Jack inspected his next victim.

  [Orc Brawler - Level 10]

  Despite what he assumed a brawler was, the orc wielded a mace. The crude weapon was tipped with a morningstar head atop its long iron shaft. The entire thing was splotched with red. A moldy rag was tied haphazardly around the hilt, and the orc raised it above his head with all the finesse of a toddler preparing to throw a ball for the first time.

  With a growl, the brawler swung and Jack sidestepped the blow. It was a near thing. His mind reeled at the sheer speed and force behind the swing.

  My perception might be improving, but I’m still only effectively level 2! he reminded himself, feeling foolish.

  The orc swung again, this time horizontally. Jack barely ducked underneath the blow. The orc was not coordinated by any stretch of the imagination, but he was beginning to understand just how much of a chasm there was between those with low stats and high stats. If Jack’s dexterity was at 7 right now, this monster had to have at least 15, maybe more.

  They continued their manic dance—Jack dodging and the orc slashing his mace through the air. He kept his guard tight, twisting and ducking. But with each passing second, he was losing ground. Worse, the other orcs were regaining their senses. Jack felt the wind inside the barrier start to pick up, but he didn’t have any time or mental energy to dedicate as to how a breeze could enter this killbox.

  The orc screamed and swung overhead again.

  Finally, Jack thought.

  He didn’t waste the opportunity. He lunged forward, putting every ounce of his strength into punching the brawler’s kidneys. Its enraged screech devolved into a gurgling squelch, and Jack felt warm, green blood start to spill from where he’d struck.

  Not any points in resilience either, Jack realized. He could see why Myrtle insisted he invest there.

  With the brawler bleeding and doubled over, Jack planted his back foot and kicked forward, landing a devastating roundhouse to the creature’s neck. It whipped through the air and slammed its head against the soft soil of the ground with a dull thud.

  Jack picked up the mace and smashed it into the orc’s skull. The wind caused the finishing blow to spray everywhere. The smell of sulfur filled the air, and Jack resisted the urge to gag.

  [Level 10 Orc Brawler slain - 2,000 EXP gained]

  This was immediately followed by another, more welcome, notification.

  [Congratulations! You have reached Level 4! 5 AP gained.]

  A third orc rushed to face him. The rag-handle of the mace was warm and moist, but he gritted his teeth and tightened his grip. He was fairly certain his single level in swordmastery wasn’t going to be a ton of help here, so he decided to keep things simple.

  Lean into what I have, not what I don’t, Jack reminded himself.

  He inspected the next monster, wind forcing him to squint all the harder.

  [Orc Scavenger - Level 9]

  The creature snarled and leapt for Jack with both clawed hands extended. Jack wasn’t a baseball player. But right then, he swung with enough force to make even the most die-hard fans of the sport nod their respect. His freshly claimed mace smashed into the monster’s left forearm, but it managed to knock it off course.

  Jack raised it again as the monster, now bleeding, scrambled back to its feet and sprinted at him again. This time, it went low, aiming for his legs. He tried to swing down, but was too slow. Three clawed fingers gouged deep rivets into his left thigh, and he roared in pain. He stumbled backward, tripping over an orc corpse. It lunged again while he was distracted and caught him across the chest, directly over his new tattoo. He managed to get his good leg hooked inside the orc’s guard and shoved him back, but it only delayed the inevitable, and they both knew it.

  The scavenger howled its victory.

  Jack did the only thing he could think of.

  “Character sheet,” he whispered.

  The screen blared to life in his vision. He had seconds. There was no time to think. No time to second guess. He knew what he needed. He could compensate for his rash decision with future levels. Right now, he was about to die if he didn’t even the odds by just a little bit.

  I can fix this.

  [Points Allocated. Confirm?]

  [Yes? No?]

  He spammed “yes” and immediately felt the difference. Power and warmth coursed through every cell in his body, and he nearly moaned at the relief he felt. He stood up, his wound diminishing from agony and into something merely bothersome. He could still feel his blood escape through the wound, but it no longer incapacitated him.

  He hoped Myrtle would be proud, wherever she was. He’d put all 10 available points into resilience, pushing him all the way up to 17.

  His bones felt stronger, his skin tougher. Not to the point of stiffness or a loss in flexibility. Just stronger. Denser. Most importantly, it drastically increased his odds of surviving the next few minutes.

  “Come on,” Jack encouraged the scavenger, who hesitated when it saw his adjusted posture.

  It clicked several times deep in its throat, and Jack saw several other orcs nearby glance in their direction. He still couldn’t understand them, but this time he didn’t need to in order to grasp what was said.

  This one’s mine, the scavenger declared.

  “Right back at you,” Jack promised.

  He raised the mace. It screeched and sprinted on all fours toward Jack, the rags it wore trailing in the gale that had filled Olric’s barrier. Jack waited, forcing himself to stay as loose as possible. The moment it leapt, aiming to tackle him to the ground and likely gouge him to death, the mechanic moved.

  With an eerie calm, he took one step to the side, clutching the mace with two hands, and swung upward. The Morningstar tip is embedded into the orc’s lower chin. He let the monster’s momentum carry his strike forward, pivoting so that he could toss the orc like one of those ball-throwers dog owners used all the time. His strength was too much, however, and already rusted tip of his weapon broke off as he finished his stroke.

  Morningstar embedded into his neck, the scavenger flew directly into the blue shield. It sizzled and fell to the ground dead.

  [Level 9 Orc Scavenger slain - 1,800 EXP gained]

  No level-up notification followed, but that was okay. He dropped the handle of the mace on the ground. He was better with his hands anyway.

  Wind tossed Jack’s brown hair aside, and he finally—finally—noticed what Olric was up to.

  The farmer was a whirlwind. He ducked, dodged, and cut with his vegetable knife like it was the deadliest blade in all of Aethros. Jack stood there, awestruck. He could barely see the man amidst the twelve remaining orcs. He would appear for one breath as his knife cut up into an orc’s armpit, only to disappear, then reappear a dozen feet away, slicing at another foe.

  Near-visible striations of wind wove around the man in a dazzling display of power and control. It went beyond mere displayed air in the wake of his speed. The wind was bending to his will, aiding him in his one-man army impersonation.

  Jack noticed an orc scurrying to the farthest side of the boxed-in zone. It wore the long robes of the leader. The sorcerer. A sickly green orb was held in its gnarled grasp, and Jack thought saw its mouth moving quickly.

  This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

  He cursed. The monster had to be casting something. And if Earth video game logic was still holding true here in this world of levels and stats, that meant that the longer the cast time, the more powerful the spell. He didn’t know how long the sorcerer had been chanting, but he knew that if he didn’t stop it, Olric and himself would be in serious trouble.

  The mechanic spared a glance at Olric. He was busy fending off ten separate attacks, with two more bodies littering the floor. He was still heavily overpowered, but seemed bottlenecked by his choice of weapon. Whatever the case, Jack had to help.

  I can fix this!

  He was running in an instant. It might’ve been his imagination, but it felt like the wind was pushing him onward. He accepted the help, sprinting as fast as his injured leg would allow him. His bare feet barely made a sound across the grass. He pumped his arms, feeling sweat disperse in the howling gale around him.

  The sorcerer noticed his approach and raised the glowing orb in front of him like a defensive charm. It screamed something in orcish, and Jack finally heard the monster’s chant. Its voice was layered atop itself in a dozen, haunting, octaves. The orb it held throbbed and boiled over, some of its green liquid sizzling against the ground. It didn’t effect the orc or its long robes, but the ground cracked and withered within seconds.

  Got it. Don’t let the evil lava lamp touch me, Jack surmised.

  His mind went through a rapid-fire selection of options on how to take down the level 15 orc. It was undeniably wounded thanks to Olric’s earlier work, but he had to end the fight now. God only knew what that orb would do if unleashed.

  I need to shut it up, and preferably take the orb out of commission, all without touching it.

  Jack decided to treat the orb like a gun. At least, in terms of the takedown technique he was about to use. He cursed at himself, wishing he’d spent more time drilling this move. It was harder than people showed it in movies, made all the more difficult by the fact that he couldn’t touch the orb and use it as leverage to break the sorcerer’s grip.

  No, he had to—in the wise words of one of his favorite films—break the wrist and walk away.

  Preferably with a dead orc in his wake.

  He reached the retreating sorcerer, who continued its chant at a frenetic pace. It raised the orb, and Jack slipped past its guard. It moved the orb to intercept, but he’d been expecting this. He feinted to the right as if he were about to kick out its legs. Its eyes widened, and it jumped back instinctively. He caught the creature’s wrist with his right hand and used his left to grasp its shoulder.

  Twisting, he threw the orc over his planted leg, causing it to fall in earnest. Jack controlled the hand that was wielding the orb, and so he forced the object to smash directly into the sorcerer’s descending chest.

  It screamed, fury and pain cutting off its chant. The orb’s toxic nature resisted the robes for one heartbeat, then two. Panic settled into Jack’s chest. Was it immune to its own magic? This was the only plan he’d thought of.

  The sorcerer roared something incoherent and threw the orb at Jack. It was an awkward toss, given that Jack still had a grip on its right arm. But that didn’t matter. It didn’t need to go far. He released his grip and jumped backward, but wasn’t quite fast enough. He felt pain blaze up his left hand, and stars danced across his reddening vision.

  Jack looked down. His left pinky finger was missing down to the final knuckle, cauterized instantly by the acidic touch of the orb. He stared at it, unable to fully comprehend the fact that he’d just lost a finger.

  “Watch out, kid!”

  Olric’s voice cut through the static, and he lifted his gaze just in time to see the orc sorcerer reclaim the orb and resume the final words to its chant. It was quickly reaching crescendo, and thin green striations of energy started to ribbon around the sorcerer.

  “Shit!” Jack shouted.

  His hand would have to wait. He had to stop this and now!

  Jack strode with long, powerful steps, letting the entire world fade into the background. He let go of the rushing wind. The pain. Olric and his farm. The other orcs. The future.

  All of it was swept away by Jack’s adamantine focus. He had a problem, and damn it, he was going to fix it!

  He didn’t run, but it took him only three steps to reach the sorcerer. He didn’t shout, didn’t scream or wail at the orc for taking his finger. Instead, he did what he should’ve done from the very beginning.

  He punched the orc in the face.

  His knuckles met incredible resistance, but he didn’t need to dislocate the creature’s jaw to cause it to stop its unholy chant. To his chagrin, the orc stumbled on its words once, but then resumed. The green orb was getting painfully bright now.

  Jack punched again, this time a vicious right hook into its temple. He followed it up with an uppercut, followed by a barrage of jabs and crosses. They all slammed into the monster’s nose, chin, temples, and jaw.

  Still, it chanted on.

  Jack slammed his bloodied fists into its face again, but this time it stopped speaking. Instead, it gave Jack a smug grin and raised the orb above its head.

  The moment it did, there was a rush of wind, and a knife appeared in the creature’s neck. The mechanic was already winding up for another punch, but adjusted his aim the moment he saw Olric’s knife sticking out of his opponent’s neck. He struck the pommel of the knife once. Twice. On the third rapid strike, it drove all the way home.

  “GET DOWN!” Olric yelled.

  Jack obliged.

  From the ground, he felt more than saw two things happen simultaneously. With an anime-quality snap of his fingers, Olric dropped the blue shield. Less than a second later, a wind that made all the previous gales he’d felt that evening feel like delicate feathers blazed over his body.

  It turned him over by its passage, and so he could see the visible tracks of the torrent pick up the sorcerer—orb and all—and catapult them into the sky. The sphere of wind veered hard to the right, directly toward the shroud. There was the crack of thunder, and then a massive green explosion right as the sphere collided with the wall of shadows. It sprayed the toxic liquid across the barrier’s surface for a few heartbeats, but was soon swallowed up by the hungry shadows.

  He waited, expecting some other horrible thing to happen. Nothing did. Thigh burning, chest bleeding, and finger missing, Jack slowly got to his bare feet.

  Across the scarred and overturned grass stood Olric, knife-less and sweaty but otherwise uninjured. His top-knot was a little messy now, but only made him look more badass.

  They met each other’s gazes, and the old farmer gave him a nod and a thin smile.

  “Not bad, kid. Not bad,” Olric said.

  “Thanks,” Jack replied, feeling the adrenaline practically evaporate from his body. “Nice wind. That was pretty cool.”

  Olric shrugged, not even glancing at the twelve corpses littered around where he stood. “Would ’a been better with a proper blade, but I did what I could. Thanks for distracting that mage for me. Had my hands full with these idiots.”

  Jack stumbled slightly, feeling oh so very lightheaded.

  “Whoa, kid! Let’s get you bandaged up before you bleed over the rest of my lawn,” Olric said, but there was no bite to the words.

  The farmer strode over to him, and Jack put a steadying arm around him. Hobbling, Jack let the man guide him back inside the house. Thankfully still conscious this time, he was able to watch Olric at work. He moved smoothly around the house, plucking a few herbs here and there, while collecting a handful of thin tinctures with metal clasps keeping them sealed. With nonchalant strength, he moved the cauldron he’d been working with earlier and replaced it with a mortar and pestle.

  Working quickly, Olric crunched the various herbs together into a thin red powder, then added very delicate drops from each of the three tinctures. There was a satisfying poof of colored smoke after each droplet.

  He didn’t waste any time and quickly retrieved a pile of clean rags he had in a pile by the sink, then spread the clay-red substance across them. The rags were soon damp with the stuff, and Olric moved over to where Jack reclined on the couch.

  “Here, we’re going to put these on. Ain’t going to quicken the healing, but it should prevent any of the corruption those damned orcs lace their claws and blades with from killing you. Sorry it ain’t more, but the good healing potions are reserved for active members of the Red Knights only.” Olric spoke all this in a single fluid breath while he administered the bandages across Jack’s various wounds.

  When he got to the cuts on his chest, he had Jack take off the dingy remains of his tunic. Within a few minutes, he was tightly wrapped and feeling a good deal less miserable. He glanced down at his left hand.

  “Is there a way to heal this?” Jack asked, hating how timid his voice sounded.

  “Yes and no, but I don’t want to get your hopes up, kid,” Olric started. “There are powerful healer classes, but most are either too busy, too expensive, or too far away to be viable options. Healing potions powerful enough to regrow limbs—even tiny ones—are illegal for civilians like us to purchase. And I can’t just brew one up without a license. Plus, the ingredients to make them are guarded more tightly than most dungeons. So while yes, Aethrian magic can do that, it’d be best to just get used to workin’ with four out of five on that hand.”

  If he didn’t hate the Red Knights before this point, he most certainly did now. How could they even pretend to justify that they were guardians of humanity when they actively denied them life-saving medicine? It was utter insanity.

  “Where do they keep them?” Jack asked before he fully understood the implications of what he was asking.

  “No,” Olric responded curtly. “I’m not going to let the only Banisher we’ve got to die because he snatched a healing potion in his first week here. Hell. No.”

  “Fine,” Jack muttered, clenching his left hand into a fist.

  Only then, when his heart rate had returned to a semblance of normal, did the system apparently decide he was no longer in any danger.

  [Skill Learned: Blunt Weapon Mastery]

  [Blunt Weapon Mastery: Level 1. Rank: Novice]

  [Congratulations! Through effort, your skill, Pugilism, has leveled up!]

  [Pugilism: Level 2?3. Rank: Novice]

  “Nice,” Jack mumbled as he read them over.

  “Well, shit,” Olric muttered.

  “What? What’d I do?” Jack asked, dismissing his notifications.

  Olric gave him an odd look, like he couldn’t quite understand the question.

  “We’ve got company,” Olric stated, gesturing with his chin at one of the windows.

  Rising to his feet, he went over to the window. Despite the evening’s darkness, Jack could just barely make out a dozen shapes moving rapidly toward them down a narrow dirt road. But thanks to the moonlight and his enhanced senses, he spotted the large masses of what had to be horses and the glint of red armor.

  Jack cursed. Loudly.