---Third POV---
The goblin, now a captive, was clearly not content with its predicament.
Even in the presence of five players, it continued to struggle, baring its teeth and spitting out incomprehensible syllables.
The five players examined it for a moment.
"Feels like it's cursing us out pretty badly," Hedgehog observed, watching the creature's angry gestures.
Lux nodded in agreement. "And its appearance alone feels like a psychological attack."
"Well, it could be worse," ProGamer_Daddy shrugged. "Wait until I take you to see LootGoblin someday; you'll know what real terror is."
Garble turned to NeverShowOff. "Show, where did you catch this thing? Is this really a goblin?"
"Most likely, yes." NeverShowOff wiped the sweat off his forehead with a clean sleeve. "After finishing with the newcomers, I went to check on the traps we set up. Luckily, I got there early—this little guy almost escaped!"
"Good thing I always carry a spool of spider silk with me."
The untreated spider silk was incredibly sticky! Without it, he wouldn't have been confident about dragging the goblin caught in the trap back with him.
He waved the others away.
"Step back. This thing may be short, but it's ridiculously strong! I got punched by it on the way back and almost lost my balance."
ProGamer_Daddy was shocked. "Its strength is that high?"
"So, we've caught a goblin. What's next?" Hedgehog propped his chin on his hand.
Garble thought for a moment.
"We can't understand what it's saying. We'll need to find Viktor."
"No need, I'm already here."
---Viktor's POV---
I approached from behind them.
Standing in front of the goblin tied up like a dumpling, I couldn't help but speak with surprise. "It's actually a Great Goblin!"
Compared to ordinary goblins, great goblins were atavistic variants. They were stronger, smarter, and essentially small leaders among goblins.
I had been wandering for days without seeing a thing. But these players had managed to catch such a valuable captive on their first attempt?! Was their luck really that much better than mine?
I thought back to when Luminaris first had fantasies about this player group and used divine blessings on three of them. Could that really be so effective?
"A great goblin?" ProGamer_Daddy repeated, puzzled. "Does that mean an adult goblin?"
"No, great goblins are a type of atavistic goblin soldier. In large groups, they serve as bodyguards or soldiers; in smaller groups, they act as leaders," I explained.
After my brief explanation, I noticed NeverShowOff's expression grow serious.
"The capture of a great goblin without any major reaction suggests that the group near Honeyvale isn't a small settlement," he said.
ProGamer_Daddy clicked his tongue. "So, how many goblins would a large settlement usually have?"
"Goblins are a highly reproductive species. Their numbers are hard to estimate, but goblins capable of fighting would probably number no less than 500," I answered.
"Five hundred?!" The five players gasped in unison.
Given NeverShowOff's description of a single great goblin's combat strength... I could almost see them thinking: Wouldn't fighting them be like facing an army of mini-bosses with their current capabilities?
ProGamer_Daddy quickly asked, "Can we interrogate the great goblin we caught?"
"Yeah, let's find out their location and launch a sneak attack!" Hedgehog flexed his wrists.
After a couple of seconds of thought, Garble nodded in agreement. "With no numerical advantage, guerrilla warfare is the best option."
NeverShowOff frowned. "We also need to act quickly. The traps we set aren't far from the town, so they might find us first!"
Lux, initially dazed by the more experienced players' planning, suddenly snapped out of it and chimed in. "Right, exactly!"
I couldn't help but chuckle faintly. "You're all oversimplifying things. Goblin captives are worthless."
"While great goblins are smarter than ordinary goblins, their intelligence mainly aids them in combat. Their language skills are severely lacking."
"Even if he's muttering syllables nonstop, most of them are meaningless. It's unrealistic to expect to get the location of their nest out of him."
These players didn't have enough information. The goblins would undoubtedly be more familiar with the jungle than they were. When it came down to guerrilla warfare, who would be ambushing whom?
"What about the little bit of understandable content? Can we translate that?" Lux asked.
I turned to her, keeping my voice calm. "Goblins are an uncivilized species closely tied to fertility and reproduction. Are you sure you want me to translate the profanities it's been yelling since it got caught?"
Lux immediately understood and mimed zipping her lips.
The great goblin on the ground thrashed wildly, screaming obscenities and trying to stretch its neck to bite someone.
Garble decisively sealed its mouth with spider silk, leaving only its blood-red eyes visible.
"Mmm! Hngh!"
Looking at the spider silk soaked in goblin saliva, Hedgehog quickly wrapped two more layers around its mouth, muttering to himself. "What a waste of spider silk!"
NeverShowOff sighed. "We finally caught a living creature, and it's completely useless?"
I could see their disappointment. Was all their effort for nothing?
"Not necessarily," I countered. "Ordinary goblins are disposable, but great goblins are different."
Even a little intelligence was still intelligence. No matter how small its brain was, it might still store some valuable information. If interrogation wasn't an option, there were more effective methods.
I glanced at the system interface displaying my survival time. It was already at 49 days. A reassuring number that allowed for more aggressive action.
"Wait a moment," I told them.
After a while, I observed the great goblin, exhausted from struggling, begin to lower its eyelids. The wariness in its eyes faded. Now was the moment.
I quickly crouched down, my skeletal white hand gripping half of the goblin's head. A burst of white light shone from the point of contact.
The great goblin's fierce eyes grew increasingly vacant, its thrashing subsided, and finally, it went limp.
Crack!
A crisp sound of bone breaking echoed.
I released the unconscious goblin and stood up, brushing off my sleeve, which had been sweeping the ground.
"I just extracted some useful information from its memory. While I couldn't locate the goblin nest, what I found is still important," I explained.
I glanced at the system panel, noting my survival time had dropped to 44 days, then looked up and froze.
"Why are you all hiding behind the tree?"
NeverShowOff, peeking out with just his eyes visible, swallowed hard. "Lord Viktor, you can perform soul-searching?"
"I also heard the sound of bones cracking!" ProGamer_Daddy added.
All five players shivered in unison.
I could read their thoughts from their varied and unfiltered expressions.
Holy crap!
We had long suspected our faction leader's class was a bit sinister.
But this kind of single-use magic is beyond our wildest expectations!
Soul-searching!
Eliminating witnesses!
This is textbook villain behavior!
Could it be... we really are playing the antagonist storyline?
"..."
I knew a lot of different spells, and for that, I was sincerely sorry. But what's with the excitement in their eyes?!
To prevent the players from overimagining dramatic inner stories, I carefully explained, "Soul Searching is an advanced and profound type of magic. I can't use it right now, and there are fewer than five magicians in present-day Aeltia who can."
"You don't need to worry about this magic being used on you."
I knew the players' minds were essentially empty projections, entirely dependent on their consciousness for actions.
What could I even extract from that? Seriously, did they think memory reading was some easy task?
Even for a goblin, extracting a lifetime of memories wouldn't take mere minutes. Attempting such recklessly could cause the caster to lose their sanity due to memory overload!
All I could do was skim some surface-level information from the consciousness of the great goblin.
Even then, it had guarded sensitive information, like the goblin nest's details, so I couldn't retrieve anything too crucial.
After hearing my explanation, the five players heaved sighs of relief and stepped out from behind the trees.
"You should've said so earlier! Scared us half to death!"
Hedgehog patted his chest in relief, his enthusiasm renewed. "So, what info did we get?"
"First, the goblin nest has between six hundred and seven hundred combatants. This includes several dozen great goblins, nine elite goblins, and one goblin shaman."
I knew the great goblins and elite goblins were manageable—just tougher combatants, not insurmountable for the players.
The real concern was the goblin shaman.
As a mage among goblins, its potential influence was immense, capable of turning the tide of battle with ease.
I hadn't managed to glean anything about the god the goblins worshipped from the great goblin's memories, leaving the shaman's methods entirely unknown.
It was an undeniable threat.
With this in mind, I paused briefly before continuing:
"Second, the dwarven craftsman we went searching for a few days ago is most likely still alive."
"But there's only half a month left before the goblins' next sacrificial ritual. If we want to rescue him, we must act before then."
The five players' jaws dropped.
Hedgehog exclaimed with excitement, "Finally, a faction war is about to begin? I had been waiting for this chance for ages!"
"There's not enough time," Garble frowned, still holding onto some semblance of rationality. "With our current forces, even guerrilla warfare wouldn't give us enough time!"
Over six hundred battle-ready goblins.
Even if they started now, they'd need to take out over thirty goblins daily—completely unrealistic.
Lux glanced around nervously, clutching her hands. "So soon?"
"Who's this dwarven craftsman, anyway? The mission seems way too hard. Should we… not bother with the rescue?" She hesitated, testing the waters.
I could tell the thought of a faction war being recorded and her potentially underperforming on video terrified her. She was probably already imagining being mercilessly mocked by cloud gamers on the forums.
So, I contemplated for a moment. "Of course, that's an option. A quick resolution is just one of the choices."
"The main issue is the magic tide. We urgently need a craftsman to construct walls. And the dwarves are famously stubborn but prideful. If we save him, he'll definitely feel obligated to help us out."
One thing led to another.
The sooner the goblin problem was resolved, the better it would be for Honeyvale Town.
The players fell into deep thought.
Technically, this was something I should plan, but since these players had made some progress, I figured I'd humor their curiosity.
Soon enough, I started shooing them off.
"Discovering such important intel, the rewards won't disappoint you."
As my words fell, a crisp "ding!" echoed in the players' ears.
The team responsible for setting traps—the Lucky Stars Team—naturally received the most rewards.
In addition to magicoins, experience points, and sweetfruits, I added a new currency to the players' game interface: contribution points.
---
[Ding! Congratulations to player NeverShowOff for earning 10 contribution points!]
[Ding! Congratulations to player *'?￥#…&%! for earning 8 contribution points!]
[Ding! Congratulations to player ProGamer_Daddy for earning 8 contribution points!]
[Ding! Congratulations to player HornyHedgehog for earning 8 contribution points!]
---
As the discoverer, NeverShowOff's rewards were naturally more generous.
I hadn't decided the exact use for contribution points yet, but leaving them unexplained was part of the strategy. Currency value relied on rarity.
The players' imaginations would fill in the gaps.
Sure enough, the four players who received contribution points looked ecstatic.
"Whoa! Contribution points! This is huge!"
"What do they even do?"
"Who cares! We're the only ones with them right now. With such a rare acquisition method, they must be super valuable!"
While the four excitedly speculated about the new currency, I didn't forget to give Lux a consolation prize.
Even though she had stumbled into the situation as a bystander, it would've been too cruel to leave her empty-handed after all this.
I awarded her one magicoin as compensation for helping control the great goblin earlier.
I tried to lift the unconscious great goblin off the ground, only to nearly dislocate my shoulder.
"..."
With no other choice, I gave up.
"This great goblin is too much for you to handle alone. Can someone help me carry it to my residence?"
I had plenty of rooms there and could lock it up temporarily to see if any new clues could be extracted.
"Huh? The goblin isn't dead?" Hedgehog looked up from his pile of rewards in shock.
"I heard its skull crack!"
"That's just a side effect of the consciousness invasion—not a fatal injury for goblins," I explained.
Most magical creatures were far tougher than humans.
Garble closed his game interface and effortlessly hoisted the great goblin onto his back.
"I'll take it. I'm headed to the mission area anyway."
Even with the rich rewards for special missions, who could say no to more loot, right? Players were easy to handle.
---
Setting aside the great goblin's interruption, the welcome event concluded perfectly.
Eight new players had reached level two—an impressive efficiency.
I was quite satisfied with these results.
"As expected, once the reservation count increased, finding ideal players became significantly easier."
The new batch of players I had recruited were all hardcore gamers with meticulously distributed skill points.
Exactly what Honeyvale needed!
Perhaps the task of resolving the goblin nest before the ritual wasn't entirely out of reach.
Glancing at the unconscious great goblin inside, I opened the official game forums.
As expected, with my deliberate hints, most beta testers and cloud gamers were now aware of my intentions to deal with the goblin nest… Such lovely nerds.