Easy Preys

The sound of sickly coughing resounded throughout the woods, blood tainted by dark spots was splashed over the vibrant green grass.

The spear-wielding goblin was contorting his body on the ground, desperately trying to find a spot that would allow him to find a form of solace in his plight, he slammed his hands on the ground, trying to offset the pain in his stomach.

No matter how much he bled, he couldn't ignore it.

The one with the hammer had gone completely delirious, continuously trying to wash his mouth with the contaminated water, having grown convinced that he could only combat fire with fire, he barely managed to drink correctly anymore, drowning himself.

As for the one armed with the sling, he hadn't been blinded by pain or turned mad.

He had eaten the least of the meat due to feeling sick when they caught the rabbit, whilst the other two had been continuously coughing blood, vomiting and suffering from severe diarrhoea.

Those symptoms dehydrated them incredibly fast, but should have allowed them to clear their organisms of the rot they had ingested.

The trio wasn't so lucky however, the rot stuck to their stomachs, gnawing at them from the inside and unaffected by the acid in their bellies or by their bowels movements, they didn't realise it but they were decaying from the inside out.

The sling holder was more well-off than the rest however, thanks to the completely unrelated illness that had struck him, he still had a chance of making it to a safe place, where he would perhaps be able to find someone with the medical capacities to cure him of his ailment.

There was still hope.

Someone arrived, he heard footsteps.

In spite of his condition, he was keenly aware that this wasn't a beast, he distinctively recognised a pair of two footsteps, not four.

Only the intelligent tribes walked on two legs, smiling at his and his companions incredible luck, he turned around tiredly, ready to just lay down and let whoever that was figure things out.

Instead of relief, it was nothing but fear and incomprehension which overtook him, he fell on his butt as the strength was drained from his legs, they trembled without stopping, he knew very well that anything would be able to finish him off.

His state made him incredibly vulnerable.

The goblin's gaze was fixated on the tall being that was standing beside his delirious fellow hunter.

That fool hadn't even realised that something was standing beside him.

Wanting to cry out to warn the other two of impending danger, he opened his mouth only for a faint grunt to come out, his throat was too dry for him to shout, it only prompted him to cough up dark blood.

Instead, he could only analyse the unknown creature in front of him.

It was still day, he could make out every feature without problem.

Fact was, that it clearly was a skeleton, that he could tell with certainty, he had seen many of those and even kept some skulls as trophies, what he couldn't wrap his head around was what it was supposed to belong to and why it was walking without its flesh.

A more knowledgeable version of himself would have likened the moving remains to that of a human, maybe an elf or anything of that build, though it wasn't quite right either.

The fiendish, pointy teeth were terribly off-putting, what sort of creature would need nothing but those sort of teeth? Only a creature that didn't need to chew or eat would find use for such things.

It was much taller than a goblin, it was even taller than Gobstroz.

It was quite lean in shape but eighty centimeters taller than the average goblin, any of them, even the fiercest and bravest of them would be stunned by having to crank their necks up so much to look this thing in the eyes.

All that just to stare directly into hollow pits of darkness, if this goblin wasn't a hunter that had gone further into the woods to face truly dangerous monsters, he would have started crying already.

Though he probably would be soon where he not completely drained of the water in his body, the skeletal undead ignored the madly drinking goblin and walked up to the spear-wielder, picking up his weapon off the ground.

It wasn't exactly simple for the undead to hold the spear, one was supposed to have something else on their hands for such activities, though it appeared like after a few moments, the monster figured out a way somehow.

Pointing the stone tip at the goblin in pain, he casually pushed the point against his throat until it pierced.

Twisting it a bit and shaking it inside the wound, he pulled it out just as calmly before turning his attention back to the delirious one, kicking him in the back of the head into the stream before stomping on his upper back, maintaining him under water for multiple minutes as the last goblin watched in horror.

His legs refused to fulfil their one purpose for existing, so he was forced to crawl the earth upon his belly.

This method of transportation was subpar at best, even with a head start of multiple minutes, the goblin was caught up to without any problem.

Pushing himself onto his back, he grabbed a hold of the rocks used for his sling and tried to throw them at the malevolent creature.

The skeleton had already dropped the spear and picked up the hammer instead, swinging at the goblin's forearm, the green fellow's last ditch effort was nullified and without getting to voice out his head was repeatedly bashed in.

It took an absurd amount of hits before Loimos was able to truly kill the monster, he stared at the hammer, the weight of it in his hand was… Off to say the least, it was poor craftsmanship and his lack of knowledge pertaining to the usage of weapons was also to blame for this messy carnage.

He had held the other goblin's head under water for much longer than was necessary too, but these sorts of skills came with trial and error.

Loimos went on to take care of the bodies before returning to the rest of the tribe.