Hope woke up in his bed and prepared to head to the tower. As he locked the door, the neighbor girl greeted him. Hope turned his head down and hurried towards the tower. Standing in front of his building, he saw the tower and started to move towards it. After he reached the tower, Hope moved to the first floor.
On the way to the hunting area, Hope saw many hunting parties hunting goblins; some killed the goblins, while only a few were putting goblins in cages.
Hope remembered his time hunting goblins with his party:
Party Leader: "Capture it alive, newbies. Don't kill them no matter what."
Hope: "Why are we putting live goblins in cages? They're dangerous, so why aren't we killing them?"
Leader: "Newbie, this is the first floor of the tower. People only hunt goblins here to get to know the monster's weaknesses and training, and sometimes they kill them to gain skills in the fight. Besides, if we kill all the goblins here, they will respawn from the walls of the tower anyway. Mining mana stones is easy without watching our backs."
Hope: "Okay, boss, got it. But I am fighting the goblins all the time, and I'm not gaining any new skills."
Leader: "Not only power, boy; you are low on luck too. Haha!
Teammate: "Sometimes people take longer to gain a skill than others. It differs from person to person."
Hope's inner voice: "My skills... it's been 3 weeks since I got awakened, and I don't know what my skills are. I have a growth skill; the first time I got the skill, I thought I can grow taller, but now, more I go near monsters, they get weaker, and I get stronger. Maybe it's a buff skill. I need to research this skill and the second skill. I can't even read it. Ohhh, I wish I could gain some new skills; my life would be easier."
Hope remembered that conversation and moved to the hunting area. Spotting a goblin near the tower road, Hope quickly got into position and took out a rusty dagger. He confirmed there were no traps, then stealthily approached with the old rusty dagger. He waited for the perfect moment to strike, knowing he had absorbed some power from the goblin, making it weaker than him. Just as he was about to attack, he heard a voice.
"Die, you parasite!"
As Hope jumped by instinct, he barely dodged a lightning bolt aimed at him, which struck the goblin, killing it instantly. Looking for the source of the attack, he saw John and his two teammates ready to attack him.
John: "You did it! Didn't you? You decreased our power! It was an easy raid, and we would've succeeded if it weren't for you! You're the cause of our rejection from the Tiger Guild!"
Hope: "What's wrong with you? Why are you attacking me out of the blue?"
Hope defended himself, "I didn't do anything! I wouldn't harm you with my skill. I'll never harm a human with my skills... again."
John: "Shut up! If it's not you, then who else? We would've won our raid and been members of the guild by now."
Hope realized he was really serious, and if they fought, he could never win. He needed to distract them and escape to safety.
Hope said, "If you fight me now, I would have to defend. And after absorbing this goblin's power, I don't think this will be good for you." Inside voice, "I must escape when he is distracted. I need to run to the entrance; then I'll be safe."
John, in anger, said, "You win this time, Hope. Let's go, guys," John said, as they turned to leave.
Suddenly, one of John's teammates attacked Hope from behind, stabbing him in the stomach.
"Ah! Ahhh!" Hope screamed in pain.
As Hope realized he needed to run for his life, he tried to stab the attacker with the dagger, but it got struck with a lightning spell from John, breaking it in half. Then, Hope kicked the attacker away and grabbed the sword from his stomach, fleeing with all his might. The others pursued him.
John: "We should block him at any cost."
One of the teammates cast a barrier spell, and a thin blue layer covered the place, trapping Hope.
Realizing he was trapped and running towards the thick bushes and got unseen from John and his teammates' sight, Hope knew he needed to distract them in order to escape. Hope used his own blood to create a distraction; he spattered the blood in one path and then ran in the opposite direction.
Hope sadly thought, "If I had a fighting skill, I could have escaped easily. This type of skill I have, I'm not able to gain any new skills. Why am I so unlucky? Why is my life like this?" My wound is slowly healing thanks to that goblin's power; the bleeding nearly stopped.
After some time, Hope reached the end of the barrier. Exhausted, Hope sought refuge behind a bush and a tree. "I need to escape from this barrier; this barrier is huge; it has a huge mana load. No one can keep this up for a long time. I need to stall for time or set traps to distract them. I should hide; that's the way I can escape from here. The trap I fell into yesterday was near here; I need to go there."
Hope moved from there, covering his bleeding stomach.
Some time later, while Hope was running silently, he heard a sound. "Come out, parasite; do you think you can trick us? We have a tracking skill. That was a good trick with the blood splatter; nice try, parasite."
Hope quickly hid in the shadow of the tree. Suddenly, a lightning bolt hit Hope, revealing his position.
John: "Oh, here you are. So, my auto-tracking spells work on parasites too, huh?"
"John, why are you doing this? I didn't do anything! Let me go, please; I won't tell anyone about this," Hope pleaded in fear.
"We can't be sure if you used your ability on us. That's why we're going to kill you," John replied coldly.
"But killing me won't benefit you! It's just pointless revenge!" Hope argued.
John chuckled sinisterly. "What happens inside the tower stays in the tower. And we heard that if the caster dies, the curse cast by them will also be dispelled. It's worth a try. Besides, who's gonna miss you? They're just considering you a burden, aren't they? If you die, no one's gonna notice."
Hope realized he was in grave danger, trapped and outnumbered by those seeking revenge. Hope said, "I have a family; I want to be there for them. I need to save my mother. Please don't kill me."
As a teammate approached Hope with a smile, saying, "I'm going to get my sword back," he focused on Hope's left hand with the bloody sword.
As he approached, Hope's scared face turned to anger, and he pulled a wire in his right hand, which was covered in mud, activatingthe trap and opening the cages with the goblins inside. The opened cages caused the goblins inside to rush towards John and his teammates as they tried to run, but they got caught in the goblin trap. In that confusion, Hope stabbed the other teammate with it.
Hope screamed, "I'm not going to die!" As goblins attacked John and John's teammate, Hope started to fight them all, killing goblins and John's teammates alike.
Hope defeated all the goblins attacking him. In the midst of battle, John and Hope were the last two people standing there. John exclaimed, "How are you so powerful? These goblins were more powerful than that! It's not possible that they killed us! So, you did absorb our powers, huh?"
Hope said, "All this time you hunted me, I was circling the goblin cages, knowing that you were targeting me and would ignore the goblin cages. I used my skill, and thanks to that, my wounds healed a bit. I got some power from all these goblins too. And for yesterday, I didn't do anything to you or to your teammates. I thought I would never do that to a human. Now, I'm not considering you as humans. And because of this barrier, my power is at its fullest. The barrier you created to trap me is going to kill you, John!"
John ran away, screaming, but he ran straight into the barrier, hitting it and fell down. Hope followed him and stabbed the sword in John's chest.
John screamed in agonizing pain, but Hope thrust the sword again and again, killing John.
After some time, Hope's eyes, deprived of emotions, looked at the body there and said, "Look what you made me do."
a message popped up, saying, "Hidden criteria have been met."
Hope got shocked by the message, then swung his sword around, finally coming to his senses. He stared at the skill screen and cried loudly at it.