Chapter 2

Gareth walked down the narrow dirt pathway in the forest, swinging his sword around and slowly becoming accustomed to its weight. Occasionally he would receive a skill point for Beginner Sword Holding. After 30 minutes of walking he saw that there was a large clearing in the forest ahead, with several wooden structures. As he approached he began to hear roars, growls, and the clash of weapons.

Gareth slowed down as he got closer until he peeked past the structures, which looked to be poorly made houses, and saw around a dozen players fighting together against a large green Goblin wearing chainmail, riding a boar, and wielding an axe to great effect, throwing the two knights fighting it back, with every swing. The others were busy picking off smaller goblins who were armed with short swords, with flaming arrows, and exploding fireballs. A swordsman was dueling another large Goblin, next to it's dead mount.

The battle progressed quickly as the goblins began to die, and the ranged players moved their damage to the Goblin on the boar, relieving the pressure on the knights. Once the Goblins mount died, it quickly fell, followed by the other, which had been distracted by the swordsman. The players began to collect loot and discuss their plans, which Gareth was barely close enough to hear.

“A few more Goblin Camps and we should be able to try a Goblin Settlement, I don’t suppose anyone leveled up?”

“Nope, did get a lot of skill proficiency though, and I am only a couple monsters from level 14”

“Yeah me too”

The rest of the team nodded in agreement.

“Alright, this camp will probably take a couple hours to respawn so let’s go back to town, sell our loot, and come back”

With that the players packed away their loot and began to run past where Gareth hid himself. After they had left, Gareth came out from the building and began to search around the area, several minutes later he had found nothing. He decided to go back, now knowing that he had been tricked by that man into coming to a high level area, and that he had just wasted an hour walking to and from here.

Gareth turned and began to walk back towards town, suddenly he heard a crack behind him. Spinning around he saw, a goblin charging him with a sword, it's leg was broken, slowing it, allowing him time to draw his sword. He desperately blocked the goblins strike, metal screeched, the goblins strength knocked him back several steps, stumbling he was barely able to regain his balance to deflect the next strike.

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*Skill gained - Block - you are able to move one object in front of another

“Great, just incredibly helpful”

The goblin kept striking at him, he was barely able to block each attack, his hands going numb, luckily the goblin was tiring faster than he was, each attack was getting weaker and weaker, until he was finally able to knock the goblins blade aside and thrust his sword at the goblins chest. The goblin wrenched itself to the side escaping with only a deep cut across it's chest, and having dropped it's sword, growled and jumped at Gareth, with wicked looking claws. Now that his brained wasn’t as fried from adrenaline, Gareth brought up his sword and thrust it at the goblin in midair, skewering it, the goblin still lived and tried to keep slashing at Gareth, but as blood continued to pour out of it's wounds, the light in its eyes finally faded.

*+90xp

*Level up - 5 free attributes gained

*New Quest - Basic Knowledge - Discover basic knowledge of this world: Go to the town Library.

*Rewards: 10xp, attribute information

*Loot - Goblin Sword, 50 coppers

The body of the goblin disappeared into motes of light drifting away, leaving behind a pile of coins, and the goblin sword.

“Status”

Character Status

Health: 4/20

Stamina: 20/50

Name: Gareth

Level: 1(40/100)

Class: N/A

Race: Human

Titles: Twig breaker(inactive)

FA: 5(?)

Constitution: 10

Strength: 10

Agility: 10

Perception: 10

Intelligence: 10

Defense: 10

Inventory

1 Rusty Iron Sword

10 Bread

Goblin Short Sword

50 Copper

Skills

Beginner Sword Holding - Somewhat able to hold a sword

Toss - able to throw objects

Block - you are able to move one object in front of another

“Alright, that was terrifying, I can’t believe I took so much damage and didn’t even realize it, maybe I can set it like a HUD so I can see it”

So for the first time Gareth went through the settings on his status page and found an option to display his health and stamina bars at the top of his vision. Noticing a new section of his status he clicked on the question mark,

*Free Attribute points are used to upgrade your basic attributes, distribution is locked until Quest basic Knowledge is completed.

“Okay, so I was like 100% supposed to do this way earlier huh”

He began snacking on some bread to restore his stamina while walking back.