Slings, it turned out, were pretty darn dangerous. If I hadn't put those extra twenty points into Constitution, or had the sling been wielded by something stronger than a goblin, the blow would have at least knocked me out, if it didn't kill me outright.

  Even with my Constitution, I wouldn't have survived a second blow, thus I was rather lucky that the second goblin missed. Another stone went whistling past my face, smashing into one of the shelters, which collapsed in a heap. Thankfully, the goblins were not perfect shots.

  Blows to the head weren't conducive to clear thinking, and even if I was conscious and upright, I needed to worry about concussion. I also needed to worry about the armed goblins trying to kill me. The goblins definitely needed to be the first priority, but, stunned as I was, it took a precious few seconds to work out which direction the attacks had come from. Heck, it took a couple of seconds to register that I'd been attacked.

  Another fact for which I was thankful was that slings took more than a few seconds to reload and swing at full speed, especially when wielded by goblins, so those few seconds didn't mean death. They did mean that by the time my brain had caught up with reality, diving flat to the floor was the only reaction I had time for. Another pair of rocks whistled through the air above me.

  I rolled, putting another of the shelters between me and one of the slingers, but the pair had come from different directions, and I couldn't shelter from both. I spent the few seconds he took to reload trying to blink the stars out of my eyes, and when he launched, I simply guarded my face with my arms. A stone struck my shoulder, which hurt like hell, but at least wasn't dangerous.

  Another stone smashed into the shelter behind me, the other goblin apparently choosing to attempt a shot straight through it rather than strafing to give himself a clear line of sight.

  That gave me another batch of seconds. Enough time to get to my feet, grab one of the supports from the collapsing shelter, and toss it at one goblin while I sprinted at the other. My target flinched, causing his next stone to go far wide. He didn't have time for another shot before I was on him, slamming punch after punch into his face until the System declared my victory.

  It occurred to me that I'd taken more than a few seconds to end the miserable creature's existence, and yet there hadn't been any more stones. I turned around to find the other goblin simply staring, the sling dangling uselessly from his limp arm.

  Our eyes met, and the sling fell from his hand. He turned and ran, gibbering madly.

  I followed, and I was faster. I leapt onto the back of the fleeing monster, knocking him to the ground where I stamped heavily on the back of his head.

  The next minute or two were largely spent remembering how to breathe. Had there been a fourth goblin sentry, I'd have been in real trouble. Thankfully, my recovery went uninterrupted.

  "Fuck," I declared, to no-one in particular.

  Mistakes had been made. I'd dealt with one sentry and, while I hadn't exactly neglected the possibility of others, I'd deemed them too far away from the village to matter. When twenty goblins had all started screeching together, I should have reevaluated that opinion. It was obvious that any other sentries would have heard such a loud ruckus.

  And then, after taking a blow to the head, I'd gone a little... feral. It was probably the best move I could have made in the situation, and I'd retained enough self control to remember how to defend, but punching a goblin to death with my bare hands wasn't something I'd previously considered as an option.

  Worse was the fact that it felt... kinda good. The head-stomp had been rather cathartic, to the extent that I was probably going to sleep tonight imagining myself doing the same thing to John's skull.

  Still, even if the ending hadn't gone quite optimally, I'd definitely come out on top. I'd cleared a full camp of goblins. Weak monsters, yes, but monsters nonetheless, and I'd only taken a single hit in the process. The effort had given me another pair of levels. I had enough skill points to boost [Adept Foraging] to rank C, if needed, or to boost [Expert Stealth] to the third stage. Neither was something I needed right this second, so instead I focused on my other prize; I had an entire camp to loot.

  It took less than a minute for disappointment to set in. Really, what was I expecting? I knew goblins weren't the brightest of creatures, so no way would their camp be full of complex manufactured goods. I took the knives from the butchers—merely sharp chips of stone wedged into bits of wood, tied in place with vines, but still better than nothing—but that was pretty much it. While they had water storage, it was in misshapen wooden bowls. Not at all suitable for carrying with me. Beyond that, there was the extra pair of slings that I couldn't make use of, a fair amount of their leather that I again couldn't do much with, and lots of wood and bones. I certainly wasn't interested in pinching their loincloths.

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  The only other interesting find was a bone spear. Well, a spear for something the size of a goblin, anyway; it was far too short for me to consider a spear. Still, they'd gone to some effort to put a point on the thing, or else it was from a monster that had spear-arms or something, and it would be more durable than wood.

  Village looted, I took another ten minutes to munch on the roast boar, meat being a luxury I very rarely got to partake in, back in the village. Then it was time to leave. I spent a minute judging the height of the sun in the sky and making a guess of where north was, and resumed my trek away from my home.

  I felt I should do something to take care of my head wound, but I had no idea what. The task was made harder by the way I couldn't see the damage, but at least there didn't seem to be much blood, and the pain had died down to a dull ache by the time I'd finished filling my stomach with meat. It was probably okay. In any case, there was no way in hell I was going to bandage it with anything found in the goblin camp. If I came across a clean stream, I'd give it a rinse, but otherwise I had little choice but to ignore it.

  I continued through the forest as the setting sun lit the landscape in beautiful shades of green and red. A lot more scenic than our village, surrounded by monotonous fields and with its distinct aroma of chicken. Which was, admittedly, better than the aroma of goblin, but still pretty bad. Besides, I hadn't encountered any more goblins. Only a single slime.

  My freshly looted pointy bone proved its worth, piercing into the slime and smashing its core without difficulty. It was interesting that I got bonus experience for a sneak attack but not for an assassination, though. Maybe something to do with whatever senses slimes used? They obviously didn't have eyes. My constant use of [Expert Stealth] obviously counted for something against it, but had I done something to give myself away at the last moment? While [Expert Stealth] offered plentiful advice on how to move, it wasn't going to teach me the intricacies of monster biology.

  Had I crossed out of our canton yet? How would I know? I wasn't travelling through the forest as quickly as I could move over clear land, and while I was using the sun for navigation, it wasn't as if I could judge directions perfectly. I was sure I was going west-ish on average, but there was no way I was keeping a perfectly straight line.

  Any pursuers of mine could probably navigate a lot more accurately...

  That thought sped me up for another hour, during which a nudge from [Adept Foraging] led me to a small river, but once the sun set, I couldn't go any further. I couldn't see enough of the sky through the canopy to navigate by stars, and the chances of me going far off course were too great. The last thing I wanted was to accidentally double back on myself and walk straight into any pursuers.

  Pursuers who likely had far higher Stats than me, and wouldn't think anything of a few nights without sleep...

  Was I being paranoid? It wasn't as if I'd seen any signs of pursuit. Maybe there were none. Then again, what signs of pursuit would there be, other than a gang of guards swarming out of the trees? They were hardly going to announce their coming.

  Either way, there wasn't anything I could do about it. As I'd already considered, this path was risky from the beginning, and there was no way around it. If I tried to travel in the dark, there was a risk of getting lost, or running into a monster I'd missed in the darkness. If I stayed, there was an increased risk of pursuers catching up. I judged the risk of travelling in the dark to be greater. Besides, my head was starting to throb where the goblin had hit me, and I really wanted some rest.

  I picked a tree with sturdy branches and a thick canopy, and climbed it, nestling myself in for the night.

  I closed my eyes.

  "I'm telling you, I heard someone snoring," hissed a voice.

  My eyes snapped open.

  There was a hint of light glistening off the leaves around me, so not only had I nodded off instantly, but I must have slept through until dawn. That was a surprise, given my uncomfortable position. Maybe I had a spot of concussion after all? Either way, I couldn't worry about it now. I had a far more important concern.

  "I don't hear anything," whispered a second voice. "My [Adept tracking] says nothing humanoid has been through here in days. Sure you're not imagining things?"

  "It's stopped now, but I know what I heard," whispered the first voice. "Look around."

  "I am looking. I see trees, and not much else."

  I shifted as much as I dared, doing my best to ensure I wasn't visible from ground level. I had two makeshift knives and my bone spear tucked into my waist, which wasn't much to confront multiple speakers.

  I was also bloody thirsty... Why hadn't I stopped for the night at the river yesterday?

  In any case, thirsty or not, I didn't fancy my chances against a pair of adults. Who knew how many more of them were around, either? From the way they were talking, they didn't sound like they were specifically hunting me—no mentions of 'maybe it's him', for example—but that only raised the question of what they were doing in the forest. If I was lucky, they weren't hostile. Adventurers gathering herbs or something.

  Not that I was going to risk introducing myself.

  "Oh, come on. Give it up, boss," whispered the second voice. "There's no-one here. Why would anyone be here? No monsters to hunt. No valuable plants to gather. It's hardly going to be woodcutters this deep in with no trail to cart their wood back to town."

  Not adventurers then. Darn.

  "Hmm..." said the first voice, no longer bothering to whisper.

  "Hey, what are you doing? Why are you..."

  "Cross Chop!"

  "Eep! Watch where you aim that thing!"

  Just as they couldn't see me, I couldn't see them, but it was still obvious what had happened. The first speaker had drawn a weapon and activated a combat Skill. Not a mere proficiency, either, but an active combat Skill of some sort. I'd never seen one before in my life, but it was damn obvious that whatever he had done wasn't a simple swing of a weapon. Wood creaked and groaned as trees toppled, his attack having sliced through thick trunks like they were made from butter.

  Alas, one of the trees he'd felled was my own, forcing me to leap from my branch to avoid getting flattened.

  "Found you," he declared.