Goblin Slayer, Vol. 5 Page 4

  “Oh-ho! I am so, so glad you came! Thank you! Thank you…!”

  The grateful old man took Goblin Slayer’s hand in his own two hands, which looked like gnarled tree branches. His hands and arms, once built up by farmwork, no longer had their former girth or strength. Yet Goblin Slayer could certainly feel the handshake as the man moved his hand up and down.

  “There are some things I want to ask you.”

  “Certainly. Anything.”

  “First of all, do you have an herbalist or healer in your village? A cleric of some kind? One capable of miracles.”

  “Ahem… We rely on visiting priests when we need a cleric. As for an herbalist, well, we have one…” The headman looked apologetic. Perhaps he thought the adventurers would ask for some payment, or at least support. “But she’s only a young woman. She became our medicine woman just recently, when her parents died in an epidemic. She isn’t…”

  “I understand,” Goblin Slayer said immediately, as if this were perfectly natural. “We’ll help care for the wounded. My party—” He paused for a second. “—has two clerics.”

  “Wha…?”

  “I’m sorry to say I can’t spare any potions.” He tapped his item pouch. The little bottles inside rattled. “If what you say about your medicine woman is true, I doubt she’ll be of much help. We can only offer you some miracles and first aid.”

  When Goblin Slayer asked, “Does this upset you?” the headman shook his head vigorously. The suspicion in his eyes had turned first to amazement and then to respect.

  Wandering minstrels told wondrous tales of an adventurer who rushed to the aid of any village that was attacked by goblins; in their songs, this hero was well-spoken and beautiful. Had there been even a shred of truth in what they sang?

  “Ha-ha-ha! I see now why you prevented me from creating a Dragontooth Warrior,” Lizard Priest said, approaching the two of them.

  “Frontier people are superstitious,” Goblin Slayer said. “Especially about bones.”

  “How thoughtful of you.”

  “I was the same way, once.”

  Lizard Priest rolled his eyes in his head by way of acknowledgment. “True. Naga or no, many might believe that only a necromancer could control a skeleton warrior.” Then he said, “We must classify the injured by the severity of their wounds,” and with a wave of his tail, he was off.

  The lizardmen had always been fighters. As a race, they often made for superior medics.

  “I’m surprised,” High Elf Archer muttered, watching the exchange from a distance. She had her bow in her hands at last and was scanning the area, but she was trying hard to keep Goblin Slayer in the corner of her vision.

  He was seated among the villagers now, tending to them with items he took out of his bag. He was bandaging wounds with herbs that would stop bleeding and neutralize poison, applying pressure to the injuries. Even here, he seemed somehow different.

  “I’m sorry, thank you so much.” Beside him, a woman in robes was bowing her head—the medicine woman they’d spoken of, perhaps.

  High Elf Archer’s pointy ears twitched, and a catlike smile came over her face. “It turns out Orcbolg really can hold a conversation, when he wants to.”

  Beside her, Dwarf Shaman stroked his beard and nodded. “Well, Beard-cutter is the most well-known of all of us.” Unlike his elf companion, who was on guard duty, with the fighting over, the dwarf had next to nothing to do.

  Not that he was unhelpful. He didn’t know first aid, but he walked around with many little items that served as catalysts for his magic. One of them was fire wine, which he described as “good for drinking and good for healing.” It was a powerful spirit, which also made it an excellent disinfectant. He had given a jar of it to the medicine woman, who had accepted it with profuse thanks, to the shaman’s distinct embarrassment. The way of the dwarves was to remember debts and gratitude as well as grudges while not sweating the little things.

  “Goblin Slayer, the most beloved adventurer on the frontier… Isn’t that the song that made you recruit him?”

  “Well, yeah, sure. But it turns out the song and the reality don’t have much in common…” High Elf Archer puffed out her cheeks in displeasure as she thought back on the ballad she had heard.

  It said he was made of the sternest stuff, that he was taciturn and loyal. A man without greed, who wouldn’t spurn even the smallest reward. When goblins appeared, he would go to even the most remote and rustic places to meet them, and his sword would slay them all. He was held up almost as if he were a saint or a Platinum rank.

  “But when you really think about it… He does get along really well with that girl at the Guild.”

  “They say those who don’t know the true situation are quick to jealousy. It’s the same everywhere.” Dwarf Shaman glanced up at the elf with a teasing smile. “So you really shouldn’t envy her just because she puts to shame that anvil you call a chest.”

  He could practically hear the anger seize High Elf Archer’s face.

  “After all, unlike a certain cleric girl, elves take a century or two to develop!”

  “Oooh, I can’t believe you said that! You great wine barrel of a—!”

  “Ho-ho-ho-ho! Among dwarves, a nice figure is a requirement for a proper man!”

  And they were off and arguing, the same as usual—but it wasn’t a sign that they had let their guards down. Dwarf Shaman hadn’t taken his hand off his bag of catalysts, and High Elf Archer’s ears were still moving, listening. She heard the two approaching sets of footsteps.

  One was a child, the other the familiar footfalls of Priestess. High Elf Archer knew all this full well.

  “Big Siiiiiis!”

  “Oh…!”

  A glow came over the face of the medicine woman, who had been moving among the wounded. The little girl came running to her, and the medicine woman caught her with both hands, hugging her to her chest. They both burst into tears, paying no heed to the eyes around them.

  Goblin Slayer watched this in silence, until at length, he looked away. He could no longer look because Priestess, who had gone to get the child, had a bright smile on her face for some reason.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  She squinted a little at the blunt question and replied innocently, “Heh-heh. Oh, nothing… I was just thinking you looked…happy.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Is that so………?”

  Goblin Slayer checked to make sure his helmet was still in good condition. There was no smile on that visor.

  “Well, fine. See to the treatment of the villagers. And the funerals.”

  “The funerals…” Priestess put a thin, pale finger to her lips, thinking for just a second. “The only funerary rites I know are those of the Earth Mother. Do you think it’ll be all right?”

  “I doubt they’ll care. So long as it’s the ritual of a god of order.”

  “Okay. Leave it to me,” Priestess responded promptly, then she looked around and moved off, holding her sounding staff. “Sorry I’m late!”

  “Ah, you’ve come.” Lizard Priest, tending to an injury with his rough, scaled hand, turned his head on his long neck to look at her.

  “Yes,” she said with a firm nod and began pulling bandages and ointments out of her pack. “I still have one miracle left, so if there are any serious injuries, I can use Minor Heal on them…”

  “In that case, I shall leave this patient to you. He seems to have been severely beaten, and all my artifice has done little.”

  “All right!”

  When she had lived at the Temple, Priestess’s job had been the treatment of wounded adventurers. As she rolled up her sleeves and began bustling among the injured, she projected more authority than her years would suggest.

  Goblin Slayer followed her with his eyes, mulling over a question in his mind.

  Surely this can’t be the end, but…?

  “Orcbolg!”

  The entire party
looked up at the sharp and clear warning from High Elf Archer.

  It must have been watching from the shadow of a barrel. Now, it had jumped out from the shadows and was dashing down the road—a single goblin trying to make his escape.

  He ran like a frightened hare; nearly slipping and stumbling, growing ever smaller in the distance.

  But only for a moment.

  “Pixies, pixies, hurry, quickly! No treats for you—I just need tricksies!”

  Dwarf Shaman intoned the spell Bind, and a rope wrapped itself around the fleeing goblin like a snake. It caught him around the legs and sent him crashing to the ground.

  This was all the opening High Elf Archer needed. “You thought we’d let you get away?!” In a motion dramatic enough for a painting, she drew the great bow off her back and jumped. From barrel, to wall, and then into space, she took leap after leap, aiming at her target.

  “So it was twenty…!”

  That was when Goblin Slayer drew an arrow from his own quiver. “Don’t kill him! We want him to take the poison home and spread it!”

  High Elf Archer reached up and grabbed the arrow out of the sky in an acrobatic movement. An instant later, the arrow whistled off, looking like a beam of light. The elf landed on the ground at the same moment as, in the distance, the goblin tumbled. How she had loaded, drawn, and fired the bow in that time, no one knew. It was truly a skill so advanced that it looked like magic.

  “Happy now?” She returned her oaken bow to her back as she landed.

  “Yes. But…” Goblin Slayer was almost muttering to himself, his gaze fixed on the goblin in the distance. He had pulled the shaft out of his shoulder and cut the rope around his legs and was running off again. He was heading north—toward the snowy mountain from where an an icy wind blew.

  “…this is not over yet.”

  That was something the whole party knew well.

  The goblins had gathered the villagers in the square because they had wanted to go looting; they gathered their spoils in the square, as well. And yet, they hadn’t touched the women. That meant they had been planning to take them back to their nest. The twenty goblins who attacked the village were only an advance unit. There were more of them, though there was no knowing whether they would launch a fresh attack or simply withdraw.

  Goblin Slayer completed his calculations and issued his conclusion without reluctance:

  “As soon as our spells have been replenished, we go on the attack.”

  He knelt before the village headman seated on the ground, then looked him in the eye. The headman’s face was drawn at the thought of another battle, but Goblin Slayer only said, “I want to request preparations for a night attack, as well as a place to rest for a night. You don’t mind?”

  “Wh-what? N-not at all! If we can do anything to help you, just let me know…”

  “Then tell me about the party of adventurers that came before us. And do you have any trackers in this village?”

  “Y-yes, so we do. Just one… He’s young, but he’s here.”

  “I need to know the geography of the mountain. I want a map, even a simple one.”

  The headman was nodding eagerly, but then he seemed to think of something, and an obsequious smile came over his face. “Oh, but… When it comes to a reward, we can’t…”

  “The goblins are more important,” Goblin Slayer said flatly. Ignoring the stunned headman, he stared at the mountains to the north. Somewhere behind the veil of clouds, the sun had already sunk behind the peaks, and the fierce wind carried hints of night.

  “As soon as everything’s ready, we will go and slay them.”

  §

  Thankfully, all things considered, damage to the village was minimal. Of course there were those who had been injured or killed fighting against the goblins. Some houses had been torched, others smashed—naturally. But the adventurers had arrived before either the loot or the captured women were carried off to the nest. So perhaps it was for the better. Or at least, Priestess thought so.

  And yet… And yet, she couldn’t quite embrace this as the best possible outcome, she thought, as she looked out over the village’s cemetery.

  Once they had finished tending to the wounded, she, the medicine girl, and Lizard Priest had to deal with the burials.

  “O Earth Mother, abounding in mercy, please, by your revered hand, guide the souls of those who have left this world.”

  Sounding staff in hand, she murmured her prayer, making the holy sign as each body was put into the ground and covered with earth.

  This was the obvious thing to do, even if there weren’t a risk of the corpses becoming undead if they were left exposed. If the living failed to say farewell to the dead, how could they go on with their lives? These burials were less necessary for the dead than they were for the living.

  So long as the dead had been among those who had words, their souls would be called to the god each of them believed in. Thus, the world would keep turning.

  “I doubt an attack will come tonight, although I can’t be certain,” Goblin Slayer said, after he had left the villagers to complete the burials. “You must be exhausted. Rest.”

  As usual, his speech brooked no argument—and yet, Priestess at least understood that this was his way of showing concern. Even if she still thought him a rather hopeless person.

  No matter how often she chided him, he never learned. Indeed, if she had refused, he wouldn’t have listened. So she figured it was best just to go along with him, despite the flash of annoyance.

  “Ahh… Phew.”

  That was why she was currently relaxing in a warm bath. She exhaled, the breath seeming to come from everywhere in her body, each muscle relaxing.

  She was in a hot spring. The snowy mountain nearby had, it seemed, once been a volcano, and the fire sprites still heated the water through the earth (or something like that).

  The hot spring sat beneath a roof on stilts, surrounded by rocks as steam drifted gently upward. The familiar stone icon of the Deity of the Basin presided over the wash water. But it depicted two faces, perhaps because this was a mixed bath open to both men and women. For that reason, Priestess had carefully wrapped herself in a towel.

  As she settled into the murky water, however, her body, so long stiffened against the cold, seemed to melt. She couldn’t stop the relaxed groan that escaped her.

  “Mmmmm…”

  High Elf Archer, it seemed, was a different matter. Her slim body, not a scrap of covering on it, looked as gossamer as any faerie. Yet she kept shuffling around the edge of the bath, looking like a frightened rabbit. She would clench her fists, determined, then hesitantly dip a toe in the water before jumping back.

  “Oooh… Ohh… Are you sure about this?” She looked like a child who didn’t want a bath—in fact, she looked much like the younger clerics Priestess knew, and it brought a smile to her face.

  “I’m telling you, it’s fine. It’s just a spring with some hot water.”

  “It’s a place where the sprites of water and earth and fire and snow all come together. That really doesn’t bother you…?”

  “Should it? I think it feels wonderful…”

  “Hmmm…”

  High Elf Archer’s gaze flitted between herself and Priestess, and her ears twitched uncertainly. After a time, she suddenly bit her lip, and—

  “Y-yaaaah!”

  “Yikes!”

  —all but flung herself into the pool, causing a great splash that crashed down on Priestess.

  “Pff! Pff!” High Elf Archer, who had gone under up to the top of her head, surfaced looking like a bedraggled cat, spitting and squeezing water out of her hair. Finally, she looked at Priestess with an expression of surprise and then let out a breath.

  “…Huh. This water’s warm. It’s kind of…nice.”

  “Gosh! Isn’t that what I’ve been trying to tell you? …And you’re not supposed to jump in.”

  “Sorry about that. I was just too scared to do it any other way.”
/>
  “…Hee-hee.”

  “…Ha-ha-ha!”

  They looked at each other, both of them soaked from head to toe, and broke into cheerful laughter.

  No matter how high a rank an adventurer achieves, the anxiety of battle never goes away. High Elf Archer might have been Silver-ranked, but she was still young and inexperienced; and Priestess, all the more so. They may have been from different races, but emotionally they were about the same age.

  They sat beside each other, looking up at the sky. The stars were blacked out by thick, leaden clouds, and only a shadow of the two moons could be seen.

  He had said once—when had it been?—that goblins came from the green moon.

  The girls’ clothing was piled neatly beside the bath, along with the weapons and tools they had used in the earlier battle. Goblin Slayer had warned them to be wary of a surprise attack while bathing.

  Maybe he wears that armor and that helmet even in the bath…

  The image was just too funny and set the girls giggling again.

  “I wish everyone else would’ve joined us,” Priestess said.

  “Oh, you know. ‘Mud is more amenable to a lizard.’ Seriously, who washes themselves in mud?” I just don’t get lizard folk. Priestess’s smile widened at the elf’s impersonation. “And the dwarf was all, ‘Wine is the way to revive your spirits!’ As for Orcbolg…”

  “…Guard duty. Of course.” Priestess blinked, her eyelashes moistened by the steam, and hugged her knees. “I’m a little worried, though. He won’t take a rest…”

  “Yeah, well, he’s got all that energy. Got to kill the goblins, he says.”

  “Doesn’t that…seem strange to you?”

  Sure does was a conclusion both of them could agree on. It was easy to picture him, keeping watch on the snowy plain and muttering, “Goblins, goblins.”

  “If we left him to his own devices, he’d spend his whole life like that,” High Elf Archer said.

  “I think…you’re right.” Priestess nodded deeply in response.

  It was really true. Goblin Slayer had changed considerably in the year since she’d met him. As had she. But still…

  “Well, it’s thanks to falling in with him that I get to visit the North like this, so I guess I don’t mind,” the elf said. She splashed restlessly at the water as if buying time to think. The motion stirred up the steam. Priestess glanced at her.