Tyler looked around the tent, thinking for a moment that the old man had simply moved without him seeing — although that was impossible in his mind, as he had been staring straight at him as he vanished.

  “Where the hell—” he said out loud, as if the words might help explain where Malek had just gone.

  “Too many numbers. You can’t stay with too many numbers,” Al said. Again, he sounded deflated, like he was swinging from happy to sad with every sentence he spoke.

  “What? He levelled? He progressed his path? I thought that was impossible for members of the Unending Accord.”

  A small rumble started shaking the walls of the tent, like a constant wind was picking up and ruffling the fabric.

  “Not impossible. Nothing is impossible anymore. Not even— well, maybe that.”

  The rumbling grew louder, and the floor started to vibrate under Tyler’s feet. He looked around the tent, wondering if, now that Malek was no longer here, the tent itself might also blink away. He wasn’t sure what that would do to him while he was still inside.

  Deciding to leave and not risk whatever was about to happen, he made his way out of the tent, picking his bar up where it was still leaning near the entrance. Seshka was standing several metres away, looking into the treeline, her spear wrapped around her arm like an extension of herself.

  That’s when Tyler noticed it. The trees were shaking too, and the ground outside was as well. Had he done something to break the Intertwining Paths? Had his little bit of tinkering with the old man’s experiment somehow led to this?

  Seshka turned and ran back to Tyler.

  “Looks like we have incoming. Where’s that old fool? He may be a mana chaser and a duster to boot, but I bet he’s still level nine. We could use his levels for whatever’s heading our way.”

  “He’s gone. I mean, we were just talking. He checked his experiment, got excited, and just vanished. One second, he was there, and the next — gone.”

  Seshka looked at Tyler inquisitively, scowled, and grabbed her buckler from her back, reorientating herself into an attacking stance toward the treeline.

  “Doesn’t nothing make any sense anymore. No gods, Unending Accord on my path, now a mana chaser advances. Hell, what next — little green men from the fourth universe coming to drink our blood?”

  Tyler grabbed his pole with his other hand and stood beside Seshka. She was obviously not having the best of times. Nothing was as she had hoped. It wasn’t for him either, but she seemed to be at breaking point

  And when a little green man came running out of the treeline straight toward them, axe in hand, he couldn’t help but wince at her bad luck.

  “Bifurcants — even worse. You don’t even get a proper fight. Little skitters.” Seshka said.

  Tyler watched as the little green creature ran towards Seshka. It was about three feet tall, with dark green skin that looked like thick leather, ready for tanning. Pointed ears sprang out from either side of its oval head. Large feet and hands — all legs and arms really — with a large, pudgy belly.

  “That’s a goblin!”

  Seshka took her eyes off the goblin for a moment and looked at Tyler, confused, then raised one eyebrow as if she’d just pieced something together and replied,

  “I see what you did there. Clever.”

  She spun with her spear as the goblin jumped towards her, its eyes wild and mouth open, revealing a row of sharp, misshapen teeth. It never made it to Seshka — her spear decapitated it, the head dropping to the floor as the body took three more steps by itself.

  The rumbling was getting louder, and Tyler noticed the dust and dry mud under his feet shifting slightly. So were the trees in the distance. Three more goblins broke free of the treeline.

  One immediately veered off, sprinting in an erratic circle before scrambling up a tree, shrieking as it climbed. Another charged straight at Seshka. The third barrelled toward Tyler, a club with stones embedded in it raised.

  The hairs on Tyler’s hands shot up like a static alert, readying him for action. He remembered the spiders — his metal bar had done little to them, but his stick… well, that had crunched bones. He dropped the bar and reached for his pole, brandishing it like an oversized bat.

  He kept himself steady and timed his swing just as the goblin got within a few feet, aiming to strike its body — a bigger target, in case he missed. The blow landed squarely on the goblin’s gut.

  The pole sank into the creature’s belly, its leathery flesh absorbing the impact as if he’d struck a heavy leather punching bag. The goblin shifted a few inches to the left, but it never broke its charge as it leapt for Tyler’s face, its hands stretched out, bony fingers like daggers.

  The goblin screeched as Tyler staggered back, the creature slamming into him, sharp nails cutting his neck as it clawed. Tyler wheezed as the creature’s weight knocked him down and knocked the breath from his lungs. A face full of sharp teeth bore down on him, snapping inches from his own, hot breath and saliva spraying across his cheek as he strained to keep it off.

  A spear punched down through the goblin’s head before Tyler could even think what to do next. Blood splattered all over him as Seshka pulled her spear free, the dead goblin falling motionless on top of him.

  Tyler lay there for half a second, stunned, blood already soaking back into his clothes. A trickle ran into his mouth, and he tasted iron — and something sweet, uncomfortably sweet. He pushed the goblin off him and got to his feet, grabbing his pole.

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  “I literally just got clean,” he groaned, seeing two new dead goblins lying on the ground near where they stood.

  “That — that — what was that?” Seshka snapped. “I’ve seen young ones handle a weapon better. Did you slip or something?”

  Tyler didn’t reply. He just tightened his grip on the stick. He was never a fighter; there had simply been no need. People didn’t get into physical fights before the system game. But he’d thought he could at least handle himself. He was feeling stronger and faster than he ever had, and he’d been on the winning side of a few battles of late. Yet Seshka’s words were embarrassing because they were truer than not.

  The goblin up in the trees jumped onto the tent and started bouncing up and down, as if it might somehow tear a hole in the fabric. It lost its footing, fell to the ground, then started biting its toenails, as if grooming was the most important activity in its life.

  Seshka sighed as five more goblins came out of the treeline, the trees behind them now visibly swaying, the air filling with screeching and jeering from what sounded like a hundred different voices.

  “Kobolding fools. Stick close to me!”

  Seshka moved to meet the goblins and stopped a metre away, planting her feet angled toward the centre of the pack. Her spear blurred as she moved it around her body, in and out of the oncoming enemies. She was precise, controlled, and violent. Every strike had purpose. She cut through the first goblin’s throat, her spear rolling back over her shoulder before she shot it out again, arm stretched, piercing another goblin in the side. The blade sank deep, and the goblin wailed.

  Blood spluttered as she pulled it free. She spun the spear twice with one arm, lowering it with each revolution into a sweeping motion that took the legs out from under two goblins in a single move. The last goblin stopped, looked around, saw its comrades, and instead of attacking, started finger-painting with the blood of the fallen.

  Tyler watched, open-eyed, at the carnage — at the skill of this warrior woman as she effortlessly ended the beasts coming at them. She wasn’t stronger or faster; she was simply skilled at fighting, at executing an enemy. The gap between him and her was as insane as this whole situation.

  Tyler needed to up his game, but getting skilled at fighting in the next few seconds just wasn’t feasible. He could try his bar, but he expected to get similar results. More goblins were incoming, and by the sound of it, there would be too many for Seshka to handle on her own. Heck, from the sound of it, there were too many for both to handle.

  What had the system given him? Insight. Yeah, that had been great up to now, but unless it gave him a way to kill multiple enemies with a single pole, he’d have to use something else. His mana? Well, he tried it on the spider webs, and it burnt a small hole. He had managed to form a small ball with it. Was there something else?

  Tyler let his mana flow—not between his fingers like he did when walking, or out to make an object—but out and into the weapon he held. Both hands glowed white as his mana flooded the pole. He felt it flow from within him, that place below his chest.

  It moved down his arms, along the grain of the wood. He could feel it connecting, snapping into place like a piece finally fitting where it belonged.

  A sharp pull came from within—deeper than Insight ever reached. It wasn’t painful, but it was noticeable. Real, as if something was taken from him. The pole shone bright white for a second, then faded back until an almost invisible layer of white mana surrounded it entirely.

  The goblin sat finger-painting noticed this, jumped up, and charged at Tyler. He swung his pole before it reached him. The pole connected like it had with the earlier goblin, sinking into the goblin’s gut, its heavy leather skin absorbing the blow just like before. But this time, Tyler felt no recoil, the pole sticking to the side of the goblin. A second later, a flash of white light burst outwards as if a detonation just took place.

  The goblin was hurled backwards into the trees, its body breaking on the trunk as the force shook the entire tree. It slid down the tree, a gaping wound torn through its side, flesh split open as if something had exploded from within.

  A notification flared at the edge of Tyler’s vision. And Al spoke or made a noise in his mind:

  “Ah.”

  He ignored both, as more than twenty goblins burst through the tree line. Several were having their own little fight, biting and pulling at each other. Several ran straight for the dead goblins, putting their hands in the blood and painting each other with it. Two were—well, two needed to get a room; they had more energy than the rest put together. More climbed the trees. Four ran at Seshka, hissing and screaming; she just took her stance again, spear at the ready. Two came at Tyler, who was now holding his pole that didn’t glow anymore.

  The whole place had just erupted, as if a crowd had just watched their team score a winning goal. Tyler hadn’t had a chance to understand what he’d just done. He did know the mana he’d put in the pole was now gone, and he wasn’t about to stop the goblins coming at him with his stick the way it was. So he turned and ran for the tent, trying to give himself time.

  As he ran, he fed more mana into the pole, but he couldn’t get it to snap into place. Moving was messing with his focus, and he just couldn’t see or feel the way the mana was to flow. He needed some cover, a little time to infuse his pole. Just as he entered the tent, he looked back once more to see where the two goblins chasing him were.

  His jaw nearly hit the floor and his heart sank, as out of the trees, screaming and screeching, came a tidal wave of goblins. There were hundreds of them. Some carrying others, some running backwards, jumping, falling. It was just a sea of dark green and an ocean of noise, pure mayhem.

  Inside the old tent he darted around the side of the table still running Malek’s experiments and put it between him and the two goblins that entered after him. Picking up the cubes on the top, he started flinging them at the creatures. His aim was terrible, but he did land a few glancing blows. One goblin, seemingly deciding the rack of bottles and boxes Tyler hit with a stray shot was more interesting than him, tore away at the stuff and flung it in the air.

  The other goblin, however, was laser-focused on Tyler. It jumped on the table, its brown tongue licking its split lips as it showed its teeth—all yellow, long, and sharp. Tyler swept his pole along the workbench, keeping it a few inches higher to miss most things but the goblin’s shins.

  Crunch. His pole hit the creature’s bony legs, and he felt the satisfying crunch as his pole connected. The goblin fell, cradling its legs, crying in exaggerated pain as if it had suffered the worst injury anyone ever had. It stopped for a second, looked around, saw no one looking, and started wailing even louder.

  Three more goblins entered the tent. Tyler ducked back and to the side, entering one of the rooms—the bedroom. That’s all it had: one large four-poster bed with faded drapes hanging around it. A goblin came in after. Tyler moved, swung his pole, but it missed as he tried to jump over the bed. His ankle was caught by the goblin, and he fell face-first onto the bed.

  The goblin pulled at his feet as he turned around to see more goblins enter the room and jump on him. His arms were pulled over his head and down by one, as two jumped onto the top of the bed’s frame. He was trapped. He tried to pull his arms free, but the goblin held tight, and one goblin from above dropped down. It stood on his chest and lowered its face to his, blood covering its features.

  His boot came off as a goblin pulled at it, but he couldn’t see, as the one on his chest laughed at him. Its eyes were flicking all over, but somehow it still stared directly at Tyler’s.

  It leaned back, opened its mouth, and moved to bite down on his head. In that moment, Tyler thought it was the end. Seshka was still outside fighting, he was bound and unable to free himself, and this goblin was mere moments away from biting his face off.