Outside the WildHorizon Guild — 10:00 AM
*SWISH*
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..
...
*SMACK*
Dylan crashed face-first onto the muddy ground with a heavy thud. Beside him, Connor twirled a wooden practice sword expertly in his hand, a slight grin tugging at his lips. With a quiet grunt of effort, Dylan pushed himself back up and resumed a defensive stance.
"You're completely dropping your balance when you strike and block. You have to maintain your center of gravity at all times, or..." Connor lunged forward, forcing Dylan to execute a high block. Instantly capitalizing on the opening, Connor swept his leg underneath, sending Dylan tumbling right back into the mud. "...you'll fall."
"AGH!... Dammit. How on earth are you doing that?! I can see your movements clearly, but I can't react in time!" Dylan complained, thoroughly baffled.
"I told you before, didn't I? Our raw stats aren't that far apart, but our combat experience and instincts are worlds away. You hesitate every time you move—that split-second hesitation is why you can't react," Connor revealed, extending a hand to help him up.
Dylan grabbed his hand and pulled himself back up, getting ready to go again.
The two crossed wooden blades once more, wood splinters flying in all directions. Rose sat quietly on a nearby wooden bench, watching their duel unfold.
"Hey, why don't you guys do that move where you lock blades and push against each other until one person gives way?" Rose chimed in, recalling iconic duel scenes from movies and anime.
"Lock blades until one gives way?" Connor repeated, flicking his sword to redirect Dylan's attack before planting a swift kick onto Dylan's rear, sending him crashing down yet again. "What in the world are you talking about?" he asked, genuinely bewildered.
"Don't listen to her," Dylan warned, pushing himself up out of the mud.
"You know, when two master swordsmen clash blades and hold their ground, struggling in a power struggle until someone overpowers the other!" Rose explained enthusiastically.
"That... That is hands-down the stupidest thing I've ever heard! And I have seven younger siblings!" Connor exclaimed at Rose's words. "Doing that in a real fight would be absolute suicide! What you seek with a blade is precision, momentum, and speed. If your sword gets caught or bound, you disengage immediately and strike from a new angle—you don't sit there having a tug-of-war!"
"But in the movies!..." Rose argued back.
"Your so-called 'movies'... or whatever they are, are completely absurd! An actual enemy isn't going to stand there force-locking weapons with you; they're going to slit your throat the moment you freeze up!" Connor retorted, spinning his wooden sword and tapping the back of Dylan's neck as he tried to stand.
"Agh, shit!" Dylan grumbled, falling face-first into the mud once again.
WildHorizon Guild — Outside the Wall, 5:00 PM
Dylan, Connor, and Rose sat inside the guild hall, reviewing available contract postings for the following day.
Rose was grumbling under her breath about having to sleep out on the cold street, wondering aloud when she'd finally be able to afford a proper bed.
Just then, at the adjacent table, four veteran-looking adventurers collapsed heavily into their chairs.
All four looked thoroughly drained, their leather armor visibly shredded, with ragged straps hanging loose from their gear.
"Dammit all, those goblins put up a hell of a fight this time," one of the male adventurers groaned.
"Tell me about it... one of them managed to swipe my dagger, and I didn't even notice until after the skirmish," a female adventurer added bitterly.
"I managed to retrieve it," a third adventurer spoke up, wrapping a tight bandage around his bleeding calf. He pulled the stolen dagger from his pocket and set it on the table.
"Is it just me, or did those goblins actually know how to coordinate their strikes?" the fourth adventurer asked, removing her wide-brimmed hat to inspect several arrow holes piercing the fabric. "They're even using proper hunting bows now."
"This is the third time this week," the first adventurer declared, drawing his iron sword and grimacing at its notched edge. "At this rate, my blade isn't going to hold up much longer. Since when did mere goblins learn how to wield forged iron weapons?"
"The real question is: where are they sourcing them from?" the fourth adventurer asked, peeling off her worn gloves to reveal deep cuts that had sliced straight through the leather lining. "Is it time we invested in higher-tier armor?"
"On our rank pay? Not a chance. We're only Rank E. Buy new armor sets, and we can say goodbye to the room we're renting," the third adventurer replied flatly. He knew their budget was stretched to the absolute limit; any unexpected expense meant sleeping out on the cobblestone streets again.
"Guys, focus!" the second female adventurer insisted, slamming her palm onto the table. "We have to address this situation—we can't keep going out like this. We need to report this anomaly to the receptionists or even the Guild Master."
"For what? So they can laugh us out of the hall for struggling against mere goblins? We're Rank E, for hell's sake! We should be taking down Hobgoblins or even Ogres by now!" the first adventurer complained bitterly.
"Except we're not!" she shot back.
A heavy silence descended over their table—so thick that even Dylan, Connor, and Rose felt an uncomfortable chill listening in.
Connor shook his head quietly. To his experienced eyes, there were only two logical explanations for what those adventurers were going through: either an extraordinarily bad streak of luck, or age catching up to them. Enjoying the story? Read on at novelping.com.
Everyone at that table appeared to be in their late thirties or early forties. Normally, an adventurer's physical youth lasted vastly longer than that of an ordinary civilian. While a normal human began feeling the physical strain of aging in their thirties, an adventurer backed by magic conditioning wouldn't begin to decline until their fifties or sixties.
Connor understood this concept all too well—his own biological mother was fifty years old, yet she maintained the youthful appearance of a woman in her mid-twenties.
It was exceedingly rare for an active adventurer's body to start deteriorating in their thirties or forties, but not impossible. Those who possessed low natural affinity or hailed from non-adventuring civilian lineages lacked sufficient inherent potential—or what adventurers referred to as Core Capacity. Without that growth potential, their physical capabilities hit a hard ceiling early on, and once they peaked, the only direction left was down.
"Poor guys... sounds like they're having a rough time," Rose commented softly.
"There's nothing to be done. That's the harsh reality of the adventuring life. They knew the risks when they drank the Initiation Potion—nobody forced them to take it..." Connor replied, before pausing mid-sentence to glance at Dylan, who was already glaring dead-panned at him.
"Right. Because I totally begged Melissa to force-feed me the Initiation Potion while I was unconscious, isn't that right?" Dylan asked sarcastically.
"You're a special case—it was either that or living the rest of your life missing an arm," Connor replied smoothly, shifting the conversation away.
However, as they sat talking, all three couldn't help but notice the steady influx of adventurers returning from their daily contracts... and almost every single group was discussing the exact same subject.
Goblins.
It felt like a sudden epidemic—as though goblins had abruptly become the sole topic of conversation across the hall, and as if every low-rank party had suddenly grown weaker overnight.
Only then did Connor, Dylan, and Rose come to the unsettling realization: the problem wasn't the adventurers. They weren't getting weaker.
"Guys... I really don't like this... this whole vibe," Rose murmured, rubbing her arms to soothe the goosebumps creeping up her skin.
It felt like a dark omen lurking over the city. Something major was unfolding right beneath their noses, yet everyone seemed to be rationalizing it away—even Connor seemed somewhat oblivious to the gravity of the situation.
"Could something actually be going on?... Do you think the goblins simply developed a new hunting tactic?" Connor mused aloud, trying to rationalize the reports.
"Are you freaking kidding me?!" Rose blurted out, stunned by Connor's downplaying.
"Connor, there's clearly something much bigger happening here," Dylan said in a low tone, leaning over the center of the table. "Is it really that hard for you to see the pattern?"
Connor's brow furrowed at Dylan's words. He knew something was off, but it couldn't possibly be what the rumors suggested... could it?
The very notion sounded preposterous: a mere goblin acquiring higher intelligence and learning human speech? Such a phenomenon had never been recorded in the documented history of Vaelthar. If those green runts were truly capable of cognitive evolution, why now? Why hadn't it happened during the height of the divine wars between mortals and gods?
It sounded utterly ridiculous.
Yet, deep down, it was the only explanation that made logical sense.