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“Gah… Ah!”
Speaking of the sorcerer: True to his claimed immortality, he was still going despite his entire body having been crushed. He lay there on the earth where he had been flattened, trying desperately to get his limbs in a functional state, suffering. If someone were to be crushed by a giant, then hung by their neck, they might begin to grasp the intensity of his pain.
Damn…those…adventurers!
Ignorant, worthless bastards, utterly beneath comparison with him. Yet the likes of them had managed to interfere with his great self, had been able to trip him up. That was not to be countenanced. He would have his revenge.
He needed to repair his flesh and knit his bones as quickly as possible and get going again—he begrudged every minute, every second. When he had himself back together, those barbarians would be as nothing before him.
Even at this point, the sorcerer had learned nothing, saw no lessons in what he had experienced. Just as he had always blamed others for all the ridicule he had endured. He was, in one sense, perhaps not wrong to do so. Many are those who will point and laugh at someone simply for harboring grand ambitions.
But the sorcerer had completely forgotten about all the things he himself had done. He had no recollection of how many people’s hopes and dreams he had trampled upon to get where he was. He wasn’t even aware of them. He had simply assumed all was his right. It was pride—and it was his blind spot.
And then pride took the form of an immense, numbing weight and a cascade of gravel.
“Oh—ahh… Ahhh…?!?!”
The sorcerer didn’t understand what had happened. He felt only a tremendous weight fall upon him, smashing the flesh and bones he had worked to repair. He had tried so hard to use the last glimmers of life in him to come back from the brink, only to be rebuffed by the stones.
The sorcerer found himself unable to move a finger, unable to draw a breath.
Why had it never occurred to him that to be immortal didn’t mean to be invincible, and immortality was not eternity?
Why had he been satisfied to make immortality his goal? Yes, there were ancient things in the Four-Cornered World, like the kings of the dead, who had braved death to live forever. Perhaps, had he sought something more, the sorcerer would have had an opportunity to aim even higher.
But any opportunity for thought was snuffed out when a boulder landed on his head, crushing it and scattering his brains to the four corners, leaving behind only a lump of flesh that no longer knew what it was.
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Almost before she knew what was happening, Priestess found herself standing in a billowing cloud of dust. Her feet were on solid ground. Her body was in one piece. The goblins were gone.
What about the others…?
“I don’t know if he was immortal or what, but if you bury him, he won’t be back.”
Ah, there they are.
Priestess breathed a sigh of relief to see the man standing calmly there. Goblin Slayer was safe. Covered in dust and dirt, yes—but he was always grimy anyway.
Everyone else was there, too.
“Because he’s unlike a goblin,” Goblin Slayer added. The sorcerer, he averred, was far easier to deal with.
Priestess assumed Goblin Slayer was already thinking about the goblins who had been crushed or perhaps how to take care of the ones who had gotten away with their wargs. Dwarf Shaman, sitting on top of the boulder and bemoaning the fact that his wine was all gone, growled, “Give it a century or two and he’ll come crawling back out, I suspect.”
“It won’t matter to me then.”
“Yeah, but it might matter to me,” High Elf Archer said, leaning back against the boulder and looking at the remains of the obo with a sigh. Then she shrugged, smiling as if to say, These things happen. “I can’t believe we set out to rescue a centaur princess…and ended up fighting goblins!” I predicted as much! She groaned loudly, followed by another sigh.
“…You’d rather have been attacked by a dragon?” Silver Blaze asked seriously.
“I think I’ve had my fill of dragons, too.” High Elf Archer laughed.
I think I get it now, Priestess thought. Princesses were like that: free, headstrong, like the wind. She shared a glance with Baturu. Priestess thought she understood now what it was between the warrior and Silver Blaze. Something much like what bound herself and High Elf Archer.
“…We’ll just have to start piling the rocks again,” Baturu said and smiled. A smile like the blowing wind, with none of the tension that had filled her face until that moment. A natural smile that showed that she could accept what the future held. “Plenty of centaurs and other travelers pass this way. I’m sure the obo will rise again in time.”
“Do you think we should set up a stele or something?” Priestess asked jokingly and giggled. “You know, something that says, Beware, for here an evil sorcerer lies sealed.”
“And then, a hundred years from now, the unwary, believing the warning to be mere superstition, will dig him up, and he’ll come back to life.” Lizard Priest bared his fangs merrily, though there was nothing merry about what he was saying.
He cheerfully began undoing the rope. “I’ll help,” High Elf Archer said, going over to him. Her delicate fingers were far more suited to this work than the long, sharp claws of a lizardman. “Humans do act like that, don’t they?” she said.
“And so the seeds of adventure never run out in the Four-Cornered World,” Dwarf Shaman added. What could a human like Priestess do but smile ruefully?
“It’s not worth worrying about,” Goblin Slayer said very softly—like a wish, like a prayer. Let it be a century; let it be two. Let it be a millennium. Whenever it happened, if it happened, then when that time came…
“Just leave it to an adventurer.”
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