Mark lay on the floor. A heavy drowsiness threatened to overpower his mind, but he knew he couldn't succumb to it; he felt that if he fell asleep now, he might never wake up again. Ironically, the sharp flares of pain radiating from his wounds were the only thing keeping him conscious. Mark gingerly probed his side, his face contorting in pure agony. "Ayyyyy-ya-yay!" His right shoulder wasn't faring any better. Movement was impossible, and any attempt to budge it sent a jolt of excruciating pain through his entire frame. After cursing the goblin shaman and his entire lineage, he used the system's Appraisal to assess his injuries.
The results brought some relief: his leather armor had absorbed a significant portion of the damage. The wound in his side hadn't punctured any internal organs or major arteries. However, the bad news was the persistent bleeding from a damaged vein. Fortunately, there was a silver lining—either the vein wasn't large or the wound wasn't deep enough, as the blood flow remained relatively slow. His shoulder remained a grave concern; the arrow had struck the bone, and Mark's desperate decision to rip the shaft out during the heat of battle had only exacerbated the trauma. On the bright side, the fractured bone hadn't displaced, sparing him the agonizing necessity of a manual repositioning.
This was the general state of things. The primary problem was blood loss, as he had already lost a considerable amount. Fortunately, due to months of intense training, his natural strength, regeneration, and physical endurance had significantly increased. His body was no longer bound by the biological limits of his old life as an office worker; it was now leaning more toward the laws of an anime.
Mark stared at his wounds, his mind racing through the limited options he had left. First, he searched for the basic medical kit from his starter pack. He knew exactly where it was, but reaching it was no small feat. Even though his legs were uninjured, the wound in his side made every movement excruciatingly painful. Once he managed to retrieve the kit, he pulled out the remaining bandages and disinfectants.
With trembling hands, he began to bind his side and shoulder. It was an agonizing process, made even more difficult by the fact that he only had one functional hand. Even after he finished, he knew these were not shallow wounds that a simple dressing could fix. He could feel the bandages already becoming soaked with sticky blood, but at least the flow had significantly slowed down.
He could see only two paths ahead of him. The first was healing magic, but Mark didn't know a single spell, and he certainly didn't have the time to learn one now. The second was to forcefully circulate his Ki to accelerate his body's regeneration. It was a viable option, but one he dreaded. While Mana and Ki could coexist in the same body, one had to be extremely careful; a single mistake in their interaction could be catastrophic. After all, that was exactly how Thaddeus had ended up crippled.
As he contemplated a third way, a look of grim skepticism crossed his face. It was an absurd idea, but one that might just work—and it was easy to test. In anime, characters often recovered from horrific injuries simply by eating. While he knew that was an exaggeration, there was a grain of truth that fit his current situation: monster meat was known to be excellent for physical recovery. Although it was typically used for recovery after grueling training rather than acute trauma, it was all he had. Right now, his inventory was packed with both raw and cooked goblin meat.
Mark made his way to the dining area. On the table sat that same tasteless porridge. He pulled out the cooked goblin meat from his system inventory and began to eat, taking massive bites. This time, he forced himself to consume more than usual. Eating so quickly caused him to choke, and he had to wash it all down with gulps of water. Soon, his stomach was at its limit; he couldn't take another bite.
As for the results... well, next to nothing. Blood continued to seep from beneath the bandages, and the pain remained a living hell. "Would the results have been better if it were the goblin shaman's meat?" he wondered. After all, that creature had been a D-rank monster. Mark hadn't even tasted E-rank meat yet, let alone D-rank.
But the situation was critical. Though the remaining goblins had fallen into a brief state of confusion after the shaman's death, there was no telling what they would do next. Spending time to retrieve the Blind Staff had been a massive gamble in itself. The only noticeable change after eating—though it might have just been his mind playing tricks on him—was that the overwhelming drowsiness had vanished. The terrifying feeling that he would die if he fell asleep was gone.
Once he felt somewhat stable, Mark began a cold post-mortem analysis of the battle. There was a lot to unpack. First and foremost, he had completely failed to notice the spy rats. It seemed the Mind Control used on them either left no mana trace or had a specialized concealment method. He should have realized they were trailing him, but he had dismissed the small animals entirely—a mistake born of pure arrogance and negligence.
Then there was the issue of his sensory range. While his Multi-sensor state covered everything within 35 meters, anything beyond that relied on "Earth Sense." However, Earth Sense was neither precise nor absolute. Its effectiveness depended on the intensity of the vibration; while a volcanic eruption could be felt for kilometers, the footsteps of a small creature like a goblin should have been audible within 150 meters. Yet, through specialized footwork or magic, footsteps could be muffled. Mark didn't know exactly what the Shaman had done, but the goblin army had managed to close in within 50 meters in total silence.
Regarding the combat itself, Mark realized he should have struck the moment he detected them, rather than allowing himself to be surrounded. Even then, he had stood there like some cliché anime hero, giving the Shaman enough time to cast debuffs and blindness curses. Furthermore, the "Stone Bullet 2.0" he had practiced so hard for proved useless; its three-second charge time was a luxury he couldn't afford in active combat. What truly saved him was the dried "Blue Rose" powder he had kept in his inventory. By scattering it within a 1.5-meter radius, he had turned the tide.
Ironically, the biggest contributor to his victory was the Goblin Shaman's own ego. By wasting time on a "show" instead of finishing him off, the Shaman gave Mark the opening he needed. Mark had bet everything on the Shaman approaching his "helpless" body. He knew there were two ways to cast magic: Incantation and Circulation. While both he and the Shaman used the latter, Mark noticed that the Shaman required hand gestures to channel mana—much like how Mark needed to mimic a gun with his fingers to fire a Stone Bullet. Mark had already identified this as a personal weakness he needed to overcome. His gamble paid off; the neurotoxic paralysis of the Blue Rose was so potent the Shaman couldn't even twitch a finger, rendering his magic useless.