Being on watch was one of the worst things to do, now I understood why my subordinates always complained about that task. I was bored. A few hours passed and the number of goblins hadn't decreased much, they were on alert, for some reason I had no idea. Maybe waiting for some enemy monsters, or more allies.
"We won't be able to defeat them before the other goblins come out of the cave."
"I agree, it would be a suicide mission."
"How much longer will we have to wait?"
"Look over there," Jasmine said while pointing at a hobgoblin. He was holding something similar to paper.
"Paper?"
"No, but it looks like it," I said.
"I think it's leather, they're using leather as paper. Can they write?"
"Maybe yes, but not in our language. It would be very interesting to collect and try to sell it to the guild, but it's too risky, so the best is not to try."
That scene was very curious, monsters acting like humans, could they really read and write? Or did they just find the leather and were imitating a human behavior they had seen?
At the guild's butcher shop, the butcher was finishing slicing the orc king, she was calmly cutting the meat and delicately separating the flesh from the bone, while at the same time writing down some notes. When she took the head and cut it, she noticed a green crystal, it broke when she removed it, at the same time the orc's head started to rot, the rest of the body remained the same, the already cut meat didn't seem to have changed.
But the head began to stink.
After taking notes, she went to the guild master.
"Did anyone else from the guild see you cut this orc?"
"No, no one else knew that we got this body."
Kalil seemed worried about something, he looked much more cautious than before, that made Cami uncomfortable.
"You know something, you want to say it, but you can't. Am I right?"
"Yes, I do have some theories about what happened, but none can be spoken."
"I understand, I won't bother you with that, I just need to report what I discovered."
"I ended up forgetting this detail, I'm sorry for that. Please, tell me what you found."
"I found this green crystal in the orc's head, when I removed it his head started to rot, but the rest of the body stayed the same. In this case, the rest of the body had already been cut, I left the head for last. The crystal also broke when I removed it," she said while placing the crystal on Kalil's table.
"It's different," Kalil said while examining the crystal.
"Different how?"
"Have you trained mana control?"
"No. Actually, yes, but it was a long time ago. I also didn't continue."
"Try to feel the mana in this crystal and in this other one," he said while looking for a crystal in one of the drawers. He found a red crystal and handed both to Cami.
"I can't describe it very well, but I feel that the orc's crystal was releasing more mana than the other crystal."
"Crystals, for the most part, are stable, of course some beginner alchemists can create crystals that release mana this way, even crystals found in dungeons can do that, but they are rare. Normally, crystals only release mana when they are used, that's why I think this crystal was created and placed inside the orc. But this information cannot leave here," he said while taking the crystals back.
"Understood, I'll pretend I didn't hear or see anything. But what do we do with the orc's meat?"
"Put it in an item pouch and store it in the evidence deposit."
The evidence deposit was a room in the guild's underground, it was near the prison, but the entrance was controlled, only people registered in a magical security system could enter, so not even thieves could steal the items. But the room was old and dusty, it didn't have many items there.
I kept waiting for the goblins to decrease, I admit I was curious about the material that looked like paper, but at the same time it could just be a piece of leather with nothing written on it. But the way that hobgoblin acted was strange, it reminded me of an engineer, I didn't remember his name, but he would stay in that same position while explaining to the masons how they should build.
Those memories always came to my mind.
"Some are going in," Dain said in an almost inaudible tone.
Some goblins were entering the cave, in a few minutes only twenty remained, which would be perfectly possible to deal with.
Even being weak monsters, in numbers they could give a lot of trouble.
We kept watching for about five minutes and no goblin entered or left.
"Let's take formation."
"Right!"
Dain stood in front, he had great endurance and strength, with Nima's help he could be even better. Nima used her magic and made Jasmine, Jasly and me stronger. With that, we managed to break the cave entrance.
I used explosive magic and Jasly controlled the air and added more oxygen, making the explosion much stronger, much stronger. It almost left me deaf. Jasmine used wind magic before and helped make it more brittle.
Dain and Elys were taking care of the goblins, I kept using fire magic to try to melt the rocks from the debris, but it was still very difficult. Jasly used wind magic and increased the oxygen supply, but even so it was hard to melt the rocks. I could use earth magic, but I was hiding this ability, no one could find out that I was capable of using four elements.
Dain and Elys finished killing the goblins, Tobias started cutting the ears.
A noise was coming from the cave, I kept trying to melt the rocks.
"Better we run, they might come out at any moment," Jasmine said.
"All right," I agreed, but I still wanted to keep melting the rocks.
We ran, and it was the best decision, the goblins managed to remove the debris and, with that, opened the entrance and started running in our direction, we were fast and they were far away.
Jasmine stopped running and used wind magic, she managed to kill two goblins, but there were still many. Dozens, no, there were hundreds of goblins.
Jasmine started running again, I used fire magic and managed to cause wounds, but nothing effective, it was hard to hit the goblins while running desperately.
I think I had never been so scared in my whole life, even in many situations where I fought for my life, I think this had been the most desperate.
We managed to get away from the goblins, but the mission failed, it would be even more risky if we tried again. I only hoped I wouldn't have to pay the fine.
"Don't worry about that amount, the failure was the guild's, giving you a mission of a higher level," Kalil said.
Dain couldn't believe it, he was already prepared to beg Kalil to at least reduce the fine.
Kalil stood up, "I'll take care of those goblins myself," he said while leaving and dropping some silver coins. "Have fun at the bar."
"What happened to him?" Dain asked while drinking beer.
"Stop thinking there's something wrong with him and just enjoy the moment, it's not every time that a failed mission comes with a reward."
Jasmine was right, it wasn't the best scenario, but surely it was very good, since I didn't have to pay the loss. But at the same time I was a little worried, I knew Kalil was strong, very strong, but even so I didn't know if he could defeat all the goblins alone.
I took a glass of juice and bit a piece of meat from some monster that I had no idea the name of.
"What monster is this?"
"This is chicken," Jasmine said laughing.
Jasly looked at Jasmine in a different way.
"It's been so long that I've been eating only monsters that I ended up forgetting the taste of animals."
In my world they would be animals, orcs looked like pigs, so we wouldn't give them another name, they would be pig something. At least that's what I thought it would be.
"We need another mission, one that is easy and at least pays for two days of lodging and food," Tobias said while drinking his second cup of beer.
"Why don't we buy a house?" Jasmine said with her mouth full.
"That's a good plan, but it's very expensive."
"How expensive?" I asked.
"Considering that we're all going to live there, we need a very big house with seven rooms..."
"Not necessarily," I interrupted. "We can turn other parts into rooms, only if no one has something against it. No, better not, we might cause some rivalry with that."
"I think at least 300 gold coins," Dain completed.
"It shouldn't be that hard to get money in the black market, where is it?" I asked.
"Are you interested in living with us?"
"To be honest, yes, I would hate to have to live at the Academy, it must be full of rules and, from what I knew, we could live in other places as long as we followed the class schedules. Well, assuming we passed the exam."
"I'll take you there, to the black market," Elys said.
Dain looked at her, but didn't say anything.