25.3ᴘᴀᴛʀᴇᴏɴ.ᴄᴏᴍ/sᴛʀᴀᴛᴏᴛʜʀᴀx

"What is that thing?! Fucking kill it you useless bear! Save him!" cried the Lamia.

The Cavebear-goblin roared and charged across the camp at Rain as the Diredog-goblin barked at him, seemingly scared of coming closer. Rain snapped at it and it whined and backed away.

"No! stop running away! Dammit Claaarence!" yelled the head of the Diredog that could speak Common to the head that could not.

Rain didn't stop to hear more but flung himself at the Cavebear and then as its massive arms capped with ten-inch claws came at him he dropped down and skidded between her legs rolling back to his feet on the other side. The Cavebear stumbled and nearly fell over herself.

Rain set his feet to launch himself at her back but suddenly coils of glossy black and green scale swept around him and looped up his body until he was entirely encased in snake body.

The Cavebear at last turned around and found the Lamia looking smug.

"Got it. See wasn't that hard, why am I always the only competent one, sigh. No idea what the fuck It is we caught but I bet it's good breeding stock. I think I should get some pretty nice privileges from the chief from this you kno-"

The Lamia suddenly froze and looked down. His mouth opened wordlessly and his eyes went round.

"Oh, Oh gods! It- It's eating me! H-help! Help!! Get it off!! Get it off me!"

The Lamia tried to uncoil itself but black furred arms and legs shot out from between the coils and held him in place as blood began to waterfall down from the gaps in his coils.

The Cavebear rushed up as the Lamia started to thrash and she tried to pull apart his tail from the black bloody shadow that was tearing the Lamia apart from the inside. The Lamia-goblin, now wild eyed and with blood pouring from his lips began to shake and desperately clutch at the bear.

"G-get it out, k-kill it!…"

The bear roared in frustration and panic as the Lamia died and she forced apart the coils only to find... nothing. Then pain hit her, and she looked down to see black fur shifting against her own dark geen and black fur, the creature had eaten its way through her stomach wall and was digging up into her body. The Cavebear staggered backward, her lank hair flying as she shook her head. Large clumsy paws came down and tried to grab the monster eating her from the insides but its body was so slippery with blood that her paws simply slicked off. She sat down with a whuff as the agony started to overwhelm her mind and she went into shock. She put a paw on her chest as she felt the grinding chewing jaws of the beast move toward her heart.

"Feels… Warm."

She slowly lowered herself to the ground as her sight started to go dark.

A few seconds later a blood drenched mass pulled itself from her stomach with a grizzly sucking sound as gore and Cavebear skin sloughed off.

Rain shook himself, cleaning off the worst of it.

"CLAARENCEE!!"

Rain looked up to see the Diredog-goblin race past with a wild eyed Opal riding on its back. She gripped its barrel with her legs and then with her cutlass held in both hands she recklessly swung at the monster's heads. Missed. Swung again, and by some fluke managed to chop into the neck of one of them.

The Diredog crashed to the ground as half its legs gave out. Opal rode it down as it slid to a stop.

The remaining head whined in confusion and pain and licked the now still and dead head that once could speak.

"Be with your sibling," said Opal as she swiftly ended its life. She sighed. "This whole tribe is just one big self-inflicted pile of nasty. The fools should have taken our ancestors' warnings about making Half-Gobbo tribes seriously."

"They seem worse than your old tribe, but you pity them?"

"Pshh. Don't get me wrong, I'm still gonna kill 'em, they're bloodthirsty and aggressive and have butchered Gobbo tribes, I've seen what's left of tribes they conquered." She shivered despite herself.

Rain grunted but said nothing more. Instead he turned and grabbed the Cavebear-goblin by the upper jaw and dragged her, with difficulty, across the grass until he came upon a hole in the ground, the third exit from the cavern. He pushed the massive corpse down into it, filling it and sealing it off.

"That's the last one. There's no passage out of this cavern now, except for passage to the afterlife."