Essence Of A Nullmancer...

~~~

[Crooked magic staff]

<Common >

A basic staff for wielding mana.

-Damage-

23-45

-Durability-

34/40

-Special Effect-

[Skill: Mana Bolt]

Release a burst of condensed mana towards a target.

Mana Requirements: 50 Mana Points

Cooldown: 30 seconds

~~~

"Oh.." Skullius marvelled at the staff in his hand, satisfied with the skill it had as well as the fact that it possessed a rarity unlike anything he had found from the goblins so far.

Apparently, even the steel sword didn't qualify for this rarity ranking, which he had learned from the information packet to range from Common, Uncommon, Rare, Unique, Legendary, Mythical and Transcendent.

Skullius didn't have time to think about these things any further as the angry goblins rushed towards him with rage filled eyes.

Their aggressiveness made him feel eager to blow them to bits as he aimed to try this staff out on them!

[You have killed LV18 Foul Goblin. 610 Exp awarded]

[Your prey emits the Essence of Null Life. Would you like to extract it? Remaining time 59 seconds]

'Great!' Skullius leapt inside as notifications appeared before him, alerting him of the death of the previous owner of his staff. He extracted the Null Life Essence immediately, the joy he reaped from this fuelling his want to destroy more goblins.

He instantly used his mana to activate the skill [Mana Bolt], and a sharp blue light was emitted from the tip of the staff.

Skullius didn't choose to shoot it yet, waiting for the perfect moment so as to not waste his mana.

In his mind, he gave Red Rage a command which the Bone Boar carried out immediately.

The short figure of the Apostle dashed out of the cover it had been hiding behind and headed towards the goblin with the sword!

When the creature saw a dark shadow zipping forth with two blue lights flashing from its face, it couldn't help but exclaim in terror, startled.

"HUH?!"

THIS was the thing that had been sniping his fellow goblins with excruciating precision?!

The goblin was dumbfounded.

The momentary attention it gave to Red Rage, made Skullius cackle evilly.

He immediately released the [Mana Bolt] towards it, the flash of compressed mana appearing before the green creature before it could react!

BOOM!

With glaring light, and the chilling sound of sizzling flesh, the target of the unrestrained might shrieked and fell to the ground!

The Boneman cackled again.

Red Rage had run out of arrows. The only means of offense he had left at his disposal was a rusty dagger which he promptly delivered to the downed goblin's throat!

The remaining goblin glanced in horror at its fallen partner as it reached Skillius, who, afraid that the staff might be destroyed by his angry opponent, tossed it aside and held his steel sword!

The goblin with the spear whirled the weapon expertly before swinging it down with great power. The light of mana was visible around it!

'Do all these guys have [Basic Mana Manipulation]?!' Skullius thought as he raised his sword to block the attack.

There was a sharp, metallic collision which barely lasted for a second before the goblin with the spear followed up with quick jabs of its weapon that Skullius could barely see, let alone dodge.

'This sockethole...!' Skullius thought as he received the relentless attacks, his skull being pounded and grazed to the point of cracking!

WHOOSH!

As the goblin flexed its skill in the spear, and asserted a different stance, Skillius realised what it aimed to do next!

The green bastard was about to use its earlier skill!

...!

Unfortunately...

TCH!

The sound of flesh being pierced was heard as the goblin stopped in its tracks.

Red Rage had planted his sword into its neck!

The goblin staggered and fell.

Red Rage whirled his sword, removing the blood before flashing a thumbs up at Skullius, one of the lights in his sockets dimming to imitate a wink.

"Good! Job! Bro!" Skillius squeezed through his teeth as his socket flames blazed. This bro...

Red Rage had stolen the last goblin's worth of experience so Skullius at least made sure to collect all the Null Life Essence.

His body had sustained quite some damage from the staff and the other two goblins he had faced.

"Urgh..." Skullius heard the gasp of the goblin which had been shot by the arrow.

It was still alive!

It lay down as it endured the pain, struggling against the pull of death.

"Ah... I thought you were dead. Let me help you with that," Skullius said as he strolled over to the goblin with his sword.

The goblin was terrified to see the tall frame walking unsteadily in its direction.

Skullius violently stabbed the goblin in the face, watching it twitch and die moments later.

It was indeed... a little extra.

[You have killed LV15 Foul Goblin. 395 Exp awarded]

[You have levelled up]

[Your prey emits the Essence...]

"Yes!" Skullius yelled as he drew in the Essence into his body.

What a reward for honest work!

The speedy movements of Red Rage were what had awarded the two a grand victory against eight higher levelled goblins, but screw that little bugger!

~~~

[Dash in Dust | Lv. 1]

Amplifies movement speed by 30% while on the ground.

Mana Requirement: 25 Mana Points per minute.

Duration: ---

Cooldown: None

~~~

This skill had allowed Red Rage to skittle across great distances and fire his arrows as stipulated by Skullius.

"The whole 'don't have a presence' thing also helped I guess," said Skullius.

Once again, since his clothing had been burnt by the [Mana Bolt], he had to loot more leather armour and this time, he found a crude robe on the body of the goblin that had wielded the staff. He wore it on top of the leather armour.

Red Rage appraised the ridiculous getup... and shook his head.

After looting, Skullius thought about how he had lost another 20 Null Life Essence from the goblin that was killed by Red Rage at the beginning of the fight. It had been too far for him to just rush to it and absorb its Essence.

His guidance field depicted that he had 220 points of NLE which made him quite happy, but the cooldown for [Unbound] made his celebration a silent one. This reminded him of how he really missed the Grand Sword of the Hedonist already.

Skullius picked up the staff and looked in the direction of the goblin settlement.

'Should I go there and have a look? In my condition, if I find a powerful enemy, I might get killed. But then again, it could be an opportunity to get more experience depending on what's going on,' thought Skullius.

He turned to Red Rage.

"What do you think we should do?"

Red Rage flashed a thumbs up.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Thumbs up!

"Don't act dumb! I know you can give your opinion you Bone Head!" Skullius barked at the short Bone Boar who shrugged with imaginary sweat dripping down his temple.

"Fine. Let's just go and check. Then we'll decide what to do from there."

The two first turned off the torches that the goblins had been using when they scouted the forest and proceeded to jog all the way to the goblin settlement.

As soon as they arrived at the edge where it was easier to see what was happening below, Skullius' jaw almost dropped to the ground.

It was carnage!

The huts which the goblins lived in were on fire (the ones not made entirely from mud).

Battles and massacres were taking place everywhere, and more often than not, they ended in a very grotesque manner.

There were brawls with fists and mutual skewerings between groups of goblins, some which looked different from the ones Skullius has seen far.

There were those that were being sniped by arrows, falling immediately, without resistance.

Skullius saw the reactions of the sniped targets to be peculiar. Those shot would start to tremble violently and start to emit light bursts of smoke from their facial orifices!

What was this?

What was going on?

Sparks and flashes of mana and elements could be seen here and there where stronger goblins were facing off in the night.

Along the steps that descended into the settlement, dozens of goblins could be seen sprawled dead or dying, with a few other goblins attacking those that ran up them!

"What the..." Skullius' sentence didn't get a conclusion.

While he was looking ahead, the staff he held suddenly trembled, shaking him from his fixation towards the fighting below.

The staff suddenly started to exude a dark blue flame that was intertwined with the Essence of Null Life which manifested as a soft bluish white light!

The Boneman was puzzled.

What was this all of a sudden?

A amyriad of notifications began to rain in his vision.

[Felled prey lies before you. Would you like to extract the Essence of Null Life? Remaining time 40 seconds]

[Felled prey lies before you. Would you like to extract the Essence of Null Life? Remaining time 12 seconds]

[Felled prey lies before you. Would you like to extract the Essence of Null Life? Remaining time 9 seconds]

....