Chapter 6: Chapter 5 – First Run

Entering the dungeon was anticlimactic. He thought that he would be fighting goblins left and right, but it appeared half the battle was exploring empty caves. It was slow going, as while he had good light with his head-lamp and lantern, the stiff inclines and winding tunnels reduced his visibility greatly. He kept himself alert, but having an invisible scout going ahead of you took away most of the risk. Almost thirty minutes into slowly exploring he finally felt a small burst of surprise and anticipation over his bond, to which he stopped his footsteps. It appeared that she had finally found his quarry.

After about a minute, the demoness became visible and waved at him. She gestured that there were two enemies around the corner, to which Jake questioned whether she checked the surrounding caverns and she nodded. It appeared Jake would get his first fight against two goblins, with no risk of additional enemies appearing.

A single enemy would have been better, but this is likely the best Jake could ask for. He reduced the headlamp to the lowest it could go and did his best to prepare his [Mana Bolt]. Holding his spear, his plan was to fire the bolt shortly after coming around the corner and attack.

When he rounded the corner, he turned his headlamp to full blast, and spotted the two goblins. The two goblins were sitting in front of what appeared to be a hut made of mud. They shouted in surprise, and reached to pick up their weapons off the ground. Jake then pointed his spear-staff and released his spell at the goblin that was slightly closer to him, blasting them near their face. The goblin was bowled over, and it seemed like bits of flesh and blood splattered in most directions.

Meanwhile, Jake ran towards the other goblin with his spear parallel to the ground. Once he was in range, the goblin was already ready with their crude club. He planted his feet just like he did during his drills, and thrust his spear-staff towards the goblin’s center mass. The goblin seemed to try to dodge and block using the club, but not only was the spear too fast, but the club, apparently rotted wood, shattered into dozens of pieces and the spear reached their gut.

Jake quickly kicked out at the goblin to retrieve his spear, trying to keep track of the goblin that had been hit by his [Mana Bolt]. It was now struggling to get up, seeming quite disoriented; it seemed to be missing a large chunk of its face, and one of the eyes was closed, or perhaps missing.

Jake retreated once his spear was removed from the goblin’s gut, and took stock. It seemed he could easily finish either of the goblins with his next attack; he decided to move to put the downed goblin between him and the gut-wounded goblin, and with a stab to their throat and a twist, it was dying. The other one charged with speed belying its injury, but Jake easily retracted his spear and returned to his proper stance, to stab the other goblin with the appropriate leverage and power before it reached him: in the chest. The goblin then collapsed, dead, and [The Framework] provided a notification that he seemed to be able to minimize for the time being.

In a way, the fight was anticlimactic. At no point did Jake feel like he was in much danger. These goblins were little more than children with a sharp knife, and for a prepared combatant like Jake they were no challenge.

While Jake was new to using a spear, he was not new to fighting. Before he quit, due to his third shift job, he had been regularly practicing boxing. In boxing, footwork and distance were paramount, and that seemed to transfer over to fighting with weapons quite well; at least, Jake felt like he wasn’t starting from scratch.

In another way, the fight took a lot out of Jake. He had never killed anything other than insects before, and the sounds that the goblins made in their death throes made him feel like he was putting down an animal. A very ugly and angry animal, but one nonetheless.

His stomach roiled, and he tried to push down the feeling. The demoness sensed this, and sent calm and reassurance over the bond, perhaps even a feeling of righteousness; it was only due course that he must kill these creatures.

Jake expressed his appreciation for her, and thought about what she was doing during the fight: watching. It appeared she wanted Jake to tackle this on his own, to build confidence and get his first kills out of the way, but there to add a distraction if Jake needed it. With that, he went to collect the spoils of war, getting his looting knife and pliers out.

It appeared that goblin canines were some sort of spell component, and so they had some value on thee [Multiverse Market]: at least enough to be worth collecting. Removing the teeth from their rotting mouths was a little gross, but it was not very difficult. He then sliced into their chest and removed their cores. It was a little difficult to find the tiny core in their chest, but the demoness showed him a trick: he could sense them with his mana.

Enemies looted; Jake reviewed the notifications he ignored in his [Menu].

 

 

 

 

It seemed that two goblins were not enough for him to earn his first level. Up to now, there was mostly only one path to take through the cave, even if it winded around everywhere and was difficult to traverse. It was slow going as they were trying to make sure that there were no surprises, and that they got the jump on the enemy instead of the other way around.

This cavern appeared to have more than one way out, though. He questioned his familiar if she would be able to track and map out the dungeon or not, to which she sent a feeling of confidence; she would be able to find the way back even if they took many paths.

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With that, they continued to explore and ran into three other pairs of goblins, and they went down much the same as the first group. The most recent group, he managed to land his [Mana Bolt] right on the goblin’s throat, and they went down immediately, adding absolutely nothing to the fight. Sometime after the first fight, he started working on moving his mana in a spiral both in between and during the fights. This practice seemed to help significantly, as he had even gotten his bolts down to only 4 seconds instead of 5.

Jake’s mana kept moving more and more fluidly, and that seemed to help how quickly he could make the spell-form. After the third grouping, they stopped and Jake had his packed dinner; they had spent several hours in the caves already. They kept moving through the caves until he felt the telltale sign that the demoness had discovered more enemies.

This was a little different though, as there was a more focused and resolute feeling coming over the bond. Jake waited for the demoness to return, to which she showed that there were 5 enemies ahead. This might be Jake’s first true challenge in this dungeon, as there was a possibility of him being wounded.

Jake approached until he was in the adjacent pathway with his headlamp off, and prepared his mana bolt, putting more into the charge than he usually would; he would need to make these count. Jake heard the goblins shriek, and he rounded the corner and lit his lamp like he always did, and fired at the nearest goblin. They were over 10 meters away in the cavern, a somewhat large room compared to the previous rooms.

The goblin was struck in the back of the neck, and it shrieked as it went down to the ground. He began charging his next [Mana Bolt], but he saw that the goblins were still quite distracted as the demoness kept lighting their faces on fire and fluttering away. They swung their clubs, but could not even come close. When Jake fired his second oversized bolt, he hit the back of the head of one of the goblins, and it sent brain matter splattering over their allies. 

The first goblin hit was still not getting up from where it fell, Jake only saw it stirring slightly. That was 2 goblins down, with the other three finally starting to pay attention to Jake. Instead of going for a third bolt, he rushed in and stood beside a wall in the cave; he could still only be attacked from a limited number of directions, at least.

When he arrived, the goblins were only barely ready for him, they were so angry and focused on the demoness’ distraction. He was able to pierce one of the goblins and retract his spear without any of them getting closer to him, allowing him to repeat the process uncontested, which left the goblin dead.

With one more goblin down, the last two finally leaped in Jake’s direction, trying to bring their small knives to bear on him. Still, Jake kept his distance and warded them off with timed thrusts, the goblins almost retreating until eventually he landed a slash on the left goblin. That seemed to make the other goblin forget about any defense and charge Jake, but they were met with a kick that sent them tumbling backwards. Jake was about to move to finish off one of the goblins, when he felt a flash of surprise and worry came from the demoness. He turned just in time to see the original goblin he had knocked over stabbing his thigh with a short knife, where he felt a sharp pain.

Jake finished the knife wielding goblin with a stab of his spear while the demoness took to distracting the other goblins, giving him time to position himself and finish them off easily. Jake felt a pain in his thigh just above his knee, but he felt the wound was not very deep. The demoness flitted about in worry, having him take off his pants so that she could apply one of the healing salves that he had previously purchased, and had him drink a single healing potion before putting his motorcycle leathers back on.

Somewhere during the fight was a notification, but Jake was too busy to take note of it. Now that the fighting was over, he checked it.

 

 

 

 

Finally, Jake had reached level two. It took over ten goblins, but he was finally there. He could now boost his attributes, and his goal was to try moving intelligence and charisma past twenty as soon as possible, with wisdom coming as soon after as he can.

It seemed as a Summoner: he could viably summon framework-assisted creatures using a [Summoning Token] whenever he received one. Entities such as creatures or people that were immortalized by [The Framework] would wait in the void when they died, unaware of the passage of time until summoned through many means, Jake’s summoning class being one of them. [The Framework] could even revive people as they were when they died, especially ones it deemed to be effective or worthwhile expenditures. Jake could die and be revived back in his [Refuge] like nothing happened, but he knew that this would not be the case until he completed his [Trial]. 

Jake guessed the [Summoning Token] would be a reward for completing a dungeon, though a beginner dungeon would be wishful thinking. However, he couldn’t pick a specialty until after level five, so Jake would want to wait until then, anyway.

Not only would he get a bonus to those summoned creatures; he would be guaranteed a rarer creature that matched that specialty, the first time he summoned after selecting it. It was a bit disappointing for him to have to wait to summon his first creature, but Jake knew that it would be worth it.

Jake finished dismantling the creatures, and he decided that was enough for his first run. He wasn’t sure how far these caves went, but he felt like for a beginner dungeon there wouldn’t be that much to go. He had already killed thirteen goblins, and he couldn’t imagine that there was much more than double that remaining. He would head back to his [Refuge] and sell his loot on the [Multiverse Market], clean himself up and prepare for tomorrow. He would also spend his attribute points, and try to predict how much he could earn in the dungeon that remains.

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