The Lone Healer-Chapter 29: A New Way to Fight

"Um..." Neve said, her words coming out muffled due to her lips currently being buried deep in the valley of Erin’s chest. "Erin?"

"Yes? Do not worry, as soon as these enemies make their way to us, I will-"

"Let me go, please."

"Huh?" Immediately, Erin released her hold. "B-But-"

"Okay, you can fight them now." Neve then instructed, pulling back a couple of steps as soon as the lamia had let go of her.

Erin blinked. Neve could see her mind processing her order in real-time.

"Very well," the snake lady replied, turning toward the enemies.

The attackers, by the way, were a small group of goblins. There were four of them. Three fighters, wielding a club and shield each, and then one goblin over by the trees up ahead, all of them with murder in their small, beady, little eyes.

That one was wielding a bow and, judging by the arrow sticking out of Erin’s back, his projectile had been what Erin lunged at Neve to protect her from.

Level 14

MP: 20/20

Level 15

MP: 10/10

Level 14

MP: 10/10

Level 11

MP: 10/10

Taking a deep breath, Neve tried to focus on the situation at hand.

It was difficult to do so when her ears were burning, and she was extremely embarrassed, but this wasn’t the time for such a thing. Enemies were attacking.

[Focus... You can tell her not to do that again later. For now, just focus.]

As Erin engaged the enemies up ahead, Neve’s muscle memory as a healer came into play and she moved up a little closer, so she could cast {Sacred Ground} on her.

[This staff is supposed to enhance Buff-type spells,] Neve thought, as the gap between Erin and the goblins shrunk. [With her Endurance being so high, and with this spell, they shouldn’t really be able to do any damage to her, right?]

Erin stopped just ahead of them, baring her claws. She waited for the goblins to get closer, but Neve thought it might be better for her to just use that paralyzing spell of hers.

[So, because she’s in Defensive mode, even though it would probably just win her the fight right here and now, she’s not using Freezing Gaze. Is that right? Maybe she’s just reacting to whatever happens around her. I might want to set her Combat Style to Balanced after all.]

It was fine this time, though, as that meant that Neve would get to see Erin’s physical attributes at work, which she did want to see. However, had these enemies been of a higher level, she’d be ordering Erin to use the spell herself.

The goblins arrived. Erin held her claws out, ready. As soon as they reached her, the three goblins went to attack her all at once, as was a goblin pack’s usual main strategy.

Neve liked that for this moment.

It was a situation that would provide a decent test of Erin’s instincts, as most low-level players Neve had seen face this exact same situation would usually freeze up here, and she’d be forced to get them through it with her healing.

With the only spell she cast being {Sacred Ground}, Neve intended to see how Erin approached the fight.

Her first move was to slither away a few steps. The goblins’ swings all caught nothing but air as Erin moved out of the way. There was a brief moment of confusion as they wondered why their target hadn’t been hit, and Erin took advantage of it.

She moved forward at the same impressive speed that she’d moved earlier, to protect Neve from the arrow that started this fight.

Then, with an overhead swing from her left hand, she slammed her claws into one of the goblin’s skulls.

"Arghk!" The goblin cried out as the force of the blow sent it straight to the ground. It wasn’t dead, but it had been stunned.

The two other goblins went to attempt a second attack, both of them running forward with their clubs held high. Erin, again, slithered back a bit. Doing so allowed her to dodge another arrow from the goblin archer and put some space between herself and both enemies at the same time.

Then, she spun and struck them both with her thick tail. Both small enemies were sent flying through the air, and Erin took the chance to finish off the goblin on the ground.

Bending over, Erin dealt it a palm strike with her right hand that produced a gross cracking sound so loud Neve could hear all the way from where she stood.

EXP Gained: 10

EXP: 300/400

Activity Points Gained: 10

Activity Points: 1160

WS Tokens Gained: 10

WS Tokens: 5451

Neve raised a brow.

[Huh? Is that WS token total right? Something feels off.]

She then placed her eyes back on the fight.

[Because Erin is my summon, any kills she gets count as mine, so I get EXP from everything she does. I had guessed that it would work like that, but it’s nice to see it confirmed. And, yeah, killing that goblin gave me some AP too. I guess that means I have reason to go looking for fights outside of dungeons, then.]

The goblins Erin had swiped away with her tail were pretty far. Their frail, tiny bodies had been launched back quite a bit, after all.

Erin remained where she stood as they got up, wanting to wait for them to come to her. She glanced over at the archer, making sure to dodge another arrow before the two fighter goblins reached her again.

Her next move was surprising. The lamia dodged another quick pair of clumsy club swings and then, before the goblins could respond, wrapped her body around them both.

She coiled around the enemies and encircled them just enough to where she could then squeeze the life out of her unfortunate opponents.

Again, some bone-chilling cracking sounds came out of the two goblins before Erin slithered away and their bodies fell to the ground, dead.

[... Ouch.]

Finally, it was just the archer remaining. However, Erin did not go running after it.

Instead, she simply positioned herself between it and Neve, allowing the goblin to shoot her, not bothering to dodge at all.

"Uh," Neve said, "it’s okay. You can go take it down."

"Are you certain?" Erin asked, with a raised brow.

"Yeah. It’s fine, honestly."

The reluctance was clear to spot on Erin’s face but, she soon nodded and slithered toward the ranged opponent.

She made her way to it slowly, dodging arrows as she approached.

Neve walked up with her to see what her plan was.

As soon as the goblin looked like he was going to run away, that was when Erin kicked things up a notch.

She closed the distance between them in the blink of an eye and knocked the flimsy wooden bow it carried out of its hands.

Before the goblin could even plead for its life, then, Erin slammed the side of her hand into the goblin’s neck, breaking it and killing the last enemy.

All tallied, Neve’s stats looked like this:

EXP: 330/400

AP: 1190

WS Tokens: 5481

Erin turned toward her, looking proud.

And, she had to admit it, Neve was impressed.

Not because she was able to kill them so effortlessly. No, the gap between their levels made it so that this was the expected outcome. But, she was impressed because there were little details in Erin’s fighting that showed she knew what she was doing.

[Her positioning was nice. Backing off to let the enemy overextend and give her openings to work with was really good, too. On top of all that, she looked so calm. That’s huge since Erin can’t see the levels of her enemies like I can. So, to her, these could have been dangerous opponents, but she didn’t seem nervous at all. Or, maybe she just guessed they’d be weak because they were so small. Huh. Now, I want to see her fight something else. Will that confidence stay if she comes across an enemy her own size?]

Erin slithered back to her.

"Did you-"

And, she disappeared.

"Oh, shit. Right," Neve thought. "The summon timer. Hold on."

She quickly cast Erin’s summon spell again, flinching as she felt the sudden sting of 300 mana leaving her body.

As Erin reappeared, however, Neve called Tamira in her mind.

[Hey, Tamira.]

"Mhm?" The snake asked.

[Was my WS Token total always like this?]

"Nope. You should check your inbox."

"Oh, okay."

Neve did as she directed, while the snake left her thoughts.

When she did, she saw the following:

{Donation Received!}

{Charlotte <3: 1 WS Token}

{Daily Token Transfer Cap: 1/2500}

Neve blinked.

"Huh?" She asked herself, as Erin manifested in front of her. "Do I know anyone called Charlotte?"

"Hm?" Erin looked down at herself, bringing Neve’s attention back to her. "I... What happened just now?"

"..." Neve sighed.

[I’m gonna have to sit down and explain this all to her. How exactly do you tell someone that they’re actually not... there, you know? That they’re the product of a spell?]