Before I had time to react, Sally pounced on the first goblin. She moved so fast my eyes couldn’t keep up and in less than a second she’d cleaved its head from its shoulders.

Her oversized sword looked difficult to handle in the jungle, but her overwhelming strength more than compensated as she destroyed the nearby bushes.

She killed three other goblins in the same strike who were hiding in the bushes that the first had appeared from.

The luscious greenery was splattered with blood and gore. It was like a nightmare.

I raised my bow and aimed at another goblin who had appeared on our left. It looked similar to the first one with a spear in hand and a bulbous, wart-covered nose.

I nocked and fired an arrow, aiming for its centre mass. It struck the goblin in the chest, the acid making short work of its brown rags and searing its chest.

It howled in pain as it looked down at bubbling, melting skin. Acid was a gross way to kill but it seemed to be effective.

Not waiting to see if it died, I moved onto the next threat. Another goblin had emerged from the side of the one I’d just shot and charged towards me.

I loosed another arrow which embedded itself in the goblin’s stomach. The goblin fell to the floor, coughing blood and bile as a notification marker popped up in the corner of my HUD.

One of them had died. Good.

Getting in the zone, I shot a third and a fourth goblin, all coming from the same direction.

Meanwhile Sally was making short work of the rest of the clearing. She was like a woman possessed, a deadly efficient killing machine.

She cleaved entire groups of goblins in half, like cutting through butter, with a single swing. The foliage also took a hammering as she singlehandedly doubled the circumference of the clearing.

I absently thought that she’d be a good landscaper as I watched her strike a downwards swing of her gleaming black sword. The sword’s edge cut easily though a goblin’s head, splitting it in two.

The two sides of the head split apart in slow motion, falling away as if they’d been glued together, badly. Brain matter, blood and gore spilled out onto the ground with a nasty splosh.

I turned back to my side and continued to shoot. The goblins were endless, notifications kept popping up on my HUD as I dropped one after another.

I felt my shots become more powerful as stats and levels rained in, mid battle.

As I shot another goblin in the chest, the arrow pierced all the way through and embedded itself in a tree. How had that happened? I wondered what stat had made such a drastic change in my power.

I didn’t have time to dwell on it though and I wasn’t complaining as I fired off arrow after arrow.

The goblins were beginning to pile up in front of the bush which worked in my favour as I had even more time to aim and shoot as they scrambled over their fallen foes.

Seeing their brethren reduced to little more than bubbling husks seemed to enrage them. The attacking goblins screamed louder and scrambled with more vigour.

It wasn’t going to help them though; I was in the zone. This was my Alamo but hopefully without my death marking the end.

We were surrounded by what must have been an entire tribe, but we weren’t going down that easily.

I learnt early into the fight that the acid damage stacked up. It wasn’t an instant killer but it seemed so potent and shocking to the goblins that they didn’t have time to attack before it burned through their flesh.

Because of that I only needed one hit per goblin. It was far from an insta kill but I felt I understood my powers a little bit more because of this realisation.

Behind me, Sally continued to cover the other three sides of the clearing. If I was doing well covering my single bush, she was a genius at covering the rest.

She hacked and slashed and cleaved her way through more goblins than I could count. The ground was slick with the blood of our enemies and there was barely any green left on the blood-soaked foliage.

My world turned red. I was covered head to toe in the spray of goblin blood, mostly from Sally’s vicious attacks.

As I continued to cover my section of the clearing I felt unsteady all of a sudden. The ground began to shake and the goblins before me seemed to get a new burst of energy.

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I couldn’t ignore it, but there wasn’t much I could do about it either it. The shaking must have come from somewhere, but I didn’t have time to dwell on it as I continued my onslaught of arrows.

“Kaleb look out!” Panda screamed.

I hadn’t thought about him since the battle had started, I wondered where he had been.

I turned towards the shouting just in time for the world to turn upside down. Something gigantic and strong gripped my leg hard and in a flash I was viewing the goblins the wrong way up.

One goblin pointed at me and laughed and I shot him in the face with an arrow. I’d had a tight grip on my bow so I hadn’t dropped it.

I pulled myself up with my abs just in time to see the snarling face of the biggest goblin I’d ever seen.

It was an off green colour and honestly looked more like a troll. It had tusk-like fangs and yellow, jaundice eyes.

It screamed at me and I felt like I’d been caught up in a hurricane from the power of its breath. I was hit with a nauseating wave of rotten eggs and perpetual morning breath as my hair blew backwards so hard I thought I was going to lose it.

You have discovered a unique monster:

Gertrude The Giant Goblin

Once upon a time there was a goblin named Gertrude. She was born just a little bit different from all the other goblins in her tribe. You see boys and girls, Gertrude was a biiiiig goblin.

All the other goblins were scared of her and they teased her, saying things like Gertrude Smash when she got angry.

Unfortunately for them, one day Gertrude did smash. She smashed the skulls of all those who bullied her in her youth, she smashed their kids too and extinguished entire family lines going back generations.

Then she smashed the goblin she had a crush on. Though it is unconfirmed if he liked her back, her friend Tiffany told her that she’d heard from her friend Jane that the boy goblin had a thing for bigger ladies.

The rest is history, Gertrude continued to smash the boy goblin and they had lots of baby goblins and started their own tribe.

Though not a contender for the Goblin King Coronation, Gertrude is a recognised power in the Forbidden Isles and is unique in that her clan is comprised solely of her own flesh and blood.

The same flesh and blood that you’ve just slaughtered and delivered excruciating, acidic death to.

I think she’s pissed… just a hunch.

As soon as the identification notification popped up I knew exactly what it had said. It was like the information had been uploaded straight to my brain.

I wondered if this was a battle feature, because if I had taken the time to read the long-winded history of Gertrude, I’d probably already be dead.

Instead though, less than a second passed and as Gertrude’s horrendous breath stung my eyes, I pulled up my bow and shot an arrow at her.

She howled as the arrow pierced her eyeball and it exploded like a gore filled balloon.

It splattered my face and some even got in my mouth. I didn’t even have time to react before she threw me away with her massive arms.

I soared through the air and crashed into a tree, uprooting it, and knocking the thing over. My HUD flashed red and I clicked down on a basic health potion just before my HP reached 0.

My bow flew out of my hand and broke in two.

I crashed and tumbled into the foliage, fighting for breath. My torso exploded with pain and I was pretty sure I’d cracked all of my rips.

My leg had come out of its socket and dangled limply as I tried to push myself up from the ground.

I felt some of the ribs fix themselves with a painful crack as the health potion went to work, but it wasn’t enough.

I was alive, but I was in pretty bad shape with a useless leg, cracked ribs and less than a quarter of my HP remaining.

I got the distinct impression that I’d be dead if it wasn’t for my quick thinking in using a potion when I did.

I heard a terrible shriek from back in the clearing. It deafened me and I felt fluid leak out of my ears as my health dropped slightly lower.

Suddenly I was overrun.

Goblins from all around the clearing trampled over me as they scattered like a herd of cattle. They were frantic, desperately trying to escape the clearing.

Was the scream sounding their retreat?

I didn’t know and I didn’t have time to think about it. I was being trampled to death. I struggled for air as the light above me faded and goblins ran over my broken ribs. Each step caused a shooting pain, the likes of which I’d never felt before, to course through my body like lightning bolts.

My HP was dropping fast and I couldn’t take another healing potion for at least an hour. I needed to do something fast or I was going to die.

Thinking quickly I ejected all 500 books I’d stolen from the cultist library out of my body at the same time.

The books sprang from all over me, piling up and leaving me both surrounded and buried in thick tomes.

It seemed to work. There were so many books all occupying the same place that the goblins moved around them, rather than risk tripping over the tall hillock of books.

They moved like water, taking the easiest path. The path of least resistance, and in less than a few seconds it was over and the jungle was eerily quiet.

I wasn’t sure what made me think to use the books. I just needed something to shield me from the goblins and they were the thing I had in abundance.

I was so glad it worked I even let out a half-hearted, painful cheer as I laid in the dirt.

I wasn’t going to be moving for a little while. My body was completely broken. I hoped Panda was alright, I was going to have to ask him where he’d been hiding the whole time.

With nothing else to do whilst I waited for the others to find me, I began to check my notifications. Sally must have killed Gertrude and I bet she gave off some serious experience points.

Chances were if I hadn’t levelled as I fought I’d have died from her throw. I was lucky, but I also felt that I did a pretty good job for my first battle.

I’d definitely say that covering that bush and killing all those goblins counted as pulling my weight.

Even Sally couldn’t have predicted an onslaught like that, it was insane.

If this was what we had to look forward to for the rest of the quest I’d be lucky to make it out alive. But I’d also probably be a respectable level by the time we were done.

It was high risk, high reward.

And speaking of rewards, it was time to check my post battle notifications.