The eastern reaches of Lowhaven were a sharp departure from the iron-grated streets and soot-stained skies of the industrial hubs. Here, the island's edge was softened by a dense, humid thicket of silver-leafed trees and tangled briars that thrived on the moisture of passing clouds.
Aiven adjusted the strap of his new longsword, the weight of the steel a comforting, solid presence at his hip. Beside him, Virelle drifted a few inches above the muddy trail, her translucent sleeves held delicately away from the damp foliage as if the mud itself were an affront to her dignity.
"Master, I was under the impression that thickets were a poetic way of saying beautiful garden," Virelle remarked, dodging a low-hanging branch with a graceful, bored roll in mid-air. "This is just... aggressive dirt. Why would anyone choose to live so close to so much nature?"
Aiven found it somewhat ironic that Virelle, an elf, gave such comments about nature.
"It's where the grazing lands are," Aiven explained, his eyes scanning the perimeter with the focus of a man who had spent the morning memorizing monster manuals. "The village of Greenhollow provides nearly a third of the fresh livestock for the central districts. We aren't here for the scenery."
They reached the outskirts of the village shortly after noon. Greenhollow was a modest cluster of thatched-roof cottages, but today, it lacked the typical bustle of a farming community. The communal well was empty, and the shutters on most windows were tightly drawn.
A young girl with braided hair and a simple linen dress stood waiting near the village gates. As they approached, she looked up, her eyes wide with a mix of hope and profound exhaustion.
"Are you the adventurers from the Guild?" she asked, her voice trembling. "I'm Elin. My father is the village chief."
"Aiven Roan," Aiven said, giving a small, reassuring nod. "And this is Virelle. We're here about the Kobold subjugation."
Elin's shoulders slumped in relief, her hand clutching a small wooden charm at her neck. "Thank goodness. It's been weeks of terror. Usually, the thickets are safe—the guards from the city pass through once a month—but lately, the Kobolds have changed. They're stealing livestock every night, and just yesterday, they dragged off two of our goats. Old Man Harlen tried to stop them and..." she bit her lip, "they broke his arm with a stone club. We can't even go to the wells alone anymore."
Virelle hovered closer, her violet eyes scanning the girl with a detached curiosity. "Pesky, scaled creatures causing this much distress?" she mused. "I had thought Kobolds were merely minor nuisances—the kind of things one steps on without realizing."
"To us, they're monsters," Elin pleaded, looking at Aiven. "They don't just steal anymore. They watch us from the trees. It's like they're... learning. Please, if you could just eliminate enough of them to make them realize this village is protected, they might stop."
Aiven looked at his new sword, then at the girl's terrified expression. What he had initially viewed as an opportunity to test his equipment suddenly felt like a mission with real stakes. For a normal human without a magic-user at their side, a pack of coordinated Kobolds was a death sentence.
"We'll take care of it, Elin," Aiven promised. "Stay inside the village gates."
The thicket grew darker and more claustrophobic as they moved away from the village. The canopy of silver leaves was so dense that the afternoon sun was reduced to pale, sickly shafts of light. Aiven kept his hand on his hilt, his "clerk-brain" recalling every tactic he had read in the adventurer magazines.
"Keep your eyes sharp, Virelle," Aiven whispered, stepping over a rotted log. "Kobolds aren't like the Rock-Shelled Lurkers. They rely on numbers and underhanded tactics. They're small, which makes them cowards individually, but they love ambushes. They'll wait for you to look at a rustling leaf before they lunge for your—"
"Numbers are irrelevant when the result is always zero," Virelle interrupted, her prismatic orb pulsing with a bored lavender light.
"We should stay on alert so that an ambush doesn't—"
Snap.
From a dense cluster of bushes to their left, three shapes erupted with terrifying speed. They were small, scaly, and dog-like, their skin a mottled brown that blended perfectly with the bark. They leaped with a high-pitched, jagged yapping, stone-tipped spears leveled directly at Aiven's chest.
Virelle didn't even turn her head. She simply made a lazy, dismissive 'hoosh' gesture with her left hand.
BOOM.
A wall of invisible mana slammed into the three Kobolds mid-air. The impact was violent; they weren't just knocked back, they were launched. The creatures were blasted ten feet through the air, their small bodies slamming into the trunk of a massive oak with a sickening, collective crunch.
Aiven stood frozen, his sword only halfway out of its scabbard. "I... I didn't think they'd jump us that early."
Virelle drifted toward the pile of scaled bodies, her face twisted in a look of profound, aristocratic annoyance. "How dare they," she hissed, her silver hair beginning to drift as her mana flared. "Attempting to touch my Master with those filthy, unwashed stones? Truly, their lack of manners is an offense to the senses."
She raised a finger, a bead of concentrated mana forming at the tip.
"Wait, Virelle—!"
Too late.
She flicked the bead toward the stacked Kobolds. There was no explosion, only a silent, searing flash of violet light. When the glow faded, there were no Kobolds—only a patch of charred, blackened earth and the faint, biting scent of ozone.
Aiven stood in the sudden silence, his heart hammering against his ribs. He looked at the empty space where the ambush had been, then at his new, unused longsword.
"I was going to say you went overboard," Aiven muttered, finally sliding his blade back into the scabbard. "But... I guess ensuring they won't be coming back to the village is the goal."
They ventured deeper into the emerald gloom. Aiven paid more attention to his surroundings now, his boots treading softly on the rotted mulch, while Virelle floated lazily around him.
Suddenly, three more Kobolds emerged from behind a cluster of thorny briars, clutching jagged stone axes. Before they could even yap a challenge, Virelle raised a hand. Several thin arcs of violet electricity snapped from her fingertips, zapping the creatures. They didn't die; instead, they began to move with a strange, jittery sluggishness, their limbs heavy as if the air had turned to lead.
Aiven looked at her, surprised she hadn't deleted them instantly. "You're... holding back?"
"I am a very attentive partner, Master," Virelle said, resting her chin in her hand as she floated. "I recall you were quite eager to test that new piece of metal. I thought I would offer a bit of... environmental aid."
"Thank you, Virelle," Aiven said, drawing his sword.
The Kobolds could still move, though they looked confused and panicked. Virelle watched them for a beat, her eyes narrowing. "Actually, perhaps I should just leave one. Three is a bit crowded for a first lesson."
She gestured with two fingers upward. Two of the Kobolds were suddenly yanked into the air, rising twenty feet before their yaps turned to screams. Then, she made a sharp downward gesture. The two creatures were slammed into the earth with the force of a falling anvil, killing them instantly.
The remaining Kobold, seeing its companions crushed, dropped its axe and turned to run.
"Oh, no you don't," Virelle hummed. She made a casual 'come here' gesture with her fingers, and a wave of gravity dragged the creature backward through the mud until it was cowering at Aiven's feet.
Virelle floated near the trembling creature, her violet eyes cold. "Fight my Master," she commanded, her voice a lethal whisper. "If you try to run again, I will sever your head before your next heartbeat."
The Kobold seemed to understand the gravity of its situation. Driven by primal terror, it scrambled up and charged at Aiven with a desperate snarl.
Aiven stepped into the fray. His movements were still somewhat sluggish, but they were significantly better than his last fight. He parried a claw-swipe, the ring of steel against scales echoing through the trees. He retreated, pivoted, and waited for the opening he'd read about.
After a few tense exchanges, he saw it. He stepped forward and drove the sword through the creature's chest. It was a clean kill.
Aiven exhaled, wiping the blade. "Better," he muttered.
They continued their advance through the thicket. The pattern repeated itself: whenever a pack of Kobolds emerged, Virelle would act with surgical precision, thinning the herd in an eye-blink and leaving exactly one survivor for Aiven. Each time, she ensured the creature was sufficiently terrified, forcing it into a corner so Aiven could practice his footwork and timing without the risk of being swarmed. It was a grueling, bloody routine, but with every encounter, Aiven's movements became more deliberate, his strikes gaining a confidence that hadn't been there at breakfast.
Then, the atmosphere changed.
Virelle's prismatic orb abruptly stopped its rhythmic humming. It began to vibrate with a high-pitched, jagged resonance, the light within shifting from a soft lavender to a harsh, flickering violet that looked like static. Virelle came to a halt in mid-air, her playful expression vanishing as she closed her eyes to listen to the mana in the air.
"Master," she said, her voice dropping into a cold, clinical register. "I feel it. The weirdness... it's just like that gigantic anomaly lurker from Sector 4. But it's louder here. Closer."
Aiven gripped the hilt of his longsword, the air around them feeling suddenly thin. "Lead the way."
Virelle nodded and drifted forward through a final wall of silver-leafed briars. They emerged into a wide, unnatural clearing. It was a proper Kobold settlement, filled with small huts made of scavenged wood and hide, but the usual yapping and clatter of stones was absent. The clearing was drowned in a heavy, terrified silence.
In the center of the settlement stood a nightmare.
It was a Kobold, but grotesquely expanded to seven feet tall, its scaly skin a sickly, bruised grey. Most horrifying were its limbs—it possessed four muscular arms, each ending in jagged, obsidian-like claws that seemed too sharp for natural bone. A purplish mist swiveled around its torso, flickering like electrical static and seemingly sewing the extra limbs into its flesh. Its eyes were no longer yellow, but empty pits of violet nothingness.
"Another anomaly," Aiven whispered, the chill of the clearing seeping into his bones.
Virelle hovered beside him, her silver hair drifting as her mana began to flare. "Guess it's no longer the time for sword practice, Master."