Jack of all Trades – 302
The Abandoned City
For a while, I stuck half of my face out and watched. Of course, Presence Detection was still activated. What it told me was that this abandoned city… Well, I had to call it that, because I didn’t know what the official name was. In any case, it was the current home of these goblins. But they didn’t live here in a way that humans might have. I was able to see quite a lot with Eyes of the God Wolf.
“Uhh…over there as well…”
There were so many of them. And they were eating. Chomp-chomp. Crunch-crunch. Splat-splat. Hands, feet, bellies, heads. They tore each other apart, limb from limb as if moved by an insatiable appetite.
They were eating each other.
Even if they had the intelligence to go out and hunt, there were too many to feed. Of course. There could be as many as thirty new goblins every week. How could they continue to feed all of them? It was quite obvious that something like this would happen.
Currently, I was only able to see as far as two kilometers around me. But that was enough to cover everything. In other words, all of the goblins were inside of my range. And they were eating each other.
“No… No, that’s not right…”
I used Eyes of the God Wolf to look inside a certain building. Several armed goblins appeared to be trapping other goblins inside. The unarmed goblins shouted behind bars, their mouths open wide. In reply, spears were thrust in their direction.
They imprisoned their own as well.
After wondering about this for a while, I felt a chill go down my spine. I had goosebumps.
“I see… Who would have thought of such a thing…?”
They were being imprisoned for food. They raised them until they were grown enough to eat. And if that still wasn’t enough, they would go out and hunt. Hunting was just to supplement their diet, it wasn’t their primary food source. They ate goblins. Animals were a side-dish.
This city that overflowed with goblins, was a cannibalistic hell.
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I continued to observe them, but then my eyes started to get tired. It was becoming harder to focus on anything. And so I was about to turn around and head back, when I detected a human through Presence Detection.
And so I quietly deactivated Eyes of the God Wolf, unsheathed my sword, and spun around. After a while, a small light began to spread out. It started illuminating the passage. Then I saw the magic light appear as the person turned the corner. It was Anis.
“Why are you here?”
“You were taking so long…”
Now that I thought about it, it had been quite some time since I descended. It was easy to forget the passage of time when it was so dark.
“Sorry about that. But it’s too dangerous here for carrying torches. Put it out. We’ll return at once.”
“Understood.”
She put the magic illumination tool out and then smiled at me. I probably looked like a nocturnal animal with my glowing eyes. She nodded and took my hand. I did mean to take her back, but this way would take too much time.
“This will be faster.”
“Huh? Oh…”
I picked her up and used Legs of the God Wolf to rush through the passage. As I was very cautious, it had taken a while to come down here, but it was just a few minutes to return.
I stepped on air and jumped up the slope at the end, and then flew out of the hollow and into the light. For a second, my vision was nothing but white. This was because I still had Nighteyes on. I frantically turned it off and looked around me. I quickly detected the presence of Igeldo and Ulgio.
“Mister Asagi.”
Igeldo ran up to us. I put Anis down and raised a hand in his direction. Ulgio also started to run towards us.
“How was it inside…?”
“Awful. Let’s go back. I’ll tell you on the way.”
I answered when Ulgio asked hesitantly. And so we started back to the camp. I needed to talk to Adlus as soon as possible so we could adjust things. This would be a lot harder than we had thought.
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There wasn’t much in the way of arguing during the third war council. There wasn’t much of a discussion either. In fact, it was a lot of silence. Everyone seemed to be too deep in thought to say anything.
“…I do have one question.”
Daniela was the first to speak up.
“Why do the goblins stay down there?”
“I’ve been wondering the same thing.”
If you had nothing in the fridge, leave the house. It should be the same for humans and monsters. And yet they stayed in that underground space and ate each other.
“I watched them for quite a while, but there was nothing that really gave me a hint.”
“Hmm…”
That was no good. We would have to investigate further if we wanted to know the answer.
“Asagi.”
“What?”
Now it was Adlus who spoke up.
“Did you catch sight of this queen?”
“About that…”
I had spread out Presence Detection and carefully scanned the place with Eyes of the God Wolf, but…
“I didn’t see any goblin that would fit the description.”
“What?”
Perhaps we had made a mistake. The appearance of the Queen’s Knight Goblin had made us assume. What if there was no queen?
That city was made by the ancient elves. No one else could have made it.
Isekai ni Kita Boku wa Kiyoubinbode Subaya-sa Tayorina Tabi o Suru Jack of all Trades
