The village chief introduced us to the four other villager men that will be coming along with us. Perhaps seeing an elf for the first time, all of them were eyeing me from the face down. Well, mostly, their eyes settled on my chest. It felt normal to me so I didn't get angry, but Fin was staring daggers at them.
Two of the men have rusted iron swords, the chief and another one have small wooden clubs, while the last one holds a tall pitchfork with two hands. None of them were wearing any kind of armour, but they appear to be confident. All of them also seem excited to show off to me. I don't mind them talking to my face on how they would impress me, but I'm seriously worried about how things will turn out.
"Don't you want to compete along?" I jokingly said to Fin who was guarding me on the side.
"Compete?" he repeated.
"I know I said we won't butt in, but..." I leaned over and whispered in his ears, "I'll give you a reward if you manage to come out with the most kills."
"S-Seriously...!?" he hurriedly exclaimed, trying to maintain his voice in a whisper.
"I won't tell you what that reward is, but I assure you, you will not be disappointed," I said to him with a wink.
"Gulp..."
He did not answer my initial question, but the sudden tightening of his hold on his staff revealed to me his intentions.
"That's more like it!"
With new motivations, we went to our target location. It did not even take us half of an hour to arrive, the distance was pretty short. Excited smiles appeared on the men's faces as they saw the goblins guarding and resting in their nest.
Like when Fin and I hunted for food, we hid behind a bush as we observe our prey. I expected their cave to be small, but it was actually pretty big. The open entrance where most of the goblins were resting was as wide and spacious as the entire interior of the house we'll be borrowing in the village.
There were only eight visible goblins in total, three were guarding the cave, while five were inside, sleeping. I'm estimating there would only be three or more hiding deeper inside that we can't see.
The goblins have humanoid features, albeit as deteriorated as they could get. They have green parched skin, rough and riddled of warts. Their noses were long and their ears pointed out like mine. They were about as tall as human children, but if they could get their hunched backs straightened up, they could be taller.
"Since there are guards, we can't sneak and take out the ones sleeping. We have no other choice, we'll have to charge in with all we have at once..." the chief relayed his plan to Fin and the others.
It seems he didn't want me in on the fight. Although I was the one who offered help, I was left out and they asked Fin to join them instead. Even though he was a noble, someone who has a much higher position than them to ask around. I felt betrayed, but since I didn't want to rain on their parade, I dind't complain.
"I think that's too risky, chief..."
"How about we lure in the guards first instead, kill them, and kill the ones resting later?"
"I'm sure that if the guards notice us, they would wake up the others," the chief shook his head, turning their suggestion down. "How about you, noble-sama? What do you think we should do?" he asked Fin.
"I can open up with a spell and hit them while their guards are down. After that, you guys will come in and defeat the rest. How about that...?"
"Oowoow..."
"As epected of noble-sama...!"
"I'm impressed...!"
All the villagers praised Fin with quiet voices. In the end, they all went with his plan and got ready.
"We'll deal with this, Eria-sama...!" Fin assured me so.
"We're waiting for your signal, noble-sama..."
"You can do it...!"
The villagers cheered Fin as he prepared to cast his spell. Sweat started to trickle on his forehead. Although he was confident at first, he now suddenly looked nervous as he pointed his staff at the enemies.
"Fire magic: Fire arrows!" he nervously shouted.
With that spell, he showered the three guards with flaming arrows. Unexpectedly, they all didn't die immediately. Screaming in agony, they woke up their comrades and they immediately glared at Fin and the others as soon as they saw them. However, before they could pick up their weapons, the chief and the remaining four villagers were already surrounding them, killing them as soon as they got the opportunity to.
Hearing the commotion outside, three more goblins came from the deeper interior of the cave, but they were easily defeated by the difference in number. Soon, the goblins Fin initially hit with his spell also eventually died, scorched as the flames spread on their bodies. Just like that, all of them were defeated...
After the short fight, Fin and the villager men heaved a sigh of relief.
Fufu! I'm impressed.
Fin really did a great job taking care of the first three guards, which lead to the easy defeat of the remaining ones. I wanted to praise him, but he was already getting enough of them from the villagers. I'll save my words for later...
"As expected, that was too easy for someone like myself," Fin said in a more boastful manner than usual.
Some of the villager men also came to me, asking me what I think of their skills, obviously trying to win me over. I humored them a little, and they all got a little ahead of themselves that they actually tried to flirt after. To their dissapointments, I did not respond to their advancements.
After Fin volunteered to burn the remaining corpses, we went back to the village.
At the village, the village chief said he would prepare a feast, so all the villagers were excited. The night later, Fin got all the compliments and thanks, while I watched him look unimpressed the entire time. Some girls also fawn over him and tried to flirt, but he ignored them completely.
"It must be the face, right?"
"No, it must be those giant breasts!"
They complained as they rudely stare at me. For a time, they debated over themselves which feature of me attracted their new crush more.
While everyone was having a great time at the feast, I pondered over what reward I should give Fin...