The rest of my month with Emilia and Melania went fine. They were still supremely happy with the mana detection of the goblins with a rough estimate. It seemed to give Em time to get into a fight mood, and gave Mel time to compose herself.

Even if it was just us three, I still kept looking to Mel as the leader as its not my forte, and she did not seem to mind the role. When it was just us three she was not as flustered as when we were in the group of ten. I'm not sure how she handled herself in the group of five, but she definitely seemed more comfortable with the role now.

Em, while still a bit cold towards me, at least was talking with her sister more now as well. She did seemed to mostly talk about their time back home rather than anything current, but it was still a lot better than the silence she had while we were in the squad of ten.

As we ventured further and further into the dungeon, I was reminded how much a diversity of weapons actually helps. Sure I was extremely comfortable with my shield and hammer by this point, but Em was able to handle all the goblins coming her way with wide sweeping strokes. Her use of her halberd was very effective, maybe even a little intimidating truth be told.

If fights against monsters were always something that could be planned around in this world, like we were able to do in this dungeon, then I wouldn't necessarily need my shield all the time.

These goblins for instance still popped as easily as wet paper bags. I honestly feel like I could have empty handedly demolished everything, even if it would have been rather.... grotesque.

As we jogged along one day, I decided to broach this subject with Mel for her opinion, since she seemed to have so much knowledge stored away.

"Hey dear leader, is my hammer and shield really effective for these guys and our squad formation?" I glanced Mel's way.

She has definitely improved as her cheeks only reddened a little with my teasing. "W-what do you mean, are you worried about your efficiency in the fight? You seem to be doing fine, we are having no troubles with any of the goblin groups we've come across."

"Well, just for instance, Em is doing amazing with her halberd right? With us all being tier four now, your arrows are piercing through goblins and getting two to three per shot. Em here can drop five or six with a swing of her halberd. As for me, I'm still only getting two to three per swing. It seems like it is just a limitation of my weapon choice, you know? The shield certainly is narrowing how many I have to worry about at a time, but it feels like I don't honestly need it. If I had a longer weapon I could probably cleave through five or six as well and still no goblins would get by us." I explained my thought process probably needlessly to her to make sure she got the full idea.

Em glanced my way and smirked as we continued down the corridor. "You feeling a bit emasculated there Will? Worried that I'm killing so much more than you?"

I couldn't help but chuckle at the provocation. "No no, honestly I just know I could be doing more. Don't get me wrong, you're crazy awesome with the halberd. I don't think I'd ever get that good. But you know how back in our weapons training, the knight instructor said every weapon had its place? Well as much as I like my hammer and shield, if we're just mowing down these goblins I feel like its not the place for them. Does that make sense?"

Em looked a bit thoughtful as we continued to jog along and she processed what I said.

Mel finally spoke up though. "You're right Will. Truthfully in just a few more weeks we'll be in here solo going through these goblins. Even I won't be able to stay at a range I'm comfortable with, unless I severely slow down the clear rate of the goblin packs. We should probably experience a new fighting style before we leave our three person squad."

Mel seems to not only agree with my worry, but was also able to tie it to a future plan. I was not even thinking about our eventual solo squad next month.

"Tell you what, how about for the rest of the week we each try a new weapon set. And while we have a safety in numbers backup, we each try taking a goblin fight alone? That way if any of us end up in a bad situation, there's still two of us to rescue the third?" Mel suggested to us while we were still pondering her last statement.

"Mel you have an excellent mind in that head of yours, that sounds amazing to me. I wasn't even thinking that far ahead. What about you Em? Want to try?" I made sure Mel knew how awesome she was before turning to Em to get her thoughts.

".... Fine. But let's start today with our current weapons then, so we'll know for comparisons' sake." And if course Emilia had to double down. Probably saw it as a challenge.

I chuckled a bit, "That's fair. You want to try first or you want me to? We'll probably stumble into a group of goblins soon enough."

Emilia smirked at me, "Oh you're going first for sure, but we're gonna let Melania time us to see what....and who.... truly works best then."

"Hah you're on! Just don't count me out until the end of the week though!" I joked back with her, because I knew today she would definitely have a faster clear time.

—----

After that we did each take turns trying fights solo. It did feel a bit overwhelming my first time going into a pack of what ended up being fifty goblins solo.

I must admit despite my earlier frustration I certainly did appreciate my shield for the group. Not having to worry about a whole half of my vision was very comforting. I simply whaled on the goblins within hammer distance until I felt sufficient pressure on my shield and then simply shoved them off, rinse and repeat.

The whole ordeal took about two minutes I believe, and I did feel in complete control during the whole fight.

Em rotated in for the next fight. When I announced another pack of goblins coming up , she sped up until she was a good distance ahead.

When she clashed with the pack she took even wider swings than she normally did, and kept reversing her hand holds at the end of each arc to reduce her recovery time. She plowed through the little cretins in a minute or less it felt like for sure. She was definitely giving it her all though, as she was unusually out of breath at the end.

As Mel and I approached her in the middle of her empty warzone I couldn't help but start a slow clap for her. She glanced at me as I approached before standing up straight and staring me down when I let out a soft whistle.

I stopped the clap and held up my hands in defeat, "That was seriously impressive Em, I mean it. I know you had to have cut my time in half. I'm not even sure I could do that with a weapon change."

For some reason, either the tiredness had her or maybe she just didn't think I was sincere before now but, I clearly caught her off guard. After my remark she blushed, pretty strongly too. I glanced at Mel but she just had the biggest smile on her face about the whole situation.

"Th-thanks. It.... it was nothing really. I had to make sure you knew what to shoot for after all. Over the next few weeks I'll expect you to do something similar you know?" She recovered while talking until she was eventually back to her odd stoic and cocky default.

For that brief moment she was pretty cute though.

"Anyway, we should move on to the next group. We still have to let Mel have a run at a group too. You okay to move out Em?" I wanted to be sure in case something went wrong during Mel's solo fight.

Emilia nodded and we continued on without another word.

Once I got close enough to the next group to sense, I told Melania she was up. She looked like she clenched her jaw in determination and sped up. She essentially rushed to the next curve of the corridor and stopped right at the end of the curve. She went ahead and drew her bow and notched an arrow.

"If they get too close, I will back up. I still plan to finish the fight myself, so please just back up with me, okay?" She must have been a little nervous about it, since it was clearly a command but she almost fell back to her shy way of talking where she was asking permission.

I patted her on the back. "You got this captain. We'll follow your lead no worries. You'll probably hear them soon. Just relax, okay?"

I stepped back to give her room and glanced at Emilia. She glanced at me briefly before we both swung back to Mel and nodded, almost but not quite in sync.

Mel looked to the far end of the corridor where it bent, expectantly. She put on a look of determination as we heard the faint scrabbles of their claws on the floor.