Serra looked at Klaus with concern in her eyes.

"Are you okay?" Serra asked.

Klaus glanced down at himself.

Goblin blood was splattered all over his clothes... green and viscous as he was already starting to smell like rotten vegetables mixed with copper.

The Hobgoblin’s explosive death had painted him thoroughly.

"I’m fine," Klaus said with a shrug. "You should be asking the goblin that."

Serra’s gaze shifted to the Hobgoblin corpse scattered across the ground or rather, the eight separate pieces of what used to be a Hobgoblin with the organs still steaming on the cold stone.

"Asking a goblin corpse if it’s fine after watching it die is something a psychopath would do..." Serra said flatly and Klaus.

There was movement in his peripheral vision as another Hobgoblin approaching from deeper in the cave.

Klaus flicked his hand outward casually.

Instead of eight swords, only three ripped forward this time. They stabbed the monster through the head and chest simultaneously, punching clean through.

The Hobgoblin’s eyes went wide then glazed over as it collapsed to the ground with a heavy thud.

Klaus retracted the weapons with a thought, making them float around him along with the eight other swords.

Eleven blades now orbited his position in a loose defensive formation as the second Hobgoblin bled out on the stone floor while they waited for the third one to show.

"So Serra, what kind of support magic can you do?" Klaus asked.

Serra took a few moments to think before answering.

"I can use Fast..." Serra said. "It makes a person or object faster than what they can usually manage. The effect scales with how much mana I put into it and the base speed of the person or object itself."

"That’s the one you used before..." Klaus nodded. "What else?"

"I can also use strong..." Serra continued. "It makes people physically stronger and its really good for adventurers who fight with weapons or need to move heavy things."

She paused with her expression souring slightly.

"Though Kahn and Garrick hated the idea of borrowed strength..." Serra added with a sigh. "They didn’t like using it since it wasn’t their own power."

’Classic tank mentality...’ Klaus thought. ’It’s always pride over pragmatism with them.’

"And finally, there’s Fortify..." Serra finished. "It strengthens the body’s natural defenses... makes skin harder to pierce, bones more resistant to breaking, increases resistance to poisons and toxins so basically a temporary boost to physical durability."

Klaus’s eyes lit up with genuine interest.

"Those are really nice," Klaus said. "Fast fits my fighting style the most... I rely on speed and precision but all three have their uses. Borrowed strength is still strength as far as I’m concerned."

He dropped down from the flying sword making his boots hit the stone with a solid thud.

The sword he’d been standing on joined the others floating around him, bringing his total to twelve blades orbiting at various heights.

"Seeing that the last Hobgoblin or the Shaman hasn’t come out..." Klaus said, scanning the dark tunnel ahead. "I suggest we go deeper into the nest together and see what they’re up to."

Serra nodded, her hands already glowing with mana and they walked deeper into the nest.

Within the cavern formation that served as the goblins’ home, Klaus was surprised by the complexity.

Some of the goblins slept outside on crude bedrolls made from stolen cloth and animal hides from what he could see... while others had their own formations of rock that had been carved into small rooms... actual living spaces with stone walls and makeshift doors.

"These goblins sure are smart." Klaus let out looking genuinely impressed.

Serra sighed while looking a bit grim.

"For them to attack merchant caravans and succeed consistently, they have to be smart..." Serra said. "Random animals don’t plan ambushes after all."

’The game really doesn’t do justice to how smart these things can become.’ Klaus thought. Monsters in Artemis Online were really smart when you thought about it... at least in the lore but experiencing it firsthand was different.

If he let one escape from here, it would come back for revenge eventually. The last thing Klaus wanted was for some goblin to escape his grasp and then come back months later as some super-powered goblin that suddenly had plot armor.

He wasn’t going to take any chances.

Though there was a specific place in the nest that they couldn’t ignore... a small clearing up ahead with long sticks planted in the ground.

The two of them walked toward it, and while they did, Klaus expanded his Magnetic Field outward to sense where the last Hobgoblin was, as well as the Shaman.

His Metal Sense picked up on a bunch of weapons clustered in one of the stone houses.

There were different kinds... swords, lances, and even staves. The goblins seemed to keep their spoils of battle there as probably as some kind of communal armory but more importantly, he sensed the last Hobgoblin hiding inside one of the larger rock formations.

He could sense it clearly because the monster was holding a steel axe with both hands while crouching and probably waiting for them to lower their guard.

Klaus angled some of his floating blades in the Hobgoblin’s direction subtly, once it came out, he’d stab it multiple times just to be sure it stayed down permanently.

’I’m grateful for this bigger pool of mana I have too...’ Klaus thought, monitoring his reserves.

If it was back when he was still Third Class, he would have probably fainted or run out of mana by now from maintaining this much simultaneous magic.

The difference between classes wasn’t just the raw power... it was sustainability, efficiency and the ability to fight for extended periods plus he had the Blessing too if he ran out of mana now.

’I also really need to visit somewhere like the capital or Rivera city and get a bigger amount of herbs...’ Klaus mused.

Apart from the first three herbs he had gotten... Azure Lotus Root, Crimson Starflower, and Silverleaf Moss.

There were several other ones that while they wouldn’t directly influence one’s breakthrough between classes, could help with mana capacity expansion, regeneration speed, or spell efficiency and he was wondering what kind of effects he would get by using Merge on different herbs.

Would combining two mana-related plants create something even more potent? Or would it just waste both ingredients?

’But for that I’ll need to go to Rivera City... for more options’ Klaus thought. ’Maybe I’ll go back to Yerefall Grove with Taula and check if rare herbs grow there naturally. I’d rather go searching with Taula than spend two days traveling to Rivera City just for plants.’

Soon Klaus and Serra arrived at the clearing with the sticks.

The sticks were planted upright in a rough circle, forming what looked almost like a ceremonial space and around them were several shapes on the ground covered by cloth... They looked like fabric that had probably been taken from the merchant carriages the goblins had raided.

The cloth was stained with old blood looking dark brown and crusty.

Klaus approached one of the covered shapes, already dreading what he’d find. He grabbed the edge of the cloth and lifted it and his eyes widened.

It was a human or rather, what remained of one.

A huge chunk had been torn through the man’s head with the entire top of his skull simply gone. There was brain matter visible but it was rotting and the body wasn’t in much better shape.

His torso had been ripped open with the ribs snapped outward like broken branches. Organs were clearly missing... the chest cavity was mostly empty except for dried blood and bits of tissue.

The face that remained was frozen in an expression of absolute terror with the mouth open in a scream that had never finished.

Klaus dropped the cloth back down and his hand clenched into a fist at his side. Serra checked another covered shape nearby, steeling herself for what she might find.

She lifted the cloth.

It was a woman. Her body appeared untouched at first glance with no visible wounds on her arms or face but then Serra’s eyes traveled downward and her stomach lurched.

The woman’s breasts had been eaten completely, leaving torn holes in her chest.

Bite marks were clearly visible around the edges of the wounds, showing where goblin teeth had ripped into flesh.

She was dead with a horrified expression frozen on her face as her eyes were wide and staring at nothing while screaming.

’W-what the hell...’ Serra thought, her hands beginning to tremble uncontrollably.

The brutality of some monsters would never stop affecting her, no matter how many times she witnessed it.

These were innocent people... merchants just trying to earn a living by transporting goods or guards just doing their jobs to feed their families.

They hadn’t deserved this... nobody deserved this, maybe criminals but still...

Then Serra forced herself to look more carefully so she could see the full extent of the damage and the "untouched" assessment had been her merely not seeing enough at first.

Upon looking further down the woman’s body, Serra saw that her whole lower body had been bitten into extensively.

Chunks of flesh were missing from her thighs and abdomen with bite marks covering every visible inch of skin.

The goblins had been eating her while she was still alive, based on the defensive wounds on her hands and the way her fingers were broken... she’d been fighting them off until the very end.

"This is too much..." Serra said, her voice trembling as she dropped the cloth back over the corpse.

At that exact moment, the Hobgoblin finally decided to rush at them from where it had been hiding, charging with its steel axe raised but Klaus didn’t even turn around.

He shot blades into the thing from behind... four of them precisely aimed.

They stuck the Hobgoblin into the ground, pinning it through the spine, lungs, and skull and the creature died instantly.

Klaus had seen enough.

He wanted to sleep properly tonight, so he wouldn’t be checking any more corpses. He’d report the scene to the Guild and let them handle body recovery for the families.

"I know you’re here, Shaman." Klaus called out loudly with his voice echoing across the whole cave. "Stop trying to play smart or else it’ll die!"

Slowly, the Shaman slinked out from where it had been hiding.

It emerged from behind one of the carved stone rooms, moving with an almost serpentine gait. The creature held a staff that had a dried-up human skull as the tip... it was a small skull like it had come from a child.

Klaus blinked in surprise.

"Oh, you actually came out?" Klaus said.

Serra raised an eyebrow at him.

"Aren’t you the one that called it out?" Serra asked with a confused face.

"I didn’t actually know it was here..." Klaus admitted with a sheepish grin. "I was just trying to sound cool and intimidating."

Serra let out an exasperated sigh, pressing one hand to her forehead.

Klaus turned his attention back to the Shaman, studying it more carefully now.

The creature didn’t even look Tier 2... it was scrawny, hunched over, and barely more physically threatening than a regular goblin.

He was trying to understand how this small thing controlled the entire nest of goblins and multiple Hobgoblins when—

The Shaman stabbed its staff forward suddenly.

The skull at the tip glowed with sickly green light and the Shaman’s mouth opened wide.

"Ghrak mok’tar, ghrak mok’tar! Zul’krath vekna shaa! Duum’keth zhara’gul!"

Black flame erupted from the skull’s eye sockets. It was not normal fire... the flames seemed to absorb light and they made the air feel cold instead of hot. The black fire shot outward, heading toward Klaus at amazing speed.

Klaus now understood exactly why this small, pathetic-looking creature was in charge of the entire nest.

His eyes widened as the black flame streaked toward him like a heat-seeking missile made of death.

"Fu—"

BOOM!