Goblin Lord

Yesterday there were many things to consider before going to bed, so a relaxing, uneventful morning is just right for calming the soul.

Since there were no rolls on the [Mana Banners], I had full energy today, so, breakfast comes early and Licia is once again woken by it.

Licia: "Morning."

Miwen: "Good morning."

Licia: "You've obtained a new skill thanks to your Gift yesterday right?"

Miwen: "Yes, I did."

Licia seems curious about it, I guess since I can share them with her, she wants to know what's in it for her.

Licia: "Was there any good one?"

Miwen: "[Faster Tree Climbing] at level 2."

Licia: "Are you being serious?"

Of course, I'm not, there's no way anyone on Earth would consider that to be a good skill, even if it's my highest-level skill right now.

Miwen: "I got a skill that enhances sight and a skill may allow the user to resist a fatal attack at a rare chance, it also boosts training, so it's pretty useful overall."

Licia: "Will you share them with me?"

Miwen: "I may do so later today, for now, I won't claim the points required before going to the dungeon."

Licia: "And why is that?"

Miwen: "There's always the possibility of a level-up, so it's better to do it after all is said and done. This way, the end of the day is the most efficient."

Licia: "When you put it like that..."

I guess I managed to convince her, and to be honest, having her understand the logic behind my actions helped me strengthen my belief in them.

And so, we finish eating breakfast, and after that, our destination was clear: The dungeon.

Licia still gets puzzled by some things along the way, it's probably going to take some time before she completely adapts. But for now, she seems to not mind most things on our way.

When we arrive at the dungeon gate, we find Sam and Roy waiting for us, Roy seems slightly anxious about today's raid, while Sam seems lost in her thoughts.

Roy: "So, we will be fighting the floor boss today huh? We are going at a very fast pace."

Miwen: "That's for sure, but I think victory is assured for us as we are right now."

Sam: "I share the same opinion, but let's try not to get overconfident okay?"

Roy: "Fine. What about you Licia, are you sure you can fight the boss?"

Licia: "Yes, I think that if Miwen and I were to fight it together, we'd be sure to defeat it."

Roy: "That would leave Sam and me to take care of the goblins right?"

Sam: "Well, it was bound to be this way even before Licia came you know? One of us would have to grab the boss's attention while the others defeated the minions."

Roy: "I guess so."

As such, we decided on our strategy for the boss. Well, it's not something very well planned out, but this floor's boss is not known to have many special abilities, the most difficult thing about it is the minions that accompany him, their numbers, to be more precise, are a problem for solo or duo parties. I believe that with Licia on the frontline, the boss should be no problem, and we could also help Roy and Sam after defeating it. Not that I think that Roy and Sam will have any trouble with two goblins each, but Licia and I are strong enough to finish the boss faster, probably.

And so, we pass by the settlements on the first floor, making our way to the closest boss room door we can find.

Along the way, we find some slimes and goblins, but they don't stand a chance and are quickly wiped out. This scene makes me proud of how far we've come in just a few days, there's no denying that we are much stronger now. But the last challenge this floor has for us is yet to come, as we stand before the door that leads to the floor boss.

Sam: "Is everyone ready?"

Sam calls for us, and with a nod, one after the other, we all tell her that we are ready for this battle.

Upon entering the room, only darkness can be seen, with no signs of any monster anywhere. Of course, we don't let our guard down, we know what's to come, and as if to confirm our decision, the door behind us closes. That's it, there's no going back now, the only way is forward, only after defeating the boss we'll be able to leave this room.

Fire torches in the walls are all lit all around us, and in front of us, there are 5 human-like creatures.

Standing in the middle is a Goblin Lord, the boss of the first floor of this dungeon. It's said that he is stronger than any normal goblin at level three and carries a small sword with him, thankfully, he has no skills of note, the only notable feature in that regard is that he appears to be smarter and is able to command the other goblins in this room. Speaking of which, the four goblins here all carry clubs with them, we know for a fact that they are all level two and level one, but the presence of weapons makes things difficult.

Licia and I target the Goblin Lord, while Sam and Roy focus on the other goblins.

Licia goes on the offensive, attacking the Goblin Lord multiple times.

I fail to understand why Licia, who's usually cautious is being so reckless right now, but there should be a reason for it. For now, I take advantage of the fact my opponent is preoccupied with Licia, and try my best to sneak behind him.

The clashing sound of Licia's knife as it meets the Goblin's sword reverberates throughout the room, she's doing a great job at keeping the boss at bay by herself. And then it finally hits me.

Licia's knife has a smaller reach than the sword the Goblin is carrying, it's also not a very durable weapon, if she were on the defensive, she would have to take the brunt of the force from the Goblin Lord multiple times, it's quite possible that knife would simply break if that were the case. But by attacking him several times, without using her full force, she's forcing the Goblin Lord to stay on the defensive while reducing the damage to her weapon. Doing so, she manages to reduce her disadvantages while also creating an opportunity for me to strike.

If that wasn't enough, when she notices that I'm in a good position for a strike, she casts her ice magic, making her knife that was connected to the Goblin Lord's sword freeze, with the both of them getting stuck together.

The Goblin Lord tries to free himself, and even though Licia is holding the handle of her knife with all the strength she can muster, the Goblin also does the same, and eventually Licia's knife breaks.

The chance she created though was more than enough, so I focus on killing the Goblin Lord in front of me before he can attack Licia, and with a strike to his neck the battle is over, and even though I was the one to kill it the MVP was absolutely Licia, her battle senses are as scary as ever.

After its death the Goblin Lord's body disappears into the ground, his sword, however, is still in front of us, so Licia grabs its handle.

Licia: "It's gonna unfreeze soon so... loot acquired!"

I have no problems with Licia using the sword, after all, her weapon broke during the fight, and it was thanks to it that I had the chance to kill the boss, so it's completely fair that she gets the sword.

Roy and Sam are still dealing with their opponents, so Licia and I separate to help them.

Roy: "Oh hey, are you finished already?"

Miwen: "Yep, we had it in the bag."

Roy manages to kill one of the goblins, while I kill the other, it seems to me that he was okay during most of the fight, and since it was a 2-on-1 he decided it would be better to be cautious and take his time when dealing with his opponents. Somehow I see this as an amazing growth on his part. It's true that when I came to him all that caution was thrown out of the window though, but you can't expect to win every time.

Miwen: "I think the girls are done on their side as well."

Roy: "Looks like it."

After dealing with their opponents, Sam and Licia come to us and we all notice something has changed in the room.

The door that was once closed has now been opened and so we decide to go through it.

After passing through the door we find ourselves in another settlement, it's a bit smaller than the last one and there are clearly fewer people around here.

Sam: "Do you guys want to try exploring a bit?"

Roy: "Well, we'll have to do it sooner or later, so I don't see any reason to postpone it."

I don't exactly understand why, maybe it's because I was the one that killed the floor boss, but I'm quite close to a level up, so I think I can get to level four if we explore just a bit.

Miwen: "Let's not go too far from the settlement though, the monsters on this floor range from level 4 to 7 and there are stronger species."

Roy: "Oh yeah, online I saw some comments about the hobgoblins and the orcs being a pain to deal with."

Sam: "It's gonna be fine as long as we don't go too deep."

And so we decided to explore a bit of this floor, since no one got badly hurt we thought it would be fine. Even if a stronger species appeared we should be able to deal with them.

While exploring this floor we didn't find many monsters, only a few goblins, but they were stronger than what we found on the floor below, I also noticed that there were no slimes anywhere to be seen.

During this exploration I managed to get to level 4, it seems like Licia also reached level 3, while Sam and Roy haven't said anything about leveling up, so I thought we would keep going for a while until everyone got their level-ups. That wasn't the case at all though.

We were still somewhat close to the settlement when we saw from afar a hobgoblin carrying a sword and commanding three other goblins. The ability to command other monsters is usually linked to a [Noble Monster], there are many ranks for nobility for monsters, the lesser being a "Lord", due to his command over three goblins, he was at least a Lord, but he could have more monsters under his command somewhere, so precaution was needed. Either Licia tells us not to fight it.

Licia: "A hobgoblin is decently stronger than a goblin, his level is unknown and he's a lord commanding three goblins of unknown level, in the worst case scenario we would be facing four monsters of level 7, I think we should go back."

I agree with Licia here, even if I'm at a higher level, I decided to enhance intelligence and defense this time around, of those, intelligence wouldn't be able to have much of an effect unless I was determined to fight until mana depletion hits me. Overall, there's clearly a difficult spike going from one floor to another, we've never had to flee from a battle on the first floor, even though some of them were close calls and some of us managed to get injured...

Roy: "Can't you shoot your ice magic at the hobgoblin? then the rest of us could kill the goblins."

Licia: "I could, but I doubt one hit would be enough to take it down, and as of this moment no one here would be capable of taking him on, depending on his level."

Sam: "Let's just retreat, there's too much risk at play here, and it's doubtful that we would be able to level up even if we were to defeat them..."

Roy: "Fine."

He doesn't look very happy about it, but there's nothing to be done here, we would only be gambling our lives for almost no reward at all.

And so, today's exploration ends with a sour aftertaste, but it's better than wasting our lives.

For the loot, there wasn't much outside of the small sword Licia got from the boss. We only found two monster cores on the second floor, both were evaluated to be of level four goblins, so Sam and Licia got $4 each. Somehow Licia was really lucky today, but I guess I also got lucky by raising my level to 4.