First Battle

The numbers on the reticle danced frantically.

Soon.

The Environmental Stability plummeted past the fifty percent mark, and the previously vibrant green numbers instantly turned into a glaring crimson.

Among the tall and dense trees all around, rapid and heavy breathing sounds faintly drifted over.

And that sharp, unpleasant screeching noise, much like fingernails scratching a blackboard.

The commotion wasn't terribly loud, yet it made one's scalp tingle.

Upon hearing this sound, Lance instead breathed a sigh of relief.

That was the unique communication sound of Goblins.

According to the Compendium, this creature had an unusually keen sense of smell, possessing a near-pathological obsession with the scent of blood and rotting things.

It seemed that the scent picked up while gathering juices or moss earlier had exposed his whereabouts.

Since he was now on guard, Lance's Perception attribute, which had reached 5 points, immediately came into play.

His gaze swept the surroundings like a falcon, and he quickly discovered clues in the bushes not far away.

There were a few clusters of dark green shadows, completely out of place with the vibrant, fresh green grass and leaves around them.

There were two primary tasks at hand.

Determine the enemy's numbers.

And choose the most advantageous battlefield.

Chapter 3 of the New Adventurer's Guide explicitly stated: If one encountered a small group of Goblins alone, they had to find favorable terrain at the very first moment, and avoid being surrounded by the enemy leveraging a numerical advantage in an open area.

Lance's peripheral vision caught sight of a recessed rock wall not far behind him.

Without a single hesitation, he propped up his round shield, his steps steady as he retreated and slowly leaned toward it.

That group of Goblins hiding in the shadows seemed to have sensed the target's intent.

They no longer hid, rushing out of the bushes with a frantic clamor and letting out piercing howls from their mouths.

This was a consistent hunting tactic of Goblins, using noise to create panic and making their prey reveal flaws in terror.

Borrowing the sunlight filtering through the gaps in the canopy, Lance finally caught his first clear look at the true face of this legendary monster.

They only stood as high as an adult's waist, their skin presenting an unhealthy dark green, covered in wrinkles and pustules.

Long, pointed ears drooped on both sides of their bald heads, their eyeballs turbid and yellow, their mouths full of jagged yellow teeth.

Fortunately.

This Goblin squad had only four members, and what they brandished in their hands were merely sharpened wooden sticks and crude beast-bone clubs.

Lance's hanging heart dropped halfway.

These were cannon fodder among the rabble, belonging to the absolute lowest tier in Goblin social hierarchy.

Seeing that Lance still maintained a defensive posture as he retreated, those four Goblins stopped in their tracks, picked up stones from the ground, and hurled them fiercely.

Snap! Snap!

Several fist-sized stones whistled over with the sound of wind.

Lance's perception was enough for him to catch these flying objects whose flight trajectories weren't particularly fast.

He tilted his body slightly, or adjusted the angle of his round shield slightly.

The stones smashed into the wooden shield covered with thick oxhide, producing a dull sound that numbed Lance's arm slightly.

The strength of these little things was far greater than their lean bodies made them look.

It was precisely at this moment that Lance discovered the fatal shortcoming in his equipment.

He lacked a ranged weapon.

He had been careless due to lack of experience; if he had a hand crossbow in his hand right now, or even just a few throwing knives, he could have counterattacked during the enemy's stone-throwing gaps and ended the battle much faster.

He would definitely make up for it next time.

While reviewing things in his mind, Lance methodically continued his retreat.

He had originally wanted to lure the opponent to charge directly in front of the rock wall for hand-to-hand combat.

Yet he found that he still underestimated the craftiness of these monsters.

Though stupid, they were not beasts entirely devoid of intelligence.

These few Goblins seemed to see that Lance's suit of equipment made movement inconvenient, and actually intended to use a stone-throwing tactic to wear down his stamina completely.

What a pity.

The one they ran into this time was a cheater.

While parrying and retreating, Lance adjusted his breathing rhythm.

With every single breath, the negligible amount of stamina lost within his body was instantly replenished to full.

Until Lance completely retreated to the defensive position in front of the solid rock wall.

Those few Goblins had thrown stones for half a day without even scratching a layer of Lance's oil, instead exhausting themselves to the point of bending over to pant heavily, their tongues practically hanging out.

Looking at the heavily armed adventurer in front of them, whose face was even hidden behind a faceplate and whose breathing frequency wasn't even disordered.

Inside the walnut-sized brains of the Goblins, they felt the anger of being toyed with.

In their eyes, this human was simply a turtle hiding its head inside a shell.

"Wah-la!!"

The leading Goblin let out a sharp roar.

They held their crude weapons high, howling to bolster their courage while launching a charge.

Originally they were accustomed to scattering to surround and ambush, but at this moment Lance had his back to the rock wall, with scattered rocks blocking left and right.

This forced them to choose the most foolish frontal assault.

Close.

Five meters, three meters.

Lance, who had maintained a defensive stance the entire time, suddenly turned his gaze cold.

Faced with the wooden spear thrusting from the very front, he did not choose a passive parry.

Instead, he stepped forward fiercely, borrowing the momentum of his body, and the round shield in his hand slammed out like an iron wall.

Bang!

The immense impact force directly caused the two Goblins rushing at the very front to lose their balance, tumbling to the ground like rolling gourds.

At this very instant.

The fine steel shortsword in Lance's right hand, which had long been primed and ready, thrust out like a viper slithering from its cave.

The essence of Castro Swordsmanship was inherently this kind of fierce, close-quarters stabbing brawl in muddy trenches.

At this moment, a proficiency as high as LV3 made this sword-thrust as fast as thunder.

The tip of the sword precisely penetrated the face of the nearest Goblin.

Splotch.

Dark green, foul-smelling blood instantly spurted out.

That Goblin didn't even have time to let out a miserable scream before it died on the spot.

Lance's expression remained blank, and he smoothly raised his foot to kick heavily against the corpse's chest, borrowing the force to pull the shortsword out.

Then he immediately retracted his shield and retreated, once again assuming an impregnable defensive posture.

Imperturbable to a maddening degree.

The other Goblin nearby that had also tumbled down climbed up in a panic using both hands and feet, the hand gripping the beast-bone club trembling, its mouth no longer daring to emit that arrogant howling sound.

Vicious though they were, they were thoroughly intimidated when faced with such a clean and crisp instant kill.

If they didn't run now, when would they?

Yet Lance was very well aware that with creatures that bullied the soft and feared the hard, if you let them run away, they would hide in the dark like flies, constantly harassing and sickening you.

Therefore, the principle of adventurers dealing with Goblins was singular: eradicate the roots.

Just at the moment when the remaining three Goblins hesitated over whether to advance or retreat.

Lance moved.

He no longer defended, but instead launched a short and fierce charge holding his shield.

The edge of the shield forcefully shoved away that troublesome wooden stick in the front.

Closely following that was another standard military stab.

The second one.

Then came a powerful, heavy sweep, plus a downward stab used as a follow-up blow to finish off.

The third one.

Lance strode in pursuit of the Goblin that had already fled, sending the shortsword into its back.

In less than ten seconds.

The originally noisy forest clearing was left with nothing but the dying wails of the very last Goblin.