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

by Matt Dinniman

  I shuddered. I hated those things. I hated going in caves.

  As we waited, Alice and I walked forward to examine the mouth of the cavern. A pair of spring traps stood right at the exit. I could see their blinking outline, but the emo-tong wouldn’t. I didn’t know if I could trigger them or not, but I kept back just in case.

  I noticed a small, glowing charm stone by the exit, covered in runes. Also etched on the stone was the symbol of the blue church of Kalika.

  I moved back and pointed it out to Gretchen.

  She shrugged. “It’s probably to keep the skeletons in the Catacombs. There’s stuff like that all over the city and the traps I’ve noticed.”

  “Does that mean those things can’t get out if Jonah’s curse triggers?”

  “Huh,” Gretchen said. “Maybe? I don’t know. It probably doesn’t matter though. He says his Detect Undead charm sees them underneath the entire city. So the other ones would probably find a way out. I guess the real version of Paris had a big system of crypts under it.”

  Poppy: Hey Jonah. How’s it going?

  His Royal Majesty Jonah: We’re working on something, but I’m not so sure it’s going to work. We’re going to go out there and test it in a bit.

  Poppy: I got an idea, but you gotta hurry your ass.

  It took almost an hour and a half for the first emo-tong to emerge from the Catacombs. The gashadokuro had finally crossed the river and was winding its way toward the catacomb entrance. The Sentinel Tower launched bolt after bolt at it, to no effect other than momentarily staggering it. The triplets hit it in every possible spot, but it just kept coming.

  “How the hell is that thing going to fit in the Catacombs?” I asked. It was taller than the entrance to the underground caverns.

  Gretchen grimaced. “Over in Quibou, they said it fell down and turned itself into a skeletal snake.”

  “Oh that’s nice.”

  The click-clack, click-clack of the marching emo-tong rose from the dark exit to the Catacombs. They emerged, one by one, holding their spears and swords, a few on the edges with glowing hands. Their emotionless, bug faces were the vision of a nightmare. Their formation was not nearly as tight as it had been before, but there were so, so many.

  I waited for the notification.

  War Party> Invaders are emerging from the Catacombs.

  War Party Admin> Calculating casualties… 1,244 casualties so far. Obstacle is still active and additional casualties may occur. 5,950 invaders remain.

  Damnit. I’d never faced such uneven odds in a group battle before.

  “Ok, folks,” I called out. “Hold the line! Listen to Colonel Holder. He knows what he’s doing. Where are my healers? Where’s Tiatha?” I had called the druid down from her tower to join the handful of other healers we now had.

  “I am here,” she called.

  “Your job is to keep me, Gretchen, Alice, and Bruce Bruce safe. All you others focus on the tanks.”

  “Ready, Colonel Holder?” I called over to the older white jacket. He saluted with his sword. He would take over commands once the fighting started. Among his multiple war party skills, he had a level 20 Battle Formation skill. The skill gave everyone here a 5% health bonus, but more importantly, it imbued the damage-enhancing effect of Bleed on all enemy soldiers who were hit by more than one fighter.

  As Gretchen and I took up positions in the middle of the line, the first few bugs clambered out, some of them using their short-range flying skill to buzz up into the air. Those who charged on the ground, triggered the spring trap, and they went flying. A moment later, the next group activated the second trap. The ones in the air were immediately skewered by the archers.

  The remaining bulk of the emo-tong lurched forward as one, more cautiously now, coming forward like a slow-moving wave of death. This group kept mostly to the ground, their gleaming weapons at the ready.

  I pulled a barkskin potion and downed it. My skin tightened as the protection took hold. The potion had a five-minute countdown. Gretchen cast two magic protection shells, one around her and Bruce Bruce and one around me and Alice. This also had a five-minute countdown, but the blue shield would shatter after too many hits.

  His Royal Majesty Jonah: the big skeleton thing is entering the Catacombs. I’m ordering the triplets to assist with your fight.

  Poppy: Don’t worry about us. Do your thing.

  His Royal Majesty Jonah: Yeah, we’re not in the cockpit. We’re near the entrance of the Catacombs. I wanted to see what it did when it entered the cavern.

  The emo-tong made odd, quick hissing noises, their weapons and mantis-like forearms swinging. Each hiss sounded like air brakes on a bus, quick and sharp. They quickened their movement, coming to a full jog. We roared in return.

  I twirled my axe and said, “Alice, let’s squash some bugs.”

  She roared and charged.

  There’s nothing quite like galloping at an enemy on the back of a full ton of screaming, pissed-off hippocorn. Alice lowered her head, charging at the bugs, cleaving through them like a snowplow. I swung left and right, my axe connecting with chitinous armor. The crunching, cracking sound of the bugs being slaughtered filled the night.

  Half-ogre, human, texugo, and dwarf fighters smashed into the crowd. Bingo and his four gorcupines roared and leaped in the air, sailing well over my head, and landing hard in the midst of the startled bugs. The five of them together completely blocked the exit, which effectively cut off the bugs already on the outside. The gorillas went to work, methodical, brutal, and fucking glorious.

  The warriors rushed into the midst of the bewildered and cut-off bugs, taking full advantage of the chaos. The bugs were weak and slow, terrible melee fighters. The emo-tong mages on the edges finally rallied, and blue and red bolts started streaking back and forth between the parties, like we were exchanging bottle rocket fire. A magic bolt smashed against my shield, sizzling. The shield continued to hold.

  The Muzzle tower fired. The blue plasma bolts sounded almost like a phaser blast from a sci-fi game. The bolts had an area of effect attack, but this tower was only level one and the area wasn’t that large. But the effect itself lasted a long time, and it fired quickly, thanks to Nale’s high level. He focused first on the emo-tong mages and then moved to the clerics. Soon, no magic emanated from the front lines, and the mages ran back toward the cave in panic—showing the first signs of emotion from the disciplined emo-tong. They ran into the waiting gorcupines, who showed them no mercy.

  Gretchen was a thing of beauty. She leaped off of Bruce Bruce, choosing to fight beside the bear. I’d seen her fight plenty of times, but not in a situation like this. She twisted and spun, leaped and jabbed with her spear. She did not yell, but I was surprised to see tears streaming down her cheeks as she fought. She’d been practicing hard, day in and out with her weapon. She was level 27 with the spear, a level three master, and it showed.

  Bruce Bruce showed no signs of the timidity he’d shown earlier. He roared and clawed, biting and slicing. He and Gretchen were a whirlwind of death.

  Without magic, the emo-tong were garbage at fighting. The slaughter was one-sided. A few of our guys went down, but not many.

  Rush, cut, rush, cut. Alice and I charged, swiping left and right. Bodies started to pile up at the cavernous exit. Hundreds, it seemed, in just a minute. The gorcupines retreated back, not wanting to get pulled further into the cave. Fresh emo-tong poured out of the caverns, crawling over the wall of their dead, headed straight into the blender. Arrows rained on them from behind and above, though most the shafts bounced off the armor of those on the ground. The few emo-tong who dared to fly were immediately cut down, their unprotected wings getting ripped to shreds by arrows.

  The javelin blasts from the triplets took out six at a time.

  Alice cried out in pain as an emo-tong leaped on her back, its sharp forearms digging into her backside as it wrested for purchase. It held a pair of glowing axes. I ducked as the four-armed bastard swung at my head
, hissing loudly.

  “Can we do it? Can we do it?” Alice called.

  “Do it!” I screamed as I leaped into the air, mentally triggering the Feather Fall effect from my helmet.

  “Barrel roll, motherfucker!” Alice screamed—just as I had taught her. She threw her body onto the ground and to the left, rolling until she was back on her feet. She immediately repeated the maneuver, this time to the right. The whole exercise took less than two full seconds to complete. She not only splattered the axe-wielding bug, but she took out a line of others.

  I landed deftly on her back in a standing position. I pulled my feet into the special, raised stirrups, remaining standing as we circled back toward our side. Gretchen and Bruce Bruce had stopped their fighting momentarily to watch the move open-mouthed.

  Your Mounted Acrobatics skill has risen from level 6 to 7.

  The host of emo-tong remained in the Catacombs now, likely rallying for an assault. They were both cornered and had to climb a hill of their own dead to get out.

  This method when on for a while, lines of emo-tong cresting the hill only to be added to the hill themselves moments later. After the hill became too tall to climb, they flew over on their ponderous, buzzing wings. They were slow in the air, and a glancing shot from the archers was enough for them to tumble out of control. I felt like the kid who found a cheat to get unlimited gold in a game. The experience kept coming and coming. Gretchen and I both were getting full experience for these kills, and I’d already leveled up several times.

  His Royal Majesty Jonah: Holy shit, Popper. I think your bridge idea might work.

  Alice and I were back with the archers taking a breather. Gretchen and Bruce Bruce were jogging back to us. Ahead, a line of half-ogres and gorcupines stood halfway up the hill of corpses, killing everything that poked its head out.

  Poppy: Well, fuck. Why didn’t we think of this earlier? We need to smash every…

  I didn’t finish the message.

  Bingo, Gretchen, and I all saw them at the same time. I shouted a warning as Gretchen leaped to the side. Bingo and all his gorcupines scattered. A line of wide, silver tubes crested the hill of dead emo-tong, arcing down to bear on us.

  The hackbuts fired all at once, a deafening thunderclap of black smoke and fire. The texugo standing to my immediate left flew back as if he had been hit by a maul. A second line of gun-wielding soldiers appeared, and they also fired. They fell back and were replaced by a third line.

  “I’m hit! I’m hit!” Alice screamed, bucking into the air. She immediately glowed. The shot fragment pushed out of her chest as Tiatha healed her. She continued to hop up and down, going “Ow, ow, ow!”

  All around me, soldiers died. The healers couldn’t keep up. Gretchen shouted angrily at Colonel Holder, who in turn nodded and started screaming orders of his own. Bingo and crew threw themselves into the midst of the gun-toting bugs, but I saw one gorcupine fly back, his head blown clear off.

  Colonel Holder screamed orders, and the group fell back, passing through the edge of the wall and melting into the side streets.

  “We’re not done yet,” I screamed, outraged we were retreating. Gretchen had pulled herself up onto Bruce Bruce and came galloping at us.

  “Look at the numbers. We’re fine. We gotta get out of here before we lose more soldiers.”

  Holder recalled the gorcupines over the chat, and even they pulled back. Pissed off, but not wanting to face the bugs alone, I followed Gretchen off the path.

  “We had them!” I yelled. A bright, red button was blinking on the edge of my vision. The button was getting bigger by the moment, and I had to stop moving or it would auto-trigger. Going Berserk could be triggered manually when my heartbeat reached a certain level, but if it went up enough, it would go off on its own whether I wanted it to or not.

  “Calm down,” Gretchen said. All signs she’d been crying earlier had fled. “Look at the numbers. Oh, and look at your level.”

  I looked. Level 24. Holy shit. I’d gone up four levels. Gretchen was level 29, right on the edge of 30.

  How long had we been fighting? I pulled up the War Events menu as I felt my heart start to calm.

  1,436 emo-tong remained. Of the 10 surviving oni, it appeared only one remained.

  “What the hell?” I said. “We killed a lot, but not that many!” That was how much? 4,500 dead? “I would have guessed we’d gotten about 750 of them. 1,000 tops. I never even saw any of those red bastards out there.”

  “I know. I think with them getting backed up inside the Catacombs and unable to exit, they were attacked over and over again on the inside. Hitting them here was really effective. We need to either build or move a barracks right here on the exit.”

  I nodded. The barracks were all like mini-castles. They spanned the path in an arch. They garrisoned multiple soldiers and featured defensive positions for archers to safely fire on the approaching creeps. An arch right where we’d just been fighting would be a great defense.

  I sighed, patting Alice on the head. She’d done well. She purred loudly.

  Gretchen also petted Bruce Bruce, who said nothing. He continued to stare back at the pile of dead bodies about fifty feet away. The remaining emo-tong were hesitantly emerging from the Catacombs, trying to form up their positions.

  Colonel Holder approached. “Orders?” he asked. The gruff white jacket made no secret his disdain for me and Gretchen being above him on the totem pole, but he was a professional soldier. He was one of those guys who you’d meet and never be able to imagine as a kid. Like he’d been born with that sword strapped over his shoulder, and even his mother had called him “The Gray Misery.”

  “How many did we lose?” I asked. I pulled a cigarette out and lit it, taking a deep drag.

  Holder reached out, and I realized he wanted to bum a cigarette. I held out the pack, and he took one. I offered my wisp lighter. He nodded his appreciation. He took a long drag. “Looks like about 25 of us, including a gorcupine.”

  I nodded. It didn’t seem like much, but we needed every soldier we could get. “We still have 1,500 of them to deal with. They’re going to hit the Hell Gate in a minute, but it hasn’t been working. The Gardens after that. I want you to add your troops to the garrison at the Butcher’s Delight and make a stand there. We can’t afford to let them get all the way to the Menagerie. Also, have some archers jump on the path to skewer them in the back after they pass. We couldn’t do that before because of that gash-however the hell you pronounce it, but it’s still in the Catacombs. I’ll have the towers focus on the gunners.”

  He nodded and saluted crisply before turning and barking more orders.

  I looked at Gretchen. “The emo-tong are done for. We did our part. Now it’s up to Jonah.”

  She looked as worried as I felt. “I hope he knows what he’s doing.”

  Jonah Note 15

  Spritz, Archie, and I stood overlooking the bridge. We’d been experimenting with Spritz’s abilities to move rocks around and to alter buildings. While the wave was active, she was limited to what she could do.

  She’d just hit level ten, and she could now place fire and archer towers. She could also move some towers around—though not while a wave was active. It didn’t cost anything for her to move or build things, but building took a lot of time. I was originally planning on having her just spam the path with alternating freeze and attack towers, but that wouldn’t work. She needed a couple hours to build a simple archer tower. Once she hit fifteen, she could build lightning, freeze, and mortars. Each one would take five or six hours. Muzzle and rock chuckers took ten hours. Specialty towers took as long as a day. We didn’t have time for that, not with only 72 hours between waves.

  I’d just had her try to destroy the bridge crossing the Cassagnac just north of Castle Two. The same location as my earlier battle with the tormented and the moles. God, that’d been what? Six hours ago? It seemed like a week. The thousands of corpses had all been cleaned up by the chamber imps, though several
of the small creatures remained on the path as we approached. It appeared they were filling in the holes left by the moles. They ignored us as we passed, and I gave them a wide berth, not wanting to accidentally touch one. The way Gretchen explained the Bad Hygiene curse made it sound almost as bad as my Devouring Soul curse.

  To everyone’s surprise, destroying the bridge actually worked. Almost. We couldn’t fully obstruct the path, but the system allowed Spritz to destroy the bridges to the point where nothing but a single, sidewalk-width amount of stone spanned the river. The thin arch defied physics, but it stood, magically held aloft by the magic of the spiral.

  The invaders crossed seven bridges during a complete spiral run. If we could slow them to a trickle at each of the bridges, we could hold off almost any number of attackers. I couldn’t believe we hadn’t thought of this earlier.

  With emo-tong, they could fly short distances, so it didn’t matter for this wave, but for the next—assuming we survived the next few hours—it meant hope. The number of creeps was going up by almost three times each wave. I shuddered at what that boded for the fifth and final wave.

  I’d hoped to be able to install a trap onto the damaged bridge itself, but the system wouldn’t let Archie do it. Nor would it allow us to install a trap about ten feet before or after the start of the bridge in a wide rectangle. We’d been struggling for a way to overcome this problem when Popper gave us his idea.

  We rushed back to the island and dragged the shaman out of the church.

  “How long does it take you to make a charm stone?” I asked.

  He looked between me and Spritz, eyes wide.

  “It depends on the purpose of the stone. The casting of the spell takes but a few moments. But the stone itself must be carved by a master mason. The weight of the stone must be precise. The purity of the materials in the stone must be exact. The runes must be perfectly placed, or the stone will not hold the magic. If any one of these is wrong, it could explode.”