Following the discussion with Alyn, he asked her to return to the village so as not to worry the other inhabitants and prevent them from discovering his true objective. Despite the disappointment of being sent away, she obeyed, but asked him to warn her when he would carry out his plan.
Now alone outside of his invocations, Tolir summoned five goblin fighters for ten points of aether, after adding the knowledge to the aetheric core in exchange for two additional knowledge slots he had acquired. Thus, he deduced, aetheric knowledge did not have the same cost.
>>>>> Aethereal Core II <<<<<
Aether: 0/100
Knowledge Points: 3/3
Aetheric Bond: 11/20
Summoning: [Goblin Recruit] (1 aether), [Goblin Fighter] (2 aethers)
Moreover, through some experimentation he discovered that if he could add or take away the aether from the core at will, he could do so in contrast to the knowledge slots. Finally, he organized his goblins into three roughly equal groups, which he dispersed back into the forest in search of aether orbs.
While his creatures scoured the area, he turned his attention to the next step. First of all, with the girl's information, he had a better idea of the power of the village's golem guard and the political stakes. According to him, if he managed to reduce to nothing the protection that the priest conferred, he could easily convince the village to rally to him or, at least, not to oppose him.
Only one doubt remained about Zali's request. She had asked him to take over this world without explaining what she meant by that... Should he convert them to his cult which would be logical since it is a deity but at the same time, nothing of the tools at his disposal went in this direction... In the worst case, if the capture of the village was not enough, he could always reconsider his attitude towards this one according to the expectations of Zali.
For the management of his resources, he decided to keep for the moment all the aether he would take for several reasons. The first was to improve the core again if it ever became available and he obtained new etheric knowledge. At the moment he had not determined why the enhancement became possible but he assumed that a higher rank of core existed.
The second reason was to avoid attracting attention. The larger the group of goblins he constituted, the more inevitably his presence had a chance of being detected. Moreover, if he summoned creatures now, if he ever discovered later that they were unsuitable, he would not be able to correct the course easily. Finally, he feared that the aether was in fact a limited resource that he had to be sparing with.
So, when the first patrol returned and he discovered an aether orb, he absorbed it without summoning new creatures upon his return. For the moment, he considered his six goblin recruits and his six goblin fighters sufficient for the organization of the patrols. The only regret was that the goblin lost in the capture of the goblin fighter was the one he was linked to directly and not through the orb. At least, he was reassured by the status of the creature, which was far superior to the one lost:
>>>>> Goblin Fighter's Status <<<<<
Health: 12/12
Mana: 2/2
Strength: 8
Agility: 6
Stamina: 8
Will: 8
Spirit: 6
Experience: -
Abilities: [Spear of Goblin Fighter], [Shield of Goblin Fighter], [Leather Armor of Goblin Fighter]
Skills: -
Title: -
For three days he planned his attack on the village, storing up the aether his troops found. If at first they were finding it regularly, as on the first day he gained 53 points of aether, the next day that number dropped to 32 and on the third day it collapsed to 11. It was this weakening of the aether recovery that prompted him to prepare for the start of the offensive the next day.
He would first send his small group of goblin recruits against the golem guards they would lure in to verify that he had properly assessed their power and even detected their strengths and weaknesses to create an army capable of defeating them.
To facilitate this plan, he had captured the day before a goblin archer to whom he had bound himself in addition to having improved his core to rank III that morning for 30 points of aether. The cost was high, but now there was nothing to stop him from accomplishing his goal.
That evening he finished the last provisions Dravel had given him. He took one last look at the aether core and his mastery of the aether, pleased with his progress, before lying down on the improvised mattress his goblins had made for him at his command. Tomorrow he would return to the village, hoping to finally get a real bed and a real meal after three days in the wild.
>>>>> Mastery of Aether <<<<<
Aether: 79
Aetheric knowledge: [Goblin Recruit], [Goblin Fighter], [Goblin Bowman]
Invocation: [Aethereal Core I] (5 aether), [Aethereal Core II] (20 aethers), [Aethereal Core III] (60 aethers)
>>>>> Aethereal Core III <<<<<
Aether: 2/100
Knowledge Points: 5/5
Aetheric Bond: 11/40
Summoning: [Goblin Recruit] (1 aether), [Goblin Fighter] (2 aethers), [Goblin Bowman] (3 aethers)
When he awoke in a good mood, he ordered his goblin recruits to follow him while the goblin fighters and the archer stayed back at the camp to guard the aether core. He didn't know if it could be destroyed, but he didn't want to find out just yet.
Accompanied by the six recruits, he made his way to the village. They stopped at the edge of the forest before the plain leading to the village came into view. Tolir wondered how to proceed. He could attack head-on with the goblins, but he might run into a strong deployment of golems who would immediately tear them apart without being able to get any relevant information.
He remembered that to the north of the village were the fields where the majority of the population worked. There, no goblins appeared and the large open field gave the guard time to intervene for the rare incursions. He opted for this terrain for his offensive.
He distributed his instructions to the goblins and then checked with them that he had understood them well. After half an hour, they had integrated them without challenging them. Tolir feared that they would protest at being sent to their deaths, but they remained unmoved. For his part, he had finally resolved his moral dilemma by considering the summoned creatures as tools and nothing more. He just hoped he wouldn't find out the other way around later, but he had enough constraints at the moment not to impose them on himself.
When the preparations were complete, he climbed a tree to observe the scene in the distance while he gave the signal to the first goblins. They set off in the direction of the field where several peasants were working. The creatures quickly approached the villagers, who spotted them a hundred meters from the field. The villagers fled in the direction of the village in peace.
Tolir smiled as he saw the desired reaction. He ordered the goblins who had remained in the forest to join their comrades who, in accordance with his instructions, were content to wait for them. In the distance, four figures approached. Three of them were the golem guards, while the last one was Father Maurias, who was leading the detachment.
If the latter was surprised for a short time by the quantity of goblins that exceeded his expectations, he did not hesitate to order his golems to engage in combat. The golems, equipped with a sword, a shield and heavy armor, charged the goblin recruits who spread out around them to better exploit their numbers.
A short battle ensued. The goblins, although superior in number, did not have the power to inflict significant damage on the golems. The golems, aware of their resistance, did not even attempt to parry their attacks. They simply absorbed the attacks to better counterattack the goblins.
The fight quickly turned to their advantage because in two or three blows, they got rid of a goblin. However, the goblins died, slightly injuring their opponent, who did not appear to be as invincible as the outcome of the battle might suggest.
The six dead recruits, Tolir came down from his tree, satisfied with the scene even if a slight remorse of sending creatures to the sacrifice took hold of him... Despite his previous resolution, a slight doubt remained in his mind about the absence of soul in his goblins...
In order not to lose himself again in endless philosophical conjectures, he occupied himself on the way back to his base to compose his future army for the capture of the village that he would unleash in the early afternoon.