BOOM!

  Stones and adventurers went flying. If the blast hadn't deafened Jeremy, he suspected he'd hear screaming. The rest of the jack-in-the-bombs went off.

  BOOM!-BOOM!-BOOM!-BOOM!-BOOM!

  When the explosions stopped, Jeremy forced himself to his feet. The boss monster rat was covered with rubble, struggling to dig his way out. The boss rat was stunned, but he was tough and would recover quickly.

  When Jeremy saw Flint, he thought he was hallucinating. Flint floated over piles of rubble, fighting a second floating being hidden in a cloak. The being emitted a soundless scream, its mouth opening wider than it had any right to. It pulled out a long, gleaming knife and slashed Flint lengthwise, cutting Flint in half. Jeremy felt like he'd been kicked in the gut.

  The two halves of Flint hopped away with impressive speed. Flint somehow produced a noncorporeal rope, using it to tie himself back together, and continued to harass the other form from a safe distance, floating away, avoiding its attacks.

  Jeremy dug frantically through the rubble. There was no way the goblins could use his elite armor-piercing long bow; they were too small and unlikely to have the strength or skill to use it, so they must have left it with their stuff before going off to try to kill him.

  He dug through the rubble, finding one dungeon pack, throwing it to the side, then another. Yes! He saw the glint from the tip of one of his armor-piercing arrows.

  Something slammed into his back. A goblin had pulled himself out of the rubble and shot him in the back with his crossbow.

  Jeremy grabbed his quiver of arrows and kept digging. He was hit twice more. Fortunately, the arrows didn't penetrate the spider queen's silk. They hurt, though.

  There! He found his bow and pulled it out of the rubble.

  “Look out!” It was Flint.

  Behind him, the floating cloaked being let out another unearthly, soundless scream and charged Jeremy, ignoring Flint's failed attempt to stop it. Like Flint, it had no body, so it couldn't hurt him. Could it?

  It charged Jeremy, plunging its knife into his chest, or at least it tried to. The ice in Jeremy's chest expanded, the knife and the arm wielding it vanished before reaching him. With a second soundless scream, the cloaked being backed away.

  Jeremy drew his bow, which was thankfully no worse for wear despite being buried in the rubble. By this time, the rat king had made a recovery, dragged himself from the rubble, and was charging him.

  Jeremy pulled the arrow back and fired with the ease of months of practice. One, then two armor-piercing arrows went through the rat king's skull. He went down and didn't get up again.

  Jeremy sensed as much as heard one of the goblin adventurers sneaking up behind him. He was on the goblin in a flash, kicking him before he could move, and then searching and taking the goblin's weapons. “Where is my stuff?”

  “Human dog,” the creature groaned.

  Jeremy kicked the creature again and used his charmed rope to tie up the goblin before tossing him to the ground nearby.

  Another crossbow bolt hit him. He shot the crossbow wielding goblin in the leg. Fair is fair, grabbed him and tied him up next to his companion.

  A third goblin fired at him with a crossbow. He dealt with the goblin like the previous one.

  He soon had three piles next to each other. His stuff, the goblin's stuff, and the goblins. The cloaked spirit being watched from a distance. Flint hung back, glaring at the cloaked being. Flint had somehow produced non-corporeal gray tape and wrapped himself in so much of it that he resembled a mummy.

  Jeremy dug through the rubble for hours, not bothering to rest or even drink water. In the end, he'd found all eight of the goblins and the supplies.

  Whatever he could say about the goblins, they were tough. All eight of them were battered and bleeding (red blood not green), but alive. The spellcaster had several necklaces, one of which had a dried toe on it that Identified as.

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  A dried human toe. Considered lucky in some parts of the universe.

  Wasn't lucky for the human, he thought with some amusement. He decided he didn't care and left the necklace where it was. He found his valuables in the pack belonging to the goblin spellcaster.

  “We'll kill you, human filth!” Terod the Spellcaster shouted as Jeremy dug through the Spellcaster's pack. Jeremy kicked the goblin again and threw his staff as far as he could into the labyrinth.

  He went through the packs carefully to make sure he had all his stuff. Thankfully, his vials of poison, charmed objects, and gun, which he found in the spellcaster's pack, were unharmed. They must not have realized the gun was a weapon, or if they did, know how to use it.

  When he was sure he hadn't missed anything, he went back to the group of goblin adventurers. They were short, green skinned, large eared, and hairless, like the mythical descriptions of goblins. They looked up at him with red eyes full of hate. He didn't care.

  “I don't know who you are, and I don't care. Quit trying to kill me and stay away from my stuff!”

  Terod the Spellcaster glared at him with one eye, the other having a patch over it. He spat in Jeremy's direction. “Kill us, human. God will bring us back, stronger. We were weak and starving before we entered the dungeon, but we grow strong, thanks to the dungeon and its food of power!”

  “We give thanks to God's blessings. The food of power,” the eight goblins chanted.

  Goblin religious fanatics? Good grief.

  “You like dungeon rations?” he asked. If that was the case, they must have been starving.

  “Humans with the Cleansing Wind took our food and drove us into the wastelands to starve,” said another. “Human Adventurer Guild hunt us for sport to raise their levels. When we leave this dungeon, we will kill thousands of humans! We will drive your human filth from our lands!”

  “Death to humans!” There was a cheer from the other goblins.

  “God has blessed our quest to eradicate humans from the universe!” Terod said.

  “God be praised!” the rest chanted.

  “Your god wouldn't be Arkys, would it?” he asked. It would be really messed up if that were the case.

  “We spit on your false god!” Terod shouted, spitting again in his direction.

  The ice shard in Jeremy's chest burned. He struggled to breathe.

  The now mummy-like Flint appeared beside him. “Since they're trying to kill you, Jeremy, you are well within your rights to kill them all. This should get you experience and dungeon coin, without you having to worry about getting marked by the dungeon.”

  If he killed these nasty beings, who in turn, were trying to kill him, he'd please his god. He'd get much needed experience, and under the circumstances, killing beings who were trying to kill him wouldn't get him penalized by the dungeon. It was the smart thing to do, but...

  “Are you considering sparing them?” Flint asked, glaring at Jeremy, his “Don't Be An Idiot,” whiteboard making a reappearance. “These are goblins. While they're not part of the dungeon, they are monsters just the same. They eat humans, and anything and anyone else, for that matter. If they'd succeeded in killing you, they would be eating you as we speak.”

  “Is that true?” Jeremy asked the goblins. “Would you kill and eat me?”

  The goblins were silent, continuing to glare up at him.

  “You're drooling,” Jeremy said.

  The goblin named Gom's mouth was overflowing with saliva, drool running down his neck and dripping on the ground.

  Flint snorted. “If you think they're drooling now, mention human infants.”

  “Do you eat human babies?”

  Again, there was silence, but three more goblins started drooling.

  “We've been through this, Jeremy. A monster is 99.9 percent less dangerous when it is dead. Draw your sword and cut off their heads. You could use your bow, but you might damage your arrows.”

  Jeremy drew his sword. Flint had a point. The goblins were evil beings, but... they were enemies of his enemies. And why did it feel wrong?

  In the end, what decided him was remembering the last two times Flint had tried to get him to kill someone. The first time, Flint had tried to convince him to annihilate a harmless dungeon tribe, and the second, to kill the hapless kobolds, who were some of the nicest beings in the dungeon. He shuddered thinking of what a tragedy killing the kobolds would have been for him. And how close he'd come to doing just that.

  “I don't care about your god,” Jeremy finally said. “I don't care about you, and I don't care about the stupid dungeon's black marks. I've never met your kind and have nothing to do with whatever you're fighting about.” He put on his pack and grabbed his spear, holding it up like a walking stick. “If I find out that you've eaten anyone who isn't completely evil, I will hunt you down and kill you. If you follow me, I'll kill you. I'm leaving this floor of the dungeon today. If I see you again, I will kill you.”

  Terod's response was to try to cast a spell.

  Jeremy put down his spear, picked up his bow, and shot Terod in the leg, pinning his leg to the dungeon floor. With a groan, Terod stopped casting.

  Jeremy felt a scream from the cloaked being. “Back off or I kill him,” Jeremy said, pointing an arrow at Terod's head.

  The cloaked being backed away.

  Flint brandished his sword at the cloaked being, but was careful to keep Jeremy between the two of them.

  Jeremy put the bow away and freed the goblins by taking his charmed rope back.

  The goblins had six healing potions with them, and none of them looked close to death. The potions wouldn't heal them completely, but they would ensure they didn't die from their injuries.

  Ignoring Flint's loud, exasperated groan. Jeremy walked away.