Winterseed -XIII-

It was the dark of the night, and havoc grew in Winterseed Village, beginning from a simple scream of fear and instantly transforming into a chaotic scene as everyone ran for their lives.

The moon hung in the sky, illuminating the village with its crescent glow, providing enough light for the soldiers to fight and for the villagers to escape.

Under the calm moonlight, Rowan, Brandon, and two young soldiers could be seen hurrying towards the battlefield.

"Fucking hell! This is not good at all. Those bastards have succeeded in turning my village upside down!" Rowan cursed inwardly as he gazed upon the destroyed mold houses.

On his right, the roof of a mold house was on fire, and on his left, several collapsed mound houses lay in ruins.

Seeing this amount of destruction, Rowan understood that they were getting closer to the battlefield.

After a few minutes, the sound of weapons clashing reached their ears. A few steps more, and Rowan found himself facing a chaotic battle.

Rowan's breath caught as he took in the chaotic scene before him.

He could see his soldiers dressed in their torn, dirty clothes fighting desperately, their faces were streaked with sweat and dirt as they fought with all their strenght. Despite their tiredness, they kept swinging their weapons, driven by sheer will.

Battling against them were goblins—ugly, green-skinned creatures with sharp, yellow teeth. Their red eyes glowed with cruel joy as they grinned and laughed. Some wore rough armor made from animal hides, while others were nearly naked, with only leaves covering their lower halves.

The goblins held crude weapons—wooden clubs, spears with crude metal tips, and jagged pieces of metal they used as swords. Even though their weapons were rough, with their naturally evolved strength, they were difficult to fight against.

With their short size of about 4'4 and large numbers, it became difficult for the soldiers who were trained to fight humans to battle against them.

Rowan evaluated the battlefield for a few seconds before charging in with a grim look on his face.

"Lord Rowan, you can't go into the battlefield!!" Brandon chased after him, trying to hold him back.

Brandon didn't have any special fighting skills, so he was helpless and useless on a battlefield like this, especially against crafty goblins.

While Brandon had no impressive skills of his own, he knew Rowan was the same—Rowan never had any proper battle practice before now.

Even the sword moves he taught the soldiers were moves he said he learned from his father just by watching. How could he then battle against goblins?

Rowan didn't heed Brandon's calls as he was dead set on slaughtering these vile creatures that came to disturb his peaceful sleep.

Rowan's eyes scanned the battlefield, quickly landing on a badly injured soldier trying to crawl his way out of the fight for safety. The soldier had a small sword in his hands. As Rowan had no weapon of his own, he made a quick sprint for the soldier.

"Young lord..." The soldier was shocked to see Rowan appear before him.

"You did a good job, I will make use of your weapon for now." Rowan flashed him a quick smile and spoke a few words of encouragement before grabbing his sword.

[ Your soldier is touched and honoured by your words… ]

[ Your soldier is on the verge of tears.] 

Rowan disregarded the message and dashed toward the battlefield.

Thanks to the moonlight, he was able to see clearly in the dark, and also, thanks to the short size and distinctive skin color of the goblins, he would be able to avoid injuring his own soldiers.

[ Goblin - Health: 89% ] 

[ Special skill: Night Vision (Copy? YES | NO) ] 

[ Status: Happy ]

Rowan set his eyes on his first goblin; it was fighting against a soldier, laughing happily as it craftily inflicted numerous injuries with its crooked spear.

'Hmm, I can even copy skills from monsters? Incredible!'

"Lord Rowan!!" The soldier, just like the others, was shocked when he saw Rowan charging towards him.

"Let go of this one; I will take care of it. Go and assist the others."

"Yes, Lord Rowan." The injured soldier stepped back, causing the goblin to tilt its ugly face towards Rowan with a grin. It was glad that Rowan was uninjured and would like to change that.

"Hehehe!" Laughing maniacally, the goblin sprinted toward Rowan, who was just six feet away from it.

Rowan smirked, seeing the goblin charging with no caution. It had already taken Rowan as one of the weak soldiers, which instantly became an advantage for him. Wasting no time, he activated his offense.

[ Sword Grandmaster activated on weapon! Attack power and efficiency have increased by 300%. ]

Rowan could feel the short sword in his hand buzzing with invisible energy.

The goblin was already close to Rowan and was stabbing its crooked spear toward his chest when Rowan's hands moved swiftly, deflecting the attack with ease. "Hee?" The goblin was shocked that Rowan blocked its attack so easily. It took two swift steps backward and observed Rowan with questioning eyes before laughing maniacally and attacking again, this time swinging the spear with all its strength.

Rowan blocked quickly and immediately used his free hand to grab the wooden handle of the spear, completely disorienting his opponent.

While grabbing the spear, he rendered the goblin immobile for a short second, but that short second was all it took to slash its neck, decapitating it.

With a thud, the headless body of the goblin fell to the ground, and its head rolled toward it as a pool of blood began to form beneath it.

Beside the corpse of the goblin, Rowan noticed a small glowing piece of metal. It was blinking as if to draw Rowan's attention toward it.

[ You slayed x1 goblin | +20 Evolution Points, +1 chunk of crude iron. ]

[ 100x Reward activated; you have received 2000 Evolution Points, 100 chunks of crude iron. ]

[ You've received your first item and unlocked INVENTORY. ]

[ INVENTORY (STAGE 1): Store all items here... Available slot: 1/10. ]

[ You can now access INVENTORY from your character status. ]

...

AUTHOR NOTE!

Thanks for reading till this point, for those readers confused why Rowan didn't use his beast taming skill.. I would love to clarify that his taming only works on beasts.. magical, demonic.. etc but not monsters!