~~~

[Crooked magic staff]

<Common>

A basic staff for wielding mana.

-Damage-

23-45

-Durability-

34/40

-Special Effect-

[Skill: Mana Bolt]

Release a burst of condensed mana towards a target.

Mana Requirements: 50 Mana Points

Cooldown: 30 seconds

~~~

“Oh..” Skullius marvelled at the staff in his hand, satisfied with the skill it had as well as the fact that it possessed a rarity, unlike everything he had found from the goblins so far.

Apparently, even the steel sword didn’t qualify for the rarity ranking, which he had learned from the information packet to range from Common, Uncommon, Rare, Unique, Legendary, Mythical and Transcendent.

Skullius didn’t have time to think about these things any further as the angry goblins rushed towards him with rage filled eyes._.

Their aggressiveness made him feel eager to blow them to bits as he aimed to use try this staff out on them!

[You have killed LV18 Foul Goblin. 610 Exp awarded]

[Your prey emits the Essence of Null Life. Would you like to extract it?  Remaining time 59 seconds]

“Great!” Skullius exclaimed in joy from the notifications that alerted him of the death of the previous owner of this staff. He extracted its NLE immediately.

Levelling up did not have the convenience of filling up mana and health. Someone like Skullius wouldn’t expect it to anyway.

He instantly used his mana to activate the skill [Mana Bolt], a sharp blue light being emitted from the tip of the staff.

Skullius didn’t choose to shoot it yet, waiting for the perfect moment so as to not waste his mana.

In his mind, he was giving Red Rage a command which the Bone Boar carried out immediately.

The short figure of the Apostle dashed out of the cover it had been hiding behind and headed towards the goblin with the sword!

When the creature saw a quick figure that zipped with two blue lights evident on the face of its skull, it couldn’t help but…

“HUH?”

This was the thing that had been sniping his fellow goblins with expert precision?!

The goblin was shocked.

As the goblin turned its attention to Red Rage, Skullius released the [Mana Bolt] towards it, the flash of compressed mana appearing before the green creature before it could react!

Boom!

With a flash, a sizzling of flesh could be heard as the target for the skill shrieked and fell to the ground with smoke swirling around its body!

Red Rage had run out of arrows, the only means of attack left at his disposal being the meticulous slicing of the throat with a rusty dagger which he promptly delivered to the downed goblin!

The remaining goblin spared a single glance at its falling partner as it reached Skillius who, afraid that the staff might be destroyed by his angry opponent, tossed it aside and held his steel sword!

The goblin with the spear whirled the weapon with expert movement before swinging it down with great power, a light of mana around the weapon!

‘Do all these guys have [Basic Mana Manipulation]? This isn’t a skill!’ Skullius thought as he raised his sword to tank the attack.

There was a sharp collision of weapons which barely lasted for a second before the goblin with the spear followed up with quick jabs of its weapon and strikes that Skullius could barely see, let alone dodge.

‘This bro…!’ Skullius thought as he received the relentless attacks, his skull being pounded to the point of cracking!

Right after, Skillius recognised the stance that the goblin was beginning to take as it aimed to use its earlier skill!

…!

Unfortunately…

TCH!

The sound of flesh being pierced was heard as the goblin stopped in its tracks.

Red Rage had planted his sword into its neck!

The goblin staggered and fell.

Red Rage whirled his sword, removing the blood before flashing a thumbs at Skullius, one of the lights in its sockets dimming to imitate a wink.

“Good! Job! Bro!” Skillius squeezed through his teeth as his socket flames blazed. This bro…

Red Rage had stolen the last goblin’s worth of experience so Skullius at least made sure to collect all the Null Life Essence.

His body had sustained quite the damage from the staff and the other two goblins he had faced.

Even now he was unwilling to use his mana to heal. That would leave him with no mana left. At least that’s what he surmised.

“Urgh…” Skullius heard the gasp of the goblin which had been shot by the arrow.

It was still alive!

It lay down as it endured the pain while being close to death.

“Ah… I thought you were dead. Let me help you with that,” Skullius said as he strolled over to the goblin with his sword.

The goblin was terrified to see the tall Boneman walking over to it while speaking in its tongue.

Skullius violently stabbed the goblin in the face, watching it twitch and die moments later.

Excessive.

[You have killed LV15 Foul Goblin. 395 Exp awarded]

[You have levelled up]

[Your prey emits the Essence…]

“Yep!” Skullius yelled as he drew in the Essence into his body.

He was a bit happy that he had managed to at least gain a pack of experience for himself and levelled up.

The speedy movements of Red Rage were what had awarded the two a grand victory against eight higher levelled goblins.

~~~

[Dash in Dust | Lv. 1]

Amplifies movement speed by 30% while on the ground.

Mana Requirement: 25 Mana Points per minute.

Duration: —

Cooldown: None

~~~

This skill had allowed Red Rage to skittle across great distances and fire his arrows as stipulated by Skullius.

“The whole ‘don’t have a presence’ thing also helped I guess,” said Skullius.

Once again, since his clothing had been burnt by the [Mana Bolt], he had to loot more leather armour and this time, he found a crude robe on the body of the goblin that had wielded the staff. He wore it on top of the leather armour, Red Rage looking at him with his weird getup and shaking his head.

After looting, Skullius thought about how he had lost another 20 NLE from the goblin that was killed by Red Rage at the beginning of the fight. It had been too far for him to just rush and absorb its Essence.

As he looked now in his guidance field, he had 220 points of NLE which made him quite happy but the cooldown for [Unbound] made his celebration a silent one. This reminded him of how he really missed the Grand Sword of the Hedonist already.

Skullius picked up the staff and looked in the direction of the goblin settlement.

‘Should I go there and have a look? In my condition, if I find a powerful enemy, I might get killed. But then again, it could be an opportunity to get more experience depending on what’s going on,’ thought Skullius.

He turned to Red Rage.

“What do you think we should do?”

Red Rage flashed a thumbs up.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Thumbs up!

“Don’t act dumb! I know you can give your opinion you Bone Head!” Skullius barked at the short Bone Boar that shrugged with imaginary sweat dripping down its skull.

“Fine. Let’s just go and check. Then we’ll decide what to do from there.”

The two first turned off the torches that goblins had been using when they scouted the forest and then proceeded to jog all the way to the goblin settlement.

As soon as they arrived at the edge where it was easier to see what was happening below, Skullius’ jaw almost dropped as he saw the carnage that was occurring!

The huts which the goblins lived in were on fire (the ones not made entirely from mud).

Battles and massacres were taking place everywhere in a very grotesque way. From brawls with fists to pure skewering by a groups of goblins that looked different from the ones he has been seeing.

From those the goblins that were being sniped by arrows, Skullius saw the reactions to be peculiar. Those shot would start to tremble violently and start to emit light bursts of smoke from their orifices!

Sparks and flashes of mana and elements could be seen here and there where stronger goblins were facing off in the night.

Along the steps that descended into the settlement, dozens of goblins could be seen sprawled dead or dying with a few other goblins attacking those that ran up them!

“What the…” Skullius’ sentence didn’t get any completion as he saw what was happening.

While he was looking ahead, the staff Skullius held suddenly trembled, jolting him from his fixation towards the fighting below.

The staff suddenly started to exude a dark blue flame that was intertwined with the Essence of Null Life which manifested as a soft bluish white light!

Skullius was puzzled on what was going on all of a sudden.

As if this sudden change occurring wasn’t enough to leave a few question marks above Skullius head, a myriad of notifications began to rain in his vision.

[Felled prey lies before you. Would you like to extract the Essence of Null Life? Remaining time 40 seconds]

[Felled prey lies before you. Would you like to extract the Essence of Null Life? Remaining time 12 seconds]

[Felled prey lies before you. Would you like to extract the Essence of Null Life? Remaining time 9 seconds]

….