Chapter 33

Cherish watched as the goblin in front of Crimson faded away. It looked like the goblin was being erased from existence.

She hope that this event wouldn’t scar him for too long. When new adventurers or recruits started and were told that dying in a dungeon, or getting disfigured, wasn’t permanent they usually breathed a sigh of relief. They thought ‘Oh, it’s no big deal if I die then.’ That thought was dead wrong.

Cherish had learned from her two months in the Delving guards that death did matter. It had an affect on the mind: facing your mortality is a big deal. She had died a total of nine times herself and had wanted to quit every time, but she couldn’t. She had to keep going, dying still hurt and it still scared her, but she was always able to get enough will power to keep going, just barely. She had still dealt with her mind falling apart, but she had people to rely on and a goal to keep her moving forward.

While Crimson didn’t die he had experienced a life threatening injury in a dungeon. She knew that if he let it affect himself he’d quit and never enter a dungeon. It was scarring. That’s why she’d told him to go kill them all.

She’d seen enough of his fighting to know that he could kill them all without any problem by him self, but he needed to confront them himself to deal with the problem before any lasting trauma presented itself to him, and having him confront the goblins wasn’t even a sure fire method to save his mind.

It was also shocking how easily he dealt with killing the goblins, when she’d first started she’d wanted to puke after every fight; after a week in the dungeon she’d been able to master that instinct and killing them no longer bothered her. Crimson had stared at his first goblin for a long moment, then turned and walked away with a shrug - like he was trying to decided if it bothered him.

In that respect she’d never surpass him, her level was higher, but he was more talented, he had a better mentality than she did. The first time that she had died was because she’d been staring at a goblin corpse fade away and had just puked. A goblin had run up behind her and…she’d ended up at the respawn point. Her DG trainer had made her run laps for a day for screwing up so bad. He’d even given he the same lecture she’d given Crimson:

“Don’t ever freeze in a dungeon! The worst possible thing you can do is freeze! Even throwing yourself at the monsters might be a better option!”

It had become her mantra, and one that she’d had to work on constantly. David, Dale, and Drake had also had a hard time getting it beaten into their skulls. Her trainer must have had such a terrible headache teaching the four of them at the same time.

“Crimson!”

“Yes Cherish? What’s up.”

“You alright?”

“I…don’t know. I don’t know why that goblin was even able to cut off my arm.”

Changing the subject and ignoring the problem? That could be a big problem.

“Didn’t the Captain explain how damage works?”

“No.”

“…I’m going to lodge a complaint when we get back. You should have known about how that works before we went to get you a weapon.”

She watched as a huge scowl crossed his face, “And why wasn’t I told?”

She mirrored his expression, “It had better be because he forgot, because if it was on purpose I’m going to lodge a complaint.”

“You already said you’d lodge one.”

“I’ll lodge seven if I want. Anyway, you know that STR stat you have? It works in direct opposition to the CON stat. If you attack somebody and they have more CON than you have STR then you won’t deal any damage. If you have more STR than they do CON then you subtract the difference to find out how much damage you dealt.”

“How much STR does a Level one goblin have?”

“8.”

“Then how was it able to hurt me??? My CON is 10!”

“Okay first off: don’t reveal your stats to somebody you wouldn’t trust with your soul. Got it?”

“Yes.” He looked at her with an irked expression.

“Very well, there are two reasons why that goblin was able to hurt you. The first is that all goblins possess a skill called [Inevitable End]. It’s a rather nasty skill that will always deal at least one point of damage regardless of stats, and it suspends your HP Regen for a few seconds after every strike. Fortunately the skill only prevents natural HP Regen, Dale will still be able to heal you if you get hit.

“The second reason is because that goblin got a Critical Hit on you. Did you ever get the explanation on how those work?”

“No, you didn’t explain it to me.”

Cherish felt another rush of annoyed anger directed at the Captain. Of course! If he didn’t explain how damage works to Crimson - why would he explain Critical Hits? She let a hiss of air out between her teeth. He’d probably found out that they existed when she’d been lecturing him on his missed opportunity for a Critical, or even Lethal, hit on the very first goblin he’d fought.

“Critical Hits…double the value of the STR stat for a single hit. Goblins have a STR stat of 8, right? So when it got a Critical Hit its STR was 16. Plus, Critical Hits have a greater chance of inflicting a debuff like bleed or, as you found out, amputate. Make sense?”

He slowly nodded, “Yeah.”

“Good, I’ll be right back. If I haven’t lost count you should be just one goblin away from leveling up.”

She stalked off before he could respond. Even if he didn’t have all the information he needed he had done well that day, but she’d still lodge that complaint, or two, when they got back.

- - - - - -

Crimson watched as the giant-sized Great Dane Wolf-Kin stalked out into the grass. Seeing a woman of her height get mad was terrifying: it was like being a little kid in font of an angry adult.

He glanced around, spotted Dale standing nearby, and walked over to him.

“Thank you for helping me.”

Dale looked at him with his kind and sad eyes and waved his hand as if to say ‘it was nothing.’

He looked at Crimson for another moment before tapping his chest over his heart, and walked back to his brothers.

Crimson decided to check his gains from the fight, hopefully he’d leveled another one of his skills:

Skill: Level Up [Running VIII]

Skill: Acquired [Evasion]

[Evasion]? That’s a new one. Wonder what it says.

[Evasion]: A Skill for avoiding hits.

Lore: Only meatheads just stand and take a hit, you’re not a meathead are you? Prove it.

Bonus: Provide a short burst of momentum to help dodge attacks.

Is the lore for this skill being passive aggressive?

Before he could really ponder it his thought process was derailed by Cherish dragging a screaming goblin by the foot as it flailed helplessly. She chucked it on the ground in front of him and stepped on its back to pin it against the ground.

“Kill it.”

He nodded, unsheathed his katana, and beheaded the goblin.

Class: Level Up [Swordsman] 2/25

Class: Bonuses applied

Class: WorldWanderer Bonuses applied

Name: Crimson Hokori

Titles: Delving Guard, Lena’s Master, Blessed Luck

Class: [Swordsman] 2/25

Sub-Class: [Empty]

Sub-Class: [Empty]

Alignment: Chaotic Good

Health Points (HP): 300/300 r/s 1.1

Magic Points (MP): 110/110 r/s 1.1

Stamina (STA): 110/110 r/s 1.1

Strength (STR): 12

Agility (AGI): 12

Constitution (CON): 11

Vitality (VIT): 11

Intelligence (INT): 11

Wisdom (WIS): 11

Perception (PER): 11

Willpower (WIL): 11

Charisma (CHA): 11

Luck (LUC): 90