Broken Anomaly

Anna lunged at the remaining goblin, cutting its wooden spear in two. The goblin tried to retreat as soon as its spear was broken but was unable to as Anna was still advancing and ran it through with her sword.

She quickly dislodged her blade and, with a sudden jerk, removed some of the blood from her sword and then used the thick piece of cloth tied around her leg to wipe the rest of it off.

The cloth was quickly becoming dark red with the number of times she had used it to clean her sword. Soon, she would have to replace it for the fourth time since she came here.

As she surveyed the field of bodies around her, she carefully examined each goblin corpse. Twelve dead goblins total, eight workers, and four fighters. She clicked her tongue in disapproval.

At her current speed, she would never clear the goblin incursion, even if she doubled her pace.

It had been a few days since she began to fight against them in earnest, but she had barely made a dent. Even her killing of these twelve goblins would barely faze them, if at all.

The death of any number of goblins seemed to be nothing but a problem of numbers that would be solved the very next day, when the incursion portal was activated again.

Their attitude toward each other wasn’t the only problem, no, the greatest problem was that each time the incursion portal was activated, it would last longer.

Initially, only ten goblins had come through, but earlier today, around thirty had crossed the threshold.

"Focus, Anna, focus,” she said to herself, driving all the doubts away. “They’re speeding up, but so are you. Twelve goblins are nothing to you now.” She tightened her grip and ventured back into the forest in search of another logging team.

Even if Anna was getting better at fighting and she was able to take on more enemies than before, she wasn’t unstoppable. She was very aware of her current limitations, which is why she only targeted groups that were isolated or too far from the incursion portal for backup to reach them in time.

She quickly arrived near another group of goblins, fourteen of them this time. Unlike the group from before, this one had eight fighters and six workers.

She took a deep breath, once again allowing herself to be bathed in the familiar sensation of sharpness. Each time she did it, the more comfortable she became with it and the easier the power would flow.

When she used it against the giant crab, it felt oddly constrained, but at the time she had no way of knowing that. Now, while still somewhat under the same constraints, it had an easier time flowing through her, as if channels were being established.

Then, without another second’s delay, she dashed forward, her sword quickly cutting down a goblin from shoulder to hip, completely bisecting it. The surrounding goblins quickly backed away, frightened by what they had just witnessed.

This was Anna’s aim all along. While she could wield the concept of sharpness much more easily now, it still didn’t last long, so she had to use it in the most efficient way possible.

While the goblins didn’t seem to care about one another, they did care about themselves, and none of them wanted to be cut in two.

Goblin +200 Experience.

Level up!

She noticed the familiar sound that came with leveling up and quickly closed the system windows. She quickly searched for the next appropriate target and quickly decided that it would be the only shield carrying goblin.

Without hesitation, she dashed toward her target, ignoring the goblins that were in between. The goblin raised its shield, desperately trying to defend itself in any way it could, sadly, the concept of sharpness was too much for a simple wooden shield to handle. The goblin’s head slid off its neck, causing even more panic.

The concept of sharpness dissipated, and Anna’s felt the weight of mental exhaustion increase, but that didn’t matter. She had accomplished her objective, to plant fear into the surrounding goblins.

What followed was nothing but a predator quickly dispatching its prey in such a swift and efficient manner, that it would’ve made you feel bad for the goblins.

The workers carried crude axes with short reach, barely being a problem and falling to the superior reach of a taller opponent and their longer weapon.

The archers tried to cover for the sword and spear-wielding goblins, but it didn’t matter. Anna had become used to how they shot, knew what they would target, and had even gotten their cadence down.

Anna was discovering that she had a sense for battle that was ill-suited for such a peaceful era like the twenty-first century. It was why it could only flourish now, under these new and dangerous conditions.

A goblin archer was limping away, only having gotten an injury on its leg and shoulder.

It left the edge of the forest, which had been moved deeper inward due to all their logging. It stumbled into the plains, causing the goblin sentries to focus their attention on them.

The big wooden doors of the hastily constructed goblin fortress opened, and a team of what seemed to be goblin medics appeared at the door, ready to receive the limbing goblin.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, its head fell off, hitting the floor, and the now dead goblin’s body collapsed.

From within the forest, a panting Anna clutched her head as her entire body trembled from an exhaustion that was beyond just mental or physical.

Sword mastery has reached level 11.

A small smile appeared on her face, overpowering her otherworldly fatigue. She and her body were quickly remembering more about her lessons with her grandfather.

At times she wouldn’t know how to continue attacking when suddenly, her body would move on its own, making her remember. Things that at the time made little sense were now more useful than ever.

-----------

Within the hastily constructed goblin fortress, atop a tower constructed with materials from their land, stood the goblin commander.

The commander carried a hard expression, the relaxed attitude from when it first arrived was nowhere to be seen.

It had left the native live out of nothing but the desire to torment it. It wanted to show the native how easily they took over their world. How futile any resistance would be in the face of the mighty goblin machine.

But now, the native stood there, with a grin of defiance. Worse than its defiance and clear mockery of those that were its betters, the native dared use the powers of beings greater than it—greater even than the commander.

With fists clenched so tightly that blood dripped onto the tower floor, the commander felt a surge of rage. This native needed to die, and it needed to die now.

----------

Alex sat near a pond inside one of the tunnels from the dome-like chamber he had discovered a few days ago. He took another sip of water and rested his back against the cave wall.

His stomach began to rumble, the water only intensifying his hunger. He tried to ignore it, but he really was nearing his limit. He checked his experience.

Level 14

Experience 9456/16875

“Still some way to go,” he said, exhaustion clear in his voice.

For days, Alex had been killing the hybrids nonstop. At every level up, he would put the points directly into strength and constitution, at this point, it was significantly easier for him to drag the hybrids out of the tunnel.

He had even begun to fight them within the tunnels, but he still ran away when it was more than two.

His gaze fell on his left arm, focusing on two puncture marks that still looked the same since he had gotten them.

One of the hybrids managed to pierce through his stone armor. He thought he was prepared for the pain, but he wasn’t.

He suddenly felt all his strength begin to leave him, he became lightheaded, and his vision blurred. With the little strength he could muster, he managed to free himself, only for blood to come gushing out.

He applied pressure to his arm and ran away. Once outside, the hybrid that had bitten him didn’t stop and continued to pursue him, completely unaffected by the sun, until suddenly it was.

By the time the hybrid felt the burning heat of the sun, no matter how fast it ran, it wouldn’t and didn’t make it back to the cave in time.

That’s when it clicked in Alex’s head—the reason why the sun burned them. “They’re part vampire,” Alex said, a pained expression clear on his face as he continued to grip his arm. “Why did it take me this long?”

Through this ordeal, he had actually come up with a new way to hunt the hybrids. It basically consisted of him using his blood to draw them out, and it worked really well.

They ignored their instinctual fear of the sunlight and would rush outside to take a sip of his blood. Alex would then give them a single punch, afraid that the System would not count it as his kill if he didn’t. However, he quickly stopped this tactic because his hunger grew worse.

Once he confirmed that they had vampire-like qualities, he also began to be more silent during the day, hoping that they would be asleep.

He quickly confirmed that to be true, but they were also incredibly sensitive to vibrations. More often than not, they would be awake by the time he got close enough.

As he watched the burning bodies of three hybrids that he’d yanked out in rapid succession, an idea invaded his mind.

He had found water, now he only needed food, and there were plenty of monsters around. But there was one problem: the bodies of monsters were toxic.

Thats when he made it his objective to reach level 15 and hopefully get a skill point. With it, he would get the Poison resistance skill and be able to eat the monsters. Although he doubted he would be able to resist all of the poisonous effects of the monster meat, any resistance was better than none.

There was, however, one problem with his plan, he was encountering fewer and fewer hybrids, and he needed to find more. He got up from the beside the pond, his joints creaking as he did so.

He also hadn’t had any good sleep. The night was a no-go since the hybrids would venture outside, and the day offered no relief as the sun moved through the sky, only allowing him a few hours of rest before it inevitably caught up to him.

He stretched in a practiced manner, honed by years of training, cracking sounds could be heard with every movement he made. Then he began to jump lightly, trying to get what he imagined was his sluggish blood pumping once more.

“Just a bit more, a bit more of them and I finally get to eat,” he told himself, hyping himself up.

He ventured back into the tunnels, knowing that he would have to go deeper and deeper into them in order to find more of the hybrids. The only thing that made him uneasy, other than his growing fatigue, was that each time he was further and further away from the cave entrance.

No matter how many tunnels he explored, no matter how upward they went or not, he hadn’t found any other exit leading outside. But he was sure there had to be another entrance somewhere.

The quest said that the hybrids were responsible for the deforestation, which meant that they had a way to get out of the canyon, reaching the desert he had stepped on when he first exited the forest. Though he hadn’t found it when looking from the cliffs, but granted, it was dark then.

Even through his feelings of unease, Alex kept advancing. He had avoided entering the first tunnel he had gone into the first time he entered the dome-like chamber, but now it was the only one that remained.

Once more, he felt like he had been walking for an eternity. At some point he even began to feel like he was walking downward, though he wasn’t sure, since it could also be because of the air or his body finally taking nutrients from something critical.

Without an internal clock, he guessed that the sun should be nearing its apex, and he was still walking through the same tunnel without having encountered a single sign of life.

After what felt like an unending journey to the center of the earth, he saw light at the end of the tunnel—a brilliant light, much more powerful than the light that was emitted by the crystals.

Cautiously, he approached, trying not to make much noise, quickly arriving at the end of the tunnel. What he saw left him speechless but quickly made him cower back into the tunnel.

He kept glancing at the tunnel exit, wanting to see more, his hunger demanding that he see more, but he held himself back. Until eventually, he slowly crawled to the edge of the tunnel.

The room that the tunnel connected to wasn’t empty, in fact, it was incredibly populated. In reality, it wasn’t even a room, it was an enormous cavern full of various plants and even trees.

The hybrids were tending to the trees and plants. Others were cutting down the fruits, leaves, and other such things, then would hand them to another who would walk away, far from Alex’s sight.

At the very top was a thin membrane that appeared to be for filtering the sunlight, stopping it from harming the hybrids.

Seeing such a space and considering how high up the tunnel he was in was from the cavern floor, he came to one conclusion.

“The ones I’ve been fighting were left behind. This is where the real tunnels begin,” he said with genuine amazement. “I need to find a way down.”