The enormous gate creaked open without a sound as they approached. It was unsettling to see such a monumental structure move soundlessly and without apparent operators.

  “Likely a product of this being a dungeon,” Braden explained—probably noticing Julia’s discomfort somehow. It was a little annoying that he could read her so well. “The real deal would probably have been pushed by trolls. Goblins are known to capture them when their settlements become large enough. Well, I say ‘capture,’ but it’s more like they lure them into their camps and keep them there by feeding them.

  “The trolls would push the gate open, but it would most certainly not be soundless and clean. The bottom of the gate would drag the ground and dig out furrows in the dirt from frequent use. They would also likely not keep them closed often.

  “Goblins have a natural intelligence, but they’re not sapient like other species. They have a sort of primal instinct to use very crude tools, but that’s about it. The gate and palisade would be contrivances of more evolved goblins, likely recreating whatever they’d seen the nearest tribes of sapients do.”

  Julia nodded. That fit with what she knew. She had done some research on the dungeon back in Striton. The Guild had a small library that one could freely read from as long as they were a member. They wouldn’t let anyone take scrolls out of the library, but reading was both free and encouraged.

  Braden said it was as much about preparing for their jobs and knowledge sharing as it was encouraging literacy among adventurers. Guild staff would read the details of a contract to you if you asked, but knowing how to read yourself would be enormously beneficial.

  The dungeon’s dossier contained basic information on goblins—the enemy encountered—a species of cruel intellect that makes and uses crude stone tools and wields the weapons of their defeated victims. They could evolve into sapient species later in their evolutionary path, but due to the nature of their upbringings, these sapient-evolved specimens were almost universally malicious and cruel.

  The worst atrocities committed by goblins, such as when they raided local villages, were perpetrated by their more evolved leaders. The less-evolved kin followed them without question and lacked the intelligence to organize significant threats to towns and villages otherwise.

  Julia supposed that this encampment, in reality, would have been constructed by such a sapient leader (or leaders), but the dungeon dossier claimed there were no such threats present in this representation of it. It was generally just the dregs that were present here.

  Braden nudged her gently from behind. “Get ready. It begins once we cross the threshold. Keep your guard up at all times. Never get comfortable in a dungeon, Jules. Never.”

  Julia nodded seriously and lowered her stance a little as they crossed the scarred ground where the closed gate would normally rest. Braden had mentioned that it would start then, but Julia was still surprised by the abruptness of it.

  Shouts and jeers suddenly overwhelmed her. She scanned around her quickly to see that there was a group of goblins surrounding them. There had been nothing there, and then, suddenly, a group appeared, surrounding them in a crescent shape and brandishing nicked, jagged swords.

  The goblins were just as the dossier described. Generally short—perhaps a head shorter than Julia, who was already short herself—with pale, green skin, large noses, and beady, yellow eyes. They wore sneers as they pointed their weapons, as though disdainful of the group that had come to threaten them. Julia wondered where their confidence came from, but that was a thought for later.

  “Ya just gonna stand there, ya puke-colored fucks!? I ain’t got no time to waste on maggots like you, so come quick! If ya make me come to you, I’m gonna stick this sword up your dickholes! Better to die with it through your necks than through your tiny, diseased pricks, ain’t it!?”

  Julia was shocked by Ravina’s sudden vulgarity—until she remembered that Ravina was playing the role of the Tank. Goblins had a basic understanding of speech. Or, it was more like they discerned tone, even if they didn’t grasp the actual words. The taunt worked. Their eyes narrowed at Ravina and, as one, they lunged at her.

  Ravina would probably be a whirlwind of death on this field under normal circumstances. As it was, she was just a regular whirlwind. She parried strikes with contemptuous ease, without wasting extra energy on dodging. She just flicked weapons aside like they were gnats that were annoying her.

  Julia appreciated the movement before recalling that Ravina was only on defense while offense was her responsibility. She moved in quickly as a goblin overextended a spear that Ravina flicked towards the ground. It struck the ground and sank in a little, requiring the goblin to halt its momentum and yank it back out. Julia took advantage of the extra movement and plunged her sword into its exposed torso.

  She experienced a brief flicker of nausea as she saw dark green blood burst from the wound and heard the squelch as she pulled her sword back out, but she shoved it down and kept moving. She backed up a step from the certainly-dead goblin to make sure its death throes wouldn’t endanger her and used the time her distance bought to quickly cast one of her new spells.

  Spatial Coordinates was a spell she learned from a combination of her experience fleeing Rockyknoll and her Spatial Awareness spell. Spatial Awareness enabled her to detect the actual locations of objects in space. She could then use that awareness to ‘lock in’ a specific position in her mind.

  It was similar to what she had done when she focused on a specific spot of the ground as she and Lothier fled town. Rather than just concentrating on that spot with her eyes, though, this locked those absolute spatial coordinates into her mind so she could make use of them later.

  She cast the spell on the handle of her sword and threw it like a javelin with all her strength at the nearest goblin. It pierced through the goblin’s neck and sank all the way to the crossguard before its momentum halted. She focused on the handle’s coordinates and used her Telekinesis to yank it back into her hand. It arrived with a thunk, and a torrent of blood began pouring down the goblin’s neck as it sank to its knees.

  Julia prepared a strike for the next goblin, but suddenly Ravina sliced the heads off the remaining two goblins with a single strike. Julia was surprised, but not as surprised as when Ravina began stalking up to her like an approaching storm.

  “Are ya daft, girl!? Who the fuck been trainin’ ya for the last year that taught ya to surrender your weapon for no good reason!?” she shouted accusingly.

  “Wha—I” Julia stammered, but Ravina interrupted before she could form coherent words.

  “Don’t answer! It was rhetorical cus I know I ain’t taught ya that poorly. Why in all the gods’ saggy tits did ya think throwing your weapon away was a good move!? Stop! Don’t answer! I already know. I been trainin’ ya for a long time, girl. I know exactly why ya did it. Ya thought it looked cool—like somethin’ an adventurer from the stories’d do. Well, it didn’t. It looked godsdammed fuckin’ stupid!

  “Throwin’ your sword is a desperate move that ya resort to when ya got no other options. I’m talkin’ when your arms are so damaged and broken that ya can’t wield it well, or you’re so outmatched that ya gotta do somethin’ unpredictable to make an advantage. Neither of them things apply to this situation.

  “I was holdin’ ‘em just fine. They wasn’t even interested in ya, even if ya picked ‘em off one-by-one. Ya weren’t even gettin’ attacked. There was no reason to get rid of your one, physical weapon. I don’t care what fancy magic ya got in there. What were ya gonna do if there was a mage hidin’ somewhere that could counter your spell? What were ya gonna do if goblins were stronger than ya thought, and ya couldn’t get your sword back from ‘em?

  “Any time your sword’s outta your hand, you’re riskin’ not gettin’ it back. I better not see ya doin’ any stupid shit like that in here again. We ain’t even close to the kinda trouble that’d warrant them kinda tactics. Next time, ya might as well just cut your whole damn arm off and throw it at ‘em, too.” Ravina sheathed her sword aggressively and stormed off muttering to herself as she started picking up the goblins’ cores.

  Astonished and chastised, Julia looked toward Braden. This was not the start to the dungeon run she’d expected. He smiled at her and shrugged. “Nothing for me to add. I wouldn’t have used those exact words, but she’s definitely right. Throwing your weapon is reckless and dangerous. Sometimes you do need to take a reckless and dangerous gamble, but you didn’t right now.

  “I’m actually a little surprised that you were so concerned about looking good. I know you love the stories of brave adventurers and all that, but is this really the same girl that needed a logical reason to wear a dress instead of pants? The same one that I got an enchanted hairbrush for specifically so she wouldn’t have to wash as often?” Braden chuckled as they walked toward the other corpses.

  Julia, cheeks red, was annoyed with herself for getting caught up in the moment. She had, at that moment, thought it would be a good idea. It would give her more ranged options without risking hitting her teammates as much as magic would. In retrospect, she realized it had initially popped into her mind simply because it looked cool, and only later did she come up with justifications for why it would work.

  Braden saw how sullen she was and put his hand on her head. “Don’t worry, Jules. I suspect you did that because, in your subconscious, you recognize that despite being in a dungeon, your life isn’t in danger—which is true. Ravina and I won’t let anything happen to you.

  “Don’t forget, though, that the purpose of these runs is so that you can solo it, eventually. It would be bad to let you develop any bad habits right now that could be fatal later.

  “You will be putting your life on the line at that point. Ravina is only so harsh with you right now because she doesn’t want you to get hurt. She’s trying to prepare you for your first solo run, but she’s also nervous about that prospect because she cares about you.

  “We both are, actually. So, absorb the lesson she’s teaching you, and remember that she’s only even here in the first place because she cares and wants you to succeed. I didn’t include training like this in her contract, so she’s here because she wants to be.

  “And the lesson to be learned this time is that the purpose of these battles is not for you to look good. It’s for you to learn how to survive.”

  They both started forward and rejoined Ravina, collecting two of the four cores as they went. Ravina had the other two. She looked at the two cores Julia was holding as she spoke. “Goblin cores ain’t worth much, but it’s somethin.’ I’ll hang on to these two as a penalty for your fuck up. I am the one who killed ‘em, after all.” Julia nodded as Ravina pocketed the two cores she was holding.

  Julia spoke as they started away from the entrance of the encampment. “Isn’t an immediate ambush right at the gate a little cruel for a ‘beginner’ dungeon?” she asked.

  Braden nodded. “It can certainly be a surprise if you’re not expecting it. Of course, anyone just needs to read the dossier at the Guild to prepare, but also remember that most come through here with a party of at least four members, which would make it effectively one-on-one. The ambush aspect would be surprising, but a one-on-one with goblins is really not that big of a deal.”

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  Ravina nodded, now back in formation and leading them through the encampment. “Aye, it’s a nasty surprise, but that’s it. Those nasty fucks wouldn’t be quick enough to give ya a killin’ blow even if they knocked ya on your ass. Most parties would just risk a couple scrapes from an ambush like that.”

  They slowed to a stop as they began hearing strange sounds ahead. There was snarling and grunting, as well as various scraping sounds. Braden made a motion to suggest they keep their voices down.

  “Right,” he said just above a whisper. “Since I’m acting as party leader on this run, I suggest we ambush them from stealth. Those noises are the rather horrible sounds of goblins mid-meal. Their guards will be down, so it’s a perfect opportunity to strike.

  “Now, Ravina and I both have ways to be stealthy, most people will be stealthy even without any stealth Classes by the time they reach our Level. However, you likely won’t have a party full of people who can be stealthy for many Levels, Julia, so we’ll consider you to be the only stealthy member of the party for this specific run.

  “We’ll have plenty of time in future runs to coordinate a surprise attack, and that’ll be more effective when you’re the one doing the planning anyway. So, for now, why don’t you use your stealth to sneak into attack range and strike? Ravina and I will hang back just out of range until the goblins mount resistance.

  “If you take them all out without them noticing, great. If not, we’ll back you up when they counterattack. We’ll switch back to our usual formation at that point. Also, consider our progress through the dungeon when you’re considering your attack options.

  “Although it’s a beginner dungeon, it’s still multiple encounters long. We need to make it to the command structure in the center of camp. That means we’ll be about halfway finished after this encounter. Manage your stamina and mana accordingly. It won’t do you any good to take all the goblins out if you use up all your mana or collapse from exhaustion.”

  Julia nodded and crept towards the goblin noises. She would love to have some tall grass to hide in, but the ground had been thoroughly tramped down by the presumably large number of goblins that the camp hosted. Julia suddenly realized that the real camp would have been extremely dangerous for her. Based on the sounds she was creeping towards, she was going to be fighting groups of four or five goblins at a time, but this camp would likely have hosted hundreds of them in reality.

  She pressed her body close to one of the “tents” the camp hosted. Though, these structures weren’t much more than a few animal carcasses stretched between stakes in the ground. They seemed to all be abandoned, though she suspected that this was only because the dungeon was not more heavily populated.

  She couldn’t help but think how nice it’d be to have Trixy with her. Trixy could’ve made them both invisible, which would’ve meant Julia could avoid using her own mana until the actual attack and remain completely unnoticed.

  Unfortunately, Braden had decided that Trixy had to be left behind until Julia could solo the dungeon. He said it was Julia’s test alone this time. They could both come in together and practice when she could survive on her own.

  She poked her head around the edge of the nearest tent and recoiled back behind her cover. The sight was so revolting that she had to physically press down on her stomach to halt a retch before it could rise too far up her throat. The sound would’ve likely given her away. She breathed deeply and centered herself before peering around the edge of the tent again.

  There were five goblins positioned around a large bonfire belching out black, acrid smoke. Or maybe that was just Julia’s perception due to the body parts being cooked around it. She wasn’t an expert on anatomy or anything, but she knew human body parts when she saw them. Or, humanoid, at least.

  Arms and legs seemed to be the most common. They were arranged in a loose pile angled slightly away from her vantage point. Although limbs were the most common, Julia noted a few torsos and even heads amidst the pile. Lifeless eyes and faces frozen in rictus fear stared back at her, as though blaming their fate on her inaction.

  Julia knew this was just her fear playing tricks on her. It was the same feeling that she got those many years ago when looking at the butcher’s blood-covered apron. She shook her head a little to clear those unhelpful thoughts and focused on her task. The thoughts were much easier to push away now than when she was younger, but they were still there.

  Three of the goblins did not seem content with waiting for the pile to cook. They were feasting on raw limbs, pulling the meat away from the bones in a horrible display of grotesque gluttony. Julia, now in a distant, calculating mode after re-centering, thought their manner of consumption was both messy and inefficient.

  Two other goblins sat in front of the limb pile entranced. She could see drool dripping from the corners of their mouths, but they had more self-control than the other three, apparently.

  A plan began forming in Julia’s mind as she examined the scene. She noted a lack of ranged weapons as well as any heavy objects that could be thrown. Confident that there would likely not be any projectiles to worry about, she began working on her trap.

  First, she had the better-safe-than-sorry ideology pounded into her brain from a young age, so she erected her water shield over her wrist, just in case. Next, she began casting her new EM Magic spell.

  The name of that magic changed in her repertoire once Braden began instructing her on how to create light with Lightning Magic. It was a difficult subject, which Braden had warned about in advance.

  She had made enough progress that she realized the connection between electricity being able to generate light. That combined with her existing knowledge of electric charges had changed the name of the magic. She could even bend light around herself to become temporarily invisible, though that also had its own issues.

  Regardless, light wasn’t what she was working on right now. There were a few ways Julia could think to eliminate the goblins, but she was thinking hard about the warnings she had received both against doing cool things for the sake of it and keeping her resource usage in mind.

  A huge fireball would likely do the trick, but it would also be expensive on her mana—not to mention obvious. She didn’t really know whether the attention of other monsters from outside the current encounter could be drawn, but now wasn’t a great time to find out.

  Her spell “Lightning Field” was essentially an offensive version of Faraday’s Armor. Rather than being armor she wore around her skin, this was a trap that sat on the ground almost invisibly, waiting to be stepped on. She placed this spell in a rectangular area in front of her, and then it was go-time.

  She stepped out from behind the tent, obvious to anyone looking in her direction (though no one was, yet), and used the Manipulation spell from Arcane Magic to grab the fire from the bonfire. She swirled the fire around into a tight ring and whipped it over to the feasting goblins. The ring contracted with the goblins in the center until it was burning against their skin.

  The goblins howled and attempted to leap away from the fire, but Julia used Manipulation on the earth below them to sink their feet in. Unable to escape and lacking any means to fight the fire, they burned rather quickly. Julia compressed the fire with the Density spell and spun it. It burned with such fierce heat that it began to torch holes through the goblins where it passed.

  The other two, shaken out of their trance by the howling of their comrades, rushed towards Julia with fists raised. They didn’t seem to have weapons, but that wasn’t even close to stopping them. However, their reckless charge halted about two or three strides from Julia. They suddenly and violently convulsed before falling to the ground and writhing there.

  Julia, unsure if the shock was enough to be fatal, drew her sword and advanced. The charge from her Field spell had dissipated fully into the goblins’ bodies, so she simply walked over to them and pierced both of them through the neck. She turned towards the burned goblins and, deciding caution was the best approach, decided to finish them off as well.

  She had punctured two of the three throats when the third launched to its feet. It couldn’t advance forward since its feet were still anchored into the ground, but it extended its arms to try and grab Julia.

  She instinctively took a step back and extended her shield. She froze the front part of the shield and extruded an icicle parallel to her fist underneath. The ice blade plunged into the lunging goblin’s face. She felt it hit and deflect off the side of the goblin’s nose before it sank almost effortlessly into its eye.

  The goblin instantly went limp and collapsed back to the ground as Julia slid the ice spike out of its head. She shuddered at the blood dripping off the end before she let the entire shield fall from her wrist, canceling the spell. She glanced around and sheathed her sword when she didn’t see or hear any other threats.

  “Well done, Julia,” Braden praised as he and Ravina approached the gruesome scene. Julia was surprised that she hadn’t noticed them approaching until he spoke. “All slain with no wounds to you and no intervention from us. Pretty much the ideal outcome.”

  “Aye. That’s good work ya done. Got a good head on your shoulders, girl…when ya decide to use it. Finishin’ ‘em off was a good move. Walk me through stabbin’ ‘em in the neck specifically,” Ravina demanded.

  “Well, I was trying to save mana, so I didn’t use much in the Lightning Field. Electricity also has a paralytic effect, so being down didn’t necessarily mean being dead. I wanted to ensure they died to protect my flank while dealing with the other two.

  “My first thought was the head or heart, but I…I haven’t stabbed many things. I thought maybe the skull and ribs would be difficult to get through, so I went for the throat,” Julia reasoned.

  “Aye, that’s good thinkin’. Neck’s easy to pierce. Your thinkin’ is solid. We been focusin’ on your swordwork and form rather than fightin’ real enemies. We’ll have to add dispatchin’ opponents to our practice from now on.

  “There are ways to squeeze a blade between ribs, but not testin’ it out in live combat was a good move. Stabbin’ their throats and immediately movin’ outta range was good thinkin.’ A throat stab is usually fatal, but not immediately. Definitely wanna get outta range after deliverin’ the blow.

  “Ya likely already noticed with your ice spike, but the eye is a good place fer dispatchin’. Creatures and people got holes leadin’ right to the brain behind their eyes, so stickin’ a sword in there is pretty effective. That’s one of the reasons skill will always trump Levels. That feelin’ ya got from passing a blade through its eye, that’d feel exactly the same whether it was a weak goblin or a Grandmaster.

  “Granted, a Grandmaster’d have a host of ways to make sure ya didn’t get the chance to stab ‘im, but still.”

  Julia nodded as Braden spoke. “I’ve got nothing to really add to that. You did good work, Julia. Normally, I would say that compressing the fire was a little wasteful, but you offset it by using existing fire rather than making your own.

  “Using the Lightning Field to restrict your opponent’s movements rather than deal fatal damage was also a good call. Probably saved a substantial amount of mana doing that. It was also a mostly-silent execution.

  “The goblins’ death throes were mostly silenced by your throat stabs, and the fire scoured the goblins’ wind pipes while you were blasting them with it, so very minimal noises escaped to alert other enemies.

  “You don’t have to worry about other enemies noticing your presence in this specific dungeon, but others are not so kind. Adventurers call situations where other dungeon creatures reinforce the group they were already fighting ‘dungeon rushes.’

  “They’ve killed many an unprepared party…well, that’s neither here nor there, I guess. I’m starting to ramble. How are you feeling? Need to rest?” Braden asked.

  Julia shook her head. She had just over three-quarters of her mana left. The group collected the cores and moved on. The third encounter went similarly to the first. A group of six patrolling goblins encountered her party as they moved towards the center of the camp.

  Julia largely stabbed around Ravina, who held their attention, when she found the opportunity. There was no reason to do anything fancy when simple worked just fine. Ravina had also encouraged Julia to use the opportunity to figure out where the most effective areas to stab are.

  Ravina said that stabbing strikes were generally the way that fights ended in the earlier Levels. Apparently, while cutting could deal devastating damage against unarmored opponents, it could take minutes for them to bleed out and die. Minutes, in a life-or-death battle, was practically an eternity, so the most effective way to end the fight was to either damage critical areas enough that they can’t fight back, or deliver an immediately-fatal blow.

  As morbid as the situation was, Julia was actually learning quite a bit. She had been correct in thinking that bones were difficult to stab through. She would stab at a critical point only for the blade to be deflected by a bone she hadn’t thought about or seen.

  Stabbing between bones required an intense precision that she didn’t yet have in battle. Perhaps she could manage on a stationary target, but she simply lacked the combat experience to do it right now against living opponents.

  Still, being stabbed by Julia’s sword wasn’t exactly sunshine and rainbows. Even if she missed the eye or got deflected by a rib, each stab did tremendous damage. At worst, it would slow the enemy down a little, so each stab was worth the effort no matter the degree of the result.

  For the last two, Julia used her Water Whip spell to test its efficacy. She created it using the Elasticity spell, which made it mana-efficient. After the initial mana investment, it required only a small amount more when striking a target.

  It didn’t deal any wounds that broke the skin, but Julia could tell from how the goblins recoiled that it was damaging. It was especially effective when striking the head or joints. Julia suspected that the joints, being where bones were connected, were weaker than the bones themselves. She wasn’t sure exactly why the head was so effective, other than it being a general weak point.

  After combat, they collected the cores and proceeded. It wasn’t long before they stood in front of an actual structure. This was the first thing Julia had seen that was built of more than just stretched hides and sticks since the palisade.

  The building was only a single story, and it was little more than a standard house—maybe a little longer. It seemed to be made of poorly-cut wooden planks. They were joined with jagged, metal nails and had gaps between them—likely only good for keeping the rain out rather than any temperature regulation.

  Still, the building’s uniqueness compared to its surroundings was indicative of a boss fight.