Jaclyn grimaced as her enchanted mace crushed yet another goblin skull. She had long ago lost count over the last few days of near constant fighting. Her thick leather armor was decorated with deep gouges, numerous scratches and dyed with the blood of goblins. There had, regrettably, not yet been a chance for her to clean up or patch her gear while hunting down the scouts in the woods and now this large scale battle.

“Derek, on your right!” She suddenly yelled out. Nearby a large hulking figure of a man quickly spun to his right and threw up his iron kite shield just in time to block the massive spiked club coming down on him from a hobgoblin.

“Thanks, Jackie!” He called back as he engaged in a life or death duel with the brute. Derek was what most would call a classic tank and a muscle-head on top of it. He was currently decked out in the heaviest full plate armor on the battlefield, apart from maybe Captain Martland, and even more so than Jaclyn’s it had seen better days.

Derek preferred to fight first and ask questions later so he accumulated a bit more than his fair share of hits. Being a big 6 foot 3 African American with bulging muscles and his skill set, he took care of himself pretty well. His armaments of choice included a large kite shield and a larger than normal falchion which looked essentially like a large curved machete with an ornate handle.

“Take this!” Derek roared as he bashed the hobgoblins spiked club to the side as it came in for another strike, causing it to stumble back and overextend its arm. Not one to miss a chance Derek brought up his falchion and swung it back down with all his might. As he brought the weapon down he pushed his Ki into the blade, enhancing the sharpness and durability as much as he could. The gash started at the hobgoblins shoulder and, after cleaving right through the clavicle, nearly cut the creature in half before the blade got stuck on another bone. “Haha! Are none of you monsters a match for the great Derek!?” He yelled out his challenge boisterously, already moving onto another target.

“Jaclyn!” Yelled out a third voice, drawing her attention back to herself just in time to see a goblin with a spear in mid-stab, aimed directly at her torso! ‘Shit!’

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From his vantage point on the wall, Alex could see almost the entire battlefield, and he saw the spear-wielding goblin sneaking up on his mother while she was distracted. ‘I need to save her!’ He thought desperately. Holding out his hand for a moment and concentrating he gathered the needed mana for a fireball and compressed it further than he had recently, almost to the point he had when fighting the shadow, but he had to be careful not to overexert himself with a single spell. “Fireball!”

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As Jaclyn mentally chastised herself for such a rookie mistake her body sluggishly attempted to move its shield fast enough, but she knew it wouldn’t be enough. To her surprise, however, the goblin suddenly exploded in a blast of fire! “Argghh!” Screamed the goblin as the upper half of its body charred nearly instantly at the heat. The small explosion had knocked the spear from its grip and it fell to the ground yelling. ‘What the hell?’ She thought to herself, quickly looking around.

There were no more goblins in her immediate surroundings, having been cleared away by her companions Derek and Claire, and so she turned her attention to the direction of the mystery fireball instead. ‘Is that… Alex up there? Using magic?’ She thought in wonder as he threw more fireballs out into the sea of enemies. ‘I had gotten the missive from that old man Jason, but I haven’t had a chance to talk to him… I didn’t expect him to be able to do something like this so fast either! Magic is truly a fearsome tool.’

“That your boy up there?” Derek asked her while they had a lull in the combat. The surrounding goblins and hobgoblins had lost a large number to just these three humans and were giving them a wide berth for the moment.

“It sure looks like it. I’ve got plenty of questions for him when this is all over, so let’s hurry up and kill us some goblins!” Jaclyn responded, full of adrenaline at the life or death experience with the spear. ‘Saved by my own son only days after he awakened… I must be getting rusty!’ She chuckled silently as she ran back into the fray, her mace snuffing out life after life.

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You have leveled up! You are now level 3! +4 wisdom, +3 intelligence, +0.5 vitality, +0.2 lifespan Name: Alex Jones Race: Archon Class: Arcanist Level: 3 Strength: 47 Vitaliy: 45 Agility: 54 Intelligence: 89 Wisdom: 39 Lifespan: 12.4

After sighing in relief seeing his mother safe, Alex returned his gaze to the battlefield at large and tried to decide what the best use of his powers would be. ‘Hmm… I wonder if this can work?’ He asked Alice as he sent her a mental picture of what he wanted to try.

‘It is an interesting idea for sure and would help adjust the tide of battle, but I am not any more aware of your capabilities than you despite my origins, so I can’t really say if it’ll work or not.’ Alice responded with an apologetic tone of voice.

“Well, no time like the present then!” Alex said aloud, startling Jeod. He began emitting a large amount of mana in a cloud around him similar to like when he was working with the enchanted items, but he did not condense it. Rather, the opposite was the goal, and he tried to stretch the mana as thin as possible before he filled up the entirety of his controllable space.

Intelligence +1

With that done, he commanded the mana just like when he wanted fireballs or when he had made the wall of stone, and told it to form a dense cloud of small dirt particles. It was straining his mind a bit to control it in such a way and he could feel a headache coming on, but if this worked….

Pushing his limits just a bit more he pushed the cloud away from him as hard and fast as he could while aiming at the back lines of the goblins - where the archers and shamans resided. He fell to one knee under the strain of managing so many different applications of mana at once but his effort was not in vain as he watched the cloud spread out and get in the eyes of hundreds of goblin archers. The shamans, unfortunately, seemed unaffected in their ritual, but the hail of arrows suddenly stopped and he heard a round of cheering rise up from the men.

Wisdom +1

The archers seemed to be having a lot of trouble getting so much debris out of their eyes in a timely manner and many began dying to the human archers who no longer had to hide while the goblins retaliated and were now free to fire as fast as they could while they had the chance.

‘Awesome, it worked!’ Alex cheered in his mind, Alice congratulating him as well on the achievement. He was still on one knee for the moment as he recovered but he was already feeling fine again and stood back up.

“That was amazing Alex!” Yelled Jeod next to him. “The impact that a single person just had on this battle…” He trailed off in wonder, thinking of the future.

Smiling, Alex responded, “The battle isn’t over yet though so I’d better get back to work.” He resumed scanning the battlefield and thinking when he saw that some of the goblins with ladders were beginning to make headway. ‘That shouldn’t be too hard to take care of.’ He thought to himself with satisfaction. “Fireball! Fireball! Fireball!” He quickly shot off a half dozen small fireballs in succession, having learned how powerful he had to make it after killing the one attacking his mother.

One after another the ladder carrying goblins quickly fell in the span of just a minute or two. The several hundred men and women on the battlefield, seeing all these fireballs flying out over their heads and into their enemies midst, began another round of cheering and roaring. They had never seen anything like it but they couldn’t be happier for the assistance.

You have leveled up! You are now level 4! +4 wisdom, +3 intelligence, +0.5 vitality, +0.2 lifespan Name: Alex Jones Race: Archon Class: Arcanist Level: 4 Strength: 47 Vitaliy: 45.5 Agility: 54 Intelligence: 93 Wisdom: 44 Lifespan: 12.6

While Alex was taking another short breather between spells, continuously slinging out fireballs whenever he had recovered enough, he could suddenly now hear the beats of the shaman’s drums echoing across the land with an incredible volume. The drums got louder and louder and the fighting stopped across the battlefield, as everyone waited to see what was happening. Suddenly the goblins began cheering loudly, and then the earth heaved beneath Alex’s feet like waves on the sea.