Poko’s Rise To The Top

Chapter 5: Goblin Village

An hour later Poko was slowly, stealthily getting closer to the settlement. At this point Poko had 12 health again although his wounds were still sore and stiff.

Dusk was going to set in in about an hour and poko was determined to not get caught today. Unfortunately hide wasn’t a very powerful skill, it only passively helped him hide, mostly when he was sitting still. But he still used this advantage to slowly get closer and closer to the settlement, keeping low and in the thicker grasses when he could.

As another hour passed and dusk settled, Poko’s health reached 17 making him feel much more comfortable. The encroaching darkness also helped him blend in as most of the goblins returned to the small village.

As poko got closer he heard all sorts of occasional fighting, even witnessing a small child goblin being killed and the two adults laughing. But that wasn’t it, in the center of town was a big fire with a pot which they threw the body into. The goblins later ate out of that pot…

To be fair, most of the goblins seemed to suffer from starvation but…

This was understandably upsetting and any thoughts of cooperation went out of Poko’s head immediately.

‘These guys need to die.’

After some time passed Poko realized there surprisingly didn’t seem to be any guards posted and the goblins started going to their tents to sleep.

As poko creeped into town he saw a couple crude wooden buildings amidst the tents.

One of these buildings was an animal pen where a couple of the wolves from earlier were, there was even another white one. These wolves looked only slightly better than the other wolves, it seemed hunger was a theme in this village. The wolves didn’t seem very tame either… which gave Poko some ideas.

The other building looked like a house, which eluded to the villages leader. Poko was in need of a rare monster to kill… with his new skills and dagger he couldn’t resist at least looking.

‘Time to risk it for the biscuit! Papa needs a new skill hehehe’

Poko first continued looking around, there was also another small wooden building that looked the best made out of the three. Surprisingly there was also a red goblin guard at the door, and better yet he looked well fed, almost fat!

Poko looked around a bit more, waiting for the village to hopefully start sleeping. Unfortunately he found nothing else of interest.

When he came back to the guarded door he found the guard barely awake, the guard siting in front of the door leaning on his shield. The crude sword was literally laying in the dirt!

‘This is the worst guard I have ever seen! Wait isn’t this the first guard I’ve ever seen? Anyways, this will be easy!’

Poko circled around the tents until he was behind the building and slowly walked up the side of it. The guard didn’t expect a thing, poko quickly slit it’s throat, the guard struggled and tried to talk but could not, it died seconds later.

‘let’s see what was so important to guard.’

As the door slowly creaked open Poko saw something he didn’t expect. There were a few crude weapons but it was mostly food!

‘The village is starving and they are hiding food here!? Whelp I guess this chief is a bad leader, or is this normal for goblins… unfortunately there is nothing good for me in here, I still got some meat and herbs, and I don’t trust this meat.’

The guard dropped 15 copper and a tome!

[Would you like to learn fire resistance?]

‘Yes!’

Poko then moved to the other house. There was no windows or other doors, this house was very crudely made.

(Creeaak)

The door creaks open and it’s dark inside, with the moonlight poko sees a straw bed with a fat goblin on it.

‘This goblin is even bigger than the guard goblin, taller than any goblin I’ve seen, I bet it counts as a new enemy hehehe.’

Unfortunately the sound of the door opening along with the new light wakes the goblin chief up.

“Groaw”

The goblin groggily looks up.

“GRROOAAW”

Before the goblin can move Poko leaps forward and stabs with piercing stab. The goblin tries to defend itself with its arms to no avail. The dagger cuts right through and sinks into its neck, cutting off its voice and killing it.

Poko suddenly sees some notifications pop up but has no time to read them as  the sound of tents opening are heard. Poko wants the drops however and waits a second, giddily grabbing the 1 bronze and both skill tomes.

As he turns around another goblin appears, but this one is black and small, much nimbler than the others. It races through the doorway and lunges at Poko with its crude daggers. Poko swings his sword, trying to use its reach advantage but the goblin deftly dodged it and closes in. Poko barely puts his shield up in time and the goblin backs off before Poko could swing again.

Realizing he is running out of time Poko starts casting his spell, however the goblin was quick and did not want to allow Poko the time to cast a spell.

It dashed forward attempting to cut Poko, although it’s real goal was to stop the casting. Poko decided he couldn’t wait longer and stuck with casting the spell.

While casting the spell it’s hard to do other things, he could do simple things like taking a few steps or holding his shield up. The goblin avoided the shield, not that it mattered since Poko let it loose on his arm to cast his spell.

Poko tried to back up and lean away as best he could but the goblin struck him right in the gut with his crude dagger, immediately before bursting into flames.

The spell was cast so close that poko actually burnt himself in it, good thing he got fire resistance! He took 12 damage from the stab and 4 from the burn, thankfully he waited till his health was back to 20 before he attacked! Now his health was at only 4 but his stomach was still bleeding, it was a bad wound.

Poko furiously looked through his bag for the potion but couldn’t find it.

‘Shit I’m so dumb I actually forgot it!?’

He quickly graded the tome that dropped and an arrow but left whatever coins there was.

He sprinted out of the building, most goblins where still pretty tired and grabbing their weapons, at least they were hungry. Poko had left the door to the storage shed open and some goblins were clearly more interested in the food than him, but that didn’t mean they would let him go. The goblins had started to block the exit.

Poko quickly ran to the wolf pen and slashed the ropes with his dagger, opening the gate. He ran trying to avoid the goblins as best he could.

The wolves originally wanted to chase, their instincts of hunting kicking in, however the hunger and smell of food proved more tempting to them.

Once the goblins saw the wolves running toward their food they quickly forgot about that pesky human and ran to defend the storage. Poko ran right through them as they raced to defend their food, leaving behind a mess of the settlement. He ran all the way to the cave without stopping.

The wound on his stomach kept bleeding, he tried his best not to aggravate it but with all the running he lost 2 more HP and wasn’t feeling good.

As poko made it back to the cave he ran in and grabbed the potion, hiding all the way in the back of the cave in case they checked it. He watched his health as he tried to cover his wounds with big leaves and some vines.

‘If my health gets to 1 I’ll drink the potion.’

But his health never got to one, his wound was stabilized and he quickly fell asleep before he could even check his 3 new skill tomes.