Granger rained hell on them.

  Poppy: As soon as they reach that first cross sidewalk, tower two go.

  Tiatha: I will do as instructed.

  A moment later, tower two added its roar to the barrage. The heat in our tower was becoming unbearable. The growl of the fire shook the walls.

  “Shit, I don’t think it’s working,” Jonah said. He had to yell to be heard. “The fire isn’t doing shit. The statues are fucking t
hem up, but they’re running through the fire like it’s nothing.”

  “Holy cow, the fountain,” Gretchen said. “There must be some fire insulation properties to the red water. The spiral is filled with stuff like that, little tricks to get past certain parts.”

  Jonah growled with frustration. “Why would the hobgoblins put that shit in here if they’re trying to keep people out?”

  “Because it’s a fucking game,” I said.

  “It’s up to us,” Gretchen said. “Insulation isn’t going to protect them from plasma.”

  “They’ll be in range in three, two, one,” Jonah said. “Fire!”

  Gretchen pulled her trigger, and Jonah screamed as he waved the aiming nozzle.

  “It’s working!” Jonah cried. “Where’s that prince asshole?”

  Achievement Unlocked! Participate in a siege event.

  Achievement Unlocked! Kill a hostile enemy using a tower.

  Experience notifications started pouring in.

  “Oh, fuck!” Jonah cried, leaning back as an arrow flew through the small opening in the tower. The arrow clattered to the floor by my feet.

  The tower sputtered out. We had ten seconds before we could fire again.

  “Shit, there he is, the prince,” Jonah called. “He’s faster than he looks. The giant centaur dude is crashing through, but a small group are already past him. Fuck, they’re going to get through. But not all of them. Hurry up and load that thing, and we can get the rear guard.”

  The blue globe popped up, and I grasped it, gingerly dropping it in the hopper. My heart thrashed. The sound of fighting, and the screams of the dying rose heavy in the air.

  “Tower loaded,” I yelled.

  “Fire,” Jonah called.

  Gretchen pulled the trigger again, sweeping up the last of the invaders.

  A moment later, silence filled the battlefield. Gretchen jumped up to look out the small window, but it was too high for me.

  “The statues are walking back to their positions,” Gretchen said. “There’s a ton of dead hobgoblins down there. The three of us had to have killed at least two hundred of them.”

  “Jesus, that’s brutal,” Jonah said. “I can smell it from here. How the hell did anyone ever get through this?”

  War Party> Invaders are emerging from the Gardens.

  War Party Admin> Calculating casualties… 420 casualties. 10 invaders remain.

  “Yeah, baby!” I called. With only ten left, Bingo and Jonah alone could probably take the remaining fighters out.

  “I wonder what he’s going to do,” Jonah said, still peering out the window. “It’s just that fat prince guy and a few battered warriors left.”

  “He can’t turn back now,” Gretchen said. “If he wants to retreat, he’ll have to go through the Gardens again. The gargoyles would kill him for sure.”

  “Check out our experience notifications,” Jonah said. “It’s not all that impressive.”

  I looked, and it appeared I’d received a measly 215 experience for my part in killing all the hobgoblins. The experience one gained from being part of a tower crew wasn’t that great. My level bar had barely moved.

  “It looks like we got just about one experience per hobgoblin killed by the tower,” Gretchen said.

  War Party> Invaders are entering castle 6.

  “I thought you said you could go around that last castle,” Jonah said.

  “You can,” Gretchen said. “And it’s supposed to be really difficult to break into. It sounds like he knows a secret way in.”

  “Do you think we should go in and get him?” Jonah asked.

  “Yes,” I said. “Definitely. We’ll get a party together and smoke his ass out.”

  “I don’t know,” Gretchen said. “That guy is tricky. Maybe we should post a guard outside but leave him be, wait for him to come to us.”

  “What’s in there, anyway?” Jonah asked. “It’s the Louvre museum in real life. I know the Mona Lisa is in there and so is the Venus de Milo.”

  “The naked chick with no arms?” I asked.

  Jonah laughed. “That’s the one.”

  “There’s supposedly a few guild halls in there,” Gretchen said, “along with some randomly-generating magical gear. I’m not really certain of the details. It’s a very high-level dungeon, but I never heard of there being anything really special in there. There are much easier-to-get-to dungeons in the world with better loot.”

  “Wait, I know this,” I said, remembering something I’d read ages ago. “The Artistry guild is in there. It’s not the main one, but there’s something you can get there that artists all want.”

  “Hmm,” Jonah said. “My artistry is level ten, but it’s also a non-enhanced skill, so I don’t know if the guild would really help.”

  I shrugged. “Who knows. If that Prince Kankan guy does have a trick up his sleeve, I doubt it has anything to do with the damn artist’s guild. I still think we better go get him. I don’t like the idea of him just sitting there. Besides, we get prizes for beating the wave, and we don’t beat the wave until he’s dead.”

  We met back with the others at the base of the towers. Below on the field, hundreds of small, goblin-like creatures appeared and were pulling the bodies away. Each creature was small, about the size of a gnome. Unlike gnomes, these creatures were thin, green beasts with pointed ears and sharp, angular jaws. They worked quickly.

  “What are those?” Jonah asked.

  “Chamber imps,” Gretchen said. “You see them in dungeons mostly. They mop up after big battles. They come out of nowhere, clean up, and disappear. It’s best to leave them alone. They’re not hostile. You can kill them easily, but you don’t get any experience. They are demon class creatures, so their blood is caustic. Also, if you touch one, you get a “Bad Hygiene” curse for an hour, which makes you smell really bad.

  I laughed, remembering. “The curse also covers your skin in oily pimples. You can’t even hold your weapon while you’re cursed. You lose a bunch of dexterity. It’s like you’re drunk.”

  Jonah grunted. “Stay away from the chamber imps. Got it.”

  I watched the little green creatures gibber to one another as they cleaned up the mess.

  “Let’s get back to Fort Bloodgasm,” I said. “We’ll check on Alice and see if Bingo had any luck talking to his old clanmates. We’ll get Winston and Vern to guard the exit of Castle Six until we decide what to do. We also need to sleep an hour to reset our regen.”

  Neither Jonah nor Gretchen responded.

  “Fort Bloodgasm?” Jonah finally asked. “What the hell is that?”

  I grinned. “It just came to me. It rolls off the tongue, doesn’t it?”

  Popper Note 14

  Castle Riot has been renamed to Fort Bloodgasm.

  “That is the stupidest name I have ever heard,” Gretchen said. “Bloodgasm? Really?”

  Jonah laughed. I grinned. “I was thinking Castle Greyskull at first, but I don’t want to rely on references, you know what I mean? I want to pave my own way.”

  Gretchen muttered something about being forced to play with a bunch of children as we crossed the bridge into the newly-named Fort Bloodgasm. We’d left Winston and Vern just outside Castle Six, and they’d warn us if anything happened.

  Poppy: Bingo, are you back yet?

  Bingo: I am still conversing with these so-called gorcupines. I will give a report upon my return. I may be a few more hours. We have much to discuss.

  “That sounds ominous,” Jonah said.

  We found Alice and Bruce Bruce waiting for us at the stables. They stood with the tall platypus-like creature. I’d been afraid Alice would be upset at missing out on the action, but she bounced up and down with excitement as we approached.

  “Popper! Hi!” Alice exclaimed as we approached. “We did what you asked. We completed the quest! We found the beastmaster! His name is Oliver.”

  “Where’s Chauncey?” Gretchen asked, looking around for the coypu. He was supposed to help
Alice and Bruce Bruce on their “quest.”

  Alice looked around, just as surprised as we were. “He was here a minute ago. Or at least an hour ago. Or maybe two hours ago.”

  The duck-billed creature looked at me with impassive eyes. I noticed with interest he wore twin whips on his belt. The creature stood about five feet tall. He had a wide, solid body covered in brown, oily hair.

  “Regent,” Oliver said, nodding. The creature had an Australian accent.

  “He knows a lot about animals,” Alice said. “He’s really nice. He has snacks.”

  “He is strong. A strong man,” Bruce Bruce added.

  Behind him, the paddock containing the gigantic scorpion mount rattled as the beast threw itself against the wall.

  “We have a lot to talk about,” I said to Oliver. “We need to see about filling the Menagerie and arming the cage traps.”

  “That’s what I do,” Oliver said. “But I can’t do much without the beasts to do it with.”

  “So, what’re you saying? We need to gather up some monsters for the traps?” Jonah asked. “How are we going to do that?”

  Oliver nodded. “I have traps of all sizes, and you’re free to use them. Before, the two princes would go out into the world, capture the beasts, and return them to me. If you wish to refill the Menagerie and the cage traps, you will have to do the same.”

  “That’s going to be tough if we’re stuck in the city,” Jonah said.

  I shook my head. “We’re not stuck in the city. We’re stuck in the country. We gotta be able to find something out there.”

  “How many do we need?” Gretchen asked Oliver.

  “The Menagerie can hold up to 150 large beasts. The spiral currently contains an additional 20 cage traps, and those can hold varying amounts based on the size of the monsters. We can add more traps, but you’ll need to build ‘em. Plus capture the beasties to stock ‘em.”

  “What about the dungeons, then?” Jonah asked.

  I nodded. I was thinking the same thing. “Yeah, can we go into Castle Six and use these traps to capture whatever is inside?”

  Oliver looked thoughtful. “We can do this. Chief Musa never wanted us to interfere with the beasties living in the castles, but if your primary concern is getting the spiral defenses up and running, this is not a bad idea.”