Essence

Angered about having been treated just like a snack, Dilan didn't even keep an eye on the stone dagger.

Instead, his attention was solely focused on the Goblin.

It was chewing on the tiny bits of flesh that it had ripped out of his neck while cackling and pointing its bony fingers at him.

Dilan felt ridiculed and annoyed by this taunting, but he quickly calmed down when he noticed that the Goblin was approaching him with slow steps.

Even if it was faster than Dilan, the Goblin noticed that its opponent was not easy to be defeated.

Thus, it took a glance at its surroundings, while trying to search for the stone dagger.

And it was at this moment that Dilan pushed his feet off the ground, accelerating towards the Goblin ahead.

He was already exhausted and felt like collapsing on a bed and resting for several hours.

However, that was only something he could do after the fight was finally over, which was why he wanted to speed up that process.

'I can use my weight to my advantage!''

This thought flashed through his mind, and Dilan implemented it immediately, using his momentum to punch the Goblin.

It might be fast and flexible, but its short legs hindered it from taking large strides to run away from him.

Using this to his advantage he followed the trajectory in which the Goblin was moving while trying to evade his first punch.

The moment he knew where it would end up, his left hand snapped out.

Moving like a snake, his hand reached out for the Goblin's neck, taking it off-guard.

Using all the energy he could muster, he tightened his grip and tried to break the beast's neck at once.

However, the Goblin wasn't going to go down so easily and it began to viciously scratch his still injured forearm.

As such, Dilan felt like letting go of his opponent at once.

The pain was just too strong, and the regeneration ability was not omnipotent.

But even though his body screamed at him to let go, Dilan clenched his other fist and began to bash it on the head of the Goblin as hard as he could.

One after another, he kept pounding at the Goblin mercilessly, his attacks getting fiercer and fiercer with every subsequent punch.

Blood was smeared on his entire hand, and his fingers hurt like hell but he kept going at it. He only stopped after more than a dozen hits.

Taking heavy breaths, he let go of the Goblin and staggered back a little.

The Goblin had stopped scratching him and the moment Dilan let go of its body, its lifeless body slumped to the ground.

It took ihm a few seconds, but when he was satisfied that the Goblin was truly dead, he fell to his knees while gasping for air. He took a few seconds to realize that he had just killed a living being.

However, instead of experiencing remorse or pity, he just felt an emptiness in his heart.

He knew that he had fought with his life on the line and that only one of them would have survived.

And in the end, it was he, who had survived which is what mattered.

Feeling the adrenaline slowly recede in his body, Dilan couldn't help but smile as he looked at the mashed face of the Goblin.

'So, are there experience points, or what?' He began to wonder, but the robotic voice did not resound in his mind.

This disappointed Dilan a little bit, and the pain in his arm began to flood his mind, preventing him from thinking straight.

The effect of his Origin ability had worn off already, and he didn't have even a single unit of mana to reuse it again.

As such, he had to wait until his body would naturally replenish some Mana, or until his Mana was to have replenished.

Just at this moment, he saw a faintly glimmering crystal in the head of the Goblin that he had beaten into a pulp.

Picking it up, Dilan inspected it for a few seconds before a message appeared in front of him, while a somewhat familiar voice resounded in his mind once again.

[Essence Crystal of a Tierless Level 1 Goblin(Adult)→ +0.1 Strength, +0.2 Health, +0.1 Stamina]

Upon hearing the familiar voice, he smiled faintly.

"So that's how it is. Are those our experience points? The essence of the monsters we kill?"

If that were to be true, killing thousands of Goblins would allow him to become hundreds of times stronger than the average human.

However, he had no idea how to absorb the Goblin's essence.

But just when Dilan thought about it, the crystal crumbled.

Energy circulated through his entire body, reaching every single cell and enhancing his physique in numerous ways.

A soothing sensation overcame him, and his smile began to widen as he clenched his fist.

Feeling that both his strength and his body's recovery mechanism had improved if only a tiny bit faster made him feel overjoyed.

Excited, he couldn't help but look at the corpse to look for more hidden treasures.

But there was nothing, except the holographic screen that swam before his eyes.

'Tierless, and Level 1…So did it spawn at Level one, or did it level up?' Dilan suddenly wondered.

It might not be of great importance, but he was currently at level zero.

As such, considering a possibility, Dilan imagined that the Goblin might have emerged from the Temporary Gate as a Tierless Level 1 monster.

Two questions flashed through his mind, and he couldn't answer either of them.

"Can monsters of a higher level emerge from the gate?' The question's answer was likely to be a 'yes', but if this included 'Tiered' monsters was something Dilan had no idea about.

Thinking about it, the fire that had covered the entire night sky was something either a beast of a higher level could have created, or it was a higher Tiered existence!

Unfortunately, thinking about the answer didn't really help him.

In fact, it would lead to the exact opposite and needlessly scare him.

With that in mind, Dilan began to search for the Stone dagger.

He spent a few minutes finding it and saw it lying in a heap of leaves. Upon picking it up, he quickly noticed that it was extremely tough and durable.

[[Reinforced Stone Dagger] <Tierless Trash treasure>

[+0.1Strength], Can inflict damage to monsters up to Level 5]

'Even weapons can give me additional stats?'

Stats were probably not only restricted to weapons, and given that there was a Stone Spear lying in the ravine, Dilan considered climbing down to retrieve it.

He was exhausted right now, but he was tempted to procure the Essence crystal of the Goblin that he had thrown into the ravine.

Furthermore, Dilan understood that the ravine might be the best place to rest, for now.

The dangers of the surroundings and the temporary Gate, whose liquid was swirling and gleaming in a bluish color, were unknown, after all.

Ignoring the pain shooting up from all over his body, he climbed down the ravine, after tucking the Reinforced Stone dagger in the waistband of his jeans.

Reaching the ground, Dilan grasped the Reinforced Stone dagger.

The Goblin he threw to the ground must have died, but it could have survived, somehow.

More insane things had happened during the last few hours!

Fortunately, Dilan's worry seemed to have been unfounded and he found the corpse of the Goblin.

It had fallen on its head so most of its head and neck had been disfigured.

But, he felt no pity for this Goblin either and instead his eyes fell on both the Essence crystal and the Stone spear.

However, what confused him the most was that there was grayish gleaming crystal right next to the Goblin's corpse.

"That's not an Essence crystal, right?"