A jigsaw massacre

The heavy door opened with a squeaking noise and Jay directly hid at the side to peek inside the space behind it.

It was a wide cave with a pretty high ceiling and way better illumination than any other in the mine. Along the wall to his right, Jay spotted numerous tools and saws for woodwork lined up and on the other side he spotted some kind of wooden frame.

Looking towards the far side of the room, there was a low platform with planks and even smaller tree trunks placed atop.

At about half of the distance to the far wall on the left, a gigantic jigsaw was running and two small Goblins were pushing a wide plank along it.

But Jay had no time to keep watching the green-skins cutting the plank when he, accompanied by mechanical sounds, saw movement to the left behind the wooden construction.

Taking cover again, Jay waited until the noises got to a further distance. Then he crouched forwards and peeked around the corner to see the origin of those sounds.

It was a robot.

Looking at it a bit more precise, Jay understood it was some kind of machine controlled by yet another of those Goblins. It looked like it was running on steam power or something similar, judging by the sounds, pipes and tubes running along the crude and rusty metal construction.

As it was just then slowly walking towards the other direction, Jay used the moment to analyze the machine.

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Sneed (Goblin-Engineer LVL22 elite)

Base LVL23

*Hobgoblin*

HP 2420/2420 * Mana 265/265

[Engineering LVL 3]

[One-handed Axe LVL 2]

[Lumbering LVL 2]

[Dagger LVL 1]

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A bit irritated at what he read, Jay watched the machine trot further away.

When it stopped at the furthest corner of the room it grabbed the plank cut by the other two Goblins and carried it with the claw mounted on one arm, to the other side of the room. Then it walked back towards Jay's hiding spot and he saw the Goblin inside and controlling it.

The creature looked similar to Gilnid and Jay understood this was Sneed who he had analyzed seconds earlier.

Concentrating on the machine again, he finally got the result he wanted and learned about this robot like thing.

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Sneed's Shredder

Construction

Requires Goblin-Engineer LVL20

(Durability 3872/3872)

Damage 20-30 Armor 150

Speed 2,8

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Glad he didn't get spotted, Jay kept watching the Goblins at work and soon learned why a not so small jigsaw had been mounted on the machines other arm. Sneed was cutting the planks to a fitting length and then put them to the side next to the longer ones.

He was just steering his Shredder towards Jay when latter heard a shrill shriek coming from behind him.

A somehow female looking Goblin that had walked over to the tools, had spotted him and sounded alarm.

Shuddering from the voice, Jay turned around and kicked the ugly creature so if flew towards the tools. Turning around once again, Jay saw Sneed running over in his Shredder, though calling it running was a bit much.

The walking speed of the machine was anything but fast, so Jay shortened the distance himself. With his swords and daggers bound to be useless on the machine and having to dodge the fast rotating saw on the left arm-like appendage, Jay went in barehanded.

The first punch onto the round main body as Sneed covered himself pretty good, left nothing but a fist shaped dent and pushed the whole construction to the side.

Jay had no time for a follow up when more goblins rushed in.

Dodging the metal claw from the first one, Jay grabbed the seconds arm as it passed him, hurled the small creature in a circle around him and threw it towards Sneed. Latter defended himself with his jigsaw, resulting in a new red paint for the machine.

When a third Goblin jumped at him after they came out of their stupor, Jay tried the same trick again. This time Sneed caught the Goblin midair with the claw though and hurled it back.

Jay had to jump to the side as the green-skin came flying with the metal hook it had been using pointed forward.

Sneed of course used this chance and attacked with the saw blade. It tore through the newly acquired leather armor and gladly only grazed the skin on his back as Jay had rolled to the side at last second. But even with his nimble reflexes he couldn't get out unscathed.

With this he knew he had to do something about the saw. And he had to do it fast as there were at least four more of those green-skins left.

Rushing in, Jay dodged one more swing of the machines arms and punched with a fire loaded fist at the pipes running along the constructed left arm.

The result was the jigsaw still spinning but the middle joints ceasing function. The dangling saw nearly hit the main body when Sneed tried to attack again and Jay dodged with ease.

Following his dodge he got another hit in on the cylindrical object at the left shoulder.

Jay had hoped for it to stop the saw, but after the object got crushed and steam shot out, all that happened was the upper joint ceasing to work as well. He could have been happy with the result, but Sneed seemed to have a solution for this.

"Eeheheheeee…" S.

Letting out a creepy laugh, the Hobgoblin pulled on two levers in his cockpit and the upper half of the machine started turning around in circles. It did so fast, but got even faster from turn to turn.

Jay had barely dodged the first round and was jumping forwards when another Goblin blocked his path.

Rolling to the side, he got hit by the claw from the front. Sliding over the ground, Jay jumped back to his feet after a swift glance at his health. It had taken only five health, but he again only got grazed and the armor seemed to have taken the brunt of it.

The thick leather on the chest was completely torn, similar to the small goblin Jay had originally dodged. It had gotten hit by the jigsaw and got spread all over the middle way they were fighting on.

Sneed hadn't come out fine as well. At least not his stomach how it looked...

The moment when the Hobgoblin stopped his Shredder again, it vomited in a wide arc onto the poor goblin standing in front of the machine.

That one reacted in the only logical way and vomited as well, to what the survivors and even Sneed himself started laughing.

Seeing the still running saw blade, Jay got an idea and used the moment when the Goblins were laughing to rush in.

Fetching one of the small bombs from his inventory, Jay lightened the fuse with magic the moment he was close enough.

After stuffing the bomb into the blocked joint the next second, Jay dashed away from the Shredder and took cover.

-BOOM-

The Goblin that had been vomiting until then got hit by the jigsaw as it flew forwards. Sneed instantly ceased laughing and stared at the serious loss he had to endure.

That was not he goblin but the broken off left arm of his Shredder.

Screaming out so loud it hurt in Jay's ears, Sneed turned around in search for Jay. At the same time the wide door at the other side flew open and seven more Goblins came running into the room.

Just when the Hobgoblin found him, Jay vanished from where he had been and reappeared next to the sole male goblin that survived the battle until then. It was that one who had wobbled over to the place where the arm including the still spinning jigsaw had crashed into.

Kicking the small green-skin over towards the closest of the seven new arrivals, Jay picked up the saw.

It was one heavy tool, but thanks to his strength he had no problem carrying it. Handling though proved difficult and after a few tries, Jay held the whole long tube under his right arm and grabbed a relatively big clasp with his left hand.

With the saw still running on high speed, Jay dashed towards the seven, now eight Goblins. What followed as he reached them was mayhem:

The first two he literally ran through, then he turned around and beheaded another one in the go. As the next tried to attack the sawblade with his axe, the weapon got fired into the headless corpse that was still standing behind Jay. It went completely through and split the torso, shooting another fountain of blood through the cave.

The Goblin who previously held the weapon first lost it's arm and when Jay's rotation got halted, he split the green-skin from the crotch up. Bringing the jigsaw down on the other side after lifting it overhead, Jay split one more of the ugly creatures on his other side.

To his own surprise, the saw bit into the hard cave floor and the rotation had so much power, the whole arm slipped out from under Jay's.

Without pausing the whole construction shot forwards and right through another Goblin that was unlucky to stand in its flight path.

Right after the arm impacted the big saw in the back, Jay rushed after it to get the fun-tool back.

And so did one of the remaining green-skins, only that it was a lot closer. But as it reached the jigsaw and tried to lift it, the thing moved not one tiny bit.

The only thing that lifted was the Goblin.

To the air that was as Jay kicked it in its ugly butt the moment he came within reach.

Looking after the green cannonball he even felt sorry for it as he saw the trajectory it had taken. At the end of said flight path waited the second jigsaw in the room that was, who knows why, still running.

The result was like Jay had anticipated a red wood plank and one opponent less.

Picking up the still running saw, Jay was about to turn around when he once again had to dodge a metal claw coming from behind. He had ignored Sneed for way too long and latter had arrived behind him.

He got accompanied by the last remaining Goblins but they couldn't attack due to the shredder taking up too much space.

Deciding to get rid of the machine first, Jay tried to attack it with the jigsaw, but it completely bounced off from the leg. Resulting in only a scratch on the Shredder and once again a saw flying though the air.

Loosing his weapon again soured Jay's mood a bit, so he decided to stop playing around and take care of the irritating machine. Sprinting some steps towards it, he slid past under it as it stood on the planked path in the middle of the cave.

And then he took cover behind a crate to the side.

The explosion that followed was at least three times the one from before, what was only logical as Jay had used three of the bombs on the Shredder. Two got stuffed into the legs joints and the last one he threw into the small cockpit.

Countless parts flew all over the room and impact sounds from metal parts came from all sides.

The moment they ceased, Jay looked over the crate and saw a cowering Sneed staring at him with hate filled eyes. To his side Jay saw the last male Goblin, or what was left of it as the Hobgoblin seemingly had used it as meat shield.

Glancing through the cave, Jay spotted the only female green-skin there as well, though her skin had gotten more red at that point. Numerous metal parts and splinters were sewn all over the small body and even analyze told Jay it was no longer anything but a corpse.

With this any possible interference was taken care of and Jay concentrated back on the overly angry Hobgoblin that was rushing towards him.

The cuts Jay had received, even though they already had closed for the most part, hindered him a bin in his movements, so he decided to test out his spells again. Fire magic proved to be effective on his new opponent, though Sneed still arrived by his side after the first tow hits.

Jay dodged the claw on the green-skins left hand that closed in first, but had a hard time to parry the small weapon that followed in the other hand. He again got grazed, but only at his left arm and the armor absorbed nearly all of it.

With a (Shadow Step) he traveled to the female goblins corpse to gain some distance but could only fire one more spell until Sneed got close.

The Hobgoblin was the fastest opponent Jay had encountered to that point.

Parrying another attack with his always accessible dagger, Jay had to dodge the other one and Sneed did the same to his counter. Jumping back and shooting out a (Scorch), Jay spotted something at the other side of the room that he might use again.

It was the jigsaw that, even though it got heavily damaged and cut off a while ago, was still running.

Keeping up his dodging, jumping back and firing short spells, Jay tried to grind down Sneed as he waited for his (Shadow Step) to get ready again. Though his initial (Fireball) had taken a good chunk of the Hobgoblins health together with the follow up (Conflagrate), the rest of his attacks got warded off, dodged or simply dealt not as much damage.

Jay still managed to take away more than half of Sneeds HP until his awaited skill finished its cool-down. Just as Sneed attacked again, his target vanished and the green-skin had to search the room for his target.

The moment it spotted Jay, an explosion resounded and countless splinters and body-parts flew through the cave. Sneed covered his head not to get hit and jumped backwards until he hit the caves wall next to the wooden frame on the left side.

Noticing the mistake he made, it was already too late…

What Jay had done after his (Shadow Step) was throwing one of the bombs he had found towards where most of the Shredder's parts, as well as some dead Goblins lay. It had been nothing but a distraction and worked just the way Jay had hoped for.

Seeing Sneed covering his ugly head, he got a wide grin on his face as he kept watching the Hobgoblins demise.

Jay had fetched the arm with the jigsaw directly after he threw the bomb, turned it so the blade would spin so it worked as a drive as well and then thrown it into the green-skins direction.

The saw shot through the cloud of vaporized goblins, dirt and dust, directly towards Sneed. Jay could still see how the Hobgoblin tried to defend himself with his claw but got it ripped of together with his arm.

To Jay's surprise the green-skin somehow barely survived the attack even though nearly a third of his upper body go split open. He rolled to the side and back on his feet when the jigsaw hit the wall, slid upwards and then fell backwards just to start accelerating into another direction.

Grabbing into a small pouch on his tool belt he took out a bomb as well. That one though was bigger and looked exactly like the grenade Jay had found on Gilnid, so he had a hunch as to what was going to happen.

While the grenade was still flying to his location, Jay sprinted forwards to where Sneed had thrown it from im hopes to gain some distance.

That was mostly due to the place he had been in as it was bound to break from the coming explosion, that was exactly next to the giant saw.

-BOOOOOMMMMM-

Following the detonation behind him, splinters and debris overtook Jay on both sides before he even felt a light shock wave pushing him forwards. Sneed Awaited Jay with his strange dagger in the remaining hand as he slid over the floor.

The loud sounds from the saw breaking apart with metal clashing noises got completely ignored by Jay as he concentrated on how to dodge the stabbing down Dagger. He had gotten hit by multiple of the wooden splinters and after rolling forwards and landing on his back his whole body ached in pain.

Sneed was only two steps away and Jay was sill rolling towards him when suddenly after one more turn, the Hobgoblin suddenly was gone. A loud and heavy sounding impact demanded Jay's attention and as he looked next to the door leading onwards, the massive jigsaw from the wood-saw had buried itself into the rocky wall.

On the path there it had scattered the bloody remnants of Sneed, the last victim of this jigsaw-massacre.