The gigantic creature had just walked out of one of the last shops in town and, to my utter horror, was carrying a severed arm in his oversized hands. The boss appeared to have gnawed on it recently if the blood covering his face had anything to say about it. The goblin boss was tall enough that I would probably only come up to his chest if I stood before him. The freakish creature must have easily weighed over three hundred pounds, if not far more. He had corded biceps and bulging shoulders akin to a body builder, but his distended stomach contrasted with his otherwise muscled frame. Though he reminded me of the goblins we fought earlier, his boils were less pronounced and less bloody. It almost looked like they had healed over recently. The giant wore an oversized leather tunic and had an animal hide kilt that reached down to just below his knees. The creature looked capable of tearing me in half, which was no doubt how he had happened across the arm that he continued to munch on occasionally.

Gitnatch the Horrifying, [Malignant Goblin Taskmaster] (Level 7 - Boss)

If malignant goblins survive long enough, the feral disease that has ravaged their bodies begins to enhance their physical prowess. While these taskmasters care little for self-preservation, these brutes still regain a modicum of their former intelligence. Due to their enormous strength, Taskmasters accrue a pack of followers and roam the land searching for prey. When they find it, the Taskmaster allows their less evolved kin to strike first before striking deeper on their own, looking for weaker targets.

A Taskmaster is a force of nature whose strength rivals all but the largest species in the world. They are often compared to giants and likely could stand toe-to-toe with one. While they can no longer transmit the disease that has fundamentally changed their minds and bodies, their newfound strength and pure ferocity have brought them levels above their kin. If you find yourself facing one of these creatures you would be wise to run before it notices you and decides your bones would make for a nice toothpick.

Stella looked to the creature then back to me, “Sorry. He already has a name. I’m not touching that. No, no thanks at all.” We watched as the boss made his way to the center of the road before hunching down, once more taking great bites out of the severed arm. It wouldn’t be long before it was entirely devoured. The beast had not yet noticed us, and I wanted to keep it that way for now.

My voice barely above a whisper, I looked to Stella. “How strong is my deflecting shield? Can it withstand one of his attacks?”

“Well, yes. The spell is capable of deflecting most attacks, but just look at him. Stronger attacks or even those from powerfully enchanted weapons would do little until your spell is at a far higher level. With his likely sky-high strength score, I’m guessing, at best, it would deflect it only slightly and, at worst, breakthrough entirely.” Stella was shaking her head back and forth as she said this. It was clear she was nowhere near confident enough for my spell would be strong enough. “Based on the description we just read, and seeing him in person… I wouldn’t count on it is all I can say.”

“I hope it doesn’t come to that,” I said with a defeated sigh. “My initial game plan was trying to cast restless slumber on it, but I’m guessing spells like that are less effective on boss monsters.” Stella nodded her agreement beside me. “I think our best strategy is to do as much ranged damage as possible and then fall back on my battle axe."

“It’s too bad he’s outside your new flamethrower spell. I bet he wouldn’t like it any more than the smaller goblins did.” Stella said, still unable to take her eyes away from the dire creature.

“Ok, let’s do this,” I said as I mentally placed my axe into my inventory. It would be back in my hand at a thought, but this battle called for magic first. Crouching low, I prepared to dual cast minor firebolt. Man, I need more damaging spells, I thought. My hands twisted, as if in a dance, as I whispered the words of the spell. My eyes never left the boss as my spell completed. A large ball of flame was sent hurtling forward like a speeding arrow. It roared like an angry lion to my ears and quickly crossed the distance between us. The boss turned to see what was happening and dropped the little that remained of the severed arm. The spell was coming in to strike his chest, so I was able to see the mob’s eyes squint, almost as if it was trying to figure out if the spell was a flying enemy or something. Just before the spell connected, his eyes widened in comprehension. His mouth fell open, pieces of gore tumbling down the front of his tunic. He tried to bring an arm up, possibly to deflect the bolt, but it had not reacted quickly enough.

The bolt slammed into him, knocking him back a step. Reflexively the giant threw a hand backwards to stop falling over from the powerful impact. The liquid ball of flame tore into his tunic, biting deeply and flash-boiling the flesh beneath. He howled in pain even as the heat from the spell sunk deeper into his body before dissipating. Damage dealt 71, the damage notification flashing in the corner of my vision.

“Sixty-five percent health remaining,” Stella said next to me, her form crouched low and tense beside me.

It looked like someone had punched a hole into the creature's chest. His tunic had a fist-sized hole, the edges blackened and burned. Blood oozed slightly underneath, but it almost looked cauterized from the intense heat from the spell's magic. Hate-filled eyes looked in our direction as the boss came to his full height in one swift flex of his leg muscles. It snarled defiance at me before beginning its charge, murder curling its lips and drawing his eyes into a deep glower. My spell's cool down elapsed so I was already deep into a dual spell casting once more. The boss’s intelligence showed itself then whereas its smaller brethren had not shown that capability. Instead of charging headlong at me, it veered off to the side with one long stride, only to come back across the other way in a zig-zag pattern. As my spell finished, with a great heave, the giant tossed the severed arm in our direction, somehow having picked it up unnoticed by either of us.

A second ball of roaring plasma blasted away, eating up the shortening distance between me and the charging monster. The creature’s eyes had been watching my hands so as the spell flew, he tried to dodge to the side. The attempt was partially in vain for his mobility was nowhere near as high as his strength stat. It wasn’t all for naught however, as the fire blasted into his shoulder instead of his neck. The damage must have been lessened as Stella updated me on his remaining health. “He’s down to thirty-eight percent!” Stella shouted out, her form flying higher in the air to avoid being anywhere near the boss when it reached us.

The boss had come to a stop from the impact. Yet, with a blood-curdling scream, this time coming through from the pure outrage that flashed across his face, it moved to rapidly close the final distance between us. Terror welled in my chest, threatening to make me run for my life, but my courage held. Doubting I would be able to complete another spell before it reached me, I pulled my axe from my inventory. Its weight and balance helped calm my nerves somewhat. Thinking of the tactics I had used against this creature’s kin, but keeping in mind the boss’s strength, I formulated a plan as the final feet closed between us. Setting my feet, I was as prepared as I could be to meet the creature’s mad rush.

As the boss neared, it reached up one of his massive arms, and swung down with all its might. The intent was clear, to bury me under the avalanche of its weight. The blow could no doubt shatter the stone beneath my feet. I needed to time this perfectly. Seeing the thickly corded muscles towering above had me doubting I could sustain even one blow from this mighty creature. Inches away from death, I acted. My feet moved me to the side just as the power of my instant cast minor deflecting shield flared a crystalline barrier between us. The magic of the spell was fully transparent but caused the boss's arm to appear refracted, almost as if looking through a multi-faceted diamond. The boss corrected for my movement, his fist following me.

Unfortunately, I hadn’t dodged far or nearly fast enough. The giant’s lips curled in expectant victory as his sledgehammer of a fist was inches away from crushing through my collarbone. His attack struck my magical barrier… and my luck held. The giant’s fist rebounded away with incredible force. His arm was thrown violently across his body and, with him running at an all-out sprint, his body twisted dangerously. With a crash, the boss fell heavily to the ground, the left side of his face sliding painfully across the paved road.

Not hesitating a moment, I struck down with my battle axe. Once, then twice in rapid succession. His momentum carried him too far as I had initially hoped to attack his vulnerable head or neck. Instead of a lethal coup de grace against a prone target, my attacks slammed into his exposed back. My attacks were still causing significant damage when Stella shouted out a warning. “Watch out!” Stella tried to call out a warning, but it was too late. Her warning hadn’t come fast enough.

Even as the monster arched its back from the powerful impacts of my axe, his massive arm was swept back towards me with frightening speed. Just before his blow connected with my mid-section, my axe’s special effect triggered as my third blow landed. A deep blue light flashed from the axe, crashing down into the deep wounds I had caused. Before I could see what effect the magic had, the goblin’s arm slammed into my side, just below my rib cage. Azure light flashed in my vision but was lost to me as I was sent spinning away.

The blow felt like a massive boulder had crashed into me. My vision tumbled as the sky and ground rapidly changed places. Finally cratering into the ground, my breath was blasted out of my lungs. My vision exploded in sparks and threatened to blacken into unconsciousness. Even in my dulled mental state, I knew if I passed out, I would never awaken. Fighting with everything I could muster; panic crushed my chest as I found I was unable to draw a breath. A notification was blinking insistently in my vision and pulled up unbidden, its message important enough to bypass my earlier settings. Hoping that it wasn’t a precursor to my death, I read the message as I continued to futilely attempt to take a breath of lifegiving air.

Notice! Debuff Added: [Minor Collapsed Lung].

[Minor Collapsed Lung]. Your left lung has partially collapsed. You are unable to draw breath for the next 9 seconds.

Panic welled up within me. Not being able to breathe was horrifying, but the thought of the boss striking down to deliver the coup de grace on me passed through my mind. I wasn’t sure what the boss was doing exactly, my eyes were firmly closed from the pain, but I knew it was only a matter of time before he was back in the fight. Completely helpless, it was all I could do as I rocked back and forth in pain, desperately trying to force air into my lungs. Even with my eyes closed, I could see my health bar. It had dropped to half with that single blow, I wouldn’t be able to take another.

Stella was shouting vainly next to me, but it sounded muffled and distant to my pain-addled mind. Finally forcing my eyes wide, I did my best to roll away several feet before trying to attempt to stand. My legs were quivering violently, but I had made it to my feet. Surprisingly, my axe was still in my hand. I looked in the direction of where I thought the boss was.

“You’re okay, you got him.” Stella’s words finally registered. The battle was won. As the debuff timer finally reached zero, I knelt to one knee, taking in deep breaths of air. Still laboring to breathe, I found the body of the goblin lying a half dozen feet away. That had been too close.

“Damn it, that hurt,” I was finally able to utter. It had felt like my lungs had been glued together. The fear and panic had blocked out anything else. If the boss hadn’t been killed there at the end, I doubt I would have been able to muster any type of defense even if it simply tried to stomp down on me. Coming to my feet once more, I was bent over, hands on my knees as I was finally able to slow my breathing. Several notifications blinked away in the corner of my vision. I was thankful I was still around to be able to view them.

Experience Awarded: Malignant Goblin Boss “Gitnatch the Horrifying” (level 7) – 800 experience

Congratulations! You have successfully completed the quest ‘Defending the Defenseless.

Objective One: Slay Malignant Goblins, 0 of 12 remaining.

Objective Two: Defeat “Gitnatch the Horrifying”, 0 of 1 remaining.

Objective Three (Hidden): 24 of 47 residents of Winterfalls have survived the goblin raid.

Calculating Rewards… Please stand by.

My breath caught as I saw the hidden objective. Nearly half of the people I had known and grown up with were dead in what seemed like a matter of minutes. Words from my parents echoed in my mind about how we were safe as long as we didn’t go outside the town’s protective field. All it took was one Hunter to bring that safety crashing down. The realization that I would likely be dead too had I not decided to venture out of town this morning crashed into me. I would have been in the shop with my parents and would have ended up just as they had, turned into a snack for those dastardly devil goblins.

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My mind was conflicted once more. Seeing myself dead beside my ‘parents’ in all likelihood, but, in reality, I had only been transported to this world just this morning. If it wasn’t for the partitioned mind that Stella had placed earlier, I would be spiraling to the ground in regret and misery. Those emotions were still there but pushed behind a type of mental barrier. I wondered curiously if that barrier would come crashing down like the one that was supposed to protect everyone within Winterfalls. Time would tell, I supposed. Stella had said that it would slowly fade over the coming weeks.

Feeling centered once more, I made my way over to the corpse of the boss. He was face down and unmoving. His left hand was at an odd angle, no doubt from the final blow that had sent me careening. The massive goblin’s back was altogether different from the rest of his body. My axe’s special effect had, quite literally, froze his entire torso solid.

“Does the axe’s ice effect normally do that?” I asked in surprise. We had seen the weapon’s special effect come into play once before on one of the goblins from the first group. Sure, the area hit had frozen, but it was minuscule compared to this. Further, when the boss had swung back at me, bringing every ounce of strength he could muster, even considering the awkward angle had come at a devastating price. From what I could tell, my weapon’s freeze combined with his attack caused the ice to shatter his lower spine. His back looked like a pane of glass with a spiderweb of lines shooting out in all directions. Frozen blood was beginning to melt and was dripping like some type of red slurry. When it finally melted, it would probably look like a small stick of dynamite had exploded.

“No,” Stella answered as she swiped a paw in the air as if looking for some piece of information on an invisible display in front of her. “We saw the damage it did before, but this… Normally the ice effect will only cause additional damage and potentially a movement speed debuff. Essentially, the nearby skin will freeze, but certainly not to this degree. From what I see from the system, now that it’s actually happened, can only happen when the creature is at very low health. The entire wound freezes solid enough so that it can spread several feet out in all directions. Against a lesser enemy, it would more or less be instant death. With the boss and his high constitution, he wouldn’t have been able to move for at least a few minutes.”

“Well, I’m glad that it did. If he had gotten up, there would have been nothing I could have done to stop him from killing me,” I said as I returned my battle axe to my inventory. Kneeling, I placed a hand on the boss and willed his inventory to appear. A familiar window appeared showing he had three gold and thirty-four silver pieces. The tunic he was wearing was also there and to my surprise was magical with some interesting statistics. His kilt was nothing special, just some animal hide that I had no intention of taking. Everything went into my bag of holding, except for the tunic. I willed that to appear in my hands. Right as it appeared in my outstretched hands, the system message appeared showing me the calculated rewards from the quest we had just completed.

Congratulations! Due to saving more than half of the remaining residents of Winterfalls, your rewards have been improved and you have earned a hidden quest reward.

Quest Experience Awarded: You earned 1,500 experiences (base 1,000).

You have earned a quest reward, {Hide Bracers of Toughness +1}.

You have earned a hidden quest reward, {Ring of Blind Rage}.

Level Up! You have earned enough experience to advance to level 3. You have 7 attribute points to distribute. Fight well, Hunter! Slay all that stand in your path!

Upon reading the last message, golden light poured down over my body, bringing with it a feeling of serenity, as if I had just woken after basking for an hour under a noon day’s sun. My health, mana, and stamina all filled to their maximum and any lingering weakness from the boss’s blow vanished in an instant like some distant memory. My eyes returned to the leather tunic in my hands, and to my surprise, it had actually shrunk in size compared to what I had been expecting. There was no way that this human-sized tunic would have fit the boss. I looked over to Stella, motioning to the leather equipment with a questioning nod.

“Anything magical in nature, unless it specifically says it cannot, will shrink or grow to fit whoever holds it. It's quite handy actually.” Stella answered my unspoken question.

“Nice,” I said as I willed the tunic’s information up.

{Troll Hide Tunic of the Bloodless}. A tunic made from the treated hide of a Dust Troll. When equipped, the user is empowered with a lesser version of rejuvenation that greatly decreases all bleed effects, as well as increasing health regeneration. Quality: Well-crafted. Rarity: Uncommon. Type: Leather. Slot: Chest. Durability: 430/500. Armor: 15. Effect(s): Blood loss from bleed effects is severely decreased. The effect of Constitution is doubled when calculating health regeneration, with the effect doubling further outside of combat.

“That’s a nice upgrade,” Stella whistled as I equipped the leather tunic. It had stitching that ran down the sides and I had to slip it over my head to wear it. “Ha, you know you could have just equipped it automatically in your inventory screen, but please do that more often in the future. I can only imagine what you’d look like trying to equip a full set of plate mail.”

Ignoring Stella’s joke, I looked over my new armor. It was tan in color and was devoid of any fur, for which I was grateful. Having something so itchy close to my skin would not have been pleasant. “Say, that reminds me, how is health, mana, and stamina regen calculated.”

Stella was floating around me, giving my new chest piece a close inspection. She hovered to the hole my spell had caused earlier and, at first, ignored my question. “Yup, just as I suspected. Your magical items will slowly repair themselves, well as long as the damage is not too severe. The damage from your spell is already closing itself. If you look, I bet the durability of the tunic went up a point or two.” I checked that in the item’s description and found that it had done just that, going from four hundred thirty remaining durability to four hundred thirty-two in just a short time.

“That’s certainly an advantage over non-magical items,” Stella continued without pausing. “As for your question, it's pretty simple. The system calculates how many points you regenerate over a minute. So, with your constitution of twelve, you regenerate twelve health per minute or about one every five seconds. With this tunic, that is increased that to once every two and a half seconds. Even better though, outside of combat it doubles that so closer to one health per second.” She hovered a little higher, coming to eye level with me. Her expression held some importance that I wasn’t quite grasping. I could hardly be blamed though; I did just become a hunter after all. She seemed to see that in my eyes, “So, even if you’re on death’s doorstep, outside of combat, in about two minutes you’ll be fully healed. That tunic acts like you’re sitting at something like sixty constitution at level two! Without the tunic, it would take you closer to ten minutes right now to fully heal.”

Okay, that caught my attention. Stella finally saw what she was looking for in my eyes so motioned for me to take a look at the rest of the gear I’d acquired from the quest. This time I equipped my new bracers from my inventory screen and they appeared instantaneously on each wrist. Both were a darker tan with a smooth, fine fur lining under where they touched my skin. Both were extremely comfortable and felt like they wouldn’t budge when the straps were tightened. Looking them over, I had been expecting a pattern or some symbols marking them, but in actually were just plain leather without any fancy embellishments.

{Hide Bracers of Toughness +1}. A fine pair of leather bracers made from a supple material provides some protection from incoming attacks. Quality: Above Average. Rarity: Uncommon. Type: Leather. Slot: Wrist. Durability 500/500. Armor: 8. Effect(s): Plus 1 constitution.

“Oh, I should also add…” Stella had an embarrassed smile showing her teeth. “Next time be mindful as there are cursed items in the Game.” Giving her an exasperated look, she waved away concern. “Yes, yes, I know I just said you can equip stuff quickly. I… forgot about the whole cursed item thing is all.”

Giving a slight chuckle to her embarrassment, I popped the hidden quest rewards ring into my hand and inspected it. This we had earned for saving over half of the villagers after all, so I was hoping it would be good. It was a simple silver band with a single tear-drop ruby-colored gem. As I stared into its depths, a feeling of fury flickered through my mind but it dissipated like the wind.

{Ring of Blind Rage}. Quality: Superb. Rarity: Rare. Slot: Finger. Durability: 1000/1000. Effect(s): Upon activation, this ring causes the user to receive the ‘Blind Rage’ effect. While under this condition, Strength and Constitution is doubled for the duration. Unfortunately, an undesirable side effect comes with this effect. When under ‘Blind Rage’ the user feels a violent, uncontrollable wrath, and is only able to focus on a single target. Until the effect wears off, nothing else matters by the rage; pain, conscious thought, all else is sent to the dim recesses of your mind. That target must be eliminated as quickly and violently as possible. If the target of your rage is defeated, a nearby target is automatically selected. Note – This effect does not distinguish between friend and foe! You have been warned. This effect lasts 120 seconds. Cooldown: 30 minutes.

That was an impressive ring that brought about an incredible strength and constitution buff. Sadly, the drawback meant you’d basically turn into the Hulk for a pair of minutes. Wading into battle without conscious thought or restraint could be disastrous. “This would need to be an item of last resort,” I said as I looked at Stella. “I’d become nothing more than one of these goblins and look how that turned out for them. Still, if I have no other choice, it could save my life.” A thought popped into my mind and I quickly added a follow-up thought. “This thing wouldn’t make me try to kill you, Stella, would it?”

“No,” Stella said in a cool voice. “I cannot be targeted by a monster, NPC, or Hunter. We’re protected by the system unless we’re not bonded to a Hunter.”

“Alright then. Well, next up is level three,” I said as I rubbed my hands together. "Next, it’s time to level up.” I said then pulled up my attributes

Strength: 7

Dexterity: 7

Constitution: 13 (*)

Intelligence: 12 (*)

Wisdom: 6

Charisma: 6

Luck: 5

My constitution and intelligence were coming along nicely, but both had something I hadn’t noticed earlier. Both had an asterisk mark. When I focused on each in turn, and right as I was about to ask Stella about it a new message popped up in my vision. After I did, both asterisks no longer showed up on my attributes page.

Constitution Threshold Reached. Effect(s): Plus 5% increased chance to resist physical stun effects. Health regeneration increased by plus 5.

Intelligence Threshold Reached. Effect(s): Plus 5% increased chance to resist magical mind-altering effects, such as charm, sleep, etc. Mana regeneration increased by plus 5.

Looking over my attributes once more the asterisks had both disappeared, though I could pull up the information again by just focusing on the metrics. “Nice, both of those threshold bonuses are excellent. It makes me want to get the bonuses from each of my attributes, but, Stella, did I get those threshold bonuses for reaching ten in each attribute?”

Stella was currently hovering over my left shoulder, peering at the same message as I was. “Yup. Even better is when you get to the fifty-point threshold bonus. The benefits become that much stronger as you reach higher and higher thresholds, and no, I won’t spoil it for you just yet.” She had a teasingly wicked smile on her mug of a face. I could only shake my head and allow her smugness for now.

“Fine, keep your secrets,” I said with a sidelong glance. She didn’t get the movie reference which I couldn’t blame her for. “So, I’m thinking of putting three points in both Strength and Dexterity to reach those thresholds. Anything I should know before doing so.”

“No, not really. You should be aware that most Hunters specifically focus on two, maybe three, attributes at most though.” Stella replied.

“Yeah, that’s something I’ll need to keep in mind, but, if I remember right, our accelerator bonus with attributes is quite higher than a normal Hunter gets, right?”

“Yup,” Stella replied. “The number of attributes a Hunter gains is the same for all hunters at the start of the Game, though you got a lucky break since I’m your accelerator, and the system rewarded you with a higher amount per level.”

“Cool, that’s what I thought. So, with the bonus attribute points per level, we have from our ‘Exalted Acceleration’ I have some wiggle room compared to other hunters with where I put my attribute points. This means that even if I focus on three attributes, I’ll likely remain competitive with Hunters who mainly focus on two.”

“Eventually, you may want to settle on two as our advantage would be even stronger than an average Hunter,” Stella said with some emphasis.

“Definitely something to keep in mind.” I said, rubbing my jaw in thought. With all of that in mind, I decided to put three points into both Strength and Dexterity to reach the ten-point threshold. The final point I placed into Charisma, figuring I could bring it to the threshold when I reached level four. I wasn’t quite sure what type of character build I wanted yet, but it wouldn’t hurt to balance myself at first and get as many threshold bonuses as I could. Charisma may not seem important, but I had found in my other life the bonuses it could bring when interacting with other people. This world would probably be no different or so hoped. After confirming my selection, I reviewed the new asterisks that appeared.

Strength Threshold Reached. Effect(s): Plus 5% increased damage from all melee-based attacks, skills, and abilities. Maximum carrying capacity increased by 25 pounds before suffering movement penalties.

Dexterity Threshold Reached. Effect(s): Plus 5% increased accuracy with all ranged attacks (including spells), skills, and abilities. Plus 2% chance to score a critical hit, attack speed, and ability to dodge incoming attacks.

I was making excellent progress all around. Several system messages were queued and blinking in the corner of my vision so I opened them up.

Reputation Achievement: You have reached over 1,000 views. You must have done something right to grab this kind of attention. Keep doing it!

Congratulations! You have been rewarded by the System based on the contributing factor that has recently increased your viewership. You have received +1 Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma, and Luck.

“Well, that’s just awesome,” I said in happy surprise. “I had no idea there were bonuses for views and, I assume, my favorites too.” I was just a little ashamed I had barely given it any thought earlier when I first pulled up my character sheet. Looking at it now, my current ‘Reputation’ showed me at 1,104 views and 11 followers. The number of views was increasing even as I watched it, albeit very slowly.

“Another benefit of being a Hunter, don’t worry I’m sure you’ll find out about that too soon,” Stella said, again with a cute smug attitude. She was feeling well apparently and I didn’t want to rain on her parade. Though, as the adrenaline of battle faded, subtle noises reached us. Townsfolk was coming out of hiding. As several approached, realization struck me. These were people that, until this morning, I thought I had known my entire life.

My happiness at seeing friends was shaken a little with confusion when I was greeted with more than one, “Thank you, Hunter. You’ve saved us!” Turning to Stella, I gestured to people who just days before freely called out to me by my name, usually to ask me to slow down from wherever I was heading.

“Oh, yeah, about that…” Stella said with a single squinting eye. She pursed her lips as I turned to face her directly, my eyes wide in expectation, waiting for her to explain just what the hell was happening. “Yeah…”