Night. The same day.
Level: 19 (16.1/20)
"You can eat now." With Hilda's words, the vines let go of the dead bodies of the goblins and kobolds. The wolves didn't hesitate; the goblin mages and adult goblins were the same. But the new Kobold mage she had enslaved wasn't sure what to do.
"Eat and recover. We need to fight more." Hilda ordered and moved to the two kobolds with a core inside their bodies.
The goblin mages had reported that the hunting party would come out of the cave during the night and hunt for livestock and humans in the nearby settlements.
It was easy to hunt them with her numerical advantage. The problem was that out of three people she could enslave, only one survived: a kobold mage.
Hilda tore through the bodies of the two goblins with her core and pulled them out. However, she didn't swallow them. First, she ate until she was no longer hungry.
"Protect me," Hilda ordered, noticing the wolf pair had already returned to his side. And she swallowed the cores.
A gust of energy rushed into her body. Hilda concentrated and appeared in his sub-core, in her limb.
The small area was brimming with mana, shades of yellow and grey. Hilda should have been able to create a core using the beginner inheritance circle that the fraud elf bestowed. However, there was a problem.
The mana was sipping out of the space at a visible speed. Hilda pulled out his aura needle and string, doughed them with the mana, and started inscribing the mana circle.
It was a race against time— whether she could complete the inscription first or if the mana would leave the subcore space.
Compared to the first time Hilda inscribed the mana core in her tail, the aura needles moved much faster. Unlike the first time, Hilda used two aura needles to engrave the mana circle.
When she completed inscribing her new mana circle, very little mana was left inside her subcore. By the time her core took shape, even that little amount of mana leaked out of her subcore space.
Knir had warned Hilda time and time again not to build the central core before the subcores. Now that she had already done it to survive, she understood why.
"It won't be impossible, but it would be very hard." That is what Knir had told her. After Hilda came to her central core from the sub-core, she could see the culprit.
In her central core, a tree was growing in the space where she had created the intermediate mana circle. It was just about two meters.
"Look at this thing. It is just stealing every mana I gather and growing like a giant." Hilda sighed.
It was the root of all of her problems. All of the cores in her sub-cores are void of any mana.
She couldn't create a new core with her own mana. Whenever she swallowed a core or mana stone, the tree would absorb the mana before she could make a core in her subspaces. That's why she swallowed two cores before making the beginner inheritance circle.
After the [Breath of Bodhi] replaced her [Earth Breathing] and [Water Breathing], all of her mana would help this tree grow. All of her subcores remained empty.
After studying and using her newfound ability, Hilda understood some things about her newfound elements.
Hilda wasn't sure if her [Patience] or the nature of the curse had given her light mana, the property of creation.
She was no saint. Naturally, she couldn't use pure light mana. One thing she knew was that combining her dual elements with the light mana had given her the ability to somehow relate to trees.
The voices inside her head were nothing but the trees around her. It was also why she was buried inside the tree when she first created the circle.
"I must gather at least three mana cores before creating the next sub-core. Mayby be four, to be safe."
Whether the mana light and darkness would oppose each other, Hilda wanted to construct additional cores before evolving into a gnoll. On top of that, she was uncertain of the physical changes that would occur to her.
According to Knir, making cores in all accessible subspaces helped with future evolution and increased the likelihood of successful evolution.
When Hilda's consciousness returned, the first thing she did was check her status. There was not much change other than the experience and…
[Breathe of Bodhi
Type: Passive
** Recover 15% of MP every hour
** Recover 7% of HP every hour
** Recover 7% of SP every hour
** ?????
** ?????]
"So I will be recovering 46 MP per hour instead of 30 MP. Great." Hilda checked around to find only the pair of wolves sitting beside her like loyal guard dogs while everyone else was sleeping.
"It will be morning soon. Just the right time to attack."
*Awwoooo*
Understanding her words, the wolf howled, waking up all those around her. With words from Hilda, her subordinates knew what to do.
Soon, they silently moved around through the forest, gathering far away from the cave. A little heap of bone had already formed in front of the mouth of the cave.
The four kobolds and the six goblins were on guard duty. Yet they were sleeping like logs.
Hilda had no intention of charging into the cave. She didn't know how effective her ability would be without trees. She wanted to check but knew a life-and-death fight was not the time to experiment with her abilities.
Instead, her plan was simple. She would slowly grind away the number of enemies.
Hilda now possesses ten wolves, seven adult goblins, two adult kobolds, one goblin mage, one kobold mage, and a kobold warrior, following her victories over two contingents of small groups of goblins and kobolds.
Hilda wanted to keep the smaller goblins, but they were too unruly to follow any order. So, they were killed to feed her troops.
Although Ken and his deer herd couldn't be counted as fighters, Ken is excellent bait.
Though reluctant, he slowly walked towards the cave. He stopped at a distance, as the guards only had melee weapons. He shot an arrow, killing one of them in sleep. The last-ditch struggle woke up the goblin beside it. However, he was also shot dead.
Only after three goblins and a kobold had died did the other realize something was wrong. They screamed and howled, waking up those in the cave. But it wasn't enough.
Ken pulled out one of the balls that threw one of the spell balls that he had used against Hilda. It bounced in front of the cave opening and rolled into the cave.
*Bang*
Bright light filled the cave, and a momentary silence followed. Then chaos broke out inside the cave. The fire started to spread.
Shocked and blinded by the surprise attack, goblins and kobolds spilled like ants out of an ant nest. The wolves didn't miss the chance.
Before they could understand what was happening, fifteen of them died. Only then did a goblin lord and a pair of mages come out.
"That goblin mage really doesn't know how to count." Since goblins lacked accurate means of learning to count, Hilda simply could not bring herself to curse them. "Retreat. Ken, bait them to the place."
As soon as Hilda ordered, the wolves retreated. Ken shot an arrow at the goblin Lord, who shot it down with his club. However, they didn't take the bait and follow Ken.
Instead, the goblin lords and the mages stood before the cave, waiting for another attack.
"This fuckers. It looks like an intelligent one came. No worry. [Tangle]."
Before they could understand what was happening, vines shot out of and covered the mouths of the caves.
"Now the spell triggers a lot faster."
Hilda had noticed the amount of mana she would need had increased from 10 MP to 15 MP, but the vines were much thicker now, and the number of vines had almost doubled.
The goblin lord could see what was happening inside the cave, and the goblins inside were trying to cut the vines. What was even more frustrating was that, even with its strength, it couldn't break the vine door with the club.
However, the pair of mages following it could use wind and fire. The fireball couldn't burn the vine in a blink, but it was doing damage. The wind blade, on the other hand, was far more effective.
[Tangle]
[Tangle]
[Tangle]
Two layers of vine-covered the cave entrance swiftly while the rest arrested the goblin lords and the mages.
Compared to the goblin and kobold mages Hilda had fought till now, these were different. Although the goblin lord struggled hard, it couldn't break free.
The wind mage was the first one to break free. As soon as it landed on its feet, it threw a wind-blade spell to get the goblin lord out of the vines.
"This motherfucker." It was outside Hilda's expectations. She was quick to attack the wind mage. With her speed, the distance was covered in a blink.
Her jaw was an inch away from the head of the wind mage when something hit the side of her face. Her first thought was that it was the goblin lord.
But seeing the goblin lord still standing at a distance and the burning sensation she felt on her face, she realized that it was the fire mage still tied to the vine.
Ignoring the pain, Hilda again charged at the wind mage, but it was faster. The wind blade cut the vines around the fire mage and let them loose.
Avoiding the club that was just an inch away from her face, Hilda ducked and ran away. The mages had no intention of letting her go and shot consecutive spells at her while the goblin lord followed.
However, as soon as Hilda went outside the range of the mage's spell, the goblin Lord stopped following.
*Roar*
Hilda stopped outside the range of the mage and looked back. The thick layer of vines was slashed in half in one smooth swing. And the creature who had done it came out of the cave carrying an axe on its shoulder.
The day had started to break, but Hilda was sure she was hiding perfectly. The beast looked right at her as soon as it stepped out of the cave. Hilda instinctively took a step back. Other than a bunch of [?????], Hilda couldn't see anything in its status.
"What is a gnoll beast like you doing here?" Its voice shook the forest.
Hilda knew it was asking her, but she had no intention of talking to it. Hilda ran away without looking back. The goblins and the kobolds turned silly from its roar. The wolves followed her, while the goblins were too afraid to move.
"Fuck it. Is that a high goblin?" Hilda had no way to confirm. She had never seen a goblin over two meters tall with such defined muscles. Even if it were an orc, she would have been less afraid than this.
She didn't even look back. She just ran. However, she didn't get too far away before she found that Ken was running towards her.
"Humans. Soldiers. Soldiers are here. They are hunting the herd. You have to save them, hurry."
"What? Are they after me?" Hilda couldn't get the chance to voice her thoughts before someone else spoke.
"Humans are already here? I thought we had more time. *Bam*"
Before Hilda could even comprehend how the higher goblin caught up with her so quickly, he hit Ken with the side of the axe.
Ken was thrown in the direction he was coming from. He broke through the first tree, collided with the second, and slammed into another. Hilda had doubts that he might not move again.
However, she didn't get the chance to worry about others. She rolled on the ground like a ragged doll, as the sharp edge of the axe still took a little bit of fur with it.
"You are quicker than other beasts."
[Tangle]
[Tangle]
[Tangle]
[Tangle]
The spell had turned the big goblin into a cocoon. Hilda felt that the high goblin had cut through the entire vegetation with one swing of his axe.
"What the hell was that?" Hilda felt the axe's edge glow as he cut through the thick vines.
"You can even use magic but can't talk. What type of abomination are you?"
[Author: Those who Hilda has inscribed can understand her. For others, she was just a beast who could growl and bark.]
Even if he was curious about the origin of Hilda, that didn't stop him from kicking him.
Hilda tried her best, but it was nowhere near enough to dodge it. Her flying body broke through two trees before slamming into the third one.
Hilda was sure at least half of her ribs were broken if not all of them. Blood was leaking out of her nostril; the view in her right eye was a little hazy. Yet, she couldn't hesitate.
Hilda has no problem understanding that she couldn't defeat this abomination. However, that didn't stop her from running in the direction Ken had come running from.
She knew the humans would kill her first if they saw her, but they were also the ones who could save her from the higher goblin.