Waking up, I instantly returned Skull-fu with Bombardier's Throw, and latched onto a rock. I threw my body to the side, narrowly avoiding an incoming arrow before throwing the rock with all my strength right at the nearest goblin—one of the machete holders.

  The rock pelted the bastard in the face, and it was enough to send the beast tumbling onto his ass.

  I was offered no quarter as the other two goblins were right in front of me. Thankfully, their bodies blocked the archer.

  Realising that throwing, or using rocks was my greatest advantage—something child me would have been ecstatic to have years ago—I quickly grabbed a handful of them. Using the trees to my advantage, I kept throwing all the rocks at my disposal as they shot out of my hands as if they were fired from a hand-catapult.

  I hit one in the eye and once I saw it eye dangling, a prang of happiness urged me forwards. Clubber in hand, I met with the only melee goblin that was still in the battle. I thrust my dagger—and slipped on a root hidden by leaves.

  I looked up just in time to see the humorous glint in the little green man’s eyes. “You bastard—”

  Were all the words I got out before its dagger pierced my eye, and into my brain.

  Three seconds back in time, I realised, to my disappointment, that I wasn’t a hand-to-hand combat expert, and decided to leave it to them.

  I grabbed some more rocks and kept on throwing them until I split open the skull of the third goblin. Now it was just me and the archer.

  The archer fired another arrow, but I was already behind the tree the moment I heard the bow twang. I peeked around the tree, and noticed the goblin trying to move into position, so I simply rounded the tree again, like a squirrel hiding from a dog.

  I was hoping the archer would grow annoyed and come in closer, but it didn’t work. It hissed, turned, and sprinted further into the forest.

  Slowly, and carefully, I left the cover of the tree and watched the goblin disappear in the dark forest. It had really run away. “Huh,” I hummed. I hadn’t expected that. Not one bit.

  Well, it saved me another potential death. So that was a major plus. With the immediate danger gone from the goblins, I turned to the next problem. The arrows sticking out of me. This was going to suck. A lot.

  Grabbing hold of the arrow shafts, with the extra strength the system provided me, I rather unyieldingly used my broken arm and yanked out the arrow. There was very little pain, so I pulled out the other in quick succession.

  Right away, I swapped Loadouts and used Blood Weave to stop the flow of blood thanks to the arrows, then back to my main Loadout.

  I wanted to flop onto my back and rest so badly, but with that goblin out there; there was no way I could idle around. So, I forced myself up and approached the two goblins that were still alive, and thrashing around the ground in pain.

  I was going to throw some more rocks at them, when I stopped myself. I didn’t know when the next Skill evolution was going to be for Bombardier's Throw, but if games had taught me anything, then it’d be a while—progress would slow at higher Levels, I already knew that. It was better to start Leveling up another Skill. And that one was his Blunt mastery.

  Finishing the two goblins, peace returned. Although I knew it was for only a moment; I relished it.

  Blunt Weapon Mastery has reached Level 4

  Endurance Surge has reached Level 17

  Steady Resolve has reached Level 17

  Chill of Mortality has reached Level 16

  Blood Weave has reached Level 16

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  ***

  An hour had passed since then, and I was busy crouching, moving from tree-to-tree. If anyone saw me, I’d have no doubt they’d believe I was an utter psychopath. But I was doing it for a good reason.

  Skill gained — Sneak (Level 1)

  “Bingo,” I muttered under my breath with a wide smile on my face. Finally, I stood up with a bad case of stiff back. When I was trying to get my hands on the Skill at first, I believed something was wrong as it was taking far too long.

  I had tucked Skull-Fu into my pocket, the copper coin hidden away for now. Somehow, I doubted I’d need to headbut many more monsters.

  So, with a Skill slot free, I finally learned Sneak.

  And with that, I couldn’t help the little nerd in me from trying to think of cool and unique Loadouts I could use. What Skills I could learn to make a strong synergy.

  I think I needed one Loadout to be my punch-shit-in-the-face class, and one that was more escape/ranged focused like sneaking, and stuff like that. Or maybe for my main Loadout I could focus more on range. Honestly, I wasn’t sure. Was this going to be my future? How long would this whole system thing go on for? Forever?

  For some reason, I just stood there, looking up at the tree canopy. I should have felt fear. Dread. Something negative. But I didn’t. All I could think of were what kind of Skills I could get my hands on and how they would evolve.

  What kind of powers could I achieve in this new world?

  I didn’t know whether I should feel bad for being excited. But I decided to just go with it. It was better being happy than dead.

  A couple of hours later, I had gained a few more Skills.

  From jumping like an idiot for over twenty minutes, I gained the Leap Skill. It allowed me to jump higher than usual. That, combined with Colossal Might, made me like a kangaroo jacked up on steroids. It was honestly too much fun jumping up to high tree branches. Almost fun enough to ignore the fact that I had a broken arm. Almost…

  The second Skill was Tracking. I got that one by following the goblin archer for a few minutes. I didn’t intend on following for any longer than that. Although I knew that there was a Challenge to kill the goblin-chief that was bound to net me some amazing rewards, something told me I wasn’t nearly ready for that just yet.

  The third Skill was Push. And yes, I got that from pushing a tree. It was quite nifty. I tested it on a stationary log, and it worked wonders. I tossed it a good fifteen feet, even with it weighing a metric shit-tonne.

  With those Skills acquired, this was my current status looked like:

  Name: Paul Webb

  Race: Human (F-Grade)

  Titles: Survivor, Terror's Bane, Skill Sculptor, Reaper's Reject

  Core Skill: Chrono-Requiem [Unique]

  Loadout 1 (Leaping Clubber):

  | Skill 1: Blunt Weapon Mastery (Level 4)

  | Skill 2: Steady Resolve (Level 17)

  | Skill 3: Leap (Level 1)

  | Skill 4: Iron Carapace (Level 51)

  | Skill 5: Colossal Might (Level 51)

  Loadout 2 (Rock Slinger):

  | Skill 1: Chill of Mortality (Level 16)

  | Skill 2: Blood Weave (Level 16)

  | Skill 3: Sneak (Level 2)

  | Skill 4: Bombardier's Throw (Level 51)

  | Skill 5: Tracking (Level 2)

  I had shifted over all my offensive Skills—or at least most of them—to Loadout 1 which I named Leaping Clubber. Loadouts were kind of like Classes, so I named it appropriately. I hadn’t added Push just yet, but I’d put it into my Loadout in place of Steady Resolve if necessary. But as of right now, it was the pain tolerance that was helping me keep my sanity.

  Loadout 2 was all about staying away from the enemy, sneaking, lobbing stones at unsuspecting prey before they got close. I didn’t have the strength that truly transformed Bombardier’s Throw into deadly cannonballs. But it was enough to stun any monster, and then deal residual damage with the toxic chemicals when the rock exploded.

  Thankfully, changing Loadouts was pretty much instantaneous.

  Skinning was a Skill I could place after a fight, so it wasn’t important to have it in the Loadout as of right now.

  All things considered, I was quite happy with what I had managed to get my hands on. But I wasn’t completely satisfied just yet. I needed something to restore my arm, badly, if that was even possible. I sure hoped it was. I needed to evolve Blood Weave further, but progress was slow without being locked in a life or death battle.

  In a flash, I switched to Rock Slinger. Goblins were closing in, their snarls growing louder with every second. I braced myself for the fight, heart steady—at least, that’s what I thought. But when the goblins finally emerged from the shadows, at least a dozen strong, my confidence wavered.

  Then I saw it.

  Lumbering into view, towering over the others, was the last to appear—a hulking figure wielding a massive hammer, forged from what looked like twisted metal and bone. My body froze. My mind screamed what I already knew: this was the Goblin Warchief.

  And he was the first Challenge.