Deeper In

Fabian didn't need to warn Rain. He had already felt a rush of air from above!

A dark shape lunged at his face. Rain spun, raised his shield to block, then drove it forward with a Shield Bash!

Bang!

The winged creature let out a pained cry and bounced away like a ball.

A Winged Kobold?

Rain's eyes lit up.

When Leia had assigned their roles before the fight, she hadn't given him the job of killing a Winged Kobold. He had been a little disappointed.

Even if a Winged Kobold's bloodline was unlikely to enhance him at this point, he would have regretted not trying it.

He hadn't expected one to come straight to him.

Whoosh!

Rain lunged after it and brought his hammer down on the Winged Kobold just as it struggled to its feet.

Its skull was apparently little tougher than an ordinary Kobold's. With a wet crunch, the hammer punched a hole in its forehead.

The Winged Kobold's eyes bulged. It twitched twice, then died.

Once Rain had killed it, the rest of the battle was a foregone conclusion.

As the three Winged Kobolds fell one after another, the Kobolds' resolve crumbled. They scattered in panic, hastening their defeat.

Soon, every Kobold lay motionless on the ground, including the three Winged Kobolds that had clung to the cavern ceiling.

Only then did Rain have a chance to examine a creature he had previously seen only in the Beginner Monster Compendium.

Kobolds, as their name suggested, had doglike heads. Most of their reddish-brown skin was exposed, with scraps of leather armor or linen covering only the essentials.

Beside many of the bodies lay miners' picks and scattered candles.

Humans used candles for light. To Kobolds, they meant something else.

They were objects of faith: Candle Worship. It was an unusual belief, to say the least.

Winged Kobolds resembled ordinary Kobolds in the face, but otherwise looked quite different. Most striking were their enormous, scaly, batlike wings and claws far longer than those of their ordinary kin.

As for fighting strength, Rain estimated that one Winged Kobold was worth three ordinary Kobolds.

In fact, if Leia hadn't warned him before the fight, he probably would have taken the Winged Kobolds, which weren't listed in the Beginner Monster Compendium, for a different kind of monster altogether.

Their appearances differed that much.

Neither type had made much of an impression on him in a one-on-one fight.

Ordinary or winged, each had gone down to a single blow from his hammer.

Still, their sling stones made for a reasonably powerful ranged attack. In sufficient numbers, they could cause serious trouble for a typical adventuring party.

Overall, Rain judged them stronger than an equal number of Goblins.

"Found them! There's human Chainmail, leather armor, and some other weapons here. They must have belonged to the missing party," Fabian called after searching near the fire.

Rain looked where Fabian pointed and saw a pile of clothing clearly sized for humans.

He hurried over to examine what remained.

Many of the items were badly damaged, but most were still recognizable. Before long, he spotted a Kite Shield with a hole broken through its center.

Its familiar size and shape told him at once that this was the shield Robin had bought at Ironforge Workshop. He remembered Robin's young face that day, bright with excitement.

His heart heavy, Rain slowly picked up the shield.

He turned it over.

On the back, he found the faint words "Ironforge Workshop."

There was no doubt. This had been Robin's shield.

As Fabian continued searching, Rain spotted a broken spear in the pile, with only its tip remaining.

He had found both spear and shield.

Rain said nothing. He bent down again, wiped the spear tip clean, and tucked it into his belt.

"Those Winged Kobolds were probably why the adventuring party went missing two days ago."

Chris held his torch over one of the unusual Kobolds and turned its batlike wing with the tip of his sword. "Three winged ones appearing together is rare. They'd pose a real threat."

"If they ambushed a typical adventuring party from behind with stones, the party would likely panic and rush farther in. That would only take them deeper into the Abandoned Mine."

"Right. Once they were deeper in, the Kobolds could use the terrain and their numbers to pick off the scattered adventurers," Fabian agreed with a nod.

"Especially since an ordinary party could never have spotted them in advance the way we did."

Without Rain's warning, the Winged Kobolds might well have caught them off guard.

Clinging to the cavern ceiling, the creatures were easy to miss.

Of course, even a successful ambush would only have caused trouble for a party of their caliber. Someone might have been injured, but the outcome wouldn't have changed.

They weren't a low-ranking adventuring party. They were an elite team.

Chris and Fabian's reasoning made sense to Rain, but something still bothered him.

The damage to Robin's Kite Shield, which he held in his hands, didn't look as though it had been caused by stones thrown by Winged Kobolds.

The shield was made of specially treated, high-quality oak a full inch thick. A fist-sized hole smashed through its center hardly seemed like the work of a Winged Kobold.

Still, he couldn't be certain.

They had yet to explore the passage in the cavern's northwest corner, which led farther down.

There might be more Kobolds below, perhaps even a strange variant of the Winged Kobolds.

So Rain said nothing for the moment.

Leia noticed him silently studying the shield and looked over.

When she saw the damage, her eyes widened slightly. She gave a soft sound of surprise, strode over, and voiced the same conclusion Rain had reached.

"Falling stones dropped by Winged Kobolds wouldn't do this."

Leia's words drew everyone else's attention.

"It looks more like a Warhammer did it," Grand, who rarely spoke, said suddenly.

"A Warhammer? Could it have been a mutated Kobold?" Fabian asked, glancing at Grand.

That...

Silence fell. It was possible.

"Then there may be a mutated Kobold we haven't found yet," Chris said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.

"Farther down?" Fabian looked toward the passage.

At Chris's words, everyone turned toward the dim passage in the northwest corner, leading deeper underground.