"If I hadn't accidentally gained those levels with that minor incident, where I caused a massive amount of water to killed dozens, I would not have survived that fight, Mae." I looked to Mae wanting some reassurance that I could do this.

"Yeah, you are not great with archery, but your ability with blades is also terrible. I agree with your assessment that you are lucky to have gained those levels when you did. We really need to get you trained up." Mae said as she cast a healing spell on me. "I have some ability to heal you, but I am unable to damage an enemy for you. So hopefully this helps a little."

I instantly felt the surge of magical healing and my HP went up by 25 points. I was now at 40 HP and really wanted to get it back to full as soon as possible. I looted the two scouts and found a few more arrows, a scroll of healing, and a cooking pot. Earlier I had looted some raw meat off of a goblin who must have been the camp's cook. Mae said if it was in my inventory it wouldn't degrade. She also said that a cooked piece of meat would start restoring HP at a slow rate.

I could tell that it was at least late afternoon and now that I had something to cook in I started looking for the safest place possible for a campsite with a fire. I found I spot where it would be harder to sneak up on me and built a fire. I started cooking a piece of the raw meat and set up a makeshift bedroll with some scrap fabric I had looted. I realized that I never grabbed that sleeping bag, but it was too late now.

After a few minutes, the description of the meat changed from raw to cooked and it showed HP rejuvenation that wasn't there before. I ate it and my HP started slowly going up and I felt a wave of relief until Mae asked me what animal that meat came from and I realized that I had no idea. I hope it was from an animal and not a goblin steak or something.

I put it out of my mind and told myself that none of this was real. I'm just in a coma and will probably have no memory of this when I wake. What started to bother me is that it had been almost a full day now and everything felt so real, but I guess time doesn't really work the same in dreams and I'd had ones that felt real before.

I sat by the fire for a while thinking of the day's events. I didn't know much about Mae so why did I trust her so easily and why did she seem so familiar? I looked over at her and she was laying down on her side on a bit of cloth. Her back and wings were facing me and I marveled at the small creature. I laid down on my makeshift bed and dozed off.

I woke up to a stabbing pain in my leg. I shot my upper body up and looked around. "I've been stabbed!" I said stupidly to the wide-eyed goblin holding the dagger that he had just stabbed me with. I thought of my sword and it appeared in my hand. Lunging forward my blade sank into the goblin's chest and he fell beside me. Where the heck was Mae? I looked around and saw her flying towards me.

"I tried to wake you up," she said as she cast her healing spell on me again. "You were out. Probably from nearly dying yesterday. It takes a good amount of energy to fight and heal."

I felt the magical healing fix the wound in my leg and my health rose back to full. "I need to set up some sort of early warning system if I'm going to be sleeping out here anymore. That was the crappiest way to wake up," I said as I rubbed my fully healed leg. I got up and stretched then went to loot the goblin, "At least that goblin wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer. Why stab me in the leg when he could have killed me?"

"You got lucky," said Mae looking around for more enemies. "He probably thought no one would be stupid enough to camp in the middle of an enemy outpost and sleep without a guard and was just making sure you were dead already. Or he was just very dumb."

"I should probably try to find a friendly town or something. Maybe I can get some proper gear or at least a good meal and a bed," I said just thinking out loud, "If only I had some sort of GUIDE to GUIDE me in the right direction."

"No need to sass me. I can only guide you if you ask me questions," said Mae matter of factly. "How will you learn anything if I just inundate you with every piece of knowledge I have all at once? You'll be more confused than ever."

"Ok then, are there any friendly towns around here? Where do I go next? Why am I not hungry? Why don't I need to go to the bathroom?" I almost always have to use the restroom when I wake up, but thinking back I haven't gone since I got here. Hadn't really been hungry or thirsty either.

"I share a map with you so I have the same locational information you have, but we might start by at least checking out the smoke we saw when we were higher up the mountain. It could be a town or another enemy outpost. The food you eat and drinks you consume convert directly into HP so you won't have to relieve yourself here. The closest you get to feeling hungry or thirsty here is when your HP is low," Mae explained as she flew back towards me relaxing a bit, "I don't see any enemies, but we should get moving."

As she said that I noticed something was only now revealed by the morning sun. A fairly large metal chest sat about 30 feet away half-covered by mud and debris. I hadn't seen it in the waning daylight, but it was visible now. I covered the distance quickly and examined the chest. I guessed it was the strongbox of the orc warlord. That must've been the building where the leader of the camp was set up. I know from playing RPGs that it wasn't unusual to get better loot from enemy leaders and bosses. I excitedly opened the container and couldn't have been happier. It contained a spellbook, a couple of scrolls of healing, some good-quality arrows, and a full-sized recurve bow, "I knew putting points into Blessing would help my chances at better loot."

I opened the spellbook and saw the runic symbols within start to glow. The book's pages started rapidly flipping themselves as a stream of green light cascaded from the middle of the book into my chest. It only took a few seconds and then I knew how to cast a spell called "Minor Heal". It could heal myself or another entity up to 20 HP. The spell cost seemed to depend on how long I held the spell before casting it. Each HP healed equated to about 1 MP spent and it took me a while to gain back magic points, but I felt a little better knowing I could now heal myself.

"Oh yay, that will come in super handy since you keep almost dying again," said Mae genuinely seeming happy even though that was a mean thing to say and she knew it. "Don't worry about it. You will grow stronger over time."

I did worry about it though. I am a terrible fighter and even though I was pretty sure my current state could be explained scientifically, it still hurt when I got stabbed. Also, what happens if I die, besides it probably hurting a lot? Is this like a matrix 'your mind makes it real' situation or will I just wake up in the hospital?

"I guess I'll just keep trying to not die then," I said as I started walking towards the direction of the smoke we had seen from higher up the mountain, "Let's move."

"Die again," Mae said as she flew beside me.