Chapter 56 Attack on The Goblin Breeding Farm

With a surge of adrenaline, I scrambled to my feet, my voice hoarse as I shouted to my fellow gobbies to seek shelter deeper within the confines of the tent. They obeyed without question, huddling together in a small pile of trembling bodies, seeking solace in the comforting embrace of their makeshift ear cocoons.

But within the chaos and destruction, my eyes caught sight of something that sent a shiver of dread coursing down my spine. Emerging from the flaming wreckage of the gates was a towering figure, a giant of a man whose presence seemed to dwarf everything around him. The same man I encountered in the forest - an adventurer. Trailing behind him was an old man, his face twisted into an evil grin as he brandished a sword in one hand and hurled fireballs with the other.

I watched in horror as the fireballs streaked through the air, their fiery tails leaving a trail of destruction in their wake. The goblin slave tents erupted into flames, the canvas walls igniting like tinder as the inferno consumed everything in its path.

 My heart froze in my chest as I watched in shock and disbelief as my fellow slaves burning bodies tumbled from the flaming tents, their skin charred and blistered, their forms singed and smoking. Their bodies were engulfed in flames as they screamed and cried out in agony. I stood frozen in shock as I watched them stagger and stumble, their movements erratic and disjointed as they desperately tried to escape the relentless onslaught of fire. Some ran in panicked circles, their bodies ablaze like living torches, while others collapsed to the ground in a heap of burning flesh and shattered dreams.

The stench of charred flesh filled the air, mingling with the acrid scent of smoke to create a sickening miasma that clung to my nostrils and choked the very life from my lungs. I could hear their desperate pleas for mercy echoing in my ears. Tears welled up in my eyes as I witnessed the horrific scene before me, the stench of burning flesh filled my nostrils and turned my stomach. I watched helplessly, knowing that there was nothing I could do to save them from the merciless grip of the flames.

As the tendrils of fear tightened their grip around me, I felt a familiar touch on my shoulder, and turning, I found myself enveloped in Kaka's arms, his tortured expression mirroring the fear swirling within me. His urgent whispers urged us to move swiftly.

"Quick, quick! No time dawdling, little gobbies!" squeaked Kaka, his voice jittery with urgency. 

"Adventurers come, danger close, must flee! Quickly, quickly! No time to dawdle, mush mush! Big trouble coming, yes, big trouble! The humans come, they come with sharp sticks and shiny swords! We must skitter away, vanish into the shadows!" Kaka mumbled in panic.

But before we could even take a step, a horde of goblin guards descended upon us like a pack of ravenous wolves.

Trapped between the relentless advance of the guards and the looming presence of the adventurers, we were like lambs caught between two predators, with nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. Kaka's desperate gaze darted from one side to the other, his eyes wide with terror as he realized the direness of our situation.

In a frantic bid to shield me from the oncoming horde, Kaka wrapped his arms around me in a protective embrace, his battered body serving as a feeble barrier against the approaching tide of goblin guards. But they cared not for his valiant effort, treating him as little more than a mere bug in their path.

With a callous disregard for life, the guards bulldozed past us, their spears gleaming with malice as they charged forward knocking us out of their way. One of the guards backhanded Kaka across the face so hard that he somersaulted a few times in the air. His already abused body, long past its limits, flew to the side like a rag doll and crashlanded in the dirt with a painful yelp, "Uuuuuf!"

 To my horror, I noticed that instead of carrying shields, they callously grasped goblin slaves by their necks, treating them as nothing more than disposable tools to be hurled at their enemies.

The scene that unfolded before me was one of unimaginable cruelty and senseless violence. The guards, driven by their twisted sense of superiority, launched the helpless goblin slaves at the adventurers like mere projectiles, their bodies shattering upon impact with sickening thuds.

But the adventurers were not so easily frightened. With swift and brutal strikes, they cleaved through the goblin slaves, their blades cutting poor slaves like hot knives through butter. The guards, realizing the futility of their attack, scattered in all directions like frightened animals, desperate to escape the wrath of their foes.

As chaos erupted around us, more adventurers emerged from the rubble of the destroyed gates, their eyes ablaze with righteous fury as they gave chase to the fleeing guards. Among them was a figure I recognized all too well: Slasher, the infamous goblin guard whose cruelty knew no bounds.

With a sinking feeling in my gut, I watched as Slasher darted back in our direction, pursued by the towering figure of the big man I had glimpsed in the forest.

In a desperate attempt to escape the coming danger, Kaka summoned every ounce of strength left in his battered body, his limbs trembling with agony as he struggled to rise to his feet. But the pain was too great, his head was still reeling from being knocked down by the goblin guards. With a final, desperate effort, he tried to drag himself toward the safety of his tent, but it was too late.

With a monstrous roar, Slasher, that heinous rat of a goblin, lunged forward with a speed that defied reason, his gnarled fingers closing around Kaka's fragile neck like a vice grip. With a sickening twist, he hurled Kaka's limp form through the air like a rag doll, his body hurtling toward the towering figure of the adventurer with terrifying velocity.

The adventurer, a behemoth of a man with muscles rippling beneath his armor like coiled serpents, barely had time to react as Kaka's broken form careened toward him. With a thunderous crash, the adventurer swung his shield with the force of a battering ram, the metal colliding with Kaka's body in a bone-shattering impact that sent him hurtling through the air like a discarded toy.

The force of the blow sent Kaka hurtling through the flimsy walls of a nearby tent like a projectile launched from a siege engine. The tent exploded into a cloud of debris and wreckage, the fabric tearing asunder with a deafening roar. Kaka lay within the wreckage, his body broken and beaten, a pitiful sight to behold. The tent, a sanctuary once filled with warmth and shelter, now lay in ruins, its tattered remnants billowing in the wind like the torn sails of a sinking ship.

But Slasher wasted no time in seizing the opportunity presented by the adventurer's momentary distraction. With a rat grin etched upon his twisted visage, he lunged forward with his crude wooden spear, driving the sharpened tip deep into the adventurer's leg with a savage thrust.

The adventurer bellowed in agony, his towering frame buckling beneath the searing pain that lanced through his wounded leg. In a heart-wrenching scene that seemed to unfold in slow motion, I witnessed the towering behemoth hurl himself toward our fragile tent with all of his weight. His colossal form bore down upon us like a vengeful god, his armored bulk crashing through the flimsy tent as if it were no more than a mere twig.

With a sickening crunch, the weight of his body flattened our sanctuary, crushing it into oblivion along with my helpless fellow hatchlings who had sought refuge within. I could only watch in horror as our sanctuary was reduced to nothing more than a pile of splintered wood and torn fabric, the once tent of sorrow now a tomb for my fellow hatchlings. Their terrified squeals echoed in my ears, a haunting melody that mingled with the sickening crunch of bone and sinew as their fragile bodies were crushed beneath the weight of the intruder.

 As the dust settled and the full extent of the carnage became clear, I felt a cold knot of horror grip my heart like a vice. The ground beneath me was stained with the blood of my fellow gobbies, their lifeless bodies entangled within the wreckage of our abode. Their lifeless bodies lay strewn across the ground, mere remnants of the innocent hatchlings they had once been, their tiny forms twisted and contorted in agony.

But the horror did not end there. Enraged by the injury he had sustained at the hands of Slasher, the towering man lashed out blindly, his sword cleaving through the air with rage. Any hatchling unfortunate enough to still cling to life found themselves the target of his wrath, their tiny bodies cleaved in half by his unchecked fury.

At that moment I only heard other adventurers shouting at the man who just killed all of my fellow gobbies.

"Clive! Are you alright? These damn goblins, did they got you?!"

Clive - it was the name of a man who was responsible for their death. My mind recoiled in horror at the sight of such unspeakable cruelty but one thought burned bright like a beacon in the darkness: find Kaka. With a surge of adrenaline, I propelled myself to my tiny feet, my limbs trembling with fear and anxiety.

Scuttling frantically, I raced to where Kaka had crash-landed, my heart pounding in my chest like a drumbeat of dread. There, within a pool of his blood and wreckage, lay Kaka. His head was split open, a gruesome wound oozing blood rivers down his pallid face.

His once vibrant eyes, now swollen and bloodshot, bulged grotesquely from their sockets, their once lively gaze replaced by a vacant stare. Each eye wandered aimlessly in its own direction, devoid of focus or purpose, lost in a sea of confusion and disorientation.

 His mouth hung agape, the lips contorted in a silent scream of anguish, yet no sound escaped the gaping maw. Instead, his jaw moved in disjointed jerks, the remnants of speech reduced to nonsensical babbling that echoed hollowly in the confines of his fractured skull.

 His skull, once a bastion of resilience, now lay shattered and splintered like a cracked eggshell. Bone fragments jutted out at odd angles, protruding through torn and mangled flesh in a gruesome display of violence. The very shape of his head had been grotesquely deformed, warped by the force of the blow that had rattled his brain to its core.

With trembling hands, I reached out to him, my fingers grazing his cold, clammy skin in a desperate attempt to rouse him from his stupor. With every ounce of strength I possessed, I whispered words of comfort and encouragement to Kaka, hoping against hope that somehow, he would find his way back to me.

"K-K-Kaka... Kaka... wake up, p-please...! I-I need you, Kaka... Don't leave me... Wake up!"

But Kaka remained motionless, his breath shallow and weak. Tears welled up in my eyes as I clung to his limp form, the weight of despair settling heavily upon my shoulders.

"P-Please, Kaka... I-I don't know what to do without you, You're... y-you're my Dada... my Muma... Please don't leave me alone... I don't know what to do without you. You're the only family I have... the only one who ever cared." I sobbed, my words choked with emotion.