Short Story: Towns - the Goblin War

[nica911]

Yu gonna keep doing the forum game Aduvash?

[Aduvash]

Yu gonna keep doing the forum game Aduvash?

You mean continue participating in yours? Yes, but I'm too tired to post right now. Also, what does that have to do with 'The Goblin War'?

[nica911]

You think that there won't be goblins?

[evaldazz]

I finally sat down to read this, the story is looking good so far.

Thanks Aduvash. Glad you're enjoying it. Just got back in town, so will have part 5 up this week.

[khearn]

Very nice story. You do a good job of weaving things together and dropping hints without giving too much away too soon. I'm looking forward to reading more when you have time to continue. Thanks for sharing this with us.

[evaldazz]

Towns – The Goblin War
Guy Severn

Part Five – Audience and the dancer

In the long grass outside of town, Alice observed Sybbyl intensely. She was an Elf and one of the few heroes in the town that would actually speak to the two sisters. The Elf crouched and sniffed the air delicately. Alice noticed how different she was from Elves in her native land. Before Hurroden, she and Isabel lived in the Isle of Laurels, as many immigrants had. They had come across a few Elves in their time.

These ones were more in touch with the land. Besides their grey cloaks they looked a little rough around the edges and had picked up the traits of the animals they lived alongside. Alice noted their cat like grace and appearance, their pointed eyes and flat noses. They were smaller, and more slender than normal elves, which was why many of them took up as archers.

Sybbyl stood over one of the carcasses and sniffed the air. Her ears pulled back and she let out a feline hiss, baring her sharp teeth before rushing off towards the woods.

“Do you think she knows something we don’t?” Terryn asked Alice.

Alice saw something oddly familiar about the way the cows had been mauled. She and her sister had come across something similar weeks earlier before entering the valley. They had assumed it was done by a wild animal.

“Did the Goblins do this?”
“Goblins don’t attack cows.”

Alice gave the crimson knight a suspicious look. He seemed to know an awful lot about these creatures having only encountered the first one the day before.

“We’ll send out a proper search to find out what this is once your sister returns.”
“What do you mean?” she exclaimed, realising she hadn’t seen Isabel all day, “Where did she go?”
“She didn’t say. She just took off after they brought in that Goblin yesterday. She said she would be back by the evening…”

“We have to go find her, she could be in trouble!”

“I’m yet to see your sister in a situation she couldn’t handle,” Terryn reminded her, “don’t worry. Oliver is back on his feet finally and I have a job for the two of you.”


The water from the waterfall of the dancer roared down the cliff face into the river below. Isabel trekked cautiously along its edge wondering if this had been such a good idea after all. It had taken her much longer to find the remains of the first Goblin they had encountered. She had to camp out under the stars and resume searching that morning. She decided to travel closer to the water dancer, being further away from the brownie bat nests that had plagued their journey toward Aranaea.

Her clothes were soaked, and large drops of water tapped on her Spiderbane plate as she shifted along the rock face. She came out the other side of the waterfall and knelt down alongside the lake. She looked upon her reflection as she twisted the water out of her hair. Over her shoulder was the reflection of a man moving on her.

She spun around and elbowed the man back. Before she even saw him, she slammed her fist into his jaw. He cried out in surprise and fell over backwards. He held up his hands as she drew her sword and pointed it towards his throat.

“Who are you? What are you doing here?!”
The man was actually a boy, maybe her sister’s age. He was covered in dirt and scratches and had a scruffy look about him. The boy immediately began to cry.
“I’m sorry, please don’t hurt me…”
“Why were you sneaking up on me?” Isabel roared at him.

The boy broke into whimpers and frightened sobs, his words coming out as indecipherable dribble. Isabel watched him for a second and suddenly felt bad, he was obviously not a threat and the more he cried the more pathetic he seemed to her. She sheathed her sword and knelt down alongside him.

“You should know better than to sneak up on a woman like that,” she told him in a calmer tone, “What’s your name?”

“Leofrick… of Vierdale.”
“I’m Isabel Demour, of Aranaea.”
“You’re only treating me like an idiot because you can beat me up.”
“I know how it sounds,” Isabel acknowledged, with a sigh, “I wouldn’t have believed it a week ago either.”

Isabel then noticed some distinctive markings on the boy’s ribs. She reached over and lifted his shirt revealing those close five scratches of Goblin fingernails she had herself. He immediately reared back from her in shock. Isabel frowned at him.

“I’m not trying to have my wicked way with you.”
“How do I know that?”
She rolled her eyes and tried to redirect the conversation, “what gave you those marks?”
“They are from these horrid creatures that live under the earth. I managed to escape from them this morning…”


“I’m not joking, this was where it was,” Hadrian told the barbarian as they walked down the dark tunnels.
They watched Alice, cautiously making her way forward in the dark.
“This was definitely made by something. So where are they?”

Alice glanced back and noticed them staring. She suddenly took her eyes off of the tunnel ahead. There was a sudden growl that echoed in the distance that made her suddenly run back over toward the ladder.

“Not as hard as your sister, are you?” Hadrian noted with a laugh.
“She’s better looking though,” the barbarian remarked running his glove down the back of her armour.
“Get off!” She yelled at him and shoved him back.
“Hey!” Oliver called from the level above, “you two get up here, Terryn wants to see you.”
“Why? He just sent us down here.”

“He’s screaming bloody murder along with your names,” Oliver told them seriously, “do you want me to tell him you’re not coming?”

The two gave one another a frightened look then rushed up the ladder. After the two could be heard running off down the tunnels above, Oliver jumped down the hole to join Alice.

“Thank you, Oliver,” he told her smugly.
“I can handle them,” she said with a scowl.
“Yeah I saw that,” he responded unconvinced, “so what have you found?”
“I went right to the end of each tunnel. There are signs that something lives down here. But we can’t find any of them. It’s like they all just moved off.”


“Do you remember anything about the dungeon, where they were holding you?” Isabel asked Leofrick as they strolled towards the diminishing setting sunlight.
“A little, I remember some of the layout.”
“What you were doing when you were captured?”

“I was tracking something that had been killing our town’s livestock. I was nearing the hills long before the water dancer when I was surrounded by these hideous green monsters. They bound my hands and feet and carried me back down into the caves”
“How did you escape?”

“They kept me in a cage between these huge fowl smelling wolves. They beat, scratched and prodded me the whole time, taunting me endlessly. One day I awoke and they were all gone, there were no guards, no wolves, my cage was also left unlocked as well. I didn’t waste the opportunity. It took me a few days, but I eventually navigated my way out of the tunnels.”
“We need to get you to Terryn, the information you hold could be vital.”

“The crimson knight?” he stated with a slight smile, “you know your Paulus well, don’t you? Vierdale is a diary community, we trade with some of the towns to the north. I’ve crossed the valley between the water dancer and audience a dozen times, there’s no town there.”

“If it wasn’t for Alice and that stupid book, I would never have known about it.”
The boy had noticed along the way that Isabel mentioned her sister more then a few times.
“And your sister lives in this imaginary town with you?”
She gave him a look, “Yes.”
“You must care a great deal about her, taking her here all the way from Hurroden.”
Her silence was as obvious as a straight ‘no’.
“You don’t like your sister?”
“It’s not that…”

Isabel went onto tell him about the trouble she had gotten the two of them into when they were little. And how even as adults things hadn’t become any better, her adventurous attitude always made her leap before looking. She then realised she hadn’t spoken about this with anyone before and wondered why she had decided to say it to a stranger.

“If she’s so much trouble, why haven’t you parted?”
“I was going to at Hurroden,” she told him honestly, feeling there was no point in hiding it now, “but then the siege happened. I don’t have anything against Alice, I’m just tired. I don’t want to be the big sister anymore. I want to find somewhere where she can be her own townie and I can go and be mine.”

They came over the next hill and the walls and crimson banners of Aranaea stretched out across the valley before them. The setting sun caught the edges of the towers and created great golden rays across the valley. Isabel glanced back at the boy expecting to see surprise on his face. Instead, he was pale with a look of horror.

“This isn’t possible…”
Isabel held out her hand and he reluctantly gave it, “come on, it’ll be alright.”


A roar came from deep in the tunnels. Alice and Oliver both turned their heads towards the darkness. They walked forwards as they heard the cries and clash of metal. Oliver drew his sword and Alice did the same, as they took on a defensive stance. It wasn’t long before they saw one of Terryn’s barbarians running toward them. He was being chased by a massive group of Goblins. He tried to reach the two but was suddenly overrun and fell into the vicious green tidal wave behind him. They hacked and tore into his body as the rest passed by. Oliver and Alice knew there was no chance or surviving this onslaught and ran for their lives.


As Isabel and Leofrick walked toward the main gates, a Goblin scurried away from the hilltop behind them. Zegar approached the far tree line where dozens of yellow eyes stared back like glittering gems upon black rocks. The Goblin scout crawled through the dark woods until he came before a larger figure, which the eyes surrounded.

The Goblin king wore a great horrifying skull for a mask and held another on the end of a long staff. He had red war paint across the edges of his face and limbs. He lowered his head to Zegar, those amber eyes burning out from the dead mans skull.
“My lord Nusep,” Zegar declared with a great bow, “the Townlings took him in as planned...”

[evaldazz]

Hi guys. I tried to get this part out a little earlier before the new patch. Hard to know how much the 0.50 is going to change things in this series. I hope you like it.

Towns – The Goblin War
Guy Severn

Part Six – Moonlight

Terryn took one look at Leofrick and called in his guards. Isabel stepped in front of the boy in shock before they could take him away. Terryn pushed her aside, and the guards dragged him off to the holding cell at the far end of the town. He cried out to her as he left her sight.

“What are you doing!” she cried at the Crimson Knight in disbelief.
“He’s a spy Isabel.”
“What?”
“Goblins don’t take prisoners,” he told her sternly, “do you really think they’d just leave him unguarded and let him go? He’s been sent to spy on us.”

“That’s insane, they tortured him horribly. He would never help them.”

“Goblin’s are shifty creatures Isabel. I thought you of all people would know this. They have bought his loyalty by freeing him from the torture they administered.”

“You’re wrong, he’s just a kid.”

“We’ll see. If he’s innocent, he won’t mind a bit of confinement until we see where his loyalties really lie.”

Isabel watched the guards as they disappeared down the end of the main street by the temple. She felt a sense of helplessness and guilt for bringing the boy to Aranaea.


Alice looked back as they sprinted by the first corner in the tunnel. The Goblins had moved straight up the ladder for the caves above, but some had seen the pair and continued after them. They went around another few corners and found themselves at a dead end.

“Ger ready,” Oliver instructed her, “try and keep them at a distance from you.”

The Goblins almost passed by the tunnel and kept going. Alice felt relief, but then the last one stuck its head back around and called out in the harsh Goblin language toward the others. Oliver didn’t give them a chance to corner them and moved swiftly against the Goblin leader.

It parried a blow with its skull staff and scratched his leg. It was a superficial wound, and it allowed Oliver to swing his blade around and drive it through the back of the creature’s neck. The other two Goblins pounced on him, but he had learnt from his previously encounter and jumped back. Alice timidly moved ahead and thrust her Iron Sword at the Goblins. The thing hissed and spat at her as it tried to scratch her with its long finger nails.

Oliver slashed the torso of the Goblin attacking him and rammed the blade through it. He then called out to the one Alice was fighting. It snapped its head around towards him and growled, before turning back in time to see Alice’s sword smash through its skull.

“Are you alright?” Alice asked Oliver and he clutched the wound on his leg.
“Fine,” he told her, “quick we need to find our way back to the town or we’ll get stuck down here with these things.”

The two moved along the tunnels cautiously, looking out for more of the Goblins. They saw the shadows of the gangly creatures as they moved along the end of the tunnels on patrol. Oliver pulled Alice into one of the empty room of the tunnel and waited until the horrid beasts had passed. Once silence resumed, they stepped out into a fork in the tunnel.

“I don’t remember this…” Oliver remarked.
Alice looked back the way they came and then back to the two directions ahead. She felt a cold shiver run down her spine.

“I think we’re lost down here, Oliver.”


Isabel could barely look at the boy as she approached his cell. The two guards at the jailhouse watched her cautiously. She gave them a severe look, which made them back up and let her get to the barred window.

“I’m so sorry Leofrick,” she uttered, a little choked up, “I would never have brought you here had I known they would do this.”

Leofrick put his hand through the window and grabbed hold of her dark red Spiderite plated gauntlet. “It’s okay, I don’t blame you.”
“Terryn thinks you’re a spy.”

“I guess he’s only being careful,” he said unsurely, “what is he going to do with me, Isabel?”
“He wants to keep you confined until he knows for sure.”
“You wouldn’t let them hurt me would you, Isabel?” he said with tears appearing in his eyes.

“You have my word on that,” she told him honestly and decided to change the subject, “hey, how about I head by the kitchen and get you something to eat?”

“Yes please.”

She walked away from the cells and made for the kitchens. She found one of the guards, an old guy with a white beard named Sadon, standing on the street corner ahead. He was staring in her direction, chuckling in a way that disturbed her.

“What are you laughing at?”
“Big tough Isabel Demour of Hurroden has the hots for farm boys…”
“Shut up,” she told him bluntly and continued on.

“You know how Aranaea deals with spies don’t you?” he continued to taunt her, “especially the ones who work against their own. We hangs them off the gates. And we don’t needs the Crimson Knight’s says so either…”

He started to laugh at her meanly. Isabel humoured him for a second, laughing along with him. Her grin then disappeared, and she slammed her Spiderite gauntlet into his face. The old man fell back onto a red flower garden and lay there motionless. A few townies that were passing by looked upon her in shock, but she didn’t care. She went off to the kitchen to get Leofrick a roast.


Oliver grabbed Alice by the hand and dragged her off the main tunnel. As soon as he did there came a low growl and a large beast came stomping by. The two watched cautiously from the end of the tunnel so they weren’t seen. It was being followed by two goblins. Judging by the features the large creature was a goblin of some sort, but much much bigger. Alice waited until they were gone before speaking.

“We are so lost,” Alice said with frightened tears forming.
Oliver placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder
“Yes we are,” he finally admitted. “But we’ll be alright. If we can’t go back up, we may as well go down. We’ll try and find a way around. No matter what happens, we have to let the others know what’s coming.”
Alice wiped her tears away and took a deep breath. She nodded and they began moving off deeper into the catacombs once more.


Night fell on Aranaea. There was a full moon obscured by a heavy overcast concealing its light. It couldn’t have been better for Isabel, as she snuck between the buildings towards the jail cells. There were very few townies around; most were in bed or at the tavern. She passed over the red flower bed where she had planted Sadon. She couldn’t see any guards around and began to worry she may be caught by the one who was hidden. But then she heard Sadon’s drunken voice and saw him and the other guard chatting to the heroes over by the tavern.

“What are you doing?” Leofrick whispered as she arrived at the bars.
“Getting you out of here,” she told him and struck the lock with her Spiderite sword.
“Why, what’s happened? I thought you said I was safe.”

“From Terryn and I you are,” she said striking it once more and finally broke it apart, “the others I’m not so sure. So you’re leaving.”
Leofrick immediately jumped out of his cell and threw his arms around her. Isabel was shocked for a moment before finally hugging him back.

“Thank you, Isabel.”
“You’re welcome,” she told him while looking about with caution, “but we have to move now.”

Isabel took the boy’s hand and led him through the town. They made it right to the gates without being spotted by a single person. Isabel had made a point earlier of watching the patrols and knew the shift changes, and when there would be a gap by the west gate. She crouched down beside Leofrick.

“The guards will change soon,” she told him, “head west to the Audience mountain range, then south all the way to Vierdale.”

“I’m sorry I caused you so much trouble,” he said sadly, “I would have liked to have met your sister and learn more about this amazing place. I would have never done anything to harm you or anyone in Aranaea.”

“I know that Leofrick,” Isabel smiled and suddenly snapped her head around toward the gate.

There stood someone she hadn’t expected. Sybbyl the Elf had been missing for days hunting down the things that butchered the livestock. Isabel had forgotten all about her. Sybbyl spoke briefly with the guards before they headed off to change over with the next ones. She remained, spoiling Isabel’s plans.

“Now what?”
“I know her,” Isabel reassured him, “I’ll try and reason with her.”

Isabel left Leofrick hiding in the flower bed of the forge building and went out towards the gate. Even before she’d come into the poor light, Sybbyl’s Elven eyes had caught her.

“She’s coming out from the shadows, with a sense of purpose in step, approaching Sybbyl with a need, this hero of Aranaea.”

Sybbyl had theatrical way of speaking, but it was to the point. Isabel didn’t even try to lie. She told her the whole story about Leofrick and what injustice they had planned for him. She didn’t ask Sybbyl to step aside and let him out the gate, but it was implied. Sybbyl listened with her head tilted slightly to the side the way a dog or a cat eyes a curiosity.

“The weight of a threat from Sadon, amounts to as much as feathers,” Sybbyl told her, “trust not in Terryn?

“I don’t want anything to happen to Leofrick,” Isabel explained sincerely, “he doesn’t deserve this after all he went through. He’s not a spy, if you had been here you would have sniffed it out and none of this would have happened.”

“A strange place you put Sybbyl,” she remarked, “in between loyalty and compassion. I guess I must lean to you, as it is also justice which sways my hand.”
“Thank you Sybbyl,” Isabel said with a sign of relief and beckoned Leofrick over.

Leofrick stepped out from the side of the building and made for the gate. He gave Isabel a final wave and a little smile. Sybbyl spoke to him just as the cloud overcast broke.

“Fare journey, Leofrick of Vierdale…”
He gave her a nod as the moonlight lit him up. Sybbyl suddenly backed up. Her perfect Elven face suddenly contorted, her nose wrinkling up, her ears pulling back, she released a ferocious feline hiss.

“What’s wrong?” Leofrick panicked, turning back to Isabel.
Isabel’s eyes widened and she began to back away also.
Leofrick’s eyes were glowing bright red.

[wizardjian]

dude, edit your story and print it then send it to a printing company. Make some books, sell it to us. DO IT NOW
(lol print the books its a great story! u win nobell peac.. scratch that. You get the nobell war award.)

[evaldazz]

Nobell war prize, i love it! I think Xavi and Ben would beat the crap out of me if I went to print without their connsent. Still, you never know, it may be something they've already thought of...

[YetiChow]

Nobell war prize, i love it! I think Xavi and Ben would beat the crap out of me if I went to print without their connsent. Still, you never know, it may be something they've already thought of...

Ask them for permission - you never know, they might just be ok with the tons of free publicity

OK that was a joke, but if Towns does seriously blow up (think minecraft-like proportions) after the full release imagine having the exclusive rights to publish Towns-based content books... It probably wouldn't hurt to ask for an option on the contract for later considering the following your stories have, especially if your "real world" book does OK.

Halo, some Medal of Honour and Call of Duty games have novels out, so a tie-in isn't out of the question. Get in early and if/when the game blows up (because once this hits steam as a full game it will definitiely have some interest at least) publish a tie-in right at the peak of the hype... Cha-Ching! (and I'm sure you could pull it off, too )