Chapter 237: You have devoured a Kobold

Seeing them both confused, especially Lucian, whose expression seemed to show that he genuinely didn’t understand what Isaac was worried about, Isaac began to explain.

"Kobolds are monsters who lurk in mostly cave-like dungeons, making it difficult to fight with such limited mobility."

He kept his voice lowered, occasionally glancing towards the darkness before continuing.

"And despite looking similar to goblins, these monsters mostly run away from strangers and only fight in groups. They are weaker than us, but greatly faster, and they’re also skilled with traps and fighting dirty, so we’ll have to be careful."

Just by his words alone, it was clear that he had researched these monsters and dungeons quite well, making Lucian slightly impressed.

Isaac himself was someone who didn’t like fighting much after all, so he had chosen the path of becoming the leader of his squad rather than a frontline fighter, preferring to coordinate everyone from behind instead of throwing himself straight into danger.

Despite possessing a C Rank talent, he rarely relied on close combat.

After understanding the implications of Isaac’s words, everyone became more on guard as they slowly began walking again, taking the same path from which the Kobold had appeared.

Their movements were more controlled now, but a few of them were slightly nervous, mostly because of the darkness and closed walls that made the entire place feel somewhat claustrophobic.

If they hadn’t prepared the torches and flashlights beforehand, some of them might have already abandoned the dungeon altogether.

They had known beforehand that this was going to be a cave-type dungeon, but they didn’t know specifically which types of monsters would appear until now, after discovering a living—rather, a previously living Kobold.

The moment they had walked a little farther away from the corpse of the Kobold, Lucian momentarily stopped.

His gaze shifted backwards, towards the corpse still lying where Ella had left it, and after staring at it for a brief moment—

Faint tendrils of dark, strange matter began oozing out from his hand, twisting around his fingers before slipping down, slowly slithering towards... the Kobold’s corpse.

Without looking back for too long, Lucian simply turned around and continued walking, keeping his hand behind him.

The tendrils stretched farther, wrapping around the corpse before engulfing it... before returning towards him.

And the place where the Kobold’s carcass had been lying only a few seconds ago...

Was empty.

The corpse had simply vanished, as if... it had disappeared out of existence.

[Ding~!]

And right before Lucian’s eyes, a familiar translucent screen flickered.

[You have devoured a Kobold.]

[You have obtained 1 Attribute Point.]

"What are you doing over there?"

Isaac’s voice suddenly came from ahead as he narrowed his eyes, noticing Lucian casually falling a few steps behind the group.

"Hm...? Nothing, just looking at the monster’s corpse," Lucian replied calmly.

Isaac clicked his tongue.

"Stay close. If we lose you somehow, you’ll have to live in here until someone comes to rescue you," he warned seriously.

Lucian simply shrugged at his words, completely unbothered—not that this dungeon had much to threaten him with.

After a few more moments of walking through the cave, with flashlights pointed forward, all of them arrived at a slightly larger opening. The walls gradually moved farther apart, while the ceiling seemed to rise slightly higher.

The cramped feeling that had been pressing against them for the past few minutes finally weakened, giving them a little more breathing space.

But the moment they were about to step further inside—

"Krehk!"

"Rkkh."

"Ghkkr...!"

They were immediately greeted by the echoing sounds of multiple Kobolds ahead.

Everyone’s expressions changed.

"Move back...!" Isaac whispered urgently, immediately pulling Jake behind him while raising a finger towards his lips, shushing them.

Isaac lowered the torch at once, aiming the light that had been pointing ahead towards the ground, making it harder for the monsters ahead to spot them.

He didn’t want to announce their exact location.

He was the only one holding the torch, since he had wanted to save the batteries in case of any unknown situations.

"It seems there are a couple of Kobolds this time," he muttered in a whisper, slowly pushing everyone backwards along with him.

"Now what?" Jake whispered beside him, his tone serious this time.

Instead of answering immediately, Isaac shifted his gaze towards Ella.

"Ella, how many are there?"

Hearing his words, the serious-looking girl narrowed her eyes, squinting into the darkness as she saw only faint silhouettes from the small amount of natural light inside the cave.

’Nine.’

Lucian thought, and almost at the same moment, Ella finally spoke.

"It’s difficult to see properly, but I’m sure there are about nine of them."

"Hmm?"

Lucian’s eyes rose curiously.

"How did you find that out?"

He kept his voice lowered, just like the others. But Ella flinched, tensing for a brief moment as she turned around, only to notice him standing so close to her... almost as if he had suddenly appeared beside her without her noticing.

She briefly glanced at him before looking forward.

"The cave isn’t entirely dark, and with good eyesight, it’s possible."

Lucian hummed softly in response.

Since he was easily able to see even in complete darkness without much trouble, he didn’t really know if there were any such difficulties or what kind of solutions people normally used to overcome them.

Isaac ignored Lucian and began thinking about their next course of action.

"Should we ambush them?" Jake asked, tightening his grip on his dagger, but Isaac immediately shut him down, making both Jake... and even Lucian feel disappointed.

The cave ahead was a bit wider than the narrow passage they had come from. There was enough room for the Kobolds to move around, but... that also meant something else.

"Can you tell me how many openings there are from which they can possibly escape?" he asked Ella, who narrowed her eyes again, trying to concentrate on the darkness beyond the Kobolds and looking for any other paths that might branch away from the main opening.

But... it was a bit difficult, as the darkness concealed most of the details, and the limited light wasn’t enough to get a proper view.

"I cannot see pro—"

"There are two more cave exits, excluding the one we’re standing at."

Lucian’s voice immediately interrupted her.

Everyone shifted their heads towards him, and Isaac’s brows furrowed.

For a moment, he dismissed the statement.

"How can I—" He paused.

Something about the confidence in Lucian’s words made him reconsider.

Isaac stared at him for a moment.

"How do you know that?" he asked instead.

"My eyesight is better than all of yours," Lucian answered casually, the subtle arrogance in his voice making a few of their lips twitch.

Isaac’s expression tightened slightly, but almost instantly, without wasting any time, he nodded.

"If what you’re saying is true..."

"It is."

Isaac’s eye twitched.

"Fine. If that’s true, then we’ll have to prevent them from escaping."

He turned his gaze back towards the cave.

"If even one of them gets away, there’s a chance it’ll alert the others deeper inside."

That was the main problem.

The Kobolds were just like Goblins. Weaker when fought individually, but when they came in groups... one small mistake might take your life away.

They were weak, perhaps even stupid, but all in all... they were monsters.

Meanwhile...

The Kobolds, having absolutely no idea that a group of humans was watching them, were sitting on the ground while speaking among themselves, or perhaps rambling something in their own, odd language, while eating a cave rat they had hunted a couple of minutes ago.

The atmosphere inside the cave was quiet, even a bit peaceful to those creatures, who were completely invested in their meal.

After about a minute...

"Ella and Jake, both of you will take the front. Don’t let them reach the exits, and try to make sure they don’t get much time to react against you."

Both of them nodded.

"Ava, make sure to kill one of them during this time, and Jennifer, keep an eye on everything... but don’t use your weapon. The noise will only attract more monsters."

"I know, you didn’t need to tell me." Jennifer rolled her eyes.

Isaac then shifted his attention towards the two newcomers.

"Mr. Lucian... I’ve heard you possess a Fire Affinity. Since this is your first time, I won’t be unreasonable, but if you can, I want you to burn at least one of them, if that is possible for you from this distance."

Lucian tilted his head, and though he wanted to say he could do much more than that... he was curious about their fighting style, so he simply nodded.

[Wow, you didn’t argue with him...?]

’I’m not that unreasonable, you know?’

[...I know... I know.]

There was clear sarcasm in our dear System’s voice.

"As for Miss Selene..."

Isaac looked towards Ava momentarily, who nodded back at him.

"Since Ava told me you’re good at close combat, I want you to target one of them."

Lucian’s eyes narrowed slightly, but he didn’t say anything, at least not after seeing the stats of the Kobolds.

But he couldn’t just send his mother into the fight without any precautions, so...

He lightly tapped his foot against the ground, looking downward before muttering something under his breath.

’I’m not sure if she understood that...’

Before he could even complete the thought, his shadow distorted, and from the unnoticed eyes of everyone else, it moved across the ground before slipping away from him, travelling towards Selene.

’Never mind, she’s too good at this.’

Lucian’s lips curled faintly as he felt even more impressed by his cute w... maid.

"And mainly, I want both of you to be careful, especially you," Isaac said, his eyes settling on Selene with seriousness.

"Even if you are skilled in combat... don’t let your guard down."

Isaac then looked towards the rest of the squad, his gaze slowly moving from one person to another.

"All of you too, don’t let your guard down. We’re here to grow, not to die inside this cave."

"Don’t worry, we’re not intending to create a fossil of ourselves in here," Jake said with a faint chuckle, easing the tension in the atmosphere immediately.

"Be careful."

Isaac muttered under his breath, then finally turned towards the entrance once again.

"Let’s go."