Chapter 2: My First Kill
I moved like a shadow with purpose.
The goblin sat slumped against the rock wall, head bowed, mouth slightly open in an ugly half-snore. The torchlight caught the edge of its crude bronze sword, and I saw the leather belt loop barely holding it in place. If I could get close enough, I could grab the weapon before it knew what hit it. But taking the sword first risked waking it. No. I had to kill first. Clean. Fast.
There was a jagged piece of stone sticking out of the floor near the wall, roughly fist-sized, sharp enough to be dangerous. I crouched and carefully pried it loose, fingers trembling not from fear but from hyperfocus. The edges bit into my hand as I lifted it. Primitive, but effective.
I crept closer, heart beating against my ribs like a war drum.
Ten steps.
The goblin twitched in its sleep, emitting a half-snort and shifting slightly. I froze mid-step, lungs paused, weight distributed evenly on both feet like I was back in the ring with a guy twice my size.
Nine steps.
Eight.
Three.
Close enough now that I could see its yellowed nails. Its skin was leathery, scarred in patches, like it had been scraped against bark too many times. A bone necklace hung around its neck, adorned with small teeth, goblin or otherwise, I didn't know. I didn't care.
I raised the stone high.
And brought it down hard.
The crack was muted, but definite. Skull meeting rock with just enough resistance to remind me it was real bone under that green flesh.
The goblin's eyes flew open.
Too late.
I smashed the stone down again, once, twice, a third time for good measure. The creature twitched, then stilled. A faint wet gurgle escaped its throat as blood, dark, almost black, pooled beneath its head.
I froze, panting, gripping the bloody stone in my hand like it might turn on me.
But the cavern remained quiet. The other goblins, further down the tunnel, still laughed and bickered, oblivious.
I dropped the stone with a faint clatter and leaned back, staring at the corpse.
I'd expected… something.
A rush. Guilt. Nausea. The kind of soul-deep horror that movies and books always talk about when someone takes a life. This was a sentient creature, wasn't it? Bipedal. Tool-using. Language-capable. A being with thoughts and feelings, even if I didn't speak its guttural language.
But I felt nothing.
No guilt. No hesitation. Just... silence.
I reached down and pulled the bronze sword free. The hilt was sticky with sweat and blood and gods-knew-what-else, but it felt solid in my hand. Heavy. Balanced poorly, but usable.
I turned the weapon over, studying its edge.
Not sharp, but not blunt either. A thick short sword, like a Roman gladius that had been forged by a drunk apprentice. Still, metal beat stone any day of the week.
I looked back at the goblin.
Its mouth hung open slightly, jaw cracked from the impact. Blood soaked into the dirt around its head. Eyes cloudy now, no longer glaring or squinting. Just… lifeless.
And still, I felt nothing.
Maybe that should've disturbed me more than it did.
But it didn't. Because the truth was, this wasn't my first kill.
Sure, it was the first humanoid one. But back on Earth? My cousins and I used to go hunting with my brother and the neighborhood boys. Birds, rodents, once a full-grown antelope we spent three hours tracking through the bush. Killing wasn't abstract to me, it was familiar.
And I remembered that one day, at my sister's wedding. My father had tasked me and my uncle with preparing the feast. We killed a cow that morning, slaughtered it ourselves. I held the knife. The blood ran hot over my hands.
I remembered the sound it made when it died.
And how I didn't flinch.
Growing up in Africa had shaped me in ways I didn't always think about. The casual proximity to life and death. You didn't just outsource your meat to a grocery store, you saw it born, fed it, then ended it when the time came. There wasn't always enough cash to go to the supermarket or go to the nearby fast food restaurant.
If I'd grown up in the States first, maybe I'd have turned vegan after this goblin kill. Maybe I'd be crying into my borrowed tunic, wondering what it said about my soul.
But I wasn't. I was calm. Very eerily calm.
Efficient.
I reached forward, grabbed the goblin's limp arms, and dragged its body into a narrow crevice behind a pillar of stone. The blood trail wasn't great, but the shadows would obscure most of it. I brushed some dirt over the pool on the ground with my boot, dulling the shine.
The last thing I needed was one of his green-skinned buddies stumbling across the mess before I had time to use this sword.
I knelt briefly, listening.
Nothing.
I was in the clear.
One goblin down.
Forty-nine to go.
And now?
Now I had a weapon.
The game had begun.
The sword felt heavier than it should've. Not because of its weight, but because of what it meant now.
I'd crossed a line. First blood. And I wasn't stopping there.
I crept forward along the curved wall of the cavern, eyes adjusting more and more with each step. The flickering torchlight didn't blind me anymore, it danced off the stone like a guide, illuminating just enough shadow to hide in, just enough danger to respect.
Another goblin sat slumped near a pile of bones, some animal, some probably not. It scratched its belly absentmindedly, mumbling in its feral language. I recognized the sound now, not speech exactly, more like intent disguised as noise.
I didn't wait.
I moved, fast and low, my feet barely brushing the ground. The goblin didn't even get a chance to look up. I brought the sword down in a diagonal arc, not elegant, not clean, just hard and fast. It sliced into the creature's neck with a meaty crack, halfway severing the windpipe. The goblin flailed and gargled, but I drove my boot into its chest and wrenched the sword free with a spray of blood.
It went still.
Still nothing in my chest. No guilt. No hesitation.
Only purpose.
I didn't pause long. Further up the tunnel, I saw another one, this one pacing with its back turned, gnawing on a stick of what I assumed was meat. I darted forward, steps silent, and wrapped one arm around its throat while driving the blade through its back and into its heart. It let out a sharp, choking gasp as it slumped into my grip, the bronze sword slipping from its hand with a clang.
I eased it to the ground gently.
Two more down.
That's when I noticed it.
I wasn't breathing hard. My hands weren't shaking. My heart was racing, sure but it wasn't panic. It was... control. Focus.
Every noise echoed sharper. Every flick of torchlight stood out with crystalline detail. I could hear distant growling and footsteps, goblin chatter and movement in adjacent chambers and I could track it.
My vision was clearer. My reactions tighter. My whole body felt wired, coiled like a spring waiting to snap.
It was like adrenaline, sure but not normal. Not Earth-normal. This wasn't just the fight-or-flight instinct of a human cornered.
This was something else.
"Ki," I muttered under my breath, wiping blood off my sword on the dead goblin's crude leather.
I remembered enough from fiction to know it wasn't just about energy blasts and screaming into power-ups. Ki was breath. Movement. Life force. Physical and spiritual synced into one.
And something in me was syncing.
I didn't want to waste it.
Around the next bend, I spotted a pair of goblins, these two were on patrol. They walked in rhythm, each carrying a sword, occasionally grunting to each other. I ducked behind a stone formation and waited. Watched.
Two-on-one wasn't ideal. Not for someone with raw swings and no technique. But something in me wanted the fight. Not out of arrogance but certainty. Like a boxer who knows he's not good yet, but steps into the ring anyway because he can see the punches coming.
They passed me.
I struck.
The first goblin barely had time to react. I slashed across his back, not deep enough to kill but enough to cripple. He screamed and twisted, swinging wildly. I ducked under the blade and drove my shoulder into his chest, slamming him into the rock.
The second one turned, blade raised.
I stepped in, fast, too fast. My footwork was sloppy, but my speed made up for it. His swing whiffed past my ribs, and I countered with a wild overhead strike. It connected with his forearm, splitting it open to the bone. He howled and dropped his sword.
But he lunged at me, biting, clawing, snarling.
I didn't hesitate. I brought the sword up and stabbed forward, burying the blade in his gut. Warm blood sprayed my arm. He spasmed, gurgled, and dropped.
I turned back to the first goblin, who was still trying to crawl away, leaving a streak of dark blood on the stone. I walked up behind him and ended it with one clean thrust to the spine.
I stood there, breathing evenly. The bronze sword gleamed in the torchlight, slick with gore.
I was fighting like an animal. Sloppy. Brutal. Desperate.
But effective.
And I was faster. Stronger. My body didn't move like it used to. It reacted. It flowed. The few hours I spent boxing back on Earth had taught me how to take a punch, how to throw one but this? This was something else.
I was raw. But not weak.
I cleaned my blade as best I could and moved down another tunnel, deeper into the labyrinth. After a few turns and several tight squeezes, I found a chamber that seemed... untouched. No bones. No weapons. No nests. Just a hollowed-out space, round and quiet, with a narrow entrance that made it easy to defend if needed.
Perfect.
I stepped inside and sat down in the center, my sword resting beside me.
The red countdown was still there, floating faintly.
29:20:15... 14... 13... 12...
Plenty of time. More than enough.
I crossed my legs and lowered myself into the lotus position, closing my eyes.
Ki.
It had to be real.
I'd seen hints of it, heard its whispers in the way my senses sharpened, in the strength I didn't remember training for. But I hadn't touched it yet. Not truly.
I slowed my breathing. In through the nose. Out through the mouth.
Back on Earth, I'd read about meditation. Thought it was mostly pseudo-science. But now? It felt... necessary. Natural.
I focused inward.
No noise. No visuals. Just breath and body.
I searched for something, anything that felt not me, but in me. Something sleeping beneath the skin.
At first, there was nothing. Just breath, heartbeat, blood.
Then... something stirred.
A warmth. Deep in my gut. Like the flicker of a flame in the cold. Faint, but real.
I chased it. Focused on it.
And it pulsed once. Like a muscle flexing from within. Like it knew I was looking for it.
I smiled faintly, not opening my eyes.
"Found you," I whispered.
It wasn't strong. Not yet. But it was there.
And I was going to feed it.
One breath at a time.