Ryan led Ellie out of the city and headed north, setting out to find that band of goblins.
The afternoon sun was harsh and scorching. Dense thickets lined both sides of the narrow path. Ryan wiped the sweat from his temple, keeping a wary eye on his surroundings.
There were plenty of bandits outside the city.
That scum preyed on lone travelers, fond of hiding in the brush to loose arrows from cover.
And traveling with a curvy beauty like Ellie made you an all too easy target, so beyond the walls one had to stay alert at every moment.
Evelyn's information was too vague. North of the city was a vast stretch of wilderness, threaded by only a few footpaths; trying to find a pack of goblins out here was like fishing a needle from the sea.
Once they had put some distance between themselves and the city, he ducked into the thicket beside the path with Ellie and began searching.
A good while of searching turned up nothing, which left Ryan a little deflated.
He sat down on a rock that was rather hot against his backside and asked Ellie offhandedly, "Can you sniff the goblins out with your nose?"
Ellie shook her head where she stood. "I'm not good at tracking by scent."
Fair enough — cats were better at ambush; it was dogs that were good at the chase.
The troublesome part of a job like this was finding the target.
Goblins were elusive things, with the burrows they dug everywhere, and with bad luck it could take several days to track them down.
Once he had money, Ryan meant to buy a Dog-Kin slave to handle target-finding. It would boost his earning rate enormously, sparing him from blundering around outside the city like a headless fly.
"Let's rest a bit, then keep looking. If we don't find the goblins today, we'll come back tomorrow."
"All right." Ellie was as sparing with words as ever, and once she had answered she stood there motionless as a block of wood.
Taking advantage of the break, Ryan went back to tinkering with the System Codex.
He tapped through every lit portrait, including the tavern owner Evelyn.
[Species: Fox-Kin Demi-human
Current Codex subject: Evelyn
Current Affection Level: 1
Current Loyalty: None]
[You have a thing for young mothers?]
Ryan hurriedly shook his head. He had no particular interest in a young mother in the first bloom of her charms; he was simply grateful to Lady Evelyn — after all, when he had arrived without a coin to his name, she was the one who had given him a meal.
At that thought, Ryan suddenly realized he had forgotten something crucial.
He had never appraised Evelyn's stats.
Once he got back to the tavern he would have to find a chance to appraise her...
Just then a gust of wind blew into their faces. Ellie tilted her head up and sniffed, then spoke to the woolgathering Ryan. "I smell goblins."
"Where?" Ryan sniffed too, but all he caught was a whiff of stale urine.
Ellie pointed straight ahead. "The wind's blowing from this direction."
Ryan drew his sword, parted the wild grass before him, and pressed on with Ellie.
After they had gone some way, Ryan suddenly felt the ground trembling faintly, and the sound of hoofbeats carried from the distance.
He pushed out of the thicket and looked toward the source.
It looked like a caravan's wagons, rolling in from afar.
The two caravan guards at the front tensed the instant they saw Ryan and Ellie poke their heads out of the grass, and slowed their pace a little.
Ryan was about to signal that he meant no harm when the two guards were suddenly tripped by a rope and sent sprawling, men and horses alike.
Before the flying dust could settle, a swarm of green goblins rushed out from every direction wielding short blades and clubs, surging into the dust cloud.
"Give them a hand."
Ellie raised her hand. A strong wind whipped up all around, scattering the dust in an instant.
The two guards gripped their longswords back to back, and had already killed a few goblins, but as their strength flagged they were steadily losing ground, crude spiked clubs clanging against their plate armor.
The panicked merchant stood on the wagon clutching a metal candlestick, bashing away at any goblin that came near.
At the same time, several goblins came charging at Ryan, swinging their spiked clubs.
Ellie raised her hand at once. The wind blades were invisible, but their sound was shrill; brushing lightly across a goblin's neck, they took the head clean off in an instant.
The goblin's body hadn't yet registered that its head had relocated, and it kept running for quite a stretch before it dropped and twitched on the ground.
She struck blindingly fast, and at range besides; her monster-clearing was frightening in its efficiency, cutting them down like melons and vegetables, green severed limbs flying everywhere.
Against these goblins, her magic was simply a curb-stomp from a higher dimension.
A dozen-odd seconds later the goblins were all but exterminated, the ground littered with their severed limbs, the whole path stained red and giving off a sharp, bloody stench.
Ryan walked up to the two dust-caked guards and looked them over with a raised brow. "You're not hurt?"
The two poor wretches had blood all over their faces and dented plate armor — hardly the picture of "fine."
"We're fine. Thanks." The one who spoke was a red-faced, mustached big man, who gritted through the pain as he pulled a dagger out of a gap in his plate, his brow furrowing.
The other guard wiped the blood from his face and glanced at Ellie. "She your slave? Her magic's really something..."
Ryan nodded. He was quite pleased with Ellie's performance — she was well worth the price.
If only her Loyalty were a touch higher, he'd be happier still.
Ryan pointed at the goblin corpses strewn everywhere and turned to the merchant. "These goblins all count as mine, then — no objections?"
The merchant breathed a sigh of relief and sagged against the wagon. "Take them and claim the bounty. We don't want them."
"Then could you give us a lift later?" Ryan raised a brow at the two wounded guards and added, "We can escort you into the city while we're at it."
The merchant nodded. "Gladly."
Ryan turned and told Ellie to go cut off the ears for the bounty, and to gather up the spoils scattered across the ground while she was at it.
This field of goblin corpses would fetch seven or eight silver tree coins at least, and their filthy, ragged clothes and weapons would sell for a fair bit too. The next few days' meals were taken care of, with enough left over to buy a thing or two and improve their lot.
Looking at the worn straw sandals on Ellie's feet and the patch-covered linen she wore, Ryan shook his head again.
He wanted to get Ellie into some better clothes; just looking at her like this made him uneasy.
In this world, clothes and shoes were things you handed down to the next generation, usually just patched when they tore.
For a farmer, a brand-new set of clothes cost about two months of a family's food money — roughly six silver coins — which he could still afford once he collected his pay.
Shoes were trickier, though. The straw sandals on her feet were cheap enough, but a slightly decent pair of leather boots ran a dozen-odd silver.
Leather itself was scarce and dear, and the shoemaking process — from vegetable tanning to stitching — was all slow, painstaking work, which kept prices sky-high, far beyond what a commoner could afford.
Ryan sighed.
There were just far too many things that needed money right now...
The more Ryan thought about it, the more it weighed on him, so he decided to treat himself a little later. "Ellie, your performance today was outstanding, far beyond what I expected. Tonight, how would you like to stuff your face with a big sausage?"