Chapter 30

It was all Bulgrit could do not to cackle when he’d watched his boss get his face demolished by the Day Hunter. For six years he’d been serving that braggart, six years of running errands and performing chores far beneath the dignity of the Boss’s Right Hand. For six years, he’d felt Gulgok’s eyes on his back, sizing him up like a snack, and wondered if today would finally be the day his boss reaped his XP.

And now, suddenly, unbelievably, he was dead. The Day Hunter had freed him from servitude while simultaneously demolishing every conceivable rival he might have left in the valley. All he needed to do now was kill off the last goblin boss and he’d be in charge. That wouldn’t even be an issue. Everyone knew Qarsik’s build was terrible for direct confrontation. It was a miracle the old schemer had ever held onto his position as Bluerock’s boss.

The Day Hunter had proven it was capable of descending into the caves, but also that it wasn’t good at it. If it hadn’t stumbled into the Grimshard breeding pit, it would have killed at most ten or twenty goblins in all its time wandering. The sources had killed many, many more by comparison, and were still down there wreaking havoc. Any new goblins that spawned from them would no doubt be slaughtered as soon as they sloughed off their slime coatings.

Now that Bulgrit was the undisputed top goblin in the valley, things were going to change. For one thing, they were going to leave the Day Hunter alone. It was obviously trying to get out of the valley, and Bulgrit intended to let it. As many goblins as the Day Hunter had already killed, he expected the order to stay far, far away from it would be welcomed.

There was one last loose end to take care of first. Bulgrit followed the stream and watched the last of his companions drift closer. As soon as he dragged himself out of the water, Bulgrit stepped out of hiding behind him and, with a single swing of his new sword, detached the last of the elite guard’s head from his body.

Blackfut was waiting for him on the other side of the river. “It all went according to plan?” the shaman asked.

Bulgrit grinned. “Exactly so. Did you see the look on Gulgrit’s face when he figured out what happened, right before the Day Hunter killed him?”

The two goblins snickered, right up until Bulgrit buried his axe in Blackfut’s back. It wouldn’t do to leave even a potential rival to his power.

* * *

Luke whistled when he checked his notifications. That one goblin had been worth a metric fuck load of XP. Altogether, he’d gotten more than enough to level up again.

[You have assisted in slaying Bloodbite Goblin (lvl 21). 229 XP awarded.]
[Congratulations! You have reached level 18. 18 AP awarded for use.]
[You have slain Bloodbite Goblin (lvl 15). 231 XP awarded.]
[You have slain Bloodbite Goblin (lvl 15). 231 XP awarded.]
[You have slain Bloodbite Goblin (lvl 16). 263 XP awarded.]

He honestly wasn’t sure what to do with the 18 AP now. He’d picked up all the combat skills Curt had recommended he buy, and his next step was to get them to max rank so that they could unlock further abilities. Until then, the only other thing he could do was push his stats higher. While he was tempting to dump the whole thing into strength, it was approximately one fight too late for that to matter.

“Hey wait, what the hell does that mean, ‘assisted?’ I didn’t see anyone else helping to kill that guy!”

Perhaps it had given partial credit to that goblin who’d betrayed the rest of the hunting party. That didn’t make sense to Luke, but he didn’t know how else to explain it. He had clearly been the only one fighting the high level goblin the entire time.

The bullshit system cheating him out of XP aside, he had a few skills that took 15 AP to upgrade, like [Mace Mastery] and [Counter], and a few others that only took 10, like [Peripheral Awareness] and [Stealth]. In the end though, the allure of higher stats was too strong. He split them, putting 12 into strength and 6 into agility. If he’d had those stats half an hour ago, that battle probably would have gone quite differently.

As soon as the stats hit, he was knocked flat on his back. “Holy fuck!” he gasped out as every muscle in his body spasmed and tore itself at the same time. It only lasted a few seconds, but those seconds were pure agony. When it was done, Luke sat back up and felt like a stranger in his own body. Casually pushing his hand down to leverage himself upright was enough to leave a three-inch deep handprint in the ground.

“Oh, that’s new,” he said, peering down at it. “Uh, System. Is that going to happen again?”

“It’s possible,” System said, appearing out of thin air next to him. “You boosted your strength significantly. Most people do not put more than a few points into a single stat at any given level. It makes it much easier to adapt to a casually increasing threshold for physical power if it’s staggered over months or even years.”

“Year?” Luke asked. “It’s only been like… two weeks? Maybe three?”

“Twenty-six days since I first noticed you on Aros. I am not aware of how long you were here prior to that point.”

“So twenty-six then? Wow, longer than I thought. But back to my question: what do you mean months or years between level ups?”

“Some species level up as quickly as you have done. They usually live short and violent lives. Human cultures, on the other hand, almost universally only level up a few times a year, and that rate slows down the stronger they get.”

“But why?” Luke asked. “It’s not like it’s hard to do. I guess it’s a little dangerous, but some high level person could just power level a new kid.”

“I am not familiar with this term, power level.”

“Oh, uh, it’s a gaming term from my world. It’s just when a strong person helps a weak person level up quickly.”

“I see. An apt description. I will add that to the system lexicon,” System said. “You would have to ask such questions yourself. My knowledge of humans is limited primarily to how they interact with the system, not why they make the choices they make.”

“Maybe if I ever meet another one,” Luke grumbled. Before he could say anything else, a flash of movement overhead caught his eye. He looked up and saw Red alighting on a thick branch overhead, one which creaked with the added weight despite its size. “And where have you been? I could have used some help!”

Red screeched at him and flapped its wings once. Luke glowered up at it. “I don’t have any food for you!”

The bird screeched again and shifted its claws on the branch. Muttering to himself, Luke looked around. “Okay, fine, let’s see if we can find something. I’m kind of hungry too.”

Without Red’s appearance, he probably would have gone back into hiding to rest and recover. He hadn’t been forced to use [Life Surge]this time, but [Power Strike] also took a toll on his body and some good food wasn’t a bad idea. Well, as good as he was capable of making it.

“Come on then, let’s see what’s out and about.”

* * *

For the next two days, Luke didn’t see a single sign of goblins anywhere. He even swung by the camp they’d built above ground, only to find it completely deserted. With all possible caution, he’d crept in, half expecting goblins to jump out at any moment, but every single building was empty. They’d taken all the tools with them, unfortunately, and all the lumber.

That put the final nail in his treehouse idea, metaphorically speaking. There were no literal nails, of course. That was kind of the problem. Luke supposed if he really wanted to, he could pick up blacksmithing and get his brother’s workshop going again. Presumably he’d know what to do with all the leftover stuff in there once he had the skill.

But he didn’t want to do that. He wanted to find civilization, talk to another person again, eat properly cooked food, and sleep on a real bed. Since the goblins had completely fucking disappeared, he needed to take advantage of that. He thought he could hit the earth elementals at least three times a day, depending on how ornery the jumbo got about him showing up.

He could feel that he was still far behind the massive earth elemental, though he couldn’t say how far. It was stronger than the sword goblin had been, stronger even than Red. Maybe level 30? Higher? He couldn’t say for sure. One thing he did know for sure was that he didn’t need to actually beat it, just outrun it.

Killing it was preferred though, just in case there was more than one. The last thing he needed was to be running from the jumbo only to have its twin brother pop up in front of him. There was also every chance that the goblins were rallying and would be back topside in force. He needed to take advantage of the free time while he could.

So as much as Luke hated it, he dragged himself up to the pass and killed as many elementals as he could get away with before he got chased off. Then he roamed around the valley, looking for new monsters to fight. Inevitably, they did their best to avoid him. Even using Stealth, the level gap was too much to hide from them. It was no wonder Red was constantly eating his food. Hunting level 3s and 4s was a giant pain in the ass.

Once a few hours had gone by, Luke returned to the pass and killed five more elementals. This time the big one showed up in a hurry and drove him off. He didn’t let that deter him from coming back one more time late at night, but it showed up almost immediately, preventing him from getting a single kill.

It looked like the optimal strategy was going to be once every twelve hours or so, and he decided to vary the times a bit just so he wouldn’t get too predictable. The elementals didn’t seem smart, but the big one was definitely lurking around, watching for him, so there had to be some level of intelligence there. Maybe it was only animal level. He hoped that was the case.

Slowly, he grew stronger. On the morning of the fourth day, he got a level up ding letting him know he’d hit 19. The points got invested into stats again, this time it was 4 to strength and 5 to everything else. The kickback wasn’t nearly as bad, though he couldn’t say he enjoyed it. He resolved to rank up a few skills next level instead.

Before he could get that far, something strange happened. He was halfway across the valley, absently whittling a chunk of wood into the bulky, squat figure of a two-ton raccoon, when the ground started rumbling. At first, he thought it was an earthquake, but then he realized the truth.

“What’s got you riled up, big guy?” he muttered as he turned to look at the pass. Perhaps the goblins were the ones trying to flee the valley now. He allowed himself a nasty little laugh at the thought of the big elemental tearing through them.

He couldn’t see it through all the trees, but that was hardly an impediment. He leaped straight up, caught a branch some twenty feet overhead, and scrambled up to the top. From there, it was easy to see the pass. About a mile up, farther than he’d ever dared to go, the giant earth elemental was clearly visible.

That would have been a unique occurrence in and of itself. He’d never seen or heard the elemental surface if it wasn’t in response to him. The animals living in the valley all stayed far away from the pass leading out, apparently smart enough to know to stay away.

But as he watched, a giant arm formed out of the elemental’s body and started flailing around, slamming the ground repeatedly. A second arm joined it, and Luke tilted his head in confusion. It looked like the elemental was fighting something. A second later, he caught a blur of motion as a figure darted out from behind it, barely keeping in front of the massive hands the elemental had manifested.

“Oh shit!” Luke leaped out of the tree and scrambled out of the hole he made when he landed. He ran at full speed, weaving through the trees and breaking off branches when they got in his way. He had to go get to the pass as quickly as possible.

There was a human being up there, fighting for his life.