Chapter XLIX: How to Flee from Living Bombs

“Okay,” Ayn said after standing up, facing the Summoner that had appeared. “Scale of 1 to 10, how dangerous is a Kindred Lord?”

Klistel eyed him as if he had taken leave of his senses. “You can’t rate the peril of a Kindred Lord. They exist beyond mortal comprehension.”

Zealot seemed introspective. “What if the scale went to 11?”

“What?”

“You see,” the Warrior explained, “most people will rate things on a scale of 1 to 10. You get to 10, you’re all the way up, where do you go from there? Nowhere. I’m saying we need that extra little push – we rate to 11.”

“But then why don’t we just consider 10 more dangerous and keep 10 as the highest number?” Greyheart countered.

Zealot puzzled it over for a moment, and then decided on his response. “This goes to 11.”

“We don’t have time for this,” Klistel insisted. “You don’t understand, we have to leave here now!”

“Slow down,” Ayn demanded, “no one’s going anywhere until you tell us what’s going on.”

“Bombs,” Menphis said from behind them, the young man’s voice still strange to hear after his long stretch of silence.

“Is that it?” the Thief asked of Klistel. “Is this Duke Berith planting bombs throughout the volcano?”

Klistel, however, had gone completely silent. The Summoner stood stock-still, his eyes wide as the volcanic winds sifted through his robes and hair, his knuckles going white around his staff. Tomiko, the Dragoon still poised protectively over her tiny blue wyvern, suddenly leaped to her feet, her spear twirling into her hands with a metallic clap of metal against metal. She stared out just over Ayn’s shoulder, and the Thief had the uneasy feeling of eyes upon him. A growing sense of trepidation began creeping in on him, filling his stomach with a tense twisting as he realized that everyone assembled in the volcanic cavern, alight with veins of magma flowing through the basalt walls, was staring at something behind him. Slowly, from the neck, he turned around just enough to see what all of the others were looking at.

Emerging from just over the rocky peak of a high ledge, bearing down on the group with their perpetually angered eyes ablaze as they floated forward, a clutch of bombs appeared with murderous intent clear in their expressions. Their jagged teeth gnashed as a thick smoke rose from their pulsating, spherical bodies, dripping molten flame from their blackened muzzles. First two of them, then four, then finally six altogether crested the rise, centered on a massive creature twice the size of the rest, the fiery points in its head formed into what could almost be called a crown. The half-dozen glowing monstrosities, throwbacks to an era long ago, hovered menacingly in the air, their attention clearly focused on the small group below.

They stood locked in place, all eyes on the bombs. The moment hung, only the sound of the heat-driven winds and the rumbling of the volcano rupturing the silence. Not turning to face the threat before them, Menphis only turned his head, lazily letting his eyes droop.

“I could have been more specific,” Menphis admitted, lowering his broad-brimmed hat.

“Run!” Klistel shouted, and it was sound enough advice not to be ignored.

Ayn, of course, had the advantage. With a burst of chi through his legs, he was off like a shot from the Ranger’s gun. He was already yards away when he screeched to a halt, angling in mid-stride to make sure Tikinas was alright, but as soon as he turned she bounded past him. She did not waste time running, instead she bound from rock wall to rock wall, shooting like a coiled spring which had been released. The bombs gave a horrendous, guttural growl in unison, and the larger one shot out flames in a clear sign of anger. They dove like birds of prey, coming down off the rise and straight for their targets, a cloud of smoke and ash following them where they went.

The twisting tunnels of Ifrit’s Cauldron were home to any number of menace. To say nothing of the dread wyverns, the adult versions of the hatchling Tomiko even now jumped to safety with, or the relentless hecteyes and fiendish Eotyrranii, there were Goblins known to live in the volcano, and Ayn was not keen on running into any of them.
The situation with the Summoner and the Dragoon would have to wait, getting away with his life intact was going to take all the concentration he had.

Down a corridor he fled, and behind him Zealot was knocked off of his feet as one of the bombs surged forward, blooms of flame in the air behind it, and caught him in the back. He tumbled over, not losing his momentum, rolling back to his feet and this time with his great axe in hand. The bomb swooped down again, and, swinging his weapon like a club, the Warrior batted it aside, smashing it directly in the rounded side of its murderous face. The creature buffeted off of a rock and collided with the rock wall, but then simply shook off the assault, fresh plumes of scorching smoke exuding from its body. The Elvaan realized his mistake as it came bounding after him again, the other five right behind it, and dove down a tunnel towards safety.

Ifrit’s Cauldron was a mass of intertwined caverns and tunnels occasionally giving way to open-air spaces and narrow ledges. The open spaces were often filled roaming monsters which had adapted to survive in the noxious volcanic gases and oppressive heat. The tunnels were home to even more creatures, those that preyed on the other monsters should they wander too close, and also bubbling, oozing flows of magma hot enough to sear flesh through even the thickest armor. The ledges provided anyone standing on them a view of the Cauldron itself, the legendary magma pit embedded in Mount Yuhtunga which gave the volcano its name, and the rocks which occasionally fell in to become puffs of smoke foretold what would happen to anyone that fell of those ledges. In short, Ifrit’s Cauldron was not the kind of place you wanted to flee at top speed away from monsters that could explode at will.

Klistel stopped to round a corner, and Ayn, looking behind himself at the moment, took cue from the Summoner and changed direction. The bombs flew onwards, driven by their massive ruler, snarling and snapping as they surged towards their fleeing targets. Ayn threw himself towards them, the last ergs of the burst of speed he called upon leaving him even as the he felt the searing heat the monsters radiated blistering his bare flesh. Twisting his body in the air like a corkscrew, the Thief slipped through the six-deep formation, the bombs flying straight past him, skidding to a halt in the air to turn back, flames drooling from their open mouths. Ayn was already back on his feet, turning his head just long enough to see the creatures coming for him again. Wasting not a second, he dove down the tunnel Klistel had vanished into, seeing the Summoner just a few yards ahead of him now.

“This way!” Klistel shouted, his robes flying behind him as he skidded to a halt before a bend in the tunnel, throwing himself to the side and disappearing even as a Bomb spiraled down towards him, colliding with the wall where he had been and ricocheting off. A scorch mark on the stone face of the volcano was etched now where the bomb had landed, and it was already making for another pass. Ayn froze, the bomb blocking Klistel’s passage and turning its attention on him. He reached for his knife, but in the same instant the bomb was batted aside, careening off of the cave walls to leave burning marks on the rock wherever it touched. It came so close to Ayn that his hair singed, and it finally stopped in the air to face the source of its attack.

Tomiko, Zealot right beside her, swung their respective weapons like clubs, the other five bombs, including the massive crown-marked one, filling the entryway to the narrow tunnel they had escaped into. The Dragoon’s spear was glowing hot from impact with the bomb, and she spun it outwards to point towards the clutch of magical abominations even now trying to fill the corridor.

“Muffin,” she shouted, “dissuade them!”

The blue-scaled wyvern hovering over her shoulder yelped out its understanding, and then from its maw came a torrent of shimmering flames. Amazingly, the bombs visibly shrank back as Muffin’s breath of flame lit up the darkened tunnel, shooting over the one which had attacked ahead of the rest. Its eyes closed as it was immersed in the wyvern’s breath, and it let out cries of pain and animalistic fear.

“Keep it up, Muffin!” Tomiko encouraged. “Burn it to ashes!”

The wyvern redoubled its efforts, wings flaring upwards as its howling flame poured out like a river Ayn would have though a creature that size incapable of producing. The other bombs had cleared away, wanting no part of the flame, but the sixth bomb was trapped in Muffin’s attack, crying out in shock.

Then, its eyes opened, and with a snarl and a burst of inky black smoke, the bomb began to grow.

Tomiko realized the danger immediately, gasping audibly before turning to run, yanking Muffin back by the tail, cutting off its stream of flame. The wyvern yelped in surprise, but the Dragoon was already diving down the narrow descending tunnel Klistel had vanished into, the same one Ayn had leaped down as soon as the bomb began to swell. The smoke from the bomb overpowered even the natural volcanic gases as Zealot finally slid head-first down the tunnel, not daring to look back. Above them, as they desperately fled, the bomb gave one final roar of anger. Then, now fully five times the size it had been before, the monster erupted.

The explosion sent a roaring jet of flame and molten rock soaring down the tunnel after them. The bomb’s death collapsed the cavern they had come from, and shattered rock and debris rocketed down the cave, pouring over them as they descended. Zealot cried out as the flaming rocks bouncing past struck him, and he pulled his gauntleted hands protectively up over his face as he continued sliding down the rapid decline of the hidden tunnel. Finally, it opened up and he tumbled out, smacking the ground with his back as the air rushed out of him from the impact. A moment later, the cavern mouth erupted with the debris from the bomb’s detonation, and the silver-haired warrior’s eyes went wide as it came crashing down towards him. With a cry and a heave, he managed to turn himself over and roll away just as white-hot rocks and streams of magma poured down where he had just been. Gasping, he pulled himself to a sitting position, staring at what had almost befallen him.

Klistel was already there, his white robes scuffed and chalked with black soot. Tomiko was coughing up tiny rocks, and Muffin flitted about her head, looking concerned. As Zealot struggled to regain a standing position, Tikinas dropped out of the shadows, flipping in the air and landing in front of Ayn, who had at least maintained his composure, if not safety from a series of burn marks along his arms.

“We lost Menphis and Greyheart,” she reported as she came down.

“Well, that’s two down,” Ayn said approvingly.

“Ah, not quite,” Greyheart’s voice corrected. The group looked around, confused, until with a ripple in the air, the Red Mage materialized before them. “Bombs were made to track their foes by sight, you see,” he explained. “So I thought it prudent to remain invisible.”

“Do you ever do anything useful?!” Ayn grated at him. “Is there a single thing you’re capable of that benefits anybody other than you?”

“I – “ Greyheart began, but Klistel silenced him.

“Please, don’t shout,” he cautioned. “They’re very sensitive about their air use down here.”

“Who’s sensitive?” Ayn shouted. “Who are you talking about? And why was I just chased through an active volcano by living magical bombs? What happened to get in, check it out, go home?”

“Ah, I can’t, well,” Klistel began, looking nervous now for some reason, “the monsters in the area seem to know what’s about to happen, and they’re understandably aggressive. I suspect Duke Berith may be doing something to purposefully agitate them as well so as to keep anyone from getting close to him while he works. As for who “they” are, I was referring to the Goblins, of course.”

“What – “ the Thief’s voice halted in his throat.

They were not alone.

Moving in from the edges of the darkness, stepping forth from the mists of gaseous vapors steaming through the enormous passage they had fallen into, they began appearing from all sides. Some few at first, eyes lighting up through the gloom like lanterns through a storm, then more, and then still more, bats coming awake in the evening, preparing to feed. There came the ringing of steel being drawn free, and indistinct chatter in low, rumbling tones began to resonate through the cave. They were all around, everywhere, and closing in to form a circle around the group which could not have been more than a fifth their number. The strangest and most enigmatic of all the beastmen to wander Vana’diel. Goblins. Ayn and the rest were completely surrounded by Goblins.

Some snarled as they drew near, fiery tendrils of liquid flame coursing through the walls shedding an orange glow upon them, turning their weapons the color of blood. Tikinas took an unconscious step closer to Ayn as Zealot kept his hands out, eyes shifting, unsure of what to do. Greyheart was frozen between the desire to make himself invisible again and uncertainty of whether or not that would make a difference this time. Tomiko looked nervous, but did not grasp her lance again, leaving it in place at her back. Klistel alone stepped forward, rapping his green-jeweled staff against the cavern floor as he did so.

“Once again,” he said in a hushed tone, “I beg forgiveness for entering your village, but if you will allow me, I seek to protect it from those who would see it harmed.”

As he spoke, a clutch of the Goblins in front of him began parting. Dwarf-like creatures, they were stunted and gnarled, their limbs thin and bent though they had heads enormous by comparison. Each one wore a mask of leather or metal, and breathed only through its filtered holes, a contraption Ayn would have gladly paid someone else’s money for after breathing in the ash-filled air of the volcano for so long now. Some held staves of twisted wood, others swords crafted for means of dismemberment and pain rather than simply killing. Their large, sagging ears twitched as Klistel spoke to them, and many of them exchanged words in their growling tongue. The sword Argentina had given to Ayn was almost in his grasp as he slowly worked his hand down, hoping not to be seen reaching for it.

Then, from within their midst, a goblin in bleached white hides and an ornamented leather mask emerged from the others, bearing a staff of notably better craft than those of his fellows. The Goblin’s talk became hushed as this new Goblin came to the forefront, the darkened lenses of his mask focusing on Klistel, who stood with his hands out, clasped before him, and his head bowed. A vein of magma lighting the shadowed cave was directly behind the Goblin, making him seem more an ominous outline of a monster than anything. The light tinged the white furs he wore with their color, and the appearance was such as if the Goblin itself were alight with flame.

“Foreseer Oramix,” Klistel intoned, “please excuse my humble trespass.” The Summoner, it would seem, was no fool. Ayn recognized immediately that the Elvaan had walked amongst these Goblins before. “Great disaster comes to your village, and all of Elshimo. Already, the great Bomb Queen has been turned against us, more will assuredly follow.”

“Silence,” the Goblin Klistel had identified as Oramix ordered, his breathing a steady rasp from behind the mask. “When you left you were but two, and now there are more. Are you bringing allies here? Betraying our trust? Do you seek to overthrow our village?”

Greyheart began to speak, but Tomiko immediately elbowed him in the ribs, and only a pained gasp escaped his lips. “We would fail if we tried, Foreseer Oramix,” Klistel said honestly, “for these are no allies, but members of the village of Norg, who came here unaware of the danger within. We found them while searching for the true threat, Duke Berith.”

“Do not speak his name!” Oramix rebuked, stamping his staff against the ground. A surge of energy burst from the rock where it struck, and its tip began to glow faintly. “Goblins serve Shadow Lord. Goblins greater than all other beastmen, greater than Children of Altana, yet we are repaid with destruction? This Berith would destroy our village simply to kill those we could easily kill ourselves?” His words ignited a fury amongst the gathered Goblins, and they brandished their weapons with anger, shouting out foul Goblin curses against the Demon Lord.

“It is even so, Foreseer,” Klistel acknowledged with a bow, “but please, while time still remains, allow me to carry out my plan. These strangers can help now, and increase the chance of success. I can defeat the traitorous Demon Lord and save your village, I just need to find out where he went. His magic obscures the paths I am familiar with.”

“Bah!” the Goblin dismissed, waving a hand in the air. “We know where he is. We cannot go where he is, for even as you say, he has beset the beasts we once tamed upon us. To desert the village would leave us defenseless.”

Klistel’s spine had straightened like a Bastokan pillar. “You know where Duke Berith is?” Immediately he winced, hissing in a breath.

“Do not say his name!” the white-garbed Goblin demanded again, and the molten rock which provided the only light seemed to flare up at his words. The Goblins closed in, growling at Klistel, and Ayn now had a firm grasp on the hilt of the curved sword. There had to be a way out. In such dim lighting with his eyes unadjusted though, with such a disadvantage in numbers . . .

With a scoff, Oramix suddenly flipped his hand dismissively, and the Goblins halted, some unwillingly, and backed away. Klistel let out a visible breath. “Forgive me, Foreseer Oramix,” he apologized, careful to always use the Goblin’s full name and title. “But if you do indeed know where the Demon Lord that forsakes the Goblins is, I can end this all the sooner.”

Oramix considered him, the Elvaan in the midst of the Goblin forces, peering at him intently as he scraped his glowing staff against the ground. It felt like an eternity before he spoke again.

“You will be taken to the cavern we have uncovered, which leads to the place where the red crystal burns. All other paths to it are impeded, but this one the foul Demon was unaware of, and remains open. You will find him in the room below, in the heart of the mountain, performing his foul magic.”

“Then in that place, where he is strongest, I will summon Ifrit, and he will strike down the Demon Lord where he stands,” Klistel asserted. Oramix tilted his head to one side, his grating breaths like rocks grinding together.

“It may very well be as you say,” Oramix considered, “but I do not trust your companions.”

Ayn felt his heart freeze momentarily as the Goblins suddenly turned all their attention towards him.

“They will march before you. They will go into the tunnel first. They will confront the Demon Lord with you.”

The news that he was going to be killed by a Demon instead of a pack of Goblins did little to ease the clenching in Ayn’s gut.

“If you don’t do as they say, they’ll kill all of us,” Tomiko whispered just behind Ayn, trying not to move her lips in the slightest.

“They might kill us anyway,” the Hume replied with greater practiced ventriloquism, not taking his eyes off of Oramix or making a single movement of his face.

“I’ll take a chance of survival over guaranteed death,” the Dragoon retorted, and then fell silent as Klistel turned towards them.

“Please,” he urged, the imperative nature of his voice clear, “go ahead. They will take you to where we have to go.” He looked at them all for a minute before adding, gravely, “There’s no other option at this point.”

Alright, Ayn thought as they went forward, this is conceivably workable. The Elvaan is a Summoner, he conjectured silently, and he’s in a place where he says Ifrit himself can visit. Call the giant fire monster, flash-fry the Demon Lord, be back in Norg by sunset. He could hide out in the village safely with Tikinas until the whole demon thing blew over, and Klistel could be rewarded with a rainbow-dyed robe or hair braids or whatever it was Summoners liked. All they had to do was survive long enough for Klistel to do what he had to do. That seemed easy. Right?

“This one, too,” one of the Goblins said as Ayn and the others walked forward, and with dismay the raven-haired Thief saw that impossibly, improbably, Menphis’s youthful face was staring back at him.

“I was camouflaged,” he said derisively, as if everyone should have known that.

“I don’t care,” Ayn replied sourly. He tried to look on the bright side. Every person with him that the Demon Lord had to kill first increased his chances of living.

“Stop,” another Goblin barked, and then pressed his hand towards a rock face in front of them. It fell away, revealing a smooth-walled tunnel with pools of lava every few yards lighting the way, leading down further into the heart of Ifrit’s Cauldron. Even from the distance they were above, Ayn could make out a hint of an eerie red light blinking at the end.

Zealot took a deep breath, probably filling his lungs with ash like an idiot Ayn thought, and entered first. Greyheart followed him reluctantly, and then Tikinas. Menphis and Ayn stared at each other, the smoldering a match for the magma around them, before the Ranger finally entered the cavern as well, beginning his descent. Ayn turned around, seeing Klistel and Tomiko still behind him, the Goblin Oramix watching closely. The Summoner grimaced urgently, and Ayn sighed, closing his eyes briefly. Finally, he entered the cavern as well, disappearing into its depths.

“There,” Klistel said once Ayn was out of sight. “Now, Oramix, allow us to enter the tunnel so we can put an end to this.”

“Very well, very well,” Oramix conceded, content at last that the others were not here to harm his village. “But do not tarry, for the Demon Lord is powerful beyond – “

His words were cut off as a calamitous crash reverberated throughout the cavern, rock shaking loose from the wall. Muffin’s eyes suddenly went alight on Tomiko’s shoulder, and the wyvern burst into the air, crying out with warning as the rumbling intensified. Goblins ran backwards and forwards as Oramix shouted for order, a wave of confusion sweeping over the beastmen.

“Oh no!” Tomiko cried, putting her metal-bound hands over her mouth with a gasp as she stared at Muffin. “That can’t be right!”

“Foreseer Oramix!” a Goblin, his words garbled behind the metal mask covering his green-skinned face, shouted as he came bounding in from another tunnel leading deeper into the Goblin village. “Foreseer Oramix! It is here!”

“No!” Oramix dismayed. “It could not have found us here! It is impossible!”

“The Demon Lord must know of the last way to the crystal!” the other Goblin said, dropping to its knees before Oramix. “It sent it here to destroy us! It has already reached the west branch!”

Any questions Klistel had as to what “it” was were answered before Oramix could even raise his voice to issue a command.

The cavern shook as it roared, stones coming loose from their foundation and lava, disrupted from its normal flow, spilling out onto blackened rock. Claws scraped the ground, leaving trenches where they passed, misshapen wings scraping the narrow tunnel entrance as its gleaming white eyes found passage deeper in to the Goblin’s home. It’s mouth was filled with fangs like stalagmites which dripped acid, lining the muzzle it had which was big enough to easily chomp a man in half. It let out another bellow, bursting through the cavern mouth, its hunched, twisted form blackened with the ash of the volcano, leaving a trail of soot wherever it went. Klistel clutched his staff as he felt the wall behind him press against his back, and somewhere beside him, Tomiko desperately tried to steady her grasp on her lance.

To his other side, the tunnel mouth collapsed in on itself as the Ash Dragon roared again, coming forward with single-minded intent.

Ayn and his companions were now walking alone towards confrontation with Duke Berith.

And as the Ash Dragon bore down on him, Klistel realized he would not live long enough to know the outcome.