“Summons!” Barnes roared. He kept no pretense of having things under control, fear and adrenaline emanating from his face.

Grace snapped out of her stupor and called forth her elemental, almost on reflex, this one an icy blue emanating a frosty chill around it unlike the one of flames she had called before. Shin didn’t spare the effort to identify it but it wasn’t hard to guess its nature. He focused on his skill and summoned his own, but with it he felt the drain of more mana than he expected. Too much more.

Shin looked at the angel he had called forth. A being of subtle holy splendor in the shape of a man 6 feet tall, golden hair flowing out of the helm covering half its face, draped in white cloth and wielding a simple bronze shield and spear. On its back was a pair of large white feathered wings, though the angel floated in place a few feet off the ground without needing to use them. Shin scanned over it in a moment seeing no difference from what he had summoned before.

[Angel (common) - Intermediate Peasant]

Strength - 39

Agility - 35

Constitution - 30

Vitality - 32

Dexterity - 38

Perception - 26

Force - 27

Spirit - 31

Control - 28

Willpower - 26

Skills:

Enhanced Strike Lvl 2, Block Lvl 2,

Traits:

Holy Presence (common), Simple Levitation (common), Petty Poison Resistance (common), Petty Disease Resistance (common), Petty Curse Resistance (common), Petty Paralysis Resistance (common), Petty Petrification Resistance (common),

Its stats were about 25% higher across the board, evenly. The skill levels, both common tier, reflected the level of his summon skill, and all of the traits remained the same. The only change Shin could see, was in its rank, the source of its higher stats and certainly the source of the higher mana expense. Around 20 mana, Shin guessed.

This was a miscalculation as he no longer had the ability to summon another. Still, that might be a fair trade off for the stronger angel. The goblins were more of a threat than he expected, such that two lesser angels might not have even mattered. Shin scanned his eyes across the emerging battle and sent his angel flying towards the monk. He’d need to make use of the party more now, and that meant keeping them alive a bit longer than planned.

Help couldn’t have come for the monk soon enough. The two shield warriors Barnes and Mendez could block the attacks of the goblins, albeit with great difficult and little room for anything else, but it was all the monk could do to dodge and evade. The constant use of his skills rapidly draining his energy and mana. It was clear he had some background in martial arts, as the only thing keeping him alive was anticipating his opponent’s attack before the creature struck. Still, even the effectiveness of that was wearing thin, as the monk tired while the goblin’s speed did not.

“Archer, get your ass in gear!” Barnes showed some restraint in his frustration of Jeter’s delay, or perhaps he simply couldn’t spare too much effort under the onslaught of the increasingly confident goblin.

Either way, it jolted the ranger to his senses, eyes darting around before sprinting off to a spot where he could put the goblin’s in his line of sight. It was to their rightmost side, where Longsword Warrior was fighting for his life with everything he had, and already injured to show for it.

“Mage!” Mendez yelled, far more desperately and less tactfully than Barnes. Milton hesitated but moved up as well, in the direction of the monk and angel, who seemed to be doing the best of them. Shin followed suit, quietly leading Grace by the shoulder to decrease the distance between them and his angel, all while keeping a close eye on the flow of battle.

The angel and monk had start to push their goblin back, by virtue of the two on one and the reach advantage of the angel’s spear. Although the monk was helping somewhat with counters after the angel blocked, his attacks didn’t seem to be doing much damage. The two shield warriors were still hanging on, much in part to the rogue woman’s well timed assists, though Milton seemed stuck, unwilling to get closer to danger but having no clear opening to use his skills from his position.

Longsword Warrior was in the most trouble. Blood now streaked down his limbs as his movements became more erratic and desperate. An arrow whizzed past his goblin’s head, hitting nothing but air.

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“Hit the thing or I’ll fucking kill you!” Lanzo bellowed at Jeter.

However this only seemed to worsen the archer’s nerves as he rushed another shot only to miss again. But a third shot, after he took a moment to collect himself, found its target in the goblin’s thigh. Jeter nocked a fourth and took aim, focus catching its stride now, and loosed, hitting the goblin in the shoulder.

A yell of victory and relief left Jeter’s mouth involuntarily. After so long he was finally succeeding, hope seeming just within reach. A hope immediately crushed by the enraged shrieks of the injured goblin, who exploded in a flurry of attacks at Lanzo. Jeter snapped back to the present and nocked an arrow once more but Shin made his move.

Having taken his hand off Grace’s shoulder long before, waiting for this moment, he moved, swiftly and quietly, not even the casters near him realizing his actions beneath all the noise. He cocked back his arm, stone in hand, and threw it behind the archer. The sudden and loud rustle of leaves made the ranger spin around on reflex to aim at whatever was behind him.

Confusion took hold over fright as nothing showed itself, and that confusion was supplanted by fear at the sound of a heavy weight hitting the ground. He turned around to see the longsword Warrior’s body motionless on the ground and his head settling from a roll yards away.

The goblin ripped the two arrows out of its body and sprinted towards the one who put them there with a vicious screeching snarl. Jeter already had an arrow nocked and loosed catching the goblin in its side, but it slowed only for a moment, its eyes having lost none of their viciousness.

Before he could aim again, a sword shot through the air, piercing his shoulder, the impact knocking him to the ground. The ranger tried to scramble to his feet but a green clawed foot stomped on his chest. He looked up at the goblin, whose fury now started to turn into cruel malice, and his face turned a ghostly pale.

Grace raised her arm and but a hand from the side grabbed her arm before she could form the skill. She looked over at Shin in confusion who didn’t takes his eyes off the bitter pair. Shrill screams of agony snapped her attention back to Jeter and the horror befolding him. The goblin clawed at his face and throat, shredding, ripping, tearing away. Screams turned to strained gurgles as blood filled the ranger’s throat and then to muffled whimpers and finally silence.

With blood soaked hands and red splattered over his armor, the goblin let out a unsettling yell, almost like a cackle. Shin waited calmly, watching for the creature’s next move. The goblin initially turn back to the fray of its kin but stopped and glanced over at the casters, a smirk stretching across its sharp face. It broke out into a sprint, charging straight towards Shin and Grace. She tried to raise her arm again but was stopped by Shin again. The goblin drew close in an instant, almost upon them now, eyes mad with evil.

“Shin!” Grace’s pleading yell was answer with a bronze spear thrust at the goblin. The vicious creature managed to escape the spear with a mere graze but not the shield which pummeled into its face.

The angel didn’t let up on its unrelenting attack but even with a now broken jaw and three arrow wounds, the fight seemed evenly matched. Had the goblin not been slowed by its injuries, Shin’s position would be quite dangerous. But still, he showed not a trace of concern, watching every move like an eerie hawk.

“Get ready.” Grace didn’t fully react to his words, spurned by a turn in the struggle, but her body moved on its own sharpened by fear.

“Now!”

A bad block of the spear had disrupted the goblin’s balance and it faltered, just enough. A swirl of mana coalesced into a ball in Grace’s hand and she cast it. The goblin’s head turned just in time for the Mana Ball to slam into its head, knocking it to the ground. It was only enough to do that much, but that was all the opening needed. A spear thrust through the goblin’s throat and again straight through its unlatched mouth, silencing the creature forever.

The pair was given no time to relax, however, as a shout of pain came from their left. Shin turned to see the monk was missing half his forearm and retreating away frantically as the goblin taunted him. Before Shin could react, Milton finally made his move. A ball of fire formed in his hand and he shot it a the goblin’s back.

Flames slammed into its armor and wrapped around until its whole body was ablaze. Pained and angry yells were met with another fireball as it turned around to face the mage. The fire scalded its skin and burned its throat as it thrashed around, trying to stamper the flames. But before it could, a bronze spear pierced through its neck, leaving the flames to finish it off.

Shin turned his eyes to the remaining two goblins, who Mendez and Barnes had managed to hold up against, though they looked worse for wear. Aisha darted around with her knives, landing one right in an eye and Barnes lunged at the opening. Slim red aura coated his one handed axe as it cleaved through the goblin’s neck.

Grace’s Wisp fired a ball of frost at the fourth and final goblin before fading away. Mendez mustered all his strength to slam the edge of his shield into the frostbitten goblin, fracturing its skull. As the goblin hit the ground, so too did the chaotic mess of noise die with it, save for the monk groaning in pain.

Barnes looked around at the battlefield, taking stock of what was left of the party, and Shin took stock of him. Seeing the severity of his injuries, the boy looked over to the monk hunched up against a tree, quietly cursing at his spatial bag, which had been torn in the fighting and the potions fallen out and broken on the ground. Shin casually walked in his direction without a word.

“Hey!” Mendez directed at Shin but he received no response. Veins bulged across his temples as he stomped towards Shin with gritted teeth and grabbed him by the collar. “Why the fuck did you take the angel away?!”

“Had to.” Shin subtly motioned at the creature in question, showing no concern for the warrior’s threatening behavior. He turned back to the monk. “I need to heal him.”

“You’re gonna heal the fucking rest of us too!”

“Don’t have enough mana. Use your potions.”

“Bastard!” Mendez clutched Shin’s tunic by the collar, almost holding him off the ground.

“Calm down!” Barnes shouted, seeing the situation was quickly falling out of control.

“How the fuck am I supposed to calm down?!” Mendez snapped back with no restraint. “Three dead! One crippled! For what?! A fucking place to sleep?!”

“Let the boy heal Zhang.”

“And then what, huh?!”

“Hey…” Milton’s voice reached the others through the gap in argument. He had moved nearer to the den since the fighting ended, standing rather listless as he stared at the entrance. “We needed a camp without blood or bodies, right? So other monsters don’t come looking for food? …what are we supposed to do now?”

He pointed at the entrance of the den and everyone’s eyes followed to find four wolf carcasses strewn about, chopped up and half eaten, blood and chunks of flesh and bone all over. A quiet fell over the party, the silent realization that all the loss and suffering had been for nothing. There was no camp to be made here.