I was led towards the deepest recesses of the cave, where the chief's "throne room" was. He wasn't what I was expecting from a Hob-goblin. From manga that I've read, goblins were savages that just killed without regard for their surroundings. As long as they were satisfied, they didn't care. Although weak, they were numerous and used that fact to their advantage. Hob-goblins, although not as numerous as goblins, weren't exempt from this fact. In fact, they rarely associated with goblins, so this was weird.
Sitting in front of me, was the Hob-goblin chief, who I presumed to be the most violent goblin in this village, drinking a bowl of slime. Apparently slime was like a delicacy to these goblins. I had also been offered one but was cautious about it. I then took a sip of it and surprisingly, I acquired some skills and resistances.
[Due to the unique skill [Evolver] you have acquired the following skills]
[You have acquired the skill [Predator]]
[You have acquired the skill [Slime body]]
[You have acquired the skill [Pain nullification]]
[You have acquired the skill [Assimilation]]
I wondered what a slime was doing with such skills, but apparently they weren't intelligent enough to actually utilize the skills. The skill [Predator] allowed me to steal status points from creatures I consumed. About 20% of their stats, I could add to one of mine.
[Slime Body] allowed my body to become slimy and all gelatinous-like. I was sort of see-through at the same time things should have been able to move through my body. [Pain Nullification] just came by to make my life smooth running or so I thought, till I found out it simply wouldn't let my stats be affected by the pain. I would still feel the pain. [Pain Resistance] was there for me to lessen the feeling. That was sort of dumb though. [Heat Resistance] needed no description, so I was left with [Assimilation]. Truly a most dangerous skill. It allowed me to completely understand the functioning of anything I consumed. In essence, I would understand the basic working of something I ate or understand the fundamentals being something whatever I ate could do.
Basically, I would be the world's best vet if I ate every animal that existed. Or if I ate a human mage, I would be able to understand how his magic worked. The problem was if I would be able to utilize some of this information.
Slimes really had insanely powerful skills. Luckily they had no intelligence and just ate all day long.
The other goblins who came along with the chief had also settled in another portion in the cave. Apparently they were supposed to be using this place but since the chief said I was an important guest, they had to relocate. I could feel them insulting me and throwing curses at my name.
Barely my second week reincarnation and I was already hated by a race.
The chief dropped his bowl to the ground and was looking at me seriously. It was just the two of us in this room. I had no idea why he was treating a bird with this much respect. It were almost as if he saw me as an equal. Could it be because I was Minerva's friend? Yeah, it must've been.
"First of all, I'd like to reintroduce myself. My name is Gorm, chief of the village of Ooo. I would like to apologize on the behalf of the young one who attacked you earlier on. He is a bit hot-headed so please go easy on him."
'Ah… his speech is so good. How?'
I ended up tilting my head in confusion. My antenna was bouncing up and down weirdly as I inspected his body. According to the data he was eight years old. In goblin years, he was as old as a seventy year old man or so I would assume.
"Oh? Are you scouting my power?"
'Huh? How did you come to that conclusion?'
"Don't worry, I'm not really strong or dangerous, but I can tell that you are strong."
'Oh? Is that so?'
"Are you curious as to how? Hehe, it's with a skill I learned from my master. It's called the [Truthseeker Eyes]. They allow me to see the ability of an individual. The true scope of your power can't be hidden from me."
'Hmmm? He can see the true scope of anyone's power? Hey, isn't that like a weaker version of [Analyst]?'
<<Notice: The learned skill [Truthseeker eyes] are mostly inaccurate since it requires the target to be exuding aura of a certain frequency>>
'Inaccurate, huh? Then it's useless to me.'
I looked away from him. I was bored, and since I had no proper way of communicating with him, this was pointless. Unconsciously, I drew the Kanji for bored on the ground. I then stood up, about to leave the cave since my one hour was up. I needed to get back before Minerva noticed.
"Bored?"
He said. I looked at him and he was pointing at the kanji on the ground.
'Huh?'
"You are bored?"
He asked me. Confused, I looked at him.
"Can you write like this?"
He asked me.
'No, no, no way. There's no way he understood that, right? He can't understand kanji.'
There was no way he understood Kanji, but just to be sure, I wrote something else down.
"I'm a Barbie doll?"
He said.
'Ah… he understands.'
After that, I spent a bit of time, using Kanji to talk to him. Apparently his master knew Kanji for some reasons so he taught it to him as well. Almost everything his master knew, he knew and apparently that was all his master spoke with him, forcing him to learn it as well.
I was suddenly hit with the possibility of his master having been from Japan like me. That meant there were others that reincarnated. This meant that Ken might have reincarnated as well. That was, if he died. I didn't want to get myself too excited so I threw away the thought.
He also revealed to me that Minerva was something of a little sister to him, which made me all the more surprised that she didn't care for the village.
"So, anyway. What brings the friend of Minerva here? Did that goblina finally change her mind?"
He decided to dive right into the topic and I was grateful for that.
"Well, um I'm not here for her. I just came to find out something."
He raised his eye brow when I wrote that down.
"Oh? And what would the friend of Minerva want with a simple goblin tribe?"
"I wanted to know why Minerva doesn't want to protect you guys."
At the question, Gorm's expression turned Grimm. I felt like I had made a bad mistake, but then he let out a sigh.
"Have you asked her yourself?"
I shook my head.
"Hmmm, let me ask you this."
I gulped when he said that.
"How long have you known her?"
"Not long."
He had a curious expression on his face, like he wanted to ask a question but then pushed it aside.
"Hmm, I guess you wouldn't know about it then." He sat up and cleared his throat. "Have you heard about the five Tyrants of the Forest of Larm?"
I nodded my head.
"The forest of Larm. This forest that we are in right now is called the Larm Forest. It was named after the Forest King Larm, who was said to have made it from over a millennia ago. This forest is a very beautiful place filled with many resources and magical creatures. It flourishes as the biggest forest in the world and of course the Forest king was happy when he made it."
Oh, I could tell where this was going. Here comes the 'but'.
"But..."
Yep, right there.
"The human nations next to the forest wished to expand their lands. They saw the Larm forest as the best place to try to reach out to and so started invading the forest. They mercilessly cut down our kind and stole resources."
By "our kind", I was guessing he meant monsters or magical creatures and not goblins alone
"The spirits in the forest cried out to the forest king to protect the forest and he responded to their cries. He created a creature to protect the forest. This creature was known as the first Tyrant of Larm. It managed to drive away the human nation, but no matter how powerful it was, it was only one creature. And one creature can't possibly hold off more than one nation on their own."
'So the forest king made more Tyrants, and that's how come there are 5 tyrants?'
Almost as if he read my mind, he gave a response to my question.
"Don't get me wrong. The forest king has only ever created only 2 tyrants. The others were created by first tyrant. Still, not every tyrant had a nice life. It's not like the Tyrant's led good lives and were suddenly given power from above. Some of them had horrible origins, mostly because of their environment."
"Minerva?"
I scribbled down and he solemnly nodded his head, then he proceeded to tell me about Minerva's past
________________________________________________________
6 Years Ago, the West of Larm.
A woman was breathing heavily under a massive tree. She was heavily injured and barely conscious. Blood had soaked her clothes and her white hair. She had been running from the goblins that had chased her out of the village of her lover, the current chief of the goblin village of Ooo, Dorm.
She was thankful for the kind of weather they were having that day. It was raining cats and dogs and as such, it wouldn't be possible for the goblins to hear her voice as she screamed in pain.
She wasn't screaming because of the wounds they had inflicted on her. No, she was screaming because of the pain she felt from the contractions, as her cervix was forcefully opening. Yes. She was pregnant with a child. It was going to be the child of the Goblin chief.
The goblin chief was a Hob-goblin. As a Hob-goblin he wasn't treated as a simple monster. No, he was treated more like a demi-human, so he was allowed into certain countries. It was in one of those countries that the two met. They had traveled the world together as adventurers and eventually fell in love, but then a time came when the Hob-goblin had to return home. He couldn't possibly abandon his people, so the woman went with him.
At first she was treated as some sort of slave, but was left alone after the Hob-goblin announced that he was going to marry her. It had been 6 months since they had gotten married and the woman was ready to give birth to their child. Unfortunately, it was prophesied by the village's sorceress that the child was going to be an albino.
The goblins had a bad history with albinos. This came from the reign of a goblin sorceress known as the Wicked Witch. The Wicked Witch was a violent magician that used her people for all sorts of sacrifices and experiments. She would sometimes simply kill the members out of boredom. It was undeniable that during her reign, goblins were feared in the forest, but she was killed by a party of heroes that had been dispatched to slay her.
However, on her death, she promised that she would return once again to take her seat as the most powerful sorceress the goblins had ever known. Ever since, the goblins would wait out for the birth of an albino, then sacrifice that albino to the Forest king the moment they were born. So this woman had to give them the baby as soon as she bore it. She couldn't handle losing her child the very moment it was born into the world. She wouldn't allow it, so she begged her husband to stop them, unfortunately he had to go somewhere and he couldn't afford to miss the opportunity. As such, he had his best friend protect the woman while he was away.
The woman thought she was safe because she knew that goblin well. Sadly, he had already betrayed the goblin chief and had tricked the woman. As soon as the man was away, he and the other goblins tied down the woman and attempted to force her to give birth, but she used all of her power to run away. That was how she ended up in the forest.
After a while of intense pain and screaming, the baby finally came out. Sadly, so did the goblins. She was too weak to even reach out for her baby that was on the ground in front of her, covered in mud. She wanted so badly to touch those flailing arms and to soothe that crying voice, but she couldn't. She could only cry tears of joy that her child was born. Also tears of sadness that they were surrounded and that the child might die.
No. No matter what, she wouldn't allow it. She couldn't allow it. Not only would that affect her mental state, it would also tarnish her family name. She had already done that by deciding to get married to a demi-human against her family's wishes, but she came from a family that did not know defeat. She gathered power from the spirits in the atmosphere. She called for the very force of nature, and her eyes glowed a brilliant golden. Ten magic circles formed in front of her, forming a line against the goblins.
The goblins were cautious of the bright orange - red magic circles that had been laid on the ground in front of them. Water droplets from the rain instantly evaporated as it made contact with them and it was producing an intense heat.
With a whisper, pillars of fire that cut the clouds emerged from the magic circles. The force from the ejection blew the goblins away, and sparks from the pillars started to burn nearby plants. That wasn't all. Soon, the pillars begun to intertwine with one another and they started to dance. It was a very beautiful dance that was slowly turning into a tornado of flames.
"AAAAGGGHHHH!!!"
"RRUUUUN!"
"WITCH! WITCH! SHES A WITCH!"
Such things could be heard from the tiny monsters that were slowly getting caught in the tornado and perishing.
Honestly, did she allow herself to be reduced to this state by creatures barely the size of a cat? She really couldn't live this down.
"Is this the power of chief's wife!?"
She heard one of them say, and she just let out a pained laugh. If it were before, she could have summoned a way more powerful spell, but for that moment, it was more than enough. It was even a miracle that she managed to gather the spirits to aid her at all. She was so angry she was prepared to burn down this side of the forest, along with goblins, but then remembered her child who had been crying.
Tears flowed down her face as she looked at her child. The flames made it easier to see, so she could clearly see her child's grey skin. She was so happy that she could see her child, so she didn't want to burn the forest. No, she only needed to protect her child from the stupid goblins. To do that, she forced herself and begged the spirits for their aid once more.
The kind spirits understood her and so they took the child away by controlling the plants. The woman let out a satisfied smile when she sensed that her child was no longer there, so she saw no reason to continue attacking the goblins. She cut the magic spell and slumped down.
Before she died, a spirit appeared to her. It flew above her almost dead body then said,
"Oh child so loved by the spirits, why choose to leave such a barbaric race be?"
The woman looked at the spirit but couldn't answer her. She could only smile. The spirit, although it couldn't fathom the woman's motives, replied in kind,
"Very well then, I shall take care of thine child. But what shall be her name?"
'Her? So I had a daughter?'
She thought. She then forced her lips open and whispered,
"....Min....er...va..."
"Very well then. I pray your soul makes it to the other side, oh child so loved by the spirits."
The spirit then radiated a blinding light as she sang her song to carry the woman's soul away. As soon as she was done, she faded away.
The only things that were left were the corpses of a woman and heavily injured goblins who still couldn't believe the scene that had just unfolded.
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