The Wanderer's Rebirth: Other Paths

“Why are there so many goblins around?” Joram asked, mostly rhetorically as he looked around for his katana, before remembering that he’d left it in his bedroom.

‘Maybe we arrived close to one of their… settlements?’ Avi posited for him with a shrug.

Joram mostly ignored her as he flipped the deadbolt then ran to his bedroom. Once there, he quickly grabbed the katana, turned around, then ran back to the living room just as the pounding started.

Then he heard glass shattering in his bedroom, and again in… the second bedroom and cursed. He ignored the second bedroom as he ran by again, mostly because there was a bunkbed in front of the window and it would slow down whoever tried to climb through there. His bedroom, on the other hand, didn’t have such a thing. In fact, his bed was also right under the window, which would actually make it easier on the invading goblins.

Just as he rounded the corner, the first goblin made its way through the broken window, presumably cursing at the glass that had cut it on its way through the new opening.

Joram didn’t wait for it to get its bearings, or ready itself, he just dashed the two or so metres to the thing and slashed down at it, going from upper right down to his left. As the sword contacted the goblin, he briefly regretted not just thrusting before he bisected the goblin from left shoulder to right hip, causing blood to spray everywhere, and over everything.

Thank all that is good and Holy for [Cleanse], he thought as the goblin behind the first one saw what happened and took off. So, he turned his head to listen for a second before dashing out of the room and lifting his sword just in time to thrust it into the goblin’s chest that had just opened the door to the second bedroom.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t a clean kill, and the goblin squealed like a stuck pig as it went down, dragging the katana from his hands due to it twisting as it dropped.

Joram didn’t bother trying to retrieve the, admittedly, overlarge sword, but instead drew his hunting knife as he began to concentrate on [Crystal Shard]. This time, he pushed as much Power into the Power as he felt was safe before releasing it at the other goblin that had managed to enter behind its squealing comrade.

Unfortunately, the shard of crystal took the second goblin in the chest, making an even bigger mess than when Avi’s had hit the one from last night. He grimaced, but once again reminded himself of [Cleanse] before turning in time to take a rusty knife to the gut.

He wasn’t sure if the hip wound or the gut wound hurt more, but he was very sure that the stabber this time wasn’t able to register its surprise before Joram’s knife found its way into the side of its head. This time, he managed to hold onto his hunting knife, jerking it out of the goblin’s head as he stumbled back towards the hallway door of his apartment, giving him a decent view of his room on the left, the 2nd bedroom right in front of him, and the hallway leading to the living room to the right.

‘You really need to stop getting stabbed like that,’ Avis unhelpfully opined from behind the spasming goblin.

Joram just grit his teeth as he concentrated on [Entangling Ectoplasm], holding the Power until the next goblin came into view. As much as a rusty knife to the gut hurt, he didn’t want to take it out just yet, knowing that the real bleeding would start the moment he did. Comfort vs Practicality.

A terrible choice.

Fortunately, he didn’t have to wait long before the next goblin came into view, this time from his room. He released the Power, smiling grimly as the goblin fell over, completely tangled in what looked like a silvery spiderwebs.

He stumbled a bit over to the storage closet to his right, opened the door, and grabbed another one of the swords he’d collected over the years. This time, it was a 19th century saber, the kind that American cavalry used to carry. He’d long since… altered it to have a much larger guard than it had come with, though. The original had been rather small.

Refocussing back on the issue at hand, Joram quickly unsheathed the blade as another goblin came through the window of the second bedroom, babbling its guttural language at him. Joram just couldn’t bring himself to care about the thing, though. Would it have mattered if he knew what the goblins were saying? Nope.

In his opinion, any form of armed home invasion deserved an immediate death sentence for the invader. Those goblins had forfeited their lives as soon as they’d entered his home in a hostile manner, and so he waited for the goblin to rush him.

Perhaps it thought he was on his last legs, given the knife sticking out of his gut. But it was mistaken, and its surprise showed as Joram took half a step back before bringing the saber’s tip up to catch the goblin in its gut. He didn’t ponder on its expression of incredulity, then rage, before bringing up his foot to kick the goblin off his sword.

It tried to bring its own knife up to do something, but apparently the pain of having been impaled, then having the sword jerked out of its gut, clouded its mind somewhat. It only managed to score a glancing slash on Joram’s calf, barely even cutting his pantleg before going down, wailing all the while.

He tried to listen for any other goblins, but the wailing of the two mortally wounded goblins made it hard to hear anything else. So, he stepped a bit to the side before manifesting [Crystal Shard] again, releasing it at the entangled goblin. He didn’t want to have to deal with it after it either extracted itself from the ectoplasmic webs, or the Power’s duration expired.

Yet another mess that he’d have to clean up.

He was growing dizzy from the pain, so he really hoped that there weren’t too many more goblins to deal with. He was seriously debating removing the knife and using [Natural Healing] when he heard a louder crash that came from the living room. That decided him.

Joram took a deep breath, re-sheathed his own knife, mentally told Avi to heal him, then pulled the knife out of his gut.

Now, in movies, doing that would cause a fountain of blood to follow. Not so in real life. Sure, some blood followed the knife out and splashed onto the wall at his side, but the blood just… glugged out of him. The pain, though, was certainly accurate.

He nearly screamed, but managed to keep his jaws clamped shut and only let out a grunt. Keeping his breathing steady, however, was much harder to do. But it was necessary to keep his breathing slow and steady. Otherwise, the heavy panting that he instinctually wanted to do would just push more blood out of him, much faster than it was already leaving him.

Avi obliged, though, and the feeling of his gut mending itself nearly caused him to vomit as the nausea that came with the pain made itself known… right as the first goblin came from the living room.

Joram tried to bring the saber around to get a slash in, but the goblin was too quick. It dodged under the strike, got in close, then stabbed. He managed to twist just in time to get an elbow down onto the goblin’s thrusting arm, knocking it down enough to take the knife in the thigh as opposed to the chest.

It was still unbelievably painful.

Instead of jumping back, the goblin showed more intelligence that Joram was comfortable with by doing a shoulder tackle into his stomach. Pain once again lanced through him as his gut wound was aggravated, then again as he was pushed into the hallway door, causing even more damage as the weight of the goblin was multiplied by the sudden stop.

That’s when he lost his grip on both his sword and the goblin knife, but also when he snapped.

Joram couldn’t see the expression on the goblin’s face when his arms wrapped around its torso, but it sure sounded surprised as its legs were lifted into the air. Panicking, the goblin let go of his waist and tried to grab for the knife, but Joram didn’t give it the time of day.

Fun fact: Joram had watched the old WWF growing up, with legendary people like Andre the Giant, Hulk Hogan, and Macho-Man Randy Savage. Pile-drivers were a thing, even back then. Which the goblin quickly found out as its head connected with the tile-covered concrete floor at an awkward angle, resulting in probably the most disgusting crack-snapping sound that he’d ever heard as the next goblin came around the corner.

Its jaw dropped. Its eyes opened wide in both hatred and terror. How did he know that was terrified? The leaking piss from its loincloth was a good indication. However, that terrified goblin proved that it had at least a modicum of bravery. It raised its own knife-like weapon and charged.

Having only the corpse of the goblin at hand, he quickly lifted it up and used it as a shield. The outrage and utter hate in the goblin’s eyes as he used the corpse of its one-time compatriot was such that Joram knew that he would never have peace with these goblins. Especially if any of them escaped alive.

This goblin, however, was smart enough to try and sidestep the improvised shield as it tugged at its buried knife. Unfortunately for it, Joram just dropped the body, dragging the knife from the goblins grasp. So, he took the opening as the Godsend that it was, and punched the goblin in the face as hard as he could.

The goblin’s head snapped back so hard that it nearly fell over. Joram stepped forward with the intent of following through, but his stabbed leg gave out. He knelt down hard on his left leg as the goblin’s head came back down, jaw open wide to try and bite him.

Nope!! Joram thought as he brought his left hand up to clamp around the goblin’s throat as hard as he could. His right hand came up in a balled fist, taking the goblin in the groin, causing its eyes to cross.

There’s no such thing as a “fair” fight when you’re fighting for your life, Joram thought as he kept tightening his grip on the goblin’s throat until he both felt and heard cartilage crack. Then its eye nearly popped out of their sockets as both its hands came up to claw at his hand.

Given the state the goblin was in, Joram just let it go before it could do more than get a scratch in on his arm. He quickly scooted back as best he could with a hole in his leg and quickly grabbed his hunting knife from its sheath again.

Avi must have surmised that he once again needed healing, because he once again felt he effects of [Natural Healing] coursing through him. For as glad as he was that he was no longer bleeding out, it would likely take him a very long time to get used to how it felt for his body to reknit itself.

The two goblins that he’d mortally wounded earlier… less than a minute ago? Anyways, those goblin’s cries had already grown weak enough to now be barely audible, for which he gave a silent prayer of thanks. Not just for the sake of his ears, but also because he could hear what was going on much better than before.

That said, aside from the dying goblins, it was quiet.

He looked around wearily, tallying the body count this time.

“Eight?” He asked Avi as she stood beside him.

She just nodded, looking around at the carnage he’d wrought.

‘You know?’ Avi started, then shook her head. ‘From what Altaea left with me, the Prime version of you had gone on a gestalt path of Shaper and Monk. I can see why,’ she said, shaking her head again.

“What? Why?” He asked, a bit dizzy now from both the loss of blood and adrenaline shakes.

‘You’re talented,’ she said, then simply motioned to the corpses that surrounded him.

Joram coughed out a laugh, then shook his head.

“What? Lean kung-fu?” He asked, visions of probably the most quoted Neo line running through his head.

‘Something like that,’ Avi replied with a smirk that was definitely not very VI-like. ‘Maybe you should consider training like your Prime version did.’

Joram just looked at Avi. He wondered just how much she knew, how much she was withholding, and just how sapient she was. Then he shrugged again, realizing that that line of questioning wouldn’t get him anywhere. Instead, he chose to humour her.

“How long did it take to get him all trained up?” He asked, genuinely curious.

‘He trained with Altaea for about three years,’ she replied, nearly knocking him over in the process.

“Th-ree years…?” He asked, nearly choking on the words.

‘Yes, it was very thorough training after all.’

After the shock wore off, he managed to nod. Sure, he could see that. Training in the monastic traditions of Altaea’s homeworld normally took decades. That Altaea had trained his Prime version meant that things had gone much faster than normal. She was, after all, a goddess.

“I’m not sure that I’ll have that kind of time before more things show up to kill me,” he said, shaking his head. “I suspect that more and more of these goblins will show up until they finally overwhelm me with numbers.”

‘That’s certainly a possibility,’ Avi said, acknowledging the point. ‘However, if you can become proficient with [Astral Construct], then I’m sure that things will become much easier for you. And certainly less… stab-y.’

Joram shot her a look, trying to figure out if that was meant to be a joke, or what. After a few moments of Avi giving him her standard bland look, he gave up.

“Well, that’ll be one way to deal with them,” he said, knowing full well that having some astral constructs around would indeed help with security… and not getting stabbed so easily.

After another couple of minutes of laying there, and another dose of [Natural Healing], Joram finally got up again. He looked around once more and couldn’t help but frown at the charnel house that had once been his apartment. It wasn’t just the corpses, though that certainly added to it, nor the actual gore spattered about. No, it was the thick stench of blood that got to him.

He’d always had keen senses, be it sight, taste, smell, hearing, touch, and proprioception. Anyways, he was what was called a “super taster”, someone who hated things like cilantro because they tasted like soap. But part of that was his increased sense of smell, and the smell of blood had always nauseated him.

It wasn’t that the image of blood or gore particularly bothered him. He could walk through a slaughterhouse and not bat an eyelash at what he saw. The smell, however, would nearly do him in.

So, he augmented [Cleanse] as much as he could, then released the Power, specifically targeting “dead” organic matter. Mainly because he didn’t want any of the broken furniture or windows to vanish on him before he could get to repairing things. No sense in losing materials, after all.

He watched as the blood, gore, viscera, and bodies quickly disintegrated into increasingly diminutive motes of light until everything was once again “clean”. The damages, however, were another story. He frowned as he looked at the bunkbed in the second bedroom, the blinds, the broken screen, as well as the broken window. It would take a while to fix everything in there. But, it was his first priority, even higher than fixing the patio door…. The front door now?

Shrug.

Then he looked down when a glint of light caught his eye. Near his foot, right where the second-to-last goblin had lain, was a small crystal of some sort. It was trigonal in shape, capped by three-sided pyramids on each end. He picked it up to get a closer look at it, and frowned a bit.

The crystal was more or less clear, but was slightly cloudy, reminding him a bit of smoky quartz… if a smoky quartz only had three sides, that is. It was also about two centimetres long, but only about half a centimetre wide. Quite frankly, it was tiny. But it also… tingled to the touch.

He looked over to Avi and raised an eyebrow. She shrugged, seemingly oblivious to its nature. If he was right, and what he’d read many times in various fantasy-based media, it was likely a monster core or something like that. Just another thing to worry about now.

He shrugged, slid it into his pocket, then turned back to the tasks at hand.

The first thing that he fixed was the broken bunkbed. He found a certain… pleasure in watching the planks come back together again, the various splinters all flowing back into place before mending as though nothing had happened. The tears in the bedding and mattresses came next, though about a minute later. He wanted to pace himself in case more goblins showed up, once again trying to murder him in his home.

After staring at the windows for a few minutes, Avi spoke.

‘Why don’t you try to familiarize yourself with [Matter Manipulation]? It will likely both save you time and effort when dealing with the aftermath of future attacks,’ she said, gesturing to the things he’d just fixed.