Watching the Goblin with a lip scar yell at the other Goblins for fighting is interesting to watch. On one hand, you could say they aren't well organized and a group of only 17 would'nt be difficult to take out, but on the other hand, the fact that the lip scar Goblin cares at all suggests some type of Hierarchy and maybe even discipline. Poor discipline, but still discipline nonetheless.
"I wonder... With Water Magic, can I change the temperature of the water? I shouldn't test on the Goblins, this is my first time, after all, I should save testing for when I'm either more experienced or on inanimate objects." Cashew pondered whether or not testing magic was worth it.
Cashew made sure there were no Goblins nearing his location before pulling out his spell book and glancing at some of the spells before spotting a few that look interesting.
"Rune Spells... Hmm... Spells that can be cast on a surface and detonates either when someone that isn't the caster gets too close, or if the caster decides to detonate it early..." Cashew read the information on the two rune spells, Ice Rune and Poison Rune.
"If the Ice Ball- or... Ice Spike spell is anything to go off, then the spells destructive power determines how draining it is, although, Water Magic has almost no destructive power and it still drains me rather fast." He thought about the cost of these new spells.
"Best case scenario, I can cast the Ice Spike spell 1 more time, with the second cast causing me to lose consciousness. Assuming I'm right about destructive power determining how draining the spell is to cast, then Poison Ball shouldn't be too expensive. It's on impact damage should be the same as Water Ball, but it's after damage should be high. The book says that even the weakest poison spells can kill someone eventually..." Cashew thought about how he could take out these Goblins and not pass out, thinking Poison Magic might be the best, but he's never used Poison Magic before.
Cashew: Let's use Poison Ball and launch it at the Goblin with a lip scar. With all those piercings in his ears, if I hit his head, the poison should be able to enter his body through the piercing holes.
Cashew Raised his hand and Thought about the poison ball, he no longer needs to say the chant loudly, saying it in his head while picturing what he wants seems to work fine now.
Hovering above his palm, a dark green and Gooey ball started to form. The a strong stench was wafting off of the ball and making Cashew want to gag, deciding against shaping the spell into a spike and instead, letting it remain as a ball, he aimed at the Goblin with a lip scar and waited until his head was complefely turned, all of the other Goblins were busy watching the one with a Lip scar yell, so Cashew wasn't worried about being spotted.
He aimed a little more and launched the spell. The Goblin with a lip scar seemed more competent than the others because he seemed to have heard the spell and looked in the direction it was coming from. He wasn't fast enough to dodge it completely, but he seemed competent enough to hear it.
The spell splashes all over the goblins face, a splash even landed on the forearm of a nearby Goblin, who noticed and sniffed it.
The Lip Scarred Goblin covered his face and let out a scream in pain, when he lowered his hands, it was visible that the Goblin was aggressively vomiting and crying blood. He even started vomiting out his rotted and cavity filled teeth, which was then followed by his intestines coming out in the form of vomit, alongside an eye popping out from vomiting so hard, soon collapsing to the ground, letting our one more scream before dying completely.
As for the Goblin who got some of the spell on his arm, a similar fate awaited him. He started vomiting out blood, rolling around on the floor with blood coming out of his eyes and mouth. He didn't seem to vomit out any organs or teeth, like the previous Goblin, but even smelling the Poison was enough to give him a slow and painful death.
"Wait... I smelled the poison? Do I await the same fate? Or does poison magic not effect the caster?... I hope so." Cashew wondered with a look of worry on his face, afraid he's gonna start vomiting out blood and everything inside of him.
All of the other goblins watched the scene with joy, with some of them kicking and stepping on the Goblin with a lip scar and others cheering as the one writhing in pain on the ground dies. They all seem to love violence, even when inflicted upon themselves.
Cashew: I don't feel any more drained. So maybe Poison Magic and Water magic have a similar price for casting.
Feeling a little relieved that he has a cheaper way to defend himself, Cashew decides to try out the Poison Rune spell.
Cashew was unsure how to cast this spell as it's a rune and not a projectile, so he decided to memorize the rune in the book, then put his spell book away and prepared to cast.
Choosing to imagine the spell as a small ball that flies from his hand and onto the ground about 3 meters away from him, in the path of the goblins should they head his way, when the ball hits the ground, the Rune is imprinted onto the dirt, seemingly ready to detonate.
The Goblins have long since gotten bored of kicking their dead leader and have moved on to laughing at the dying Goblin, well, they were laughing. They are now getting violent towards the dying Goblin. Kicking him, a few stabbed their rusty swords into his body as he was dying, Cashew was afraid they would search more earnestly for him now once they got fully bored or bloodlusted, so he sent two more Poison Balls flying at the heads of two random Goblins, both of them had a similar fate to the Goblin with a lip scar.
Cashew soon realized that may have been a mistake because instead of the goblins crowding and laughing at the two newly dying goblins like he expected, two of them stabbed the newly dying ones in the heads, killing them and then all of them have quieted down and are looking around, seemingly now aware that someone is attacking them.
"Well, damn..." Cashew thought, he can only cast the poison ball spell about 4 more times before he will lose consciousness.
After a moment of contemplating, Cashew came up with a plan. He was gonna cast 1 more Poison Ball at a Goblin. Now that the goblins were looking for him and he already planted the Rune, he was hoping the goblins would run towards him after he casts a new spell and they would trigger the Rune and hopefully all of them would die from it.
It was a hopeful plan, but it's that or hope someone is looking for him and hope the Goblins don't find him before then.
After picking a target, Cashew got ready to cast the spell. He chose a Goblin that was the farthest away from his location, hoping that the longer travel time would tell the other goblins what direction it came from.
Cashew raised his hand and prepared the spell... Then he launched it at the Goblin he chose as a target. His plan worked perfectly. The longer travel distance of the spell gave all the goblins enough time to see what direction it came from, something Cashew didn't account for, however, was the Goblin he targeted spotting the Poison Ball flying in his direction and dodging, which is exactly what happened.
All 12 of the remaining Goblins looked in the direction the spell came from and started slowly moving in that direction, directly towards the Poison Rune that Cashew planted originally, which is going almost exactly as Cashew planned. If the plan was going perfectly, then it would be 11 Goblins remaining, not 12.
However, one of the Goblins seemed to have noticed the Rune and stopped all other goblins, saying something in their own language, Cashew can't understand them, but he's making an educated guess that the one Goblin is letting the others know about the Rune.
The Goblin who spotted the Rune, he is on the larger end compared to the other Goblins, He has no earrings, but what looks like a small bone going through his nose, it seems to be a nose piercing. He is also missing an eye.
A second Goblin slowly moves closer until he was next to the one with a Bone piercing, cautiously looking at the ground in front of them, suddenly, the Goblin with a Bone piercing pushed the second Goblin forward, causing the trap to trigger.
The second Goblin died instantly. The Poison instantly overwhelmed him and killed him. No suffering, no vomiting blood, nothing. Instant death.
Even though the Goblin died instantly, all of the others were still laughing hysterically at it, finding it absolutely hilarious.
"Interesting... So the Rune is an instant kill on Goblins, it's only downside is being easy to spot. I wonder how I could change that?" Cashew pondered, forgetting about the danger he is in. He can only cast 3 more spells at most and he has 11 enemies, his trump card was wasted on a singular enemy. He seems to have forgotten the danger he's in.
While Cashew is thinking, the Goblins have started to move forward, still laughing about the death of the previous Goblin, they no longer seem cautious about anything, thinking that the Rune that was destroyed was the only defense and all they need to do is find the culprit, which is all true.
Hearing a twig snap, Cashew snapped out of his thoughts and remembered what was happening, he peeked through a bush and saw the goblins working towards him.
"Can I cast runes onto living targets?" Cashew thought of an idea.
Deciding to test it, since the Goblins were 3 meters away from him now, he peaked through the bush, Prepared the Poison Rune spell again, and casted it on the chest of the Goblin farthest away from him. He assumes that any goblins behind the one hit by the Rune will be unaffected.
The first Rune that exploded had a blast radius of only about 2 meters wide, but the blast height was at least 5 meters tall, so after hiding firmly behind the tree that was next to his bush, he detonated the Rune spell.
The Goblin felt the Rune hit him and land on his body, instantly panicking and looking at one of the others for help, which they did not do.
All of them ran forward, hoping to get out of the blast radius, some of them were lucky, but 9 of the goblins were hit by the blast. The ones closest died instantly and the ones farthest away started vomiting up everything inside of them, including their organs.
Only two Goblins are left. The one with a Bone piercing that spotted the first Rune, and a second Goblin that is missing the tip of his right ear. The one missing his ear ran to the side, avoiding the Rune by getting out of its explosion width, while the Goblin with the Bone piercing managed to hide behind a tree. It's a shame he hid behind the same tree that Cashew is hiding behind.
Cashew: Ah?...
The Goblin with a Bone piercing looked at Cashew with absolute anger and raised his foot,
*BAM*