Two days passed since Elijah engaged in the unending battle of wills with the goblins. Currently it was the third day after his fight with the goblins. A little before noon, a message suddenly appeared in Elijah’s view.
A hostile force has entered your territory. Without an awakened core, you are unable to determine the number of enemies or their location.
“I received this message a few minutes ago.” Elijah addressed Elder Jeb and a few others. “Inform everyone that the goblins should arrive within the next few hours. They can take this time to mentally prepare themselves.”
“Everyone has been ready and waiting for a long time.” An elder said. “I’m sure many people will be relieved to hear the goblins are approaching. Waiting is worse than fighting. We can finally fight to determine the life or death of the village.”
“There’s no need to worry,” Elder Jamal said. “Our sneak attacks weakened the goblins. Also, from what I have experienced, their fighting ability isn’t that great anyway. We’ve completed the necessary training and constructed the necessary defenses. Our victory is assured.”
“We’re as ready as we can possibly be.” Elder Jeb agreed. “But what about you? How is your recovery going?”
“My senses are recovering well,” Elijah answered. “I should be at one hundred percent in the next two or three hours.”
During the past two days several things occurred. One of those things was that Elijah injured himself during cultivation. He managed to successfully reach level thirty-six but doing so robbed him of his senses.
Level thirty-six was the Initial Senses Tempering stage. In this stage a cultivator tempered their five senses. This tempering increased the power and control of a cultivators five senses.
A cultivator’s eyes would gain the ability to see things up close and far away. Their nose would be better at taking in and ignoring certain scents, and the same could be applied to sounds with a cultivator’s ears. Taste could be used through the other four senses and the same could be said for touch. A single look was all it took to know if a normal meal was delicious or not.
Normally, the tempering for the five senses would be done by gently guiding astral energy into the parts of the body they were connected to. The tempering of the five senses often lead to a cultivator losing control of their senses. Sounds would spontaneously become louder, and scents would suddenly become more intense.
For a cultivator, losing control of their senses was an unpleasant experience, but outside of battle it wasn’t a serious issue. At most, the loss of control would last for two minutes, but usually it lasted for a few seconds. What was a serious issue was when a cultivator became injured when tempering the five senses.
It wasn’t uncommon for the average cultivator to experience injuries while they tempered their five senses. Usually when a cultivator injured any one of their senses, they weren’t able to use one or more senses for at least a few hours. When Elder Jeb and the others found out Elijah was injured, they weren’t that worried at first. However, they became more concerned when they realized Elijah wasn’t recovering after a day had passed.
Due to the unique approach Elijah took to tempering his senses, the injuries he received were much more severe. These severe injuries didn’t result in the loss of one or two senses, but it resulted in the loss of all five of his senses. Luckily, Elijah unlocked the Supreme Astral Sense talent.
Using his new talent, Elijah had no problem moving around and interacting with the world despite being blind and deaf. In fact, nobody would have noticed there was something wrong with him if Jenny didn’t say anything. Due to her talents, Jenny only needed one look to see that Elijah was injured.
At first, Jenny didn’t look too closely at Elijah’s injuries and recommended that he properly rest and avoid any further cultivation. After a day passed and Elijah was still injured, everyone became worried and had Jenny take a second look. She found Elijah’s wounds were healing properly and not leaving any hidden injuries.
Jenny could only recommend that Elijah rest more when she saw how he was healing. She was worried that any suggestions she made in an attempt to speed up Elijah’s healing would do more harm than good. She decided it was best to let Elijah heal naturally, since his injuries were not seriously affecting him at the moment. Therefore, Elijah spent the next few days without his five senses.
At the meeting with Elder Jeb and the others, Elijah spent some time reassuring Elder Jeb and the others that he was okay. Everyone let out a sigh of relief once they were assured that Elijah would be fully recovered before the battle. Although Elijah’s loss of senses probably wouldn’t hinder him during the battle, it was still best for him to recover so he could fight at one hundred percent.
Elijah spent the next few minutes discussing several topics and strategies before they went their separate ways. Elder Jeb and the others would handle last minute tasks for the battle while Elijah would sit around and do nothing.
Stolen novel; please report.
Really! This was a plan that Elder Jeb and the others agreed on. If everyone saw that the Chief wasn’t worried about the battle, they would feel more relaxed. As someone with the determination to be the best ruler for his people, Elijah was naturally willing to take on the difficult task of doing nothing.
“It sucks that this game doesn’t have any chat options,” Tyler stated.
“Yup and you can’t take pictures, or videos, or do any streaming,” BB agreed. “This game is lacking in too many ways.”
“Oh boohoo.” Atom said. “The most realistic virtual reality game known to man and you’re complaining because you can’t talk to people. Some people are never satisfied.”
“Hey, human interaction and communication has been declared a human right, so my complaints aren’t unreasonable.” BB declared. “Also, if I don’t complain in the game then how will the company know what they’re doing wrong. So far nobody has found any way to contact them.”
“I just hope we don’t have to pay for a bunch of DLC’s,” Tyler said.
“Now THAT would make the game suck,” Atom agreed.
After spending some time relaxing by himself, Atom and the other players eventually came to chat with Elijah. They were discussing their experience playing Fallen Heaven and comparing it to other games they played. As they continued to talk eventually the conversation moved to the upcoming battle.
“I’m looking forward to fighting the goblins and getting some cool loot,” Tyler said.
“Dibs on the fire spell the goblin leader was using.” BB said.
“Isn’t it a bit too soon to begin claiming items when the goblin leader isn’t even dead?” Atom asked.
“Dibs on the magi staff,” Tyler quickly stated.
“Hey, hold on!” Atom shouted looking a bit panicked.
“Dibs on the legacy item.” Elijah spoke up before Atom could continue speaking.
“Well what the fuck is left for me?”
“Hehe, maybe the goblin leader will drop some old worn shoes.” BB answered.
“The ears usually have some use for crafting.” Tyler said
“Maybe its teeth are a collector’s item,”
“Oh, screw you guys!”
The group shared a laugh at Atom’s exaggerated outrage. Other than Elijah none of them had an idea of what to expect in terms of rewards for killing the goblin leader. Therefore, they were simply joking around. Also, other than Elijah, none of them had much confidence in killing the goblin leader.
“On a serious note, that goblin leader is pretty strong,” BB said. Do we have a plan to beat it?”
“What do you think our defenses are for?” Tyler asked.
“Right, I’m sure a couple of wooden walls will work great against a magical goblin that throws around fireballs.”
“Don’t worry about the goblin leader,” Elijah said. “Elder Jeb and I will be able to handle it. But don’t worry, other than an item I need for the development of the village, I’ll leave the rest of the loot to you guys.”
So far, Elijah’s interactions with Tyler and the others in Fallen heaven had been harmonious. However, Elijah wouldn’t let his guard down now that he was at the finish line for establishing his village. If one of the players took the legacy item and used it on the broken crystal, they might gain the opportunity to establish their own village.
The chances that the players would stab Elijah in the back were low, but they weren’t zero. Therefore, Elijah began to mentally prepare for potential betrayals. Also, he took this opportunity to give out a subtle warning.
“I forgot we had a hacker on our team,” Atom said. “I’m sure you can take on the army of goblins without any help.”
“I’m not a hacker, I’m just a little lucky.”
“Right.” Atom spoke while giving Elijah an exaggerated wink. “Sure, you are.”
“The game hasn’t even been out for a month. How could someone figure out how to hack it?
“I’m sure a pro hacker like you wouldn’t have any problems.”
“Except I’m not a pro hacker or even an ordinary hacker, so stop calling me one.”
“Fine, Fine. I’ll stop. Hackersaywhat.
“What?”
“Ha, got him.”
“Dude, I dint know you were a hacker.” Tyler said. “Now it all makes sense.”
“He said so himself so it must be true.” BB agreed.
Boss Bitch and Tyler didn’t hesitate to assist Atom in forcing the title hacker on to Elijah. Elijah’s face twisted in annoyance as he listened to them speak. He wasn’t annoyed by their teasing and part of him found the entire situation amusing. However, another part of him was upset that he fell for the simple trick.
Elijah couldn’t help but take a quick look at his status page. His intelligence was over one hundred and yet he couldn’t avoid such a simple trap. Did the numbers next to his intelligence stat exist for show?
“Although you said we don’t have to worry about the goblin leader, I’ve actually been thinking about a way to deal with him,” Tyler said.
“What have you come up with?” BB asked.
“Since the goblin’s using fire magic, we just need to learn water or ice magic to stop him.” As Tyler continued speaking, he became more excited. “The astral energy in Fallen Heaven is just like mana in other games. The difference is that we can actually feel the energy being used. I thought it might be possible to cast some spells if I practiced controlling the energy. After some practice I… well, take a look at this.”
Lifting his arms Tyler had his palms face each other as he held his hands in front of his chest. After a few seconds passed the astral energy in the surroundings noticeably increased and started to become chaotic. Sweat began to roll down Tyler’s brow and his body started to shake.
Elijah became serious as he saw the effort Tyler was putting forth. He could guess that Tyler was summoning the astral energy around him in an attempt to create a ball of water. His Supreme Astral Sense allowed him to understand the changes Tyler was trying to apply to the astral energy in their surroundings. After some time, Tyler was soaked in sweat and his body looked like it would fall over if it was hit by a strong breeze. However, Tyler successfully managed to summon something between his palms.
A single drop of water.
The drop of water remained between Tyler’s palm for two seconds before it fell to the ground. Tyler dropped his hand and looked at everyone with a satisfied expression. Looking at Tyler’s expression Elijah’s body began to shake, and he struggled to maintain control of himself.
“Don’t laugh,” Elijah told himself. Elijah tried his best, but he knew he was fighting a losing battle. “Don’t laugh. Don’t. Laugh.”
HAHAHA!