Ashford jumped off his beat-up couch and sprinted to his front door. A shatter resounded through his apartment, escaping his notice as he slammed his door shut behind him.

He flew down the stairs at a breakneck pace, sprinting faster than he’d ever run before to get to his pristine navy blue 2012 Ford F-150. He jumped in and revved the engine up. Throwing it into reverse, he peeled out of the space and sped away at a ridiculous speed.

Cruising down Ashley River Rd, his eyes screwed up and his mouth opened slightly at the distinct lack of people around. At certain sights, his eyes opened wide and his mouth moved in a soundless motion. Some of the classical herbivores such as rabbits and deer seemed to be wildly mutated versions and were tearing at each other and tearing chunks out of those that had died.

Continuing down the road, his eyes narrowed at the scene ahead of him. He saw two men standing over something. Even more strange, was the other man sitting atop some type of mount a short distance away from the others. What made them all strange, however, was their apparel.

The foot soldiers seemed to have a type of lamellar armor sitting over a thick gambeson. In their hands, a spear and shield combo was touted above the spectacle below them. The two spears were dyed in a crimson fluid.

The man standing over the others wore a seemingly more valuable set of armor. There were thick metal greaves seated above polished sabatons. A pair of cuisses were worn to protect the thigh and his chest was protected by a cuirass. Vambraces, upper and lower cannon, sat on his arms to protect them further. The metal was shined to a glimmering sheen and showed little use.

He sat atop his steed peering down upon the others with an imperious gaze. Even more bizarre, was that his steed wasn’t normal. No, it was far from it.

The animal had the coloring and basic attributes of a horse, but their claws and teeth seemed razor sharp and their skin had little to no hair. Rather, it looked strangely reptilian with scutes along their skin. As he got further along the road, he noticed two people sitting on the ground, blood seeping from their abdomens.

As soon as he realized that these men weren’t helping, he swerved off the road, splattering one of the henchmen with his truck. He stomped on the breaks and applied the emergency brake before getting out.

He summoned a large amount of mana out of the air before surrounding it and began vibrating it faster than he thought possible. The amount of energy being produced from this incredibly dense amount of mana was immense.

He started losing control of the mana and so he threw it in the direction of the other man. The superheated ball of mana rocketed towards the foot soldier, exploding in a spectacular combustion that threw the nearby knight off his horse. The foot soldier, however, was reduced to a distorted mass of burnt flesh. The rapidly expanding gases had ripped him apart.

Seeing this, Ashford knelt over and vomited right on his boots. Seeing a man shot in his service was much different from witnessing someone explode. He retched several more times at the stench of burnt flesh that pervaded the surroundings. While he was in a stupor, however, the knight frantically kicked his horse into action.

Thundering down the distance, the knight couched his lance and aimed straight at Ashford kneeling on the ground. He bore down on Ashford and Ashford looked up at the incoming knight, concussed.

His mind hadn’t restarted yet, so he stared at the knight for several seconds before bursting into action. He threw himself to the side as the knight reached him to no avail.

The knight’s lance pierced through the edge of his torso, piercing excruciatingly into his chest. He shrieked in agony as he stared at the gruesome puncture. In the corner of his vision, he saw a small blue number pop up.

-15 HP!

His brain started shutting down as he realized that he was going to die. After 42 years of breathing and loving and hating and wanting and needing and breathing and living, he was going to die. Scorching tears dragged their way across his cheeks at this realization.

He saw the knight pulling back on the reigns and he despaired. The knight lined up and started charging towards him once more. Out of the depths of his despair, he felt a glimmer of resolve. If he was going to be killed, he would make damn sure the knight was taken down with him.

Encompassing the largest amount of mana he’d ever taken and compressing it down into the size of a tennis ball, he rapidly increased the movement of the wild mana, keeping a tight grip on the personal mana. When he was satisfied, he looked to his right at the fireball and saw the ball so bright, it outshined the sun at this distance. It was so bright he was unable to look anywhere near it.

He saw the knight shying away from the spell, and with a profound sense of vengeance, he sent the orb flying at the knight. Upon impact, the spell exploded with the force of 10 pounds of TNT, obliterating the knight and the concussive force washed over Ashford before he got a blast of fire right to the face. The shrapnel peppered Ashford’s body, causing his health bar to drop below 0 and his body went slack as his eyes started lightlessly into the sky.

There was no smoke as there were no particles produced from the waste of a chemical reaction. It was just pure carnage. The searing flames kept crawling over his skin even after his health bar went below 0.

Ashford came to when he felt a shocking splash of water washed across his face. He sat up, screaming out from the shock. Looking around, Ashford saw that the two people that he’d saved seemed to have conversely saved him. Surprisingly to him, he recognized one of them.

“Mr. Delaware? Is that you? What are you doing here?” Ashford exclaimed weakly. He was rather worried about the man, seeing as how his face was ashen.

After he said these words, Canton collapsed. Looking at Canton’s abdomen, he could tell that Canton had been lucky. None of his vital organs or arteries had been punctured by the spear.

Ashford whispered to the other man, “Quickly, get the first aid kit from my truck!” Looking around, he found that somehow, his wound had been sewed closed. He looked down and his eyes jumped open as he saw the first aid kit sitting next to him. He looked over to the other man, at which he shook his head and he stared at Canton’s unmoving body.

His face quickly turned red as he sat up, breathing heavily. He frantically shuffled towards the unmoving body. Applying pressure, he finally felt that he’d gotten the situation under control. The other person, a 30-year-old or so man, was sitting nearby, staring out into the distance.

“Hey, you there! Can you please help me out? I need you to apply pressure while I call 911!” He called out to the man as his strength returned to him. His gaze shot over to Ashford, seemingly staring right through him for a second, making Ashford recoil slightly and eyes unfocused. After a moment, the man startled, realizing Ashford was talking to him.

“Huh?” the man said dumbly.

“Dude, come on, help me dammit!” Ashford said, internally facepalming.

“Oh... okay…” he said as he ambled over after Ashford thanked him.

After bandaging Canton’s wound and checking on the other man, he looked around. They’d been in front of a residential house, possibly one of the men’s homes.

“So what’s your name?” Ashford asked amicably. His strength had returned to him enough to talk normally, although he knew that he wasn’t going to be lifting anything heavy anytime soon.

“… Dean,” the other man muttered.

During their short ‘conversation,’ Canton’s eyes fluttered open and his mouth opened slightly. His eyes quickly snapped over to Ashford before he took a deep breath. His mouth started moving, but Ashford quickly interrupted him.

“Where do you live?” Ashford asked the two of them, trying to get Canton’s attention off the wound.

“I’m from out of town,” Dean mumbled out

“I live in this piece of shit,” Canton grunted out past the pain.

Looking up at the house, Ashford cringed at the peeling paint and corroded corrugated metal roofs. Additionally, the yard in front was rife with weeds.

Looking at the Dean, he said, “Can you help Canton into the house? I think I can manage myself.”

Dean pulled Canton onto his feet and helped him into the house. Ashford grunted out as he stood up. Slowly limping his way behind them, they finally reached the inside. Sitting Canton down on the couch, Dean got something for him to drink and started thinking.

As he was in his mind thinking, Dean broke his train of thought by saying, “So, where are you planning on going?”

“Why do you want to know?” Ashford asked suspiciously.

“Well… I figure that I’m safer with you. Could I please follow you? Please, I’ll do anything! I just don’t want to die,” Dean responded with teary eyes pointed to the ground.

The problem was, Canton’s wound prevented them from moving. If Ashford were to help Dean, helping Canton was necessary. If he was only helping Dean, that wouldn’t be right. He knew that he was their best hope.

The only feasible way that they could move as if he were to somehow heal Canton’s wound. After making magic happen, he figured he’d be able to figure something out. So, he got to thinking, reasoning out the problem.

Delving into his consciousness, he observed the aura of Canton. There were dark particles exuding from his aura. When he looked closer, they centered around Canton’s wound. Pulling these away from his wound, Canton’s breathing came easier.

Looking at the wound, he could see that the red inflammation started to recede, eventually, it started to scab over at an incredible rate. Even though it was an incredible rate, he could tell it’d take days of constant care to fully fix the wound.

He pushed his personal mana into the wound, and the rate picked up even further. After several minutes, the wound had finally closed well enough to move.

“Canton, I have a… proposition. As you saw, I have certain… capabilities, shall we say, and I need your help. I need someone to watch my back, and I trust you more than I do Dean,” Ashford asked, practically on his knees.

“Dr. Ashford-” he started mournfully.

“Just Ashford, there are no doctors nowadays,” Ashford chuckled darkly.

“Mr. Ashford, I can’t. I need to find my daughter. Her husband passed away and she doesn’t have anyone to protect her and her baby... if you… if you promise me that you will make her your number one priority, then yes. I will.” He decided resolutely.

“What is her name? What does she look like?” Ashford inquired.

“That doesn’t matter… she’s probably dead anyways,” Canton said, seemingly giving up any hope.

“Canton, I understand you’re panicking, but you need to calm down. We don’t know that anything has happened to her, but we also know that she’s safer with us. So that means we need to find her soon, right? Where would she be? Is she at home? Where is her child? All of these questions need answers before we decide what to do.” Ashford said soothingly.

“Dean, you can follow me but we need to find Canton’s daughter. As such, you need to decide right now. Are you going to follow me, or are you going to go on your own?” Ashford said, directed in Dean’s general direction.

“I… I…” Dean stuttered out.

“You need to decide now!” Ashford shouted.

“Fine! I’ll follow you, okay?” Dean replied, seeming very stressed out.

“Alright, grab anything we might need. We’ll leave soon.” Ashford replied.

“Alright, Canton answer these questions in this order. First, what is her name?” Ashford asked calmly.

“Sachi, her name is Sachi,” Canton explained.

“Okay, second, where would she be?” Ashford once again asked.

“At her home. She would’ve already picked up her daughter. “ Canton said, surer of himself.

“Okay, that’s my third question answered. Can you drive me to her house? I’ll sit in the pickup bed and make sure nothing bothers us.” Ashford ordered.

After they got themselves loaded up, Canton started driving. About 30 minutes passed by before something eventful happened. Ashford was sitting in the back, twirling a strand of mana particles around his hand when they started hearing a strange sound.

After several moments, he was barely able to make out the sound of metal screeching and protesting at some type of strain. When the truck started slowing down, Canton looked over the edge of the cab.

When Ashford peeked over the edge of the truck, his eyes unfocused and his heart started racing at a mile a minute. A small group of gargantuan wolves, approximately 3 wolves, was running after a crippled, spluttering van. The van had huge gashes torn out of its roof. The right tires were fully gone and the one rear left tire that they could see was in shreds.

“Gun it Canton!” Ashford screamed. They rocketed down the long road at the group of enemies. Ashford fired up several fireballs, stretching his mental capacities to the maximum. Just as he got within 20 yards, he chucked them with all his mental might.

The fireballs streaked down the distance, two of them impacting the wolves, and the other veering off to the left, almost hitting the van. The truck continued to roar down the road towards the last standing wolf. He once again conjured three more fireballs, throwing them all at the third, unscathed wolf. The truck went rolling right over the dead wolf.

The truck shot forward, plowing into the sides of one of the recovering wolves. It died when the massive truck plowed into its horse-sized sides. Canton drove over to the stopped van. Peeking inside, Ashford could glimpse an elderly couple and what seemed to be two grandchildren.

“Get in!” Ashford screamed out as he turned around. He pumped his muscles full of mana and wrestled the wolf to the ground. At the same time, Dean also jumped out, helping hold down the wolf. He tried to cast a fireball, yet for whatever reason, he wasn’t able to exude the personal mana necessary.

He froze up at this realization long enough for the wolf to chomp down on his arm, gnawing on it before his bone finally gave in, sending searing pain through his arm as he wailed out at witnessing his own arm break in half. As he glanced back, he saw the elderly couple usher the kids up into the truck bed. Once they’d hiked themselves up, he screamed to Canton, “GUN IT!”

During this excruciating pain, he dropped the mana empowerment. As he dropped the mana empowerment and pulled his arm out, it lashed out at Dean, catching Dean's throat, shredding it into pieces. Dean's eyes shot wide open as blood gushed out of his savages throat. The wolf pulled back, seeing Dean's throat wound and its eyes shined with a satisfied gleam.

As he regained personal mana control, he conjured another fireball. Throwing it into the open mouth of the wolf after he pulled back from Dean, he stared at the wolf as its midsection blew into pieces. Whining pitifully, it dragged itself away from Ashford as Ashford ran over to Dean's body.

Dean started spluttering out blood as he tried to say something. Leaning down to hear it, Ashford just barely heard out, "I... I thought I was supposed to be safe..."

This statement broke down Ashford as he knelt over Dean's dead body as he sobbed. He bawled his eyes out there for several moments for Dean, before he put his arms under Dean's knees and neck. Pulling him up, he slowly walked back to the truck. His arm was pulsing in agony as he carried Dean's body with the unbroken section of his arm, tears leaking down his face.

When he finally got to the stationary truck, he put Dean into the truck before collapsing on the ground, unconscious.

Surfacing from unconsciousness, he stared up at the passing blue sky. God, I hope this was just a dream. He thought to himself. Putting his weight on his broken arm, he shrieked out in pain as he collapsed back down.

“Stop moving! What are you thinking, we nearly lost you!” The elderly woman declared angrily.

“How long was I out?” Ashford grunted out.

“About half an hour!” Canton yelled from within the truck's cabin.

“Did- Did Dean make it?” Ashford choked out.

“No... No, he didn't Ashford,” The elderly woman said gingerly. At this, his small bit of dignity broke down and all he felt was despair and uselessness. If only he’d never let Dean join them. If only he’d not frozen up. If only… if only…

Falling into meditation to numb the pain, he was about to repeat his previous ministrations with Canton before he realized something. The problem was the position of the bone.

The bone was shattered in several locations, namely where the wolf’s teeth were left. Tenderly encircling a small shard of bone with his mana, he was able to move it slowly back into place. He did this again and again over the course of the next hour and finally finished, keeping the shape of his bone with constant telekinesis. Finally, he pumped personal mana to weakly bind the bones before releasing his control.

The mana acted much quicker, accelerating the speed of regeneration considerably. Within ten minutes, he heard a faint ding as his arm felt fully fixed. Looking in the top left of his vision, he noticed a blinking red dot. When he stared intently at it, a series of screens appeared.

New Skill Created!

Telekinesis

Classification C, Rank 2

2-8 Healing

Channeling: During non-combat situations, you may channel this spell for a constant healing every second.

Mana Cost: 10

New Spell Created!

Heal

Classification E, Rank 2

2-8 Healing

Channeling: During non-combat situations, you may channel this spell for a constant healing every second.

Mana Cost: 10

Skill Level Increase x3!

Mana Manipulation Level 10(MAX)

Skill Level Increase x4!

Mana Empowerment Level 5(29%)

Experience Awarded!

+ 175 EXP for Skill Level Increase x7

Experience Awarded!

1,000 EXP for Grade C Spell Creation

Experience Awarded!

10 EXP for Grade E Spell Creation

Do you want to rank up Mana Manipulation?

BEGINNER > NOVICE

Y / N

Do you want to rank up Mana Manipulation?

NOVICE > ADEPT

Y / N

You leveled up x2!

LVL 1 > LVL 3

+6 Available Stat Increases

He paused upon being swamped with the slew of notifications. He definitely needed to check these more often he somberly told himself. He was barely able to stand himself when he was in meditation, nonetheless when he was out of the emotion-numbing state. He didn't know how he was going to live with himself. Selecting Y, he then thought ‘Status’ to open up his Character Screen.

Status Screen

Name:

Ashford Meyers

Level:

3

Class:

None

Titles:

Mana Master

Experience:

480

EXP to LVL UP:

20

Health:

16/16

Mana:

26/26

Statistics

+6 Available

INT:

F-3

AGI:

G-1

WIS:

F-2

DEX:

G-3

MND:

G-4

STR:

G-2

CHA:

G-2

VIT:

G-3

Titles +

Skills +

Spells +

Status Screen

Name:

Ashford Meyers

Level:

3

Class:

None

Titles:

Mana Master

Experience:

480

EXP to LVL UP:

20

Health:

13/13

Mana:

22/34 > 37/49

Statistics

INT:

F-3 > F-5

AGI:

G-1

WIS:

F-2 > F-4

DEX:

G-3

MND:

G-4 > F-1

STR:

G-2

CHA:

G-2

VIT:

G-3

Titles +

Skills +

Spells +

After deliberating for a moment, he decided to increase his mental stats by 2 each. It seemed for each level up, he gained 3 stat increases. As he finally hit the accept button, his mind’s perception of mana seemed to extend and intensify. His instincts told him that he could also control mana better and farther. His mana pool seemed to have increased. It also seemed to be returning faster.

He knew that his current state wasn’t sufficient for this brave, new world of his. If he wanted to protect others, like he failed to do with Dean, he needed to get stronger, faster, and smarter. Quickly. Utilizing his strengths seemed to be the obvious path. Once again delving into meditation in the back of the truck, he felt for the mana around him. He found that he could control the particles much easier now.

It seemed that accepting the two mana manipulation increases had more benefits than obvious. And with that, he started scheming up new spells.

There are many tropes in fantasy novels, ranging from magic missile to fireball. He figured that he had an area of effect spell, caused by the explosive nature of fireball, so he knew he needed something more focused. Anything piercing in nature would help him.

Thinking of the usual types of elements, several came to him ranging from ice to nature or wood to even metal. He figured that anything ethereal in nature would be more difficult to achieve, so elements like void or spirit were out of the question. The piercing necessity ruled out elements like fire and nature. He debated for a short time between metal and ice, but finally, he decided on Ice as his next pursuit.

He would work further on fire, but his current focus was ice. Now, he needed to figure out how he was going to form the ice necessary. He knew that ice was just frozen water. The problem he had, however, was generating that water.

He tried to coax the surrounding water out, stopping virtually all movement in a small area, quickly the area reached sub-zero. The only problem was, the water in the air wasn’t enough to for any type of projectile. He went through his pack for a short while to find the necessary water for his experiments.

After pouring some of the water into his hand, he surrounded the liquid with wild mana. Floating it up in front of him, he realized a flaw in his plans. He wasn’t able to propel the water very far at all. He sat there for several minutes before he got an idea. He thought of the chemical makeup of water, two oxygens, and one hydrogen.

He imagined all the intermolecular forces making that miraculous molecule feasible. The different minerals in water, while he didn’t know intimately he did know generals, like magnesium. He pressed all of this knowledge into a packet of personal mana, and when he opened his eyes there was a floating ball of water which was still his. He had complete control over the position of this water. He slowed the movement, watching as the mana became locked into a rigid structure of what seemed to be hexagons.

He formed the ice into a dense three-foot long icicle floating above his right shoulder. He catapulted this spike forwards towards a nearby passing tree. Of course, due to the moving car and awkward nature of his position, his shot veered wildly to the left. It hit another tree, embedding itself two feet into the massive trunk. He noticed a new notification and looked to the upper left portion of his view.

New Spell Created!

Icicle Spike

Classification C, Rank 4

4-32 Piercing Ice Damage

Experience Awarded!

+ 40 EXP for Grade C Spell Creation

You leveled up!

LVL 3 > LVL 4

+3 Available Stat Increases

Status Screen

Name:

Ashford Meyers

Level:

4

Class:

None

Titles:

Mana Master

Experience:

520

EXP to LVL UP:

240

Health:

16/16

Mana:

27/30 > 29/32

Statistics

INT:

F-5 > E-1

AGI:

G-1

WIS:

F-4 > F-5

DEX:

G-3

MND:

F-1 > F-2

STR:

G-2

CHA:

G-2

VIT:

G-3

Titles +

Skills +

Spells +

Smiling an ironic, small smile to himself, he began practicing small versions of the spell. He looked around the truck and saw the people with him. If he wanted to protect those with him, he needed to get serious. It didn't matter if he was hurting emotionally, these people were depending on him. Within another 5 minutes, they arrived at their destination.

When they arrived at the apartment building, Ashford’s eyes narrowed and he stared around the truck in suspicion. Seeing nothing, he cautiously hops out of the bed of the truck, shortly followed by Canton leaving the truck. Slowly padding up the concrete walkway, he kept an ear out. Peering around his surroundings, he was shocked out of his trance by a female scream from within.

Hearing this, Ashford springs into action, slamming the front door open and sprinted up the staircase. Going by the racket that the woman was making, she was on the 5th floor. Throwing open the stairs door, he looked down the hallway. There, right in front of one of the apartment doors, was a group of unsavory men.

Upon the loud bang of the door, they turned to the left and stared at the duo. Finally realizing what made the racket, the leader said, “Hahaha, look at this little scumbag. He thought he’d be a hero, didn’t you? Well, come ge-- glech,”

Upon getting a large icicle inside his chest, he stopped. Looking down slowly, he stared at the protruding icicle that Ashford had cold-bloodedly thrown into him, he finally collapsed. As if the signal gun in a race, the other four sprinted down the hall at the pair.

Ashford only had time to get out a quick icicle, disabling one of the men’s arms before they arrived on them. The injured man and another guy jumped at Ashford while Canton dealt with the other two. Firing up his mana empowerment at full capacity, he punched out at the injured man, only to witness his head splatter all over the ground behind him.

The other man, upon seeing this, gave a horrified shriek before backpedaling into the nearby wall. Slowly stalking towards him, Ashford conjured an ice crystal. Staring into the eyes of the man, all he saw was terror and fear. Slowly dismantling the icicle, he said to him, “It’s okay… I won’t kill you. You’re okay…”

As soon as the icicle was fully gone, however, the man jumped at him once more, this time with a dagger poised to stab into his throat. At the last minute, a ‘shluck’ resounded throughout the room as Canton stabbed his own dagger into the man’s eye socket.

Slowly his body fell to the ground, lifeless. Looking over towards where Canton was before, he saw that the other two were also dead, throats slit like pigs in a slaughter. He started retching all over the floor, losing his previously eaten lunch.

“Sachi? Sachi! Are you in there? Open up Sachi!” Canton called out to the people behind the door, apparently ignoring Ashford’s predicament.

They heard a clattering behind the door and a large crash. After several more moments, they saw a young teenager open the door.

She peered out, saw Canton, and then said, “Mr. Delaware! What are you doing here?”

Looking down at Canton’s blood-splattered shirt, she said, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine Becca. It’s not my blood. Where is Sachi?” Canton asked while trying to peer past her.

“Oh, she’s not here. Is she okay? The news is saying horrible things, and then those guys were banging on the door…” She trailed off.

“I need to know where she went. I need to find her.”

“Oh, she went to the doctor. Her head was hurting. She also said that she would stop by the grocery store before heading home.” Becca responded looking rapidly between the two.

Turning around to leave, Canton started down the hallway before Becca grabbed his sleeve.

“Wait! Don’t just leave me here, please! What happens if someone else hears Jordan?” Becca asked, eyes wide open with fright.

“We need to leave! Grab Jordan and whatever you need. We’re leaving soon.” Canton said before turning around and continuing out to the truck. Becca stood there looking at Ashford.

“Well? Chop chop! Faster!” Ashford exclaimed before also walking out. After waiting a short time, Becca came out of the house with Jordan in her arms. She had a backpack that seemed full of baby products.

Getting everyone loaded up, they started towards the local Walmart.

It took only about 15 minutes before they arrived before the large grey building. Looking at the parking lot, it seemed many of the cars were destroyed.

“There! That’s her car!” Canton shouted, pointing at a modern small sedan.

“Alright, I’ll go inside, I need you to stay with the others and protect them, Canton,” Ashford ordered quickly. He jumped out of the pickup bed and stalked to the sliding doors cautiously.

Creeping through the front door, he noticed that the lights inside were flickering on and off. This continued for a moment before finally going out, upon which he could hear the cries of men and women alike sound out. He looked around for a moment for any movement, and despite not seeing anything he didn’t move quite yet. He wasn’t able to see properly enough to confirm so he needed to create light.

Shouting out for Sachi, he lit up a small pocket of wild mana to create a makeshift torch. Stalking down the aisle, row by row, he jumped back, screaming like a little girl when his foot bumped into a body. After recovering from the shock, he looked down to find a human staring lifelessly up at him.

They were killed by what seemed to be weapons judging by the clean slashes and stabs. Following further down the aisle, he found many more bodies. Time after time, he wasn’t able to find a single survivor. Finally, he got to a closed door that seemed to have marks gouged out of it. Knocking on the door, he called out, “Sachi! Are you in there?”

As soon as he let out those words, the hair on the back of his neck stuck up and his eyes widened in fear as he slowly looked behind him. Right before he finished turning around, an excruciating pain stabbed into his side. Protruding from his abdomen, he could see the point of a spear. Looking behind him, he saw a classic opponent.

Standing at about 4 foot tall, the little monster had a dark green skin and a bulbous belly. His face was distorted with a foot long fat nose, horizontal ears, and yellow sharp teeth. In its hands, it carried the aforementioned spear.

Surrounding the accursed goblin with wild mana, he vibrated it rapidly, beginning to roast him. The goblin burned into a crisp along with the handle of the spear. When he looked past the corpse, he could see beady yellow eyes flashing in the faint torchlight. When he saw this, he heard someone open the door behind him.