"More than one goblin group?"
Wakasha's heart tightened. He stopped at once, crouched low, and slipped behind a thick tree trunk, carefully peeking out to examine the surroundings.
His eyes swept across the nearby bushes, large trees, and the low-lying ground farther ahead, trying to spot any sign of goblins. But everything around him was deathly quiet. Other than the rustle of leaves in the wind, he could hear nothing else, and he could not see a single goblin.
Wakasha did not act rashly. He closed his eyes, focused, and pushed his senses to their limit.
Tiny sounds flowed into his ears one after another: the soft rustling of leaves, the distant cries of birds, the faint skittering of insects through the undergrowth... and that indistinct goblin chatter.
The voices were coming from somewhere dozens of meters ahead, and from more than one direction. It seemed there were two separate goblin groups, some distance apart, apparently chattering back and forth about something.
At the same time, the faint foul smell became a little clearer. It really was coming from ahead, and it was getting stronger, which meant he was steadily drawing closer to the goblins' active territory.
Wakasha slowly opened his eyes. His gaze grew calmer as he rapidly weighed the situation in his mind.
There were probably two goblin groups ahead. He had no idea how many were in each group, or whether there were any stronger mutated goblins among them.
Right now, his Challenge Rating was only Level 0. Both his Strength and Constitution were only 4. Although he had a powerful weapon like Deathbird, his mental reserves were still an unknown, and his close-combat ability was weak. If he rushed in recklessly and ran into a large goblin pack, things could get dangerous fast.
"Don't get impulsive. Scout the situation first."
Having made up his mind, Wakasha slowly shifted his body, circled around to the other side of the tree, and carefully crept forward.
He kept himself as low as possible and moved with extreme lightness, avoiding branches and stones on the ground so he would not make any noise that might alert the goblins.
Deathbird had already been summoned into his right hand, ready for battle at any moment. The short sword at his waist was partially drawn as well, its cold blade exposed by about an inch, just in case.
The closer he moved, the clearer the goblin chatter became, and the stronger the foul smell grew. The stench was so sharp that Wakasha could not help frowning. He took out the herb pouch from his bag, pinched out a little herbal powder, and rubbed it beneath his nose. The faint herbal scent masked part of the stink and made him feel much better.
After creeping forward about ten more meters, Wakasha stopped.
A clearing had appeared ahead. Dense bushes and low trees surrounded it, making it the perfect place to hide.
He slipped behind a tall clump of bushes, carefully poked his head out, and looked into the clearing. What he saw filled him with both excitement and renewed caution.
On the left side of the clearing was a group of goblins—five in total. All of them were ordinary goblins, around one meter tall, with dark green skin, cloudy eyes, and ragged burlap clothes stained with filth and blood.
They were holding thick wooden clubs, and two of them also carried fist-sized stones they had picked up somewhere. Right now, they were crowded together, gnawing on the fresh carcass of a beast—apparently a rabbit they had just killed. The body had already been torn to pieces, and blood stained the ground around it red.
On the right side of the clearing was another goblin group, smaller than the one on the left, with only three members. They were also ordinary goblins. Unlike the others, they were not eating. Instead, they were crouched on the ground, scratching random patterns into the dirt with stones, occasionally chirping and chattering as though discussing something—or perhaps performing some crude little ritual.
The two goblin groups were separated by roughly twenty meters and showed no sign of interacting with each other. They seemed like two independent squads that had just happened to gather in the same clearing.
Wakasha observed carefully for a while and confirmed that there were no mutated goblins in sight. They were all ordinary goblins, individually weak, almost identical to the three he had just killed. That let him relax a little.
"Five on the left. Three on the right. Eight total. All ordinary goblins. No mutated types."
Wakasha silently memorized their numbers and positions, then quickly scanned the terrain around the clearing and began shaping an ambush plan.
"The three on the right include one lookout, but its guard is weak. And they're crouched down, focused on what they're drawing on the ground, which makes them easier to ambush. The five on the left are more numerous, but they're completely absorbed in tearing apart their food and fighting over it, so their attention is scattered too. Still, once a fight starts, they'll probably react immediately and gang up on me, so I need to be careful."
He thought it over for several minutes. In the end, he decided to ambush the three goblins on the right first, then deal with the five on the left.
The reason was simple. There were fewer goblins on the right, and they presented a much clearer opening. Killing them first would reduce the number of enemies, earn him experience points, and prevent him from being caught between two goblin groups in the middle of a later fight.
And among those three on the right, one was acting as a lookout. Even if it was not especially alert, a single careless move on his part might still expose him. That meant he had to finish them quickly—kill them all before the lookout had a chance to react and sound the alarm.
If he could eliminate the three goblins on the right without a sound, then take his time ambushing the five on the left afterward, his odds of winning would rise dramatically.
Wakasha adjusted his position again, fully hiding himself behind the bushes. He took several deep breaths, forcing himself to calm down until his heartbeat slowly steadied.
Then he closed his eyes and focused, feeling for the presence of Deathbird. That instinctive sensation—the weapon as an extension of himself—rose up again. At the same time, he quietly tested his mental power.
He could sense a faint warm current inside his mind. That current was his mental power, and Deathbird relied on it to generate bullets.
He tried channeling a thread of that mental power into Deathbird.
At once, the gun's body gave off a faint glow. The purple-gold crow pattern became sharper, and a mental bullet formed inside the chamber.
To test the cost of creating ammunition, Wakasha generated another bullet, then another, until he had filled the magazine to its maximum capacity of ten rounds.
Earlier he had not paid attention, but now he carefully checked the state of his mind.
Just those ten bullets left him feeling noticeably drained.
A wave of drowsiness started creeping over him.
Judging by feel alone, those ten bullets had consumed around twenty-five percent of his mental power.