Slowly opening his eyes his consciousness woke up and the moment of dreaming was over for Adolf, his eyes cleared but he could only see darkness around him, it took him a while to realize that everything that had happened was not a bad dream, Sighing to himself, he got up and left his hiding place after making sure it was night.
But a message that appeared in front of his eyes filled him with a pleasant surprise.
[Thanks to your continuous efforts your mana stat has increased]
Adolf felt a cool sensation run through his body as he felt his mana surge.
[Mana 9--->10]
'So that's the feeling when your mana increases, quite an intoxicating feeling I must say.'
After that Adolf left the ruined house with his new halberd in his hands, leaving the rusty tube lying and burned on one side, carefully sneaking through the ruins and debris trying to be as stealthy as possible.
A tense expression could be seen on his face as he tried not to run into a burnt hair.
Crack
Adolf quickly hid himself as he searched for the source of the sound, looking around him he was able to spot a creature he had met the day before.
He was small, his height was similar to that of a small child, his green skin was full of pimples and disgusting bumps, his teeth were all pointy and jagged while he always kept a lewd smile on his ugly face, nose and ears. They were large and pointed, their eyes were too large for the size of their heads, but the strangest thing was that their sclera were totally yellow while their pupil was similar to a black vertically angled rectangle.
He was a goblin, but Adolf immediately noticed that he was carrying a strange wooden staff with various stones and feathers adorning it, so to make sure he checked the name of the goblin.
[Goblin Apprentice Shaman (Level 15)]
Adolf upon reading the name and level of the goblin immediately put a dark expression on his face.
'Damn even this damn goblin is several times stronger than me. No wait, the goblin has a [Mage] type class so his physical stats will have to be low compared to his mana, even if he's physically stronger than me I still have a better quality weapon as well as I can retreat if things get dangerous'.
With that Adolf closed his eyes and began to breathe in a certain way, his heart rate calmed as all the nervousness within him disappeared, when he reopened his eyes they were eerily calm.
Taking his halberd Adolf slowly approached the goblin, when I estimate that he was a good distance away he ran from his hiding place and charged towards the goblin, the goblin was surprised to see Adolf running towards him but, when he had gotten close enough Adolf He swung his halberd vertically.
The goblin saw this and laughed disgustingly, when the halberd was about to hit the goblin a strong gust of wind was created out of nowhere and deflected the halberd, it hit the ground and Adolf could feel the vibration of the impact it ran through his entire body, it felt like hitting a large rock with an iron pipe.
Adolf glared at the goblin but he did not attack again but rather retreated a little to readjust his posture, looking at the goblin again he could see how it laughed maliciously while drooling, it was as if he were observing a delicacy never seen before and could not avoid eating it right now.
'According to the tales, goblins love to rape women but they eat men...' .
The more he thought about it, the higher the possibility that it was true, the goblin in front of him wanted to eat it.
Adolf frowned deeply as he looked at the goblin, the goblin instead laughed and then licked his lips in a disgusting way, Adolf instinctively knew what he meant by that gesture.
In the end he mumbled something softly before running towards the goblin.
Without wasting another second, Adolf attacked the goblin again, but just like the first time, when the halberd was going to hit the goblin, a gust of wind deflected it, Adolf did not stop to regret his failed attack and instead he launched another attack after another.
The goblin simply created gusts of wind to deflect the halberd, but he began to tire of Adolf's insistence and for the first time since the fight began he had the initiative to attack.
Speaking in a language unknown to Adolf the goblin started to say something but before Adolf could even try to guess what was happening all the body hair on his body stood on end, without thinking twice he jumped to the side and could only watch as a rubble behind where he was was split in two, a cold sweat covered his body at the thought of what would happen if you reach hit him.
'Is that magic? it's more powerful than I originally thought, I should definitely do my best not to receive any attack from the front, if that were to happen I'm more than dead'.
But Adolf felt something strange on his side so he touched himself only to feel that he got wet with some warm liquid, he took his hand covered in that liquid where he could see it and when he did an expression of anger was drawn on his face, he liquid was none other than blood, his blood.
Apparently Adolf couldn't dodge the attack fast enough and the goblin's attack made a wound on the right side of his torso, but as the wound appeared, the [Chaos Bugs] healed it in the blink of an eye. , it was so fast that neither Adolf nor the goblin realized it, the only proof that Adolf was hurt is his own blood.
The expression on Adolf's face was getting darker and darker right now making him look like a vicious beast ready to tear his enemy apart, Adolf realized this and began to breathe in and out slowly and deeply to calm himself down, bit by bit. his expression became one of serenity.
'I almost let myself be influenced by my emotions, if I hadn't realized that it probably would have cost me dearly.'
In the time it took for Adolf to regain his composure the goblin did not sit still, he was preparing a powerful magic spell to instantly kill Adolf, but compared to his first spell it required more time to be cast at once. that its cost was considerably higher.
Adolf noticed this and ran as fast as possible towards the goblin, unfortunately for him he had realized that too late, the goblin smiled with malice and mockery as he finished preparing his spell.
Long and pointed fragments of the ice formed at the same time that a small white tornado was created, both came together and thanks to the power of the tornado the ice fragments became like locks that rotated madly around it, if already to be attacked by the tornado or the ice fragments apart was incredibly dangerous, now that they had merged for a single attack it was certain death sentence for Adolf.
But naturally the goblin also suffered the consequences, panting heavily as sweat ran down his forehead, casting a spell of such caliber for him, an apprentice shaman was incredibly difficult.
Adolf kept running as he tried to keep his distance with his death sentence, but that wasn't a long-term plan as his stamina was constantly wearing down, though he minimized the expense with his knowledge coming from [Arms Lord] not yet. I could keep running for a long time.
The goblin began to get annoyed when seeing his prey did not die instantly as he had thought, also to add salt to the wound he had to be constantly supplying his mana to the tornado and the ice fragments would otherwise disappear.
Adolf was frustrated that he couldn't do anything but run away, he couldn't even escape since every time he tried the tornado became more violent and he suffered minor injuries, if it wasn't for the [Chaos Bugs] he might as well have died from it. blood loss.
Looking at the halberd in his hands Adolf made a decision, he waited for the right moment where he was certain that he would not fail, so when the moment arose Adolf threw his halberd at the goblin, he did not expect the human in front of him he will abandon his weapon without further ado.
The halberd flew directly towards the goblin but with the distance between him and Adolf he could easily dodge it, but when he went back to look for Adolf he had disappeared, the goblin believed that he had escaped and growled as he stamped the ground in anger, with another growled the tornado and the ice fragments disappeared, the goblin had spent a large amount of mana and still had not been able to kill the miserable human who was weaker than him, this was the greatest humiliation he had ever gone through.
When he was preparing to leave the area, something pushed him from behind and he fell to the ground, turning his head to see who or what had thrown him, the goblin could see something that left him surprised, it was the human he had faced and somehow he had not escaped but had hidden himself waiting for this moment.
- - - - - - -
*A few moments before.
After Adolf will throw his halberd and the moment he realized that the goblin had looked away from him without hesitation he activated [Shadow Fusion] to be able to hide and although it will only last 25 seconds it was more than enough.
Just as Adolf had thought, the goblin, after seeing that Adolf had "escaped" and was nowhere to be found, canceled his spells and prepared to leave, Adolf took advantage of that to approach and stand behind him and then knock him down, a Once the goblin fell to the ground he stood on top of it.
And that brings us to the present, the goblin was lying on the ground face down with Adolf on top of him, Adolf made a quick decision and threw the cane that the goblin was carrying away from him, he supposed that with that he could no longer use magic or at least it would weaken or take longer to cast.
Adolf turned the goblin over and now he was lying on his back while Adolf was sitting on his torso as he used his feet to keep his arms immobilized.
Adolf was panting and his body was drenched in sweat, he had already spent almost 100% of his mana and 90% of his current stamina, he felt his head spinning and his lungs burning, he could never imagine that using his abilities in a real combat would be so difficult, complicated and tiring.
But seeing the goblin struggling to escape from under him totally made up for it.
A strange smile was drawn on Adolf's face and seeing it the goblin felt a deep fear and discomfort.
Adolf closed his right hand with force at the same time that his left hand held the goblin's neck, he raised his right hand to force it down to the goblin's horror, the blow impacted the goblin's nose and it released high-pitched screeches as it writhed Adolf didn't hesitate and threw one blow after another, with each blow that impacted the goblin's face it shrieked miserably which made Adolf's smile deepen.
Quickly Adolf's fist was stained with blood, but compared to the human or animal blood that Adolf knew, the goblin's was yellowish green and smelled disgusting.
Adolf didn't seem to mind that as he continued to pummel the goblin, his teeth falling out, his nose broken as his skull slowly cracked from the repeated blows Adolf was giving him.
Tears, saliva and other bodily fluids came out of the goblin making it look disgusting and miserable, Adolf thought that this new look really suited the goblin.
After beating him for several minutes in which he retaliated and took all the frustrations out of him Adolf stopped and then held his neck with both hands, the goblin began to writhe miserably as he tried with all his might to breathe.
In the end after a few more seconds he stopped fighting and then fell dead, at this moment it was that Adolf withdrew his hands from the goblin's neck, after a few seconds of looking at his lifeless body Adolf got up and walked to where his halberd was , seeing that he was well on his way back to the lifeless body of the goblin.
When he was in front of him again Adolf couldn't help but think that maybe he should have hit him a little more, then with a movement he nailed his halberd to the goblin's head and then with great difficulty opened it and there he saw it, a small mana stone, Adolf quickly picked it up before putting it away.
He was about to leave but then he saw the cane that the goblin used, so he took it with him and greedily left that place, his fight against the goblin had caused too much noise and Adolf feared that the scandal could have called a burned knight. .
Adolf was deathly pale, his lips had lost all color as he broke out in a cold sweat, in the end he could only find a place in the rubble to hide until he was back to full health.
If it wasn't for [Shadow Fusion] Adolf wouldn't have won but there were two more skills that played a role.
- - - - - - -
[Lesser Blind (No rank - Level 1)]: A type of magic from the family of curses. Effectively cursing another being will suffer a 1-4% decrease in their clarity and field of vision.
*The effect of [Blind] cannot be applied more than once.
*The success rate depends entirely on the mental and magical resistance of the opponent.
Duration: 5 minutes.
Cost: 5 mana points.
Cooldown: 30 minutes:
- - - - - - -
This ability helped Adolf not to be discovered, he didn't know if goblins were diurnal or nocturnal creatures so after being injured by the goblin's attack he cast [Lesser Blind] and was lucky that it was affected.
Although [Shadow Fusion] greatly increases Adolf's stealth he has a major weakness, against beings stronger than him his stealth was reduced by a considerable amount, with the difference in level between him being level 1 and the goblin's level 15 stealth would be significantly reduced, but with the help of [Lesser Blind] he was at least able to sneak in low enough to ambush the goblin.
It was also nice that the ability didn't specify the spend, but instead simply asked for a percentage that was 80% mana and 50% stamina at the time it activated, meaning that even if Adolf only had one point of mana and stamina could still trigger the ability.
Pero también tenía su drawbacks and it was that its cost was too high.
The next ability that played an important role was:
- - - - - - -
[Lord of Arms (Rank 3 - Level 1)]: You are born, raised, live and die by and for war. Your great ambition, pride and thirst for power have led you to learn to handle an unimaginable number of different types of weapons.
*You gain advanced proficiency with all weapons.
*Whenever you wield a weapon, the damage is increased by 50%.
*When fighting with bare hands your damage is increased by 20%.
*When entering combat mode your resistance decreases 15% less quickly than usual.
- - - - - - -
The skill [Lord of Arms] gave Adolf great mastery over weapons, it was as if he had practiced for years, just by holding a weapon in his hand he could instinctively know how to get the most out of the weapon.
Also thanks to the effect that when entering a fight his stamina was spent 15% less quickly than usual he helped him continue fighting.
Each of his abilities contributed their grain of sand for Adolf to emerge victorious, but thanks to the [Chaos Bugs] all the wounds he suffered have already healed and only a large amount of physical and mental fatigue remained.
Feeling that he couldn't take it anymore, Adolf closed his eyes and allowed his consciousness to fall into a deep sleep.
- - - - - - -
Opening his eyes, the first thing Adolf received was a series of messages that made his headache worse.
[The Gods praise your ingenious use of your abilities]
[The Gods are curious about your true nature]
[The Gods ask if you can reveal your true nature]
"Damn bastards…" Adolf felt complex as to his true nature.
In human society others didn't care about "actions", however these can be easily covered up with money or people of great power and status in the social pyramid.
They also didn't care about the "truth", since this can always be altered by others, at the end of the day a simple rumor can escalate and simply replace the truth since at the end of the day people believe that rumor as their truth.
In the end all that mattered was the "attitude", no matter what your "actions" or the "truth" since you have shown your attitude it is easier to be accepted by society, at the end of the day all people always wear a mask where they hide their true feelings, thoughts and even personality.
Adolf was not very different from the others in that aspect, he always wore a "mask" that showed a good "attitude" towards others, since it is easier to live if you maintain neutral relationships with others.
Being aloof? that's not very preferable as you can easily be framed and the others won't even help you, anyway it's not them or someone they know or care about so why put your hands in the fire for others?
To be sociable? It was also not recommended, all the time you need to have a good attitude and maintain a friendly facade, because if the opposite happens they would start spreading rumors that something happened and they would move away from you, since they are only with you because they are interested in you. "good, friendly and sociable" and they don't care about anything else, there is also that the moment you make a mistake everyone will judge you without trying to understand you.
For Adolf, maintaining a good relationship but with enough distance with others was the best, neither cold and distant nor warm and sociable.