Nora stopped taking videos and got into serious mode, as we got in a huddle to discuss what our plan was to approach the two distress flares in the distance, presumably sent by our regiment comrades. To the best of my knowledge, there weren’t any other humans in this entire region aside from our regiment, so it was pretty much confirmed to be an emergency signal from other soldiers.

“Not gonna lie, I’m not sure if we should help them,” Books said definitively. “That treant one shotting those three warriors was a wakeup call.”

“I agree. We have no idea what monster they’re dealing with, if it even is a monster,” Nora said cooly.

Rose looked a bit conflicted. “But what if they really need our help? They sent out two flares!”

“I think it’s best if we scout first, then see how it plays out,” I answered with a level head. “Summon cat.”

Meat Shield appeared through a portal and landed on my shoulder. Rose squealed in delight at the sight of the cute black kitten with shining eyes resting snug on my shoulder. Donovan, despite his scary exterior, also looked very much swayed by my cat’s cute factor. This fraudulent cat was nuzzling against my neck now, trying her best to be cute and curry favor with the squad, so she could shake them down for treats later on.

The squad was aware of my abilities to some extent at this point, including my portal cat and summoned whip. I had yet to reveal my other, more alarming abilities, since it would take too much explaining.

“Master, aren’t you going to change my name soon~”

I karate chopped her in the head. “Stop talking nonsense. Maybe when you become less useless I’ll change it, so listen up and try to do something useful for now. We saw a few distress flares up ahead, so I need you to scout with Solar and figure out what exactly is going on, then report back to me.”

“Okay~”

Solar looked happy as well. “Yay, I get to work with kitty-chan~”

Moving forward, we devised an in depth reconnaissance plan. Solar and Meat Shield would pave the way, archer on the left and cat on the right. The rest of our squad would follow them in a V formation so as to reduce detection risk and have a reasonable formation in place in case a fight did break out.

Aeric’s tankiness potential was a bit lower now that his shield had a significant welt in it, and there weren’t any blacksmiths around to fix it for him. However, he was still our main tank, and formed the left flank of our formation.

Donovan stood at the right flank in his heavy chainmail. The second row was made of myself and Felix, and then the rest of the backline was behind us.

Why a V formation? We decided upon that after much deliberation as a way for the rest of the team to get out of dodge when Nora casted aoe magic from the backline.

The rationale was that she was our strongest dps but also the most unwieldy, so we would structure our formation to compensate for her.

In actuality, I was by far the strongest dps on the team, but that would require me to use abilities I had no intention of revealing.

The two flares were fired about ten minutes walking distance from our current location. We began to make our way over, following the two scouts in the front. Meat Shield leapt from branch to branch in the trees above, as Solar followed suit at a slower pace. As we headed towards the location, I sorted out some thoughts in my head.

First and foremost, I was looking forward to hitting level 30. That was when some classes gained their second class ability. For example, the infamous [Backstab] skill was given to thieves at level 30, and archers gained [Eagle Eye], which allowed them to see further into the distance.

I was curious what kind of skill [Dimension Thief] gave as a second class ability, if any at all. So far, all I had was [Dimension Room] and my mythical [Dimension Ripper] item. Oh, and I guess I had the ability to summon a cat, but it only worked when the cat wanted to be summoned.

I tried poaching another mage spell back at the capital to add to my arsenal, [Flame Burst], but it gave me a notification that having two borrowed skills learned increased the penalty on both exponentially. So yeah, 27 damage thunderbolt recoil would become 729 damage, enough to overkill me twice.

I also experimented with looking for a higher tier spell than [Thunderbolt], which was a basic mage ability. Unfortunately, borrowing higher level spells increased the recoil penalty and even added a separate mana consumption penalty, making them virtually unusable. So for now I decided to stick with the tried and true.

Really had to hand it to the developers, they did a commendable job at balancing the game, giving players options without too many exploits or power creep.

“Ow.”

Engrossed in my thoughts, I tripped over a branch and stumbled.

Felix smirked at me. “What kind of thief are you, tripping over your own shoelaces? You’re an embarrassment to all thieves on the server!”

“Just shut up, will you. We’re almost there,” Nora replied, before I could even think of a retort.

We advanced for a few more minutes until we were very close to the launch origin of the flares, until Meat Shield stopped in her tracks.

“There’s nobody up ahead~”

Solar sped forward a bit more to confirm with her [Eagle Vision].

“Your cat is right. There are signs of a fight, but the area’s clear now.”

We approached the site of the battle cautiously. It was a part of the mountain where the ground was solid rock. Just from a cursory glance at the bloody skid marks on the floor, it was obvious that a fight occurred very recently.

There were bits of broken spear on the ground of non-human make and recent traces of battle, but surprisingly no corpses. It was a shame that there were no footprints to track because of the granite terrain.

“Look here,” said Rose, waving us over. There was a bit of torn cloth on one of the spears.

Hm. It was a torn piece of our regiment’s cloth uniform, as the white paint on the torn cloth was easily recognizable. That confirmed that at least one of the squads from our regiments was among the parties involved in the fight that took place here.

However, there was just no trace of our regiment comrades. I couldn’t figure out heads or tails from this situation. It wasn’t like there was anywhere to go from here. And if they were taken away, there would be footprints once they passed the area where the granite rock bed transitioned to dirt and grass.

“You think it was the dwarves?” Rose asked. “This smells of trickery.”

“If it is, we should report back,” Aeris stated. “The commander ought to know that we found possible signs of dwarf activity.”

“Hang on, let’s split up a bit and investigate first to figure out what really happened here. Don’t wander off too far, but search the area,” Donovan suggested.

“Sounds good,” Books replied.

I noticed that he was constantly siding with the safer, more conservative approach as of late, contrary to the Books I knew from before. Seemed like losing all of his hard earned gold and getting slung up at the slave market made him a lot less willing to take risks that he would’ve taken before. I reminded myself that I needed to loosen him up a bit.

We split up like the gang in scooby doo to investigate, although instead of four members and a dog named Scooby, we had eight members and a cat named Useless Shit. We searched for a good half an hour, but aside from the broken weapons and a few traces of blood, there wasn’t a single sign of the regiment or the mysterious assailants.

While we were searching, a group of familiar faces approached from a distance. It was commander Isaac and a mix of his personal guard and a few officers, making up ten people in total.

“Commander,” Donovan said in a respectful tone as the commander’s retinue approached.

“Soldiers,” he nodded, acknowledging us as he made strong eye contact with each of us one by one. “Status report?”

Donovan began to lay out the details. “We saw the two flares go up, so we came here cautiously to find out what happened.”

The commander nodded. “Noted, I was given the report from Avery’s squad that two distress signals were made in this area, which is why I’ve come.”

“Yes, sir,” Donovan continued. “By the time we got here, we found signs of a struggle and some ripped clothing that belonged to our squad’s uniform, but not a single sign of where the soldiers could have gone. Not a single corpse, or any sign of the assailants.”

“It’s possible that the dwarves ambushed them here and carried them away, sir.”

“Hmm….”

The commander walked over and picked up one of the broken spears and looked it over, paying special attention to the grip of the shaft and the head of the spear.

“This isn’t dwarven craftsmanship. The grip is too narrow for dwarf fingers which are short and stubby. And the craftsmanship itself is horrible.”

“What do you think it was then, sir?” Books asked.

Commander Isaac rubbed his chin in contemplation, looking at the surroundings. There really was nothing here from the wall of the mountain to the area where greenery began to grow.

“Ah,” he said cryptically. The eye-patched commander walked to the vertical wall of the mountain, and began knocking on it with his knuckles. He then walked several feet to the left and repeated the procedure.

“Checking for hollow areas,” I mumbled, understanding what he was doing.

“That’s right,” Isaac growled. He continued down the vertical wall until a certain point, where he listened to the knock. “It’s definitely hollow here. That’s where the sons of bitches are.”

Commander Isaac motioned towards one of the mages in his retinue. “Send the regroup signal. We’re heading back to camp.”

“Come with me,” he said, motioning my squad to follow him. “That’s an order.”

As a group of eighteen, we made our way down the mountain to base camp.

“What do you reckon is inside that hollow wall?” Books asked.

“Probably goblins,” Felix answered.

“I don’t know, man. A squad from our regiment can easily hold their own against a few goblins,” Books replied with a worried look on his face.

“Oh, that’s two other squads over there!” Rose exclaimed. We met up with them excitedly and merged into a larger group. The new group swapped stories with ours as we moved along. It really did feel like safety in numbers.

More soldiers who saw the retreat and regroup signal ran into us along the way. By the time we reached base camp we had about fifty soldiers total.

“Let’s wait for all the squads to arrive,” the commander said. The regiment members present set up a large bonfire so that we’d have a source of warmth and light as night fell.

Within fifteen minutes, there were one hundred and ninety-four of us, with several casualties reported in the squads present, and two entire squads still missing. The next fifteen minutes, nobody else showed up.

“This might be all of us left alive,” Commander Isaac said gravely. “Although it doesn’t matter at this point. We have to move fast.”

The commander stood up and put two fingers to his mouth, whistling loudly.

“Attention!”

“We march in force tonight to show that aggression against the Imperial Army will not be tolerated. Move out!”

“Yes, sir!”

Neat rows of soldiers with torch bearers in every other row followed behind the commander’s footsteps, as we ascended the mountain to the site of our comrades’ disappearance. Marching at a brisk pace, we reached the area rather quickly, with the light from the torches illuminating the way as night fell.

The commander located the spot that was hollow, then whipped out a piece of chalk and marked it with a big cross.

“It’s hollow inside, but the wall is still very thick. We need heavy explosives to get through,” he muttered.

He walked back and signalled for the regiment to back off with him and create some space.

“Clear the area for the mages! Mages, at attention! Prepare to fire at the white mark!”

The non-mage classes of the regiment quickly got out of the way from in front of the row of mages that formed behind them. Nora rolled up her sleeves alongside the other mages in the regiment, a safe distance away from the wall as the non-mage classes cowered in the forest, understanding just how much friendly fire power was about to be released.

“Fireball!”

“Earth Lance!”

“Ice Whip!”

“Fireball!”

“Meteor!”

....

“Nya?”

Meat Shield flinched, suddenly alert.

Oh fuck. One of the officers, a level 100 mage, let loose a spell that made all the novice mages in the regiment’s jaws drop to the ground. A massive flaming meteorite smashed into the broad side of the mountain, leaving a tremendous sizzling hole in the wall that revealed a natural cave system.

Several notifications lit up my interface.

You have discovered a new location.

You have leveled up.

Some non-human shrieking sounds came from inside the cave. There were animal fat makeshift torches lining the walls, indicating that whatever species lived inside needed light to function as well.

Commander Isaac growled. “Assume formation!”

The archers readied their weapons as the clerics began casting buffs.

Your physical resistance has increased by 10.

Your magic resistance has increased by 10.

Your vitality has increased by 10.

“Skreeeee!!!”

With scaled skin and a lizard-like humanoid body, several kobolds wielding spears emerged from the spacious cavern. Amongst the kobolds, some were significantly bigger than the others.

These were the [Kobold Commanders], and behind them, the hulking [Kobold King] who had a gold crown and various necklaces hanging around his neck. He was dragging the decapitated body of a female soldier in his left hand.

“Humansssss,” the Kobold King hissed. “You do not belong here. Do not expect to leave our lair alive.”

Commander Isaac chuckled, as he took the cigar out of his mouth and spit on the floor. “I’ve killed my fair share of kobolds in my day.”

“You’ve killed some minionsss and got confident?” The Kobold King stood to full height and slung a massive cleaver over his shoulder.

More kobolds emerged from the cavern, some with mining equipment on their backs.