As Wiz collected all the ears to turn in for the reward money, Dominic and Bella went to greet the guards, who were jogging down the road toward the site of the battle.
"Gentlemen, thank you for your timely response, but we have already taken care of the Goblin breach of the boundary patrols. Do we have any idea what went wrong? They so rarely miss anything, much less a patrol with Hobgoblins in it." Bella asked.
The guards shook their heads. "We have no idea. There haven’t been any reports of strange activity today, and you took care of the last big incident a few days ago. I suspect that we won’t know what happened until someone fails to come back tonight." The guard replied.
That was a harsh truth, but he had a point. The most likely reason that they didn’t get a warning about this patrol was because they had overrun the guards who were supposed to be holding them off.
The leader of the guard team went forward to take a note of the number of ears collected by Wiz, as well as any damaged property on the affected farms, in case they were going to need some sort of relief. The guard did the best that they could to protect the farms, but there were no guarantees, and a particularly bad attack could cost them everything, even if they managed to escape.
In those cases, the locals would chip in to help the family get set up again, but it would normally take years for things to really get back to normal after a crop was lost, and a home was razed.
"We need to head back to the gate, we’re on standby for the next attack, but can you keep an eye out on the forest for us? We could use as much advance notice as we can get if there is another attack." The guards asked.
The farmer scoffed at the notion that he wouldn’t be watching for more attacks today. "I don’t think I’ll be sleeping anytime soon, so that isn’t a problem. I’m just thankful that these fine folk showed up on time to deal with the problem. We thought it was just a couple of goblins at first, then suddenly there were Hobgoblins running at us, and it was chaos."
The leader of the guard team looked over the familiar faces of Wiz and Bella with a trained eye, making sure the local adventurers were ready for battle and weren’t injured, and then nodded.
"Their enhancement gems might still be low level, but that’s nothing that time won’t fix. Their gear is good, and they have crafted magical weapons. That is the part that matters most against these beasts, being able to hack cleanly through them, and not letting that leathery skin turn your blade away while they pounce on you." The guard assured the farmer.
It wasn’t like the farmer needed to be sold on the strength of Bella and Wiz, they had grown up here, and he’d known them all their lives. He just needed a little positive affirmation to help settle his mind after the attack.
"We’re going to run off to the treeline and see if we can find where they crossed over. One of the teams might need assistance." Wiz informed the guards as they were preparing to head back to the city.
That didn’t sound like the best idea that the big Crusader had ever had, but if he was right, there might be injured local guards in the woods, or even more Goblins coming their way after finding a gap in the lines.
Both were terrible news for the farmers, who couldn’t even properly run away with young children on the farms.
Dominic had to jog to keep up with Wiz as he headed for the trees, but that kept him from overthinking the situation and talking himself into turning around. Because he really wanted to turn around and not go into the woods hunting Goblins in the dark with only two other people, no matter how good their gear was.
Their lack of numbers wasn’t slowing Wiz, and his tracking seemed to be pretty good, as he found broken branches and fresh Goblin blood almost immediately after reaching the tree line.
"Now we just follow that in. It looks like at least one was injured when they arrived, so it shouldn’t be too hard. Goblin blood is stinky, oily stuff. It might make good lantern oil if it didn’t smell so bad," he explained.
"Just don’t get us too close. I can’t shoot my way out of close combat, and Dominic is literally half your size." Bella reminded him.
"No worries, we’re just looking for the patrol team in this zone and wherever the blood starts. I’m hoping that’s the last of them, but I’ve got a bad feeling about this." Wiz explained.
That made all three of them.
Slowly they made their way through the woods, following the blood trail and the obvious signs of passing Hobgoblins. The creatures got mad at the branches for poking them, so they would smash them with their clubs and blades to clear the way, leaving a distinct path behind them, even if one of the goblins wasn’t bleeding.
Not long after, they came to a clearing, where there had been a vicious battle, which included at least one spell caster, as there were scorch marks on both the Goblin bodies and the trees.
Wiz checked through the bodies of the fallen goblins, which were all missing their left ear, and pointed to the east.
"It looks like our scouts won the fight, but a bunch of Goblins fled the battle and made it to the farms. There are signs of a litter being dragged this way, and something large following behind them, too large to be a human."
Dominic looked over the Crusader, and Bella laughed.
"When he says too big to be human, he means bigger than he is." The Mystic Gunslinger remarked in a wry tone.
"Well, that’s not good. We should probably find them, now that we know they’re alive and moving." Dominic agreed.
If they were dragging their wounded with them, they wouldn’t be moving very quickly. The goblins had headed straight for the town, and they were running, so by Dominic’s less than expert guess, they were only ten minutes or so behind the patrol. They could make that up in no