"Who would want to stay with all the undead heading this way from deeper in the marshes? I wonder where they came from. They will probably murder every Goblin they find in the Marshes."
With her comprehension now tuned to goblin, Talene understands that the goblins have ignored her request for an explanation and instead have fallen into bickering among themselves. She can tell there are three goblins participating in the debate.
Goblin 1: "You're being an idiot, the bone ghosts didn't ever talk so these aren't the bone ghosts."
Goblin 2: "You're being an idiot, the bone ghosts are being clever and trying to fool us by talking now."
Goblin 3: "You both stupid. We're hiding and so we shouldn't be talking to them because you can't do that when you're hiding."
++++++
Whether or not Yuki's attempt to scare them with her threat of approaching undead works or not is difficult to say. It could instead be their own squabbling that produces a result. Either way, soon after a goblin face appears briefly to peek around the corner of the door. The face jerks back inside almost immediately and yells "It's not ghosts! It's longshanks! Let's kill 'em I'm hungry!"
Talene's understanding of what the goblin has said gives her a slight advantage in reacting compared to the rest of the party's reliance and the sounds of scrambling from inside the building.
Talene sighs, "Goblins will be Goblins it seems!"
She calls to Desna, "Goddess, disarm these foes!"
The first goblin to come jumping out of the doorway shrieks and drops his dogslicer in midair as it suddenly glows red-hot. He lands badly but rolls to his feet before coming to a stop among you, now disarmed.
A second goblin jumps down between Yuki and Daufni. He swings his dogslicer at Daufni with a feral snarl, but she steps aside and the blow does not connect.
A third goblin appears in the doorway as well, close behind the others.
"Well," Daufni shrugs, "we tried to be nice."
Finding herself in a flanking position opposite a Goblin that just tried to slice Daufni, Yuki reacts. Literally, it's not so much a concious decision as her body moving from years of training, Kata's and studied attack sequences.
Spinning around, first Yuki's heel connects with the Goblins forehead, before she turns the remaining impulse into an ellbow slam. She was not particularily strong, but her assault was flawless in execution.
The goblin between Daufni and Yuki bounces away from Daufni's attack. Yuki's kick connects though, and she hears the pop of bone. The elbow strike that follows finishes what her kick started. When Yuki stops the goblin lies on the ground with a broken neck.
"Aw crap, seriously--" Mari whistles to Flax, guiding him to her destination--
--and they move as one, intercepting the goblin at the doorway. They both attack it in unison, with Mari lifting her lucerne high in the air, and Flax rushing in for the attack.
Flax lunges forward toward the goblin in the doorway. However the heigt of the platform requires a leap to bring him high enough. His bite is only a couple of inches short of its target. Mari's aim with her lucern hammer is also jogged off by the leap, and falls wide.
Inari brings his spear to bear on the goblin who dropped his suddenly heated weapon. The goblin is not taken unawares though, and steps aside.
"Desna, guide the blades of my allies that we defeat these Goblins with mercy..."
The goblin who got his fingers burned snatches his dogslicer back up.
The goblin in the doorway yelps in fear and fury when he realizes a wolf is present. Fixating on the attractive target the wolf's backside makes as he passes by on his missed bite, the goblin jumps down to stabby stabby it, but comes nowhere close to making contact with Flax.
Mari snaps Flax to attention to intercept that goblin, and wolf and halfling move in unison as they both snap at the poor goblin.
After that, she makes sure she has the goblin at the door on lockdown, attacking him again with Flax and hammer.
Daufni re-adjusts her grip on her sword and takes another swing.
The reality of death being present and real sunk in on Yuki again when she felt the Goblins neck snap.
It was one thing to be brave at home, to train for combat with a teacher.
It was a whole different thing to be in the middle of combat...and she felt new respect for Daufni and Mari for being in the militia to keep all of them safe, every day.
Still, the realization of these things distracted Yuki, and her strikes lacked the accuracy and power from just before.
The unarmed goblin manages to thread his way through the attacks by Mari, Flax, and Yuki untouched. Picking up his weapon, he thrusts it at Yuki but manages to only scratch her with his poorly aimed slash . Immediately after Daufni cuts him down with her sword.
Meanwhile Mari and Flax turn back to the goblin who just jumped from the doorway. Both weapon and teeth find their mark, leaving him dead.
The yells of "Longshanks" and noise of fighting seems to have stirred the village though. Not quite so unoccupied as it seemed, several more goblins issue out of doorways farther into the village.
They move along the walkways taking up the shouts of "kill the longshanks!" and converge on the courtyard where the party stands.
"Desna, this will be a challenge indeed..."
The two goblins who emerge for the building to your southwest run along the walkway, and climb down the ladder. Both come at Talene, waving their dogslicers and whooping. While they are enthusiastic and committed to murdering Talene, neither lands a blow successfully.
The group of four who came up the walkway from deeper in the village split. Two run around to take the ladder down from the tower. They stay farther to your left, running toward Inari.
The other two jump directly from the walkway to the ground. Both come straight at Yuki, yipping excitedly as they dream of roasted Yuki for dinner. Their luck is no better though. Yuki deftly avoids each of their blades.
Daufni, believing the left side is taken care of, moves around the pit and attacks the nearest goblin.
The goblin goes down under Daufni's sword in a spray of gore.
Inari lunged, his heart racing.
"More of the a&%%#%%%s! For Sandpoint!"
With a great yell, Mari clicks her heels together against Flax's side and rolls him towards Talene and the nearest goblin, rushing in to attack it.
Mari tags the goblin in the shoulder with the spike atop her lucern hammer. Inari finishes the job by burying his spear in its chest.
Yuki delivers two quick strikes with her fists, killing the goblin to her left.
Talene once more stands before the Goblins unafraid, "Desna, aid my friends that they end the battle swiftly!"
With half their number dead on the ground almost as soon as they arrive, the three remaining goblins panic. With shouts of "Run away, run away!" and "They're going to kill us all!" they break and flee madly away, making for whatever seems like the nearest safety.
.
Q-Staff Attack -
Q-Staff Damage
Encouraged by how much her training had helped so far, Yuki lashes out at the Goblin trying to get away...striking down someone fleeing was not a nice thing to do...but with these little buggers, it only meant not letting them regroup for more mischief.
Regardless, it was a close call on wether her strike would connect...it was a good punch, but the Goblin ducked low just at the right time-
[dice=Punchie!]1d20+1 [dice=Crunchie?]1d6
Encouraged by how much her training had helped so far, Yuki lashes out at the Goblin trying to get away...striking down someone fleeing was not a nice thing to do...but with these little buggers, it only meant not letting them regroup for more mischief.
Regardless, it was a close call on wether her strike would connect...it was a good punch, but the Goblin ducked low just at the right time-
With a great cry, she tries to catch one of the goblins and prevent them from running away.
Inari's spear flashed out in a quick snagging strike at the goblin's legs.
The goblin ducks but not soon enough. Yuki's punch lays him out.
Mari skewers the goblin beside Yuki's victim, leaving Inari to trip a falling body.
The last of the goblins flees up the nearest ladder and back into the boardwalk linked buildings yelping in fear.
"We...did it - but there may be more? What should we do?", with an awed, yet somewhat panicky voice Yuki turns to Mari and Daufni. They were militia, certainly they knew how to deal with this.
"Do we burn down the village, or...?", Yuki suggests meekly, more because the lack of an inmediate answer to her question filled the air with an uncomfortable silence for a few moments, rather than to present the idea as a real suggestion.
"Burnin' down the village might set the whole marsh on fire." Daufni points around to all the trees. "We don't want to risk that. But we should try to find out what happened here."
Pointing to the fire pit, she says "Someone, or something, killed those goblins."
"But the Marsh is so wet. I'm sure it...", Yuki starts to protest, then lets her voice trail off...she had turned to the militia member for guidance, it was inpolite to dismiss the answer, especially when she herself was not convinced about her suggested course of action.
"Do marshes burn?" Inari said, seeming surprised and skeptical. He shrugged, not really considering it important enough to argue about. "Should we go after that last one?"
"I think that the Goblin were burned is all we will learn here unless you all believe that we have cowed them sufficiently to get some questions answered..."
As you discuss what to do next, you hear banging, like someone knocking on wood. These are accompanied by cries in goblin, presumably the one who just ran away. Both come from out of sight, farther into the village.
Perception
Talene understands the cries. The goblin is yelling "Let me in! They're killing everyone!" over and over.
Talene is incredulous, "They're claiming we are killing everyone after they attacked us. I think it is time to move on, we have learned everything we can here. Staying longer will simply cause us to have to slay more of them..."
"Mmh, that don't sit right with me. I feel like there's sommin here we can find, but... we ain't got any leads still, so let's move on before we get in trouble with more of 'em." Clicking her teeth, she nods to everyone and moves to take point out of the village. She waits for a bit though, glancing back. "...which way are we leaving though?"
"Uhm...I kind of do want to leave...but didn't we come to deal with the goblin problem? We do seem to have the upper hand right now, surprisingly - and if somebody incited them to attack merchants, any proof for that would probably be in the village, still?"
Oh, Yuki was right behind Mari. She was happy to leave. But she also had a sense of duty that made her unsure if leaving was the wise choice, or only the desirable one.
"Yuki's right," says Daufni. "The mayor wants the goblins gone. Killin' 'em or chasin' 'em off does the same thing. Besides, we still need to find out where they got the fireworks from."
"There are women and children here, do we kill them too? I don't think I can in good conscience do that.
I am willing to stay but I am getting discouraged..."
"How do you tell a boy goblin from a girl goblin?" Inari asked, honestly not sure if the ones they had just fought were male or female.