Entropy's Servant

Chapter 8 - Various Occurances

"Hero, Hero!"

"Hero, this weak?"

"Hero, this slow?"

"Can't even catch us!"

After insulting the Hero with venomous words, the strange creatures chortled with a vile laughter. They were roughly the height of a child, but their heads were far bigger than a child's head, their faces unbelievably ugly, their noses long and crooked enough to go in front of their mouths filled with razor-sharp teeth and, most notably, their skin was a sickening shade of green. Their eyes were entirely brown, from the pupils to the eyewhites, and one could tell at a glance these creatures were 'cursed' by Gnome. These were High Goblins, a race of Demon which was in a sense an alternate evolution path from the standard Hobgoblin. Unlike the Hobgoblin, a High Goblin looked the exact same as a regular Goblin, but their physical abilities were scores higher, particularly their speed and agility.

"Just die already, you little-", the Hero grunted, swinging his sword and missing for the twentieth time in a row. His forehead was covered in sweat, as was the rest of his body, and the odour coming from his body was unpleasant and could be smelled metres away.

"Kahahahaha!", the High Goblins laughed, pointing their dirty fingers and holding their stomachs. One of them took his rusty, bent sword from the makeshift sheath made from the whole skin of some forest creature he had caught and made a jump for the Hero's back, attempting to slash him. The Hero blocked the attack by forcefully twisting his body and holding up his own sword, but this forced posture left him open to attack from other sources, and another of the High Goblins rushed for this opportunity, setting his teeth into the Hero's now-exposed back.

"Gah!", the Hero cried out, shuddering. There was no pain due to Lady Luciel's blessing, but the feeling was still deeply unpleasant, so he shook heavily in an attempt to get the High Goblin off his back. After shaking like this, fruitlessly, for a few seconds, he attempted to thrust his sword in the High Goblin's direction, and managed to scratch the Monster before the High Goblin jumped off.

"Gyaaaah!", the High Goblin exaggeratedly cried out in pain, even though the scratch was only a surface wound. High Goblins were the evolved forms of Goblins which happened to be born swiftly, after all, so it was likely he had been wounded not once his entire life.

"Don't like that, do you, brats?! Well, get ready for a world of pain, you bastard!", the Hero cried out. They were not lines suited for an ally of justice, but it did not seem like he cared anymore as he snapped the fingers of his left hand, crying out "[Holy Sword's Exorcism]!" with an angry scowl on his face.

The High Goblin's scream raised in volume as the scratch expanded in size to a cut and then a gash, while faintly radiating light. The next moment, the gash had spread across the entire Demon's body, and he shrieked in pain as he fell to the ground, his body covered in blood.

The other High Goblins, meanwhile, looked on in horror, and after a few seconds, they once again started screeching out with their raspy voices:

"Hero, weak!"

"But skills, strong!"

"Don't get hit, don't get hit!"

The High Goblins again started to run around the Hero in circles, and this time, they seemed to put more of their energy into avoiding his attacks.

"How do you like that, you little shits?!", the Hero shouted, slashing left and right without any kind of strategy. Of course, the chances of these berserk slashes actually hitting a speed-focused target were as good as nil.

"Hero, dumb!"

"Hero, berserk!"

"Hero, musclehead!"