You would think the council members would have left all dramatically after the agreed duel to the death. Nope. We spent another hour talking through logistics and plans. This got sticky, because all aid with building fortification or strengthening walls that Brunhilda and I could have offered was now dependent on the town being open to accepting goblin refugees. That was dependent on the goblins following Lola, something they currently did not do. Madigan wasn’t budging. So neither was Brunhilda. She was prepared to sit out the mob rush altogether.

Eventually, though, the rough outline of a plan came together. From my perspective it basically sounded like ‘clench tight, this is gonna be bad’, but it was a plan. It was even on paper. That makes it official. When the others left Seth, Spine, Brunhilda, Angelica and I sat at the table. Brand stood by a window smoking.

“What now?” the goblin asked.

“Now, We stack every advantage in your favor we can to get you ready for duel to the death,” Brunhilda said. She was considering something.

“How?” Spine demanded scowling at Brunhilda. That was better than him cussing at her. Hurray for progress.

We all sort of looked at each other for a moment. Angelica shrugged with a ‘I got nothing’ look on her face. Brunhilda and Brand both clearly had ideas, but frowned as they examined Spine.

Seth spoke, “Spine is likely going to fight Howard, the guy from earlier. He is roughly level twenty to twenty-five. Being one of Madigan’s best students, he has probably mastered several of the Elevated Martial arts. He will certainly have the First Step Up the Mountain, a hyper aggressive style focused on burying enemies under the weight of attacks. He will likely have Second Step up the Mountain, that is a more defensive style that will open up opportunities for single devastating attacks. He probably is most of the way through the Third Step Up the Mountain. It sort of merges the two previous steps allowing for extreme bursts of devastating attack while keeping defenses high. I doubt he has that one mastered.”

“Is that how elevated martial arts normally work?” I asked.

Seth tilted his hand side to side, “Sort of. People eventually build a base and a structure to grow in power. The Path Up the Mountain is unique in that it does this in a more organized and repeatable way than most. Remember how I said a master came down from the mountains to teach the Technacoast? It wasn’t just that he was powerful. The methodology of teaching it and its many offshoots are why the Technacoast is the military power in the area.”

Angelica made a face but didn’t say anything.

Brunhilda admitted, “He has a point there. Elevated martial arts, and the Technacoast’s ability to produce a large number of soldiers with them, and as a result them having high combat skills, pushed the main armies of the Fantasy Coast back in the last two conflicts.”

“Okay, so we just need to teach Spine a martial art,” I said more or less thinking aloud.

“I would prefer to be taught whatever it was Bruce Lee knew.” Spine piped up.

“Good choice, but consider having Jackie Chan style skills,” I said. I am still not certain how Spine knew stuff about the world that was, it probably had to do with Goblin Mode, but at the same time being able to talk about something from that simpler time… it was a relief. It felt low stakes and helped me center my thoughts, even if we were discussing child pit fighting. Also I was determined to not panic Spine.

“Wait, I need to get the Keanu Reeves slash John Wick Gun Fu,” Spine said as he theatrically rubbed his chin. “I don’t have the beard though.”

“You’ll make do,” I assured him.

Everyone else was staring at us like we were stupid. I could see the moment where Celeste translated what we said to Angelica. The corner of her mouth curved briefly before she shook her head.

“Time is a factor,” Brand reminded us.

Spine and I nodded and turned to Seth, looking for wisdom.

Seth sighed, “You are one of the greatest tests in my life.”

“If it were up to me, I would give you an A,” I assured him. Tactical brown nosing has its place.

Seth glowered at me for a good three seconds. Finally he looked at Spine, “How do you fight?”

“I sneak up behind things and shoot them in the back,” Spine said. He showed us his crossbow.

“What combat skills do you have?” Seth asked.

“Unarmed at Untrained, Knives at Trained, Crossbow at Expert, Dodge at Trained, Block is Untrained also,” Spine said. “I also have Blend In, Move Silently, Ambush, Detect Weakness, Terrify, and Manipulate Shadow, but all of them are at Untrained levels.” Spine said, sounding less certain the longer he spoke.

Seth frowned, “Let me guess, you have multiple survival skills and Perception and Notice at Trained or higher.”

“Yeah,” Spine said.

“Makes sense, you have been living outside a town’s limits your entire life. You had to spread out your skills.” Seth said.

“What does that mean?” I asked.

Seth shrugged, “He is going to need to improve his skills. That is going to be hard with less than 48 hours.”

“How would he do that?” I asked.

“Grind,” everyone said at once.

“Any other options?” I asked. I am all for fair play, but this was time to consider cheating. I mean duels are dangerous. That said, Spine winning meant… dammit.

“The Mentor skill can help people break through to Master Level and beyond,” Angelica offered.

“Is there any reason we couldn’t use that to help him break through to lower levels?” I asked.

“A few. You can only roll the Mentor skill once per month per skill, and it is technically not beneficial to the person you are teaching. While it ups their mastery and grants scale, using it to break through the lower skill levels is counterproductive.” Seth explained.

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“That doesn’t sound like a big limitation, is everyone here a master in combat skills?” I asked.

Everyone gave me that look, like when they realize I don’t know how food works.

“No, the standard is to have the person looking to break through perform some sort of service for the master, often a year or more of service.” Seth said.

“Does it cost the user?” I asked.

“Not really, it is just the standard,” Seth said.

Gross. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I get not teaching everyone combat skills, and I agree with not unilaterally elevating every random psycho’s ability to inflict harm. That said this had a serious ‘Fuck you! Got mine’ vibe to it.

“Where does that leave us on teaching Spine a Martial Art?”

“I could try and lay the groundwork for a martial art,” Seth said slowly. He considered for a while, “But he is clearly going for a stealthy hit and run style of combat, and everything I know is more direct.”

“Would ‘Path of the Snow Lion’ work better? It has a stealth skill in it?” I asked.

Everyone was giving me that look I get when they are wondering if I am serious.

Seth sighed and his eyes flashed with some form of scrutinize skill. He blinked for a moment. Then his eyes went back to flashing. He frowned. “That is a new style. Most people don’t base their methods off of mobs or their methods of fighting. How many of those have you killed.

“Not enough,” I said in a dark tone. I waited for one to ambush me… nothing. “Anyways, how does it work?”

Seth sort of shrugged, “It is hard to say. It looks to be some sort of stealth and ambush style martial art. I am pretty sure the fast attack is a melee skill and stealth skills. The heavy attack is ambush and some attack skill. You found the movement one, mixing Blend In, Move Silently and mobility skills. No idea what else it has. This is new.”

“That sounds good,” Spine said.

“You sure?” I asked.

“Yes,” Spine said immediately, “I want you to be my teacher.

That was quick. I frowned at him, “Why so quick.”

“For the XP,” Spine said. He stared at me like I was stupid.

It glanced at Seth.

“He will get an achievement for being the first disciple of a titan spawn.” Seth said.

“Why didn’t you get an achievement for being my teacher?” I asked.

“I did. It gave me half a million XP,” Seth said. “If I can get you to master your Cosmic Martial Art the achievement should give me another 750 thousand.”

Realizing that the experience curve was apparently exponential, I paused to consider. That would absolutely explain the disdain for grind against mobs.

Those were way bigger numbers than what I got for stuff.

“How much would he get if I teach him?” I asked. Spine’s eyes were the size of dinner plates. He was shaking slightly.

Seth shrugged. “No idea. Not as much as being a teacher.”

What level are you now, Spine?” I asked.

“Eighteen,” he said. “Holy shit, that is some serious power leveling.”

Seth frowned, “What do you mean?”

“I was level seven when I met these assholes.” The goblin said loudly.

“They grow up so fast,” I quipped.

Seth eyed me. His look was bordering on baleful. He seemed to be wondering if I was messing with him, “Yeah the best path forward is to have Doug teach Spine.”

Everyone looked at me.

“What?” I asked.

“Teach the goblin martial arts,” Seth instructed.

“How?” I asked sheepishly.

Seth took a deep breath before speaking, “use the mentor skill.”

That made sense. No wait. It didn’t make any sense at all. “How?”

“God love ya buddy, but you have to quit yanking Seth’s chain,” Brunhilda said. “Just use the skill.” she pushed me toward Spine.

I looked at Spine. He looked at me. I kept looking at him. He kept looking at me. As I looked at him, he looked at me. This was not advancing the plot. I put my hand on his head.

…mentor please?

Mentor check… Successful

Please select skill to elevate:

Unarmed

Block

Dodge

Blend In

Move Silently

Craft

Willpower

That was a list. I selected Blend In. Spline twitched but said nothing. I used the mentor skill again. And selected Move Silently.

New Achievement!

Substitute Teacher

You are teaching Martial Arts without mastering one yourself. Are you going to Monday morning quarterback next? Anyways this while not a “good” idea is entertaining.

Reward: let’s hold off and see if your disciple lives to weeks end before handing out any rewards.

The odd tendency for the achievements to be either hyper clinical or extremely flippant was continuing. I suspected this was a Wilson composed prompt.

Spine stagger. He was bug eyed, “That is so weird. That caused so much existential dread.

“I got a martial art!” he yelled. He pointed at a random passer by, “Fuck you I got a martial art!”

The random person paused and examined the us.eventually they decided to not engage beyond said, “Cool, I guess,” and walking away.

“Don’t just yell at people,” I told Spine.

Spine was crouched down slightly “Am I invisible?”

“No,” most of us told him. Angelica did seem to lose track of him. She wasn’t far off but she was looking at a small mound of snow to his right. The rest of us could spot him. That said Seth seemed to be more or less guessing where the little goblin was likely to move and finding him there.

“Alright let’s focus,” I said after a few moments of Spine trying to see if he could ‘disappear’ from our vision.

“You’re not the boss of me,” Spine said. The kid was getting more than a little manic.

Perception check… Successful

Spine is using the trait Goblin Mode. He is currently being bombarded with inputs. He is not lost to the network but he is distracted.

Seth demonstrating he was both fast and agile appeared almost instantly next to Spine. Faster than though Seth reached down and flicked the top of Spine’s head, “Respect your teacher.”

“Ow!” Spine said. He seemed more surprised than anything. He was rubbing the spot on his head seemingly confused it wasn’t actually damaged

Terms of Pact with Spine Spindle-Bite not in danger.

Blow was Held Back

Intent was teaching, not harm

You are still in good standing with protecting Spine Spindle-Bite as if he were you own offspring.

That was indeed a prompt. I could tell from the words and what not. Well it seemed to basically say everything was okay. Although I did still worry about some sort of secret consequence should I violate the pact, you know beside Spine possibly dying.

“Hey! I am your student. Are you going to let him treat me that way?” Spine demanded.

“You did mess with his stuff a lot,” I countered.

“Plus I am his teacher so it would be bad form for him to challenge me,” Seth said.

“So am I supposed to challenge you?” Spine asked Seth.

Seth frowned at the goblin, “No.”

“I think I would be obligated as his student to meet your challenge,” I added.

No one contradicted me.

“So what now?” Spine asked.

“I have an idea to get you a bunch of sparring partners,” I told him. I turned to Seth, “You will not like it.”