Free Web NovelChapter 28: Chapter 28: Lizardmen in the Swamp
"Damn you, Lizardmen!" Klade roared. He kicked up the spear from the ground, its sharp tip instantly piercing the belly of a giant lizard.
"I was wondering why these giant lizards kept attacking us over and over without any of the goblins sounding an alarm. So it was you lot pulling the strings!"
Lizardmen were humanoids whose loathsomeness was nearly on par with that of goblins. They were in a near-constant state of war with their neighbors and other creatures. They marked their borders with cracked skulls and remains, or with pictographs painted in blood and feces to mark their territory. Lizardmen lived in filth. The walls of their caves were smeared with grime, greasy secretions, and the detritus of their foul feasts.
In terms of intelligence, these creatures were only marginally smarter than beasts and completely incomparable to goblins. A person with enough eloquence and wit might be able to talk their way out of a goblin’s clutches, but when facing Lizardmen and their domesticated giant lizards, the only options were to fight to the death or die.
"Is their territory here?!" Aive raised her tower shield in front of Ron, blocking a Lizardman’s sharp claw strike, while Delaford immediately loosed an arrow, wounding its shoulder blade.
"It shouldn’t be!" Victoria shouted in response, knocking over a giant lizard with a swing of her hammer. "Their territory is supposed to be in the deeper swamps!"
The Lizardmen’s intelligence wasn’t high enough for them to understand or speak the Common Language. In response to Victoria’s question, they just let out a string of incomprehensible Lizardman speech before retreating, leaving the giant lizards to block the way.
They hadn’t expected to be ambushed themselves. Now, seeing that the situation was dire, they clearly wanted to escape.
"Trying to run?" Klade sneered. He flicked his arm, the spear flying from his grasp, and a Lizardman went down.
The heavy spear had pierced straight through its lower abdomen, pinning it firmly to the ground.
"After them!" Seeing that Ron and the others had dealt with all the surrounding giant lizards, Klade immediately prepared to chase down and kill the Lizardman that Delaford had wounded.
"Wait!" Ron quickly stopped him. "Let it go back!"
"What?! Did a giant lizard bite you in the head?"
"Let it go back. The blood trail will reveal its tracks!" Ron said, pointing at the Lizardman that was rapidly disappearing into the woods. "If you want to pull up the weeds, you have to get the roots. We’ll take our best Hunters and track it to the Lizardmen’s lair. We’ll wipe them all out in one fell swoop!"
’If I had encroached on their territory, that would be one thing. Then I would have nothing to say about them pulling a stunt like this. But this clearly isn’t the Lizardmen’s hunting ground, and they still ambushed us. It’s obvious we have to exterminate them completely.’
’We’re supposed to build an outpost here. Most of those refugees and merchants are ordinary people. Who could stand it if the Lizardmen kept showing up every day?’
"Good idea!" Klade nodded in approval. He walked over and pulled out his spear. "Go gather the Hunters!"
Before Ron and the others could even move, a Warg Mount had already taken off, sprinting toward the camp to deliver the message. In no time, a dozen or so Hunters swarmed over, accompanied by a clamor of noisy chatter. freёwebnoѵel.com
The terrain in the forest was complex, and the Lizardmen had naturally camouflaging skin, making it unsuitable for a Warg pack to fight. Therefore, these Hunters were all on foot.
Leaving the blood-tracking to the Warg Mount was sufficient.
"It went south." The Warg Mount led the way. As the sky began to brighten at dawn, a filthy, muddy swamp appeared before them. "That Lizardman went in there. The scents are too chaotic here, I can’t track it any further."
"Doesn’t matter. They won’t get away!" Ron, no longer caring about the mud, began a grid search with his companions and a group of goblins, vowing to find the Lizardmen’s hiding place.
"Boss! We’ve got something over here!"
Soon, a Goblin Hunter shouted out. He had discovered a stone, over a meter tall, painted with some unknown pattern in blood.
However, the Hunter failed to notice a distinct distortion in the space behind him, and it was rapidly closing in.
"Behind you!"
Without a second thought, Victoria whipped the light crossbow off her back and fired an arrow.
A spray of blood blossomed in the air.
But unfortunately, thanks to the protection of the Lizardman’s natural scale armor, Victoria’s crossbow arrow didn’t inflict a fatal wound. The Lizardman still managed to swing its claws, scratching the Hunter’s skin.
Strange calls echoed from all directions as large numbers of Lizardmen and their domesticated giant lizards charged out from behind trees and from within the mud, completely surrounding them. The two groups clashed in close quarters, and a fierce battle immediately erupted.
These Lizardmen were virtually indistinguishable from beasts. Their bodies were protected only by their natural scales, and their attacks were limited to scratching and biting. Although these creatures were exceptionally ferocious, they were quickly at a disadvantage against the relatively "well-equipped" goblins.
Ron took cover in the shadow of the Aive Tower Shield, periodically unleashing Flaming Arrows at the Lizardmen while carefully observing his surroundings.
’Lizardmen have a simple tribal structure. Cut off the head of the snake... If I can take down their leader first, this battle should end quickly.’
A particular Lizardman caught his attention.
This Lizardman wasn’t bare-handed; it wielded a battered and somewhat rusty Longsword. It was tall and powerfully built, with a tough physique. Five whole Goblin Hunters were attacking it, yet they were making no headway.
Lizardmen understood the value of metal weapons and armor, and would fight amongst themselves for the right to possess such items. Without a doubt, the largest and toughest Lizardman would emerge victorious, becoming the tribe’s leader while also claiming these items.
"Klade, ignore the regular Lizardmen!" Ron shouted. "The one with the Longsword is the chieftain!"
"I see him!" Klade reversed his spear, using the butt end to knock a charging Lizardman to the ground, and then charged toward the Lizardman chieftain with great strides. freewebnøvel.com
"Die, you stupid thing!"
Though the Lizardman was ferocious, it was no match for the earth goblin. After less than thirty seconds, Klade feigned an opening. He baited the chieftain into a wild swing that hit nothing but air, then spun and drove his spear upward. With a SQUELCH, the spearpoint skewered the chieftain’s jaws together.
"Too close!" The earth goblin drew his dagger and stabbed several more bloody holes into the Lizardman chieftain’s body, only stopping once he was certain it was completely dead.
By this time, Ron had disengaged from the battle. He was standing by the blood-smeared boulder, staring thoughtfully at a hole in the ground.
"What are you looking at? Aren’t you going in?" Aive walked over curiously and joined Ron in examining the cave entrance.
"Look here," Ron said, pointing at the jumbled footprints in the muddy water before them. "These three-toed tracks are from the Lizardmen, right?"
"So then... who made these?"
