They were humanoid. Roughly.
But everything was wrong and twisted, like someone had tried to sculpt a human from memory and gotten all the proportions fucked up.
Green skin—the sickly yellow-green of infected wounds looked rough and warty, like toad skin.
Their heads were too large for their bodies with pointed ears that stuck out at odd angles. Their noses were flat, almost pig-like. And the eyes were too far apart, yellow with black pupils that reflected the torchlight like a cat's, creating an unsettling glow.
But the mouths. Jesus Christ, the mouths.
Too wide, stretching nearly ear to ear, filled with yellowed teeth that jutted at random angles—some pointing forward, some backward, some broken off at jagged stumps.
When they breathed, Marcus could see black tongues, too long and too pointed, flicking out to lick at cracked lips.
They were short, maybe four and a half feet tall. Their knuckles nearly dragging on the ground when they walked.
They wore scraps of leather and rusted metal, cobbled together from what looked like scavenged materials—a hubcap breastplate on the largest one, another wearing what might have been a car door panel bent into a crude shoulder guard, a third with a helmet that was clearly just an overturned cooking pot with eye holes punched through it.
Their weapons were equally crude but no less lethal: clubs made from table legs with rusted nails driven through them. Rusty blades that looked like they'd been filed down from scrap metal, edges jagged and irregular. One had what looked like a femur bone—human-sized, Marcus noted with a cold drop in his stomach.
The smell hit him then. He'd been so focused on visual processing that his brain had delayed the olfactory input.
Goblins.
His brain supplied the word before he could stop it. They're goblins. Like from a video game. What the hell is happening?
There were five of them that he could see, clustered around something in the center of the chamber. Marcus caught a glimpse of Derek's bright red Walmart vest. The assistant manager wasn't moving.
Blue text materialized in front of Marcus again, smaller this time, almost conversational:
[COMBAT ENCOUNTER]
Enemy Type: Goblin Raider x 5
Threat Level: MODERATE
Recommended Strategy: Stealth approach, isolate targets
Note: You have no weapons, no armor, and no combat skills.
This will probably hurt.
"Gee, thanks for the pep talk," Marcus muttered.
One of the goblins—larger than the others—kicked Derek's body. Derek groaned. Still alive then. Barely.
Marcus had two choices. He could back away, find another route, maybe survive this tutorial by avoiding combat entirely. Or he could do what every fiber of his training screamed at him to do—go in and drag the wounded man out.
It wasn't really a choice at all.
Marcus set the torch down carefully, silently.
He scanned the chamber again, this time with tactical eyes. The goblins were distracted. The larger one—call him Alpha—was barking orders in some guttural language. The other four were spreading out, probably looking for more prey.
Standard predator behavior. They'd expect him to run, to hide. They wouldn't expect someone to come toward them.
Marcus moved. He didn't sprint or roar but close the distance with quiet, deliberate steps—the kind meant to end fights before they properly began.
The goblin turned too late. When those yellow eyes went wide and that mouth opened to screech a warning, Marcus was already inside its guard.
His right hand shot out, grabbed the goblin's wrist—the one holding the rusty knife—and twisted. The bone snapped with a wet crack that Marcus felt as much as heard.
The goblin's wrist bent at an impossible angle, bone fragments pressing white against green skin from the inside.
The screech that came out of the creature's mouth was inhuman—high-pitched and warbling. He could see down its throat, see that black tongue thrashing, see the strings of yellow saliva connecting its jaws.
Marcus's left hand found its throat, fingers digging into soft tissue.
The skin was warm, and underneath he could feel the rapid flutter of its pulse, the struggling movement of its windpipe.
The goblin thrashed with surprising strength—those six-fingered hands clawing at his forearm, black talons scoring lines in his skin that immediately began to sting. Its legs kicked out, those backward-jointed knees giving it leverage to drive its clawed feet into Marcus's shins.
But Marcus had trained for this. Pain was just information.
He squeezed harder, felt the windpipe collapse under his grip.
The goblin's yellow eyes bulged, blood vessels bursting. Its tongue protruded, black and swollen.
It took twelve seconds for it to go limp, twelve seconds of watching the light fade from those alien eyes while it scratched uselessly at his arms.
Blue text flashed in the corner of his vision:
[SKILL CREATED: Close Quarters Combat]
Rank: Basic
Marcus didn't have time to process what that meant.
The other four goblins had noticed.
Alpha—the larger one—was already charging, moving with that disturbing loping gait, those too-long arms pumping. That bone club was held high, and Marcus could see dark stains along its length.
Marcus spun, using the dead goblin as a shield.
It weighed maybe sixty pounds, dense muscle and thick bone.
The club came down with brutal force, and it struck the goblin's skull with a sickening crunch. Green blood sprayed, hot and thick, coating Marcus's face and hands. It smelled like copper and ammonia, burned his eyes where it splattered.
The body went limp in Marcus's grip, suddenly heavier, dead weight. He could feel warm fluids soaking through his vest where he held it against his chest.
He shoved it forward into Alpha, and the goblin leader stumbled, slipping in the spreading pool of its companion's blood and brain matter.
Two seconds.
Marcus grabbed the rusty knife from the dead goblin's hand.
The handle was wrapped in stained leather, sticky with something he didn't want to identify. The blade was corroded, pitted with rust, but the edge had been sharpened recently. It was unbalanced, crude, but it had a point and an edge, and that was enough.
Another Two seconds to assess the remaining threats.
Two goblins flanking right, one hanging back left, Alpha recovering. Standard pack tactics—they'd done this before, had practice working together to bring down larger prey.
Two more seconds to remember every CQB drill his instructors had beaten into him at Fort Sam Houston. Dominate the fight. Move inside their reach. Make them hurt each other. Always have an exit.
Then Alpha was on him, and Marcus stopped thinking entirely.
Training took over. Muscle memory. Years of practice that his conscious mind had forgotten but his body remembered perfectly. His hands knew what to do even if his brain was three steps behind.
Duck under the club swing—he felt the wind of it passing.
Blade up, into the armpit where the hubcap breastplate didn't protect.
The knife punched through skin that was tougher than it looked, like cutting through leather, then slid into soft tissue.
Hot blood—hotter than human blood, almost scalding—poured over his hand, thick and viscous.
The goblin's roar shook the air, so loud it made Marcus's ears ring.
Knife out—he had to twist it, felt it catch on something, maybe a rib.
Pivot left. Slash across the throat of the one coming from the right. The blade opened the green skin from ear to ear, parting it like a zipper.
The spray of blood was immediate and pressurized, hitting Marcus in the chest with enough force to make him stagger.
Backpedal. Block with the flat of the blade as another rusty weapon—a jagged piece of re-bar—comes down. The impact sent vibrations up his arm, his hand going numb, but the knife held barely.
Kick out, catch the goblin in the knee. The joint bent backward with a pop that made Marcus's own knees ache in sympathy. The goblin went down screaming, white bone jutting through green skin.
Marcus finished it with a downward thrust—straight through the eye socket. The resistance was minimal, then the blade scraped against the inside of its skull. The goblin spasmed once, twice, then went still.
Three down. Alpha still fighting despite the blood pouring from his armpit, the dark arterial flow that was already pooling at his feet.
The last goblin circling, smarter than the others, yellow eyes calculating, waiting for an opening.
Marcus's hands were slick with green blood. The stuff was everywhere—coating his palms, dripping from his fingers, soaking into his sleeves.
His breath came hard but steady, each exhale visible in the cold air. The knife felt natural in his grip now, like an extension of his arm.
Alpha lunged again, slower now, weakening from blood loss.
Marcus could see the goblin's movements becoming sluggish, could see the way it favored its left side, trying to keep weight off the wounded arm.
Amateur mistake.
Marcus sidestepped, let momentum carry the goblin past him—he could smell the Alpha's death on it now, that particular scent of a body starting to shut down—and drove the knife into the base of its skull, right where spine met brain stem.
The blade slid in smoothly, almost easier than the others, and Alpha dropped like a puppet with its strings cut. No death throes, no final gasp. Just instant shutdown. The hubcap breastplate clattered against stone.
The last goblin broke and ran, its clawed feet scrabbling for purchase on the blood-slicked stone as it fled into one of the dark corridors. Marcus watched it go, tracking its movement until the darkness swallowed it.
Smart. He'd have run too.
Marcus let it go. He had more important things to worry about.
He dropped to his knees beside Derek, the impact sending a jolt of pain through his legs. His hands were shaking now—not from PTSD but from adrenaline dump.
He checked for a pulse first, two fingers against Derek's carotid artery. Weak but there, thready and irregular. His skin was cold, clammy with shock sweat.
Breathing was shallow, maybe eight breaths per minute when it should be closer to sixteen.
Marcus could see the subtle rise and fall of Derek's chest, could hear the wet quality to each breath that suggested fluid in the lungs. Possible internal bleeding, definitely a concussion based on the swelling around his temple—a lump the size of a golf ball.
His Walmart vest was torn, the bright red fabric dark with blood in several places. Marcus carefully lifted the hem, checking for wounds. Three deep gouges across Derek's ribs.
The wounds weren't bleeding much, which was either very good or very bad. In Marcus's experience, it was usually bad. It meant the body was already in shock, shunting blood away from extremities and non-vital areas. He pressed his hands against Derek's ribs.
"Derek. Derek, can you hear me?"
The assistant manager's eyes fluttered open, unfocused and glazed. His pupils were different sizes—definite concussion, possible skull fracture. When he tried to speak, blood bubbled at the corner of his mouth. "Kane? What... what happened? Where—" His voice was slurred, words running together.
"Don't talk. You're hurt. I need to—"
Blue text interrupted him:
[SKILL CREATED: Combat Medic]
Rank: Basic
Description: Diagnose and treat injuries under combat conditions