I stepped forward and poked Tirka’s nose, still wondering if I was just hallucinating.

“Boy, I don’t know what your tribe is like, but here, touching another’s nose is disrespectful.”

‘Yep, definitely real. And that voice too, maybe it’s a male.’

Retracting my hands, I asked,

“So…are you really a Goblin?”

“I’ve lived for more than 50 years, so I’m a Hobgoblin.”

‘At least one thing inside this dungeon is consistent with Goblin anatomy.’

“And you just built this town all by yoursel—”

“You asked me a question, so it’s only fair that I ask you one back, don’t you agree?” Tirka interrupted me rudely.

‘You do NOT interrupt a Swordsmaster!’

Of course, my condition didn’t let me express my irritation, nor did it let me effectively convey sarcasm.

“I’m sure that us children would have the ability to answer your questions, o smartest Hobgoblin.”

Tirka coughed as his face turned red. It seemed that he was flattered by my “compliment.”

“Ehem, then, I shall take up on your offer. Tell me, what are you? I’ve never seen any creature like you before.”

“We’re something called…Humans. You don’t know what a Human is?”

“So they’re called ‘Humans’...” Tirka muttered. Then, he answered my question with a shake of his head. “No, the closest things to ‘humans’ I’ve seen are the Coldsapes that we skinned for fur. Are you sure you aren’t some kind of…mutated Coldsape?”

“Do we look like that to you?”

“You certainly do. Though, you’re much smarter and smaller than those wild beasts. Well, now it’s my turn to ask. Where do you come from?”

As I was about to fake my answer, the huge Goblin from before placed its thick hand on Tirka’s shoulder, making him jolt up in surprise.

“Tirka, my advisor, it’s rude to ask them so many questions. That hairless Coldsape managed to dodge my attack after all.” The huge Goblin, whose name I guessed was Noxt, looked at me with a dangerous glint in his eyes.

‘Another male…’

Then, Jaxt interjected with a slap on Noxt’s shoulder.

“Noxt, only because he dodged your unwarranted, surprise attack? Aren’t you forgetting something?”

“R-Right,” Noxt scratched his skull-helmet. “Thanks for saving my kids.”

“...So those guys were your kids.”

“Haha, that’s right! Aren’t they handsome, just like their father?”

‘Hideous. Ugly. Puke-inducing. Horrendous.’

“Haha, yeah, they definitely look good for their age.”

As soon as I finished that sentence, kid Ihwa looked at me weirdly, as if to ask me, “did you really just say that?”

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

During all that, I could hear Fenris’ faint snicker under the table.

‘Damn these brats, can’t you see that I can’t offend a 3-star Berserker?’

I could probably take out Tirka the Shaman with a surprise attack, but the problem was the Berserker. I was sure that he was going to give me a painful death if he knew that I killed the Shaman.

“Glad you can understand beauty,” Noxt nodded with a satisfied smile. “It’s such a shame that you Humans are hideous, ugly, puke-inducing, and horrendous. So, sorry, I can’t wed my sons or daughter to you.”

‘Who the fuck would even want…!’

Suddenly, a small green head poked out from the doorway.

“Dada…is it our turn?”

Noxt’s face noticeably softened at the voice and he nodded. “Of course. Come on in.”

Following the first Goblin, 2 more Goblins entered the room and sat on the chairs.

Then, Tirka cleared his throat and said,

“Well then, ‘Humans,’ I’d like you to give your opinion on this matter.” Without waiting for us to answer, he prompted the Goblin kids to speak. “Tell me, Igla, Asret, and Iso, what happened before you met these ‘Humans?’”

A Goblin child immediately answered, “we were going to the Volcanic cave to dump our trash in the Lizard hole like always, but we found that everyone stationed there died.”

As if this was the first time he’d heard about this, Noxt roared in anger, “WHO! WHO DID IT?!”

“Calm down,” Tirka said. “That’s what we’re about to find out.”

‘Shit…’

Kid Ihwa and I exchanged nervous glances. The Volcanic cave was most likely the cave we emerged from, and the Lizard hole was probably the pit of lava we saw.

And…we were definitely the culprits.

Of course, acting nervous right now was to suicide, so I squeezed kid Ihwa’s hand to calm her down—which worked wonderfully. Though, she was now flustered with reddened cheeks instead of being nervous.

As for me, it was easy to keep my facial expression in check for obvious reasons.

Unaware that the perpetrators were in the room, the Goblin kid continued,

“We checked the corpses. Every of their wounds was caused by something sharp.”

“Strange…” Tirka tapped his chin as he fell into thoughts. “...There’s no creature with sharp claws in this region, and there’s no species intelligent enough to use weapons apart from us. So, unless we have a traitor in our midst, the culprit must be…”

Tirka pointed at our swords and exclaimed, “YOU!”

Immediately, a tense pressure exuded from Tirka, making the atmosphere hard to breathe for us. Although the pressure definitely contained malintent, I knew that it was just a scare tactic. After all, the Berserker wasn’t moving from his spot and instead, stood there calmly.

However, kid Ihwa was shaking violently. Clearly, she wasn’t used to experiencing pressures of people stronger than her. As such, I stood in front of her to block the pressure and said with a calm voice,

“It wasn’t us.”

“Y-Yeah! It can’t be them!” The Goblin kids shouted. “They saved us from the Coldsape! They even gave us delicious food!”

But Tirka still didn’t retract his pressure.

“Then, how do you explain the wounds? Are you saying that there’s a traitor in our midst?”

“T-That…”

“Besides, they’re at least strong enough to react to Noxt’s attack. If it isn’t them, who else w—”

Suddenly, the door was swung open.

“CHIEF NOXT!”

A Goblin covered head-to-toe in armor rushed in while gasping for breath.

Noxt turned his attention away from us and patted the armored Goblin’s shoulder.

“Calm down now, soldier. Take deep breaths.”

Seeing that the soldier had calmed down, Noxt continued,

“Now, what brings you here?”

“C-Chief, we just received a report from our scouts! In the forest outside the Volcanic cave, 30 more of our soldiers were killed! Their corpses were drained of blood!”

‘...Fuck. I knew I should’ve at least tried to hide the corpses.’

It was in these moments that I appreciated not being able to display any emotion on my face.

Immediately, Noxt’s face paled.

“Y-You don’t mean…!”

“I-I’m afraid that what you fears is correct.”

Tirka butted in the conversation by tapping his staff on the ground.

“How can you be so sure that it’s the work of him? For all we know, these ‘Humans’ can drink blood for food.”

“T-That’s because…” The soldier gulped. “Our scouts saw him personally. White fur, big body, a-and…blades protruding from his arms, e-eating the corpses of our kin with a satisfied grin on his face…”

Hearing this, even Tirka’s face paled as he dropped his staff and knelt down on both of his legs. Looking up to the ceiling, he clasped his hand in prayer.

“G-God saves us all… The Coldsape Highblade is here!”