Chapter 19 - 19: The Demon In The Smoke

Chapter 19: Chapter 19: The Demon In The Smoke

It has been close to an hour since Lake had begun his hunt in the goblin fortress. Since then, Lake had been navigating through the fortress using the past of the goblins he had seen to guide him through the encampment, all while silently killing them off.

In the short time that had passed, he had already managed to kill close to a hundred goblins!

The reason he was able to kill so many of them in such a short time was mostly due to how densely packed the goblin fortress was. In other places like zone one, candidates had to spend most of their efforts searching for monsters to kill, wasting most of their time.

This wasn't the case for Lake however. Since all the goblins were inside the fortress, he didn't have to spend much time searching for his next kill, as he only had to walk around a corner before he spotted his prey.

[Total Points = 480]

[RP Points = 115.354]

Looking at the points that he had gathered, Lake smiled happily, especially when he saw the huge amount of RP that he had managed to gather.

With the current amount of points Lake could immediately upgrade his Observer of Fate Skill to Level 2. Lake thought about it for a bit before deciding to wait until the exam was over before upgrading his skill. Remembering the state he was left in when he first obtained his skills, he didn't want to take the risk in case upgrading his skills also left him in a vulnerable state.

After checking his RP, Lake began to think about his next move. At this point he had already killed most of the goblins located in the living sector. The only ones that remained were the hunting goblins in the outer sector and the goblin king located in the inner sector.

He could stop his hunt now and be satisfied with the points that he had gathered but Lake didn't wish to do so as he still had the quest issued by the system. Pulling up the system menu once more, Lake took another look at the system quest.

[Quest Name: The Hunt.]

[Quest Description: The system has detected a large group of otherworldly creatures near the host. Please clean them up.]

[Quest Objective: Kill as many otherworldly creatures as possible within the time limit. Current Time remaining = 2 hours and 39 minutes.]

[Quest reward: The more creatures the host kills, the better the reward.]

[Current number of creatures killed = 99.]

There were still more than two and a half hours remaining and Lake didn't want to simply waste it waiting for the exam to be over.

Taking a deep breath, he steeled himself as he turned his gaze to the outer sector. As Lake began to move out of the living sector he started analyzing all the information he had on the goblins there and the best way to approach the situation.

So far, Lake had managed to easily kill them by ambushing and taking them out one by one. Since the goblins in the living sector were also unarmed, Lake didn't have to worry too much about a counterattack from his victims so far.

Unfortunately, that strategy wasn't going to work this time. The goblins in the outer sector were all armed and stayed in small groups so taking them out one by one wasn't going to work.

If he wanted to kill them safely he would have to draw them out one by one before slowly picking them off. If he were to do it that way however, it was going to take way too long and the exam would be long over by then.

If Lake was going to finish this quickly and efficiently, he was going to need to be fast and efficient with his approach.

As Lake's thoughts reached this point, he arrived in the outer sector. The area was mostly an open area with fire pits and large tents scattered around. There were a few towers and ladders as well leading to the walls where he could see goblins patrolling. The rest of the hunting goblins sat around the fire pits as they talked with one another.

As Lake stayed hidden behind one of the huts near the outer sector, he quietly began to observe the fates of the goblins that were moving about. He started to madly analyze each and every goblin that was within range as he began to roughly form a plan in his head.

There are a total of one hundred and eight goblins in the outer sector. Ten of those goblins are standing on towers while another twenty patrols the walls. The remaining goblins were separated into small groups that sat around the various fire pits or walked around.

Most of the goblins used crudely made spears while a very small percent of them used bows. If Lake was going to finish this quickly he would first need to take out the goblins with the bows, otherwise he would have to constantly be wary of being shot from behind while he fights the goblins.

Looking at the positions of the goblins with the bows, most of them stood within the towers that overlooked the area while the rest were grouped up around a fire pit.

After observing around one more time, Lake formulated a plan as he began to sneak closer to one of the towers. This tower was located next to a group of about twelve goblins sitting around a fire pit as they talked in their language. Lake could even see them making jokes with one another as they got along.

This made Lake feel slightly strange, as the more Lake looked at them, the more intelligent and human they appeared. Knowing he would also have to kill all of them, it made Lake feel slightly uncomfortable, however, he didn't let it bother him for long as he moved closer to the tower.

At this point, Lake was around twenty meters away from the tower. The area between him and the tower was in the open and in clear view of the group of goblins.

As Lake crouched, he took a deep breath as he calmed his nerves. In order to successfully complete this plan he was going to need to be extremely quick and precise with his next couple of actions.

After taking one last look at the group of goblins next to the fire pit, Lake dashed straight to the tower. While Lake ran he was spotted by one of the goblins who pointed him out to the rest.

However before the goblins could get up from the fire pit, Lake had already reached the tower. Without hesitation, Lake quickly grabbed the supporting beam for the tower before gripping down hard and pulling with all of his strength as veins began to show on his arms and neck. Lake's thought process was fairly simple, since it would take too long to climb each tower individually, he would simply knock each tower down forcefully.

This may appear as an extremely stupid idea if it were attempted by a normal candidate. Each of the pillars were extremely thick, roughly 10 inches wide and were planted firmly into the ground. The strength needed to break the pillar would be something no ordinary candidate would possess. However, Lake was no ordinary candidate..

The goblins who saw the human trying to pull the tower laughed loudly at him as they spoke in a mocking tone in their own language. However, before they could even grab their weapons to deal with the human, a loud sound resonated throughout the area.

*CRACK*

The goblins with stunned expressions watched on as they saw the solid wood support pillar that was nearly as thick as their own bodies, quickly began to bend as splinters of wood flew out from it under the pressure.

Feeling that the pillar was at its breaking point, Lake relaxed his grip for a moment before making a last ditch effort and tugging at the pillar with all his might as he snapped the support in two with a resounding crack.

The goblins that stood there in a daze finally awoke after seeing that the pillar had been broken; however, they were still too late to react.

With one of the support pillars gone, the other support pillars were struggling to keep the tower upright. Seeing the goblins still in the same place, Lake didn't waste the opportunity as he quickly kicked another one of the support pillars, causing it to snap under the pressure that had suddenly increased.

As the tower slowly began to lean forward now with two pillars gone, Lake jumped up, grabbing onto a piece of wood that connected the now two broken pillars, before dragging it down, greatly accelerating the fall of the tower towards the goblins.

The group of goblins who had originally been laughing and mocking at the human before them, were now shaking in fear as they looked on in despair as the 20 meter tall tower fell down towards them. n0vEluSb.c0m

Some of the goblins tried to jump out of the way but the majority of them were too slow as they were crushed under the weight of the tower.

*BOOM*

A shockwave spread throughout the area as clouds of dust and debris arose from the rubble of the fallen tower.

The fall of the tower created a loud noise that had attracted the attention of the other goblins in the surrounding area. When the goblins had arrived at the site of the fallen tower, clouds of dust still filled the area.

When the dust finally cleared a bit and the goblins could see what was going on, they were all shocked. When the tower fell it had crushed most of the goblins into paste as parts of their body lay scattered about.

The tower had also fallen onto the fire pit that still had embers in it causing the wooden tower to catch ablaze as a fire began to rage. Feeling the scorching heat rising from the fire, all the goblins couldn't help but take a step back.

However, before the goblins could understand how such a tragedy could have happened, they were suddenly alarmed as they heard another loud boom from behind them as they all felt the ground shake.

Quickly turning around, the goblin's watched in both shock and horror as another tower fell down causing even more clouds of dust to rise. The goblins were seriously terrified at this point. Two out of their five main towers had suddenly fallen out of nowhere with no apparent reason causing them all to tremble in fear.

Before the goblins could calm down however, they watched on as another tower fell even quicker than the first and the second one, crashing into a set of tents causing the fire to spread even more as the tower was also ignited.

What terrified the goblins the most however was that they remembered that there was no open fire in that area, so how did the tower catch ablaze?

With all these thoughts filling their heads and fear clouding their judgements, the goblins watched on in horror as the last two remaining towers fell one after the other causing the fire to spread as clouds smoke and dust filled the area making visibility extremely low.

From where the goblin's stood they could see that the fire had somehow managed to spread to the walls and the tents in the living sector, lighting the entire fortress on fire.

At this point, the group of goblins were close to peeing themselves as they held each other as they trembled with a deep sense of fear.

As visibility became low, the goblins could barely see a few feet in front of them as they all began to cough as they inhaled the smoke that filled the area.

Feeling that something needed to be done immediately, one of the captains of the goblin hunting party gave the order to quickly retreat out of the smoke. Hearing the orders of the captain, the goblins quickly began to retreat as they rushed to the nearest exit.

As the goblins moved through the heavy smoke, they moved in large numbers. What the goblins didn't realize however, is that their numbers had been dwindling since they began walking through the smoke as a goblin disappeared every so often.

It took a long while before the goblin captain realized something was wrong as he stopped the goblins that had been retreating. They had arrived in an area where the smoke was far less than compared to the area they were in previously so they were able to take a breather here.

However everyone quickly realized that their numbers had fallen sharply since they entered the smoke. The originally close to one hundred goblins had fallen by nearly half in the time it took them to move through the smoke.

At this point the goblins were starting to get extremely creeped out as they felt something was extremely wrong with this situation. Why did the towers fall? How did the fire from the outer sector spread to the living sector? Where did their goblin brethren and friends disappear to?

With all these thoughts going through everyone's head, they were suddenly startled as the screams of a goblin shouted out.

Turning in the direction of the scream, everyone felt chills go up their spines as they watched a goblin get dragged into the smoke.

Before anyone could react and go help the goblin, they were suddenly rooted to the ground as they heard the screams of the goblins stop abruptly

Before anyone could do anything they watched as an object was thrown out from the smoke before rolling on the floor.

When the object finally stopped rolling, everyone quickly realized what it was as they all widened their eyes in horror.

The object was the head of the goblin that had been dragged into the smoke, its face still had the expression of fear when it died. That same fear seemed to be contagious as everyone's mental walls began to break down.

Some goblins couldn't control themselves any longer as a pungent smell of urine was emitted from their bodies. They had finally peed themselves.

The only reason the goblins hadn't started panicking is due to their captain who was still with them. He was currently giving orders for everyone to group up and don't panic.

"(spoken in goblin) Gather up everyone! There is something in the smoke, we can't let it get to-" Before the goblin captain could finish speaking, he was suddenly interrupted as an object quickly flew through the air.

*Pierce!*

The goblin captain that stopped mid sentence, turned his gaze slightly downwards where he could see the tip of a spear sticking out of his chest.

After a few seconds everyone watched as the goblin captain's body fell to the ground with a solid thud.

It didn't take long after that for panic to ensue among the goblins as they all began to scatter in various directions, screaming as they ran.

A distance away, standing in the smoke stood Lake wearing a soaked cloth mask he had quickly made when the smoke began to spread.

Lake picked up a spear from the bundle he had gathered while taking out the goblins. Looking into the smoke, Lake gaze flashed with a cold light as he smiled lightly underneath the mask, as he looked at the fleeing goblins.

In that instant, his eyes looked incomparably cold.