Amazon Apocalypse: Chapter 35

Sakura and I read as much as possible about our enemy and the current foes we were against.

“So we have to fight these goblins?” Sakura asked uncertainly.

I nodded. “It’s a battle royal of sorts. The System will keep smashing shards together, giving each shard just enough time for one faction to rise above the others and subjugate them. Then the next shard merge begins, and two more shards are merged. The idea is that the final world created by this process is run and ruled by the strongest civilization built from all constituent worlds. Only then will it be strong enough to stand toe to toe with the established forces of the Arcadia Multiverse?”

Sakura shot me a strange look. “You... know a lot about this, don’t you, Carter?”

I shrugged sheepishly. It was all information given to me by Myrina. Otherwise, I’d be just as lost as Sakura. “So basically, we’re going to fight these goblins one way or another. It might be possible to get them to surrender peacefully and win that way, but if these are the goblins we see in RPG games, they won’t reason with us.”

Sakura shook her head in wonder. “Goblins. I could take giant squirrel monsters and massive rats, but goblins? How did they, of all things, end up here?”

Myrina had an explanation for that too. Our games were a way the System prepared us for integration before even the faintest whispers of it appeared. It had probably known that one of the nearby worlds that would be integrated alongside ours featured a race that called themselves goblins, and so we had included them as a staple in our games accordingly.

Sakura insisted I recover more health points, and soon I was fully healed, though depleted of mana. I was still walking a little funny, but I could make my way around with something to lean on. I looked around my room and soon found a wizard’s staff I’d picked up at a Renaissance fair once. I had Sakura bring it to me, and with it on my weak side, I could hobble along behind her. With the help of Warp Step, my hobbles carried me along deceptively fast as the world compressed beneath me with every step.

Sakura led me through the valley. The new patch on the horizon was easy enough to find after a day of walking the entire valley. What had been mostly empty grassland now had a roughly square patch of dense forest on the opposite side of my farmhouse.

The forest took up nearly half of the valley. From the way the System positioned it in sharp contrast to my farmhouse, the mountain peaks rising up all around us felt much like an arena, with Sakura and I on one side and an entire tribe of goblins on the other.

As we neared the forest, we noticed signs of their presence immediately. They marked the borders of their domain with stacks of stones and animal skulls bleached by the sun and stuck on sticks. There was a primitive savagery to it that had me on my guard.

“How sophisticated are these goblins?” I asked Sakura.

She shrugged. “I think I saw a few spears among them. I couldn’t tell what they were tipped with.”

“No firearms then. How would you describe their houses? Wattle and daub? Brick and mortar?”

“More sticks and  rawhides.”

I nodded. “We’re likely dealing with a tribal stone age civilization here.”

“When you say it like that, it makes me feel like we’re about to contact an alien species,” Sakura smirked.

I chuckled. “Good thought, because that’s exactly what we’re about to do.”

We entered the forest, ignoring the skulls as a warning sign against trespassing. We needed to get a good look at these goblins long enough to use examination on some of them and get a feel for their levels.

If they were significantly stronger than us, we’d have no choice but to gather as much as we could carry and flee the valley as quickly as we could. It was best to get this done before the goblins thought of scouting us out. No doubt their chieftain had gotten the same notification I’d received.

As we walked through the forest, broken branches, discarded bones, and occasional scraps of hand-woven coarse cloth littered the area, evidence of their primitive lifestyle. We followed the trail cautiously, aware we could be walking into danger at any moment.

When we finally came across the goblin camp, it was a jarring contrast to the serene beauty of my valley. The settlement was a chaotic mess, with huts haphazardly constructed from branches, leaves, and mud. The structures were of varying sizes and shapes, as if they had been thrown together without any planning or organization.

In the center of the camp, a large bonfire crackled, its smoky scent overpowering the natural fragrance of the forest. Surrounding the fire were a collection of crude wooden benches and tables, all scavenged from the surrounding area. Piles of food scraps and bones littered the ground, evidence of the goblins’ recent meals.

The goblins were a motley assortment of small, green-skinned creatures, with beady eyes and sharp, pointed teeth. Their clothing was as haphazard as their dwellings, with a mix of tattered rags and animal hides draped over their scrawny frames.

They scurried about, tending to various tasks, their movements quick and frantic as they tried to maintain order within their camp. These goblins had been even more surprised by the integration than we’d been.

Curious about the goblins’ strength, I used Examine on a few of them. To my surprise, their levels were quite low, ranging between three and seven. Strangely, they hadn’t leveled up more in the past three days, especially considering the numerous opportunities for advancement in the valley.

Sakura noticed the puzzled expression on my face and asked, “What’s wrong, Carter?”

“The goblins... they’re weaker than I expected,” I replied, still trying to make sense of the situation. “I thought they would’ve leveled up more by now.”

Sakura shrugged. “Maybe they’re just not as resourceful as we are.”

Deciding to take advantage of the goblins’ apparent weakness, I nodded in agreement. “Let’s hit them by surprise. If we’re lucky, we can drive them out of the valley without too much trouble. I don’t want a threat lurking at our backs.”

Sakura glanced at me warily. “Are you sure you’re ready for something like that? How’s your health? Mana?”

“I’m in full health,” I assured her. Though I couldn’t quite say the same about my mana just yet. “I can handle a fight.”

Sakura didn’t look happy, but she hefted her club all the same. “Stay behind me. I’ll draw their fire. You can use your spells from a distance.”

I cast her a nod to show I was ready, and she did the same in return. A moment later, she was screaming at the top of her lungs as she charged into the center of the goblin tribe.

As we sprang into action, the goblins scattered and fled in terror. Now that we were up close, they were smaller than I thought they’d be. At only waist-high, they resembled short-limbed apes more than ferocious creatures of myth and legend.

I expected spears, arrows, weapons, and a barrage of weapons thrown in our direction. Instead, I heard screams of terror.

“Humies! Humies are attacking! Ahhhh!” a goblin screamed in terror. I couldn’t tell whether it was male or female, but it ran in a panicked circle waving its arms and screaming until it eventually ran face-first into a tree and knocked itself unconscious.

Sakura ran around left and right, waving at her club with furious aggression. She swung it back and forth, each blow a promise of deadly destruction to any that met her in battle.

But no goblin stepped forth to challenge her. Nobody even attacked. They were all too busy screaming in terror and shouting the word ‘humies’.

One eventually caught sight of me and must have thought I was an easier target than Sakura. A rock the size of my fingernail hit me in the back of the head.

It wasn’t thrown hard or fast, and turning I saw the one who’d struck me was merely throwing them by hand.

I turned to the goblin, this one clearly male and much larger than the rest.

Goblin (Level 7)

While not quite a worthy foe, he was strong enough that if he wanted to pick a fight with me, he’d get one.

I pointed my finger at the goblin.

“Mana Bolt.”

A spark of bright, magical light shot from my fingertip and struck the goblin in the center of his chest. The blast threw the goblin backward, flesh sizzling and gasping for breath.

His eyes were wide with terror as he scrambled back from me, only getting to his feet when he put a tree between the two of us. From there, he turned and fled as fast as his stubbly little legs could.

“Run! Run!” He shouted as he fled. Most of the goblins running around the tribe in scattered panic turned and followed him, running as fast as they could toward the valley’s edge.

Chief Wubwub was defeated! You have maintained your claim over [Unnamed Valley] and seized control over Chief Wubwub’s domain, expanding your holdings.

Additional features are now available because of your increased ownership.

I turned to Sakura, who was still waving around her club and terrorizing the remaining goblins. The scattered few were so paralyzed with fear that they hadn’t followed Chief Wubwub and the others in their flight from the valley.

Instead, they’d just laid down where they stood, sucking their thumbs and huddling in terror.

“Sakura, you can stop now. We won.”

“Rahhhh!” Sakura roared, swinging her club at a tree and shattering it with one blow. “Fight me!” Sakura bellowed.

“Sakura! It’s over!” I yelled.

“Huh?” Sakura glanced at me, then at her club. “…But… I haven’t even done anything yet.”

I shrugged. “The System says we won.”

Sakura finally put down her club. “Okay. Well, this is weird. We’ve never had survivors before. What do we do with these guys?”

Sakura bent over and gave the unconscious goblin a poke, who’d run straight into a tree trunk.

I shrugged. “Well, I think they surrendered, so we can’t kill them. Let’s just gather them up and... interrogate them, I guess.”

***

Sakura and I quickly rounded up the remaining goblins, herding them into the center of the little village. There were only a few left, and they were all visibly terrified, huddling together in fear.

None of them would speak to us. They just huddled in terror. These few goblins were those who’d frozen in place and been unable to run away, so their reaction now was along the same lines.

It wasn’t until the screamer who’d slammed her head into a tree and knocked herself unconscious woke up that we finally got some answers.

All were about a head shorter than Chief Wubwub and a lot less muscular. Assuming the similarities to humans went deeper than just general body shape, I suspected all those remaining represented the females of their kind.

“Ahhhh! Humies! Flee! Run for your lives!” she shouted as she sat up to find me hovering over her. I caught her before she could bash her head into a tree again and force us to wait another ten minutes for her to wake up again.

“None of that now,” I said, using Warp Step to appear in front of her to block her flight.

But that was a mistake. Seeing me twist reality around myself just terrified her even more and sent her scurrying off in the other direction. She didn’t stop running until Sakura grabbed her by the waist and brought her back down with the others, where about six goblins lay huddled together, shaking with fear.

I looked them over with cold eyes.

“Listen, you’ve been defeated. The System wanted us to fight, and it looks like we won. If you surrender, we don’t have to hurt you. You do surrender, right?”

“Y-yes…” the goblin who’d bashed her head into a tree whispered.

You have subjugated six members of Wubwub’s Goblin Tribe!

The following options are available to you.

Ransom?

Enslave?

Execute?

I hit ransom. Thought it might mean I would have to fight these goblins another day; they had proven little of a challenge the first time.

But moments after I selected the option, a new notification shot back to me.

Chief Wubwub has rejected your offer of ransom.

That figured. I ended up just dismissing the whole prompt. I would puzzle over my remaining options later.

After more coaxing from me and Sakura, the goblin who’d bashed her head into the tree finally gave us her name.

“I… I am Gobgob,” the goblin said hesitantly.

I barely held in a laugh. “Really? Gobgob? Nevermind. You’re a spokesperson for the rest of your tribe since everybody else is too scared to speak. Why are they all so nervous anyway?

“You’re humies!” Gobgob replied, poking a stubby finger toward my chest.

“Humies?” I frowned. “You mean humans?”

Gobgob shuddered. “Yes. Big scary monsters. Very scary. Very smart. They build and destroy for unknowable schemes. Monsters from campfire stories.”

Her eyes darted nervously, suddenly remembering she was talking to one of those monsters.

I shared a glance with Sakura. The System seemed to have seeded goblins with knowledge of us the same way it seeded knowledge of goblins among humanity.

With tears streaming down her face, one of the other goblins finally spoke up and asked in a trembling voice, “Where did our chief go? What happened to him?”

I couldn’t bring myself to lie to them, so I answered honestly, “He ran off with most of the others. We don’t know where they went.”

Their faces fell and one of the older goblins lamented, “Our chief was the only male, and without him, our tribe is doomed.”

That answered the question of goblin gender. Only one goblin was male. Perhaps their culture was like apes, with one alpha male leading a group of females and all other males cast out of the tribe to make their way on their own.

“Please, please, no-kill us,” Gobgob pleaded, her eyes wide with terror.

I shook my head, my voice gentle but firm. “We won’t kill you as long as you behave and cause no more trouble.”

The goblins nodded their heads vigorously, relief spreading across their faces. Sakura and I exchanged glances, hoping this would be enough to keep the goblins in check.

With the goblins momentarily pacified, we decided to head back to the cabin to figure out our next move. We had nipped a violent conflict in the bud for now, but Sakura and I weren’t the only human settlement. That wasn’t likely the only goblin tribe spliced in with Crownhill.

What was happening beyond my little valley? And what would happen when the next species was set against the humans of Earth?

<Note>

So, goblins got a bit of a nerf in this version. They just shouldn't really be capable of putting up a fight against humans who have now had a few days to integrate with the system and get into survival mode. They were always going to get their asses kicked eventually, but now it happened a lot sooner. The main challenge will come from the more powerful races.

Also, any resemblance to the Total War victory options are completely coincidental!