Several more notifications scrolled into my vision as we sat in the road recovering from the previous battle. I noticed what the glazed over looks on both Alyssa and Johnny’s faces which was becoming the tell tale sign that someone was reviewing their own notifications and statuses. Johnny was absentmindedly scratching behind the big coyote’s ears. Seems he’s made a friend. I peered down both directions of the street and looked for any more hostiles waiting to ride up on us. I dismissed my notifications for the moment and cleared my throat to get the others attention.

“We should loot these assholes and get off the street before checking our notifications.”

Johnny nodded his assent and Alyssa startled with a bit of surprise on her face. She beamed brightly at me, “I made lvl four.”

“As did I.” Johnny added “I will loot the Shaman. I want his staff”

I chuckled at that and watched Johnny head over to the burnt and charred corpse of the Goblin Shaman and it’s mount. He returned with the aforementioned staff topped with some animal skull, feathers hung at the end of leather cording with multi-colored beads at the base of the feathers. The staff appeared to be as long as his walking stick which he chose to lean against the apartment building. He smiled a toothy smile and rejoined us.

“Lets get to the other side of the road, get on the other side of that house and we’ll finish checking our statuses.”

I was getting antsy standing in the open. I wanted to get in cover yesterday. Once we got to the ditch I indicated I pulled up my status messages. Between the 5 goblins and 4 mounts that we killed I had pulled in 5400 experience. Another 1000 experience for the quest completion reward brought me up to level five. This apparently was a milestone level. Several things unlocked for me.

CONGRATULATIONS! YOU HAVE UNLOCKED A NEW SKILL: THE DUELIST - Grants passive increases to the Outlaws primary weapon. [Pistol Marksmanship] designated primary weapon class gains the following increases: +10% recoil control, +10% Aim, +10% Weapon Handling, +10% Reaction. Off hand penalties eliminated.

My rifle skills increased all these things as active skills, though I had no such thing for pistols. It’s nice it’s a passive too. Though I’ve not really experienced any drawbacks to shooting from my offhand, won’t complain though.

CONGRATULATIONS! YOU HAVE UNLOCKED YOUR SPATIAL INVENTORY! YOU CAN CURRENTLY HOLD UP TO 50KG IN YOUR INVENTORY.

“Spatial Inventory?”

Johnny and Alyssa looked at me in curiosity.

"Veep, what’s spatial inventory?”

“Spatial inventory is a pocket dimension linked to your personal mana signature that allows you to place items up to your mass limit in kilograms inside it. Space increases as your strength goes up. There is no limit on the number of items, only the total mass of said items. You unlock this at level five.”

“COOOL! I’m only one level away from my own Bag of Holding!” Alyssa blurted excitedly.

Nice.

“Alright, if everyone’s ready let’s get going.” I said as I started experimenting with opening and closing the spatial inventory.

When I opened it I saw a silvery edged black portal form in front of me. I tossed some of the miscellaneous loot I gathered from the goblins, pieces of jade, then looked through my menus and found the tab for Inventory. I accessed it and a three dimensional representation of the jade pieces appeared in a list under the tab. The weight of the item or stack of items it seemed was listed next to it. I could then simply think about what I wanted to pull out of my inventory and it would appear in my hand. Satisfied with my experimentations I moved on to the next notification that appeared to me.

FOR COMPLETING THE OPTIONAL QUEST: DEFEAT OR AVOID GOBLIN COYOTE RIDER PATROL YOU HAVE EARNED A BONUS REWARD FOR EACH MEMBER IN YOUR PARTY, WOULD YOU LIKE REWARDS DISTRIBUTED NOW? YES/NO?

I selected “YES”and an item began to “grow” from seemingly thin air in front of each of us. Johnny’s award finished first, a simple looking amulet of bone and feather tied by a leather cord. He took it gingerly and then placed it around his neck.

A pair of black leather bracers appeared to Alyssa, she considered them with some hesitation then smiled and began strapping them to her forearms. “They improve my Agility by 5 points and provide 10 armor.”

While my current compatriots received decidedly fantasy style accoutrements what landed in my hands was a rather modern looking tactical armor vest. It was light, flexible and charcoal black in color. It looked exactly like one of those tactical vests you see the hero of an action movie would wear. I promptly analyzed it’s stats.

Outlaws Tactical Vest (Uncommon)

25 Armor, 10% Kinetic Damage Resistance

+5 Perception

“Nice” I mumbled as I slipped the vest over my neck. It fit my still slightly overweight body perfectly. I still hadn’t taken the time to really look at myself but I could feel the changes taking place as the system used mana to ‘fix’ me.

We crossed the railroad tracks and clambered down the other side into the desert. Johnny’s new coyote friend whimpered slightly when we made it about 100 meters and the ground began to shake. Johnny and I stopped and turned towards the vibration and then caught the faint sound of a train coming from the east. Alyssa continued on for a few steps before looking at us in question, her Perception not nearly as high as ours.

Soon the noise of the train grew loud enough for her to hear it too and we stared down the train line as one of the many cargo trains rocketed past us in a crescendo of squealing steel wheels and clattering metal cargo cars. The train stretched for almost a mile and was quickly moving to pass us. The coyote’s ears pinned back and it began to growl.

“That’s moving way too fast.” I stated flatly.

“It is. Look at the back…” Johnny pointed to the rear of the train that was quickly approaching.

It was on fire and some kind of oversized lizard was currently attempting to crawl across the train cars. The flames flicked wide and furiously and a 6 legged lizard the size of a bus emerged from the burning train cars focused on its approach to the front. As the train flew past us the lizard glanced at us and flicked out a 6 foot tongue in our direction and then continued it’s assault.

Alyssa gulped audibly, “Let’s hope that thing don’t remember us later.”

“Agreed, let’s keep moving, it’s already past noon and I want this task done, preferably before sunset.”

We turned back to our march into the desert. A moment later the sound of an explosion roared in the direction the train had been travelling. We turned in time to see a massive fireball rise in the distance, train cars tumbled through the air in all directions, most largely twisted and shredded as they tumbled back to the ground. A moment later several secondary explosions rumbled across the landscape.

“It would seem the track wasn’t clear.” I intoned.

“Think that big scary fucking lizard is still alive?” Alyssa asked with worry on her face.

“Let’s hope not.” I commented thoughtfully and then continued on to our objective.

The explosion at the railyard back in the town had attracted several more smaller goblin patrols. We worked our way around the patrols as we could, and when we couldn’t we, eliminated them. We reached the outskirts of the Goblin camp by late afternoon. Alyssa and Johnny had reached level 5 and gained new unique abilities that they were both excited for. It even appeared that the coyote had gained a level. Guess he’s part of the party now. I smirked at the thought.

I surveyed the Goblin camp from the top of a flagstone rock cropping with Johnny while Alyssa crouched low below us with Johnny’s coyote keeping an eye out for any wayward patrols. The camp was nestled between a pair of flagstone formations that gently descended into a shallow canyon that led back to the Clear Creek that forked off from the Little Colorado River. Gnarled mesquite wood palisades rose up at the mouth of the canyon entrance and a pair of archer platforms stood on either side of a wood and bone gate.

Inside the walls were several small round wood and thatch huts that you would see in a medieval fantasy movie, all made from the shitty mesquite wood that permeated the region. In the center was a large stone fire pit with a black iron cauldron that could easily fit several fully grown human bodies in it. Beyond that lined up directly facing the gate was a rounded long house with a pair of totems, painted in reds, yellows, and blues. This must be the Goblin leaders house. Next to it was a stable where more of the coyote mounts were tended by several gobs. We counted roughly four dozen globlins on foot and a half dozen more patrolling the length of the palisade.

We pushed back from the lip of the rock we were using to spy on the camp and rejoined Alyssa. The friendly coyote turned and licked Johnny on the face and he leaned in and began scratching behind its ears.

“Well, what d’ya think Johnny?”

He continued scratching the neck of the coyote and thought for a moment before speaking. “There are many inside, I don’t think we can fight them there.”

“I wish I had some explosives or something, think you can toss down another one of those lightning storms?”

“I can, I can also bind them now.”

I thought carefully about that and I formed a plan that I related to them. “Alright, I’m going to get up the side of the opposite cliff. Johnny you start the fight with one of them lightning storms. We will try to pull them away from the gates, make them come to us. Alyssa you hide yourself between myself and Johnny and kill anything that comes your way, keep them off us directly, that kind of thing.”

Johnny nodded and Alyssa quipped “At least there aren’t any apartment buildings around here.”

I smiled at that and pushed myself up and began to head to my chosen shooting position. Alyssa had already disappeared into the shadows. Johnny surprised me though when he walked up to his new coyote friend and accepted a flurry of licks and wagging tail while patting its shoulder. He spoke something into its ear in Navajo and then grabbed hold of the saddle and swung up onto its back. Guess Johnny wants to stay mobile. Good for him.