Chapter 2: The Blunt Tavern
When the hand, tightly wrapped in soft black lambskin, lightly touched the priest's throat, she only showed a lazy smile, she was so young, she had never been rejected, not to mention that today belonged to Flo, it was the day when men and women were able to overeat and indulge without scruples, she raised her head and waited for more strokes and kneading, she hoped that this hand was strong enough, she liked to be rough.
The hand was so powerful, as she wished, that it grabbed the priest's neck and lifted her up with ease, like a deep-sea fish pulled out of the water, and before she could show half a look of horror was thrown out of the way with sheer force, and her back slammed against the heavy door that was only concealed, and the sound of the door against the doorframe was loud enough to shake every piece of furniture in the room.
The black-brown door was slammed open again as fast as it had been shut, and Flo's priest was slammed against the wall, screaming and crying behind the heavy planks, and a rough and strong fellow stood in the doorway in bewilderment, the candle still burning on the ground, the light flickering to illuminate his jaw. His briefly digested head stretched forward like a wild dog, his fat nose sobbed, his eyes gleamed in the faint light like a fire of charcoal about to be extinguished, and his earthy yellow skin was covered with warts, which was characteristic of ogres, but a normal ogre should be nine to ten feet, not seven and a half feet, and the facial features could be distinguished, indicating that one of his parents was most likely a human—most likely an unfortunate woman.
This out-and-out mongrel sticks into the room first, then the head and body.
Before he knew what he was stepping on, he had fallen, his weight causing the entire tavern to shake slightly, and the stick slipped out of his hand, "Horn!Horn!" he called out to his accomplices as he tried to get up from the greasy.
The halfling hidden outside the door raised his dagger, hesitating to join the chaos.
The half-ogre staggered to his feet, "Horn!" he cried angrily, finding his stick in the broken chair, his knees aching, and he couldn't find his prey, the unexpected frustration and the increasing intensity of the killing** caused the roar to roll deep in his throat, he inhaled and exhaled deeply, the stench from the mouth of the toothy pig could be used as a second weapon— He walked around the room, heavy sticks that had smashed everything in their reach before the average man could finish a sentence, the bed tilted and collapsed in disbelief as the half-ogre jumped on it, the corduroy slipped out from under the wool felt, ignited by the burning oil, and hundreds of small insects crawled out of their hideouts and canteens in panic, waving their tentacles, elytra, and arthropods in the choking smoke, their shadows covering the walls in a disorderly manner.
A thumb-sized bug fell into the half-ogre's red eye, he grabbed the bug, put it in his mouth and chewed it, blinking quickly to regain his blurred vision, the flames that flowed around with the lamp oil suddenly rolled up his ankle and climbed up deftly, and as he was in a hurry to extinguish the flames on his legs and dogskin shorts, a thin sword drawn from his cane broke through the smoke and stabbed through his back, piercing through the fat heart and stirring rapidly.
He opened his mouth to let out a bitter howl, and the smoke poured into his throat, so that the last bit of noise he left on earth was a muffled, unbearable cough.
The halfling's eyes widened desperately, and a great deal of smoke came out of the damp rush grass, only smoke, and no light—just as he thought so, he saw the light, a scorching white light, and his eyes were immediately blinded, and a tiny crystal sliced through his trachea with the darkness, and his throat hissed, and slowly deflated like a gas-filled skin, and the dagger that had no use fell to the ground.
The third man who climbed up from the bumpy façade of the tavern saw only a flickering white light, and he opened the wooden window with his fingers, and a wisp of smoke suddenly hurt his eyes, and the steel crossbow he held began to heat and burn so hot in two breaths that he couldn't hold it tightly.
He yelled uncontrollably, letting go of his fingers, the crossbow falling with his unbalanced body, the window fifteen feet off the ground, and it was all too easy to land safely—without a silver rope wrapped around his feet.
He kissed the back of his head and the hard gravel floor.
It was a long time before the tavern owner slowly climbed the stairs. The fire was extinguished, for there was not much to burn, and there was charred ash and debris everywhere, and the stench of a great variety, the dry stench of the flames burning through the cobwebs and dust, the stench of the scorched walls of the toasted earth, the stench of the sea breeze and rain, the musty stench of rush grass and woollen felt, the hot stench of lamp oil, the rancid smell of half-ogre blood, feces, and urine mixed together like shark meat buried in the ground for a whole year...... You can, of course, completely open the wooden windows to disperse them, provided you don't freeze and drown.
"There's really no room now. He shook his head.
- We don't have a room anymore.
- What terrible news - there is no room left, the lich sarcastically said that you will die for it, right?
- I'm not complaining, the otherworldly soul argued, but that's what you're waiting for?
- I said we were strangers to Sharp Jaws.
- You can at least remind me. The soul of the other world said in his heart that perhaps we could try to avoid this unnecessary ...... conflict, but he forgot that there is no such thing as "speaking in the heart" in the world of consciousness. The lich let out a sharp sneer.
- Think of them as monsters and NPCs in your game, the lich says bluntly, while they can't be resurrected, they spawn, and the only thing that the inferior race is probably commendable is that you never have to worry about missing a hand in your pocket or a stick in a hurry to knock your head open - the cheapest thing in Sharp Jaw Harbor is life except for the sand in the sea, and they are, and so are you, and given that you've already died once, I thought you'd cherish it a little more - Do not forget that death is not the end of our world, and that the unbelievers will be walled, eaten, or traded. And you, a soul from another distant plane, may have more and more important uses......
- never, the spirit of the other world interrupted him, I never forgot every word, - so I could cut a throat or pierce a heart.
- You'll get used to it, the lich said calmly.
- What a terrible thing that would be. The soul of the other world muttered.
They stepped into the corridors that were still a little smoky, and the place they passed was quiet and dark, as if there were no people behind the doors or all dead—a corner of coral-colored robes quickly disappeared from their sight, and Flo's priest miraculously escaped a life from under the half-ogre's clubs and flames, though not unscathed—but she had healed her crooked nose.
- I thought you'd be kind to her.
- Who? Who, I know who you're talking about, Priest Flo - for that bottle of honey in question?
- You've praised her legs, believing that they satisfy the most popular assumptions of most men and a few women.
The soul of the other world burst into a deep laugh in his consciousness.
- God...... Well, sorry, I mean, I never thought of that...... Well, a bit of obscenity can still have such a subtle and literary expression - yes, I praised it, but ......
- But something alive can make you speechless, and you'd rather face a gadget that can be downloaded, copied, and deleted at any time, isn't it?
——...... Is it my delusion? You seem to be happy to see me embarrassed.
- Maybe it's because you're not so stupid when you're embarrassed?
The antechamber of the tavern was empty, and the hearth was filled with new firewood, and the fire was blazing.
A thin kobold timidly pods out half of his head from behind the glittering stone bar and offers them a pot of steaming almond pulp. The ribs protruded from the bare part of his fur, he had a chain collar around his neck, the other end of the long chain was attached to the wall, he was the tavernkeeper's slave, helping him carry the barrels, painting the walls, cleaning the floor, working in the kitchen, and the tavern owner watching the mountains of beer and wine kegs when he had to leave the tavern for various reasons.
The tavern owner stood at the entrance to the alley at the back of the tavern, covered with a long cloak made of whale stems, as if separated from the rain by a layer of air, and he carefully studied the face of the man who had fallen from the window, it was still a child, and the beard on his face was as light as hair.
"What about this?" shouted the little goblin who had collected the corpse, his voice high and thin.
"This won't work. The tavern owner said, a slight hint of anxiety passing across his flat face.
"Give this to us," argued the little goblin, "it's too hard, it stinks!" he pointed at the half-ogre: "It's too small!" and "We want this, human, tender, many, delicious!" He stuck out his gray-green tongue, and the thorny white barbs stood up, and translucent acidic saliva flowed to the ground, and if it wasn't raining, there would have been many more small craters on the ground, and he had four or five companions around him, all of whom made jagged grunts of support and threat.
The tavern master lifted his cloak, revealing the long and short weapons on his belt.
The little goblin was only one-third the size of an ordinary goblin, and a red-robed mage who was too lazy to clean up the remnants of the experiment used the brains of six-year-old human children, the stomachs of little goblins in the abyss, the bodies of lizards, the skins of toads, the tongues of cats, and the teeth of goblins. Children and dying patients are a threat, not necessarily in the face of a well-trained, strong and armed mercenary.
The red-robed creatures flinched, dragging the bodies of the half-ogre and halfling out of the dark and stinking alleys, cursing the humans, the rain, and the temperature expertly in the language of the goblins.