Blacksmith vs. the System

Finding the main group had been easy. I didn't have Perception, but the rushed movement of forty people, particularly when it was accompanied by a monster horde, was not too difficult. Luckily, not every single one of them had a movement ability, so they had to split their forces into two.

The main group, the bigger crowd, had rushed forward, while the second team, consisting of merely ten members, with six of them pulling the carts the ballistas were placed on, trailed behind them.

Their burst of speed confirmed that they were in communication with the other group, doing their best to catch up with Eleanor before she could finish with the armored team.

What I wanted to do was to talk with Eleanor and convince her to retreat, but I doubted that she would follow that suggestion. She was too confident, too headstrong.

I needed to equalize the stakes. The distance between the first and the second group wasn't far enough for me to deal with all of them before the reinforcements could arrive — the distance between the two groups was merely two hundred yards, and I didn't have the luxury of delaying them.

Luckily, killing them wasn't my objective.

I attacked them from behind, which cost them a valuable second before they could raise an alarm. They tried to put a defensive line around the ballistas as they shouted, trying to raise an alarm, but it was too late.

I was already on top of the carts, and delivered the mana variant of the Quake punch, figuring out if it would be enough to destroy an immobile target. It was not. The siege weapon was able to resist the attack better than I had expected.

Thankfully, letting out a secondary blast of mana, this time under the control of Mana Forge, had been enough to deal with them. An Epic skill, even if it was merely a production one, was an incredible asset when used correctly.

I didn't even need to destroy them completely, just damage the main shaft and add a large crack — one that I could repair just as easily if the need arose.

They made an attempt to catch me, but none of them had the necessary speed. I retreated, not only leaving them with their precious ballistas, which were turned into expensive junk, but also dragging a large box of ballista bolts with me.

I departed in a hurry, as I saw ten people splitting from the main group, including Thomas' bodyguard and three of five guild masters I had recognized. It was an elite force, one that I wasn't ready to confront.

I didn't expect Thomas' bodyguard to be as strong as Eleanor — or he wouldn't have gone through all that trouble to set up such a huge ambush — but that didn't mean he wasn't as strong as me. And, supported by three guild masters and a few other soldiers, he had an overwhelming advantage.

Unless, of course, I changed the equation somewhat.

I picked a route that was almost perpendicular to Eleanor's direction, which, as an added benefit, allowed me to stay near her without restricting my escape path. But, the real benefit was that it was on the path of the safe houses I had created, which also doubled as an armory, filled with javelins.

Manipulating their pursuit was easy. Several members of their party were faster than me unless I used Floating Stride, which was still not something I could use, but they didn't dare to confront me without the rest. So, they moved near the group, spread to cut my path in case I wanted to make a beeline for Eleanor.

I changed direction occasionally, acting like I was trying to do that to make the scouts' job of trying to find my location harder. Even with the help of Perception, tracking the location of someone solely by sound was not easy, especially when the man in question could incorporate wind into his steps, and monsters were hardly silent either.

When combined, my advantage in vision allowed me to easily avoid the traps they tried to place. I had to admit, their attempts weren't half bad both in terms of creativity and robustness.

In a way, it was like playing chess with Maria, where every move was done with a strategic robustness that I couldn't come close to matching. Unfortunately for them, it wasn't a chess game, where both sides had equal resources and equal information, where pure calculation ability of the stat and mindless repeating solved their problem.

It required them to systematically analyze the information granted by the Stat and direct it efficiently. Without a deliberate restriction and being pushed in the correct direction, the Stat didn't work. A classic garbage-in-garbage-out problem. They were not even able to understand the reason for their continued failures, still under the assumption that we shared the same range of vision, just setting even more elaborate traps.

In any other situation, I would have lamented about it being a waste, but coming from my enemies, it was always welcome.

It was appropriate to add some more complexity to their plight. I opened the box I had taken and pulled one of the bolts. It was mostly metal, but a quick check with my Repair skill showed me that the metal was nothing more than a relatively ordinary iron alloy, once again there to hold the enchantment in place.

And, the enchantment was far too complicated to even start making sense. I didn't waste any time before I threw it toward my enemies. It managed to catch them in surprise even as it hit one of them in the chest … only to bounce helplessly.

Whatever enchantment was on the bolt, it didn't trigger when I threw it by hand.

I threw two more, and they bounced off nearby rocks, and their lack of reaction implying that my method of using the bolts was utterly useless. Still, I threw a few more until I had reached one of my safe houses. I pulled the hatch to enter, placed the remaining ballista bolts there, and grabbed a bunch of throwing spears, as well as the spear-thrower I had designed.

Well, "designed" was a big word. A spear-thrower, or atlatl as my anthropologist friends insisted to call it, was one of the first inventions the early humans had ever come up with, believed to be in use for almost thirty thousand years.

It was attached to the bottom of the spear and folded against it. Then, the spear was thrown by the action of the upper arm and wrist. Atlatl acted as a low-mass, fast-moving extension of the throwing arm, increasing the length of the lever, and allowing the thrower to impart force to the dart over a longer distance, thus putting more energy and allowing for higher speeds.

Though, in my case, there was one other advantage. I designed the atlatl to hold my mana so that I could imbue the javelin as I wanted. Not only did it cause more damage, but, as an added benefit, it might have caused an outside observer to mistake the source of the attack, and assume that I had some kind of magical device rather than Essence Stat.

It wasn't a guarantee, but I had done all that was needed to do so, including making the atlatl needlessly ornamental, with gold and silver fittings on the surface. It did look like a weapon purchased from the System shop.

Now, it was time for a field test. I moved away from the entrance, zeroing in on my first target: The scout. Not only was he not wearing heavy armor, which made him a good target for the ranged attack, but also his direction was a critical part of their strategy.

I channeled some of my Mana to the spear, weakening its structure appropriately as I targeted him, and released it.

[-40 Mana]

To his credit, the scout tried to dodge the attack. The combination of Dexterity and Perception gave him a chance despite the mist significantly restricting his vision. When all of it added up, however, even his supernatural abilities didn't help.

The spear not only hit, but the weakened structure started to shatter into razor-sharp, mana-soaked shards as it hit his chest with enough momentum to shred his clothing. The damage was severe, but Health was already helping him to recover.

[-37 Mana]

[-28 Mana]

Two more spears, one targeting his head, stopped that recovery. I couldn't help but wince as I killed another man. It was not a good way to go.

"Take cover," one of them shouted in panic. The one with the Intelligence tried to give some orders to change it, quick to realize that ranged attack had only been effective on the scout because of his lack of armor, but his command went unheeded as the orders conflicted.

One disadvantage of mixing the various guilds.

I decided to fuel their worry even further. I threw another spear, but this time, the mana worked the opposite way. Rather than spreading through its structure to weaken its integrity, it focused on the spearhead, reinforcing the impact point as much as possible.

[-95 Mana]

Then, I threw it to the one with Intelligence, one that was doing his best to control them. The spear sank into his right elbow, making him drop his sword in pain.

Loss of the only calm voice didn't help their panic. It was a good moment to attack them … if I had the ability to deal with a team of armored soldiers. Unfortunately, I did not. Health made that process very troubling.

Even with the hammer I used against the gargantuan monsters, it wasn't a challenge I would be willingly embracing. Without it, it was hopeless. Instead, I had just absorbed the mana from a few shells while they tried to recover, threw two more spears at the stragglers, and forced them to gather together to defend against the inevitable assault.

Then, I ran away to meet up with Eleanor.