Goblin Slayer

Allen woke up right after 5 a.m., thirty minutes earlier than usual. He quickly put on his casual clothes and then ran out the back door of the mansion to the city gates, relying solely on the illumination from the streetlights.

"What's the matter, lad? It's not time to open this gate yet," the guard told Allen.

"Mm, I know. I'll wait."

This gate was mainly used by members of Baron Granvelle's household as well as those living in the nobles' residential area. Allen had already learned from Rickel beforehand that it opened at the 6 am bell. Back in Krena Village, the bell had only rung at 9 am, 12 noon, 3 pm, and 6 pm; however, here in Granvelle City, 6 am and 9 pm were also added to the schedule for a total of six rings every day. As expected of the big city—the mornings were early and the nights late.

'While I wait, let's do one final check.'

Allen got out his grimoire and confirmed what he had put inside its Storage.

___

Short sword x 1

Wooden sword x 3

Stick of firewood x 30

Rope x 3

Jerky x 5

Waterskin x 2

Throwing stone x 10

Silver coin x 93

Copper coin x 2

Rank E magic stone x 3

___

During his previous day off, Allen had gone out to town and bought everything that he thought he would need traveling outside the city. He had also adjusted the distribution of the cards in the holders.

___

Insect G x 3

Insect E x 1

Beast E x 10

Bird E x 6

Grass E x 20

___

Before he had kept twenty Bird E cards, but he had swapped most of them out to adopt a build more suitable for hunting. Consequently, his stock of Rank E magic stones had decreased from more than ten to only three. It was pretty much all tapped out.

Allen had also been informed by Sebas that as a manservant, he was forbidden from carrying weapons on his person. This applied to the short sword that he had received from Dogora as a parting gift. Therefore, the weapon was now inside Storage alongside a few wooden swords.

'Wait, I have firewood, the kind for warming rooms, but no flint to light it with. Oh well, I can always buy it while out on another errand.' Cecil sent Allen to buy things for her quite often. He could easily drop by a general store along the way.

CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!

The large city bell pealed loudly, indicating that it was now six o'clock.

The gate guard called out to Allen. "Hey lad, gate's open. You got your pass with you?"

Allen retrieved a badge bearing the crest of House Granvelle's servants from his trouser pocket. This gave him access to all of the city gates.

"M-My apologies. I did not realize you were in His Lordship's service."

"No worries," Allen responded before stepping through. He immediately found his breath taken away and murmured with emotion, "I'm finally outside!"

Allen had dreamed of the view currently spread out before his eyes for eight years. He walked forward as if mesmerized. A part of him heard the gate guard say, "Lad, stay safe," but he was too occupied to pay any mind.

A nearly bare grassland stretched out for about a kilometer from the gate, beyond which was a sparse forest that obscured the horizon. The trees seemed planted at regular intervals, indicating unnatural growth. It had been the same around Krena Village.

After walking for a while, Allen took his crest back out for a better look. The symbol was made of three trees, likely in reference to the wealth of untouched nature in the fiefdom.

'Well then, Rank D monsters seem like a good place to start. I don't think I'll lose to something on par with an albaheron.'

Allen had already learned at the Adventurer's Guild that the strength of the monsters in this area was proportional to proximity to the White Dragon Mountains. The mountain range lay beyond Krena Village to the southwest of Granvelle City and stretched north to south into the far distance. The base of the mountains was a seven days' walk from the city. Everything that Allen knew about the geography of the vicinity had come from Rickel, since he himself did not have access to the mansion's study where maps of the fiefdom were presumably located.

'If I have the misfortune of bumping into a high-ranked monster, I can just aggro it with Hopper and run away.'

When used, Insect G's Ability, Provoke, would cause monsters to become enraged. Allen intended to use it as a way to get unwanted monsters off his back.

Because his time was limited, Allen started to run. He stopped only after traversing around ten kilometers.

'This should be far enough. Before I start hunting, I want to have a better look at the Bird E Summon. Come on out, Hawkins.'

A giant hawk with a wingspan of two meters suddenly appeared in midair.

'Come here.'

"Pii!"

The Bird E landed and made its way over with stalking steps.

'Hold on, it's doing what I told it to even though I never trained it. Is this because of its high Intelligence?...Spin around once, please.'

Sure enough, the creature slowly turned around in a circle. Allen was delighted to have a Summon that could finally understand orders, but the first order of business was to analyze why. The first possible answer that came to mind was Intelligence. Whereas Bird E only started with 50 Intelligence, Strengthening Lvl. 4 buffed the stat by a hundred, bringing it to 150 in total.

'Hm, I'll tentatively take this to mean Summons can understand instructions once they reach 150 in Intelligence. Next: walk one meter to the right.'

Hawkins obediently walked one meter to the right.

'Nice, so it already understands words. Saves me the trouble. Let's try this with other Summons. Tama, come on out.'

A saber-toothed cat appeared, towering at a bit more than a meter tall and two meters in length. Now that Allen was getting to the third tier of unlockable Summons, they were starting to look quite intimidating.

'Here, Tama. Come.'

The large beast started rolling about on the ground, rubbing its back against the soft green grass and purring with contentment.

'Hm, so I can't give instructions to Tama, who's the same rank but only has 28 Intelligence. In other words, the deciding factor really is the Intelligence stat, not the rank of the Summon.'

Because he was done confirming the factor behind the Summons' ability to comprehend words and instructions, Allen reverted Tama back to card form.

'The other tests I want to do all need an opponent, so we might as well get started. Hawkins, use Hawk Eye and find me a target.'

"Pii!" It cried in acknowledgement and few out.

Then Allen remained in place, waiting and enduring the heat of the sun that had climbed quite high by now. However, even after waiting fifteen minutes, Hawkins showed no sign of returning.

'Gah, the encounter rate in this world is way too low.'

Despite currently being more than an hour away from Granvelle City, Allen had yet to see battle. Apparently monsters were not all that common in this world.

'I've also waited for more than an hour for an albaheron to fly overhead. This is just way too inefficient. I've got to make the most out of the limited time I have for hunting. You know what? I'll send out the rest of the Bird E Summons that I have stocked.'

Allen gave the five Summons that appeared the same instruction he had given the first. They cried out in unison, then took off in a burst of fluttering.

'Okay, that should make it faster to find monsters to kill. Oh right, gotta take my short sword out. And in exchange, I'll put the crest inside Storage so that I don't accidentally drop it.'

"Pii!"

This time, a Bird E came back right away. It descended and landed on a nearby tree as if saying, "This way."

'That direction, then?'

Allen drew his weapon and cautiously proceeded in the direction indicated. He walked one hundred meters...three hundred meters...five hundred meters...and yet there was still no monster to be seen.

'Ugh, is there actually a monster up ahead? I'm going to have to use more precise questions to figure out exactly how far away the target is.'

Three other Hawkins were circling overhead, indicating that they had also found monsters. 'Thinking about it, I should probably also limit the search radius I want. If it turns out what I'm now heading toward is ten kilometers away, not only is it too far away, I would be continuing on blind for the entire distance.'

Just as Allen pondered how to use Hawkins in a smarter way, he noticed a humanoid figure looming ahead.

'Hm? Is that a monster?'

"Gugagaga."

It turned out to be a monster about 150 centimeters tall with green skin. It had a cloth wrapped around its waist.

'That's gotta be a goblin, right?'

"Gugagaga."

Allen stopped and faced off against the goblin, who turned out to have four more companions. They all had muscular bodies and were holding swords or clubs. They cackled loudly, as if they thought lunch in the form of an eight-year-old boy had just dropped into their laps.

'Crap, I lost the element of surprise.'

One of the basics of fighting was to get a preemptive strike in. Allen would have preferred starting off the fight by first taking a few pot shots from behind cover, but he had let his guard down and barged right in instead.

"Gugagaga!" one of the goblins screamed, after which all of them charged forward, weapons held aloft.

'Tamas, come out!'

"Grrrrr!"

Allen could freely call out as many Summons as he wanted at the same time without any concern for MP costs. With that, five Strengthened saber-toothed cats surrounded Allen in a defensive formation.

"Guga?"

The goblins faltered in their steps, surprised by the sudden appearance of the Summons.

"Grrrr!"

That moment, five more Tamas appeared behind the group of goblins.

Allen was capable of calling forth his Summons anywhere within fifty meters that he had direct line of sight to. Now the monsters were surrounded.

Attacking an enemy from behind was the most basic, and the most effective, method of attack. Allen ordered all the sabertooths to use their Ability, Claw.

The goblins flew into a mindless panic, clearly not very intelligent. When they turned around to face the assailants behind them, the ones protecting Allen surged forward in attack. Two goblins fell immediately.

'Before the others die... Ageha, come on out and use your Ability!'

A giant butterfly with a meter wingspan appeared. It flapped its wings toward the goblins, covering them with a yellowish powder. Two of the remaining three monsters fell asleep on their feet so quickly it was as if they had lost consciousness.

Allen took out a rock from Storage and threw it at the face of one of the sleeping goblins with his full strength. However, no line appeared on his grimoire, indicating that it was still alive.

'That wasn't enough to finish it off, huh?'

One of the Beast Es dealt the finishing blow to the monster with a crushed-in face.

'I see, so one goblin gives me 200 XP. There's five of them here, which means a total of 1,000 XP! Yahoo!'

Allen could not help but do a little jig inside his mind after calculating how much XP he would gain from this fight. He earned 100 XP from one albaheron and 400 XP from one great boar. Thanks to the adoption of his suggestions, the hunting party at Krena Village had become capable of hunting three great boars each trip, which added up to a total of 1,200 XP.

'Efficiency's always important to consider when grinding. Goblins have better hourly rates, plain and simple.'

Great boars were, including the time needed to reach and return from the hunting grounds, worth 1,200 XP for six hours. In sharp contrast, he had just earned 1,000 XP before two hours had even passed. That made the hourly rate for great boars 200 and for goblins 500. It was blatantly obvious which was more efficient.

The Hawkins circling above told Allen his next target was already lined up.

'Good, good. Let's grab the magic stones in these goblins and then move on. But hm, so Scale Powder causes the Sleep debuff. Just one Ageha was enough to have an effect. This supports my hypothesis.'

From what he had observed, Allen had realized there was a certain rule to the debuffs cast by the Insect cards. He wanted to confirm it through today's battles.

For now, he approached the dead goblins and used his short sword to cut into their chests, taking out their magic stones. It was honestly quite a gross task, but magic stones were precious. This was especially true for Allen as a Summoner—magic stones could very likely determine his survival someday. As such, just leaving them untouched was not an option. Soon, Allen's stock of magic stones had gone up by five.

During that time, multiple Tamas kept a vigilant lookout around Allen just in case there were other goblins nearby. Getting attacked from behind was a very real danger when hunting all by yourself.

'All right, that's the harvesting done. Hawkins, I want more goblins! Those who saw a group of five or more just now, come on down. Has to be within three kilometers, though. The rest of you, go back out there and keep looking with Hawk Eye.'

Promptly, four of the hawks flew off. Two descended, seemingly having found something that matched Allen's criteria. They indicated the direction, then Allen took off.

After this, Allen completely lost himself in goblin hunting. Time passed in a flash, and before he knew it, the sun had started to go down.

***

'Nice! Thanks to killing eighty goblins and five horned rabbits in total, my level's gone up by two! Days off are the best!'

A single goblin gave 200 XP and a horned rabbit gave 10. All together, Allen had earned 16,050 XP today alone. He was now Lvl. 9.

As a result of his testing today, he had also figured out a rule behind the Insect Summons. When he wanted the Insect Gs to use their Ability on albaherons, a monster three ranks higher at D, he needed three of them to work together. Conversely, a single Insect E had been able to affect a group of goblins, Rank D monsters. From this, he derived the following postulates:

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- One Summon is sufficient to affect a monster one rank higher with an Ability

- Two Summons are needed to affect a monster two ranks higher with an Ability

- An additional Summon is needed to affect a monster each successive rank higher with an Ability

- The probability of successfully debuffing a monster is not 100% (unaffected by the number of Summons)

- A single Summon is capable of debuffing several monsters at once

___

The debuff from Scale Powder turned out to be Sleep. It was roughly eighty percent effective against goblins, which was a very high number. Admittedly, this might be a number specific to only goblins, so more testing was needed.

Unfortunately, Allen's side did not exactly get through the day unscathed. The goblins, buff as they were, had proved surprisingly effective at killing the saber-toothed tigers. The Strengthening skill had given the Beast E Summons more HP and Attack, which meant they were still quite low on Agility and Endurance. It certainly did not help matters that their rank was lower than the goblins'.

Allen started off every fight using Insect E, but there were times when he got unlucky and Scale Powder still left more goblins standing than not. When that happened, the Tamas would end up taking more attacks. In order to offset his losses, Allen searched out horned rabbits every now and then for their Rank E magic stones.

Another thing that Allen learned today was that he could not create Rank E Summons using the Rank D magic stones harvested from goblins. When Creating and Synthesizing new Summons, he needed magic stones of the exact same rank.

'All right, next group! Where are you, my little goblins?'

Groups of goblins were the perfect targets, as they meant more XP in one place with less searching. Allen continued seeking them out, feeling like he had become a goblin hunter. However, all six of his hawks suddenly circled once in the air and then descended.

'Hm? What's wrong? Are you tired? I can still go on, though.'

The birds, which were now standing in a row on the ground, all shook their heads. Apparently the reason for their behavior was not fatigue.

With a start, Allen suddenly realized his surroundings had gotten rather dim. It would not be long before the sun set completely.

'Wait, is it because you guys can't see in the dark?' Six nods confirmed Allen's guess.

"Oh my god, you guys really are hawks! So you can't scout at night. Uh-oh, I'm in trouble, then."

It was at this moment that Allen finally realized that he had completely lost his sense of direction after all the twists and turns he took chasing goblins. He had no idea where he currently was nor what direction Granvelle City was.

'I'd planned on having Hawkins direct me back home, but it looks like I'll have to figure it out myself.'

Thankfully, there was still a little bit of sun, which gave Allen a general idea of direction. He then dashed as fast as he could through the darkening forest.

***

Several hours later, he successfully returned to the city gate. By now, it was pitch black outside.

"Oh, there you are, lad! Congrats on making it back in one piece."

"Th-Thank you, sir."

It was the same guard who had been standing at the gate since morning.

'Guards sure have it tough, having to be on their feet all day long,' Allen thought while producing his crest. 'But okay, that was a really close shave. I'm going to have to wrap things up earlier in the day next time.'

Thus Allen's first full day off ended with a little bit of introspection.