The jog back was quiet, each member of their little group consumed by their own thoughts. Andrew wanted desperately to check his log, look over all of the stat gains and level ups he was sure were waiting there at the bottom of the list. At the same time he never wanted to see it again. He would have to confront the names in that log again, acknowledge the mistake still fresh on all their minds. He let himself focus on the jog instead, watch for boars, or wolves, or anything else that could distract him. It wasn't working very well.

When they arrived back at the cart the silence persisted.

"Look, we can't stand around here forever. What happened today sucks, it really, really, sucks. But we have a job to do. This is the world we live in now, and we can still help people, we can make up for what happened here, but we can't let ourselves be consumed by mistakes like this right now, not until we've found a safe place for us and those we're trying to save. Alright?" Andrew said.

A beat passed before anyone responded.

"Yes. You're right, we need to move. I saw a few people killed by hobgoblins while in the camp, it-- that’s just a part of life out here. I just, never thought I would help kill someone, a real human person, I mean. I'll be ok, let's just get moving." Kalan said, looking away stoically to idly re-check the contents of the wagon.

"We had no way of knowing there was anyone down there, so it's not really our fault anyways." Shelby said, voice slightly raised, "Besides, we never would've been able to get them out. I mean, how many of them do you think were down there? Twenty? Thirty? More? They would've just killed us instead. Better us than-- It, It's just better this way, we couldn't have helped them anyways. Besides how many levels did you guys just get from that? I jumped five levels just from that, and my archery skill increased and everything. So ultimately this just helped us save the people back in camp instead."

"I gained four levels in both class and catalyst. So yeah, we did get something out of it" Kalan said.

I suppose it's time I forced myself to look through the log then. Shit. Fine.

Show Log

[Goblin Level 16 defeated]

[Goblin Level 18 defeated]

[Goblin Level 12 defeated]

……

Andrew skipped through the notifications as quickly as he could, but he still couldn't help but slow down to read the names.

[Kayla Lemons]

[Alexander Price]

[August Kingsley]

Not productive

[Scavenger Leveled up]

[Scavenger Leveled up]

[Scavenger Leveled up]

[Scavenger Leveled up]

[Scavenger Leveled up]

[+1 Dexterity for performing precise work]

[+1 Wisdom for sustaining constant mana control]

[+1 Wisdom for sustaining constant mana control]

[+1 Intelligence for pushing the limits of your mana control]

[Rune Inscription lvl 8-9]

[Mana Control lvl 8-9]

[Title Earned: Goblin Slayer I]

Five levels is impressive for how under leveled those goblins were. I must have gotten the bulk of the experience for killing them, otherwise I'm sure Kalan and Shelby would've gained far more than I did. Stat gains are nice, and my profession skills are getting quite close, nearly at ten in rune inscription, mana control, and blacksmithing. Even Mana inscription and empower item are at level 8, if I can get all five to level 10 before I pick a profession I might be able to get something truly specialized. All depends on when my next chance to do some blacksmithing is I suppose. The title is new.

Title Description Goblin Slayer

[Goblin Slayer I: You waged war on a tribe of goblins and won, personally killing more than fifty goblins and all of a tribe's shamans. Goblin tribesmen are now instinctively wary of you. You gain the ability to distinguish between goblin tribes. You gain the ability to instinctively recognize goblin tracks. +2 to all attributes]

Ok, that’s pretty good. Not sure how useful it will be to tell goblin tribes apart, but tracking knowledge is fantastic. Even better if it applies to hobgoblins too, but I'm not sure if the system lumps them together or not. Instinctive fear could be nice, but if they run to raise the alarm instead of fighting it will make my traps a whole lot less useful. More than a level worth of stats is a decent trade of though, especially now that levels are starting to slow down a little.

Show Status

Name: Andrew Neilson

Race: Human

Catalyst: None

Class: Scavenger lvl 39

Profession: None

Titles: Pioneer, Goblin Slayer I

Status:

HP: 578/620

SP: 550/620

MP: 300/410

Attribute points: 190

Strength: 49

Dexterity: 76

Vitality: 65

Intelligence: 44

Wisdom: 67

Scavenger Skill Points: 0

Skills:

-Perception lvl 6

-Camouflage lvl 1

-Mana Control lvl 9

-Woodcarving lvl 4

-Rune Inscription lvl 9

-Adaptive Weapon Mastery lvl 4

-Empower Item lvl 8

-Rune Modification lvl 5

-Blood Infusion lvl 1

-Stone Carving lvl 2

-Mana Inscription lvl 8

-Mana Smelting lvl 3

-Blacksmithing lvl 9

-Scavenger's Resilience lvl 3

-Lumberjack lvl 3

-Carpenter lvl 1

-Butcher lvl 1

-Pain Resistance lvl 1

-Fire Resistance lvl 1

-Siphon Affinity lvl 4

-Minor Translation lvl 1

"What kind of gains are you looking at Andrew?" Kalan said.

Andrew tore his eyes away from the status screen, pulling himself out of thought. "Pretty good gains yeah. Um, yeah, I leveled five times, got some stat increases, and got some skill increases too. I also got a new title. [Goblin Slayer]. So that’s pretty cool, apparently I'm like a big ol goblin predator now, they're all supposed to be instinctually afraid of me or something."

"Anyways we should get going, lets try and get a good distance past the goblin caves before nightfall." Andrew said, before setting up behind the wagon and getting ready to push.

Kalan joined him and soon they were moving along nicely. Shelby took up position at the front, pulling the wagon and trying to steer them out of the way of roots and bushes and other obstacles. Andrew was consumed by the work, between pushing the wagon and considering the implications of his new title the impact of their mistake began to dull. He almost didn't notice when they passed by the goblin caves. The smell of smoke and char was more than enough to regain his attention though, and the final leg of the days journey was spent in a different kind of reflective silence.

They didn't stop until it was too dark to continue. They set up camp in a small indentation in the cliff face, between several protective boulders. They built a small fire and everyone took a watch, but the local wildlife seemed disinclined to engage, and there was no sign of lingering goblins. Andrew was asleep almost as soon as he laid his head down.

The next day passed quickly and almost as quietly. Everyone took up position easily and knew what to do without discussion. Andrew pulled and steered the wagon. Kalan pushed the wagon. Shelby was on watch for threats, and occasionally dropping behind to erase their tracks. The muted conversation they did have was limited to navigation and observations. The exultation of new levels and skills faded, and Andrews found his thoughts circling back more and more to the events of yesterday.

What could we have done differently? Lure the goblins out maybe? We could have hunted down the hunting parties first, reduced their numbers slowly. When they noticed something was wrong they might have sent a group out to check, we could've ambushed them outside. If they ran inside the cave to hide we could've waited them out, starved them until they ran out to fight us.

That might have turned out worse though. What if they just ate the prisoners instead? We would've just found bones and assumed they were dead when we got there. That might've felt better, but the end result is the same. We definitely couldn't attack the caves themselves, they were small enough to maneuver down there, we would've been surrounded, cramped up in the dark. Either way what we did was the best option we had. Even if we just left them and ran away from goblin territory, they would've just been trapped down their longer, stuck in a deep dark cave subjected to whatever it is goblins do to their prisoners. No we did what was right. The next best thing is to get so strong we can crawl down one of those caves and smash through anything and everything those goblins can throw at us in time to save anyone who is down there. That’s the real goal.

The second day of travel ended much like the first, they found a clear space along the cliff face, which was dropping lower and lower as they traveled. Andrew was pretty confident he could climb to the top safely at this point. Hell, he could probably jump off it just fine with how high his vitality was now. They made another small fire, but took their time to find dry branches to avoid creating too much smoke. It took three days of travel for the caravan Kalan and Shelby were with to reach Andrew's old camp. They were moving slower now, but they were getting close enough to merit a little extra caution.

Kalan made a dinner of foraged veggies and frozen meats while Shelby searched for firewood and Andrew sat on a rock, carving rocks. He finished two grenades before it was time for bed, and another two while keeping watch. He had a total of six now, not much but he would have time to increase the stockpile before they attacked.

The third day of travel was hard. Shelby left to scout ahead. The cliff face deviated significantly from the road, and they had to travel through the forest and underbrush to get back on track. Navigating through the roots and bushes and between trees was much more difficult than the open ground near the cliff face. They made much slower progress but by the time night fell again the group was feeling optimistic. Earlier in the day Shelby found some landmarks she recognized along the road. She predicted they were within a day of the camp already. A brief planning session by the camp fire had them agreeing to find a good camp site nearby tomorrow, one that had access to the road so that they could ambush the next caravan, and access to water for drinking.

Andrew finished another four grenades that night, bringing his stockpile up to ten.

They traveled a little further the next morning, moving through the forest parallel to the road until shelby doubled back and warned them the would be within sight of the camp soon. The hobgoblins cleared up the forest around their camp, and soon they would have no more than stumps and dirt to hide behind.

"I guess this is it then. Time to find somewhere semi-permanent to hole up so we can get started on phase one of the plan. Lets go over that one more time, just so we're all on the same page." Andrew said.

"Okay sure," Kalan said, "So we camp out here for a while, you hunker down and make bombs while me and Shelby trade off watching the road and practicing with our weapons. As soon as a new caravan starts heading towards us we alert you, then get into position. We hit the caravan hard and fast, don’t let anyone get away, and don’t get any of the prisoners killed. Then we train up the new guys, and pump them for information about the camp. From there, well, maybe we attack the camp, maybe we wait for another caravan to roll through, depends on what they know I guess."

"And we don't use any explosives while we're doing it" Shelby interjected "As close as we are, setting one of those off is going to give us away for sure, even without it we might make too much noise ambushing them this close. We'll have to be very careful to get out of the area as soon as the ambush is done, and we'll want to clean the site up too, just in case they send someone to go check it out."

"Perfect, exactly right. Okay. So everyone should keep an eye out for a good spot near the road to drag the wagon and hobgoblin bodies while we're looking for a campsite. Once we find one we should still keep an eye out for something like that. From there, it seems like everyone knows the plan, so lets get to work." Andrew said.

Andrew stayed behind on wagon watch, and took the opportunity to carve as many explosives as possible. He was only halfway through his second before Shelby returned.

"[Wilderness Tracking] has certainly paid for itself. Found a couple animal trails that lead to water, there's a little river just up the way and it seems like it's coming from the same cliffside. I didn't check that though, I followed it down and out and I'm pretty sure this is what the hobgoblins are using for their water too! It goes all the way out of the forest and down towards their camp. I couldn't see it clearly but I bet it's the one we had to carry water from all the time. We might be able to cut it off or something, draw some of them out." Shelby said.

"Oh nice, good work. Though, did the hobgoblins ever travel up river? It would be bad if they just wandered into camp on accident one day."

"I don't think so, never saw them do it while I was there, and we were never allowed to go close to the forest while we were prisoners, I don't think it's likely we'll get caught. I would suggest poisoning it or something, but that would probably hurt the prisoners more than the hobgoblins." Shelby said.

"Alright, well I'll start dragging the wagon over that way, if you find Kalan out there let him know the plan."

It was slow going with only one person, but he was soon joined by Kalan and they found their way to a little clearing not far from the river. It was far more exposed than any of their previous camps, but the trees around were dense and the ground within was spacious enough to fit the cart with space to spare for a fire and sleeping spaces. They left the cart almost entirely packed up, only bringing out enough supplies to make meals and produce more runes. They would be sleeping rough for the next couple days, but it was all going to be worth it in the end. The next phase was finally beginning and everyone fell into their roles easily.

By the time the trio reconvened for dinner Andrew had a total of sixteen explosive stones. At four runes a stone he had carved sixty four runes already, and it showed. The manual labor of pulling the cart was paying off, and both he and Kalan had stat gains to show for the four days labor.

[+1 Strength for performing physical labor that pushes your limits]

[+1 Strength for performing physical labor that pushes your limits]

[+1 Strength for performing physical labor that pushes your limits]

[+1 Vitality for pushing the limits of your physical endurance]

[+1 Strength for performing physical labor that pushes your limits]

[+1 Wisdom for sustaining constant mana control]

[+1 Strength for performing physical labor that pushes your limits]

[+1 Vitality for pushing the limits of your physical endurance]

[Mana Inscription lvl 8-9]

[+1 Wisdom for sustaining constant mana control]

[+1 Dexterity for performing precise work]

[+1 Intelligence for pushing the limits of your mana control]

Name: Andrew Neilson

Race: Human

Catalyst: None

Class: Scavenger lvl 39

Profession: None

Titles: Pioneer, Goblin Slayer I

Status:

HP: 640/640

SP: 600/640

MP: 350/420

Attribute points: 190

Strength: 54

Dexterity: 77

Vitality: 67

Intelligence: 45

Wisdom: 69

Scavenger Skill Points: 0

Skills:

-Perception lvl 6

-Camouflage lvl 1

-Mana Control lvl 9

-Woodcarving lvl 4

-Rune Inscription lvl 9

-Adaptive Weapon Mastery lvl 4

-Empower Item lvl 8

-Rune Modification lvl 5

-Blood Infusion lvl 1

-Stone Carving lvl 2

-Mana Inscription lvl 9

-Mana Smelting lvl 3

-Blacksmithing lvl 9

-Scavenger's Resilience lvl 3

-Lumberjack lvl 3

-Carpenter lvl 1

-Butcher lvl 1

-Pain Resistance lvl 1

-Fire Resistance lvl 1

-Siphon Affinity lvl 4

-Minor Translation lvl 1

Almost time. The anticipation of it is killing me. We're going to have to fight again soon. Fight a lot. Fight against monsters that are probably a lot stronger than us, without explosives. The strangest thing is that I think I'm almost looking forward to it this time. I'm definitely looking forward to helping some people, gathering them up then getting the absolute fuck out of the area for good, but this is something else I think. Either way, I'll need to get a good nights rest tonight. We have work to do.