He didn't have enough Mana to Shadow Step to the base, but that wasn't part of the plan. Connie would use her Flash Spell to blind their group of goblins. Doris was fighting the goblin with the chainmail armour and Barbara and Connie were fighting one of the Goblin Fighters

When James arrived at the ledge, Connie was casting a Magic Dart to try and finish off the Goblin Fighter that Barbara was duelling. Fortunately, Magic Dart doesn't miss, but they don't do an overwhelming amount of damage either. The goblin's leather armour had blocked some of Magic Dart.

Doris was in a fight with the Goblin Warrior. The two-handed sword had cut off chucks of Doris' shield, and she had to backpedal more than once to avoid a Power Swing. The Goblin Warrior was not looking too healthy as it had several burns to its face and blood flowed freely from several wounds.

Targetting the Goblin Warrior, James let loose with a barrage of PSI Bolts. It only took five bolts to cause it to stagger, giving Doris the opening she needed to swoop in with her Flaming Sword and decapitate the Warrior. Without pausing in his casting, James switched targets to the Goblin Fighter and hit it twice in the back before it too fell. Barbara didn't waste any time stabbing it a couple of times to make sure it was dead.

Doing a glance around, James called out, "Clear!" The women looked up at him before Doris shook her head.

James grabbed the three goblin corpses, dropped them off the edge, and searched the area for anything of value. The area was set up with blankets on the hard ground and a fire pit. Not wanting to search through their items, James used his sword to peel back the blankets and shuffle things around. Satisfied that there was nothing of value, he turned and headed back to the ledge.

"Anything interesting?" James called down.

Connie held out a coin purse, "The shaman had almost ten gold."

"Nice. Come up when you are ready. I need to Meditate and don't want to start until someone is up here watching the tunnel." James moved back from the edge and sat down, far enough away from the smell of goblin. Opening up his notifications, he was pleased with what he saw.

Endurance +1

Willpower +1

Back Attack +1

Evasion +1

Res - Pain +1

Shield +1

Congratulations! Shield has reached level 10.

You have gained the Advantage Shield Bash. When using your shield to bash your target, you can, at the cost of 10 Stamina, stun the target for 3 seconds and cause them to take a step back.

James was happy he finally had an ability that used his Stamina. He had a fair bit of Stamina and had not had many calls to use it.

Barbara and Connie came up and sat on either side of him. "I'll keep watch while you Meditate."

"How was the fight for you? The experience the same?" James asked.

Connie flinched, "No, about two-thirds of what we got before."

Barbara grumped, "Must be because you got to level 10, and now the creatures are a lower level than you."

James sighed and slipped into a meditative state.

When James opened his eyes, Doris was up with the Party and munching on some rations. James realized it was a good idea and pulled out some of his rations. While they ate, Connie continued to Meditate as her Mana Regeneration was much lower than James'. James considered a hack that might work and turned to Rocko, who was napping on a wall.

"Hey, Rocko," James called. Barbara looked to Doris, who just rolled her eyes, "Here we go again."

Rocko opened one eye and looked at James without responding.

"Is there a way to transfer Mana from one person to another? Not as an attack Spell, but willingly," he asked.

"Let me check," Rocko muttered as he closed his eye again.

"Are you thinking of giving Connie your Mana because you regenerate it faster?" Doris asked.

When James nodded his head, she continued, "See if you can do the same thing with Health. That may be another consideration since you can heal yourself so easily."

James agreed and turned to Rocko, "Hey, Rocko."

Rocko didn't even open his eyes, "I heard."

By the time they had finished their food, Rocko had opened his eyes, "There are a couple of ways you can do it. But I think that at this level, potions are cheaper."

James considered, "That's true. They are only a few gold each. May as well just have a stack of potions and use those instead of wasting Advantage points on something you can get cheaply."

"You can only use a potion once an hour," Barbara pipped up.

"Really?" James asked and then turned back to Rocko.

"That restriction doesn't apply to Champions." Rocko clarified. When James passed that information on to Barbara and Doris, Doris muttered foully to herself.

"There are three Advantages that allow you to transfer either Mana or Health to another. The first is a Tier 2 Spell. It allows you to transfer twenty Mana to another person. It costs 20 Mana to cast the Spell, so it has a two-to-one transfer ratio. The second option is a PSI Power, Tier 3. It allows you to transfer 3 Mana per second to another person at 3 PSI per second. Since this is a maintained Power, the cost for you is reduced by 1 per second." Rocko paused and took a breath, "The last option is to purchase a Mana Storage Crystal. This is like your PSI Storage Crystal on your Glrick Sword but works for Mana. Depending on how much you want to spend, it can have a transfer ratio of from 2 to 1 up to 6 to 1. It can hold from 50 Mana up to 500 Mana. The starting price is 500 gold for the 50 Mana Crystal with a transfer ratio of 4 to 1."

James allowed that information to absorb. The crystal seemed to be the best option, aside from using potions. Potions were a continuous expense, whereas the Crystals were a one-time expense. The nice thing about them is that they helped him as much as someone else. And if the women decided not to travel with him, it was something that he could use for his benefit. It was something he wouldn't have access to until he returned to the city to buy one.

After waking Connie from her meditative state, he shared the information with them but changed the ability to use PSI to one that uses Mana. They all seemed to contemplate the data for a while before anyone spoke.

"I think the Crystals are the best long-term investment and use the potions for now," Connie ventured.

Doris nodded, "Having an ability to heal someone else would be valuable, but only if you didn't have someone else who could do it. The big issue here, I think, is the sharing of Mana. Even I could use Mana on occasion."

"Don't look at me," Barbara laughed, "I don't use it for anything. But I would rather keep Doris over half Mana than Connie. No offence, sis."

Connie nodded, "Healing comes first."

"Unless there is the option to strike first and fast enough that you don't take any damage. In that case, we want Connie to have the Mana." James added.

"I say, skip it for now. It was a nice thought, and perhaps it may help you in the future, but for now, just use potions." Connie decided.

Doris nodded, "Speaking of which, how many do we have left of each?"

"We have three here and another eight in my Bag of Holding," James stated.

"Your what?" Barbara asked, but Doris cut her off, "Just go with it. It's easier."

"I recommend that we give each person two potions each. And you should have a couple of potions accessible. If you are unconscious, we can't get the potions in your ... Bag of holding. So, they become useless to the rest of us." Connie said.

James agreed and pulled out the potions. He also pulled out the X Potions of Mana, Potion of Magic Armour, and Potion of Strength, "These are all the ones I have here."

James was not aware that they had also collected a few potions from the loot of the goblins in the dungeon. Not that many, but a couple of Health and Mana potions

After the potions were divvied up, James put the remainder back into this Bag. He made sure that Doris and Connie had the Potions of Mana, and he gave the Potion of Strength to Barbara. He had been lucky that he didn't require potions in the middle of a fight. When he got to the end of the battle, he would just Meditate and get his PSI, Health and Mana back. It was faster for him to do Self Heal III and then recover the PSI than it was to regenerate his lost Health.

Getting to his feet, James made his way to the tunnel entrance, "Wait here."

James found a trap along the way and missed the one immediately after. The first one was a tripwire that seemed to trigger a flame jet. James was able to disarm the tripwire, but he was unable to do anything about the flame jet. He was hoping he would be able to salvage it. The second was a pit trap. The trap had a wooden lid that was covered with mud. Once stepped on, it collapsed into a deep pit with water at the bottom. The hole appeared to be about ten meters deep, and the walls were covered in slick mud.

Once James had collected his thoughts, he used Shadow Step to appear at the top of the pit. That one Power was perhaps his most useful ability. Being able to get past barriers or obstacles, move quickly or get out of ambush, and get behind the enemy quickly, without them seeing you do it—all of these things and more. The sad part was that at 100 Mana a jump, it was expensive. At best, he could use it twice, but if he used either of his other two Powers, he could only use it once.

Moving forward carefully, James tested the ground in front of him with his sword. Not the most dignified use of the blade, but better than falling to his death. If that pit had spikes at its bottom, he might not have survived the fall.

Arriving in the next room, James used the tried and true process of hiding in the darkness using Shadow Meld and then Shadow Sense to move his perception further into the room. This room was much large than the other rooms. The room was wet and had a specific path to follow to get through it. In an S-shaped pattern, there were three large mounds and two smaller mounds. The first mound was about 10 meters from the tunnel's exit, then a path went to a smaller mound to the right, then back to a larger mound to the left of that one. Another smaller mound to the left of the second larger mound, and then back to the right to the third large mound.

On the central mound was a wooden bailey, a small wooden tower with a short wooden wall around it. The other two large mounds had fortified the position in the middle of the mound. The two smaller mounds had two level 9 Goblin Fighters. The two large mounds with fortifications had two level 9 Goblin Fighters and two level 9 Goblin Crossbowmen. The large mound in the middle had four level 9 Goblin Crossbowmen, two-level 10 Goblin Warriors, a level 12 Goblin Soldier and a level 11 Goblin Shaman.

This was not a fight that would be won in one go. This would require hit and run tactics, retreating to a secure position to rest before striking the next target. This would depend on how the goblins reacted to the first assault. The four Goblin Crossbowmen would support the first mound and the Goblin Shaman. The way that the forces were deployed made no sense. The other rooms at least made sense, but this was strange. The goblins were there only to slow down the progress of the assaulting force, allowing the Goblin Crossbowmen to do as much damage as possible. There was an obvious route that the assaulting force was supposed to take. The mud and water between the mounds and of the track were intended to trap an assaulting force and make them easy pickings for the Goblin Crossbowmen.

The real threat here was the Goblin Crossbowmen. Once they were neutralized, the others would be easier, including the Goblin Shaman. It would be necessary to bombard the bailey and attack from a distance. Deciding not to tip his hand, James retreated to the previous room and began to inform the women of the results of his Recon.