He sat there, in his glowing blue hovel, staring at the [Tainted Core Fragment].
It represented 15 dead roaches. Fifteen tedious, smelly, chitin-crunching, pus-gathering hunts in that filthy crawlspace.
His 14 Intelligence weighed the odds. 35% chance of disease.
His human impatience, a trait far older than his 14 points, weighed the boredom.
"Okay, look," he muttered to himself, his voice a reedy goblin rasp. "Thirty-five percent. That's a high chance of failure. In any self-respecting gacha game, that's a trap banner. You never pull on the 35% trap banner."
He looked at the fragment again, glowing faintly with its sickly, tainted light.
"But... this isn't a gacha game. This is a survival simulation. And 35% failure also means 65%... success."
His logic was, he had to admit, deeply flawed. But the thought of eating another 15 sour, acidic roaches made his skin crawl.
"Besides," he rationalized, "I'm Lvl 3 now. My Stamina is 7. I ate all that other 'Tainted' stuff and was fine. My immune system is probably a beast. A goblin beast."
He was, he realized, an expert at talking himself into terrible ideas. It was the same logic that, as a human, convinced him to start a 700-chapter webnovel at 2 AM on a work night.
"Ah, what the hell. Mange."
He popped the [Tainted Core Fragment] into his mouth.
If the roach meat was sour, this was obscene. It tasted like licking a 9-volt battery that had been dipped in bleach and old pennies. It was acrid, sharp, and it burned as it went down.
He squeezed his eyes shut, his whole body tensing.
Then, the notification.
[You have consumed [Core Fragment (Tainted)]!]
[A surge of corrupted energy floods your system!]
[Experience Gained: 25 EXP!]
[Level 3 (25/30 EXP)]
"Ha!" he cackled, a wet, gasping sound. "Yes! See? Sixty-five percent! It worked! I'm a genius! That's 12 roaches I don't have to—"
[STAMINA CHECK (7) vs. Tainted Energy (Difficulty 10)...]
His triumphant cackle died in his throat, turning into a strangled gulp.
"...Difficulty what?"
[...CHECK FAILED.]
[You have been afflicted with [Cave Rot (Stage 1)]!]
For a second, nothing happened. He just sat there, frozen in his "I'm-a-genius" pose.
Then, he itched.
It wasn't a normal itch. It was a deep, burrowing sensation, like insects crawling under his skin. He frantically scratched his arm with his claws, but it did nothing.
He looked down.
On his forearm, a small, pale-green patch of his skin was turning a dull, sickly grey. As he watched, a tiny, weeping pustule formed in the center of it.
"Oh, nyango," he whispered, his human mind supplying the Cameroonian slang for crap in a moment of pure, unadulterated panic. "Oh, you absolute idiot."
He had played himself. He, with his 14 points of Intelligence, had been outsmarted by a glowing rock. He'd traded 12 roach-hunts for a front-row ticket to becoming one of the weeping, flesh-sloughing monsters he'd seen in the main cavern. This wasn't bad luck; this was consequences. This was the universe telling him he was, in fact, dumber than a bag of hammers.
And just as his despair was about to peak, the System, which had been so helpful and passive, chimed in with a new, terrifyingly formal tone.
[CRITICAL ALERT: Host Vitality is Compromised.]
[Host's actions have initiated a high-risk, high-reward... wait, no. A high-risk, high-consequence scenario.]
[New Function Unlocked: MISSIONS]
A new window, this one edged in a pulsing, urgent red, seared itself into his vision.
[MISSION GENERATED (URGENT)]
Title: The Price of a Shortcut (Or: How I Learned to Stop Gambling and Hate Myself)
Objective: The [Cave Rot] has taken root. Only a potent, purifying fungal agent can counteract it. Find and consume one [Glow-Cap Spore-Cluster].
Time Limit: 24:00:00
Reward:
[Cave Rot] cleansed.
50 EXP.
New Skill: [Toxin Resistance (Passive) Lvl 1].
Failure:
[Cave Rot] progresses to Stage 2 (Irreversible).
Permanent Attribute Loss: -1 Stamina.
Eventual, agonizing death.
His brain, spinning from the panic, latched onto the objective.
"Glow-Cap Spore-Cluster? Not the shrooms?"
He frantically grabbed one of the three [Glow-Cap Shrooms] lighting his alcove.
'Appraisal!'
[Glow-Cap Shroom (Lesser) (Utility)]
Description: A common bioluminescent fungus... This is the mature, fruiting body of the fungus.
Note: The [Spore-Cluster] is the central root-node of a colony. It is rarely found, typically growing in areas of extreme, concentrated "nutrients."
He stared at the note, the words "extreme, concentrated nutrients" echoing in his head.
He thought of the main cavern.
He thought of the [Tribe Bully]'s raised platform.
The throne... made of garbage. The piles of half-eaten bones, rotted meat, and fresh goblin corpses.
A charnel house. A compost heap. A garden.
"You have got to be kidding me," he wheezed, the itch on his arm now a constant, maddening throb.
The cure for his self-inflicted, shortcut-induced disease was in the one place he absolutely could not go. It was in the Lvl 7 [Tribe Bully]'s personal pantry.
This wasn't a simulation. This was a cosmic joke.
A new icon appeared on his status screen. A little green, bubbling skull.
[DEBUFF ACTIVE: Cave Rot (Stage 1)]
Your skin is compromised. You feel a constant, distracting itch. Your focus is split.
Effect: -1 Agility, -1 Perception.
Time Remaining: 23:59:45... 44... 43...
He was weaker.
He was now Lvl 3, but his Agility was back down to 6 and his Perception was 9. He had to go into the boss room nerfed.
"This is not my day," he whimpered.
He stood up, his small, green body shaking with a mix of itchiness, fear, and profound self-loathing. He grabbed his remaining [Corroded Bone Shards]. He strapped his [Vials of Roach Pus] to his loincloth-belt.
He was a sick, weakened, Lvl 3 goblin, armed with acid-dipped bones and bug-guts. And he was about to try and steal a magical mushroom from a Lvl 7 cannibal king's throne of garbage.
He took one last look at his safe, glowing-blue alcove.
"Right," he sighed, scratching his arm furiously. "Let's go be a hero. Or, more likely, a light snack."
The clock was ticking.