Chapter Two: The Goblin Horde, Part Three

The ogre, after a few more pats from his hand, extinguished the fire and turned to the golden warrior. The behemoth of an ogre screamed at the hero and their posse, charging at them a moment after. The elite soldier waited a moment for the bastard to get within range of striking and ducked underneath him as he was preoccupied with swinging his club downwards. They charged up the ogre's back and rested their legs against the shoulders of the ogre as they lay their steel katana in front of the beast's neck. The ogre let loose another screech as he attempted to grasp the nimble hero, only to find the hero slitting their throat and jumping off him using his shoulders as a makeshift launch plate.

The ogre for the first time in its life lacked the strength to move, so he gave in and allowed his body to obey nature and fall. It only took 1 second for the dust to settle but it took another 10 seconds before the noise of the crash was fully able to dissipate from the echo of the cave.

The ground was shaken from the fall as loose crystals began to fly all about the cave. The elite soldier had only the time to raise their shield before the dust reached them, shoving them back 5 feet. Ledias reacted first and decided to help her. "Let's go, the monster still lives," she called. Everyone followed suit and charged the great thing. Ledias launched at the Ogre and begin to hack at the limbs of the ogre and dashed away before the ogre could smack him. Phil and Sorvex stood behind the abomination and sunk their blades into the back of the ogre in perfect synchronization.

Slayer moved towards the fallen mountain in great haste but was forced to stop and cough due to the dust entering his mouth. Midnight cast Acid Splash once again and sent it flying towards the ogre's face. Cyprus, finally successful in her mission of turning the forest of crystals into glass, found herself staring at the final untouched crystal dangling upon the cavern roof, determined to turn it as well.

Justin quickly began to blow into his wooden flute in a frantic, energy filled tone, directing the lively music towards the cold stone of the caven's floor. His mind became clear as his ancestors came to him in a blurry but viable hallucination. They held hands and a green aura surrounded him. From the barren stone emerged life, vines to be more specific, the plants grew long and stretched out through the cavern and found itself wrapped around the ogre. The plants soon matched the tone of justin's sound as they started to grow thorns to imitate the intensity of his song.

The ogre on its last legs, on one knee looked upon the golden hero and spoke in a deep and spiteful tone. "I refuse to… die alone hero..." he muttered in perfect common as he gathered the fragments of strength he was left with to draw his javelin from his belt. He grasped upon the wood of the javelin as he reeled his right arm, and like the god of lighting threw his mighty bolt of steel at the golden warrior without fear or doubt.

"Look out!" Phil yelled. The hero had only the time to glance up take witness of the avenging bolt of hate, speeding towards her. Black hair whipped in front of them as they saw the just paladin place herself in front of them. The force of the flying weapon effortlessly took her alongside the crude javelin, allowing the holy one to fly for a moment before crashing into the far end of the cavern pinning her to the wall with the rod of wood protruding outwards from the right of her chest, absolutely annotating the heroic avenger's rightmost lung, ribcage, and back. The golden hero was unable to react to such an event, so there they stood, paralyzed in shock perhaps, but not for too long as a full second passed by before they run towards dear sweet Ledias.

Ledias was found dangling 4 feet off the ground when they finally reached her. slightly unbalanced she turned a little bit to the left as her weight readjusted her angle, causing her to widen her eyes in shock and opening her mouth only for a whimper of pain to leave her body as the oxygen supplying continued to deplete.

"LEDIAS!" Phil screamed and ran over. Everyone quickly took his side and followed Phil to Ledias's side. "Take it out of her! Quick!" Phil pleaded. The elite soldier came over with their mercenaries and began to pull out the javelin, but as they did, Ledias attempted to react to the pain once more, only for the faintest of squeaks of her voice escaped her lips; she lacked the air to properly announce her pain and distress.

Ledias was pale and without breath, every time she would try to breath in, her body refused to obey, she would only be left with a feeling of a heated iron rod being shoved into her throat and into the rightmost part of her chest after every attempt to breath. Her hands shook violently as she seeked for something to grasp to lessen the white hot steel in her stomach. She reached out and held Phil's hand and squeezed it tightly. She looked up to him in hopes of something to keep her going, but her sight soon began to fade and weaken, turning the figures of the men and women into blobs of dim colors and patches of absolute black.

"Phil...?" she asked. Tears flowed down her eyes. Lily ran out from her hiding spot and ran up to Ledias's side. The ogre fully content with his action cracked one final crooked smile as was fully enveloped by the horned vines. As he was fully encased in the plants they soon began to burst throughout the body of the ogre, growing inside and out of his organs and skeleton of the monster.

Blood slowly began to pool over the stone floor. "I-Ii.ii… don't www-wan--t w.. want to die…please…" she pleaded without breath, like a scared child would to their mother. Her body temperature was now comparable to that of a cup holding frozen waters. She couldn't see, she couldn't move, she was without all senses but her hearing. Lily held her other hand.

The elite soldier fell on their knees and bowed its head. Phil still held her, his mind in deep thought, but at the same time, still present. He predicted that this would've happened. In fact, he predicted everything…

Ledias's vision soon turned black as her eyes finally gave out, her thoughts dispersed into a million fragments of consciousness before those fragments split once again into the winds, leaving nothing but her body resting the the arms of her party.

Her body was without weight as she looked upon the darkness and then the brightness of the clouds above and below her. There was no pain left to feel, no pain was left to endure, only nothingness. The wind brushed through her hair as she approached a golden gate of immeasurable size. It was open. Beyond the gate laid a city of infinite space resting upon the horizon beyond the gate. Grog and Riley stood at the entrance, with somber tones of peace and their eyes gently closed. She smiled upon them and flew towards them with open arms, but they stopped her with a slight push back.

"What's wrong?" she asked, confused by their actions. They both shook their heads holding the same emotion as they started with.

"You are not meant to join us yet," they both said in unison. "Fate has too many plans for you." They pointed downwards at the ground as the clouds dispersed, showing a pathway of similar size of the golden gates. She didn't really see what the crossroads were but she felt what they are, what good and horrible feelings it will bring and take, what new journeys she would partake. Her future was clearly there on earth, not here. Not yet. Her life would extend onwards for hundreds of years. Why hundreds? Who knows.

She turned back towards the two. "I guess I'll see you guys later," she said with a smile. Riley's face remained unchanged but he raised his arm upwards as he gave a thumbs up.

"We can wait forever so please, refrain from rushing to our next meeting," he spoke. Ledias gave them both a hug. As she moved away from the two, she began to feel the weight of mortality drag her down to the material plane, sending her flying past the yellow clouds faster than light.

Lily cried out loud, tears flowing down her face. Everyone but Justin had tears flowing down their faces, save for the mercenaries who were merely tearing up at the sight of a dying girl's last words. "We lost another one… didn't we?" Phil asked, his words uncertain but sincere. Sorvex places his hand over Phil's shoulder.

"We did…" he said. The light in the cave suddenly went out. The crystal in the cavern's ceiling stopped glowing after the huge crystal hanging down from the ceiling turned to glass. The cave went dark and silent. Echoes of water splashing bounced across all the walls. Cyprus was hanging on the ceiling, hugging the crystal and asleep.

Ledias's body was laid upon the ground to rest forever more, hadn't she begun levitating, it would have been a sorrowful sight. The young one begun to slowly move away from the ground as she begun to turn upright. As she began to turn, a raw white light began pulsating out of the crystal closest to her body, then another, and another until eventually every crystal but the crystal hanging from the cavern roof was lit up with the light. A moment of pure shock entered the band of heroes before the final crystal lit up with the brightest of pale yellows began shooting out of it, hitting every crystal before a bright flash of every color radiates from the cavern until the party is blinded by the bright white light once more

After a moment, the adventurers removed their hands from their eyes and saw that the cavern had regained its vibrant colors of blue, purple, yellow, and white. The crystals no longer lost their color when they were touched. They looked down at the ground and saw Ledias unconscious. Her hair became perfectly platinum white after absorbing the nature of pure radiance from the crystals.

"What just…" Phil was at a loss of words. He tried to touch Ledias's head, but when his hand made contact with her white hair, it stung him lightly, sending holy energy through his body, zapping him. Nothing that was with sin could touch such divinity. Phil carefully wrapped his arms around her chest and laid her across his arms, careful to avoid having her divine hair from touching him.

"Today has been far too eventful, let us seek refuge within the cave," he suggested. And without objection they took to his side. They started to follow Phil. They only pressed their feet twice upon the stone of the ground before a wall of absolute darkness slowly rose from the ground in which they stood. The black slime loomed over the party with the decaying body of the Commander inside of it. The golden elite gazed at the body and gasped.

"Commander!" The elite soldier yelled and drew her sword, but Ace stopped her.

"Dont, you and your men are too weak. We don't need another dead body in this cave," Ace spoke with absolute bound and determined demeter. They hesitated for a moment and nodded.

"Sorvex! Slayer! Ace! Tactic 3: Keep Away!" Phil Barked.

Sorvex took a step forward before speaking. "I might have a concussion, but I'll do my best." Ace and Slayer followed suit with weapons drawn and a fire burning in their hearts. The slime began to shuffle it's way towards the living beings that stood against it. Ace picked up whatever lose stones and dirt was left upon the ground and hurled it at the shapeless darkness. the black slime stopped for a moment to absorb the rocks, thinking it has caught organic flesh, once the rocks enter the slime, it must fully regurgitate the rocks in order to continue moving.

Sorvex swung his blade in a horizontal arc, only to find the tear he made in the slime mended back together like adhesive. The rest of the party had already retreated safely, but now the rest of them will need to find a way to get out of this mess.

Slayer came up to the slime and smirked. "Psh… This guy is like slime compared to the rest of them," he said obliviously.

"Thanks for being so useful to the team," Ace spoke sarcastically.

Slayer unsheathed his blade and lifted the glimmering steel above his head before dropping it down upon the slime, cutting it into two pieces. Ace was without words. Was ace actually being useful for once? Turns out not. The two pieces of the slime fell to the ground before gestating and squirming around, a second passed before both chunks of the slime begin to lift themselves off the ground and leap into the air, with one of them landing squarely on Slayer's head, engulfing his entire face.

The second slime whilst in the air attempted to land upon Ace to no avail. Ace, after the assault, grasped Sorvex's collar and propelled themselves upwards in the air. "What are you doing!?" Sorvex yelled.

"We did our part! We're getting out of here!" Ace explained.

"And leave Slayer to die at the hands of this monstrosity?" Sorvex spoke rhetorically. He cared not for him but the prospect of informing Ledias that another friend died was too much.

"He's tough, he can handle it," Ace stated as they flew away. Ace was lying through his teeth. He didn't really know if Slayer could take them both on by himself. He just wanted to survive.

Slayer found himself accidentally performing the moves of the ancient tribal dance of a thousand stomps whilst attempting to remove the blackened slime. The second slime, after missing it's initial target began to make its way towards the jigging dragonborn in an attempt to compensate for the meal that was lost. In a blinded panic, the dragonborn prayed for a miracle as he began sending sulfur through his nose and flames through his breath.

The moment the dragonborn opened his mouth and the flame licked the slime, the only thing he saw was his vision sent crashing downwards towards the harden stone, as mixing flame with the black slime caused the poor soul to combust into a fine smoke due to the anatomy of the black slime. All that remained of the first slime is the said smoke. To call the combustion of the slime loud would be underplaying the effect it had on the soundwaves around it, as once the flames touched the thing, the sound of an unexplainable release of heavily concentrated helium was released all at once.

Slayer sat there on the ground. His head was covered in dust and ash, but other than that, he was perfectly fine. The black slime contained huge amounts of natural gas inside of it, so when it came in contact with Slayer's flames, it exploded. The second slime was still alive, but it was tremendously slowed down due to the dust, but it still slowly approached Slayer.

"What's this, you want to explode too?" Slayer asked with a smirk on his face. He breathed in oxygen from the air to fire once more only to find dust entering his throat. The ashes have clogged his throat, making him unable to breath properly. He backed up against the crystal as the slime approached him.

Arrows suddenly flew down and crashed into the black slime. Goblins were in the back, sniping the monster. Cyprus, having successfully charmed three goblins with flirtatious remarks and banter, had effectively enthralled the goblins as she was one of if not the only female to speak to them.

The slime became distracted by the oncoming arrows and spears and decided to attack the annoying goblins. Slayer was spared once more. He ran away as fast as a crippled, coughing, and frankly terrified dragonborn, could run towards his party.