“Good job, that was some good work.” Roy high-fived Robb with a smile on his face.
“You too, that was a nice feint,” Robb replied with a grin.
“Well, this one took less time than I expected, wanna go for another-” Roy’s words were interrupted as he noticed a small shining light coming from the ogre’s remains. “Wait, what’s that…”
“What’s what?” Robb looked at Roy as the latter was searching through the monster’s bloody guts.
“Huh, found it.” Roy held a red diamond-shaped gem in his hand. It was relatively big, at around the length of half an index finger.
“Damn, what’s that shiny thing?” Robb sat next to Roy and looked at the object with an interested expression.
“Looks like a gem of some sort, but it’s like there is a fire burning inside it. I have never seen anything like this.”
“You think the ogre ate it?” Robb asked with evergrowing interest.
Roy thought for a few seconds before responding. “Maybe, or maybe it was there all along.” He then turned to look at his friend before continuing, “Wanna go with me to check the other ogres? I wanna see if they have something like this too.”
Robb scratched his chin for a few seconds before answering, “That’s not a bad idea. If we find more of these gems, maybe they can be used somewhere. Which one do you wanna check first?”
“Let’s go for the one close to the house.” Roy stood up while holding the gem in his hand. As he looked at it, he couldn’t help but remark, “We will need pouches to keep these. Can’t be fighting while holding them in my hands.”
“Oh really, you need some fancy pouches.” Robb stood up while rolling his eyes. “What about some pants and a shirt first.”
Roy looked at his own clothes and laughed, they were barely holding onto his skin. “Well, you’re right. I guess we just have to put them in a jar at Roger’s place for now.”
The duo walked back to where the ogre that wounded Jaimie was. The scent from the decomposing corpse that had been laying in the sun for a full day was atrocious. Roy rolled the corpse of the monster on its back before cutting into its belly. As he opened its solar plexus, the gem shone brightly amongst the grey and pink organs.
Roy cleaned off the purple blood before staring at it in amazement.
“So this gem is in all of the ogres, you think it’s in the goblins too?” Robb asked with eyes full of intrigue.
“Probably not?” Roy raised his eyebrow while thinking. “With all of the goblins we have killed, we should have seen it already.”
“Or maybe we were just not paying attention,” Robb rebutted. “Let’s just keep an eye out for it.”
Roy nodded. The two then went to the locations of the rest of the killed ogres searching for more gems. They were able to secure the one Alfonse had fought and Robb had killed, but not the other. When they crossed the forest and reached the bottom of the cliff where they killed the first ogre, they could only find its bones with small pieces of meat decorating them. Even the gem was nowhere to be found.
“You think the beast ate it?” Robb looked at Roy in search of an answer.
“That’s probably what happened,” The young man replied while holding his chin. “Though it’s possible that not all ogres have the gem in their body. We would need to kill more of them to understand how all of this works.”
“So let’s go do that,” Robb grinned. “I wanna kill as many of them before our stats get updated at midnight. That way we can be at our strongest tomorrow.”
Roy chuckled, “You’re quite the greedy bastard, aren’t you?”
“Oh, are you scared of a few little ogres?” Robb teased with a playful look.
“No, I was actually thinking the same thing. We will go with the same strategy, that way we save time and energy.”
The two made their way back to the village, and after half an hour of jogging, they finally found an ogre roaming through the plaza and making its way to the marketplace. They quickly took a lead over the monster before climbing the roof of one of the shops and laid down on their stomach to hide.
As they waited for the ogre to pass by, Robb asked out of nowhere. “Do you think those guys ever sleep?”
Robb’s questions pushed Roy’s mind to overdrive with the possibilities. “I wonder about that. We have fought them in the morning and the night, but maybe some of them sleep while others are awake?”
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Roy’s brain raced through his thoughts. If the ogres or the red bear were asleep, then setting up an ambush would become easy. However, to actually put this plan to practice, they would need to understand these creatures’ habits and way of life. This was something that they didn’t have the luxury nor the manpower to do right now.
“Focus, the ogre is almost here.”
Robb’s signal brought back Roy to reality. He turned to look back at the ogre and it was surprisingly close. The tip of its club stood barely a head below the roof on which they were laying.
Once the monster passed by them, the two immediately jumped at it. Roy slashed through its back and legs, while Robb stabbed it from below the rib cage.
With a pained scream, the ogre fell to its knees while the two were still attacking it. With each strike, more wounds accumulated on its massive body. And when Roy finally slashed his sword toward its neck, the monster released its red aura.
The aura coated the neck of the monster like armor and completely blocked the young man’s strike. Roy jumped away from the ogre as he knew that it was about to go berserk.
The monster stood up with a powerful roar before concentrating its red aura on its club. It dashed with herculean might towards Roy who barely rolled away from its charge.
Robb came from behind and rushed towards the disoriented ogre and slashed. The monster could barely block the young man’s attack. However, as it stood in a stalemate with Robb, Roy also dashed towards it and pierced it through its throat.
The light of life dimmed from the ogre’s eyes while it fell to the ground and flailed. As the gurgles stopped, its body movement soon followed. Without saying any words, Roy slashed through its solar plexus and took out the prized gem which he still didn’t understand the use of.
With the same tactic, the duo searched for more ogres and killed them. By the end of their hunt, Roy had killed two more while Robb killed three.
As they fought, Roy couldn’t help but continuously be impressed by Robb’s skills. He was fast—extremely so—and he used it to his full advantage. Whenever an ogre would show an opening, Robb would jump on it as a cheetah would pounce on its prey.
Soon, midnight had come and with it the long-awaited green aura covered the both of them. Roy thought of the word status, and his stats screen materialized in front of his eyes.
Stats Attributes Rank Level Strength Sentinel E+ Constitution Sentinel E- Agility Sentinel D+ Mana Sentinel B-
As he finished absorbing the green aura, Roy felt an incredible energy flowing throughout his body. It was as if a dragon was coursing through his veins that wanted to fly outside and spread its wings.
As the energy became more fiery and hot, Roy followed his instinct and spread his arm in front of him. The energy flowed through his veins before reaching his fingertips.
With a booming sound, Roy conjured a fireball in front of him before sending it flying toward the end of the street. When it touched the ground, it exploded and grew into a larger fireball before slowly dying out. The crater it left was full of ashes and crystallized sand.
Robb looked at the whole scene with an ajar mouth. Seconds passed before he could regain his sanity and run toward Roy.
“What the hell was that?!”
However, Roy could not even properly answer his friend as screens and words flashed in front of his eyes. “Wait, those floating words are appearing in front of me. Let me read them first.”
“Congratulation, you have unlocked a new skill. You can find the description and the proficiency level in your status window.”
Fireball Description Launch a fireball (size depends on mana used) toward a specific location where it will explode into a larger one (size depends on mana used) Proficiency 0.32%
Just as those words faded from Roy’s vision, another set appeared right after.
“Congratulation, you have unlocked an achievement.”
Skill, will, and talent Description Due to either your skills, your mana, or your talent, you were able to unlock your first skill before your class change which is a notable feat. Reward 50 red monster gems (can be accessed once you become an official citizen of a territory).
As Roy read through the floating words, he had more questions than answers. What are skills? What are achievements? What is an official citizen of a territory? And more important of all, what are those red monster gems that he would be able to access?
Roy’s mind raced with thoughts when he suddenly had a hunch. He opened his clenched hand and looked intently at the pile of gems he and Robb had gathered.