(Gavin)

An hour has passed, and we're still unable to leave. There are ten of those goblins, now, and this is starting to look bad. How are we going to escape this? The Dark Knight and Paladin watching us don't seem inclined on helping us, which means this doesn't qualify for that.

Which means that they probably won't step in unless we're going to die for sure, after taking a lot of damage.

That's not good.

I look at Luca again, who is moving small rocks around. Well, they're probably small chunks of stone bricks that broke off, but they could also be small rocks. He nudges another one, frowning, then shakes his head.

Why did Zack do this to us? He knows there isn't a chance in the world we could get out of such a situation. Neither of us are ranged combatants. Theoretically, I could learn a spell, but it would be too weak to really do anything. It would also be risky for me to learn, as it probably wouldn't be a good idea to try to obtain one in these ruins, so I would have to exit them and put myself in a situation where I'd probably get hit several times.

Thus ruining my visualization.

"Stay here," Luca tells me, climbing over my legs to walk towards the opening we entered the building through.

"Hey!" I grab him, pulling him back. "What are you doing?"

"Stay here," he glares at me, a fierce, annoyed expression filling his face, determination in his eyes. "And don't look."

He pulls out of my grip, then scrambles outside. I want to chase after him, but something about his words warned me away from it.

A moment later, I hear a goblin wailing. What in the world? The wail cuts off a moment later, and I am really tempted to look and see what it is Luca is doing. A few minutes pass, and Luca reenters the ruined building and looks down at me.

His hair is a little ruffled, but other than that, he looks just fine.

"Done," he says. "We can go now."

"What did you do?" I peek outside and notice that the goblins are gone, though there are several arrows on the ground in a spot, as if they had hit Luca's Barrier and simply fell there. "And how did you deal with all of the arrows? Not all were taken care of by Barrier, I'm sure."

"My brother's robe has a high damage resistance," Luca pats his robe. "Their arrows weren't enough to pierce it."

"And how did you take care of them?"

"By showing I was stronger."

I'm glad he talks a little bit more now… but seriously, Luca? Please tell me how you dealt with the ranged attackers.

"Before we go," I tell Luca. "We need to have a plan to deal with things that attack from a distance. We don't have ranged attacks, ourselves, and neither of us are climbers, so the archers would be a major problem."

"Everything runs out of arrows," Luca says. "And Mana."

He doesn't need to say more for me to understand his idea, and it's a very Zack idea. Let them use up their arrows and Mana as we dodge the attacks. I could use Deflect on certain attacks, but even that has its limits – and it comes with a Mana cost.

"You will run out of Mana as well," I point out.

"Will I?" He cocks his head to the side. "Only the Goblin Shaman so far come anywhere near my Mana pools. Let's go. I want to finish this soon so I can beat Mr. Zack with my staff."

So it's Zack who's the source of his annoyed state. Probably for leaving Talorn.

"Alright," I stand. "Here's the plan, Luca. Keep an eye on the upper levels of buildings for possible archers. I already know how to use one Mystic Knight elemental blade, I'll try to learn the others for the slimes, to make it easier to handle them.

"As usual," I continue. "You and I will avoid any attacks we can. If we can't, use your Barrier to stop them. If we come across archers in a building, you and I will enter the building rather than retreat, and try to get up to them.

"For ground monsters," I continue. "I will do my best to get in close. Your job is to provide me support, I'm likely to take hits along the way. Your robe has a hood, yes?"

He nods, pulling it up over his head.

"Good," I say. "Keep the hood up, Luca. You said the robe has a high defense, which means you should be fine as long as nothing hits your hands or face. I'll trust in your abilities to keep me alive. Do you understand?"

Please understand.

"Yes," he nods. "Keep my hood up, watch the buildings for archers, protect you when I can, evade when I can't, and help you reach the monsters like the trio of Water Slimes up ahead."

I turn around and find the trio of Level 2 Water Slimes. This would be a time to use Flame Blade, then. It won't be as effective as Wind Blade on a Stone Slime or Chocolate Slime, but should be enough to allow me to use more of my Strength through the ooze.

I go through the same process I went through to use Wind Blade the first time, only with fire instead. My blade coats with small flames, the edges of it taking on a dense orange hue, representing the fiery effect added on to the pure strike itself.

Dismissing the Skill notice, I charge forward, stepping to the side to avoid a jet of water. It only takes me a few moments to reach the Water Slimes, even as they try to hit me with their jets. When I reach the trio, I thrust my sword forward, jabbing it into one of the slimes, then pull it back and pivot, striking at another one of them slimes.

Flame Blade runs out all too fast, so I trigger it again as I take a hit in the back from one of the Water Slimes. Even with my armor, I still take damage from the impact, but it's thankfully not as bad as it could have been.

I continue to strike and step, using Deflect a couple of times, and by the time the slimes are all dead, I'm almost completely out of Mana. I really need to increase that. Would Mystic Knight be a better choice for a second Class than Paladin, to give me that extra Mana? What is it based on?

Shaking my head, I look at Luca, who is giving me a completely innocent look. I frown and look around as I approach him, spotting… nothing. But there are a few new arrows beside him, which means there were Goblin Archers here.

And I doubt I will receive an answer as to what happened to them.

Luca gives me a quick Heal, then we resume our traveling. I should probably gain a few more Levels before we try to face off against whatever is guarding the banners. Knowing Zack, they are strong. And probably not alone.

But how to do that while dealing with the archers? Those are the biggest threat at the moment due to us needing to climb. I know I suggested a solution to Luca, but I don't see it as actually being a viable plan.

Deciding to deal with that as we get to it – again – I lead Luca down the street as my Mana recovers, keeping an eye out for archers. I also check on Luca constantly, worried something is going to happen to him.

A few times, he has a small pile of rocks in his hands, frowning and shaking his head. I'm not sure what he's doing with the rocks, but okay.

Rocks.

As we walk, I pick up any small rocks I can find, trying to keep them between the size of a shooter marble and twice that size. I send them into my Inventory, but have a plan for them. I doubt it's how Luca has been chasing off the archers, but I can probably throw the rocks at the goblins. With my current Strength, I can probably throw them pretty hard and fast, and do a bit of damage to the archers.

Not long passes before I get to test that, Luca muttering about 'stupid archers thinking they're hidden' alerting me to their presence. I pull the first rock out of my Inventory and aim at the goblin archer, which is aiming at us from the second floor of a building, through a gap that was probably once the window.

Pulling my arm back, I throw the rock. It zips through the air, flashing by the goblin's head. The goblin freezes up for a moment, and I pull another rock out of my Inventory as it recovers from its shock. Luca and I bolt to the side to avoid the arrow, and I throw the second rock. This one strikes the goblin's hand, and then we charge to the building it's in.

I race up the stairs, Luca right behind me, and the archer fires at me as soon as my head pokes up into the second floor. I pull my head back, narrowly avoiding the arrow, then ascend, charging at the goblin as it hastily nocks another arrow.

Swinging my sword, I cut into its arm, causing it to drop the bow, then I strike again, jabbing at its stomach. A third strike to its neck, and I manage to kill it, then quickly check on Luca, who's giving me an innocent look.

What did he do this time?

Dismissing it, I lead Luca back downstairs as I rethink the plan of going up into the buildings. I'm wearing armor, but even it has limits. What if the arrows make it into my eyes? Or pierce the metal?

So maybe we'll stick to throwing the rocks for now.

We resume our trip through the ruins of Talorn, and it doesn't take long for us to come across a quintet of slimes. At least it's not a Goblin Shaman, I don't think I can handle one without another couple of Levels. And as I think that, I realize that that's probably what's guarding each of the banners.

The slimes consist of a Heal Slime, two Water Slimes, and two Earth Slimes. All things I have Skills to deal with. The Heal Slime, I can take out with pure damage, so long as I manage to do it faster than it can use Heal on itself.

The trick with that is avoiding the attacks of the others. They will no doubt do what they can to prevent me from killing it, which would mean I'd need to focus on them, but then it would heal them instead.

Thankfully, they haven't noticed us yet, but it's probably only a matter of time before they do. How should I deal with the Heal Slime? I pull Luca into the ruins of a building as I contemplate the plan, and he sets a bunch of rocks on the ground and starts shifting them around.

"There are five of them, right?" Luca suddenly looks at me.

"What?" I ask.

"Slimes," he points at the rocks. "There are five of them, right?"

I look at the rocks, and realize that he has five rocks in a cluster, and two a short distance away, then several 'buildings' and 'streets' formed with the rocks. He's thinking over a plan with the rocks? It's not a very good representation, but I guess he can visualize it well enough.

"Yes," I nod.

"Okay," he says. "So here's the plan. You kill the Heal Slime, then take on the other four."

He nods to himself, as if that's the best plan there is and it's as simple as that, so I tell him what's wrong with it. He frowns, then shakes his head.

"Guts and effort."

"I'm not Zack."

"Guts and effort!" He insists, pointing at the rocks. "Mr. Zack would just eliminate all five at once."

Okay, yeah, he probably would. Luca has a point on that.

"Guts and effort doesn't work for everything," I tell him.

"Obviously," he rolls his eyes. "No go put in guts and effort. I'll back you up."

"I'm not sure what you're doing to handle those archers," I say. "But I doubt you could actually help me here, Luca."

He looks disappointed.

"Unless it's healing me when needed," I add on quickly. "I meant offensively. You're a good healer."

He still looks disappointed, and now I feel really bad. I hadn't meant it in a mean way, and now upset Luca. I hope he doesn't do anything rash.

After checking his hood and robe to make sure he's protected well enough, I look out of the building and check on the slimes, formulating a plan. I'm regretting having bought this armor. The weight, I can handle because of my Strength stat, but it limits my mobility. Now I understand why Zack's armor is closer to a rogue's than a warrior's.

It gives him much greater freedom of movement.

The downside is that if I get rid of it, I expose myself a lot more. I won't have as much protection over my body to shield me from arrows and other attacks. And then there's-

Where's Luca?

I quickly look around the space I can see, then spot the tail end of his cloak disappearing up the stairs. Chasing after him, I find Luca flat on his stomach on the second floor, looking out into the street from a small gap in the wall.

"Luca!" I hiss as I approach him, crouching. "Don't wander off! What if there was something that attacked you?"

"I checked first," he responds. "So the plan is for you to kill the Heal Slime. After that, kill the others. We can lure them over here with the Wiggle-Wiggle-Jiggle Dance, and-"

"With the what?" I ask.

"The Wiggle-Wiggle-Jiggle Dance," he gives me a confused look. "Max does it all the time, and it always gets slimes to-"

"That's not a dance," I say. "That's Max being Max, Luca. And Max can kill slimes with ease. He'd probably-"

"FIREBALL FURY!"

A series of Fireballs shoot from out of view, slamming into the quintet of slimes and killing them.

"Do that."

"Yay!" I hear Max exclaim. "Ooh! Smell Luca and Gavin!"

He didn't tack 'friend' on to the ends of our names.

"Ow!" Max exclaims. "Braden! Whyyyy?"

I don't hear the response, but Max whines again. Luca and I climb down out of the building and approach Max and Braden, who were walking towards our hiding spot anyway.

"Hi, Luca, Gavin!" Max waves to us, a grin on his face as his tail wags.

"Zack didn't say," Braden tells us. "That we couldn't work together for part of this."

"Are you guys struggling?" I ask.

"Sort of," Braden frowns. "Actually, I was thinking that we swap hunting grounds for awhile. You guys are probably facing ranged things, right?"

"Yes," I nod. "What are you dealing with? I can't figure out what Zack came up with to challenge your abilities."

"Goblin Giants," he answers. "And large groups of monsters. We went to one of our banners, and it has around fifty monsters guarding it, most of them of the warrior variety, meaning lots of Health and resistance to attacks. We found one of yours – it has much fewer numbers, but a Goblin Shaman is there, in addition to several archers and slimes. Nothing near ours."

That's a lot of talking for Braden, but even though he's quiet and his voice is soft, he does talk when there's business to be had.

"So you want," I say. "To try to swap what we're fighting for Levels?"

"Yes," he nods. "I've already estimated where your areas are, so we came to track you down. We weren't far, and Max picked up your scent pretty easily."

I give Max a glance, then realize that he still has most of his Mana. But he used Fireball Fury?

"Fireball Fury isn't actually a Skill," Braden whispers to me, realizing what I was looking at. "It's just him silent-casting and rapid-casting a bunch of Fireballs. He's Max, though, and gets carried away."

Which results in casting as many Fireballs as he can, running out of Mana in the process.

"Ow!" Max exclaims as Luca whacks him over the head with his staff. "Luca, whyyyy?"

Because he's influenced by Zack too much.

"Alright," I tell Braden. "That sounds like a plan, but we're still going to race to finish first."

"So are we," Braden responds. "Let me see your map."

I gesture for Luca to show him the map, and Braden marks three spots on it.

"These are ours," he tells us. "The paths leading to them from each other and from base camp are filled with the monsters fitting our challenge, with some intersection with ranged, which are were the paths cross with yours, it looks like. Max, the map?"

Max hands Braden the map, and Braden marks three spots on it, then nods, handing Luca and Max their maps back.

"Thanks," Braden says. "See you when you get back to camp."

"We'll see you when you get back to camp," Luca retorts, and Braden grins, then takes off with Max.

"Let's go to their paths," I tell Luca. "It'll be easier for me to gain some Levels that way."