Silence reigned as Enota, who carried a dim lamp, wandered aimlessly with Gab for hours through the narrow cave passages. The only sound they've heard were the echoes of their steps and the water droplets dripping down from the stalactites. In the beginning, the two had a lot of hopes when it came to finding fellow group members. But as time moved on, even the two slowly grew tired and were on the verge of giving up, searching for the rest.
"Maybe we should stop looking for the rest. It's probably wiser to finish this floor and await the rest on the end of the third floor," sighed Enota loudly. On the other hand, Gab was unsure whether he shared the same opinion or not.
As the two continued small talks, they soon reached a new cave larger than the previous one. But to Gab's surprise, Enota stopped abruptly, which caused him to bump into her because he was lost in thought.
"Sorry," whispered Gab, but Enota, merely raised her hand while giving glaring at him for a second, telling him to be quiet.
It took a mere second for Gab to realize that something seemed to be off from this cave.
'The smell… It is strong… smells way too familiar to me… It must be blood.'
The scent was even so strong that it nearly excited him.
'I must not let it go over my head.' The latter's eyes immediately narrowed before cutting his palm with his armor shoulder piece. 'That should help me with calming my mind. I can also now use my own blood as a last resort attack.'
Gab slowly closed his eyes as he tried to calm himself down. His two cats who followed behind him realized how Gab was feeling and were quiet as they snuggled against his leg. He wanted to pet them, but his palms were bleeding, so he merely smiled at his big-eyed cats.
Slowly Enota took out her thunder speer from her sheet, and the two silently moved into the cave as quietly as possible.
There they saw something that they expected and didn't expect at the same time. A small puddle of blood formed on the floor, while traces of conflict were visible in the cave since the walls were painted in blood-red blood.
But there was something strange. Apart from the red blood, one could also see remnants of blue fluids on the wall.
'Strange.'
As they slowly moved into the cave, Enot muttered to herself: "Who the hell was fighting here, and what is this blue fluid that's smeared on the walls?"
Realizing that his body wanted to consume the blue liquid, Gab decided to comment: "It must be blood."
His comment didn't really surprise the latter, who merely nodded before finding a familiar sign on the ground.
Enota slowly knelt down and picked up the fallen and broken piece of armor, staring at the emblem. It was a piece of armor that her men wore.
"I see… I see… My men must have fought something unknown here," she revealed.
Gab nodded to her statement before telling her: "I hope you don't mind me for what I'll be doing now."
Enota shrugged, telling him to do whatever you want.
Before even a second could pass, all the blood from the walls and the ground rushed towards his body. His eyes were closed as he consumed the spilled blood from everyone in the place.
'Thrilling… But the blue blood tastes like shit.'
"I didn't know you were such a person who would even consume the blood from your fellow humans," the princess commented in amusement. Seeing how she didn't judge him for doing that nor showed any disgust made him smile.
"I need blood to attack, and since I've been running low on blood and don't want to gamble too much on my own blood, I'll take whatever is available. I never drink the blood of fellow human beings whenever I'm surrounded by them. After all, I've got an image to keep," admitted Gab while winking with his left eyes.
Enota merely chuckled at his word before also admitting: "You seem to resemble a vampire. A group that once dwelled in various places in the kingdom. I neither care how you became one nor even if you are one as long as you are useful, my dear.~"
'I expected that.'
"Anyway, can you detect blood? It would be great if you could detect the blue blood," Enota continued as she stared at the ground where one saw a blood trail leaving the cave.
Gab nodded to her question before leading the two away, following the blood trail on the floor.
'Strange. I'm not sure if it was a group of monsters or not. But why did they carry these soldiers with them?'
As they followed deeper, into the narrow passages, they soon saw the first living creature. It looked strange for a bipedal creature, and it was also the first time for Gab to see such a small creature.
The creature was around half their size and had ugly scarred green skin, while its crooked teeth were clearly visible. It walked aimlessly through the passage as it drooled uncontrollably while also making weird noises from time to time.
If a modern-day person saw its behavior, they would think that it's a mentally retarded creature with rabies. The creature was no other than a goblin.
A small creature with a pretty low IQ whose behavior was that of a caveman. These things lived in groups ranging from small bands up to cities.
It was also one of the favorite monsters for mages who were researching topics such as genetic determinism, social behavior.
Some mages let them grow on islands to watch and analyze their social behavior in hopes of finding clues leading to how humans developed.
For whatever reason, these creatures immediately know how to form bigger groups and what to do. Even though they can teach others how to do something such as make weapons and so forth, they rarely taught each other such skills. On the other hand, it seemed as if it was ingrained in their DNA. From the moment they were born, they know how to interact with each other, what they can eat, and so forth.
This only fueled the interest of fellow mages, who were using these creatures as guinea pigs, in hopes of finding the answers plaguing the magic society.
How can we mages replicate such genetical behavior ingrained deep into the DNA of goblins on humans? We could ingrain memories such as magical knowledge onto the human DNA, resulting in every Newborn being automatically a mage.
But that wasn't the only thing in which mages were interested in such a species. There was still another reason. The bigger the groups grew, the higher the chance became for these unintelligent creatures to birth goblins superior to them. It seemed like a natural thing to them. These goblins of higher intelligence also seemed to know how to use their abilities.
If mages were to even replicate one of the abilities of goblins on humans, the strength of the human community as a whole would increase drastically in such a short time. The mages who replicate such a thing on humans will live forever in the textbook.
In the end, there were a lot of marvels to unravel for the unending desire for knowledge of human mages.
Thx for the chapter!