Chapter 32

Skill: [System Insight X] deactivated

“…and finally be more effective about where you strike.”

She’d had a lot of notes for him. Apparently, both Critical Strikes and Lethal Strikes existed in this world and he’d missed his opportunity to land both of them. His stance was terrible, he didn’t properly consider his party, and he was too slow killing the goblin.

“A fight in a dungeon is a balance of time vs danger. You have to kill every opponent you cross reasonably quickly, but while taking as little damage as you can, even if it means intentionally taking a little damage to end the fight quicker. There are some cases where it’s best to be a bit reckless, but those are few and far between. You seem to have a good head on your shoulders, but it’s useless if you don’t use it.

“True, if you’re careful you could probably kill any goblin in these fields in a 1v1 fight without any problem-if you’re careful, but that’s only 1v1. There are plenty of goblins in this field. You could start a 1v1 fight, but it could quickly turn into a 1v2, 1v3, or 1v6 if you can’t properly assess the situation.

“There are even situations where the best option is to retreat like your pants are on fire.”

“Understood.”

Her notes did hurt to hear, he could hear his pride screaming, but they were useful.

After her long winded lecture they got a move on. One interesting thing he’d been forced to notice was that Stamina behaved a bit differently in the dungeon, for one: he could drain it all the way to 0 without passing out, but when it was 0 he couldn’t move very well and he couldn’t swing his katana at all. One upside to that little experiment was:

Skill: Level Up [Stamina Mediation IV]

His [Stamina Meditation] had gone up a level.

The goblin he had beaten did drop something when it died. It dropped: 1 Goblin’s Tooth and 1 Goblin’s Toenail. The first was useful for an alchemical solution that increased weapon sharpness for a short time, the second was trash. Cherish had explained to him about both and bluntly told him to chuck the Toenail. He hadn’t needed much convincing.

“Since you were the one that killed it you get to turn it in as a part of your quota.”

“Understood.”

Cherish was pretty good at explaining stuff-she pretended to act serious, but he could see her tail wagging when she was explaining something; she was clearly excited to have someone to teach.

“Let’s go find another goblin for you to kill!”

They resumed formation and stalked through the field. After just a few minutes they ran into a pair of goblins.

“Crimson, you take that one on by yourself.”

“What about teamwork?”

“Just kill it! We need to get you to Level 2 by the end of today. Dale, keep him alive. David, keep that other goblin over here so Crimson isn’t surrounded.”

Unlike the last time David didn’t make his shield glow, he slung his shield across his back and grabbed his sword by the blade in a Mordhau stance and made the pommel of his sword glow yellow, before he bashed the rightmost goblin on the head. It fell over with yellow sparks crossing it’s body and didn’t move.

Crimson turned his attention to the goblin on the left: it didn’t look any different from the first one that he had fought.

He gripped the handle of his katana in his left hand and walked forward in a slight crouch. When he got a bit closer the goblin ‘Lefty’ lunged at him. He performed a lunging sidestep and it’s attack missed him. He quickly slashed at it’s neck-hoping to get a Lethal Strike.

He did cut the goblin’s neck, but it wasn’t lethal, and it wasn’t deep. The goblin staggered back holding it’s neck-leaving it’s stomach completely open. Crimson performed another slash and opened up it’s guts. It was mostly just a spray of red; when this strike hit he could feel a sorta pressure in his stomach: it didn’t hurt, but it felt weird. The goblin fell to it’s knees and tried to hold it’s guts: he slashed its neck again. This time the goblin evaporated and left something on the ground.

He ignored what it left behind and ran a few steps over to the other goblin that was just getting up off the ground from it’s 7th hit on the head. Crimson grabbed the handle of his sword with both hands and performed a heavy hit without stopping. He felt the pressure in his stomach again and the goblin dropped to the ground and evaporated: its head had been sheared off its body. Crimson had just performed his first Lethal Strike.

It was kind of an odd thing for him: killing those goblins. On the one hand a part of him felt bad for killing a living creature, on the other he was used to killing goblins from his time playing video games. It left him with an odd aftertaste in his mouth. It wasn’t quite guilt, but it definitely wasn’t enjoyment.

After he’d killed his first goblin it had taken him a moment to process what he’d done and to think about how he should feel; he decided that it wasn’t an enjoyable activity, but it was necessary, and it helps that the goblins were a construction of the dungeon and weren’t quite real. That thought had helped him reach his conclusion: killing goblins was okay, but it wasn’t something that made him excited or happy.

“Crimson, grab the loot and get a move on! You need to kill 10 of these to get to Level 2!”

“Understood.”

He grabbed the drops from the goblins and placed them in his inventory.

Cherish gave him a different duty when they started moving for the third time: “We are attack types Crimson, we can move quite a bit faster than almost every [Guardian] so it’s our job to scout ahead and also to act as bait. So, the next time we run into a group of goblins I want you to lure them over here where David will use a skill to make them hate him more than you. While they’re focused on attacking him I want you to kill them off. You get me?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

Crimson had to walk in front of the party by a fairly reasonable distance. He had to walk about a good hundred feet in front of the group to keep a good watch. They paced through the grass for a good while when suddenly he heard a rumble in the ground behind him; goblins were bursting out of the ground. He could see the same blue smoke from earlier gathering around their bodies as they hauled themselves outta the ground.

He froze in shock as one of the six lunged at him. He broke out of his shock a little too late and wasn’t able to stop the blow from hurting him. Fortunately he was able to move his arm enough to keep the claws from piercing his chest, but they did chop off his right arm.

Agony shot through him as he jumped back.

Skill: Level Up [Focused Mind IV]

It became a little easier to ignore the pain as he gripped his katana with his left hand. He couldn’t fight back right then, his health was dropping too fast, and even though [Focused Mind] was helping him keep his feet he definitely couldn’t focus enough to fight through the pain of his missing arm.

Left with no other choice he sheathed his blade, grabbed his arm to staunch the bleeding, and sprinted around the goblins back to his party. It was strangely hard to run while missing an arm. His balance was slightly off and it was weird being slightly lighter. It threw off the rhythm he’d done his best to perfect during his hours of running.

He was able to make it back to his group where Cherish grabbed him. She hauled his butt over to Dale where he began to cast spell after spell on him. He even spoke for it. “[Green Growth], [Healing Wood], [Call of the Forest], [Restoration]”

On and on Dale casted spells, his voice was a little cracked and rough from being unused, but it never wavered.

Crimson checked his Status page - ignoring every thing but his health:

Health Points (HP): 17/100 r/s 1.0 [Amputated] [Suspended]

Magic Points (MP): 100/100 r/s 1.0

Stamina (STA): 40/100 r/s 1.0

A chill ran through him and his gut clenched as he realized how close he’d been to dying. Even if it wouldn’t be permanent because of the dungeon it was no less terrifying.

Behind him David was using his skills over and over again to put all the goblins on the ground with out killing them, even Drake helped as he used some sort of rope made of fire to tie them up. Cherish stood next to Crimson with a concerned expression on her face, both her tail and her ears were drooping as she watched the healing process.

It took a few minutes, but Dale was able to regrow his arm. Cherish began to shake him right after Dale finished and began to tell him off: “You never, ever freeze in a dungeon! It is literally the worst possible mistake you can make! Even throwing yourself at the enemy might be better! Now, go lop off their heads! I need to take a break.”

Crimson moved his arm around. It didn’t feel any different, there was a circular scar right under the elbow, but that was the only sign that he’d lost it - that, and the bloody arm lying on the ground 100 feet away.

His stomach writhed as he approached the goblins, a part of him wanted to fear them: they’d almost killed him! …I…won’t be controlled by my fear! He gnashed his teeth as he charged a goblin that had just gotten onto all fours. He crouched low as he neared it and drew his katana out of the sheath, deeply cutting the goblin’s neck in the process. He felt that pressure in his gut again as it tumbled to the ground scrabbling at its neck, before evaporating.

Crimson had already long since left as it breathed it’s death rattle. He charged the next one, flat on its back with yellow sparks arcing across its body and rammed his sword into the thing’s eyes. It didn’t die on the first blow so he had to stab it two more times before it disappeared.

The next one he had to cut it on the neck twice before he felt the pressure in his stomach again. He’d come to realize that the pressure meant that he’d performed a Critical Strike or a Lethal Strike. Once he felt the pressure in his gut he knew he could move on.

Even if he had lost his right arm facing these stupid things they were still extremely weak. It wasn’t any problem for him to kill them, especially when they were all stunned. Well, were stunned. The last three had gotten up and were looking at him. David had backed off at Cherish’s signal, but was watching closely.

Glaring at them he reached down and grabbed a rock off the ground and winged it as hard as he could at the center one’s face. He missed by quite a bit. Crimson hadn’t really thrown anything with serious intent before, but it was enough to make all three goblin’s flinch.

That flinch was the only gap he needed to stab the one on the left in the chest. He felt the pressure in his stomach and knew that it wouldn’t survive.

He had to quickly jump back as the one on the right charged at him and tried to stab him with its claws. When he wasn’t panicking they were very easy to dodge. He grabbed the katana with both of his hands and raised it over his head. The center goblin seeing its chance tried to make use of the opening he left.

Crimson had actually made a feint.

Right as it lunged at him he stepped to the side and let it pass by him and kicked it in the back. It fell on its face as he turned to face the right goblin. “Since you took my arm I’ll leave you for last.” He said to the one on the ground without taking his eyes off the right goblin.

It lunged at him again, but he just extended his sword and used the goblin’s momentum to make it impale itself on his katana. He stepped to the side as he did that - dragging the goblin with him, and used it as a goblin shield from the center goblin as it charged him. The center goblin’s claws were the last thing that the right goblin needed and it evaporated.

Crimson, his katana now freed from his goblin shield, stared at the center goblin.

“You took my arm…if I don’t kill you here and now then I’ll have a hard time sleeping tonight. I’ll have to deal with dungeon ‘jitters’ every time I enter. I may still have to deal with that, but the first step to dealing with it is to kill you.”

The goblins were very stupid, their attacks consisted of lunging and clawing with no variety. So it was easy for Crimson to lop off this goblin’s arm right as it attacked him. The goblin screamed in pain and backed off as he pursued it. He lopped of its other arm. Then, with a pressure in his gut:

He lopped off its head.