Ashes of the Fallen

"Right," I muttered to myself while letting out a sigh. "Social group of kids I got here." Before accepting the invite, I looked around once more to see if another group happened to be approaching on the horizon.

To my dismay there was no such luck.

I was stuck with this pick-up group if I wanted to enter.

Oh well, have to roll the dice sometimes.

Accepting the invite, I shook my head and sighed once more before stepping forth into the cold muddiness of the portal that transported me from the pleasant outdoors to the stifling, dreary and dank interior of the mining complex.

The home of the Outcast Goblins… a joyous adventure, filled with all the rancid odors one could think of along with all the ash one could choke on.

A lovely place, this dungeon was.

The only thing better, was this lovely party of mine.

Well, maybe that was too harsh.

They were simply anti-social and lacked etiquette, which wasn't too unusual seeing as they all looked to be in their late teens to early twenties, at least as far as their character appearance went. I didn't really have much to go on but, there were trends with player behavior online and within games, to the point where it was rather predictable after a while. Yeah, as long as we could clear the first floor at a reasonable pace, I wouldn't have any real complaints.

Everyone had their moody days anyhow.

But as soon as I caught up with the party of four that had positioned just slightly out of range of the first group of goblins, the archer drew his bow and fired off a shot. Without even taking a pause to see if I was ready, or to consult or discuss group strategy, he pulled and stood there waiting for me to take aggro off of him.

This stupid son of a bitch, I thought to myself as I hurriedly dashed in front of the group and began to cast a [Chain Lightning]. With only seconds to spare I rushed the cast and skipped the chanted verse, drastically lowering the amount of damage of the spell and in turn, lowering my ability to maintain threat in the long run.

As the five goblins continued their charge with swords waving in the air and high-pitched screams accompanying them, they were hit with my lightning and immediately went silent. Momentarily frozen in place, as if they had run into a wall, the disoriented goblins pulled themselves together as I grabbed my one-handed axe from its sling on my waist. Raising my shield and axe to meet their charge, I swung down at the first goblin in an attempt to catch it off-guard.

The swing was a miss as the reach was so much shorter than I was used to, and just as I tried to bring the axe back, a sword slash came down across my face, nearly slicing my nose in two. Reactively jerking my head back and lifting my shield in-turn, the second slash of another goblin was easily deflected.

But before I could even prepare for a counter attack, two [Fireballs] exploded in my vicinity as the first goblin took minor damage and flames licked my face. My eyebrows singed, I pulled back and attempted to turn the goblins to the side so I would be out of the firing line, yet before I could even gain position, an arrow found itself lodged into the back of my shoulder.

Wincing from the pain I grit my teeth, trying my best to contain my rage.

Ignoring the arrow, I deflected the other three goblin attacks with ease as the five had nearly surrounded me. They weren't as skilled as the latter floors and the [Minor Goblins] were almost inconsequential, so I felt confident going forward. That was until [Fireballs] started to randomly pelt different goblins every one and a half seconds.

With the unfocused attacks of the three damage dealers, threat management was proving nearly impossible for me as I had to quickly attack one goblin then rotate to the next. Switching through my targets when they looked as if they were about to be peeled off of me, I barely maintained some semblance of control.

I didn't have the Area of Effect taunt that Barik or other shield bearers had, since I was new to tanking with a shield, so I couldn't force the mobs to focus me. In order to maintain hate, I needed to deal enough damage to them to remain high on their threat priority. Switching back and forth between goblins, was not the way to do that.

And then it happened.

Another wayward arrow hit me in the ribs, and the sudden pain deep in the center of my midsection distracted me as a goblin landed a sword thrust into my thigh. Thinking that was the worst of it, I was quickly disappointed as two of the five remaining goblins took off and started to beeline towards the casters. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched as the archer managed to hit one of them in the chest with an arrow, causing the goblin to chase him instead.

And that's when the fight devolved into chaos.