Chapter 22: The One That Got Away
The spider spirit essence was obliterated by the fireball, causing Grozz to tremble violently as he suffered severe backlash from the broken connection. Before Garoth could notice him, the goblin scrambled on all fours into the alchemy workshop, clutching the message stone with shaking claws as he tried to activate it to contact the merchant caravan.
Boom!
The workshop's roof was violently torn away, revealing the night sky above - and the cold, dangerous gaze of the red iron young dragon looking down. Garoth spotted the message stone in Grozz's grasp. Fortunately, its runes remained dark, still unactivated.
"Great dragonkind, I offer everything for mercy..." Grozz stammered in broken Draconic, his plea for mercy cut short as dense flames engulfed his pustule-covered body, reducing both goblin and message stone to charred husks almost instantly.
Garoth swept low over the goblin tribe, unleashing torrents of fiery breath. The raging inferno quickly consumed the Rock Gnawer Tribe. Lizard skulls hanging from vines blackened and cracked as the entire settlement became a sea of flames, not a single goblin escaping the conflagration.
The brilliant firelight illuminated the night as the goblin tribe burned to ashes. Circling in the dark sky, Garoth watched the flames below, his throat burning painfully from prolonged breath attacks - far exceeding what normal young dragons could sustain.
"The alchemical tools on this planet are too advanced. I must exercise extreme caution against intelligent species," Garoth reflected seriously.
In eras with less developed alchemy, only noble spellcasters or extremely expensive magical artifacts could achieve long-distance communication. Yet here, even a minor goblin tribe possessed message stones usable without magic. The alchemical prowess on this planet surpassed even the technology of Garoth's previous world, capable of producing spacecraft that explored the cosmos.
"That last goblin speaking Draconic was unexpected," Garoth mused. Grozz's plea had genuinely surprised him. A Draconic-speaking goblin shaman with alchemical knowledge represented significant potential value. At minimum, such a minion could have used shamanic spells to help Garoth develop resistances, while its intelligence made it useful for tasks.