Goblin General (Level 12)

  Goblins are a race considered to be the scourge of any planet. Basic goblins are aggressive and not intelligent. They only care about killing, looting, and breeding. This specific goblin variant is a General type. The Generals are the most powerful, and most intelligent goblins in an army. They excel in combat, tactics, and usually command a massive force. They are not to be underestimated.

  Alex sighed. Another one so soon. I fucking knew there was a General somewhere around here. It felt like there were too many goblins to be without one.

  He called out to his team, since half hadn’t turned to see what he sent the wind blades towards. “Goblin General! Looks to be an assassin type.”

  The eyes of most of his team members went wide when they heard that, causing them to instantly spin around to face the new threat.

  “Derek, your call. You guys want to hold off the General, or take out the small ones while I do?” Alex wanted to give them the chance to decide for themselves; he trusted their judgment if they thought they could hold it off. He also wasn’t fond of fighting a general alone with his current debuff.

  Derek looked around at his team, minus Alex, and they each nodded back to him. “We’ll hold the General until you can finish the smaller goblins off.” He said, his voice stern and resolute.

  “Copy that. You guys be careful.” Alex replied before he turned back towards the goblin horde. Though it was becoming less and less like a horde. The numbers had dwindled drastically.

  “heheheh,” the goblin snickered. Understanding what they had all said. The General clearly thought it was funny. “You all die slow.” It flicked its dagger into the air and caught it.

  This General was a bit shorter than the Berserker Alex had fought, but was still easily almost six feet tall. It wore black leather armor, lined with thin black metal plates for extra protection. This assassin general used daggers, lots of them. Two large wicked-edged ones in its hands, and several other styles of daggers in sheaths on its body, even some smaller ones that looked meant for throwing.

  ***

  Looking at the goblin, Derek was a bit intimidated. He vividly remembered the fight with the commander, who had been really tough, and then looked again at this General and knew they wouldn’t compare. This General was on another level.

  Being an assassin type also brought its own challenges. Most likely, it wouldn’t be able to use stealth anymore. He knew Alex couldn't use it again in combat, and he hoped the assassin was the same. There was also a high chance it would have some kind of poison.

  The biggest issue would be its speed. Derek’s team wasn’t very fast, except for Alex and Rykos. Alex was tied up at the moment, so he would have to rely on the beastkin. Fighting this general was also bad timing for them all. He knew his party’s casters were all low on mana, Alex included. Derek also had his evolution already ready… If they had time, he could have evolved, making this fight much easier. But he couldn’t right now.

  Mentally prepared, he moved towards the General, his team followed close behind. Once he was in range, he used his [Charge] skill to quickly close the distance and slammed his shield forward, hoping to hit the goblin with it.

  He never felt his shield impact it, but he did feel the dagger that stabbed him in the thigh. Reacting quickly, before any follow-up attacks could land, he activated his [Iron Skin] skill. The skill boosted his body's defenses and toughness, reducing damage taken by 80% for 10 seconds.

  As soon as the skill was activated, he was assaulted with four more blows from the general, along his sides and chest. They didn’t penetrate him as much as the first attack, but they still drew blood and would have killed him if he hadn’t used the skill.

  “Ooohhh. Tough. Not die already.” The General said, standing a few yards away, licking the blood from the dagger.

  Derek could feel the cool flow of Sarah’s healing seeping into his wounds. She had come up behind him, hands resting on his back, and started healing him.

  “He’s fast; I could barely see his movements,” Korgrith said from beside him.

  Rykos growled. “I saw them clearly. He's faster than me.

  “Then we need to predict his movements, or throw out area attacks. We’ve got to kill this green asshole.” Sam added.

  “Agreed. We’re killing this thing, or at least holding it off until Alex’s finished taking out the small fry.” Derek said. “And none of us dies.” He was healed enough now; the wounds sealed shut.

  “Remember, Derek. Healing only helps so much. I can’t restore your stamina or the mental toll pain takes on you; at some point, your body will need rest. Each wound will slow you in the long run. Not to mention my mana is limited.” Sarah whispered to him from behind.

  Derek nodded to her, but didn’t take his eyes off the general. “Rykos, you’re the fastest of us. Try to disrupt his attacks when he comes for us, or slow him down so we can hit. Anything you can do.”

  He moved forward again; this time, he wouldn’t charge ahead. He wanted his friends close by to attack while he attempted to defend.

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  The General was still patiently waiting for them to get close with a smirk on his face. The creature was obviously enjoying himself, treating it like a game.

  We’re not weak. He’s going to regret taking us lightly. Derek thought, as he looked at Sam briefly and nodded.

  Close enough, the tank stabbed his blade forward. Right before Derek struck the goblin with his sword, Sam sent out two fireballs. They didn’t do much since the first was dodged, and the second was cut out of the air. But this distracted the General, allowing Derek’s sword to get closer than the goblin intended.

  As the blade was about to pierce the goblin, Derek activated his [Power Strike]. Unable to block or parry the skill-powered blow, the General twisted its body to the side, mostly avoiding the attack and instead taking a deep graze across its chest.

  Rykos moved in at the same time and struck out with his claws, jabbing them forward like a dagger. His claws sank into the goblin's back, right as the creature crouched and spun around. Using the spins rotation, the General swung his daggers out, attacking those around him. He spun like a bladed top, blades whirling around him.

  Derek was able to block using his shield, but Rykos got caught while he was too close. The daggers slashed him across the chest and again near his neck, almost slitting his throat.

  While spinning, the goblin didn’t see a very large minotaur bearing down on it. Korgrith planted his hoof in front of him and used his [Shattering Stomp] skill. Splitting the ground beneath the General knocked it off balance, ending its rotation.

  Derek stepped in front of Rykos, blocking him from any further attacks, while Sarah went to heal him.

  Korgrith continued to press the attack. He followed up with an overhead strike of his two-handed hammer. The General was easily able to dodge the blow, but it kept him occupied and unable to attack anyone else for now.

  Sam was helping with the pressure by bombarding the goblin with fireballs constantly. They weren’t his higher-powered ones, going with quantity over quality, but they were still potent enough to want to dodge.

  During one particular moment when Korgrith and Sam put on a lot of pressure, the general completely faded out of existence, like when using a stealth skill. He appeared out of a shadow twenty feet away. No one had seen his movement or what had happened.

  Derek sighed. “Assassins suck, “ he mumbled.

  ***

  Alex had finished with the weaker goblins by now, the remnants only taking a moment. Being bronze ranked made them easy, not even requiring mana to finish. He now watched his team just to see how they did. He knew how strong a General was, so he was impressed they weren’t doing too badly, though Rykos had a close moment there.

  I guess it's time I joined in, so we can wrap this up.

  Channeling his wind enhancement through himself and his sword, he summoned a few wind blades and launched them at the goblin. He wanted them to be dodged, and immediately followed up with a wind rift from his sword. He timed the rift to go right where the assassin was landing after his dodge.

  As predicted, the goblin saw the wind blades coming and jumped into the air to avoid them. After it jumped, the creature noticed the wind rift coming and was forced to use a skill.

  “You bastard, you're almost as ugly as that berserker general was,” Alex commented, after he completely dodged the wind rift. He used some kind of defensive ability that blurred his body, allowing the wind rift to pass through him unimpeded.

  That ability lasted only about 2 seconds, but it was powerful. I bet it has a cooldown or high cost. He won’t be able to do it much.

  Alex ran toward the general, sword still wrapped in wind, intent on cutting the creature down. Halfway to him, the goblin pulled a few knives off its chest straps. Holding the knives for a moment, they glowed a bright, sickly green.

  Poison. Shit.

  The General threw one at Alex. He quickly boosted his wind enhancement to increase his speed and dodged the dagger before he lowered his wind enhancement to a previous level to conserve mana.

  The other two of the daggers weren’t thrown towards him. They were aimed at his party. One stuck in Sam’s [Mage Barrier] skill, penetrated it an inch before it stopped, while the other sank into Sarah’s stomach.

  She instantly started screaming and fell to the ground. Alex didn’t know if it was from the pain of the knife wound or from the poison’s potency.

  “SARAH!” Alex yelled out, wanting to run over and check on her. But he knew it wouldn’t do any good. Alex wasn’t a healer. So he focused on what he could do. Kill things.

  “You're dead asshole.” He told the General.

  Alex was pissed and didn’t care about mana anymore. He could feel his Progenitor racial traits rising to the surface again. Its possessiveness, superiority complex, and anger over someone having the gall to hurt what was his. He leaned into it.

  In anger, he cranked up his wind enhancement again on himself and tried something new. He also boosted the wind enhancement on his sword.

  Alex hadn’t tried adding more mana to his sword, increasing the range and strength of the weapon imbue. His sword looked like a tornado. The wind around him was whipping in all directions, pushing, pulling, twisting, cutting.

  Crouching down low, he kicked off the ground and leapt forward. Alex dashed full tilt towards the General. It stood there, waiting for him, enjoying the torment it was causing him by hurting someone he cared about.

  Quickly closing the distance, he stabbed out, blade first, at the general’s chest. The goblin used some kind of skill that made a green glow wrap around him. Using this, he was able to easily dodge Alex’s lunging stab. But even dodging the blade, the winds around the sword tore into the general, leaving small cuts along his exposed flesh.

  Undeterred, he pulled his sword back and slashed out from above, bringing his blade from shoulder to hip. But again, the goblin dodged.

  It laughed and struck back at him with its daggers. With his boosted speed, Alex was only just able to dodge or deflect the attacks, but he wouldn’t be able to keep it going for long. His mana was dwindling; regeneration was unable to slow his expenditure. The dagger strikes were coming hard and fast.

  Gripping his sword tighter, he slashed out across the midsection of the goblin, hoping it would be harder to dodge. He was correct in his assumption. The general was unable to dodge it. Forcing it to use that flicker ability again to let the blade pass through.

  He’d already seen the skill, though, and knew how long it lasted. A second strike was quickly used, timed to land just as the defensive skill ended. It worked perfectly.

  Alex's sword, infused with the wind magic, cleanly took off the goblin's right arm at the shoulder. He smiled as the goblin screamed and grabbed its shoulder to stop the bleeding. It stared daggers at Alex.

  Fireballs rained down on the General. These were the improved and stronger ones that Sam could make with more time and mana; he hadn’t been standing idly by. Alex noticed them coming up with a plan and buying them time.

  Immediately after the fireballs stopped, Rykos appeared. Using his high speed, he clamped his jaws down on the only remaining arm of the goblin and dug his claws into the goblin to hold him. Korgrith followed a moment later and grabbed onto the General with his high strength, not giving him an inch to move.

  This allowed Alex to slowly walk forward as he released his wind magic, with a wide grin on his face. His eyes glowing, deep black hair matted with blood, armor covered in red from all the goblins he slew.

  In reach of the General, Alex raised his sword and slowly and deliberately stabbed it into the goblin's neck. Staring into his eyes, he saw when the light left them, then he wrenched his blade out the side, cleanly severing the head off.

  “Well, that was fun. How’s Sarah? He asked, looking towards her.

  She still sat on the ground, with Derek hovering over her as her protector. But she seemed a bit better than before, having at least stopped screaming.

  “Recovering,” Korgrith said as they walked towards her. “Sarah said the poison wasn’t designed to kill her, but it attacked her nerves instead, causing immense pain. It would be almost impossible for someone to fight while it affected them.”

  “Sarah, is your wound alright? Korgrith told me about the poison.”

  She nodded slowly, obviously still not 100%. “Yeah,” she replied with a slight twinge of pain, “the wound wasn’t too bad, I was able to heal it quickly. But the poison was of high quality and is taking me a while to cleanse. Though I’m not in any danger from it. It’s just painful.”

  “I see. Well, I’m glad you’ll be okay. I'm sure I wasn't the only one worried about you. If you're unable to walk, let us know. One of us can easily carry you for a bit.”

  Turning towards the rest of his team, he told them, “I’m going to throw the General and some of the goblins' equipment into my storage. Then we need to catch up to the survivors. They don’t know where our camp is and might run into more goblins. Actually, Rykos, can you go run ahead and find them? We’ll catch up in a minute.”

  Rykos grunted and nodded, “Yes. I will lead towards the camp.” He turned and ran in the direction they had fled.

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