Chapter 97: The Goblin Village, Kyoya Sasajima
The following day.
Shirazawa and Shiro set out alone toward the Mystic Mountains. This region served as a dense habitat for magical beasts, and a massive network of goblin villages was scattered throughout the peaks. The surrounding border towns naturally acted as a bustling hub for mercenaries and explorers, who marched into the treacherous terrain every few days to hunt down monsters and harvest resources. The mountains were incredibly rich in raw materials, but they were equally deadly.
"Brr~ it's freezing." Shirazawa rubbed his arms, looking up to survey the towering, majestic peaks looming before them. They had officially crossed the threshold of the mountain range; looking in any direction, there was nothing but blinding white snow and dense, ancient forestry.
Shiro thoughtfully cast a barrage of passive enhancements on his vessel, stacking high-tier Ice Resistance and Flame Reinforcement. The climate-controlled matrix instantly made Shirazawa significantly more comfortable.
*Aze, is our core objective for this excursion to retrieve the reincarnation?* she transmitted her thoughts directly into his mind.
*Let's just introduce ourselves and get a feel for the situation first. It ultimately hinges on his own personal free will. We aren't like that wretched old elf; we don't engage in human trafficking or forced compliance.*
*True.* Shiro fell silent, quietly trailing a step behind Shirazawa.
Regarding the Wrath King, Wrath, Shirazawa was highly inclined to recruit him into their primary faction. However, if the youth flatly refused the invitation, there was absolutely nothing they could do about it. Their current party matrix certainly didn't lack raw combat power; bringing Wrath aboard would merely be a spectacular icing on the cake, and if he declined, they could simply leave him to enjoy his personal isekai adventure. After all, the goblin village at this specific chronological junction was still peaceful and intact, completely untouched by human cruelty.
Wrath's baseline hatred for the human race had not yet reached the critical mass required to forcefully trigger his system-integrated Ruler Skill:
Deep within a secluded valley of the mountain range.
A sprawling goblin village sat nestled among the jagged cliffs. Hundreds of diminutive goblins were busy hauling timber and crude tools, working tirelessly to assemble log cabins and defensive perimeters.
"Phew~ I'm completely wiped out." A visibly lean, scrawny goblin wiped the sweat from his brow, his eyes gleaming with satisfaction as he inspected a beautifully crafted shortsword he had just produced. *My
"Brother~ Brother~!"
A soft, squeaky loli voice echoed from behind. A thoroughly adorable female goblin came toddling over on her tiny, stubby legs.
"What's wrong, Leest?"
"Waaah! Brother~!" The young girl threw herself directly into his chest, wrapping her arms around his neck to affectionately rub her face against his.
"Hey, Leest, it looks like you've grown a bit taller again."
"(*^▽^*) Hehehe~ The Chief Uncle gave every single scrap of the monster meat he brought back to Leest! How could I not grow taller~?" Leest laughed sweetly, displaying a thoroughly innocent, dorkish charm that easily put a smile on anyone's face.
"This is the latest weapon I just finished forging. Take it and present it to the Chief; we can't be freeloading off his monster meat for nothing."
"Alrighty~ Brother is the absolute best~!" Leest scooped up the shortsword and happily bounded away, rapidly disappearing past the entrance of the forge.
Watching his little sister's figure vanish at the edge of his vision, the goblin youth finally retracted his gaze. *My MP has recovered a decent amount. Time to keep forging,* he murmured to himself. Reinvigorating his focus, a vibrant, complex magic circle instantly ignited across his palms.
The youth's current name was Wrath–the moniker assigned to him upon manifesting in this reality. As for his original name...
It was Kyoya Sasajima, a hot-blooded young man who had possessed a fierce, unyielding habit of standing up against injustice in his past life. However, because his righteous interventions frequently manifested as physical brawls, he was continuously reprimanded by his academic instructors and guardians alike. Over time, he had begun to deeply ponder the underlying morality of his actions: *Why can't violence be used to systematically neutralize violence?* Ultimately, he had chosen to completely suppress his sharp edges, forced to adapt into a thoroughly ordinary, non-disruptive student.
Now, having been inexplicably reincarnated into an alternate universe, he found himself trapped in the vessel of a low-tier goblin.
Yet, the goblins of this world were drastically different from the textbook pop-culture tropes he had envisioned, both in terms of physical aesthetics and baseline societal behaviors. Inside this peaceful village, he possessed a completely adorable goblin sister who acted as his permanent shadow, happily trailing behind his footsteps wherever he ventured. Though their daily lifestyle was structurally impoverished, it was entirely liberated from the chaotic friction of the outside world.
Goblins were an incredibly straightforward, transparent race, completely devoid of complex, toxic interpersonal politics. Although they were statistically weak as hell, their internal unity was absolute. When combined with their phenomenally high reproductive rates, they managed to carve out a stubborn, resilient existence within this monster-infested mountain range.
A goblin's lifestyle was profoundly primitive, characterized by a non-stop, desperate struggle for baseline survival. There was zero necessity to analyze abstract concepts of right or wrong; preserving the continuity of life was the singular, eternal objective.
This was exactly the brand of unburdened existence he had secretly yearned for. Just shut up and grind!
Simultaneously, his presence had systematically elevated the village's baseline power matrix. His innate skill,
Regrettably, the sudden manifestation of several uninvited guests was about to violently shatter his beautiful dream.
In the dense forestry bordering the perimeter of the settlement.
A unit of seven or eight human adventurers advanced at a leisurely pace, their countenances dripping with supreme, cold indifference.
"So this pathetic little dump is the verified origin point of those high-tier enchanted weapons?" The vanguard leader let out a mocking sneer. "To think it was actually a primitive goblin village. What a thoroughly hilarious twist."
"Boss, let's just slaughter this settlement and head straight back to civilization. This barren, godforsaken wasteland doesn't even feature a single decent-looking woman. The local taverns are packed entirely with old hags; it's genuinely repulsive," an adjacent adventurer grumbled with a face full of sheer disgust.
"Don't be so short-sighted. Those newly introduced magical armaments possess an incredibly high baseline destructive output. If we can forcefully extract the underlying structural logic of their forging process, an infinite mountain of gold and silver treasures awaits our return. Once we have that kind of leverage, will we ever lack beautiful women?" The vanguard leader's lips curled into a thoroughly sinister, predatory arc.
The surrounding mercenaries instantly caught the capitalistic logic, unleashing a barrage of sycophantic, fawning praise. "The Boss is truly magnanimous and brilliant! To think you could map out the long-term projections so flawlessly!"
"Mm." The leader nodded dismissively, his cold gaze scanning the crude log cabins of the settlement. "Alright, this guide asset has officially outlived his tactical utility. Dispose of him."
The exact second the command was issued, the captured goblin who had been forced to navigate them through the perimeter began to tremble violently, staring in absolute, paralyzed horror as a cold steel blade closed the distance to his throat.
*SLASH!* A fountain of crimson blood erupted into the air. The guide goblin's eyes rolled back as his limp body collapsed heavily onto the snowy earth, his life force permanently extinguished.
"Tsk, tsk. Pathetic, utterly weak trash. I genuinely fail to comprehend how a species this statistically garbage managed to survive inside the Mystic Mountains."
"They probably relied entirely on sheer, dumb luck! Hahaha~!"
The adventurers erupted into a chorus of uninhibited, arrogant laughter.
"Enough, quit wasting precious time. Execute a swift, systematic sweep so we can vacate this miserable dump as quickly as possible," the vanguard leader barked, his brows knitting in irritation.
His orders received an immediate chorus of agreement from his subordinates. Brandishing their longswords and combat axes, the mercenaries forcefully charged straight toward the perimeter of the goblin village. Within minutes, the agonizing shrieks of slaughter echoed violently through the settlement.
"Hahaha! Weak! You're all so pathetically weak!" An adventurer roared with excitement, casually cleaving a goblin villager in two before continuing his frenzied, blood-soaked crusade.
"ROAR!"
Accompanied by a thunderous wave of pure, unadulterated fury, a massive, heavily built adult Ogre forcefully erupted from the center of the village. The human invaders, completely incapable of decoding the monster's vocalizations, simply ignited their personal reinforcement magic to systematically buff their physical attributes, before charging forward to eliminate the creature.
"Brother! Brother!" A frantic, terrified scream sliced through the air.
"Leest? What happened?" Wrath set down a newly forged, lightning-attributed shortsword, raising his eyes in deep confusion as his diminutive little sister came charging into the smithy at a frantic sprint.
"We have to run! Right now! Chief Uncle said an invading force of hostile enemies has breached the perimeter, and he ordered us to evacuate the village immediately!" Leest forcefully grabbed his large sleeve, desperately tugging his frame toward the exit.
"What?!" Wrath's complexion instantly shifted. He snapped to his feet, grabbing his sister's hand as they bolted out into the open air.
"ROAR!"
Not far from their position, the massive Ogre let out a devastating bellow, slamming his feet violently into the earth as his colossal frame propelled forward like a heavy artillery shell toward the invading forces.
*BOOM!*
The earth trembled violently as dense clouds of dust and snow saturated the atmosphere. The meticulously constructed log cabins they had painstakingly built over the past months were effortlessly pulverized and flipped over. A massive volume of his fellow kinsmen was being ruthlessly slaughtered, their lifeblood staining the frozen ground a deep, horrific shade of crimson.
"You bastards! You absolute, heartless monsters!"
Wrath's eyes turned completely bloodshot. Brandishing his shortsword, he forcefully sprinted toward the vanguard, only to be effortlessly swatted away by a devastating counter-cleave from a mercenary's longsword, flying backward into the snow. The little sister behind him was thoroughly paralyzed with absolute horror, completely broken by the sheer, unmitigated cruelty of the humans.
"Wrath, run! Get the hell out of here, don't throw your life away!" The Ogre roared furiously at the duo, before hoisting his massive spiked club to launch another desperate, earth-shattering swing toward the human vanguard.
"Tsk~ to think a low-tier settlement actually managed to harbor a fully evolved Ogre. What a massive pain in the ass." The human adventurer leader let out a cold snort. Raising his enchanted staff, he rapidly chanted a spell formula: "[Tornado]!"
A violent vortex of pressurized wind materialized out of thin air, effortlessly hoisting the Ogre's massive frame into the sky and trapping him in midair. Seizing this flawless tactical opening, an adjacent long-range adventurer pulled his recurve bow to full draw. A brilliant flash of magical reinforcement illuminated the arrowhead before he released the string.
*SHUUU–*
The enchanted arrow pierced straight through the center of the Ogre's sternum with absolute precision. The massive creature let out a muffled, choked groan as his heavy body crashed violently onto the frozen earth. Following a few brief, involuntary muscle spasms, he went completely, chillingly still.
"CHIEF!!!"
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