I watched as the first of many poison needles soared through the air and towards the goblin closest to me. For a while, I actually thought I was gonna hit it, but in the end, the needle just barely missed its target.

It whizzed past the goblin's pointy ear and softly impacted the ground some few feet ahead of him. Technically perfectly visible. I patiently observed the goblin's reaction, but there was no immediate sign that it had noticed something unusual. After a few minutes, I fired the second needle, reassured that my spell wouldn’t immediately alert my enemies when I missed.

Contrary to my expectations, the second needle hit its target, impacting somewhere around the heel of its left foot. Curious as to how much of an effect my heavily upgraded poison would have on a creature of the second layer, I once again opted to just observe my prey. The goblin seemed to have noticed that something had stung it, so it curiously looked around its feet for any insects that may have been the culprit.

Since it couldn’t see anything, it just went straight back to participating in whatever festivities were going on. Maybe it assumed that it stepped on a pointy branch or something? Whatever the case, it didn’t take long for my powerful poison to do its work, and I could see the goblin visibly turn sluggish.

Before long, the goblin keeled over and I got the notification for killing it.

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You have killed a T2 Lv. 3 Goblin

You have been awarded 200 XP

You have been awarded 26 Data Points

You have leveled up!

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Killing the goblin barely pushed me over the XP threshold for my next level up! One thing I noticed, was just how much more XP a tier two creature gave. Initially disappointed by the relatively low XP reward from the snake, I was now entirely on board. Apparently, it was just the level one monsters that gave low rewards, but then it skyrocketed with each level. I left my newly gained Skill and Attribute points alone, for now, opting for surveilling the situation in the goblin camp instead. It took the others a while, but eventually, they noticed that one of their own had kicked the bucket.

The little celebration they had going came to a halt as they fanned out around their camp, searching for any enemies that may be responsible, only to come up empty. Some of them got pretty close to me, but my stealth passive kept me from being discovered. Eventually, they gave up their search and returned to the camp. They couldn’t find any monsters close by, so they probably just assumed they were safe.

Their primitive ways on full display, they dragged their dead companion over to the fire and started roasting him along with whatever they had grilling over their fire. I assumed my poison wouldn’t survive being in such hot temperatures, even if it was of a pretty high level. These dumb goblins, if they really had to cannibalize their own, they could at least just eat them raw. That way I’d have to spend less time fumbling about with inaccurate spells. Putting aside my annoyance, I started to wonder just why these goblins were willing to eat their own.

Of course, that might just be how goblins do, but maybe there was another reason. I hadn’t seen many of the second layer’s inhabitants, so it was entirely possible that goblins were at the bottom of the food chain, and they needed every morsel of food they could get their grubby little hands on.

Then again, why make a big fire, that was visible over large distances when you lived in constant fear of stronger monsters? They’d just be inviting their own death this way. So were they actually just so confident in their abilities that they could afford to be cocky? Be that as it may, I had a stealthy way of killing them off one by one, so it didn’t really matter, I suppose. Getting surrounded by them would be bad news for me, no matter if they were strong or weak.

While I thought about the intricacies of the second layer and its inhabitants, I continued firing off my poison needles. Yet, I couldn’t hit a single goblin with the eight shots I had left. With a mental sigh, I resigned myself to my fate of having to wait for my mana to fill back up. Of course, thanks to my mutations, I wouldn’t have to wait that long, but it still meant that I would just be sitting here for a long time, especially if I wanted to take all of them out.

One thing I noticed during my time of silent assassination attempts, was that my giant hunter passive didn’t seem to activate. The goblins I was trying to kill were all of the second tier, and since I was still tier one, it should technically be active. I wonder if the spells I was flinging didn’t count as fighting, then? It was a shame too since I could really use the extra MP regeneration I’d get from the increased attributes.

Shot after shot went flying, and quite a bit of time passed, yet all I had to show for it were two more dead goblins and another level up. Hunting monsters of a higher tier than myself was really paying off here, judging by how fast I was leveling up.

Each time one of them died, the goblins would spread out and look for me, yet would return to their normal activities after a while. I could tell they were getting a bit nervous, though. So far, no goblin survived after being hit with a poison needle, which at least meant as long as I got a hit in, I’d get the kill.

Eventually, it appeared to be bedtime for the little goblin community. Most of them retreated into their makeshift homes, leaving only a few to guard their camp. This was where my assassination skills could truly shine… maybe.

I took some time to properly regenerate my MP and observe the goblins that remained awake. Just four of them were guarding the different corners of the camp, and they didn’t seem to communicate with each other. They’d probably just scream loudly when something attacked, alerting the others. After waiting for my MP to fill up completely, I put my new plan into motion.

The guards just sat there, yawning every now and again, bored out of their minds, and they didn’t seem to go on patrols either. Which meant, that if I could silently take out the one closest to me, I’d be able to sneak into the camp unnoticed.

First, I had to move closer to my target to increase my chances of hitting it with a poison needle, which caused me to lose the bonus from my turret skill. Thankfully, my stealth passive was still active. This, combined with the fact that slugs didn’t really make a lot of sounds when moving, made it pretty easy to approach.

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Eventually, I was just above my chosen victim, which was sitting against a tree trunk. I briefly debated just shooting it with a regular poison needle but decided against it. Turret only needed ten minutes of standing still to activate, and I was nothing if not a patient hunter. I wasn't entirely sure how Turret affected my poison since the description of the skill was so vague, but I’m sure it had some effect. Whatever the case, the faster this goblin died, the better.

After the now-familiar sensation of my turret passive activating, I started shooting at my target. As was tradition, I missed my first three shots but eventually managed to land a proper headshot with my fourth.

The goblin just slapped his head, as if squashing a mosquito that bit him, scratching the spot a few times, and then returned to keeping vigilance. I briefly thought of the possible horrors of giant monster mosquitos but quickly discarded that train of thought. Nothing but nightmares that way lay.

Just like the three goblins before him, my most recent victim's condition took a turn for the worse. Labored breathing, sweating, and apparent dizziness made themselves noticeable. I could almost see the gears turning in its tiny brain, and after some time it seemed to have figured out what was happening to it.

With horror in its eyes, the goblin stood up, intent on alerting the rest of the camp, but it was already too late. As soon as it got up from its seated position, it fell over with a dull thud. Just like in a movie scene, I could see it reaching one of its arms towards the camp with desperation, before going limp. The system confirmed the goblin as deceased, much to my enjoyment.

Although, this little stunt made me feel just ever so slightly like the bad guy…

Anyway, moving on! After confirming that the other sentinels hadn’t noticed one of their own expiring, I started making my way down the tree. Silently, death approached the rest of the goblins.

From up on my earlier perch, I had already spotted the best place for me to hide in the middle of the camp. The goblins had made a neat pile of bones, extracted from their own catch and the fellow goblins that they ate. And now it would serve me well to disguise my small form. I was incredibly nervous on my way over there, for if any one of them noticed me and alerted the others, I’d be in heaps of trouble.

Thankfully, my stealth passive once again proved its worth and I made it to my destination without issue. Now, I faced another challenge, though. I had to crawl into the pile of bones without them making too much noise. I slowly, ever so slowly used my various tentacles to move the bones a little bit. Basically, I was playing high-stakes Jenga.

Every time I felt a clank from two bones hitting each other, I immediately stopped and observed my surroundings. This entire operation was stupid and I, once again, cursed myself out for even thinking of this. Eventually, though, I managed to hide myself well enough.

Not wasting any time, I started charging up my secret weapon. Poison Mist! These fools were all asleep, and by the time the guards noticed that the attack was coming from inside the camp, instead of from outside, it would be all but too late.

The only other time that I used poison mist, I only used forty MP to charge the spell. This made a decent amount of poison mist, but I needed to think big here. Judging by how this went last time, I tripled my mana usage to one hundred and twenty. Charging the spell took quite some time, even with my mutated brain, but that was okay. I was waiting for turret to activate anyway.

In the end, I finished charging my spell long before turret activated, so I just sat there, holding my spell until it finally did.

I released my spell, watching with awe as a ridiculous amount of mist emanated from me, quickly engulfing the entire camp and beyond. The goblins on guard quickly noticed, and just as I anticipated, started screaming bloody murder, waking up the entire camp. Movement exploded around me as confused goblins emerged from their tents, nonetheless ready to fight whatever was attacking.

But all they found was a greenish mist all around them.

They seemed to at least realize that this was a bad thing, and heavily argued with each other. Thankfully too busy to spare any thought on looking for me. Unbeknownst to them, each breath they took while wasting their time arguing was bringing them closer to death, as they inhaled more of my sweet poison.

The wake-up call arrived with the first goblin that dropped dead, a measly level one, as the system informed me. It made sense that he’d be the first to fall since he was the weakest. He was quickly followed by six more just like him, their weak stats unable to resist my poison for long.

Now, instead of arguing, the goblins engaged in full-on panic mode. They must’ve realized that the weird mist was to blame, so they all scattered, trying to get away as fast as possible. Yet, most of them were already flagging at this point. Quite a few dropped dead after only a few steps, the level two’s as the system told me.

The rest of the goblins quickly left my field of view, the nearby trees obscuring them. I wasn’t sure how far my poison mist went, but since the goblins had already inhaled copious amounts of it, they were dead men walking either way. All I had to do was wait and watch the kill notifications pour in. And pour in they did.

Again, it would appear that covering an area with poison mist did not count as me engaging in battle. Otherwise, the system would only announce my kills after everything was over. Maybe the system only recognized something as a battle if all parties were aware of each other?

Be that as it may, after a while, the notifications stopped. The last confirmed kill was a level seven goblin. I quickly tallied up my kills, which added up to twenty, all in all. Which meant there were three goblins out there that somehow survived. They must have either had enough HP to outlast the poison or had some type of resistance to it. I seriously doubted that they’d come back anytime soon, since they were probably scared, so I started collecting the corpses around me into my inventory for later consumption.

I kept one eye out for any returnees, and my other one focused on the menu in front of me. Exterminating this group of goblins gave me a whopping seven levels! I knew that killing monsters of a higher tier was a lucrative business, but this was ridiculous! I only had four more levels to go until I reached the evolution goal of level twenty.

Since I wasn’t planning on evolving until I completed both bonus goals anyway, one of which would only be revealed once I arrived at the third layer, I was in a prime position to find out if there would be another hidden quest. All I had to do was gain massive amounts of XP once I reached my level cap.

I felt like I was having enough MP for the moment, so I invested all eight of my attribute points into intelligence. More potent poison was always good, and I could already see the limit of my poison since it failed to kill some of the stronger goblins. I quickly scanned over my skill tree, thinking about how to optimally spend my skill points. Originally I wanted to beeline it to the poison and venom immunity passive but now that might not be the best option.

I would gain four more skill points before reaching the level cap, so after some quick maths, I decided to buy the immunity last. Instead, I used seven points to purchase the upgrade to the poison needle spell, as well as a seven intelligence bonus from the left path. The upgraded poison needle would concentrate the poison until it was similar in effect to the next poison tier.

The upgraded spell used up almost twice as much MP to cast, but I was more than willing to pay that cost in exchange for access to tier four poison.

This, combined with my fifteen-point increase in intelligence, was sure to make short work of anything on the second layer! For now, I needed to find a safe place to eat. My inventory had quite a few corpses in it by now, and my Gluttony passive was demanding food.