The road started out straight, even, and cleared of all debris. The trees were rather sparse for a forest, and far enough back from the road to give a degree of safety. If anyone was hiding behind one waiting to ambush me I would likely have time to react.

  The real problem was sound. Everywhere you turned there were bird calls, leaf rustling, and other things not distinguishable enough to truly separate. An experienced woodsman could have possibly made heads or tails of what was going on. I was not so experienced; only going on the occasional walk in the woods. If an ambush came only a truly inept attacker would be heard over the cacophony.

  Truth be told it was so loud it did not seem natural. There was too much sound as if every creature in the damn woods decided to shake tree branches and say hi to each other. I was forced to rely on sight. Keeping my head on a swivel I swept the forest as I walked trying to take in as much as possible in each pass. Every so often I would swing around to look for flanking enemies, A tactic learned from a brief and inglorious stint in the military as an armchair warrior. The real trick was not turning around, but instead trying to make the turns random enough an enemy could not exploit a pattern.

  The view truly was beautiful even with the weird colored leaves. I managed to spot a squirrel running from tree to tree, his mouth full of acorns. Just as he disappeared out of sigh my ankle hit something. I went down only just managing to throw my hands out and save my nose a beating. As I started to get back on my feet I felt a sharp pain tear though my back.

GNOLL SCOUT HAS SNEAK ATTACKED YOU FOR 37 HEALTH

  The blow sent me crashing into the road where my arms took a bruising. Whipping around sent agony though my injured back. Before me was a small creature about 4 and a half feet tall wielding a spear about the same length. The only way I could describe it was a jackal decided to stand up and walk one day. Either way he had his spear raised and was about to drive it down again. I gathered my magic, threw my hand toward it, and used Ice Shard, the instant version of my basic spell. This close I could not miss.

ICE SHARD DOES 8 DAMAGE TO GNOLL SCOUT

  Damn I had really hoped that would kill it. It staggered back; holding its chest where my spell had connected. Not wanting to take any chances I cast it again this time pointing my hand directly toward its head.

ICE SHARD DOES 6 X 2X HEADSHOT BONUS= 12 DAMAGE

GNOLL SCOUT DIES! 10 EXP REWARDED!

  It was too painful to sit up properly at the moment so I tilted my head and looked around. The thing that snagged my ankles was a tripwire strung across the road. Thin and low to the ground it would have been hard to see even if I was not watching squirrels. Looking around I could see no viable hiding spots it could have rushed me from. Did it have some kind of stealth? That was a truly scary thought, especially as I was currently turtled and unable to stand.

  Why was the pain not receding? Was health regeneration not a thing in this system? Something in that thought must have counted as an inquiry because I saw a message that made my blood run truly cold.

IN-COMBAT HEALTH REGENERATION IS NOT AVAILABLE FOR YOUR CLASS. IN ORDER TO RESTORE HEALTH REGENERATION EXIT COMBAT.

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  Fuck fuck fuck. Someone was still here. Taking a bracing breath I forced myself to a sitting position and the pain ripped my breath away. This is why I stayed away from anything melee. Any one who would willingly do this every fight was a special breed of person. Alright, now where were my attackers. After a couple minutes of sweeping I finally saw what I was looking for. Nearly 200 feet away near perfectly camouflaged in a small patch of bush was another gnoll. It was laying prone with the bush for top cover. If that was how well hidden these fuckers could be no wonder I had missed the damn scout.

  The only thing that let me see him was the certain knowledge he had to be here somewhere. I had looked at that bush three times before I noticed him. He was bigger than the scout by a large amount in every dimension. This must be who the scout was working for. So what was he waiting for? I was still pain bound to my spot, and he looked like a decent sprinter.

  After another moment I realized I was going to have to start this. He was most likely waiting for me to rest so he could just walk up and end me. Taking a moment I checked my mana revealing a full bar. I guess mages could regen mana in combat which made sense. A mage without mana was as useless as a fire extinguisher in a volcano. Hmm. two hundred yards and an opponent who looked hardy as hell. If he got to me I was done.

  Only one solution came to me. Take out a knee and he might fall giving me an easy pincushion or at least slow him enough for me to win the attrition war. The problem was trying to hit a small moving target with my only way of aiming being to point my arm and eyeball it. Some instinct inside told me he would not retreat even unto death.

  Trying to be as subtle as possible I moved my arm into firing position doing my best to mask it as stretching. When I had it lined up to my limited ability I cast Ice spike. The two second cast time felt like an eternity. I kept waiting for him to move or realize what I was doing, but he either was too committed to the ambush or did not put it together. The shard flew through the air nailing him in the face. I ignored the resulting message too focused on casting the follow up spike even as the first was still travelling.

  As soon as the spike hit he jumped from his bush and started his charge. Fuck he was big, probably somewhere around 7 feet. That is when I got my first break since hitting that damn tripwire. By jumping up and forward he had brought his right leg straight into my second spike’s path. It missed the knee but shattered on the shin with a sickening crack. At first I thought it had to have been a negative impact, because his face did not register the hit in any way. Just pure angry intensity to get to me and destroy me. That all changed about three strides afterwards.

  My third spike which I had aimed at his knee flew forward. At the last moment he attempted to pivot to the side placing all his power into his right leg to power the movement. As soon as he pushed off the ground I heard something crack with a sickening sound that made me nauseous to hear. He collapsed to the ground with the weight of momentum pushing him too low for my spike to hit. It didn’t matter. Not wasting a moment I cast again changing aim to his new position and free firing.

  He made several attempts to regain his footing or move out of my firing line. All of them failed. The leg was finished beyond any wild hope I had begun this with. Perhaps given time he could have used his solo leg to go somewhere, but my shots just knocked him down every time he managed to get up. The truly monstrous thing was how many shots it took. At full mana I had 24 shots of Ice spike before I was spent. I ran out of mana and had to wait to regen 6 mana twice before he finally died.

CONGRATULATIONS! YOU HAVE DEFEATED A GNOLL CHAMPION OF PENVAR!

YOU RECEIVE 200 EXP!

CONGRATULATIONS! YOU HAVE LEVELED UP TO LEVEL 1! IN ADDITION TO THE NORMAL BENEFITS OF A LEVEL UP, BY DOING SO DURING TESTING, AND BY DEFEATING A FOE THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN FAR BEYOND YOUR ABILITY, YOU HAVE PROVEN YOUR VALUE IN THE EYES OF THE GODS, AND MAY KEEP WHAT HAS BEEN GIVEN.NO MORE TESTING IS REQUIRED. STANDBY FOR TRANSFER TO STARTING VILLAGE! 3..2..1

  A bright light shone all around me and when it dimmed I was in an entirely different place.