Sitting down and waiting to take the hatchet out of his shoulder was probably the worst experience he had gone through yet. Every instinct of his screamed out to him to get rid of the invader but what remained of his hazy mind told him not to pull it out at all costs. His thoughts were hazy because of blood loss and he knew if he let the axe out, the spray of blood that would come from the open wound may overwhelm the room’s ability to heal and he would die. Pretty embarrassing when he had already gotten the death-defying skill.
The nightmare of sitting there and just enduring the pain finally ended after an amount of time Noah couldn’t bother trying to figure out. He pulled the hatchet out and threw it away, using his right arm to pull his left shoulder as close to his body as he could to try and prevent some of the bleeding. What he considered to be less than a minute passed by before he began to get woozy again. The damage was far less than before though so should he faint he wouldn’t die from blood loss, like the other times.
He didn’t faint though, and sat there, vigilant for as long as it took for him to believe he was back up to a reasonable amount of blood. “Never get overconfident.” He once again told himself, he was thrown into a situation that was likely to kill him again just because he wasn’t vigilant after gaining new stats.
He decided to go over his gains to see what was new, and it was kind of as disappointing as his fight. He learned a valuable lesson, but other than that things stayed the same. He wondered if his death-defying skill would come in handy now that it had reached level 1. But like the other skills, he couldn’t really sense any difference in his actions based on his skill levels.
“Oh, Damnit I forgot about that? That was the whole reason I spent power like that!” Noah exclaimed when looking over his constitution of 5. The whole reason he had raised his constitution was to see if he could boost it with energy. \|and instead of doing that, he walked off and nearly died!
Grumbling about it he settled back into a cross-legged position. While he couldn’t do it with the memories so fresh in his mind, he would try to do it now. Trying to take a hold of his energy again reminded him how hard it was. He tried to mentally project the desire to make the energy go in a certain direction; but the energy just was pushed and returned to its position; like he had waved a hand through it.
It was a lot easier when he had to actually push the energy somewhere but that was because half of the effort was done already as his sword was pulling the energy towards itself. He had to keep trying though, forcing the energy through whatever means necessary and pushing it towards his body.
This made him think of the three mental stats he had. Ego was obviously the force he could push into his desires, but what would help him control the energy easier. He could definitely force the energy in certain directions, but it always slipped from his mental grasp. The lack of ability to project his energy caused him to give up in irritation a small while later. Looking back at his status screen, it was likely wisdom that dictated his ability to articulate mentally since it was currently his lowest stat.
“Should I spend the power on upping my wisdom though? I only have one more fight with the goblin and then I’ll be thrown into a new situation. Do I even have a skill that’s likely to raise my wisdom if I turned it into something with grand forge?” Looking at his skills, survival could just as easily be constitution or dexterity as wisdom. Death-defying was wisdom but he was sure that anything made with that skill would be high grade. Meditation would likely give wisdom, but what sort of thing could he forge with wisdom? No item he had really screamed wisdom.
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“Damnit, I need to be self-sufficient but it’s hard to figure out what will allow me to advance further.” He complained, looking around at the cave, he could only let out a sigh. Having 2 power stored when he faced the next challenge would be better than trying to predict what he needed.
Soon he came up against the goblin for the last time. The small thing, just like always, advanced upon Noah as soon as it saw him, and Noah didn’t have any intention of doing anything other than killing the thing as safe as possible. He held his sword up like he was going to go for a slash against the creature, and it took the bait, lunging forwards, intending to cut Noah off before he could get the strike off. However, the creature didn’t expect Noah to jump toward it.
The thing looked on in shock as it overshot the young man, who landed on his feet and advanced toward the goblin. Expecting to crash into its target, the goblin didn’t plan much in its landing so was stumbling when Noah caught back up to it. It wasn’t as easy to kill however, as it rolled forward as Noah sent a sweeping slash. He did cut into the goblin’s feet, but it was far from the serious wound the human hoped for.
Getting back up, the goblin was at the entrance to the tunnel that served as Noah’s winning strategy for their second bout. it was in a defensive position, making Noah wary. It was a standoff, as neither moved, waiting for the other to make the first move.
Noah was confused as the goblin wasn’t going to kill him, but just seeing its frown gave him a hint. After the first baiting attack, the goblin probably defaulted to whatever perception of him would be worse. Someone who tricked others to stab them in the back. Not being able to take advantage of the goblin’s aggressiveness would hurt when it came to parrying and survival, as he was sure the goblin could punish better than Noah could go on the offensive.
Noah sent a weak thrust forward, which the goblin easily deflected using the haft of its axe, Noah brought his other hand to his sword’s hilt for a diagonal slash, taking advantage of the deflection to give him enough space for a heavy strike. But once again the goblin was ready. The thing blocked again with it’s axe, but the sword bit into the handle this time as it jumped backwards. Now fully inside the corridor and it’s range shrunk significantly.
Noah continued forwards, intending to take advantage of the goblin being on the back foot when it launched forwards again, slamming the butt of its axe into Noah’s gut and sending them sprawling back into the room.
This got Noah especially nervous as he flailed his sword above him before rolling and getting onto his feet, he felt he cut something, but it didn’t matter as the goblin was already going for a chop that would likely cut him in two if Noah let it connect.
Taking a gamble, Noah moved towards the goblin and swung his sword at the axe handle, intending to let his agility and strength force the axe to stop before it did significant damage to him. What he didn’t expect as for the goblin’s axe to be hit in the same place as the time he tried to take advantage of the goblin’s wariness, and he cut the makeshift hatchet in two.
Without the force of the goblin keeping it going in an arc, the axe hit the wall behind Noah. Not wanting to lose the advantage, Noah stepped forwards while spinning, trying to get as much force into the cut as possible as he swung in the same horizontal arc that risked to kill him before.