Snarling and smacking its nasty jaws, the horrid creature drove from above its jagged spear blade down with all its might. The point inched closer to my face with each passing second.

  Drool and spittle fell from the creature’s mouth, splattering over my cheeks and chin. I kicked and struggled underneath the goblin, unable to break myself away. Fear ran its course, my heart working overtime, threatening to burst like a primed grenade. And closer the spearhead inched, threatening to split my face open if I didn’t do something fast. But what? But what?

  “My class,” I remarked, suddenly.

  Then, out from the long grasses shot something small and furry. In less than a second, the furry creature was on the goblin’s face, the goblin releasing hold over the spear. I yanked it to the side and let the goblin drive it deep into the soil.

  In the next moment, I looked up to see what had caused the trouble… and found Spot!

  The rabbit had launched itself onto the face of the goblin, clamping on to its broad fat nose with gnarly teeth.

  In the next moment, Spot was off, jumping back with its powerful legs, arching through the air back into the grass where it skittered away. The force of the jump flung the goblin’s face back. It let go of the spear and cradled its nose.

  That gave me time to enact my plan.

  “I want to change my class to warrior!” I shouted.

  !Class changed from Scout to Warrior

  [Free class change used]

  Suddenly, strength coursed through my veins. My warrior body knew exactly what to do. Using my hips, I launched the goblin off of me and shot to my feet.

  The goblin rolled in the dirt, wildly flailing about like a dog with rabies before hobbling to its knees. Unfortunately, it didn’t have its spear anymore. But I had mine.

  With a mighty swing, I arced my spear around, the blade of the sword lopping the creature’s head off with warrior precision.

  Then it was over. The goblin head rolled away and its body fell limp to the ground, spitting a long string of black blood across the grass. The smell was awful.

  Goblin warrior slain!

  150XP

  !Achievement

  Defeat a monster or person of equal level

  500XP

  I stared down at the creature’s body, adrenaline still shocking my system. I had almost died. The realness of the situation I was in suddenly hit me all at once. Yet, still here I was and more than that… Spot had saved my life.

  “Spot!” I cried out, frantic now. The other goblins were still around. They were poaching our kill right at the moment but they’d be back. I searched the long grasses for Spot for several minutes before there was rustling in a shrub behind me.

  Spot hopped out as if nothing was wrong.

  Back at camp, I used some water from the reservoir, boiled it, and soaked my leftover homemade rags to clean the goblin blood off of my blade. The creature’s blood stank like swamp muck and the consistency was like melted jello.

  A fire crackled in the pit already. I hadn’t had time to catch anything yet but a quick trip to the river would get me a fish, at least. I didn’t want goblin blood festering in my meal though.

  As I cleaned my blade I looked over at Spot with renewed appreciation. Spot was munching down on an extra large serving of berries and favorite greens the little rabbit had very much earned. It felt deserved after today’s performance. I smiled.

  “I appreciate what you did for me today. That was really brave of you.”

  Nuzzling a berry, Spot decided to take a juicier one, biting into it and spraying juice all over its white maw.

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  “You know you could’ve got yourself killed. No more heroics, alright? I’m the warrior here. Anyways, I still appreciate what you did. I owe you one.” My blade gleamed in the firelight.

  “I better get me something to eat before it's dark. I’ll be back.” Then I dashed off to the river for a fish.

  As the stream trickled below me, I reflected on the day’s events one more time. Spot had really impressed me. Who would’ve thought rabbits had such instincts? A part of me didn’t think berries were enough of a reward.

  “Hm. What can I do to repay such an act of valor?” There didn’t seem to be much that could be done with the resources I had.

  On my mind were the goblins too. After all this time they hadn’t found us but they were an increasing problem.

  “They’re getting smarter… or used to our hunting habits. Little bastards. And that special one today. It was stronger than the rest.” I reflected on some of the body marks it had that I didn’t get to in the moment. Body tattoos ran up one arm, or rather some kind of fire branding mimicking body tattoos.

  “It was a goblin warrior, apparently. Nasty little guy. And it was the same level as I was. So goblins have levels too.” I guessed everything had levels… except maybe trees.

  The goblin also had a series of scars up its arms and across its body, memorials to past battles it had survived.

  I reached down and touched the wound where I’d been stabbed. It had healed a while back and now a rosy pink line was all that was left.

  “These goblins are dangerous and it sounds like they’ll only get more dangerous if left unattended. I might have to take care of them one of these days.” That didn’t sound like too appetizing of a plan. Though the XP was a nice consolation prize.

  “I guess I’ll have to start fighting more if I ever want out of this place.” That reasoning was a scary one but made sense.

  A black fish swam by my ankle. It was an easy catch.

  !Fish slain

  10XP

  !Congratulations

  You’ve ascended to level 8

  You’ve been rewarded with a free class change

  You’ve been granted one wish!

  “Oh, nice,” I said, enthused. The thrill of leveling up still hadn’t lost its luster.

  This new level gave me an idea, though. Maybe there was something I could do for Spot after all.

  At camp, the fire crackled on, big logs still burning away. I walked up confident in my surprise, my harpoon with the freshly caught fish swinging on my shoulder.

  “Hey there, Spot. I got something for ya.” I put the fish on the spit to roast and sat beside my buddy.

  Spot was lying absolutely still on all fours eyes, glazed over. The smorgasbord was taking its toll now. A belly too full was closing Spot’s eyes, shutting down all systems but those needed to digest.

  “Don’t worry. It’s not food. It’s this,” I said, pulling out a collar with a nice silver buckle on it. The buckle had SPOT engraved on it. On the other side it read: for acts of bravery. It had taken me a long time to get the specifics right. A frustratingly long time…

  I fastened the collar around the bunny’s neck. Spot lifted its chin to allow me to without using any extra energy than needed. I straightened the collar and took a look.

  “Looking good.” I scratched Spot’s head to which Spot’s eyes closed in enjoyment. Spot’s eyes opened when I stopped.

  “I just wanted to thank you for saving my life.” Suddenly, I caught my mistake.

  “It’s not a collar,” I lied, realizing animals probably hated collars, “Hehe, I know you’re not my pet… It’s… a medal. Yeah. For your acts of bravery in the line of duty,” I weaseled. Whew. Nice save. “Don’t worry, you don’t have to wear it every day.”

  Spot sighed a contented sigh, the belly full of food satisfying and the warmth of the fire soothing.

  “You don’t look like you like it,” I said hesitantly. “You would rather have had hay, huh?”

  We sat under the stars again that night. The sky was the clearest it had been in a week. Shimmering, stars twinkled in the completely cloudless void and the moon– or this place’s moon, glowed ethereal and bone white.

  I was soothed by the smell of the fire, intoxicating, and the taste of my meal still pleasantly lingered from dinner.

  “Nothing’s better than a full belly and a nice place to sleep.”

  Spot’s nose twitched in a dreamy daze.

  “Yeah. You said it.”

  In the morning, I started repairs on my sandals.

  “Level eight. Dang. It’s taken me a couple months to get to level eight. Ninety nine is going to take me forever,” I said, skirting over the real topic I wanted to talk about. I eyed Spot to see if there was any suspicion in that little rabbit brain over my real intentions.

  “You know, that goblin I killed yesterday was apparently the same level as I was. Rather, it was level seven. Gave me five hundred points for that one kill. That’s pretty crazy, right?” I eyed Spot again.

  Spot was sniffing out a place in the dirt to poop.

  “So… I was thinking that if I want to take this leveling thing seriously then I should probably get into more fights.” Spot saw that coming a mile away.

  “And why not?” I asked, ashamed I’d been caught in my act. “Oh, I can too handle myself. I’ve gotten two of them already… Please, you were responsible for only half of that take down and you know it… It’s not too dangerous!” I sulked for a minute wrapping new vines around the base of my padded trunk bottoms.

  “And would you stop talking to me while you’re doing that?” I threw some spare vine over at Spot annoyed at the lack of manners.

  Spot finished up and kicked dirt over the little black pebbles for good measure. The vines landed harmlessly beside the rabbit who sniffed them for a second before continuing on without a care.

  “Fine. I’ll just be stuck here forever, then. Is that what you want?” Seething, I kept wrapping my sandals up, tightening them too tight. That day my toes would turn purple and swell like hotdogs nuked in the microwave for too long.