The colossal hobgoblin’s eyes scanned them, and David felt a cold knot tighten in his stomach. It was the same feeling you'd get if a tiger at the zoo made eye contact and then started working its way through the lock to its cage.

  They were amateurs with sharp sticks.

  David’s first instinct, his second, and his third, and every other all screamed the same thing in perfect harmony: Run. Run now. Run fast. Leave. Every muscle fiber was twitching, ready to turn this into a track meet where first prize was not being turned into paste.

  He took a half-step back, his heels digging into the soil, his body almost into the first step of what his brain had brilliantly labeled "Operation Get The Hell Out,” and then he stopped. He saw Jamie, spear leveled, his entire body trembling but his feet planted. He saw Rhea, already calculating another throw, her expression grim but determined. They were holding; making a stand.

  Jamie, kid's knuckles white as bone on his spear, the tip drawing tiny, terrified circles in the air. But his feet were planted. He saw Rhea, her gaze gone distant, her head tilting just slightly like she was already working out the angles of a throw.

  David’s feet froze.

  A hot spike of anger, sharp and clean, cut through the fear. Since when do I wait for an invitation to run? Since when am I the guy looking for a leader? The anger was sudden and clean. This wasn't about being brave. It was about being dead later instead of being smart now. It had tracked their location from the smell of Rheas javelin alone. A simple conclusion; running with a Level 10 predator on your literal scent was a death sentence with extra steps.

  He'd been waiting. For Corbin to bark an order, for Evans to take charge, for some adult in the room to make the decision. The realization tasted like ash in his mouth. What a crock of shit.

  It was one thing to be realistic. Running from a fight you can't win was just good sense. But somewhere along the way, he'd stopped asking the next question: How do I win this? How do I use the tools I have to come out ahead? He looked at the monster, then at Jamie's ice and Rhea's javelins. The arithmetic started scrolling behind his eyes, fast and desperate.

  The memory of the Ogre, the one that could teleport, flashed in the back of his mind. One threat at a time. Deal with this first. Then Corbin. Then Mara. The Ogre? You just wait your turn, you teleporting dickhead.

  The hobgoblin took one deliberate step forward, its heavy warclub resting easily in its grip. It had finished its assessment. It saw three manageable threats.

  [Calm Mind].

  [Battle Sense].

  [Energy Affinity].

  [Demonic Energy].

  [Demonic Energy Mastery].

  David activated all of his skills in a rapid, internal cascade. [Demonic Energy] caused a surge of power to fill him, pouring from his chest as though someone had switched on a tap. [Demonic Energy Mastery] let him control it like a new limb. Power buzzed in his muscles, sharpening his reflexes, making the world feel a little slower, a little more manageable. Like a switch flipped in his head, [Calm Mind] took his panic and fear, filing it away in a soundproof mental box labeled 'Later'.

  [Energy Affinity] let him see everything—the power coursing through its limbs. [Battle Sense] whispered how he should move, turning the world into a web of probabilities. The hobgoblin’s movements became a series of potential futures, probabilities flashing behind his eyes.

  The five skills layered together, turning him from a scared guy with a spear into a scared guy with a spear who could see two seconds into the future. He would have to make it enough.

  "Jamie, give me ice!" David barked, holding out his hand.

  A shard of frost condensed into his palm. David focused, trying to pull the cold into himself with his Energy Affinity, to convert it. Nothing. The ice just sat there, a cold, useless lump—he threw it away. Ice doesn’t work? Useless. The tactical setback was a bucket of cold water. No easy advantages. Forget it. Fight with what you have.

  They could win. With his battle sense, portals, and demonic energy. Rhea’s sight and javelins. And Jamie’s ice. They could do it. It wasn't blind faith but calculation. Neither was it a good plan. But it was a plan with percentages that were above zero. The math said they could maybe, possibly, not all die immediately.

  "It's faster, stronger, and it already knows our scent—you run, you die alone." David said, his voice low and rapid. "Your only job is to never let it get close. You hear me? Never. Jamie, you're on harassment duty. Aim for its eyes. Rhea, you hit it when it's distracted. Do exactly what I say when I say it."

  Jamie gave a frantic nod, then shoved his own spear into Rhea's free hand. He understood. His job was his hands. Good.

  There was nothing left to do but trust the screaming alarms in his head and the pointy stick in his hands. That portal trick with the spear... it was a gimmick, a stupid, dangerous parlor trick. But it was a trick that could cut things that shouldn't be cut. He pulled the demonic energy in, feeling it flood his muscles, and then he leaned forward, mentally, putting all his weight on the Battle Sense. The world dissolved into a tactile map of cause and effect. Okay, you ugly son of a bitch. Time to ruin your day or give you indigestion.

  He slammed his boot into the dirt, feeling the demonic energy surge down his legs like a shot of adrenaline, cracking the earth as he sprinted forward, Jamie and Rhea hung back, spreading out slightly. His [Battle Sense] was a constant, screaming feed of all the ways he could die in the next five seconds.

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  He didn't charge like an idiot; he exploded forward at an angle, out side of its dominant hand, forcing it to telegraph every move. The idea was to make it shift its grip or take an awkward swing—or spend so long reaching with its weaker hand, [Battle Sense] would tell him it’s birthday. Buying time and keeping its attention away from the others was the play. Come on, you big bastard. Look at me.

  Its eyes lacked the gleam of imps or the hunger of a warg—just intelligence and discipline, which was worse. It scanned them like a security guard checking IDs, clearly displeased. David eyed the warclub, knowing one swing would make a puddle of any of them. No blocking, he thought. Got it.

  The hobgoblin answered with a single, deliberate step that ate up several feet of ground. It wasn't rushed. The space between them suddenly felt about as big as a bathroom. Okay, so it's fast too. Amazing.

  The hobgoblin’s lips peeled back from its yellowed teeth in a silent snarl of derision. It began its advance, a controlled, dominating walk that ate up the distance.

  "Jamie, its eyes! Now!" David yelled, charging forward on a diagonal to draw its focus.

  Jamie thrust his hands out. A spike of ice shot through the air. The hobgoblin didn’t even bother to block; it tilted its head a precise few inches, and the shard whistled harmlessly past its ear. Its eyes stayed locked on David. Martial superiority. It had dismissed them, deciding he was the main course and apparent leader, and that the others were just side dishes.

  Rhea’s javelin flew a second later, a telekinetic blur. The hobgoblin’s reaction was inhuman. It didn’t dodge or even fully turn. Its warclub moved in a short, brutal, economical twist, smashing the javelin out of the air without breaking its advance. It continued toward David, its pace unhurried. Physical superiority. Martial discipline. Speed. Unless we time it right, This is going to be a nightmare.

  David’s [Battle Sense] screamed a warning a half-second before the hobgoblin feinted high and swept low. He leaped, the club grazing the sole of his boot. The follow-up was a jab with the club’s handle. David, guided by [Battle Sense], was already twisting in mid-air, taking a grazing blow to the ribs that stole his breath and sent him stumbling. He landed hard, pain flaring in his side.

  "Jamie, the ground under its feet!" he gasped, scrambling backward.

  Jamie understood. A sheet of clear, slick ice flashed into existence just as the hobgoblin planted its foot for a killing swing. Its leg shot out from under it. For a single, glorious moment, its perfect balance was broken.

  "Hold!" David shouted, then immediately cursed himself despite the situation. 'Hold'? Who do you think you are, a Spartan?

  His Battle Sense had been right to yell. The hobgoblin’s core strength was monstrous. Instead of falling, it went into a controlled slide, used the momentum to hurl a fallen branch that forced Rhea and Jamie to scatter, and regained its footing almost instantly. It had turned a stumble into a tactical reset.

  “See! We can do this!” David yelled tactically. Inside, his thought was a lot simpler: Holy shit, can we do this? His heart was trying to punch its way out of his chest. This thing is a problem. He sent a silent thank you to whatever messed-up part of his brain was running Battle Sense.

  "Again! Don't let it set up!" he yelled.

  This time, the coordination worked. Rhea threw high. As the hobgoblin’s eyes tracked the javelin, Jamie blasted a cloud of frost into its face. Blind for a critical half-second, it was forced to block the javelin with its club. In that opening, David lunged. He didn't aim for killing blows it could parry. He focused his demonic energy and, from a foot away, wrenched a tiny, precise portal into existence at the tip of his spear, directly over the tendon in the hobgoblin’s forearm. He couldn't control the portals for long or make them big, but he could open and shut them fast. For now, that was enough.

  The portal snapped shut.

  The hobgoblin roared, a sound of pure, shocked agony, its grip on the club faltering as a tendon severed. It switched hands, its face a mask of furious rage now, and focused entirely on David.

  It charged. David’s Battle Sense became a single, constant tone of imminent death. He couldn't dodge this.

  "Jamie, my feet!" he screamed.

  As the warclub descended toward his skull, Jamie iced the ground behind David. David threw himself, dropped and slid backward on the slick surface, the club smashing a crater into the earth where his head had been.

  The injured hobgoblin became a vortex of violence, but a sloppier one. David's world shrank to the flood of pre-cognitive warnings from his Battle Sense. A fist aimed at his temple—he jerked his head back, feeling the wind of its passage. A grab for his spear—he twisted the haft, and the hobgoblin's thick fingers closed on empty air. Jamie blinded it with another frost burst, Rhea’s javelin slammed into the same wounded shoulder, and David, seizing the opening, focused his spear-tip and tore a tiny portal across its grasping hand. Three of its thick fingers tumbled to the forest floor. The warclub dropped from its grip with a heavy thud.

  David created distance, gasping. As the hobgoblin planted its foot to charge again, David didn't try to touch it. He focused his [Energy Affinity], inhaling sharply, and pulled. A visible stream of silvery mana and bloody life force tore from the hobgoblin’s chest, flowing into David’s lungs. The creature staggered, grunting in confusion. David’s body thrummed with stolen power, his senses sharpening to a razor's edge.

  He saw Rhea gathering a massive amount of mana for one final strike. "Now, Rhea! Do it now!"

  Jamie, understanding the plan, thrust his hands forward. A thick, opaque sphere of ice condensed instantly around the hobgoblin’s head, sealing it in a frozen helmet.

  Blind and suffocating, the hobgoblin still had its discipline. It sensed the telekinetic javelin ripping through the air from the treeline and rotated its torso to protect its neck, raising its maimed arm as a shield.

  It was the most defensively sound move it could make. And David’s [Battle Sense] had already plotted its path.

  He was already moving, not aiming for where the hobgoblin was, but where its neck was going to be. He thrust his spear into empty space and, at the apex of the lunge, focused. Reality tore at the spear’s tip—a portal the size of a coin winked into existence.

  The hobgoblin’s own powerful, evasive turn drove the side of its thick neck directly into the infinitely sharp edge. The portal vanished.

  The head, its one visible eye still blazing with hate, toppled from the shoulders and hit the moss with a soft, final thud. The body remained standing for a moment longer before collapsing.

  David struck it a few times more for good measure.

  The ice sphere shattered. Jamie stood panting, his hands shaking. Rhea leaned against a tree, spear lowered, her breath coming in ragged gulps. David stood over the corpse, his own body a symphony of pain, his energy reserves almost but not completely drained.

  [You have defeated the Hobgoblin - Colossal Variant Lvl 10]

  [Lvl 5 > Lvl 6]

  It hadn't been defeated by a superior warrior. It had been assassinated—David’s intention from the start—by a perfectly coordinated, desperate system of three.

  He looked from Jamie’s terrified but determined face to Rhea’s exhausted resolve. The cold arithmetic of survival in his head updated their files from 'liabilities' to 'assets'.

  Okay, David thought, a faint, tired smirk touching his lips. These two might not get me killed after all.