Nothing happened.
He kept his eyes shut tightly for a moment before he opened them slowly.
Yuki gripped her staff tightly, knuckles whitening under the pressure, as she extended it forward, her eyes narrowing with fierce determination. The thick white mage robes she wore fluttered in the unnatural wind that seemed to coil around her like a living thing.
The last boulder rolled forward and vanished into an invisible barrier, and Yuki lowered her staff slowly. The air around her stilled, the wind dying down to a gentle breeze that rustled the edges of her robes. She glanced at the area where the boulders had been, the ground unmarred, as though nothing had happened.
She then pointed her staff back out, and the boulders launched toward the goblin. They flew forward and slammed into it, squashing it.
134/450
For a moment, Ezra wasn’t even sure what to say.
The goblin somehow pushed itself up, let out a cry and stamped its foot on the ground. A moment later, four more boulders dropped out of the ceiling. They landed hard and shook the ground.
Ezra glanced at Yuki. “Don’t suppose you can just keep using that trick?!”
Yuki bit her bottom lip, then shook her head. “I can’t. That was the end of my cool down, Ezra.”
The skill took hours to cool down, eh?
The goblin raised its hand and twirled its finger again. This time, the boulders centered around Yuki instead of Ezra. She followed the movements of the boulders with her eyes.
Ezra dashed toward the goblin. The goblin’s eyes widened and it abruptly stopped what it was doing. It thrust out its palm in Ezra’s direction, and the ground shaped into a boulder right in front of the goblin. This boulder shot out toward Ezra and rolled toward him.
Ezra’s eyes widened, he forced himself to pivot and threw himself out of the way of the attack.
A moment later, another boulder flew toward him, this time from his right.
Ezra cursed and leaped forward. He used an [Air Attack] and flew away from the goblin and toward his allies. A moment later, Ezra could feel the swoosh of cold air as a boulder shot past the area he’d been in. He landed around where Pete and Yuki were standing, his landing kicking up dirt as he forced his momentum to come to a halt.
He looked at the monster.
“This is so goddamn stupid,” he said. “It’s just lobbing dirt balls at us.”
Pete stammered. “Well, they’re some pretty scary dirt balls!”
“We need to finish this soon,” Yuki said. “We’re gonna get overwhelmed!”
Ezra’s mind raced. The goblin wasn’t attacking. Not yet. He had a moment to think. After a few seconds, he nodded.
“I’ve got it,” he said. “We need to overwhelm it. Hit it with different things from different directions.”
Yuki didn’t look away from the goblin. “How?”
“I don’t know, you and Pete do something. On three. One, two—“
“Ezra,” Yuki said. “Do something isn’t enough information—“
“—three!”
Ezra broke off in a dead sprint with the intent of circling the goblin.
Yuki gave a screech.
“Fine!” she said. “Pete, we’ll go from the left!”
Pete nodded. “R-right!”
They dashed off in the other direction. The goblin darted its eyes between the two. It thrust its hands out in both directions. Immediately, a boulder exploded out of the ground and started rolling toward Yuki and Pete. On the opposite side, the same thing happened to Ezra.
Ezra dodged, then rushed toward the goblin.
The goblin thrust out its hand, shooting out a half-dozen boulders. On the other side. Yuki chanted something and Pete’s bow started to glow with a green light.
Pete shot out the attack. The arrow soared through the air—and landed far away from the goblin.
The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
The goblin looked at Pete, a distinctly confused look on its face.
Ezra took advantage of the confusion and rushed forward. He was there in moments—
But the goblin was faster.
It dodged to the left, then formed a fist. It raised the fist upward, and a crumbling sound occurred under Ezra’s feet. Ezra flew into the air, the breath knocked out of him by the feeling of a ton of packed dirt slamming into his chest.
His brain kicked into overdrive and he focused on the goblin. Carefully, he shifted his weight to allow him to land where he wanted.
He continued going upward, slowly losing momentum, until he came to a gentle stop.
Then he started to fall.
The wind cut against his skin. The goblin smirked and started walking away leisurely, confident in the fact that Ezra would miss. The ground raced toward Ezra.
Ezra thrust out his weapon in the direction of the goblin prince.
Instantly, Ezra felt his stomach turn as he abruptly made a sharp turn in mid-air.
The goblin barely had the chance to scream before Ezra’s needle pierced its heart. Blood splattered against the ground.
0/490
Ezra continued. His momentum had been decreased by his clever usage of [Air Attack], but it hadn’t disappeared entirely. He flew into the ground in a messy heap. He shook his head and pushed himself up. He looked down at himself. His fall had been broken by the goblin’s corpse. Ezra pushed himself up and off the goblin. He was covered in fluids and flesh. His feet slipped and he forced himself to stay on his feet thanks to his 40 Dexterity.
You have leveled up!
You have leveled up!
“Man, only two level-ups?” he said. “What a scam.”
Ezra watched the guts start to disappear and turn to ash. For a second, he thought he saw a red glow from the center of its being before it disappeared as if there’d been nothing there.
Ezra grunted.
“Funky things are happening,” he said.
The ash flew into his needle—some of it, anyway. The rest went over toward Pete and Yuki. At the bottom of this pile of ash was a glowing crystal.
What?
He reached out and touched it.
Information Crystal
Contains information on the boss monster [Thřuba]. View information?
Y/N
This is what Yuki was talking about, right? This wasn’t at all what he was expecting. Then again, he wasn’t quite sure what he was expecting.
He clicked Y.
The most obvious thing was a map that appeared to the left. It had two dots. In the center, a white dot with an arrow that seemed to indicate their current location. In the distance was a red dot. Probably the enemy they were looking for. To the right was a whole new box.
Thřuba - Lv. 30
Race: Goblin
Class: Mage
Sub-class: N/A
Health Points: 1000/1000
Mana Points: 1500/1500
Okay.
That was already fairly concerning.
He kept reading. It had a smattering of random skills like swordfighting and bowmanship. [Escape] and [Disable] looked worrying. But all of them were relatively low-level. Not much higher than Ezra.
Then Ezra reached the bottom of the skills list.
[Telekinesis] - Lv. 70
Ezra looked up at the sky.
That would be a bit hard to deal with, he imagined.
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Yuki’s eyes quickly scanned through the information on the information skill. Her face shifted from uninterested to worried to extremely worried in a few moments. She looked back at Ezra.
“That’s not good,” she said.
Pete glanced at the crystal, a droplet of sweat already formed on his forehead. “What’s on that thing? Why are you guys so freaked out?”
Yuki handed him the crystal without a word. Pete glanced in front of him, a curious look on his face. He clicked the air. After a few movements with his eyes, he shut the prompt and faced Ezra and Yuki.
“So, we’re giving up now, right?” he said. “This is an awful idea.”
“Awful quick to give up, aren’t you?” Ezra said.
Yuki rubbed her temples.
“Oh, quit it,” she said. “He’s right, this guy’s way too scary. Right now, at least.”
“Come on, it’s not that much higher. I’m sure we’d be able to take care of him after some grinding—“
“What about Charles?” she said.
Ezra’s lips drew into a thin line.
“What about him?” he said.
“He’s going to be after this guy as well. You know he will.”
“And?”
“Ezra, he’s going to beat us to the boss. You saw how much he’s grown.”
Ezra laughed and forced his lips into a grin.
“We can take him—“
“Him and Idia? No, Ezra, we’ve got to call the whole thing off. Not unless there’s something we’re missing.”
Ezra knew she was right, of course.
If this was how much trouble they had against a semi-telekinetic enemy, how difficult would it be against one who had a seemingly unlimited and higher-leveled one? Ezra opened up his abilities panel. The completed robin constellation looked back at him. [Air attack] was powerful, no doubt. But would it be enough against this Thřuba guy? Ezra wasn’t so sure. Ezra started flipping through his different abilities. Many of them seemed interesting. Many of them seemed like they’d be truly useful.
None of them seemed like a hard counter against a telekinetic fighter.
Damn. A competent group with skills that complimented each other was sounding more and more useful. Internally, he cursed Idia for being such a pain—
Ezra resisted the urge to shiver when he thought of that man. He could almost feel the sword cutting through his chest. [Calm] kicked in, ripping away the negative emotions. He forced himself to look at the situation more objectively. Okay. He doesn’t have the right kind of skill. Maybe Yuki or Pete do…? But did he want to rely on them? No, they’re cannon fodder. It wouldn’t be any good for him to rely on cannon fodder.
He clicked his tongue. This seemed more and more hopeless by the minute.
An odd sensation started to roll across his stomach. It was like it was being flipped upside down or something. He grabbed his stomach and leaned over. Droplets of sweat rolled down his cheeks.
“Ezra?” Yuki approached him. “Are you okay?”
Ezra gritted his teeth.
Then fell to his knees.
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Charles - Otherworlder - Lv. 33