Four’s a Party 3: Goblin Slaying for Fun and Profit (Patreon)

A/N: You can read the first two chapters of Four's a Party Here 

For this month, I will be posting new chapters of Four's a Party every Monday, and commissions every Thursday. I hope you all enjoy the story!

Four's a Party 3: Goblin Slaying for Fun and Profit

So, when I pictured adventuring, it wasn’t like this.

“Ugh, there’s blood all over my hammer.”

“Can’t you just make it fall off, and help me with the goblins already?”

Turns out, the newest Demon Queen, some dragon lady, had completely changed the normal paradigm of the war between Humans and Demons.

Normally, they fought like it was, well... a War. But the current Demon Queen had pulled back all her forces to the mountainous “Demon Peninsula.”

Thus named, presumably, because it was a peninsula. And it had demons.

Couldn’t have anyone in the setting getting confused after all.

“Taylor, I’ve told you this before.” Amy shook her hammer, as if waving it in the air enough would somehow make the blood disappear. “I can’t just make a hemophage because it’s convenient.”

With a grunt, I slit the ear off of another goblin. “Why not? Just make something that dies in five seconds and wave the stupid hammer through it.”

Now, normally, the constant invasion of demons meant a veritable army of adventurers to match. Normally, constant invasion of demons meant powerful adventurers holding the line, while weaker ones (read: Amy and I) would go around doing the odd jobs to keep the kingdom running.

Normally, a constant invasion of demons meant a constant stream of work for anyone with the balls to pick up a sword.

But then, overnight, the demons had vanished.

No demons meant that people on the other continents considered the war essentially over.

No demons meant less high-level adventurers ready to challenge the demon queen.

And no demons meant that every job worth the time of day was snapped up by some level fifty something or higher.

Leaving scut work for newbies like us.

“I’d have to contain it then!” Amy said, drawing me out of my annoyed musings. “And make sure nothing escapes or replicates.”

I nudged the next goblin over with my foot so I could get to its ears past the mushy, mushy mess Amy’s hammer had made of its head. “Then do that.” I sighed. “No one’s gonna report you to the PRT.”

Better yet, get over here and use your power to pop the goblin ears off so we could finish this stupid job.

Amy licked her lips. “I shouldn’t…”

I rolled my eyes, sawing my dagger through the stringy cartilage of the ugly thing’s pointed ear. Really, at this point I would have almost preferred eyes. At least they popped right out.

Well, more like they just popped, but still.

Amy kicked the ground. “It’s probably not a good idea.”

I went to pinch my nose, and smeared some blood over the lens of my glasses. I sighed.

“Do you want recriminations? Cause I can do that too.” I pulled off my glasses, waving them at her. “If I yell at you and tell you what a terrible person you are for wanting to use your power et cetera, et cetera, will you clean my glasses off at least?”

Amy scoffed, but she grabbed my glasses all the same. “I’m not that bad.” A second later she shoved them back into my hands, completely clean. “It’s just that at least one of us has to be responsible.”

“Responsible.” I put my glasses on. “Right.”

Across from me, Amy pushed the head of her Warhammer into a glossy floating bubble she’d thrown together in half a second. Because it was oh so difficult. As I watched, the blood on the metal flaked away into the air and vanished. She pulled out a clean hammer, which didn’t burst the gently floating bubble I might add, before poking it with a finger.

I raised an eyebrow at her as Amy gave a satisfied nod.

And then she saw me looking and blushed. “Okay, it was easy.” She looked away. “You don’t need to make a big deal out of it.”

I found myself smirking. “You know what else would be easy…?”

She glared. “I’m not giving you your powers back.”

I tilted my head, putting a hand to my mouth. “But Amy, I was just going to ask for your help harvesting these goblins.” I placed my hands on my cheeks. “I didn’t know it was so easy to give me my powers back!”

“What? No that’s not what I meant at all.”

I sighed, resting the back of my hand against my forehead. “But I understand… if you don’t want to help me, even after I got us money, and weapons, and food, and stunned the entire goblin raiding party so you could smash them all to bits to your heart’s content.”

I held up an ear, still dripping with blood. “And harvested all the ears. But if you don’t want to do anything for me, that’s fine too.”

I met Amy’s gaze.

“Completely fine.”

She sputtered, face growing beet red as she looked away. “It’s not that… that I don’t want to.” She coughed. “Even though you’re terrifying. But I can’t.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“There’s nothing left, okay? Whatever Contessa did after you killed Scion, your Gemma and Pollentia are just gone.”

I blinked. “Huh.” Amy nodded rapidly. “Well that’s just rude.”

Check Success!

Gain +5 intimidate EXP

Oh. Whoops?

“Jesus.” Amy sat down on a rock. “You’re fucking terrifying, Taylor.”

I shrugged, going back to the goblins. “You’re the one who still has a power.”

Ugh, arguing with Amy had made me lose my place. I’d say you’d be able to tell by which of the bodies had large pools of blood beneath their heads, but Amy kinda went whole hog on the ugly green doorknob noses.

What I’m trying to say is if you imagined a bunch of watermelons dropped out a window, that would be less of a mess.

Amy snorted. “God I can’t believe you can say that.”

“Hmm?”

That one looked like it might still have an ear. Did I miss it earlier?

“You killed Scion with bugs.”

“Amy please. I’ll not have you slandering your own contribution.”

She laughed, and I paused, looking over at her. She was clutching her hammer tightly against her chest, fingers trembling slightly.

“My contribution, she says!” Amy shook her head. “You killed Dragon with hornets.” Her laughter turned a tad… hysterical. “Then I’m here, putting you back together again, because I guess I owe you for saving the world—all of the worlds—and for whacking me over the head with… Victoria. And you just… keep going!”

I paused, standing up. I opened my mouth to tell Amy not to have a breakdown right now, before stopping.

It… had never worked out for me before.

Instead, I sheathed my dagger. Themon had this really nifty double sheath that held my dagger right next to my flute. Walking over, I sat down next to Amy on the rock.

“Honestly,” I said. “I don’t know how to stop. Kinda like a shark, you know, with really bad myopia.”

Amy gave another giggle. “You’ve been keeping me busy too.”

I smirked. “Okay, I won’t lie, I’ve been mostly using you for my own amusement.” I shrugged at her offended glare. “What? I spent years being ‘grrrr I am the night. I am justice.’ And where did it get me?” I made a finger gun, popping my lips. “Two in the head from the only person who should have actually appreciated what I did.”

Amy paused, then nodded.

“And.” I rolled my neck. “No offense, but I’m pretty sure you put something back wrong. Usually people go to school before attempting neurosurgery.”

“I—you!” Amy threw up her hands. “I don’t do brains!”

“Uh huh. Pull the other one, it has bells.”

With a growl Amy reached out. I just sighed when her hands latched onto my collar bone.

Amy froze. “You just… let me?”

I hummed, looking up at the clouds. Thank god for the breeze, the goblin corpses were starting to smell.

“I’ve been thinking about things,” I said. “And I think the biggest reason is that I’m officially out of fucks to give.” I grinned. “Thrown into a new world with the grumpiest healer? Sure. Fantasy monsters and video game systems? Put me in. Honestly, the biggest thing we have to worry about is our loan payments to the guild. It’s a cakewalk.”

“A cakewalk.” Amy laughed again, fingers curling against my skin. “Hold still, there’s got to be something wrong with you.”

“I thought you said you didn’t do brains.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Not that I mind or anything, but…”

She frowned. I gestured to the way she was straddling my lap.

Amy just rolled her eyes. “Do you expect me to be embarrassed?”

“I mean, then I wouldn’t have to be.”

“I worked in a hospital, idiot.” She pursed her lips.

“That’s funny. I always hated hospitals.”

“Join the club.” She shook her head, before snatching the glasses off my face. “Whatever. We’ll do it your way.”

I blinked, everything going fuzzy for a second before snapping into focus.

“You just… fixed my eyes?”

She snorted. “No it was your ears, dummy.”

“Oh, okay. No wonder I can hear your baseless aggression so well.”

“Don’t make a big deal about it, okay!” She glowered. “I just don’t want your stupid glasses to fall off and you actually end up being blind.”

As opposed to blinding myself on purpose and using bug sight? I mean, between my bugs and my eyes, I’d probably--no definitely--pick the former. But mom always said that only uncouth individuals looked a gift horse in the mouth.

So instead I just smiled. “Isn’t making a big deal out of it your job?”

She jabbed a finger in my face. “I don’t want to hear that from you!” She crossed her arms. “I just… you know what? I could go for a little repression right about now. Let’s try this ‘keep moving’ thing.”

I chuckled. “I knew you’d enjoy hitting things with the hammer.”

Amy hugged it against her chest, smirking darkly. “Oh? Want to see how much I enjoy smashing things?”

“What with your boner?” I raised an eyebrow. “No, I think not.”

Amy fumbled for a second, inventorying her hammer to stop it from falling over. “I told you, we’re not calling it that!”

I grinned. “Really? Because I remember that’s exactly what we decided to call it.”

“Don’t you have goblin ears to harvest?”

“Isn’t that basically what your powers are for?” I asked. “Why am I even doing it in the first place when you can just make the ears fall off, Miss ‘it’s not gross cause I worked in a hospital.’”

She smirked. “My power doesn’t work on dead things. And the goblins have been dead for a while now.” She shrugged. “Whoops.”

I froze as I realized the depths of her betrayal.

“No.”

Her grin widened. “Yeah.”

I looked back to the bloody mess of (mostly) headless goblins Amy left scattered around the clearing.

“Better get to work~!” Amy leaned back, kicking her feet against the rock. “I’m afraid I don’t have a dagger, because someone was trying to save money.”

I staggered.

“So it looks like you’ll just have to get the rest yourself.” Amy paused, tapping her chin. “How many pairs of ears did the quest call for? Twenty? No, it was thirty right?”

I’d been played.

“How many do we have so far?”

Like a fiddle.

“Fourteen.” I grit out.

“That’s not a lot.”

I bowed my head, my new, improved eyes making it easy to see exactly how much work I had cut out for me.

Or uncut out for me, if you will.

“I’ll get you for this,” I said.

Amy cackled.

“My revenge will be swift and immeasurable.”

“Yeah?”

“It will come when you least expect it,” I told her, “and leave you as bereft as I feel at this very moment.”

“Oh, and I improved your nose too, so you could really appreciate the eau de goblin.”

Amy’s words hit me like a physical blow.

I placed a hand against my chest. “All of this spite, just because I was nice to you?”

“You? Nice?” Amy gave me a look. “Yeah, fucking right.”

I was about to say something incredibly witty and moving, that would convince Amy to cut off the goblin ears for me, I swear, but then I saw a bush rustle at the edge of the clearing.

I stilled, all of the jokes and laughter and talk about moving all falling by the wayside like the window dressing it was.

My eyes flicked left and right, catching flashes of green skin and misshapen limbs.

“Amy,” I said.

“What.” She smirked down her nose at me. “I don’t see you cutting—”

“Cover your ears!”

I yanked my flute from its pouch, no time to even set my fingers.

Luckily, I was going for a high note.

I blew just as a second troupe of goblins sprang into the clearing. My screeching note hit our attackers like a physical force, causing them to flinch midair.

They fell onto the ground writhing, clutching at their ears.

Goblins had naturally acute hearing after all.

And now they got to experience the acute pain of my performance.

I winced internally at the thought.

What did I do to deserve getting stuck with me?

One of the goblins rolled to a stop in front of me. Raising my foot, I stomped down on its spindly little chest twice and it popped like a balloon.

Couldn’t think of a thing.

Ding!

Level Up!

Bard increased to level 6!

{Demigod increased to level 2!}

Finally!

Jesus, we’d been killing level 6 to 8 goblins for a while. And my Demigod class hadn’t leveled up at all.

But as much as I wanted to take a break and see what level 2 in that class got me, we had bigger problems.

“The fuck?” Luckily, Amy was on top of things. Even though she looked surprised, this was a girl who survived the S9.

You don’t do that if you’re the type of person who freezes in the face of danger.

Her hammer materialized in her hands mid swing—which was about the biggest inventory cheat we’d found so far. She brought it down on the head of a goblin, spinning with the force of the blow to hit the next.

But there were a lot of goblins this time.

I narrowed my eyes as some of them started climbing to their feet. +2 Loudness or not, a shrill noise was an inconvenience, not an outright deterrent.

Taking a breath, I switched focus, thinking about how much I wanted the goblins to be inspired by my music.

They’d better work twice as hard or I’d rip their stupid little limbs off.

The moment the first note of my song sounded, they froze.

Fear was a… useful tool.

May have used it once or twice, you know, casually.

I took a step forward, and like that, the little things started scrambling backwards, crude stone weapons forgotten on the grass.

Whaddaya know, Goblins really were the dumbest type of demons.

“Get back here!” Amy dashed forward. Her six levels in paladin had done a lot for her stats. “I’m not done triaging you!”

And smashing things in with a hammer had given her a great appreciation for the potential application of hammers in all problem-solving capacities.

Amy, completely unaware of my silent judgment, continued to cackle maniacally. “I only brought black tags today SO HOLD STILL WHILE I MAKE YOU NEED ONE!”

And they called me the villain, honestly.

For my part, I was playing noticeably better than I’d been this morning. Oh sure, my notes sounded warbly whenever I had to skip forward to kick a goblin in its giant red pepper of a nose, but it wasn’t like they were complaining about my artistic ability.

And if they did…

Well, I suppose I could just kill them myself, instead of leaving them to Amy’s tender mercies.

“Just! Stop! Squirming!”

Poor girl, she had a lot of anger to work out. With a neat little hop, I punted one of the closer goblins over towards Amy. She caught it with the backswing, a wide grin growing on her face.

And here she had the nerve to say that I wasn’t a good friend.

In a few minutes, the clearing was much more empty of goblins and much more full of goblin bits, in every sense of the word.

Amy was panting, half hunched over as she rested her warhammer on the ground. Unfortunately, paladins seemed to get more points in CON then END, which were different stats in this system for… reasons, apparently.

I lowered my flute, massaging my jaw. My last few lines had been more air than note. “I think I’m tapped out for the day.” Bards also did not get many points in END. “Can we just skip the arguing part and get to the part where you make the goblin ears fall off so we can get out of here?”

Amy huffed, inventorying her hammer. “What’s in it for me?”

I sighed. “I’ll let you pick what we get for dinner tonight.”

“Deal!”

I pinched my nose. My food choices weren’t that horrible. We’d only been in this world for a day and a half!

It had just been a mistake! It wasn’t my fault Amy couldn’t handle spice!

Brushing it off, I opened my HUD, eager to look at what leveling up my hidden class had netted me. Bard got some usual stuff, one stat point on the sixth level just like every other even level, a tiny HP and MP bump… oh, I could learn a new song.

Neat.

I wondered if there was a song buff that was the thematic opposite of ‘swarmed by killer hornets.’

But now, onto the main event.

{Demigod Level Up!}

Rewards

1 Attribute Point

+10 HP/MP

+1 Perk Point

Domain Unlocked

My eyes widened. That was more than double the Health and Mana bonus I got from Bard. I quickly checked my numbers, a smile growing on my face when I realized that yes, they were added together.

Amy told me Paladin, which was apparently a higher-level class, gave her 10 health per level, but only 4 mana just like bard.

And she’d had the nerve to brag about it too.

I snickered.

How long would it take her to realize that my HP pool was larger than it should be?

To say nothing of the rest of it. Perk Points? Perks were apparently something you got at every tenth level, but I got one at level 2.

Would I get one at level 3 as well? Level 4?

But I would be lying if I said that was what really interested me.

What was Domain?

I clicked it, causing a new info box to pop up.

{Domain}

Gods and Demigods alike draw strength from their core concept.

Your Myth has granted allowed you select one of the following domains

[Insects]

[Darkness]

[Knowledge]

[Control]

Well, most of those were pretty straightforward. I’d take a hard pass on control for the moment.

That seemed like a good way to get two more bullets in my head.

I tapped ‘knowledge’ to see the description, even though I was sorely tempted by insects.

I missed my black widows. Sure they probably didn’t exist in this universe, but I’m sure there’d be other types of deadly bugs I could make friends with!

{Knowledge}

Knowledge takes many forms, but above all it is the quest of learning and seeing what others have left unknown and unseen.

Your domain will first materialize as the knowledge of one's surroundings that you were once so famous for. In time, it will grow to match, and perhaps even exceed, the quasi-omniciense that made you so feared...once upon a time.

I frowned.

This was the first overt sign I’d had that this “system” knew intimately about my life. Oh sure, there had been class choices, but this was far more intimate.

I put the thought aside for later.

For now, I had more important things to worry about, like which slice of my power I wanted back the most when the clear answer was yes.

Darkness I immediately cast aside. It was a useful aspect of my power, but only because I’d been so squishy. Misdirection was something my bard skills could hopefully provide.

You know, whenever they stopped being so… bardy.

Someday.

Control, though powerful, was out for obvious reasons. The boxes had even warned me that the gods wouldn’t take kindly to me, so something that overt was probably out.

I wasn’t the kind to slither my way into the halls of power through quiet influence and soft power until I took over everything.

That was much more Lisa’s shtick.

So that left insects and… awareness of my surroundings.

I sighed. In the end, the choice was pretty obvious wasn’t it?

Farewell sweet little spiders. I will yearn for you in my heart.

But another power that would be obvious and overt, compared with what might have been hands down the most useful effect of my power beyond simple brute force application?

I winced, not to mention the fact that people kept almost sneaking up on me because I didn’t even look around anymore. I just expected to know where everyone was in my range.

That had to be fixed before it got me killed or, even worse,

Amy found out about it.

A quick glance at the other categories confirmed that my initial guesses were essentially correct. I wouldn’t even get to go biblical on people with the insect power for at least a dozen levels, which was too long to wait in my opinion.

Knowledge it was.

Sorry Lisa, guess I’ll be taking this part of your kit instead.

With a small smile. I selected Knowledge and finalized my selection.

The box dinged before vanishing. I looked up to see Amy standing in front of me with a bag presumably full of goblin ears in hand.

“You done yet?” she asked. “Or did you want to read a book while we’re here.”

I looked around, trying to get a sense of my new ‘awareness’ only to come up blank. I bit my lip. “Yeah. Just, song selections this level up.”

“What? Why did you level up? I did most of the killing.”

“Clearly the system knows that I did most of the wo—”

I was spinning before I realized why. I only knew that there was no time to go for my dagger.

Instead I flicked my flute across my palm, grasping it by the mouthpiece.

I brought it down behind me like my old baton, catching a green blur by the side of the head. The goblin went bouncing across the clearing, I was after it instantly. My flute came down in a flash.

Something cracked.

And it wasn’t the metal.

Standing up, I blinked my new eyes once down at the dead goblin in front of me.

It was like I’d just known.

Snrk.

I felt a smile coming on, but I fought it down as I turned to Amy, raising my flute.

“Any chance you could get the blood off of this too?”

And then she blinked, and rolled her eyes. “God, you are just the worst. Why’d you even buy the knife if you were gonna beat up monsters with the stupid flute!”

I raised an eyebrow. “So someone could trick me into harvesting goblin ears, probably.”

Amy coughed. “Whatever, just give it.” She held out her hand. “Unless you want it to dry inside. Not that you’d care since you’re just going to be whacking people with it apparently.”

“I needed to test the durability enchantments!”

“I needed to test the durability!” she simpered. Still, with a few swipes of her hand she pulled together another one of her soap bubbles and waved my flute through it. “Can we go now? I’m starving.”

I sighed. “So impatient.”

She stared at me. “You were the one complaining about taking too long.”

“Only because it meant more work for me, you see.” I laughed once at her glare. “How’d you manage to get them all so fast anyway? There were a lot of goblins.”

She just shrugged as we started walking. “Just made a plant to connect them and bring the ears back. It was faster that way.”

“Amy! For shame! What would the PRT think?”

Amy punched me in the shoulder, and this time, I actually had to hide the wince. “Shut up. I put it all back afterwards.”

“Just as well as you put me back, I’m sure.”

“I can take you apart again if it’d make you feel any better!”

“Please, you’d have to catch me first.”

[Line Break]

Later

The Demon Tower

(Thus named because it is a tower, and it has demons)

Fhaust puzzled over the body the little goat-like Pookas had brought him. The ears were cut off, as was normal as the humans harvested his kind for parts.

Well, to be fair, Fhaust harvested goblins for parts as well, but it was the principle of the thing! Just like Queen Velverosa always said.

Fhaust had yet to discover any principles beyond the scientific kind, but he was sure he’d get there eventually.

In the meantime, he’d found a much more interesting kind of discovery.

“What made this cut?” He ran a single gloved finger over the smooth stumps of the goblins ears. “It is almost as if the cells were lysed…” A smile grew beneath his black opera mask. “How utterly fascinating. I’ll have to have my scouts keep an eye out for any unusual mages.”

He chuckled, the shadows around him curling in glee. “And to think, they’re still weak enough to be hunting goblins! Oh what fun!”

“Fhaust! Hello!” A voice called. He perked up! The Queen’s soon to be paramour and the tower’s #1 top performing mana battery was stopping by today as well? Things just couldn’t get better.

“Malori!” The Demon researcher straightened, smiling happily. “It’s so good to see you again.”

At her feet, the tiny little pukkas started their traditional dance. “Malori! Malori! Malori!” The human giggled, pending down to pet them between their horns.

“Hi guys. It’s good to see you again.

“Queen Velverosa’s been most wroth lately.” Fhaust leaned forward, wagging a finger. “You wouldn’t happen to have any idea why would you?”

The red haired human laughed awkwardly, rubbing the back of her head. “Uh, yeah, I might have messed up… Don’t worry, I’ll fix it!”

“Well if you want to see her, go on up.” Malori was all but a guest of the tower after all. Far be it from him to keep the Queen from her favorite chew toy.

And the way they interacted with each other was a wonderful case study for his research paper into human/demon relations!

Unfortunately, no one could see Fhaust’s eyebrows wiggle beneath his mask, or he’d do it more often.

But Malori only shook her head, amethyst eyes sliding down to the floor. “Actually I wanted to ask for some advice. Last time… last time I really messed up. Queen Vel called me worse than trash, because of how I treated my teammates. I did some thinking and, and even though I fought her with all of my heart, it wasn’t enough to make her change her mind.”

“Oh?”

“She said she hated people who would cast aside their allies in the name of their goal, so… so I want to show Queen Vel that I’m not like that!”

Fhaust tilted his head. “Aren’t you though?”

“Grk.” Malori hunched over, clutching at her stomach.

Fhaust patted her back awkwardly. “I feel as if this is more General Melantha’s area of expertise.”

“Her advice got me into this mess in the first place.” Malori moaned, staying hunched over. “I need to change how Queen Vel sees me if I’m ever going to have a chance!”

Fhaust hummed. “Well, if the Queen is upset that you threw away your comrades like a piece of sentient human garbage…” Malori fell over, but Fhaust continued unbothered. “Why don’t you do the opposite?”

The girl perked up, short-cut red hair bobbing around an interested face. “The opposite?”

Fhaust nodded. “Take some weaker adventurers and nurture them. Show that you’re willing to put the same work into your people that you’re willing to put into your goal of marrying the Queen.”

Malori frowned. “Train people? Well… I guess I could always help those two?” She paused, eyes flicking back to Fhaust. “But wait. If I train more adventurers, wouldn’t that make things more difficult for you guys?”

Fhaust smiled. More strong adventurers meant more mana harvested for his device. But more importantly… “Malori, you faced Queen Vel with experienced adventurers and she destroyed you.” Malori nodded, sadly, and Fhaust couldn’t help but pat the poor girl’s shoulder.

“And you are an exemplar of the human species!” Really, if she wasn’t so powerful, he’d have had her on the dissection table years ago. “Do you really think someone you just train for a while will be able to succeed where you failed?”

Malori hummed, but then her eyes started to sparkle. “Hey, you know what, Fhaust, that’s a really good idea!”

“I’m sure no matter who I pick, Queen Vel will be able to take them!”

Four’s a Party

Worm/Mage and Demon Queen