Status Name Lilith Race Human Class Elementalist Health Points 580/580 (+1/sec) Mana Points 1200/1200 (+2/sec) Strength 42 Dexterity 64 Constitution 53 Intelligence 179 Willpower 118 Physical Resistance 85 Magical Resistance 187

“Alright, that will do for now!” I say taking a look at my final stats after an hour of “farming” as the fire dies off. The stat growth decreased after a while. Clearly there is a limit to how much I can level grinding creatures that are vastly inferior in strength, even if I do mow them down by the

Satisfied with my “leveling” for now and, quite frankly, a little bored of sitting for a whole hour, I decide to take a stroll out of the valley, following the small unburnt path I left for myself so that I don’t have to walk across a burnt graveyard I left in my wake.

I leave the charred valley, clouds as black as death itself follow me, blown by the winds of the coming reckoning. I will spread my name across this world! What is the point of being powerful if no one else knows how awesome I can be? Hopefully, I’ll run into some dastardly villains soon!

“Aah! Help!” I hear a female voice in the distance.

“Bingo!” I smile and head in the direction of pleas for help.

It takes slightly longer than I anticipated to reach the source of the cries, even at a brisk pace. I keep forgetting that my legs are much shorter than they used to be. Still, after passing a couple more hills I do find what I was looking for. I want a better view, so I climb up one of the small grassy hills, which is hardly anything more than a small “bump” in the landscape.

Standing up, I see a bunch of unsavory individuals harassing a peasant girl. There’s about a dozen of the ruffians. All men, dressed in weathered clothes, armed with daggers and some old swords. I can see that at least one sword is completely rusted even from where I’m standing. Looks like none of them has shaved for a couple of days. It doesn’t look like hygiene is among the priorities for these men and I don’t want to even imagine what they smell like.

A couple of the ruffians are standing over a young lad laying in a pool of his own blood. One of the men is sitting, trying on the leather shoes of the deadman. The girl is already tied up with scratchy-looking rope and gagged with some old cloth. One of the bigger, shirtless men picks up the girl and carries her to an old wooden wagon.

The wagon doesn’t even have any sort of cover from the weather. Just something a farmer might have to take his harvest to the market. A man in a black cloak is at the head of the wagon, with the curb reins of a single, brown, muscly horse responsible for pulling the wagon. Inside the wagon, there are three more young girls tied up and gagged. So these guys are just riding along the countryside killing men and stealing pretty girls? Perfect!

“Unhand that girl, you vile criminals!” I shout from atop the small hilltop.

They turn their heads in my direction and finally notice me.

“Bwahaha!” One of them laughs. “Did you hear that lads? That little girl just called us “vile criminals”!”

“Why don’t you come down here and teach us a lesson?” Another man says and licks the blood off his dagger. Yuck!

“Alright, I’ll do just that!” I say loudly with a smile and slowly walk down the hill.

Some might think this is reckless of me. After all, I’m in the body of a small girl, challenging a dozen grown men to a fight! And I suppose there is a cosmically remote possibility that one of them could be dangerous to me. But in all seriousness, I only need a single look and a tiny bit of savviness to realize that is as unlikely a possibility as one of them being the King of Spain!

The poor, beggar-level clothing, old, starter-level weapons, and the fact that it takes twelve of them to find the courage to attack peasants tells me all I need to know. And if by some miracle one of them actually turns out to be the Kind of Spain I can always just burn them all alive in my Heavenly Fires.

“Who’s the strongest among you?” I ask as I approach them.

“Heh, sure, that’d be me,” The big, shirtless man puts the girl in the wagon and approaches me. I’m already standing in his shadow and he’s still two yards away from me! Is he like seven feet or something?

“You see this?” The man holds up a bronze chain with a small, round bronze medallion attached to it. The medallion has some sort of castle or dungeon silhouette carved on it. “This means I’ve cleared a bronze level dungeon! Me! Alone!”

“Hm. I’m new around here, but isn’t bronze the lowest level of any ranking system using metals?”

“Wha—?” The big man seemed to be both shocked and furious at the same time.

One of the ruffians snickered behind his back. I can only assume that this guy loves to show off his precious medallion at the slightest opportunity.

“It’s not the lowest rank, you dumb kid!” The big man shouts at me. “Copper is!”

“Ah, so you needed to level up to bronze before working up the courage to attack small girls?”

“Whyyy, youuu…” The big man grinds his teeth and clenches his fist, threatening to pop a vein on his forehead.

“Are you really getting so worked up because of a small child throwing insults at you?” I say and cross my arms.

A couple of ruffians start laughing out loud.

“Alright, I’m going to teach you a lesson you will never forget!” The man says through his teeth and reaches to grab me.

“Freeze!” I point my index finger at him and let out a ray of cold, snow and ice.

First, the man’s open hand freezes over and the ice rapidly spreads up his arm, to his shoulder, neck, and chest. Within three seconds the man frozen solid in several inches of semi-translucent white and blue ice.

There is a moment of silence.

“Shall we pay our respects?” I ask the others and close my eyes, bow my head and hold my hands together. Of course, I open one eye to glance at the ruffians who are still in utter shock. After all, I can’t have them throw a dagger or something while I’m showing off.

“Kill the little demon!” One of them finally shouts and runs at me, holding his sword high with both hands.

There it is! I point my index finger at his head and shout, “Ice Spear!”

A thin, six-feet long ice spear flies from my fingertip through the charging man’s forehead. His legs loose strength and he falls forward dead.

Skill name: Ice Spear Level: 1/20 Type: Active Cost: 30 MP Fires a single thin ice spear, up to fifty yards in range.

A couple more ruffians try their luck, but I simply fire my Ice Spears at them, skewering two and three of them at a time like shashlik. Now I just need some fire.

“It’s the devil! Run!!” with over half of the criminals dead or dying, the others have a more appropriate reaction and run each in their own direction. The man sitting at the wagon lashes the horse, trying to run away.

“Oh, target practice?” I ask no one in particular, close my left eye and aim the index finger of my right hand like a gun at the backs of the bandits. Of course, the first I down is, unfortunately, the horse. By some miracle, the wagon does not topple over. The bandit in charge of the wagon jumps off and tries to run, but my ice spear flies straight through his spine and he falls over.

One at a time, I unleash ice spears at the other bandits. I’m ashamed to admit that I did miss a couple of times and three bandits managed to run out of my range. But that will probably work for the best—what better way to spread my name than having terrified criminals do it for me?

“Aw, bugger!” I exclaim remembering the crucial detail. “They don’t know my name!”

I frown, disappointed in myself.

“Oh well, can’t do anything about it, so why worry now?” I say, cheering up and walk over to the wagon to free the girls.

Just as I take my first steps since arriving to face the ruffians, I see the big ice cube melt. The “bronze” ruffian drops to the ground, face-first like a statue. His skin is pale blue. He’s dead. I suppose it would’ve been unreasonable to expect him to have magic resistance even remotely close to mine.

On my way, I pick up one of the ruffian’s daggers to cut the ropes. As I walk closer, I notice the girl’s eyes, wide in horror. All four of them huddle together in the corner of the wagon, trying to stay as far away from me as possible.

“Oh, it’s alright! Don’t worry! I’ve come to help you!” I try to reassure them as smile as gently as I can and lower the dagger. I hope I don’t look like a little demon, about to feast on its prize.

Though the girls still tremble in fear, they do let me cut the ropes. I let them remove the gags themselves.

“T-thank you!” the girl that was taken last says to me. Her hair is red as the fires that I caused in the valley.

“Return to your homes!” I say to the girls. “And let everyone know—wherever there will be evil, whenever an innocent will suffer, there will be Lilith!”