Robin wasn’t sure which hurt more, the sharp stones jabbing at his feet or the harsh cries of the goblins shrilling in his ears. He ran, the little green beasts hot on his heels. He ran until he turned a sharp turn in the tunnel and Ora-Jean shouted at him.

‘Here! We’re making a stand.’ The halfling hefted her double-bladed axe. As the first goblin came charging around the corner, she let fly and buried the blade deep in the goblin’s neck.

Fiamah took the next one, her mace swinging at his head. The goblin threw up an arm and traded a crushed skull for a broken wrist. He howled and slashed at her with the dagger in his other hand.

Grathilde hung back and Lantha was, predictably, nowhere to be seen, though Robin expected her knives to dart out the shadows at any moment and deprive some goblin of his last life’s breath.

Robin put his back to the nearby tunnel wall and wrapped himself in a [Lesser Phantasm]. So far, the adage of his old gaming group still held out: the best armour is not getting hit in the first place. Time to sharpen his wits and throw out some [Cutting Words].

Ora-Jean’s axe was stuck in the neck of the goblin she had nearly beheaded, and two more were sneaking up into a flanking position behind her. She swore and tugged harder at the haft of her axe.

‘Hey, Snaggletooth,’ Robin yelled at the one closer to him, ‘did you murder a tooth fairy or are your teeth just naturally as crooked as your moral compass?’

The goblin spun around and glared at him. ‘What? What that even mean?’ It snarled.

So he didn’t get it. At least he was offended. Robin’s cantrip was still having some effect.

‘Hey,’ he said as a follow up, ‘at least you’re as bright as your smile!’

The goblin began foaming at the mouth and collapsed over, dead of a magical rage-aneurysm. In the mean time, Ora-Jean had extricated her axe and was trading blows with the other goblin.

A blast of air sliced past Robin’s ear and slammed another goblin up against the wall. The impact staggered the little monster. Before the goblin could so much as shake his head to clear it, one of Lantha’s daggers sliced out of a nearby shadow and lodged itself in his eye.

‘Don’t waste your energies,’ Lantha shouted to Grathilde. ‘We’re paying a high enough price for them as it is.’

‘Less talky-talky, more stabby-stabby,’ the dwarf yelled back.

Fiamah was holding off three goblins with wild swings of her mace. They danced around her, not giving her the chance to focus on any single one of them. The cleric was bleeding from a few shallow cuts, and each of the goblins’ daggers had bloodied blades.

Robin flicked his hand through the gestures of [Lesser Phantasm] and conjured the sound of a harpy commanding the goblins to fall back and defend her. Two of the three paused. Fiamah was quick to take advantage of the breather and caved in the head of the third.

Lantha’s dagger flashed out of the nearby shadows and took one in the back. That one died with a look of surprise on his face as he slumped to the floor. He didn’t even manage to cry out.

The final goblin didn’t stand a chance. Fiamah’s mace went for his head at the same time Ora-Jean’s axe cut him off at the knees. The spray of blood that resulted painted the wall Robin had his back against green. It also splattered him with more than his fair share of gore. In disgust he dropped the illusion and stepped out into the tunnel.

‘Well, that was bracing.’ Ora-Jean said drily, leaning on her axe.

‘Are you serious?’ Grathilde glared, clearly upset that she’d had to spend such a large portion of her elemental energies so soon after gathering them.

‘Yeah, I just love being mobbed by a swarm of smelly, green murder-puppets…’ Robin deadpanned. ‘…NOT.’

Ora-Jean snorted a laugh, startled. Wicked! Finally a use for the high art of ’90s sarcasm. Party on, dude.

[Laughter is the Best Medicine] Progress: 3/4! Bonus: 3/4

Grathilde glared at them both. Robin ignored the look, wondering what else he might be able to recycle from his home world. Ugh. No more movies. Frell. And his choice of games and books was likely to be sharply limited.

He shoved the thought out of his mind. He had bigger problems right now. Like staying alive. Or finding a shirt he could actually wear. Or scavenging some food that didn’t taste like dead, chewy dirt. If he got any hungrier, he might be tempted to try fried goblin.

The thought made him go green. No, probably not. Not even mushrooms were that unappetising. Close, but not quite.

‘Do you have enough energy left for a [Hearth’s Blessing], Fiamah?’ Grathilde asked hopefully.

‘Loot first, cleanse later,’ the cleric replied. ‘I’m not going to waste the divine favour of my goddess just because you want to hoard your own energies.’

The dwarf pouted. Robin was secretly disappointed as well. he didn’t fancy wearing goblin blood any longer than necessary. In fact, his skin was crawling at the thought.

Which god did he have to talk dirty to to get a hook-up like [Hearth’s Blessing]? It didn’t really seem like Rhyth’s bag, but maybe it was a universal thing all gods could grant? Or a power he could learn. Maybe he could learn [Cleanse] from Grathilde. Though he’d probably have to unlock whatever class she had to do so.

If she even had a class. That’s it, focus on the unknowns. Ignore the greasy goblin blood going sticky and itching across your skin.

‘Ora-Jean,’ Lantha said, ‘do a quick scout of the tunnels. I don’t want more goblins following the sounds of battle to us. Or more kobolds, if those tracks we saw earlier were as fresh as you thought.’

Ora-Jean nodded and slipped off down the tunnel, back the way they’d run. She’d shout a warning if there were more goblins approaching, and if not, slip out to see what else might be in the area.

Fiamah was healing the last of the small lacerations she had sustained during the battle. Grathilde was morosely looking at her fingertips as if she could spool back the power she had expended through the sheer force of her pout.

Robin took a deep breath and let it out. Still alive and hopefully wiser for the experience. And speaking of experience, he should check how much he’d gathered. If he was lucky, tricking the harpies would count as well.

He opened his interface and loaded up his status. 57% of the way to Tier 1? He had to have gotten harpy experience. There was no way it had jumped that high just off fighting off a dozen goblins.

His progress was above 45%. Now was the time to invest a little more heavily in skills and see if his calculations about level markers and skills costs bore out.

He increased Persuasion, Perception, Insight, and Learning to 1 and Deception and Expression to 4. While Ranged Combat might be useful, he didn’t have a reliable ranged weapon, so that option could wait. Besides, he was rather enjoying [Cutting Words] and could otherwise rely on his wits and [Lesser Phantasm] to get him out of trouble.

Robin checked his percentage to Tier 1. He was back down to 36%. Yikes. Skills must increase in cost as they ranked up. That or his mental maths were off (a distinct possibility). He shouldn’t have spent that much experience. He considered his character sheet.

ROBIN PARKER Heritage: Shadeling, Juvenile Profession: None Tier: 0 (Progress to Tier 1: 36%) Properties

Physical Mental Social Strength: 11 Intelligence: 17 Charisma: 15 Dexterity: 14 Cunning: 18 Manipulation: 13 Fortitude: 11 Resilience: 14 Poise: 15 Proficiencies

Physical (5/9) Mental (4/9) Social (5/9) Athletics: 0 Arcane Lore: 0 ??? ??? ??? Deception: 4 ??? ??? Empathy: 1 ??? ??? Expression: 4 ??? ??? ??? Ranged Combat: 0 Insight: 1 ??? Sleight of Hand: 0 Learning: 1 Persuasion: 1 Stealth: 1 ??? Socialise: 0 Survival: 1 Perception: 1 ??? Peculiarities Blessing of Rhyth Tongue of the Fallen Tower Mark of the Trickster

Less progress to Tier 1 for what he got than he would have liked. Still, it confirmed for him that his next milestone was likely 67% progress. It was annoying. His next level would give him access to another peculiarity, either shapeshifting or a bigger and better illusion spell, if he didn’t unlock any other choices.

Well, he was this low, he might as well spend a little more. Robin paid to raise Sleight of Hand to 1. He’d done quite well so far with his other trickster-y skills. He might as well make sure he was raising all of them.

‘Oi, Bard!’ Grathilde called. ‘Help us search these bodies for loot.’

‘Am I getting a share now?’ He shot back.

‘No, but slackers never even get the chance at one, so chop chop.’ Grathilde gestured at the bodies.

Robin grimaced. Killing charging monsters out for blood with magic from a distance was one thing, but digging through the pockets of the stinking and recently deceased was another. His mouth stung with pre-vomit acid. Deep breaths. Pretend it’s just a very immersive VR game.

At least part of his childhood had been spent on a farm. He was no stranger to death, disgusting bodily fluids, and cleaning up after such things. Didn’t mean he had to like it, though.

At least there weren’t a lot of pockets to go through. Most of the goblins just wore loincloths and kept their valuables in small pouches.

‘I don’t suppose I could get a dagger to cut these free?’ he asked.

‘Nope,’ Lantha said.

‘Not until you earn it, greenbeard,’ Grathilde grinned.

He didn’t even have a beard. Robin sighed and fought with the hide straps used to tie the pouch to the bit of poorly-tanned leather that served as a belt for the loincloth. His fingers would never feel clean again.

Finally, however, he managed to get it open. Inside were a few copper pieces, some shiny pieces of quartz, and a dirty rag. Robin almost threw the rag aside when he noticed it had markings on it. He spread it out and angled it toward Lantha’s magelight to get a better view.

It was a map! Crude, to be sure, and it probably didn’t trace all the tunnels, but it was more than they were working with. There had to be another entrance on here. There was no way those goblins never left the caves. Not with the food they’d had in those baskets. And they certainly couldn’t rely on the harpies for transport up and down those cliffs. He had to show this to the others!

‘Hey! I think—‘ Robin looked up and stopped in his tracks. ‘Uh, y’all, we’ve got company,’ he said slowly.

Ora-Jean stood a few metres away in the middle of the tunnel. Behind her, the one-eyed priest of Urkhan loomed, a wicked-looking dagger held tightly to her throat. Ora-Jean twisted her lips bitterly.

‘I found the kobolds.’