SSS-Ranked Trash Hero: I Was Scammed Into Being Summoned-Chapter 45: Holding the Tunnel

The first goblin appeared in the tunnel entrance.

It saw them waiting and hesitated for just a second. That second cost it. Hiroshi’s blade took it across the throat before it could raise its weapon. It fell and the one behind it tripped over the body.

Elias’s sword came down and finished the second one.

Two down immediately. But more were coming. Hiroshi could hear them in the tunnel. Many more.

Three goblins pushed through together, trying to overwhelm with numbers. The entrance was just wide enough for them to squeeze through shoulder to shoulder.

Hiroshi took the one on the left. His Dodge skill read its attack pattern and he sidestepped the clumsy swing, countered with a thrust that caught it in the ribs. It went down hard.

The middle and right goblins both attacked at once. Hiroshi blocked one strike with his blade but the other got through, scraping across his forearm. Pain flared but his Pain Suppression skill pushed it back to something manageable.

He kicked the closer goblin back and drove his sword through the other one’s chest.

Four more goblins pushed through the entrance.

Hiroshi engaged two of them. His Sword Mastery was getting better. The movements felt more natural now, less conscious thought required. Block, parry, counter. One goblin went down. The other pressed harder, forcing him back a step.

Behind him he could hear the woman guard shouting. A goblin had gotten past and was going for Baros. The injured guard couldn’t help. Tomas was barely standing.

Hiroshi couldn’t turn. He had two more goblins in front of him now. If he broke away to help Baros, these two would overwhelm him. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝚠𝕖𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝕖𝚕.𝚌𝗼𝗺

Steel rang against steel somewhere behind him. A goblin cry cut off suddenly. The threat to Baros was handled.

Hiroshi focused on his own fight. The two goblins were coordinating now. One high, one low. His Fighter Instinct calculated the angles and warned him he couldn’t block both.

He didn’t try. Instead he moved forward into the attack, inside their range, and drove his elbow into one goblin’s face while his sword took the other through the ribs. Both fell.

Six more goblins pushed through the entrance. They were coming faster now. The tunnel behind them was packed with more waiting for room to advance.

Hiroshi’s arms were starting to burn from sustained combat. His breathing was getting harder. The cuts he’d taken were adding up. Nothing serious individually but collectively they were slowing him down.

A goblin got lucky and its blade scraped across his shoulder. Deep enough to draw blood freely. He hissed in pain and killed it in response but the damage was done.

He couldn’t maintain this pace much longer. There were too many of them.

Eight more goblins pushed through. The bodies were piling up at the entrance now, making it harder for them to advance but also giving them cover to attack from.

Hiroshi blocked a strike meant for his head and countered with a slash that opened the goblin’s throat. Another came immediately after. Then another.

His stamina was dropping fast. His Fighter Instinct was screaming warnings about fatigue, about slowing reactions, about attacks he was barely blocking in time.

"The ceiling!" the woman guard shouted from behind him. "Look at the ceiling above the tunnel!"

Hiroshi risked a glance up while blocking another strike. The rock above the tunnel entrance showed cracks. Deep structural weaknesses in the stone. The kind that looked ready to come down if someone hit them right.

If the tunnel collapsed, the goblins would be sealed out.

But they’d be sealed in.

"Can we bring it down?" Hiroshi called out.

"Maybe," Elias said from somewhere behind him. "Need to hit the support points. Give me thirty seconds."

Thirty seconds. Hiroshi looked at the goblins pressing through the entrance. At least ten visible now with more behind them. Thirty seconds of holding this line alone.

He’d never manage it. Not at his current stamina level. Not without help.

Unless.

Hiroshi reached for the multiplier ability. That two-times enhancement he’d used in the G-rank dungeon. The one that had nearly killed him from overexertion afterward.

Heat exploded through his body.

Everything sharpened immediately. His exhaustion didn’t disappear but it got pushed back. His muscles responded faster. Stronger. The pain from his wounds became distant and ignorable.

A goblin swung at him and the attack looked almost slow. Hiroshi’s enhanced speed let him sidestep it easily and his counter-strike took the creature’s head clean off.

Two more came at him together. He ducked under their weapons, spun, and his blade cut through both of them in one motion.

The goblins hesitated, seeing their companions fall so quickly.

Hiroshi pressed the advantage. Stepped into the tunnel entrance and forced them back with aggressive strikes. His enhanced strength drove his blade through crude armor like it wasn’t there. His enhanced speed let him attack and recover before the goblins could respond.

Four goblins rushed him at once.

He met them directly. First one died to a thrust through the chest. Second to a slash across the throat. Third and fourth fell in quick succession, his Sword Mastery combining with the multiplier to make every strike count.

The tunnel entrance was filling with bodies. The goblins in the back were having trouble getting over their dead to reach him.

Behind him he could hear steel on stone. Elias hitting the weak points. Working methodically.

More goblins pushed through. Hiroshi cut them down. His muscles were starting to burn even with the enhancement active. The ability was powerful but it was draining him faster than normal combat. He could feel his stamina bleeding away.

But he held the line.

Kept the entrance blocked.

His vision was starting to narrow at the edges from exertion but he kept fighting.

A goblin blade got through his guard and cut across his ribs. Shallow but painful. He killed the goblin and kept moving.

Another cut on his leg. Another on his arm.

He was slowing down. Even with the multiplier active. The fatigue was building too fast.

"Done!" Elias shouted. "Get back now!"

Hiroshi threw himself backward into the chamber just as something hit the ceiling hard.

The stone groaned.

Cracks spread across the surface like spiderwebs radiating from multiple points.

The goblins in the tunnel looked up.

Too late.

The ceiling came down.

Rock and stone crashed into the tunnel with a sound like thunder. Dust exploded outward in a choking cloud. The roar was deafening, echoing off the walls, drowning out the goblin screams from the tunnel.

Hiroshi hit the ground hard and rolled. The multiplier was still burning through him. He let it drop and exhaustion hit him hard.

He lay there gasping for air, his whole body shaking.

The dust started to settle slowly.

Where the tunnel entrance had been, there was now just a solid wall of collapsed rock and debris. The passage was completely blocked. No light coming through from the other side. No sounds except very faint muffled voices far away beyond tons of stone.

The goblins were sealed out.

But they were sealed in.

Hiroshi sat up slowly, his body protesting every movement. His shoulder was bleeding. His ribs hurt. Cuts all over his arms and legs. The multiplier’s aftereffect made everything feel twice as heavy.

He looked around the chamber. The woman guard was helping the injured one sit properly against the wall. Baros looked like he might pass out from fear.

Elias stood near the collapsed entrance examining the rockfall. His sword was already cleaned and sheathed.

"That’ll hold them," Elias said. "For a while at least."

Hiroshi just nodded. He was too tired to talk.

They were trapped in a dead-end cave with limited supplies, no obvious exit, and an entire goblin village probably trying to dig through from the other side.

But they were alive.

For now.

"We need to find another way out," Elias said, already starting to examine the walls.

Hiroshi leaned back against the stone and closed his eyes.

Just for a minute to catch his breath.

Then they’d figure out the next step.