Cleaning Up
Adam walked up to the wooden throne that the Goblin Chief was sitting on hours ago.
He sat on it and crossed his legs.
'What to do? Mmm... Mika would say that I should just take the biggest gate. Mina would say I should slowly open up each one of them before choosing the gate to enter. Meanwhile, mom would say I should get out of the dungeon.' Adam wondered, looking at the ceiling.
[ "The Hero Who Survived By Sleeping For a Century " likes the look in your eyes.]
["The One Who Sits On The Golden Throne" says you should look forward to obtaining a better throne.]
["The One Who Spreads The Myth" is surprised by your progress.]
[ The majority of beings that watch you are curious about the challenge that was issued.]
[A Certain Evil feigns ignorance.]
[The absolute majority of Gods believe that a random Evil doesn't have the authority to issue a challenge this early in the First Phase.]
[The absolute majority of Gods are curious about who issued the challenge.]
'Is that.. what drama between Gods look like?' Adam shook his head.
'Let's ignore them for now.' He brought his hand to his chin.
"It's mostly just Goblins outside, probably. Goblins are weak, so the military knife will be just as useful as the Old Assassin's Dagger. The greatsword could be used too I guess. But horizontal swings are harder to perform and vertical swings. Plus the sword is too heavy, so running away would be hard. With my Dark Cloak and my Old Assassin's Boots, wielding two daggers would probably be the optimal course of action." Adam muttered in a low voice while rubbing his chin.
'The door I came from, the one with the treasure chest, is behind me. In front is the biggest gate out of the four. Probably the one you would come from if you missed the secret passages. Leading to a real fight in the darkness with the Goblin Chief. The ones on the side are smaller. Let's start with those.'
Adam got up, took his military knife out of his storage and into his left hand. The Old Assassin's dagger was in his right hand.
'Alright, let's enter the gate on the right.'
Once he was in front of the gates, he felt a presence on the other side of it. He pushed the gates slowly and carefully.
Just as there was some space between the two gates, he saw a green wide back in front of him. The creature looked like a Goblin but there were many differences. The creature was a bit taller than Adam while Goblins were much shorter than him. It was also much more muscular and its limbs did not look weak or skinny at all. The skin looked tougher than that of a normal Goblin. It had long pointy ears. Two axes were hanging on its back.
It was a Hobgoblin. It exuded much more strength than a Goblin.
But Adam wasn't scared, as it did not look stronger than the Goblin Chief he had already defeated.
As long as he saw his enemy's back, he would be victorious. Adam thought.
After he noticed that the monster's skin looked similar to that of the Goblin Chief, Adam put his military knife inside its sheath.
He, once again, grabbed the enemy's left shoulder with his left hand and stabbed it in the back with his dagger.
[You have backstabbed an enemy using the Old Assassin's Dagger. Damage dealt goes up by 200%.]
The dagger went deeply inside the Hobgoblin's body. Adam took the dagger out of the wound and lots of blood flowed out of it.
He was ready to stab it again when
[1 Hobgoblin has been defeated. Congratulations! You have gained 40Gold and 80Experience Points.]
'What? How come? It did look weaker than the Goblin Chief but I didn't expect it to die in one stab. Oh...'
"System, how are Damage Points calculated?"
[Damage Points depend on many things. Defense Points, did the attack graze the enemy or stab/hit the enemy's body perfectly, your Strength stat, whether you hit a weak point like the neck or a protected one like a monster's shell, the weapon's Attack Power, the weapon's special effect...]
"All right all right. Euumm, well how much Damage Points did this stab inflict?"
[Attack Power of the weapon: 50.
Strength Stat: 40.
Weapon's special effect: +200% Damage Points.
Enemy's Armor: None.
Armor Defense Points: None.
Deep wound inflicted.
Total Damage Points inflicted: 90+2*90.
Damage Points: 270. ]
"All right. So my calculations from before were wrong. That's a lot of damage. So the Strength stat is more important than I thought."
Just as Adam said that, he felt something to his right and turned that way.
The tip of a spear was 10 centimeters away from his nose and approaching rapidly.
He quickly jumped back while looking at the attacker. Without meaning to, he let go of his dagger.
A normal Goblin armed with a spear in its right hand attacked him. He felt the presence of three other Goblins further inside the room.
The tip of the spear grazed Adam's left cheek. He formed a fist with his left hand.
Just as Adam was about to punch the Goblin with all his strength, he noticed that its other hand was armed with a small knife.
The knife was directed towards Adam's stomach.
His heart started beating much faster. He was in real danger because he got careless.
Adam quickly turned his body sideways. The knife missed him by a bit.
He was unarmed and managed to grab the Goblin's forearm.
The Goblin's arm started rapidly turning into dust. It didn't understand what was happening but it stepped back. The Goblin had lost its whole right arm.
'That was close. Way too close.'
Just as Adam was looking at his dagger on the ground, about to pick it up, his Sense stat once again made him understand that something was coming.
He lifted his eyes and immediately bent down.
Three arrows passed above Adam's head, right where he had been standing a moment ago.
'Damn, their aim is good. Let's finish this quickly. Those archers are trouble.'
He picked up the dagger that was next to him and started sprinting towards the Goblin.
The distance between Adam and the Goblin spearman was closed in an instance.
Once the surprise element faded, Adam realized that the Goblin's movements were extremely slow.
The Goblin struggled to extend its spear towards Adam. But the attack was easily dodged.
Before the Goblin knew it, its head was flying in the air.
Green blood flowed everywhere. Some of the blood fell on Adam's face.
[1 Goblin has been slain. Congratulations! You have gained 5Gold and 10Experience Points.]
'Filthy.' He thought. But Adam didn't stop for a second.
On the contrary, he only got faster.
The archers were hiding in the dark.
Adam hadn't taken the time to asses the room he was in before.
The room fairly small. 10meters large and 10meters long. The ceiling was 2meters high.
On the wall where the gate was, torches were hanging. The other walls and a big portion of the room were in total darkness.
That was where the archers were hiding.
But Adam could still feel their presence and hear the sounds they were making.
When he was 5meters away from one of the Goblins, he felt an arrow coming from his left. He gave it no mind and slashed the throat of the Goblin in front of him.
[1 Goblin has been slain. Congratulations! You have gained 5Gold and 10Experience Points.]
The arrow hit his side. But it didn't penetrate the military vest he still had on.
'I guess that's Game Over for you then.' He thought, as he sprinted towards the second Goblin. Just as he slashed its throat, he felt another arrow coming.
[1 Goblin has been slain. Congratulations! You have gained 5Gold and 10Experience Points.]
'Can't you see those don't hurt me?' Adam thought while slashing the air with his dagger, in order to rid it of the green blood that was dripping from it.
The arrow hit, and Adam felt a sharp pain from his upper leg.
He looked down, gritting his teeth. The arrow was deeply embedded in his right thigh. He ran in the direction the arrow came from.
'How could I be so stupid?' Adam thought, as he slashed the last goblin's neck.
[1 Goblin has been slain. Congratulations! You have gained 5Gold and 10 Experience Points.]
"This is so annoying. Let's try that at least." He said, shaking his head.
"Health Points."
[ Health Points: 420/450.]
'So I took about 30 Damage Points from that.'
"Can I open the storage by thinking about it?" Adam asked.
[You only need to think about what item you want out of it .]
"Alright." Adam extended his left hand.
'Light healing potion.' and just as he thought that, it appeared in his left hand.
"Convenient. Does that work with weapons too?"
[This only works with items.]
"Aren't weapons items? Can I get more detail on that?" Adam asked as he began drinking the potion. He felt this was an important distinction he had missed before.
[Weapons are Artefacts. They can be stored automatically if taken from a Treasure Chest or defeating a Boss Monster. Artefacts found in dungeons like weapons that an enemy uses have to be inserted inside the storage manually. ]
[The main difference between Items and Artefacts is that Items can only be used a certain amount of time. A healing potion can only be used once. While a sword can be used and stored multiple times. Most Items are single-use. However, exceptions do exist.]
'Mmm I guess I kind of get it.' He thought as he finished drinking the green potion. It tasted sweet but its green color reminded him of Goblin blood.
[You have consumed 1 Light Healing Potion. You have recovered 15 Health Points.]
'15HP for 10 Gold coins isn't too bad. I guess. Maybe?' He had no idea how good or bad that deal was.
'Anyways. What's up with this room.' He looked around.
There was no gate other than the one he got in from.
After walking a bit in the dark, his eyes finally adjusted.
He noticed a hole in one of the walls. It was big enough for him to get in without bending his back.
'This is probably the other side of the tunnel I had been in earlier.' He said earlier as he had no sense of time since he entered the cave. It had been about 16 hours since he had entered the Goblin Chief's Domain.
He went in without any worries.
His confidence wasn't baseless.
One, the tunnel was extremely dark which favored him and his Black Cloak.
Two, his Sense stat was his highest stat other than Strength.
Three, all Goblins died in one slash from his dagger.
Four, he had many Healing potions and enough Gold coins if he needed more.
Five, his military vest was at least resistant enough to protect him from arrows, probably knife attacks too. As long as they were aimed at his upper body.
Adam's eyes were already adjusted to the darkness, so he just walked while being focused on his surroundings.
He felt a presence about 15meters away. It was a lone Goblin.
He kept getting closer and closer. He wanted to know how useful the Dark Cloak was against Goblins in the dark.
He kept taking steps forward until he was right next to the Goblin. It had no idea there was someone or something next to it. The Goblin only saw the darkness and didn't feel anything.
Adam was one meter away from the Goblin. He smiled at how amazing his Dark Cloak was. He slashed the Goblin's head off and kept walking.
[1 Goblin has been slain. Congratulations! You have gained 5Gold and 10 Experience Points.]
He soon found a horde of Goblins. Some were asleep, some were awake.
He counted how many presences he could feel.
'..27..28..29...29 Goblins. That's a lot. Good thing I tested the Dark Cloak's effectiveness.'
Adam decided to start off by getting rid of the standing Goblins before finishing off the ones sleeping after that.
He walked in the midst of the horde. Stealthily cutting the standing Goblins while making sure that their corpse didn't fall on the bodies of the sleeping ones.
[1 Goblin has been slain. Congratulations! You have gained 5Gold and 10 Experience Points.]
....
For the ones that noticed him, which was usually only one at a time, he used his "Crumbling Touch" skill to get rid of it quickly.
[1 Goblin has been slain. Congratulations! You have gained 5Gold and 10 Experience Points.]
....
He was being mindful so as to not run out of Endurance.
Once he killed all the standing ones, he stepped out of the horde of Goblins to recover his Endurance.
Although it wasn't a hard task, it still left him a bit tired, as he tried to do it as fast as possible while balancing many things.
' Did another Goblin notice me? Are arrows coming towards me? Should I slash with my dagger or use "Crumbling Touch"? How's my endurance looking? Let's slash this one from this angle so that it falls back as there's a sleeping Goblin in front of it. Did the sound of the corpse hitting the ground wake up the Goblin?' These were all the things Adam had to think of at the same time.
He had killed 17 Goblins in only about 40 seconds. He gained 85 Gold coins 170 Experience Points.
He put his back against the wall of the tunnel, about 20 meters away from the sleeping Goblins.
"Let's check the stats." Adam whispered with a calm voice, trying to catch his breath.
[ Stats: Strength: 40
Agility: 24
Sense: 35
Vigor & Endurance: 25
Magic Affinity: 7(+2)
Stealth: 8(+3)
Unused stat points: 0
]
'Mm Stealth and Magic Affinity increased a bit. Probably from getting rid of monsters before they noticed my presence and repeated use of Crumbling Touch. But those stats are under 10, so they should increase pretty easily.' He thought
"Status." Adam said.
[ Name: Adam
Age: 12years old
Species & level : Human Lv6(300/500xp)
Gold: 950
HP: 445/450
Endurance: 60/150
Stats: Strength: 40
Agility: 24
Sense: 35
Vigor & Endurance: 25
Magic Affinity: 7(+2)
Stealth: 8(+3)
Unused stat points: 0
Skill(s): Sleeping Beauty
Crumbling Touch
Title(s): The First Pioneer
Ri#hteous to E#il Points: 640 to 0
S####o#: (None) ]
'Oh. The Points thing went up a lot again. There are more readable letters too. Ri..hteous to E...il Points? Mm is it...'
"Righteous to Evil Points?" Adam asked with a quiet voice.
[ Congratulations! You have unlocked the Righteous to Evil Points option. Depending on your actions, you shall earn Righteous Points or Evil Points. Once a certain amount of Points is achieved in either category, you will be able to use part of the authority of that side. Only your actions count, not your words, as they speak much louder.]
"What do you mean part of the authority?"
[This information is locked.]
Other messages appeared
[Many angels encourage you to amass many more Good Points.]
[Evil Creatures want you to selfishly follow your deepest wicked desires by drawing blood wherever you go.]
[A Certain Evil is watching your actions.]
[The Laziest of God's Archangels wants you to earn Righteous Points, although it doesn't really care either way.]
"System, do I have to do anything special?"Adam asked, a bit confused.
[No, the Righteous and Evil Points are but a simplified record of your actions. Do not pay it any mind.]
'Alright. Anyways...'He thought, looking in the Goblin horde's way. '..the tunnels won't clean themselves up.'