I walked ever so slightly forward. Even if the troll was in that room, my protection was there too.

Would Maraine really be fine? I figured she's strong but... this thing was big. She didn't have any sort of weapon with her, and she wasn't a mage. Did she underestimate this gate? I don't know. I just know I'm panicking.

Before I could even see the troll, I heard it. Loud footsteps, a loud scream, the sound of something dragging across the floor. It shook the ground and my body with it too.

Standing at the edge of the hallway into this room, I peeked my head through and saw it.

It was at least double my height, maybe a little more. It had long arms that were covered in the same mossy shade of green that the rest of its body was. It was covered in muscles everywhere as I saw the giant wooden club it was dragging on the stone floor.

Seeing such a monster walking towards someone as small as she was did worry me. I wanted to call out to her, suggest that we back off and come back prepared, but the troll beat me to it and began swinging.

For something so big and heavy, it was surprisingly fast. Its club-wielding arm rose into the air before swinging at Maraine.

It missed completely, hitting the ground she had stood on instead. I lost sight of her for a few moments before I saw her slash her hands at the troll's back.

The Troll let out a lead scream of pain as it quickly turned around and swung at the air. Maraine reappeared just as soon as she had disappeared and slashed at his exposed side.

4 deep claw marks appeared at the same moment that started leaking blood. It looked like the Troll was just as surprised as I was to watch this happen.

Even injured, this monster was terrifying. Yet Maraine was cutting it up with no issue, and no weapon! Where were those claw marks coming from? I'm sure she was only using her bare hands.

The Troll looked around for her, lost at where she had gone. Another two slashes came with no warning, this time to the monster's ankle as it was forced to fall to its knees.

She really made this fight look easy as she punched his wooden club, shattering it to dozens of pieces. Wasting no time, she attacked its shoulders and elbows, completely incapacitating the monster.

I don't know what kind of fight I expected to see, but this was something else. It was comically one-sided. There wasn't even a second where the Troll was in control of the fight. The Troll was just on its knees, unable to move its arms or its legs.

I almost felt bad for it as it yelled out in pain, shaking the entire cave. It was still alive, and Maraine wasn't ending the fight yet. In fact, she was walking back to me.

Feeling a bit safer considering the Troll's situation, I walked out of the hallway and into the room as well.

"Calling that fight one-sided would be an understatement..."

"As I said, I've fought them before. Feral trolls are not typically intelligent enough to pose a threat."

"Still... that was something I won't be forgetting anytime soon."

There wasn't a single drop of blood on her. Her hands were clean too, and I didn't see anything that looked like it could so cleanly through the monster. If she wasn't mentioning it, I probably didn't need to either.

"Good. There's always something you can learn from every fight, even ones that you didn't participate in."

"You're right. Why did you leave it alive anyway?"

"It would be good pr-"

Another loud scream from the troll interrupted her as I covered my ears. In less than a second, she had disappeared from my side and cut the Troll's throat, leaving it unable to yell. As soon as she was gone, she was right back next to me.

"As I was saying, it would be good practice to use your magic at a real target. You'll grow stronger if you're the one to kill it."

"Ah... You're right."

That kind of speed was insane... or was it teleporting? I don't know, but it's impressive anyway.

I walked closer to the monster, still keeping more than enough distance between us in case anything happened. Admittedly, now that I got to see Maraine fight, I was more than willing to believe that she could ensure my safety with zero issues.

Aiming for the head, I shot two Mana Bolts one after another that hit their target. If it hurt, the troll didn't show it. Its head simply bounced back slightly.

I put more Mana into each attack until I hit hard enough that the Troll fell to the ground face-first.

[You have reached level 2]
[You have reached level 3]
[You have reached level 4]
[You have reached level 5]
[You have reached level 6]

The pop-ups I got were proof that it was finally dead. All the way to level 6 in one fight? I didn't feel any different yet.

[Class: Sage. Grade F. Level: 6]
[Strength: 10]
[Agility: 10]
[Stamina: 10]
[Intelligence: 10]
[Wisdom: 10]
[Health 160/160]
[Mana 87/120]
[Mana Recovery: 10 per minute]

[Skill points available: 25]

"I just got 25 skill points from that. What should I put it in?"

"What do you mean?"

I wasn't sure where the confusion was, so I showed her my stat page.

For the first time ever, I saw Maraine with a surprised look on her face, like she couldn't believe her eyes.

"You should thank your unique class, Sage. You're the first person I've met that was capable of freely deciding how they grow."

Did everyone else get auto-assigned? My friends too? That sounded awful.

"Huh. I didn't know that."

"You don't have to spend those points just yet. They're extremely valuable. You can decide once you're out of the gate, you should have more points by then as well."