The battle with the goblin pack was less a struggle and more of a rhythmic slaughter. Between my shield-bashes and Erwen's frantic cover fire, the nine creatures didn't stand a chance.
"One shot, one death," I muttered, watching the first goblin's head cave in under my hammer.
The Swordsman goblin—wielding a scimitar that was more of a glorified meat cleaver—tried to flank me. I didn't even give him the satisfaction of an exchange; I rolled, used the momentum to spring back up, and let Erwen's arrow do the talking. Sunnk! Right through his temple.
[You have defeated the Goblin Swordsman. EXP +1]
By the time the last two tried to flee, the forest floor was littered with fading clusters of light and mana stones. We walked away with eleven stones in under two minutes—a haul that would have taken a full day of desperate wandering on the first floor.
I handed Erwen two stones, keeping nine. She didn't complain; the swordsman's stone was denser, and she knew the weight of our contract.
Days four, five, and six blurred into a cycle of violence and profit. We pushed the perimeter of the portal out by miles, encountering archers who used stealth magic and harp-shaped bows. Each time, my barbarian reflexes caught the arrows on my shield, while Erwen's counter-sniping turned the hunters into the hunted.
We weren't just survivors anymore. We were a team.
– Day 6.
"You can sleep first," I told her during a break.
Erwen didn't even try to play the "warrior" card. She plopped down, let me drape the blanket over her, and was snoring—a soft, un-barbarian-like sound—within sixty seconds.
I sat there, hammer across my knees, watching the dark woods. We had encountered eleven groups of explorers. Each time, I felt a weight in my stomach that no goblin could produce. They looked at Erwen—her shimmering silver hair and amber eyes—with a hunger that had nothing to do with mana stones.
"The problem is that she's too beautiful," I sighed.
"...Am I that pretty?" she mumbled in her sleep, the snoring pausing for only a heartbeat.
"Go back to sleep," I grumbled.
Day 7 arrived. The day the Labyrinth would spit us back into the city.
"Food's low, and we only have ten arrows left," I noted. "We're heading back to the portal early. No risks."
We were three and a half kilometers out when we stumbled upon a fresh group: eight regulars, two swordsmen, and two archers.
"Are we fighting?" Erwen asked, her bow already half-drawn.
"Yeah."
The maneuver was muscle memory now. Erwen vanished into the brush; I charged the center. My hammer became a blur of "One-Hit-Kills." I roared, a primal, aggressive sound that made the goblins hesitate just long enough for me to crush the swordsmen's skulls. Erwen's arrows whistled over my shoulders, picking off the archers before they could even nock a poisoned tip.
The silence returned as quickly as the chaos had started.
"Good job, Erwen," I said, catching my breath.
"Hehe."
I walked over to collect the spoils, but Erwen called out, her voice pitching up with excitement. "Sir! There's something strange here!"
I hurried over. Floating in the air where the archer had fallen was a fist-sized ball of pure, pulsating light. My heart skipped a beat.
"It's an essence," I whispered. "The Essence of the Goblin Archer."
In the world of Dungeon & Stone, an essence was better than gold. It was a permanent skill, a fraction of a monster's power fused into your soul. Dropping one from a Rank 9 mob was rare; dropping the specific variant for an archer was a miracle.
"EE-Essence? For me?" Erwen's eyes were like saucers.
I looked at the light. As a barbarian, I had no use for a goblin archer's soul. But for Erwen? It would make her a professional.
"I'll give it to you," I said, smiling as I prepared to lay down my final condition for our future partnership. "But you have to promise me one thing—"
"Hey, guys! What are you doing?"
The scream cut through my moment like a rusted blade. I looked up. Four humans were sprinting toward us, their faces twisted with greed. They had seen the light. They had seen the treasure.
My "bad luck" hadn't turned around. It had just been bait.
"Erwen, forget the essence for a second," I growled, raising my shield as the barbarians' blood in my veins began to boil. "Prepare to fight. We have company."
The 9:1 split was about to earn its keep.