Into the Woods

Eventually, I decided to register for all the quests on the board, as there wasn't really any reason not to. I did intend to clear all of them eventually, and signing up now would allow me to track their progression, if anyone else happened to clear them.

When I picked up the first quest, a goblin subjugation, I also received a new name – Adventurer. It was one of the two names I most wanted early on, the second being Magical Swordsman or Magical Warrior, or a variation of that, but I was missing the qualifications for that at the moment. For now, I decided to set my name as Adventurer.

Aside from the name, Hardkale was registered as a respawn point. That made me very happy, as now I could take greater risks without fearing as much. I still didn't want to experience death, even though the system claimed that there aren't penalties. I'll need to find an opportunity to test the respawn option though.

When I signed up for the quest, it also appeared in my quest log, with an additional surprise. Clearing the goblin village would earn me 50 silver, as it was a low risk job for those capable of the task. Goblins were a menace to small villages, but they were still relatively docile. The pay was low because while they were pestering farmers and travelers, patrolling knights would eventually get the job done.

But the surprising part was that I would get an additional reward from the system. A single attribute point as well as a skill shard – once five are collected it is turned into a skill point. A small reward, but it accumulates. However, there was also a "first clear" bonus, giving out 5 attribute points and a skill point for the first time the quest is cleared.

All the quests on the board had such a reward and checking the quest menu, they were under a repeatable tag. It made sense that with time, monsters will appear once again. Perfect eradication seemed to be impossible, but I wondered how long it would take for them to reappear. It could be a nice farm.

All the subjugation quests targeted the low level common monsters that one would usually encounter at the start of many fantasy games – goblins, orcs, kobolds and lizardman. There were usually some variation between the dangers that these races pose, but those around were of the lowest form of their species, so it was a perfect hunting ground for me. I decided to go for the goblins first because they were the closest, and I also wanted to see what they forces were like, since it's been two years since I cleared their raiding party.

I decided to go into the forest with my current equipment – which was basically a rusty sword and rocks. I could have upgraded my equipment easily, or even asked Hunter, but I had my reasons. The goblins weren't able to put up a fight against me two years ago, and now I was confident enough that I won't even need to use guerrilla warfare against them. I didn't need equipment, and it wasn't something easy for Hunter to give away, so I didn't want to bother him. I also didn't want to spend money on beginner equipment when I'll replace it as soon as I get to the city.

Entering the forest, I headed towards the goblin village. A normal person would have to put some effort into navigation, but the quest marker was clear on my minimap, so there was no fear of getting lost.

On the way, I wanted to test how my Inventory Control improved, as I was only using it on a small rock up until now. My hand brushed against a tree and with a thought, it vanished, roots and all. It was so sudden that I startled myself, especially since I didn't think that it would work. And the skill leveled up instantly!

To be able to store a tree with a level 6 skill, that was insane. Blessings were indeed very fearsome. I stored a few more trees and boulders, and eventually the skill leveled up once more.

There was still some ways to go, but I decided to take a short detour when I noticed a gray dot on the map and was curious about it. It wasn't the first one I noticed, but I was distracted by other things until now. So far, I knew that a red dot meant hostile, blue meant neutral and green meant friendly, and didn't pay much attention to gray dots.

Apparently, gray denoted wildlife. Animals seemed to be indifferent towards me, and didn't retreat nor even react to my approaching presence. They behaved very close to how random animals would behave in many MMORPGs, completely ignoring the PCs. Killing them usually gave no benefit, so they were ignored, but…

I had the Naming blessing, which was currently very limited. I could wait until I was tier 2, or I could train on the wildlife and see how it improves with levels.

When I encountered a rabbit in the forest, I remembered that there was a problem with my plan. The appearance of a named rabbit would be very suspicious, so I'll need to deal with them after naming them. At best, one would call my actions distasteful, or horrifying at worst.

"I name you, Rabbit!" Perhaps with this, I won't need to kill the innocent! Nothing happened.

I sighed. "I name you… Fluffy." I told the rabbit as I resigned to its fate. The skill worked, changing it from Rabbit to Fluffy, and the gray dot changed to a blue one. The skill didn't instantly turn it into an ally, but it was now intelligent? I examined the rabbit for any changes, and even tried talking to it or petting it, but it didn't seem to behave any differently.

Well, at least my Naming skill leveled up.

Perhaps now it would work? I decided to try again. "I name you, Rabbit." Nothing happened. "I name you Fluffy McFluffyFace." That worked, however the name was kinda… Bad. I decided a few more names, and all except Rabbit worked. Even Wabbit worked. My skill didn't level up from this, so I assumed that I get skill XP only once per creature.

"Goodbye, Wabbit." I said with a sad sigh. I didn't really grow attached to it, but it didn't feel good to know that I'm going to be killing a lot of animals after giving them a name. I'm bad at coming up with names, and I didn't want to recycle them too much, as it would be disrespectful…

With a quick stab, the life of Wabbit ended. I looted it through the system, obtaining "Rabbit Meat – Low Quality", which did not change Wabbit's corpse at all, so I stuffed it into my inventory as well.

That day, on the way to (and from) the goblin village, many rabbits, deer, foxes, and other critters had obtained something that many humans could only dream of, in exchange for their lives. Through the system I collected a lot of meat (the quality seemed to be random, with most being low and a few medium), bones, pelts, eyes, hearts and other internal organs. The looting proved that it was not only random, it was separate from the actual animal. One of the foxes gave me two hearts…

I tried harvesting the parts manually, to see if I can double up on the loot, but it failed. I didn't have the right skills, so I just ruined a perfectly good rabbit pelt.

And my Naming rose to level 5 by the time I was back.

With such thoughts, the goblin village was finally within my sight. According to the map, there were several hundred goblins, though not all of them were hostile. I noticed that only the awakened goblins were marked as hostiles, while the rest, oddly enough, were marked gray.

The second thought that passed through my head was that my first thought was rather frightening. That was so because I thought that it would be interesting to see how the gray marked goblins react once I start slaughtering the hostile goblins. The gray goblins were unawakened, and for goblins it meant only one thing – they didn't reach adulthood yet. I was curious about how children would react when seeing their parents killed.

It was pure curiosity. There were no other emotions behind that thought, such as bloodthirst or delivering vengeance for daring to attack my village. I just wanted to test how a child would react in such a situation. And the only reason that I thought that it was a frightening thought was because I believed that's not how normal people are supposed to think. Even now, I didn't really care about the situation all that much.

As long as word doesn't spread about my true personality, people will think of me as a hero, right? So it's fine…

I stared coldly at the goblin village as a rusty sword appeared in my hand.