Goblins- Damon POV

I felt trapped, chains wrapped tightly around my whole body, with only the darkness for company. The darkness wasn’t great company to say the least… Instead I felt frightened as I foresaw a future with nothing, just darkness… I needed to break out!

And so I began my struggle as I forced my arm… My arm? My body? None of it, I couldn’t feel anything. All I could sense were two shutters in front of me that blocked out all life. I ran over before I began to force them up, but to no effect. It felt like the shutters were chained to boulders as I tried once more, and again which finally proved itself as I could feel my surroundings changing. Now I could instinctively feel that the shutters were further away, and I would be a fool if this brought any joy to me.

It was almost like every time I tried to force up the shutters, the further they would be away and the more drained I would feel of energy. And then it came, it came for me that was. It had no form whatsoever but I could feel it behind me, chasing me as I tried my utmost to sprint away. From it I could feel the cold embrace of sleep, the deathly cold embrace…

It must have been that desperation that gave birth to amount-less energy inside of me as I frantically heaved while lifting the shutters. And I could feel it slowly moving upwards as a rays of light penetrated the darkness, giving light to the despair that I had been in all this time. My eyes naturally followed the rays as I glanced back to see nothing, I had been in a dark space that had hidden nothing.

At least it wasn’t dark anymore, but then I tilted my head a bit more to notice the looming thing getting closer. The rays of light had pierced through all the darkness that had filled this space until it had reached the thing, which would simply eradicate the light from existence. I guess that was my wake-up call as my head instantly returned facing forwards, as I re-continued my efforts on the shutters despite the pain that threatened to tear my arms apart. And they opened…

Only I was met with more darkness, well not exactly, but wherever I lay was still dark. I could instantly feel myself waking up as the whole world began to get clearer: my vision all of a sudden clearing up as I could differentiate the shades of darkness; my sense of smell sharper as the musty odour of rotten flesh assaulted my nose; my sense of touch more sensitive as the cold from the stone penetrating my flesh, although I couldn’t complain as it numbed the excruciating pangs of pain from my stomach…

The cold may have numbed the pain but it wasn’t enough as the pangs only grew, overcoming the cold as it lay siege to my brain which crumbled before it. All of a sudden I was no longer sensing the world but rather wincing at the pain of hunger. Perhaps my body would have squirmed was it not for the fact that I couldn’t move them… I could feel them, they were there and yet I had no energy to move my effectively dead limbs and so I lay there, tears parting my face as they rolled down onto the freezing stone beneath.

And then I heard. A sound so crisp that it broke through the besieging pain and offered aid to my brain. It echoed through the cave, not once but several times as I heard it again and again. What was it? It was a short thump-like sound quickly followed by several echoes. But then the thought hit me, what if those weren’t echoes? Rather just a sound being repeated, a sound that was getting louder, a sound almost like … footsteps.

I could hear the footsteps getting closer, the besieging pain of hunger so overshadowed right now as all my focus went into the footsteps. That was a bad idea… What followed was my mind imagining what it was. No idea, but maybe my memory knew. And so my mind interrogated my drowsy memory, as it set to work to find out who or what the thing getting closer was.

…

Had I killed Raraak?

The scene suddenly broke into my mind as it replayed the moment the knife entered his chest, followed by a beautiful dive into his arms, before the grand finale of the freefall into his head.

…

Why did I kill Raraak?

…

I forced my mind to move on as I knew deep down in my heart that I would get no answer, well no answer other than ones I didn’t want to hear.

Next I saw myself in a cave which looked very similar to here. And I had felt the pangs of hunger assault me then, just like they had a few seconds ago. The thought alone seemed to revive the pain as it came back, though not as strong as before. At the time I had been exhausted from battle and thus was heavily affected by the pain, I had frantically searched the area for food only to find some lying next to me. I had bitten into it: chewy, tough and yet addictive as the desire for another bite grew within me. It was like a meal in one as it was succulent, filled with juice that sated my thirst alongside my hunger.

After I had eaten that, I felt satisfied, I felt at one with the world as my body had slumped onto the cold stone. And I had slept till now I guess…

So who was this walking now? I had been with Withil, maybe it was him? The footsteps were loud enough by this point that I could even hear the person or thing scrape its feet over the stone.

“Argh. The density is still quite high in here, although nothing I can’t handle”

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It was a Goblin, I could tell from the accent. But not one I knew, certainly not Withil. He seemed to be talking to himself as I doubted he could see my body slumped by the side of the cave in this darkness.

“Ha-ha, there you are little one. I was shocked when I’d heard about the little one that had been evolving for several days, only to “die” the next time they came to check. Those idiots don’t know anything!”

I guess he could see me after all, despite how dark it was. But more importantly, I’d evolved?! I didn’t feel like it, but then again I had no energy so that could be a reason why.

“Oh fucking hell, look at you boy. You barely survived that, I bet you can’t even tilt your head now nevertheless move.”

Following that I had no time to think as the Goblin opened my mouth before dropping something in. He then lifted my jaw to make sure I chewed before swallowing. I’m sure this went on for at least a few minutes before he poured water into my mouth. The Goblin then left me in the cave as he walked away. It would be a few more minutes until I could actually move my body as energy rushed to my limbs, I felt both great and terrible at the same time as I realised the food hadn’t even been close to filling me up.

A while later the Goblin came back with a little bloody rabbit, which I was more than happy to vigorously feast on as blood and flesh splattered over my whole body.

The Goblin kept talking throughout, “I’ve seen a few evolutions gone bad when I was a kid but none as bad as this. You’re really lucky to live, nevertheless succeed with that evolution. Look at yourself, you’ve not got a layer of fat on you.”

It was at this moment I actually felt my new body, only to find that I couldn’t even squeeze my skin. This was disastrous for any animal living in the Great Forest and I could instantly feel my stress increase.

“Looks like whatever you ate before had barely enough mana to complete your evolution which is why you only barely lived through it. A definite sub-par evolution to say it nicely, although I guess that doesn’t matter much considering the fact that you have just jumped from tier 1 to tier 3”

I had felt my spirits dampen as he had talked off me being sub-par, although they had instantly rekindled hearing I was tier 3! Tier fucking 3, it was something I had never even imagined being, needless to say actually accomplishing it!”

Over the next hour the aged Goblin would ramble on some more as I restored my energy. I used it as a chance to discover my new body, focusing first on the most obvious change: how skinny I was. I was still well-built but the muscles felt as if they would rip out of my skin if I flexed due to how tight they were. I needed to fatten up! My face had on the whole stayed the same, other than the lack of hair over my head. Instead they were replaced with markings engraved on my skin, giving a weird feeling as I slid my hand over them.

After a bit, I finally regained enough energy as I began walking outside alongside the other Goblin. It was as we exited I clearly saw him in the light, the Goblin was aged as his hair was clearly losing colour. Other than that he was extremely well-built and reached 1.8m. I also noticed how he was green but not the normal shade, instead he was a blueish green mix that gave him a peculiar look. And then the thought struck my mind; there was only one Goblin shaded blue that I had ever heard off…

“Finally I can introduce myself, Damon. I’m Gregal, the first and only tier-3 Goblin in the whole Great forest until now.”

Gregal, the strongest Goblin in the village who for some reason didn’t live in the village… He was like an elusive legend as there were more tales about him than sightings of him, but one thing was for sure, and that was that he was the strongest by a LARGE margin!

“Now being the only other tier-3 Goblin, I feel it is only right to teach you. After all it would be great pity if our Arts were simply forgotten due to the tides of War…”

I felt a greater story behind this but I dared not speak as I felt the amiable Goblin all of a sudden turn cold and fierce as he spoke. He turned around to look at me, his eyes almost as if they had pierced through my soul as a mountain of pressure stacked upon me.

“I’m sure you’re happy with becoming a tier 3. Well you’re just crap compared to a true tier 3 Goblin, nevertheless the other tier 3 monsters. But that’s something that can be changed, but you will have to sacrifice both time and sanity to gain it. Although it’s not like you have a choice…

Now can you feel the new flavour in the air, making it thicker and denser than before? That is mana, the source of all magic in our World. Now follow this breathing technique and take the mana from the air”

A deep breath, followed by 3 short rapid ones and a final deep breath where your whole mind forced its focus onto the mana.

I repeated the breathing pattern 3 times before I felt the energy draining from my body. It was after doing it for about 5 minutes I felt a change in my energy, instead of decreasing it was slowly increasing. It took around 10 minutes until I felt full of energy, my body no longer daring to take in anymore mana.

I turned around to Gregal who nodded before taking doing a single breathing pattern. After which he carried on his talk, “Now force the mana into your arm and into your fingers. I heard you use knives so manipulate the mana from your arms into these knives”, after which he handed me a blunt, rusted knife while keeping another for himself.

It would be a further 30 minutes before I managed to trickle the mana into the knife, which was followed my Gregal doing within the time taken to breath. The knives seemed to glow brighter after infusing them with mana, especially Gregal’s which shone bright compared to mine.

“Now throw the knife into that tree.”

This I could do well as I straightened my weary-body, followed by throwing my arm backwards before it slung back, causing the knife to slide out of my fingers as it pierced through the air.

*thump*

The rusty knife penetrated the thick trunk of the tree as it slid into it, disappearing from sight as it embedded itself in there. And this was a dull knife… I felt myself going euphoric as I imagined the potential of mana: I could instantly kill any monster with a single, accurate knife throw.

Gregal stood in a sloppy stance before he threw his knife towards the same tree, stabbing the trunk like mine had done before slipping into it. And yet instead of lying there, the mana in his knife burnt red hot as the knife exploded, causing daunting, clear blue fire to break out that incinerated the trunk within a single second. Within the next second the 40m tree keep tumbled down as it smashed into the ground, creating a booming thud. However that didn’t even enter my mind as I watched the blue flames burn on, devouring the remaining trunk to the ground like a ghastly beast.

His voice thundered out louder than the thud, “That is the Flaming bomb, the fearsome Art we Goblins were slaughtered for!”…