Forest of Thorns' Labyrinth (Part 1)

Chapter XXIII

Forest of Thorns' Labyrinth (Part 1)

“Enji, run!”

The snake turned its head to where Popa hid behind the smashed tree. Enji searched behind him for an escape route; the nearest opening was a small hole between two massive tree roots, barely big enough for him to pass through. The other three pathways lay on the far side of where he was, one of them behind Popa.

“I found a hole I can crawl through. I’ll try to distract the snake, then you can run to find the others.”

As soon as he spoke, the snake turned to him, as it finished uncoiling from the trees above and settling down on the ground. Enji considered casting a fireball to blind the monster, but Galakei had warned them against using fire spells inside the forest due to the dry trees’ flammability. And the action might be useless, even though blind, some snakes could sense the heat from their prey.

“I won’t leave you behind!” Again, the snake set its sights on Popa.

Enji crouched and moved backward slowly, not taking his eyes from the snake. It doesn’t seem to have any problem hearing, and it can see with the bioluminescence emitted by the trees. Enji tried to remember what he had heard of snakes. Do they sense electrical fields? No, those are sharks. Watching its forked tongue flick in the air, he recalled that snakes used the tongue to ‘sniff’ the air for chemical particles. Enji sniffed his armpits. Ugh! She could smell me all the way to the moon! The snake didn’t seem to be in any rush to attack them. Right! She must be stuffed.

“Popa, I’m going to make some noise. The snake is a little lethargic because it just ate, so it might not move too fast. Use the opportunity to escape!”

“Understood!”

Enji clapped his hands. “Hey, you! I feel like barbequing some snake, wanna die and—”

Enji jumped headfirst into the opening as soon as the snake attacked. Everything around him shook with the shock of the snake’s head collision against the trees. What the hell?! Who said it was lethargic? Enji thought the trees behind him would snap like the one they were on when the snake attacked the boar.

“Enji! Enji! Talk to me!” came the distant pleas from Popa.

Enji, with a tight chest and heart jackhammering, waited a moment to catch his breath before replying. “I’m fine, I’ll try to find my way around, you go to the others.”

“I’ll wait here for them to find me. Sol can track me!”

“Alright!”

The snake kept flicking its tongue into the hole, annoyed that its prey had escaped.

Enji crawled along a long, twisting tunnel on all fours until he ran into a passageway. Standing, he tried to orient himself to find the way to Popa, but the many twists and turns he had taken to get there had confused him.

Indecisive as to which way he should take, he sang the ‘dore ni shiyou kana’ song to choose his way. “To the right, I guess.” Before he started, he wanted to leave marks along the way, but the trees were too hard to make visible scars with his sword. If I leave cracker crumbs... He desisted immediately, not knowing what kind of critters it might attract, remembering the parrots.

He was so distracted thinking of ways to use Basic magic for a location spell that he almost ran into a creature after taking a few steps.

“Screech! Screech!” The creature screamed while reeling backward. Enji, too, stepped back.

Enji was about to pull his sword when he noticed what the creature was. It was a female, he could tell that by certain attributes she possessed, since she only wore a loincloth, but what stopped him was that this creature had a child on her back and another next to her. This was the first time Enji had seen a goblin up close, and, curious, he studied her. Her skin was green, and she was devoid of hair; her height was about 1.3 meters. Her yellow eyes were set in a face that, except for her slightly crooked nose and long ears, could be common among many races back on Earth. Not a beauty queen for sure.

“Sorry, I mean no harm. You can leave.” Enji gestured for her to pass.

The goblin screeched at him excitedly, eyeing him with fear while pulling the child next to her closer.

“I’m going to go pass you the way you came. Don’t worry about me, I won’t harm you or your children.”

There was more screeching, not only from the mother but also from the child beside her. The baby, too, began to bawl. Enji didn’t know what to do; he wasn’t very good at dealing with infants and babies. He pressed his back against the tree’s wall, as the goblin might suddenly attack if he turned his back on it. He edged his way past her.

With a sigh, he began retreating the way the goblin had come. He looked back at the mother and kids, who were slowly retreating, too.

“Wait, don’t go in there! There is a big snake on the other side!” Enji’s scream stopped the goblin from entering the tunnel from which he had made his escape.

The gobbling stared wide-eyed at Enji.

“There is a big snake.” Enji tried to pantomime what a snake looked like to the goblin without much success. “Snake! Big, bad snake. Chomp! It ate a boar.”

“[Screeg, craag cree straach!] why hairy help raarea?”

Huh? They talk! I can understand goblinese! “You know what I’m saying?”

“Raarea hear hairy talk of snake. Snake is Raarea enemy. Hairy enemy, why help?”

Enji took his hand to his hair, thinking that he probably needed a haircut. “If by hairy you mean me. I’m not your enemy. I’m here with my companions, looking for other people who are lost.”

“Hairy kill Raarea. Raarea always enemy of hairy.”

Oh, she means hairy as people in general. It was understandable since the goblins didn’t have any hair compared to the humans and four-ears. How about a baldie? He shook his head; he was digressing. “This ‘hairy’ has no reason to kill Raarea.” Enji adopted the goblin terminology to make it easier for her to understand.

She eyed him with distrust, but immediately her attention went to the crying child on her back. Without taking her eyes off Enji, she pulled forward the sling where she carried the baby and began breastfeeding him.

Enji looked away, embarrassed, not because he found the act erotic, but to give her some privacy. When the mother made calming noises to her baby, Enji couldn’t help but look. Are all mothers the same?

The little kid, who was hugging her leg, made some noises too. Enji figured that they must be hungry by the way they looked up at their mother. Enji pulled out the package of crackers he was carrying and offered one to the kid. The mother hissed at him.

“It is food.” He bit into one cracker and offered one to the mother. She took it with reluctance. After taking a bite and savoring it, she gave the remaining piece to her child. “Here, take more.” Enji gave her several of the crackers.

The goblin and her child partook of the small meal.

“I must leave now, I need to find a way to my friends.” Enji waved at the goblin.

“Where, friend?”

Enji hesitated for a moment, not knowing how to explain. “In the clearing where that tunnel leads to, there are three openings. My companion is waiting for me on the one to the right.” Enji explained by pointing and gestures, unsure if the gobbling would understand.

“Hairy follow.” The goblin woman led Enji through the passway from which she had initially emerged. Eventually, they arrived at a small opening, which was larger than the tunnel he had to crawl to escape from the snake, but still, he had to lower his head to avoid hitting the intertwined branches that crisscrossed the passway ceiling.

Enji followed the goblin; finally, they emerged in one of the wide paths. After a few minutes of walking, he saw someone lying on the ground, resting against a tree.

“Popa!” He ran to her, fearing the worst.

“Oh! Enji Lo, you found me!” She made an effort to stand, but couldn’t.

“What’s wrong? Are you injured?”

Popa pulled her jacket that covered her left leg and showed him. “It’s just a gash. I’ve been trying to cast a healing spell on it for a while, but I’m not very good at it. At least the bleeding stopped.”

“Can you walk?” Enji doubted she could. The gash on her thigh looked nasty,

“Not for long, it might reopen.”

“Raarea help hairy woman?”

At that moment, Popa realized they were not alone. “Enji... Don’t move. There is a goblin behind you,” she whispered as she tried to reach for her swords.

“She’s a friend. We understand each other.” Enji pointed to his translator. Turning to the goblin, he asked, “How can Raarea help?”

“Raarea have [scrwesh agshch] for hurt.” She pointed at Popa’s injury.

“Enji Lo, I understood some of it.”

“Yes, but some of it wasn’t translated.” Turning to the goblin woman, he asked, “Where do we have to go?”

“Follow.”

Enji helped Popa to her feet. “Lean on my shoulder, to take the weight off your leg.” With an arm around her slender waist, he helped Popa to walk.

Slowly, they trekked along the pathway to an unknown location. Enji wondered if the goblins had an innate sense of navigation or if there were markings undetectable to his eyes.

After what felt like hours to Enji, they finally arrived at a clearing.

It was bigger than the clearings Enji had passed through before. Primitive huts were scattered haphazardly, and some small animals and children ran in between the twig huts. Smoke from cooking fires spiraled to the sky, and pleasant odors came from whatever was being cooked inside the huts.

One of the older kids spotted the newcomers and uttered a shrill scream that immediately transformed the village into utter chaos. Every goblin ran to take refuge in what looked like a natural rock formation, but on closer scrutiny, it was a crude house made with flat stone slates, piled together.

The goblin woman ran down to the house and, with screeches and gestures, tried to convince the villagers that the hairy ones with her were friendly. That was the way Enji pictured it.

After a while, some of the goblins came out. The kids were the more audacious of the villagers; they approached the hairy ones with curiosity.

Finally, they all approached Enji and Popa. The villagers consisted of seven women of varying ages, two males of advanced age, and ten children.

One young goblin woman led by the hand one of the old goblins. He was blind. Seeing his cloudy eyes, Enji figured he suffered from cataracts. The old goblin spoke in a faltering voice, “Oma say hairy no enemy?”

“I am not an enemy,” Enji replied to the man he believed to be the village chief.

“Hairy killed many Raarea. Hairy enemy.”

“This hairy will not harm or kill any of... Raarea.”

“Why?”

“I have no reason to harm any of you.”

“Why come?” The goblin man came closer to Enji.

“Many hairy came and got lost. We are searching for them.” Enji did his best to convey what he meant.

“Raarea no see any hairy for many Helam.”

Enji was surprised by the goblin’s use of the region’s common name for the largest moon. Helam, the red moon, took thirty days to orbit this world. Rua took eighteen days. So, many moons meant many months. “They haven’t had contact with the mages.”

“Enji Lo, what are they doing?”

Enji turned to Popa. Two of the goblin women were applying a greenish paste to Popa’s injured leg. “I believe that’s the cure that...” He realized he didn’t know the female goblin’s name, whom he initially mistook for Raarea, but that was what they called themselves as a tribe. He searched for her. She was with an older woman, apparently discussing the newcomers. Their eyes locked, Enji made a timid gesture with a hand to call her.

She approached, still with her infant on her back.

“Enji pointed to his face and said, “Enji.” He then pointed at Popa and said her name.

These goblins were not the stupid creatures depicted in some of the manga and anime from his world. They seemed reasonably intelligent and resourceful, given what he could see of the village. So his intention was clearly understood.

“Oma.” She pointed to her face.

“It’s a pleasure meeting you.” Enji bowed his head slightly, which confused Oma and the other goblins around them.

The young goblin whispered in the ear of the old man. He nodded and, pounding his chest, uttered, “Aka.”

Red? Enji discarded the Japanese meaning as a mere phonetic coincidence.

“Good to know, Aka.”

Enji glanced around. Something had been bothering him. “Where are the men? The males.” Oma looked at him without understanding. “Your mate. Companion.”

“Oma mate killed.” She recited the names of all the women in the village, saying the same thing. All the males of the goblin village had been killed by someone or something.

“Who did it?”

“[Guja killed Raarea].”

The translator couldn’t find an analogy for the word’s meaning in Enji’s mind. That scared him. Just remembering the tripods that had the untranslatable name ‘gleth’ made him shudder.

The old goblin seemed to be interested in Popa after hearing her voice as she talked to some of the goblin women.

Left alone by the chief, Enji walked around studying the goblins’ dwellings. He was followed by Oma and a group of kids, who were curious about his actions. He stopped at the crude stone structure, and after going around it, he peered inside. It was big enough for all af the villagers to take refuge inside with room to spare. The flagstones on the inner walls and floor were of a flatness that marvelled Enji. His writing slate wasn’t as smooth as these stones. The crude exterior might have been a way to conceal the refuge from being discovered.

“Who made this?”

“No know. Stone hut for Raarea is good.”

“Is the hut special for the Raarea? How?”

Oma used pantomime and words to describe her answer. What Enji understood was that in places with stone structures similar to that one, the goblins could build dwellings. It probably had some magic that prevented the relentless shifting of the labyrinth from swallowing the clearing where it was located.

Enji went back to where Popa was and sat next to her. “How’s your leg?”

Popa flexed her leg up and down. “It doesn’t hurt anymore. That salve they used must contain a painkiller.”

“What do you think of the goblins?” Several of the goblin females had spoken with her, so she might have an opinion.

“I always thought the goblins were monster-like animals. But they are just like us.”

Yes. That was Enji’s impression, too. Put some clothes on them, and they might as well pass as another of the many races that lived in the kingdom.

An older woman brought two bowls of stew for them. It smelled good, but Enji was cautious, not knowing what was in it. “What meat is this?”

The woman pointed to one of the small animals that roamed freely among the huts. It was similar to a pig. With his doubts cleared, he tasted the stew.

“This is good! It tastes better than what we had in the palace.” He needed to find out what spices the goblins used; it could revolutionize Whitewall’s cuisine.

“Hmm, hmm!” Popa avidly gobbled the stew.

Enji took the last package of crackers from his bag and gave it to the goblin woman.

Soon, an impromptu party had formed around the ‘hairy’ visitors, all merrily partaking of stew and crackers.