Chapter 93 Mutation

“Clang!”

Sparks burst across the dim cave.

A finely made standard machete came down hard against the stone wall, its edge flashing cold in the darkness.

It missed Xia Nan completely.

The blade only crushed a few patches of moss.

Xia Nan rolled away, came up on one knee, then pushed himself upright.

The tip of his decapitating longsword touched the ground.

His breathing was heavy.

Sweat had plastered strands of hair across his forehead, and flecks of mud streaked one cheek.

The trousers over the outside of his thigh had been torn open.

Blood slowly seeped from the cut beneath.

The injury had not even come from his opponent.

During the fight, Xia Nan had slipped too close to one of the jagged stones jutting from the cave floor and sliced himself on the edge.

Fortunately, the wound was shallow.

With his current constitution, it would scab over soon enough.

Blood loss was not a concern.

The enemy in front of him was another matter.

It stood roughly as tall as an adult man.

Its skin was reddish-brown.

Its tusks were stained yellow.

A hobgoblin.

Like bugbears, hobgoblins were a subspecies of goblin.

If the goblin race was a branch, then bugbears and hobgoblins were two forks growing from it.

Bugbears had developed toward size and raw physical power.

Hobgoblins had taken a different path.

Intelligence.

Discipline.

Command.

With a challenge rating of only 0.5, an ordinary hobgoblin without any unusual talent was generally weaker than a bugbear in a direct one-on-one fight.

But challenge rating did not tell the whole story.

Hobgoblins possessed intelligence far beyond that of ordinary greenskins.

That gave them much greater potential.

These natural leaders and commanders could easily take control of large goblin settlements after reaching adulthood.

Through raiding methods and military habits passed down from generation to generation, they could turn a disorganized tribe into a serious threat to nearby intelligent races with frightening speed.

And under rare enough circumstances, elite hobgoblins could even receive the protection of their chief god, learn combat techniques, obtain class levels…

Some could even manipulate magical particles.

None of that mattered right now.

The hobgoblin in front of Xia Nan was just a hobgoblin.

“ROAR!”

Thick saliva dripped from the tips of its tusks.

It swung its machete and snarled.

After fighting Xia Nan for so long, the creature was naturally covered in injuries.

Sword cuts crossed its arms.

Its waist.

Its calves.

Blood kept flowing.

Its strength kept falling.

And the closer it came to death, the more impatient it became.

“You damned flea! I’ll cut off your head and feed your brains to the maggots in the cesspit!”

Xia Nan almost laughed.

That was it?

In his previous life, he had spent countless nights sitting behind a keyboard, fighting verbal wars with people from every corner of the country on internet forums.

Compared with the things he had read back then, this hobgoblin’s insult had all the destructive power of a gentle breeze.

If Xia Nan actually wanted to make the creature lose its mind, he could pick almost any one or two responses currently passing through his head.

The poor, “innocent” tribal youth in front of him would probably explode on the spot and charge over screaming.

But there was no need.

Xia Nan had entered the cave for one reason.

Practice.

Real combat accelerated his progress with [Fang Hunt] far more effectively than repetitive drills.

Now, however, the hobgoblin had suffered too many wounds.

Its movements were slowing.

Its combat ability was collapsing.

It had already lost its value as a training partner.

So…

Time to kill it.

“Clang!”

Xia Nan brought the iron-gray decapitating longsword across his chest.

The hobgoblin’s machete smashed against it.

The impact made the sword vibrate violently.

For an instant, it looked as if the two sides were about to enter a contest of brute strength.

Then Xia Nan suddenly relaxed his arms.

“Bang!”

His leather boots, crusted with ice, dug into the cave floor.

Mud and moss exploded beneath his feet.

The scenery on either side of him seemed to slide backward.

The air thickened.

For a heartbeat, Xia Nan felt as though he had plunged into deep water.

A faint animal cry gathered beside his ears.

Closer.

Louder.

Almost there.

It seemed ready to break free in the next instant…

Then it stopped.

[Too bad.]

[Just a little more.]

If [Fang Hunt] had truly reached the Novice level, Xia Nan should have crossed the remaining distance and appeared directly behind the hobgoblin.

Instead, the technique broke down early.

His acceleration faded when he reached the creature’s side.

But that was enough.

Xia Nan’s body tightened like a drawn bowstring.

His waist twisted.

He borrowed the remaining forward momentum and turned it into rotational force.

The decapitating longsword swept out in a flawless arc.

[Spinning Slash]!

Hummm!

A crescent of iron-gray light flashed through the darkness.

[Slashing Expert] granted a five-percent bonus to slashing damage.

The longsword itself carried a five-percent decapitation effect.

The two stacked.

Xia Nan’s blade rose diagonally.

One strike.

That was all it took.

The edge tore through the hobgoblin’s left shoulder and kept going.

Half of its head disappeared.

“Thud.”

The ruined corpse collapsed.

Xia Nan calmly wiped the blood from his sword, then sheathed it.

Four full days had passed since he entered the forest with Forgan.

Four days of repetitive drills.

Four days of actual fighting.

His familiarity with [Fang Hunt] had climbed at a speed that even Xia Nan found ridiculous.

Now he was only one step away.

One final push.

Perhaps one more high-quality fight would be enough for him to truly master the technique at the Novice level.

Once that happened…

[Fang Hunt] should finally appear on his attribute panel.

Xia Nan glanced at the hobgoblin’s corpse.

Then he turned and examined the cave.

Compared with the other goblin nests they had cleared, this one was noticeably cleaner and wider.

Almost like a small underground plaza.

Yet despite its size, fewer than twenty goblins had lived here.

Hobgoblins were not nearly as strong as bugbears in direct combat.

But if the question was which one was more troublesome to deal with?

Hobgoblins won by a wide margin.

Their intelligence approached that of humans.

And their instinctive grasp of simple military organization made them dangerous in ways ordinary goblins could never manage.

The hobgoblin had used harsh discipline to suppress the chaotic instincts of its underlings.

It forced them to obey.

To follow orders.

To act almost like soldiers.

With barely more than a dozen goblins, it had turned the nest into a confusing maze of branching passages and narrow tunnels.

Some areas even contained crude traps meant to stop intruders.

More importantly…

When Xia Nan had fought his way inside, the goblins had not simply screamed and rushed him with clubs like they normally did.

Under the hobgoblin’s commands, they had shown something disturbingly close to tactics.

Attack from the front.

Circle around from the sides.

Pressure from behind.

A few even stayed farther back and threw stones while the others engaged him.

If there had been more goblins…

Or a few decent ranged weapons…

Xia Nan paused.

Actually, even that was unnecessary.

If the nest had simply known he was coming and prepared in advance, he probably would not have made it all the way to the deepest chamber this easily.

Xia Nan had already estimated the limit.

Add ten more goblins to the group, and even with both swords in hand and all his equipment on, the safest choice would have been retreat.

“Awoo…”

A soft whimper came from one corner of the cave.

Xia Nan turned.

Two worgs crouched there.

They were already as tall as an adult’s thigh despite only recently leaving the juvenile stage.

Yes.

Hobgoblins had more than military instincts.

Like the civilized races of the continent, they knew how to make use of animals.

Livestock for food.

Beasts of burden for transport.

Birds for messages.

And worgs for war.

The techniques passed down through hobgoblin tribes allowed them to raise worgs from a young age and teach the vicious creatures to obey their owners.

Once grown, a worg could be paired with a suitably trained goblin to create a crude version of a worg rider.

The creatures were intelligent too.

Looking at the pair in front of him, Xia Nan suspected they might actually be smarter than ordinary goblin grunts.

He took two steps closer.

The reaction was immediate.

Both worgs lowered themselves to the ground and whimpered pitifully.

Xia Nan reached out one hand.

They rolled over.

Tongues hanging out.

Soft gray-black bellies exposed.

Perfect submission.

Apparently, the fact that Xia Nan had just slaughtered their owners meant absolutely nothing.

One of them was even clever enough to wag its tail, pick up the hobgoblin’s half-crushed skull, and place it obediently at Xia Nan’s feet.

Xia Nan stared.

Well.

That was new.

Before he could do anything else, slow footsteps came from behind him.

Cold wind swept through the cave.

The temperature plunged.

In the next instant, both worgs became crystal-clear ice sculptures.

They died without even changing posture.

One still had its tongue out.

The other still looked as though it expected praise.

“They can’t be tamed.”

Forgan’s obsidian handaxe swayed lightly at his waist.

“Don’t touch them.”

Ordinary wild animals had no concept of morality.

They hunted.

They fled.

They killed.

They survived.

That was all.

Worgs were different.

Their intelligence approached that of young human children.

Some could even understand simple Common and Goblin.

Once a creature possessed that level of intelligence, its viciousness could no longer be dismissed as simple instinct.

Worgs were cruel.

Treacherous.

By any reasonable standard in this world, they belonged firmly to the evil alignment.

Wild packs roamed the wilderness.

They stole livestock from human settlements.

Killed isolated farmers.

Attacked caravans.

And even the greenskins that raised them from birth were not safe.

If a worg became dissatisfied, its hunting instincts could turn on its owner without warning.

One bite to the throat.

Dinner solved.

They were fickle in the truest sense of the word.

Untamable.

Only druids, who lived alongside nature and possessed class abilities suited to communicating with wild creatures, had any real chance of coexisting peacefully with them.

If Xia Nan kept these two worgs around?

He might as well give up sleeping forever.

After all, who knew whether one of them would count the bones in its dinner, notice there was one fewer than yesterday, get offended, and bite through his throat while he slept?

Xia Nan shrugged.

Fine.

No pet worgs.

He turned away and began searching the cave for loot.

Behind him, Forgan remained where he was.

As usual, the barbarian summoned the translucent wolf spirit and sent it searching.

Xia Nan had been curious at first.

The Misty Forest was enormous.

There were countless monsters in the outer region suitable for his level.

So why did Forgan keep choosing greenskin nests?

For a while, it had almost looked personal.

After several days, Xia Nan had a reasonable guess.

Whatever Forgan was tracking was connected to goblins.

Since the barbarian had temporarily accepted the request to teach Xia Nan a combat technique, he simply let Xia Nan use the goblins in those nests as training targets along the way.

Once a battle ended, Forgan even gave him half an hour to search for valuables.

If they encountered elite creatures like bugbears, he would freeze the bounty-worthy parts so Xia Nan could preserve them.

[He’s actually pretty nice.]

The thought felt increasingly reasonable.

Maybe Forgan had once done the same work when he was younger.

Maybe he knew how difficult it was for low-level adventurers to earn money.

Not that Xia Nan was desperate.

His savings were healthy enough that he could go ten days or even half a month without earning a copper and still live comfortably.

But if Forgan was offering help freely, Xia Nan had no reason to reject it.

Twenty minutes passed.

Then Xia Nan stood in the middle of the cavern with his arms folded.

His brows drew together.

“That’s strange.”

The hobgoblin’s left ear had been destroyed in the battle.

No bounty for that.

A shame, but acceptable.

When a fight turned dangerous, Xia Nan was not about to protect the enemy’s ears just to preserve a few gold coins.

The real problem was the cave itself.

He had searched the entire place.

Nothing.

Not one copper coin.

That made no sense.

Even the crudest goblin nest with fewer than ten inhabitants usually contained a few small stones worth selling.

A cave this large should have produced more than that.

At the same time…

The translucent wolf spirit was behaving strangely too.

Normally, it circled the cave once and returned to Forgan.

This time, it kept searching.

Its movements slowed.

It drifted carefully from one place to another as though it had picked up a faint trail.

Xia Nan followed it with his eyes.

Again.

Again.

Then he stopped.

One corner of the cave was blocked by a broken slab of rock about half a person’s height.

There was less dust on its surface than on the surrounding stone.

And the floor around it was covered in scrape marks.

The rock had been moved before.

Repeatedly.

Xia Nan crossed the cave and pressed both hands against it.

He shoved.

The stone shifted aside.

Behind it, set into the wall, was a small wooden chest.

Pitch-black.

Hidden.

Xia Nan’s heartbeat quickened.

He did not rush forward.

Instead, he stepped back at an angle, drew his longsword, and used the tip to lift the lid from a safe distance.

Click.

The chest opened.

“Hummm…”

Silver-white light gleamed in the darkness.

Mixed with it was the unmistakable glow of gold.

Xia Nan’s eyes widened.

“Whoa.”

No trap activated.

He hurried forward.

One hand plunged into the chest.

Coins spilled through his fingers.

He weighed the handful, glanced at what remained, and immediately began estimating.

At least thirty gold!

And that did not even include the dozen glittering stones mixed among the coins.

Thirty gold in currency alone.

Not bad.

Not bad at all.

Xia Nan hugged the chest to his chest and turned around.

Whoosh!

A violent gust of freezing wind exploded through the cave.

This cold was different.

Sharper.

Heavier.

Carrying something so oppressive that Xia Nan’s skin tightened.

He looked up.

Thin crimson blood vessels had spread through Forgan’s ice-blue eyes like cracks.

A low growl rolled from the barbarian’s throat.

Deep.

Dangerous.

Suffocating.

The beast-hide cloak wrapped around Forgan’s shoulders shifted in the wind.

The overlapping wolf muzzles on his chest seemed to burn with pale, freezing fire rising from beneath a sheet of ice.

The wolf spirit had dropped to all fours.

Its body was tense.

Its icicle-like fangs gleamed.

A warning growl vibrated through the cave.

And in front of them…

Lay the hobgoblin’s corpse.

Only half its head remained.

One of its thickly furred fingers had somehow fused with a patch of moss on the damp ground.

Fine threads spread outward.

Mycelium.

Growing.

Twisting.

Climbing.

Then a pale green mushroom pushed free.

It swayed gently in the cold wind.

Forgan stared at it.

“Plans have changed.”

His voice was flat.

“We’re going back to town.”