It’s like a scene straight from a movie, but instead of time slowing, the world coming to a halt in that split second of life and death, the blow meets its target without interruptions. Goblin B is smashed into the ground, drenching the grass in dark gloopy liquid.

No time to cry out in pain or surprise. One blink and voila, a clean kill that executioners would envy. The air is thick with a foul smell I’m growing familiar. It drills into my nostrils, and I inhale carefully. A mouthful of that and my queasy stomach might decide to riot.

The Orc angles the club over his shoulder, staring down at his handywork. The area is steeped in faint sunlight, and it lights up the crimson spray decorating his front. I shift my attention from the Orc, a vicious creature more muscle than bone, to the dismal and lifeless body splayed out on a grass.

If that large section of Goblin B’s skull was not completely folded in, it’ll be easy to mistake the creature for simply curling up for a nap. The sound of bone shattering continues to loop in my head. It’s funny. The sound reminds me of the time I watched an egg roll off the kitchen counter and crack open on impact.

Shifting my focus on inane observations like that is an excellent way to delay the repulsion I can feel gathering at the base of my stomach.

I reel myself back to the present and sweep my gaze over the three individuals, two human, one not, who have lost their lives in this short span of time I’ve been revived.

I look at the Orc and feel my entire body recoil. Can that thing even be called a face anymore?

It’s a fearsome burn wound. Not surprising, considering he literally ate the flames head on. I’m not sure to what extent magic can help with injuries in this world, but looking at the Orc’s destroyed face, he needs all the help he can get.

I stare at his blistering expanse of flesh, noting certain portions starting to gel over with a substance I suspect to be pus. A description to match the state of his face might be how plastic looks when it’s melted. It’s a miracle the Orc’s eyes didn’t also turn out like that considering the rest of his face. I guess even fantasy creatures aren’t exempt from small miracles.

“Not burning but still hurts bad,” he bemoans.

I snort. What’s he groaning about? At least he’s alive. Unlike the poor goblin who got substituted for a fire extinguisher, survived it, and still ended up dead. None of what happened was remotely his fault, all due to the Orc’s airheaded bluster.

Goblin A hasn’t moved an inch. I might be overthinking it, but though the empty obedience it displays isn’t different from before, it feels like it’s quietly mourning the untimely death of its partner.

I glance at the Orc again. This time, an irrational rage fills me to the brim. I work my fingers to dissipate the feeling, and the repetitive soothing motions calm me. Huh. Where did that come from?

The peace is short lived. “Bah, at least now one less trouble to watch,” the Orc complains. “Stupid goblin.” He glares at us. “Borg always alone or with brothers. One day, I be like that. When day comes, human will be more scared and drop treasure when running. Baha!”

The Orc tries to clean the pieces of meat fused to his club by shaking it with as much energy he can muster. It succeeds, but doesn’t shake off the extra stubborn chunks. I think I hear him grind his teeth before he reaches out, using his fingers to pluck them individually.

He’s almost done with his task when his gaze catches on something a little ways from where he stands. I secretly follow his line of sight.

Oh. It’s the box. The reprehensible object responsible for his current woe. Talk about the universe rubbing it in his face.

I expect him to stomp over and flatten it with his club. From what’s happened so far, it’s clear his first resort to everything is violence. Unadulterated animal impulses. I don’t know if this is a trait of his species or just him in particular, but I hope this Orc is the exception. If he isn’t, I think the chances of my survival here are going to be pretty slim.

To my surprise, he refocuses his attention on the prone form of Goblin B. Without hesitation, he raises his club and swings it down.

“Useless. Stupid. Goblin!” He punctuates each blow with words from his limited vocabulary. “Your fault for finding fake treasure!” His attacks are vigorous and fearsome. Poor Goblin B, having to deal with this crap even when dead.

The Orc’s curses merge into one loud noise. Ugh, now my head is pounding. The upside is that I no longer hear the nauseating squelches of a body getting reduced to into fleshy pulp.

I hurriedly back away when the stench trailing out of the corpse becomes too powerful to endure.

Bleh, my sense of smell is going to be more trouble than it’s worth. It’s keen enough to pick up scents several feet away, and if this place is going to be a backwards, non-technological age it’s turning out to be, then I’m going to be smelling sweat, body odour and faeces without trying.

I grimace. Alright, maybe that’s going too far. I have yet to see human civilization. I might even get a nice surprise. Yay, that’s one point for optimism!

The Orc continues with his petty abuse of a corpse. Well. I might as well try to communicate with my fellow goblin if he’s going to be that absorbed. Species solidarity and whatnot.

As I stride past the abandoned fire-spitting box, sticking side up in a perfect picture of innocence, I bend down and swipe it up. Call it morbid curiosity but I want to see if it holds other secrets. I idly run my fingers over its rigid edges, mapping out its waxy surface in the time it takes to reach Goblin A.

His impassive face greets me. “So, how’s your day going?” I ask with an idiotic grin. Grin, because my teeth feel a little too big to form the smile I was going for. As expected, the Goblin A doesn’t even blink when directly addressed.

“I can’t tell if you’re faking. If you are, you’re at least better at anger management than your trigger happy leader over there. Tell him to go see a psych or something. That kind of impulsive anger hints at deep seated issues. I can relate, and wow, listen to me ramble.”

It doesn’t speak once throughout my unprompted babbling. I sigh. This is like being vulnerable to a wall and expecting cracks to form in the plaster from the weight of your soul.

I continue to stare at Goblin A, and the longer I do, the more questions begin to form. Like, why is my attitude towards goblins so much lighter compared to the Orc? Are my feelings of empathy because we’re the little guys? Or is my being in a goblin body unconsciously making me bias towards them?

I crimp my fingers on the side of the box. Great, as if I need more reasons to doubt myself. “I feel like I’m going insane. But you probably have no idea, do you?” Goblin A continues to stare listlessly at the Orc, freezing me out like Ying Ze does whenever she sees me. “Wow, the similarity is uncanny,” I chuckle. “Whatever. Thanks for the talk.”

I rock on my heels, feeling silly for attempting to hold a conversation. At least with Badass Wizard, there was a chance of getting some answers. I could try talking to the Orc, but the chances of him not reacting negatively is non-existent. It seems the only option is to play the part of a submissive goblin for now.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Or, I could ditch these two and try my luck elsewhere. I pull a face. But I can’t, because it’s a legitimate worry I might run into beasts like the Snagtooth out here. If I do, there won’t be a wizard to take the hit for me the next time.

I rub my face, ignoring the way my teeth scrapes over my open palm. Barely a day into my new life and things aren’t looking too hot. Everything that’s happened feels like something out of a shonen manga, but instead of being the protagonist, I’m the fodder they kill to show how cool they are.

Then there’s the matter of watching Badass Wizard get mauled to death, and Goblin B’s demise at the hands of the Orc. My eyes slide shut as the memories send a wave of nausea crashing into me.

I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel. I’m angry for letting it happen, but at the same time… what could I have done? If I could turn back time, I would save them, but I can’t. No matter how terrible I’m feeling, snuffing out this gnawing guilt is the correct answer. Nothing will change if I dwell.

I glance at my hands. Green stained with brown dark red, the blood long dried and starting to flake. The assurances I’m selling to myself makes sense, but it won’t stop my mind from trying to torture me with what if’s.

More importantly, is there a point in trying to survive here? Auntie Bao, Athea, Jin Ma… my reasons for staying alive don’t even exist. I should roll over and let nature take it’s course. Let fate dictate whatever will come next. Maybe dying will allow me to go back from where I came from in the first place.

I grab some flesh on my arm and give it a small twist. “Mei, quit it with the loser talk,” I reprimand myself. “It’s too early draw conclusions. What you need is sleep. After that, you’ll be back to normal and whining about everything, like usual.”

The mention of sleep makes my eyelids grow heavy. It sounds heavenly, and I’m tempted to lay down on the grass and start snoozing. Has sleep ever not solved problems? Hell no.

And who knows, all of this is simply a complex nightmare my mind came up with. Sherlock killing me the result of a slasher flick I watched right before dozing off. I’ll open my eyes and find myself stuck in a fiddly plastic chair at the hospital, and go on to piss off the nurses by eating food meant for the patient.

“Haah,” I drag out a heavy sigh. “I guess acknowledging that I’m stuck here isn’t enough to make me accept things so quickly.” If we could accept whatever the universe threw at us, we’d probably be a much happier species.

But enough of all this moping. Since I’m so free, I’d check out my surroundings.

As I sweep my gaze over the greenery, it hits me how exquisite and spectacular everything is. Life in the city means the nature I see on the regular is well maintained parks and gardens. Places meticulous crafted and cared for by human hands.

The sprawling green vision before me, on the other hand, is raw and savage. There’s an undercurrent thrum of life my eyes can’t pick out, but my body can.

This idyllic, empty field I stand in is but a footnote in the landscape. The farther I look, I notice that the flat terrain eventually ends, replaced by forests. The border is hedged by hulking trees, majestic in their leafy splendour, but intimidating in their size. Even the crumbling ruins in the distance are eye catching, beckoning me to go exploring.

I shake those thoughts away and look down at the ankle height grass. I’m squishing some of it under my bare feet and it feels nothing more than a distant tingle in my soles. Lush and green and soft. If I wanted to, it would be easy to pretend it’s luxurious carpet to take a nap on.

In a bid avoid doing exactly that, I turn my attention to the mysterious box I nabbed. When I first found it on Badass Wizard and held it, I had felt a strange kinship toward it. After the Orc got his face exploded by a fireball, it’s likely my goblin senses were actually tricked into believing the box had treasure.

Badass Wizard must have planned to use it for a last ditch attack,considering it spat out a fiery ball of flames.

I wag a finger at the box. “Not so smug now that you’ve been emptied, eh?”

The previously sealed opening now has a gap no bigger than a flat edge of a ruler. I shove my nail into the space. They’re horridly thick, the gunk under them visible now that I’m looking. Yikes. I’ll need to trim them later.

As I lift the lid of the box, it hits me. No, not another fireball, but the thought there might be another one.

I turn the opening away from my face, the skin of my arms covered in goosepimples. I shudder, recalling the Orc’s melted puddle of a face. I’m not taking any chances.

The lid opens. No surprise fireball. I guess it’s back to being a regular box.

“Now let’s see what is inside box number one,” I say, turning it back to face me before peering inside. “And there’s– huh?”

There’s something inside. I pinch it between my fingers, pulling it out. As soon as it’s out of the box, the compact cut of cloth doubles in weight. I hold it up to my face. The box was lighter than feather, and yet, it actually had something inside? More magic shenanigans.

I slowly unfold the square cloth. I grab a corner and let it unfurl until its complete form dangles in front of me. “Gloves?” I hear my own voice, slack jawed with surprise. “No, there’s only one.”

As I hold the glove, it fills me with a strange feeling once more. Although it’s comfortable, a faint and effusive warmth wriggling into me and settling there, letting my emotions be dictated by something so abstract unsettles me. I grit my teeth. This glove must be hiding some sort of secret.

I run my fingers over the material. The pads of my fingers glide over it, smooth and leathery. It’s brown… yeah, as if I can tell what it is by the colour. Anyway, I can’t be sure if it’s leather, or something else. There is no visible stitching in the glove, but again, I don’t glean anything from it. There’s a hundred ways to make something, I can’t deign it as special since I don’t even know what special is supposed to be.

If I saw this glove in my past life, I wouldn’t look twice. There’s nothing particularly eye-catching about it. If it wasn’t hidden in a booby trapped box like something precious, I wouldn’t believe it hides anything unusual.

“I should wear it,” I say feebly. “It’s just a glove. Even if there’s a spell cast on it, it shouldn’t be anything too bad,” A wayward beam of sunlight angles down and strikes the surface. In the light, I almost think the glove is winking. “That’s got to be a sign, right?”

Without letting myself second guess my decision, I quickly slip the glove onto my left hand.

It’s warm. Quite comfortable, actually. I stare at my gloved hand and wriggle my fingers. Am I overthinking it, or is it starting to feel a little tight?

No. The glove is shrinking. It’s shrinking around my hand!

Before I can tug it off, the shade of the brown material abruptly. Or to be more accurate, the colour didn’t just lighten, it’s changing into a different one entirely. Like a chameleon who’s found a new patch of colour to experiment with.

I watch, transfixed, as an olive green colour bleeds in from the fingertips. It rapidly spreads to the rest of the glove in the span of three breaths. There’s a lump in my throat when I realize changing colour is not all it’s going to do.

Seconds later, I’m proven correct as the back of my hand erupts in a blinding flash of light. Thank goodness my palm is face up, or there’s no way it wouldn’t draw the Orc’s attention. A blinding pillar light would have drawn every set of eyes in the vicinity. A frightening thought.

I flip my hand, somewhat afraid to see what might be there.

A golden letter ‘H’ is carved in the center. It’s tiny enough no one would notice unless I point it out. Not that I will, because I’m starting to realize the glove has moulded over my hand like a second layer of skin. Ignoring the fact I may have to wear this until I die, I start clenching my fingers in a test run.

Hm. My sense of touch is muted, obviously because of the layer over my skin. I stretch my fingers and– wow, now this new.

There is a faint luminescent film or web between the valleys of each finger. I hold up my left hand up, looking at it from different angles. The webbing is almost translucent to the naked eye, just a subtle ripple of air to hint at something there. I move my hand directly into the sunlight, and the webbing becomes stained with a gentle, golden hue.

I use my non-gloved hand to touch the web. It feels smooth, like a woven sheet of spider silk. After that, I continue to test the fingers of my left hand. There is no changes to my motor skills and they work just like they should. It’s just… I’m not used to having something hugging my skin.

I form different shapes with my fingers, and eventually curling them to form a circle. Seized by a childish curiosity, I press the edge of my fist against one eye, peering through round gap like I’m playing pirate.

Everything I see, from the grass to the rock to the curvaceous nimbuses bobbing overhead, is cloaked in a hazy and dreamlike edge. Woah. My breathing stutters in my chest. This is way cool, almost like some sort of filter.

“Bahaha, this proof that Orcs stronger than human and goblin!”

I whirl around in panic, hoping he hasn’t spotted me being weird and sneaky. Thankfully, the Orc isn’t stomping towards me, nor am I in imminent danger of getting crushed under a blunted club. And then I see it and my heart jumps into overdrive, hammering against my ribs and stealing the air from my lungs.

It's not the twisted lump left of Goblin B’s body that shocks me, but the translucent rectangular window floating above the Orc’s head which reads:

Orc

Scavenger

LVL 15

Status Effect: -