"It's still unbelievable, I don't think even the potions from the imperial capital would achieve this result. Maybe at most the potions from before the Corruption started but those are guarded with more braids than the other in the palace." Sofi said to everyone in the room.
Everyone knew that Sofi was not a normal person, she had barely changed since Gerard and Agatha were children when she arrived from the middle of the forest supposedly from beyond the barrier possibly from the corrupted area or beyond. In other villages she would have been expelled due to people's fear and fear, luckily for her the people of this village were surprisingly kind, they were still afraid and distrustful of her but they still helped her when she was weak and disoriented.
In return, Sofi helped some of the sick people in the village and before she knew it, she had already become so comfortable with the village that 4 years had passed. From then on, she settled in an old hut where she made various ointments and medicines for the sick and helped as possible in the community.
"Now the question is—"
"—What do we do from now on."
Gerard added, as an officer he would be like a second chief of the village, the chief in fact was already old and was barely able to afford his duties, so much so that while all the confusion was going on with the nobleman, the knights and the God who had helped them, he had been sleeping since the afternoon and only woke up the next day to hear everything that had happened. The result?
He passed out and has been unconscious ever since.
"And what would be the options?" Ivan asked, leaning against the door, cleaning his nails with a dagger. Looking carefree and a little grumpy, but everyone knew he was alert for anything.
"It depends on several things."
"Example?"
"We don't even know where this nobleman came from, what connections he and the knights have, nor where they were going. All of this will impact how we should act."
Sofi replied Ivan, showing again that his mind does not work like an ordinary villager.
"And until then, what should we do, nothing?"
He asked putting away the dagger.
Before anyone could say anything, they heard a commotion outside the house.
Soon one of the villagers entered the already crowded room, looking quite excited, but not afraid or exactly urgent.
"Ivan has something you need to see!"
"What? Another boar problem?"
The hunter asked, half irritated, half laughing.
"No, actually, I think everyone should go see this too."
"See what?"
"It's easier to believe seeing it, we think it might have something to do with Him."
The villager pointed to the empty bottle on top of a chest against the wall. Soon everyone became serious.
"Show me where."
Soon everyone except Matt, Constance and Agatha came out of the house to see what had happened.
""""""""""""""""
"Very well that's strange."
Ivan said looking at the floor.
There was a big black mark on it as if lightning had hit the place, if it was just that it wouldn't be a big deal, lightning hitting the ground is something that doesn't happen often but it's still something natural.
The strange thing was that just yesterday this part of the plantation was normal, with nothing, and from yesterday to today it hadn't rained. Not even a cloud appeared in the sky all week, and that wasn't all. A little behind this mark there were footprints, barefoot and small footprints, footprints with a foot with 4 toes.
Even the villagers already had an idea of which creature these footprints belonged to but they needed to be sure, so they called Ivan who was one of those who encountered the most animals and creatures when hunting.
"Please tell me this isn't what I think it is." Gerard asked his old friend.
"Do you want me to tell you the truth or what do you want to hear?"
Ivan gave the characteristic response he adopted when they became teenagers many years ago. It was already a confirmation in itself.
"Shit..."
"It gets worse"
He said approaching a tree on the edge of the plantation. Ivan was a hunter by vocation and by instinct, he always had sharper senses, hearing, vision and of course smell, he did not reach the point of exceeding the human limit, but he was certainly better at detection, pursuit, ambushes and combat than most of common people.
Because of this he could smell, up to 300 meters, in an open field, surrounded by people who did not bathe very often, he smelled a weak but pungent smell, a smell that became increasingly stronger the closer he got to the tree, when they were 15 meters away, Gerard and the villager who had brought the two also began to smell it and their faces frowned, both because of the smell and what that smell meant.
On the tree, 5 scratches could be seen, 4 smaller and not very deep ones and one longer and deeper, it was from this deeper scratch that the pungent smell came from, the smell of excrement.
Excrement that a humanoid creature, extremely irritating and dangerous to remote villages makes up their most abomination. Marks were and smells were the ways these creatures informed each other about a food source.
Small, child-sized creatures with green skin, bulging eyes, and pointy ears and noses.
Goblins.
One of the deadliest pests that exist, small, numerous, smart, fierce and inventive.
Being humanoid creatures they also have the characteristic of being able to use rudimentary tools and some extraordinary ones can even use magic, fortunately these only exist in ancient stories and in current times no one has heard of any goblin achieving this feat.
Still, this doesn't change the fact that the existence of goblins is a big problem for the village, not only are they numerous, smart and aggressive, they are also omnivores.
The tree with the goblin identification marks shows that the small monster that was vaporized later was just a lone goblin responsible for finding a food source for the tribe, and found the village.
A place with maximum defense was just a small stone wall of no more than 1 meter, which already had holes in some parts.
A village with a wall literally falling apart with a plantation ready to harvest with some pets, small children and babies.
For a group of goblins this is essentially a feast ready to attack.
"Can you have any idea how many there are?"
"I can't even imagine, if there was anything left of the scout maybe I could have an idea but..."
Ivan didn't finish, he didn't need to, if he said anything else it would be a criticism even more so of the person who had helped them just yesterday. And none of the men or anyone in the village wanted that to happen.
"Um...."
Fortunately for them, there was still one person who could perhaps remedy this situation.
"I think we're in trouble."
Sofi said looking at the marks.