A few minutes later, Pild-nac was admitted through the inner barbican. This was achieved much more easily than it otherwise would have thanks to the contingent leader swearing that a horde of bloodthirsty sprites was directly on their heels. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t seen anything personally. He was not going to let an asshole like Pild-nac outshine him.
Soon enough, the charmed goblin was approaching the encampment commander himself, the massive Heqht-jo. The grinder tried to continue forward, but the commander’s personal guard were much more diligent about protecting their leader than the gate guards had been about letting him into the inner barbican. Pild-nac was stopped more than a dozen yards from the commander, who looked at him in anger and suspicion. The commander stood next to the Bloodstone, and beside him was hit pet caster, Radg-or. The rikker station goblin stood with his hand on the red jewel, and his eyes glowed scarlet from accessing the power within.
“What happened?” Heqht-jo bellowed. “Speak, fool! How are you the only one alive and why are you smeared with the blood of goblins?”
Pild-nac mumbled a response.
“Louder! I swear that I will skin you alive if you do not tell me what I want to know!”
Pild-nac started stammering. He spoke quickly, but it was absolute nonsense, interjecting the words “sprite” and “prisoners escaped” periodically, exactly as Richter had bid him to do.
The commander lost his temper and stomped closer to the grinder, intent on throttling the information from the blood-drenched coward. The mage behind him cast a spell, though. His eyes widened, and he hissed, “He is enchanted. Go no closer!”
Heqht-jo’s head whipped back to look at the mage, before looking at Pild-nac again, an even hotter fury burning in his chest. The commander felt himself slipping into a rage.
The grinder smiled, relieved that the farce was done. He knew that McClane was his very best friend in the world, as unlikely as that seemed, but it had made him uncomfortable lying to his fellow goblins. A small voice inside of him had also been screaming something about how Richter was a hated enemy. That had made no sense to Pild-nac though, so he had just ignored the voice. As time had passed, the irritating voice had been getting harder to ignore. That was why the grinder was pleased that he could carry out McClane’s final request.
Pild-nac smiled at the commander and shouted the expression his human friend had taught him. The goblin didn’t understand any of the words, but McClane had promised that the phrase was an expression of friendship. The grinder shouted, “Yippe ki yay, motherfucker!” at the top of his lungs; then he slammed the four “peace” crystals together. McClane had also promised that when the red granulated spheres were smashed, Pild-nac would get a wonderful “reward.”
Radg-or had started casting right after warning Heqht-jo. It still bothered him somewhat that the Bloodstone could speak into his mind, but this time, the powerful item had saved him. Not wasting any time, the caster had finished his incantation, the red light in his eyes glowing brighter as he drew on the power of the Bloodstone. He was not a moment too soon. The grinder’s body exploded with fire that quickly washed outward. Even twenty yards away, the caster felt the heat. Radg-or finished the spell Krin-lac’s Circle of Containment and drew heavily upon the powers of the Bloodstone.
A magical sphere appeared around Pild-nac and the five goblins closest to him. A small of amount of fire had already escaped beyond the AoE of Radg-or’s spell, but it quickly died out, barely singeing any of the goblins. Inside the sphere, however, was an inferno. Through the green energy field of the caster’s spell, every goblin present could see a spinning maelstrom of flame. It pushed against the boundaries of the Earth magic spell, and Radg-or bared his teeth in strain. The Bloodstone user kept one hand on the object of Power and extended his other hand towards the sphere.
The spell was active, allowing him to continually feed energy into it. For a moment, the walls of magic rippled and vibrated as the simultaneous release of four Red Foxfire crystals threatened to overwhelm it. The alchemy could not overcome the power of the Bloodstone, however, despite that fact that the wielder was not a Blood mage. Goblin fists could be seen beating against the inside of the containment sphere. This only lasted for a few moments, however, then all that could be seen was fire. The conflagration continued to rage.
The fires finally died, and only churning black smoke remained. The caster kept the sphere in place for another full minute, just to be safe. It was silent as the grave as all of the goblins looked at the contained explosion and realized many of them had narrowly missed death. When the spell was finally dropped, the smoke diffused out into the air quickly. A choking stink of charred corpses and cooked flesh spread to every goblin inside the barbican. Even the goblins were slightly sickened.
All that was left of Pild-nac and the five other goblins that had been trapped within the sphere were blackened bodies. All of them were stuck in a rictus of death and pain. Even their gear had been destroyed, reduced to a durability of zero. Precious few of the goblins lamented the deaths of their fellows, but many were disappointed that the time-honored tradition of stealing from the dead could not be observed.
Alma saw all of this from high above. The sky was beginning to lighten as dawn approached. Her small black body was still unseen against the barely brightened sky, though. Richter gritted his teeth as he watched through her eyes. The chaos seed had truly been hoping to cut the head off the snake by killing the enemy commander. The goblin mage’s quick thinking had ruined that. The wounded sprites were already in the riverbed. The chaos seed, Sion, and Damien were on a rise just outside of the goblin encampment, awaiting the pursuit Richter had promised. A pursuit that now might never come. To make everything worse, there were far more goblins in the camp than they had thought.
Sion saw the distress on his face, “What is it? Didn’t it work?”
Richter waved a hand quickly back and forth, silently telling his friend to be quiet. Sion fumed slightly, but silently. The chaos seed continued watching through the eyes of his familiar.
The goblin caster slumped, the red glow in his eyes finally subsiding. The rikker pulled his hand free of the Bloodstone. He couldn’t seem to let go at first, but he was eventually able to release it. A bloody, black handprint was left behind on the red jewel. It was quickly consumed, leaving the surface unblemished.