Monster Mansion 2 by Dante King (best way to read ebooks .txt) 📗

faces as she closed the distance between them at lightning speed. The first one died with one of her short swords in his belly before he’d even had time to get his blade up.

The second leaped over the bleeding wreck of his fallen companion, screeching obscenities at her in a language she didn’t recognize. He was armed with a hide shield as well as his jagged scimitar, and he raised this to turn a blow from the sword in her right hand while catching the sword in her left hand with his scimitar.

He leered at her and grinned with yellow teeth, sticking his long-nosed and pointy-chinned face forward at her mockingly. His shield and scimitar pushed her weapons out of the way, leaving his face exposed. Sarah took the opening and smashed the rim of her helmet into the bridge of his nose.

The blow made him howl and leap backward, where he got tangled up with the third member of his party, a great fat goblin in black ring mail and a crude half-helm, armed with a battleaxe.

The fat goblin roared, trying to push past the skinny one to get to Sarah. The skinny goblin, blood sheeting down his smashed face, squealed and tried to climb over him.

Sarah’s foot caught on something and she glanced down. There was a mace on the ground.

“I could have sworn that wasn’t there a moment ago,” she said to herself. “It wasn’t one of the goblins’ weapons. Perhaps the dungeon wants me to use it?”

Deciding that she should take the opportunity, Sarah sheathed both of her swords, then leaned down and grabbed up the mace. It was a solid piece of work, heavy in her hand, and she grinned as the fat goblin punched the smaller one in the gut, roaring his frustration.

With a flash of inspiration, Sarah grabbed up the skinny goblin’s hide shield from where he had dropped it. A shield went well with a mace, she had always felt, and now seemed a good opportunity to put that to the test.

“Let’s see what you’ve got,” she muttered, and charged the two fighting goblins.

When the fat one saw her charge, he picked the little one up and flung him at Sarah. The speed buffs Todd had granted her were still strong within her, and she dodged as quick as a snake. The skinny goblin landed behind her and rolled away, moaning and holding his head.

“Die, hooman!” thundered the fat goblin in a deep, gurgling voice, and ran up to meet her charge with a swing of his battleaxe. He was hampered by the confined space, but still managed to bring the axe round in a powerful smashing blow.

“I’m no human,” grunted Sarah as she blocked the strike with the goblin shield. It was made of a heavy iron-bound wooded back covered in stiffened hide. The axe head smashed through the shield and connected with her steel-and-Kevlar-gauntleted forearm, striking sparks from the metal.

But the axe head was jammed in the wood of the shield, and the fat goblin could not pull it free for another swing. Darting in, Sarah delivered a ringing blow to his helm, caving one side of it in, then following up with a blow to his shoulder and another to his wrist.

There was the satisfying sound of bone crunching under the last blow, and the goblin howled in anger and pain. She drove into him, putting all the weight of herself and her armor behind the shield.

He lost his balance, took a step back to try to find his feet again, and Sarah destroyed him with a final mighty mace blow to his face.

The battleaxe crashed to the ground with a clang, and Sarah held up the bloody mace in victory. Suddenly, the mace shone out brightly, a blinding light within the firelit corridor. Lighting crackled around it, and she saw with amazement a blue, backlit screen appear next to it.

Stats: Dungeon Mace (item)

Owner:

Sarah Windvane

Enemies destroyed:

1

Boss destroyed:

Grog the Goblin

Experience to level up:

25%

Name available:

Goblin Cleaver

Do you wish to apply the name (Goblin Cleaver) ?

Yes?

No?

She’d heard of weapons with stat readouts before, but never seen one. Excited, she reached for the Yes option to apply the name, and the mace glowed out brightly again, then faded.

“Thanks, dungeon!” she said. “Loot doesn’t get much cooler than that!”

She would use the mace as much as possible for the rest of the run, she decided.

Sarah dropped the ruined shield and was about to move on, when the goblin whose nose she’d broken grabbed her by the ankle and tried to trip her up.

“I’d forgotten about you,” she said, turning. The goblin was carrying a dagger and trying to pull himself upright so he could use it.

Sarah hefted the mace and brought it down on his head, turning bone and flesh into a shapeless pulp with one powerful swing.

“That’ll do it,” she said with satisfaction.

She got going, leaving the fallen corpses of her enemies behind her. She had gone a long way— or at least she felt that she had— when she spied a low doorway at the end of the corridor. A glint of gold beyond drew her forward, and she moved swiftly but carefully.

“Need to be wary and watch out for traps,” she reminded herself, and kept one eye carefully on the ground for tripwires and pressure-triggers. There were none visible, but she stepped gingerly all the same. Such things were not always obvious to the naked eye.

When she reached the doorway, she stuck her head through and looked around.

There was a roomy chamber beyond the door, circular and centered around a tall granite statue of a beautiful woman and a handsome man standing side by side. The woman was wearing a plunging gown, with long slashes up each side to show