Chapter 394: Goblin City

Kael waited several more seconds before moving. The combination of Darkness and Presence had passed its first test.

The buildings inside the wall deepened the mystery. Nothing appeared poorly constructed or unusually cramped, but every feature had been designed for inhabitants much shorter than Kael. Doors reached only to the upper part of his chest, windows sat lower than expected, and the railings and exterior counters would have been uncomfortable for an average human to use.

Even the stairs visible between several buildings had shallow rises built for shorter legs. A human could live here with frequent inconvenience. Kael would need to bend nearly in half to enter some of the houses.

The streets remained wide enough for carts, allowing him to move without brushing against walls or stacked crates. He followed the darkness between buildings and avoided the lanterns hanging above intersections while the map expanded at the edge of his vision.

The red objective marker continued pulsing farther inward.

Voices drifted from one of the houses he passed. The speakers used the same rapid language as the guards, with clicks between certain words and occasional whistles that seemed to carry meaning rather than emphasis. Kael could not understand any of it.

"I should get moving" Kael murmured as he continued toward the target.

Light spilled across the street ahead. He slowed before reaching the corner and found a small intersection illuminated by three suspended lamps. Two figures stood beneath them, arguing loudly enough that he understood the nature of the conversation without recognizing a single word.

One waved both hands with increasingly sharp movements. The other swayed where he stood, attempted to point at his companion, and missed by enough that his arm continued toward the empty street.

A whistle cut through the argument, followed by rapid speech and several angry clicks. The unsteady figure took one step forward, lost whatever battle he had been fighting with balance, and fell onto his back.

His companion shouted at him. The fallen man answered from the stones in a slurred stream of offended noises while a bottle rolled from his hand.

Kael shifted behind the corner and found a clearer angle. Green skin showed beneath the lamps, accompanied by a long nose, pointed ears, and a body built according to the same short proportions as the guards.

The standing creature wore a brown coat over a loose shirt and trousers. He carried no weapon beyond a utility knife at his belt. The one lying in the road wore a stained vest and the heavy clothing of a laborer.

Kael stared through the Darkness moving around his helmet. "Goblins?"

The sober one grabbed his companion beneath the arm and attempted to pull him upright. The drunk goblin protested loudly, failed to regain his feet, and was eventually dragged toward a nearby house.

The scene unsettled Kael more than the appearance of another monster would have.

He had fought goblins before. His earliest encounters with them had established a simple relationship: goblins were small, green enemies carrying crude weapons and attempting to stab him.

These two had not attacked anyone. One had become drunk, and his irritated friend was taking him home before he embarrassed himself further. Other goblins were probably sleeping, working late, eating with their families, or conducting similar arguments throughout the city.

Kael looked again at the low doors, short spears, guarded walls, and carefully planned streets. The pieces aligned with embarrassing simplicity.

This was not a human fortress occupied by goblins. It was a goblin city.

The settlement had permanent homes, civilian districts, workshops, farms, military patrols, and fortifications large enough to protect a regional population. The central complex might even contain a formal government or ruling family.

Kael reopened the mission description and examined its wording. The system had described the region as foreign-controlled and hostile. It had never called the people living here monsters.

That distinction gave new weight to one of the performance conditions.

[Number of unnecessary casualties.]

The Tower expected Kael to kill a specific target, not slaughter the city surrounding him. Whoever had issued the contract viewed these goblins as an opposing power rather than a collection of creatures waiting to become experience.

Kael had not intended to massacre civilians, but the discovery complicated his plan. He knew nothing about the power that had hired him, its conflict with the city, or why the marked individual needed to die. The contract might have come from humans, another goblin nation, or something else entirely.

It also destroyed any hope of blending into the population. Kael was already large by human standards. Among goblins, no cloak or stolen uniform would conceal the fact that he stood several heads above everyone around him. Disguising himself as a traveler would require removing half his legs.

His options narrowed to genuine stealth. He could not walk through the gates, join a caravan, or move openly through crowded districts. Every stage of the mission would depend upon Darkness and Presence continuing to work.

Kael glanced at the shadows curling around his arms. "Good thing the combination decided to become ridiculous."

He moved deeper into the city. The farther he travelled, the more evidence of ordinary life appeared around him. A bakery had closed for the night, although warm bread still scented the air outside. A small smithy occupied another corner, its forge dark and its tools arranged behind a shuttered window. Wooden signs hung above shops, covered in symbols he could not read.

Carts stood beside homes, laundry stretched between upper windows, and stacked baskets waited near doors for morning collection. Someone snored through an open window above Kael as he passed beneath it.

The sound stopped abruptly.

Kael froze in the narrow street and pressed closer to the wall. Several seconds passed before the goblin inside shifted, muttered something incomprehensible, and resumed snoring.

Darkness and Presence continued holding.

The fifty-percent reduction changed what would have been a series of brief concealment attempts into a viable method of infiltration. Under ordinary conditions, Kael would already have been calculating how long he could maintain both Runes before finding somewhere to recover. The drain remained noticeable, but it no longer threatened to empty his reserves before he reached the central district.

He still needed to avoid carelessness. Presence made observers reluctant to recognize him; it did not prevent a guard from noticing a door opening by itself, hearing metal scrape across a roof, or watching a shadow sprint through direct lantern light.

The map revealed more of the city as he advanced. Streets appeared as simplified lines, while buildings formed dark outlines around them. Kael adjusted his route toward the pulsing red marker and avoided the broad central avenue, where patrols passed often enough to make continued concealment risky.

He moved through alleys, crossed behind warehouses, and climbed onto rooftops whenever the streets became too exposed. Goblin architecture made that easier than expected. Most buildings stood only two or three stories tall, and the gaps between them required little effort to cross.

From the roofs, Kael gained a clearer view of the city’s center. The structure containing his target was larger than he had first estimated. A second wall separated it from the surrounding districts, with private guards watching several entrances. Multiple buildings enclosed inner courtyards, and elevated walkways connected the largest sections.

It could have been a palace, administrative fortress, or military headquarters. Whatever its purpose, it had been designed to protect whoever lived at its center.

Kael crouched behind a chimney and checked the map. The red marker hovered directly above the middle of the compound, proving that the Tower had placed his target in the location requiring the greatest possible effort to reach.

"Consistent, if nothing else."

A second point appeared on the map.

Kael blinked and shifted the interface, expecting it to disappear as the revealed streets adjusted. The light vanished briefly, then returned when he focused on the same section.

It was not red.

The new marker sat several streets away from the target compound, close enough to reach without entering the inner walls. Kael expanded the map and watched the point sharpen into a clear orange light.

He stopped breathing for a moment.

The map had identified valuable discoveries before, although rarely enough that Kael remembered every instance. Different colors represented different levels of rarity. Orange did not indicate something merely Rare or Epic.

Orange meant Legendary.

Kael leaned toward the interface despite it floating directly before his eyes. The red mission target continued pulsing within the central compound, while several streets away sat something his map considered valuable enough to mark in orange.

"That’s orange," he whispered.

A patrol on the street below slowed.

Kael immediately went silent and pressed himself against the chimney. Darkness tightened around his body while Presence pushed against the goblins’ awareness.

One guard raised his head and stared toward the rooftop. His gaze remained there long enough for Kael to wonder whether the synergy had finally failed, but the goblin eventually looked away and continued after the others.

Kael waited until the patrol disappeared around the next corner before checking the map again. The orange marker remained exactly where it had appeared, bright and unmistakable.

His contracted target waited inside the most protected compound in the city. Something Legendary waited several streets away.

Kael smiled beneath the Spartan helmet. Floor Twelve had already warned him that unnecessary risks would make the mission harder, yet the Tower had placed a Legendary discovery directly beside his route and apparently expected him to ignore it.

That felt less like a warning and more like a personal insult.