Loki stopped suddenly and raised his hand, for no clear reason at first, just a feeling that something wasn’t in its place. He smelled something. Not the smell of rotten leaves, something heavier.
He tied his shoe again — it had come untied an hour ago and he forgot to tie it — then crept two steps forward, until he saw through the bushes five green creatures, the height of one of them not exceeding the height of a child, but their bodies were abnormally broad, and their mouths were full of scattered yellow fangs. One carrying a stick, another carrying a broken bone as a blade.
He didn’t know their name. He didn’t need to know.
He thought of running away first. The idea came and went with the same speed, because he wasn’t even sure which direction he had come from, and there might be more behind him instead of in front of him. He stayed in his place, watching.
The group stopped at a pool of water, crowding and pushing noisily. One small in size was pushed away from the water and stood isolated on the edge for seconds.
This was his chance, he thought.
He slipped from behind a tree trunk, tried to move silently as he had seen in movies that no longer even existed in this world, and stepped on a dry branch he hadn’t noticed.
A loud crack.
The small goblin turned before he reached it, and screamed.
"No, no, no—" Loki didn’t finish his sentence, instead he lunged, stabbed the goblin in its neck with a strike that wasn’t as clean as he imagined, but slanted, wounding it without killing it instantly, so the creature fell writhing and screaming louder than he expected.
The other four were already running toward him.
He received a stick blow on his shoulder, flew sideways, collided with a tree trunk. He tried to get up quickly, his foot tripped on a protruding root, fell on one knee instead of standing, and raised the knife in front of him while another goblin attacked him with its jaw open.
He stabbed it in the eye because it was the closest point, not because he planned it.
A sharp scream, then a fall.
A third lunged with the broken bone, slicing his left arm with a long line. Loki screamed and thrust the knife into the creature’s chest with all his remaining strength, and pulled it out with more difficulty than he expected, because the blade got stuck for a moment in something hard inside.
Two remained.
His left arm no longer responded. He tasted his blood in his mouth, and wasn’t sure if it was his blood or the blood of one of the creatures.
The biggest one lunged first, twisted his injured arm, so he screamed. For a moment, he didn’t recognize the sound that came out of him. The knife fell from his hand.
The second kicked him in the stomach.
He collapsed to the ground, and everything around him seemed to be moving. He thought he would die here. Then the idea disappeared when he felt a foot stepping on his hand extended toward the knife.
He didn’t think after that.
He lunged with his mouth onto the ankle of the bigger goblin, bit with all the remaining strength of his jaws, a disgusting sour taste filling his mouth, and a scream above him vibrating in the air.
The creature fell stumbling. Loki freed the knife from under its shifting foot, grabbed it with a trembling hand, and plunged it into the neck of the last opponent twice, then again, until the body under him stopped moving.
He remained lying there, panting. He didn’t count the bodies at first; he did that after a full minute of ragged breathing.
Five.
He laughed, a short laugh that came out unintentionally, then stopped when he felt pain in his ribs.
He tore a piece of his shirt with his intact hand and his teeth and tried to tie it around his arm, failed the first time because the knot slipped, tried again, and succeeded this time even though it wasn’t as tight as he wanted.
"Status window." He said in a hoarse voice, barely coming out of his throat.
It appeared in front of him:
[Eliminated: 5 Goblins]
[Hit Points: 31/100]
He stared at the number. He didn’t comment on it. He was too tired to think about what it meant.
He leaned his back against a nearby tree trunk and closed his eyes for seconds, then opened them suddenly when he remembered that the blood on his clothes might attract something else. He tried to get up, swayed, sat again.
"Okay." He said to himself, with no particular tone. "Okay."
He stayed there for minutes, not knowing exactly how many, surrounded by five corpses.