Ch 8.
"This way Slayer-san." Axe Warrior said as he led the now conscious leader of Slayer Keep, and Priestess, HEA, Dwarf Shaman Lizard Priest and the captains of Slayer Keep, inside the lair of the currently deceased goblin overlord.
"This place is huge and well organized. The barrier miracle and the smoke bombs trick killed a lot of them, including the human women that were mentally enslaved by him. But its big enough that the smoke barely covered half of it, we spent half the night laying down traps, avoiding ambushes and cutting our way through this place. We found some still alive prisoners. All women mostly, we gave them some moon tea, and the ones with the big bellies are being overseen by the healer mages right now and they should be goblin free come nightfall. But what I really want to show you is this room." Axe Warrior said as he led them to a door that his teammate Half Elf Wizard opened with a few incantations.
"It's been magically locked in a way that only goblins could open it." She said as Goblin Slayer entered the room.
"A storage supply room." Goblin Slayer said as he looked at what was inside this new chamber.
"Hard biscuit bread, salted pork, smoked fish, dried fruit and nuts, pickled vegetables, and black tea leaves."Lizard Priest said after giving the air a good sniff.
"That's all marching food. Made to not spoil and be light to carry. The tea is for making muddy water drinkable and to give you extra energy for marching and fighting." High Elf Archer said with a scowl.
She recognized these foods from the many times her people went to war.
They were horse masters and archer lords that constantly roamed all across their lands in quick raids and ambushes against their many foes.
"Not just campaign food." Dwarf Shaman said and walked to another part of the storage room.
"Pikes, helmets, gambesons, shields, arrow heads, shorts words, axe heads, and heavy ordinance, all decent quality. Decent enough for any country's troopers." Dwarf Shaman said, clenching his fist in rage.
This had been no mere goblin horde!
"Priestess, light the room."
"Holy light!" She said and used her miracle.
Once the light flooded the room they realized that it wasn't a room at all.
It was a very, very big, storage depot; it went on for so long that the light could not fully engulf the room.
"Thousands, this is enough equipment for thousands of goblins. How many women did you find here?"
"About 50." Axe Warrior replied.
"How many goblin children?" GS asked
"What we brought with us was only one out of ten heads." Rhea-Ranger said to him.
"With what they had here in six months time that horde of hundreds would have been thousands. We would have been plagued by a goblin army."
And in another 6 months something worse than that would have threatened them.
Though, none dared say it out loud.
Not even Goblin Slayer, he had only heard rumors of such a terror, never seeing it himself.
"Any high level gear?"
"Everything that we found was enchanted to have effects and debuffs against non-goblins. The runes and spells are so potent that no non-goblin can even hold the weapons." Warrior replied.
"Can we change that?"
"I am afraid not. We could break the spells and scratch off the runes, but it will only turn them into normal weapons." Wizard replied to his enquiry.
"We will do that then. The rest of the equipment is not suitable for humans. The weapons can be used by us, but the armor, and helmets are too small. We'll have to bring them back and reforge them into new gear. The food thought is a great boon, check for poisons and curses and if it's safe we'll take it back to Slayer Keep, it should be big enough to last us for two years at our current numbers." Goblin Slayer replied and Noble Fighter gave commands to be dispatched in order to fulfill his orders.
"Anything else?"
"Yes, we did find this." Fighter said and showed him another chamber of the lair.
In it was something that filled the Slayer army leaders with more dread than the room full of weapons and war supplies that had been plenty enough for a great goblin army.
It was a room full of books, with stone, wood and painting tools lying around, along with paper making equipment and many other things.
Many other things that you would find in a town or a city.
Or even a capitol!
"This is what is needed for building and roadwork. They weren't gonna just raise an army, they were gonna build a GOBLIN KINGDOM." Goblin Slayer said, his voice filled with pure raged and endless hatred for the thought.
"We came here just in time. Burn the books, and everything else. Did we discover anything else?" GS asked.
"Yeah and I tell ya, it's a dozy!" Warrior said and showed him the third and final room, which was filled with treasure chests.
Empty treasure chests!
"This horde must have had plenty of gold and jewels, but every single chest we open is empty. I mean what happened wit-"
"They spent it all on the weapons and food." Goblin Slayer suddenly interrupted Warrior.
"And I am sure if you check the cities were the spies had been sent, along with those within 1.000 miles from here, you'll find new accounts, opened under names that did not exist the day before the gold was brought to the bank, and the keys to those accounts belong to lords of those cities. War bribe…..They were not planning on building a kingdom, they were planning on building an Empire…We really did get here in time." Goblin Slayer said and left her room, followed by the trio and his captains.
They all stayed silent while following him.
The terror of what they discovered, of what could have come to pass…..it was too much, simply too much for them to say anything for a while.
Night came shortly afterwards, and after recovering from the morning's battle the army of Slayer Keep fixed what wagons it had left, sent runners to the nearest villages who came bag with new wagons and horses, loaded the food and weapons found in the lair into them.
They now rested and had dinner.
"Now there are several types of cartridges for firearms, and ya all line them up front to back in this order. There's the white, the blue and the red. White ones mean canister shells, they are filled with small balls that spread once fired, this is for short range up to 100 yards and is yer go to when dealing with large groups. Da second type is blue; it has a single arrow shaped bullet that's designed for single targets like hobgoblins and champions. Da last one is yer red bullets, these ones are steel tipped bullets, and they are for use against ogres and other big things, and only against those! Cause they will go through anything smaller, and if ya shoot red into smaller targets than ya could hit any teammate that's behind yer target. That's why ye line up ammo in yer pouch like this: first white, then blue, the red, so you can remember small target, big targets, giant targets." Dwarf Shaman said and explained to several adventures how to use the muskets they had captured from the goblin horde.
"Next is how ta keep it. First off, after firing ye always boil some water and then pour it down a rifle's barrel to wash the ash away and then used the rod, covered in a cloth to clean it . Black powder makes it start clogging after 30 shots. After that you have to keep it greased and oiled so it doesn't rust, and always have a good sharpened flint in the flintlock, so carry spares with ye. Finally ya keep yer rifle and cartridges in bags of leather and ye grease the cover in order to keep them dry, cause if they get wet then it's just a pack of mush and a very expensive club."
After he told them that he turned towards Goblin Slayer and handed him the shotgun that he had used to kill the goblin Overlord.
"I've replaced the handle wood with sturdy oak, and rifled the barrels for extra accuracy. I've also put in a breach loading mechanism and attached bullet holders beneath the forestock. So after ye fire, ye can grab a pair o cartridges, push back the breach, put the cartridges in, push the breach forward to block it and fire. This shortens the firing time from 3 shots per minute to 8. Try it."
Goblin Slayer took the firearm, aimed in the distance and fired, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, 12, 13!
"14 rounds per minute. Not bad, a good dwarf firearm can manage 15 a minute, but this is not exactly a chassepot, so ye got an excuse if yer feeling embarrassed." Dwarf Shaman said with a giggle.
Goblin Slayer nodded, then immediately started putting some water to boil and prepared a cloth and grease, all under the watchful eye and approving nods of the head from Dwarf Shaman.
"I'll start rifling and breach loading the rest of the firearms tomorrow, should be able to be done with them in a two days time, as for the rest of the powder weapons, it'll take me about a week to 10 days to properly improve them."
"That is good to know. Thank you for improving them." Goblin Slayer said as he tended to his shotgun.
"You seem satisfied." High Elf Archer said all of a sudden.
"Why wouldn't I be?"
"Honestly, I was worried for a while that you'd charge us extra for all these adventurers that came and for the fact that the horde was twice as big as we what we expected, and the boss much stronger than what we thought they him to be. And after all this trouble there weren't any riches to loot. Don't you feel cheated?" High Elf Archer asked.
"We came here to slay a powerful goblin horde. We did so. This has been a successful quest." Goblin Slayer answered, finishing cleaning and greasing his shotgun, he then placed it in a greased leather carrier.
"Kill Goblins, kill Goblins and then kill them some more. I get it that you guys are Slayer Keep, but don't you want to go on an adventure occasionally? I mean I know you guys need to advertise and grow your forces in size-"
"The best thing would be if the Slayer Army and Slayer Keep disappeared forever one day." Goblin Slayer said all of a sudden, shocking the entirety of the Slayer army.
"W-what do you mean my liege?" Noble Fighter asked in shock.
"The day Slayer Keep disappears is the day when there are no more goblins in the world." The Master of Slayer Keep said, surprising his comrades twice in one night.
"When that day comes…then I'll…..no, then we'll all become Adventurer Keep and the Adventurer Army."Goblin Slayer said, he then slumped his head forwards and fell asleep.
The others gave half exasperated, half endearing smiles at this now common sight.
High Elf Archer had the most exaggerated reaction of all.
The Slayer Army having heard that, had their shocked faces morph into expressions of relief, joy and bittersweet anticipation for the future.
In that evening the first tradition of Slayer Keep was born.
The day of Promise, where once a year all would gather and hold a feast and pledge to make that day come, this would be achieved by reciting in mass the Slayersenna, the poem that prophesied the fate of Slayer Keep.
One day they we'll take our final quest.
One day we will slay the last goblin nest.
One day Slayer Keep and the Slayer Army will be no more.
Time will leave nothing but stories told at fires with roasted bore.
But not yet!
The end came for all.
Neither men, women, keeps or kingdoms keep it at bay;
But to him the Slayer Army says:
Not yet, not yet;
Not today!