I crept up the tunnel to get a better look at what was going on. While light came down and what felt like a draft, I wasn’t convinced that the room was open to the rest of the world. It seemed like that would be a break somehow in the way that the dungeon did things.

The tunnel entrance was still in darkness which gave me the advantage of being able to see the goblins without being seen myself. However, even with that advantage, I wasn’t happy with my prospects of winning this fight. Each one had gotten a bit harder, and the last one, I was still dealing with some issues.

Behind the goblins was a dais with a treasure chest sitting on it. It was the first I had seen on this floor, and unlike the ones, on the other floors, this one shone a blueish glow out of its cracks. Four of the goblins were mounted and stationed at the corners of the dais. The fifth wore black armor and stood next to a boar twice the size of the rest. The boar had a rope ladder hanging down the right side of it, and the points of its tusks were coated in shining metal. The black-armored goblin was clutching a spear that had a green mist floating around its tip.

If I were to engage the goblins head-on, I would lose. It wasn’t a matter of skill in this case, just raw power. The boars gave them more speed than I had, and I was betting that those mounts also had more health than me. In a direct fight, they would overpower me, which meant I needed a way to make this not a direct fight.

So far, I had been going through the dungeon without much thought. I would tackle each challenge like I was a brute trying to muscle my way through. For the most part, I had been rewarded for that effort. Yet, now I had to stop to think.

If I faced these mounted goblins near my home, I would look to find a place where the terrain favored me. I would want either a place where the trees were so dense that the boars couldn’t get up to speed or a ledge that I could fight from. The goal with either would be to remove the speed advantage and lessen the likelihood of me getting trampled to death. However, in this cave, I had neither the trees nor a ledge which meant I needed to figure out a way to adjust things.

I got a tight smile, I had an idea, but it was a kind of big gamble. I was going to need to take some time to prepare the tunnel and hope that I could draw the exploding armor goblin up to this fight. He was going to be the key to the battle; I just had to ensure he was where I needed him.

I focused on being soothing and sure through the bond, “Hey, we are going to do a little bit of work before we tackle the guys. Don’t let them know you are here. I will be busy for a while but I think it will work out.”

Blink sent back an almost pouty feeling, “fines bes fasst.”

I laughed a bit and headed back down the tunnel. I wished that I had my tools from when I was digging to do this work, but I didn’t, and so I was going to be dancing to get the holes where I needed them.

The first thing I did was head down the tunnel a few curves. I didn’t need to attract the goblins up above with what I was doing. Then I sat down and, after casting a few glows, started carving ruins on the copper coins I had found. I would have rather had stones to work with, but this dungeon was far too clean for my tastes.

It took me about 4 hours to get everything ready. It was only because I was in a dungeon and the goblins were staying put that I was able to do this. In the real world… I snorted a little with that. I wouldn’t have the chance to sit down and prepare for a few hours.

I checked in on the goblin with the reactive armor a few times and ensured he was moving up the tunnel. That guy was slow as he could only take about a six-inch step with the weight he had, but he was slowly coming for me. I would be worried if he could do anything other than explode. From my two experiments with him, it seemed like the explosion was increased by the amount of force that hit time. My first hit was straight on, and so all the power of my throw was used. My second one clipped his arm, and so most of the force passed by.

I had used a series of runes to first turn the dungeon walls to dirt and then from there to water. I now had a small place that I could duck into and hide. I also went further down and created a series of pits. That took an extra step to turn water to steam but made it so the holes were empty.

The first four pits were small. Each was about four feet deep and about five feet long. These were for the smaller hogs. I figured that the big one would run them over like they weren’t even there. I also figured that it would be small enough that the hog would be mostly trapped and might even kill the rider while trying to get out.

The last pit was massive and angled. I made it so that there was more room in the bottom than the top would show but that the opening was angled so that it would be hard to get out. I wanted it to be hard for the giant boar to turn around but big enough that it would still be at speed when the pit ended. I was treating it like a carpenter bee trap. I also made a small slide going into it. The slide was the most crucial part.

I didn’t want to just trap the goblins; I wanted to see the equipment that they had. Mostly I desired the spear with the green mist. I didn’t know what it was, but I felt that it was a treasure, and I wanted that treasure.

I carefully moved around the pit’s opening and headed back towards the goblin that I was starting to think of as Splodey. He was most of the way to the slide taking his sweet time clicking his shield in some messed up rhythm that was changing and missing beats.

When I got near him, he stopped walking forward and started to click faster. Then I noticed that his armor began to glow. I had been planning on pushing him down the slide, but now it looked like he was truly a ticking bomb. So I backed off, and he slowed down his ticking, and the armor stopped glowing.

It took me a few minutes to get him to start coming after me again, but he was still as slow as ever. Since I couldn’t do the honors of speeding him up, Blink did. She was able to sneak up behind him and do a slow push. When he stopped walking from her pushing, she just kept moving him forward.

For whatever reason, he didn’t click when she was pushing him. It might have been how he was moved around in the past if he had a past, or perhaps he needed to see his target. Either way, Blink increased Splody’s speed enough to make it only take another thirty minutes before he was heading down the slide.

Once he was down there, I filled in the slide with magically created fill stone. The thing I had been most worried about was that he would explode at the bottom of the slide, but it seemed that it was slow enough that the armor didn’t react. Then I heard his clicking start again.

The fun part of the plan was about to start. I didn’t think that I had a way to do real damage to the big boar, and I figured that I would be toast if I was fighting more than one of the others. So my plan was simple. I was going to let Splodey play catch the running boar. But to do that, I would have to make them good and truly mad.

I dumped my bag in my escape hole and then took my bow and headed up. Blink was going to do the honors of pissing off the far boar. She was going to attack at about the same time as I did so that it would seem like a bigger attack.

I wanted them to leave where they were guarding and run after me. Then I would hide and let them slip by. The best way I could see to do that was to piss off the big one. So out came my bow again and up to the mouth of the tunnel.

I took a few deep breaths. There was no way I could get out of how dumb this was. I was about to shoot at a boar that had to weigh in around a ton. I thought at Blink, “You ready girl?”

“Hunts funs!” She replied with way too much excitement.

I drew back my arrow and stepped beyond the mouth of the cave. This was it; either my plan was going to work, or it was going to be an epic fail. Right before I released the arrow, I yelled. “Hey y’all, watch this!”

All five of the goblins snapped their heads around to me as I yelled. Then my arrow flew true and slammed into the grotesquely massive body of the boar. I heard a sequel like a snort, and it went from laying down to standing. Its tail was swinging back and forth, and it was looking around. The dumb thing must have missed me yelling, so I screamed a wordless yell.

While I was doing that, Blink had the back most boar. I didn’t see her strike, but I saw it start to spin in circles until it was facing me. Then it began to run as I let my second arrow out. That arrow nailed the big one right on the forehead. Unfortunately, I thought that I couldn’t have been doing much damage because the way damage was explained, it didn’t seem like the bow could do more. What I was doing, however, was pissing it off, which was everything that I needed.

What I hadn’t expected, however, was that the more base instincts of the boar would come to the surface so quickly. The rider with the green spear didn’t even have a chance to mount before the big one charged at me. The little ones were already moving from when I yelled, and so had a nice head start.

I turned my tail and ran as quickly as I could back down the path. I made the second bend and then pulled myself into my hole. I was hoping that I was hidden enough they would run by. If I wasn’t, then it would be a quick death as I didn’t have any room to move.

The little ones went right past me. I heard the first just around the next bend start to squeal. It had found the trap, but I also heard and felt the big one come running through behind. I heard a yelp and a crunching sound, almost like a car wreck. I could only assume that was the rider meeting with the massive hog.

I waited for a while. I could hear in the tunnel angry hogs and goblins yelling, and then I listened to the sound I had been waiting for. The explosion. The whole tunnel shook a wall of smoke, and heat came pouring up the ramp. It was not as bad as when I was in the room, but it was enough to let me know that I was delighted I hadn’t tried to kill that goblin on my own.

Well, the mounts were taken care of; now it was clean-up work that I hoped would be much smoother. So I reached out to Blink, “How does it look in the treasure room?”

Blink sent back to me a picture of the black-armored goblin laid out on his back, working on getting up. “Skin toos hards,” was what she said with the image.

She was able to knock him over but not finish him off because of the armor. I smiled; I hadn’t seen her try magic yet. Then, I started down the tunnel. I needed to finish off the other goblins while she played. “Blink, try to use fire strike and see if that gets through the armor any.”