Reincarnation of the Sword Master - Chapter 29

Chapter 29 – Humanity chose to forget (2)
Translated by : betterdays
Proofread by : ch17175

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Some of the Goblins in the pack were deciding to rest by making a hut out of some grass, leaves and pieces of wood. In the middle, some were chewing some raw animal meat raw, and some were fighting each other to take it away from each other despite the meat being covered in dirt, but they sank their teeth into it again because they liked it.

“…that’s a pack of Goblins. They’re what the territory will be having to defend against.”

Reika looked at the pack of goblins in front of her with a stiff expression. She had never seen a single monster before in her life up until today, and now on that very same day she was looking at a horde of them.

‘It’s not much different from my memory.’

Asher thought something had changed since 50 years ago, but it was the same as he remembered it. Their style of living was very crude but it resembled a very vague semblance to the way humans acted, fought and worked in society. Thanks to that it was a relief for Reika to know their intelligence was low.

‘The distance from the estate is about one to two days by foot.’

Given the speed of Goblin’s movement and the size of the group, it would probably take about that long. For a moment, Asher’s eyes narrowed, considering the location of the estate.

‘But how are these guys already here?’

This was the center of the Empire, near the capital. Monsters had never come in numbers like this towards the capital even fifty years ago. The only exception was when the Demon Lord had waged war and flooded the Kingdoms and Empire with forces.

But here they were, unhindered in their movements and so close to the capital.

‘I don’t know what the hell happened in order for them to get here so fast without any word from the other cities.’

It was something he had never experienced in his previous life. Asher shook his head and looked around at the goblins. He didn’t understand the situation fully, but it was reality. And since it was, he had no choice but to accept it.

‘The number is approximately 300.’

Their numbers were exactly as states in the report. Asher wondered what he should do. He thought about it for a while and came to a conclusion. The warriors and guards of the state were not prepared. He had to buy them time.

“Let’s shave their numbers off slowly for now.”

“Kill them? Are you saying to go right in like an idiot?”

“No way, that would be downright reckless.”

The goblins were quite well organized at that moment. No matter how many times he thought about it, the two of them against three hundred goblins was far too much.

“Wait a minute okay. Here’s what we’ll do : The Goblins tend to sleep for long periods throughout the day and don’t wake up easily as they are deep sleepers. We will wait till they fall asleep and stab as many of them as we can without getting caught and then retreat.”

“…you sure know an awful lot about these things, Asher….”

Reika spoke with suspicion present in her voice. Asher didn’t mind her and prepared himself as he spoke to her quietly.

“It’s time to get going.”

Asher pulled a dagger out of the wrist brace.

“Reika, I’m going to go right now, I’ll need you to wait here for a bit.”

“I’ll wait. What can I do anyways?”

Reika grumbled in a sarcastic voice. She was immature, but she knew it was the right decision right now as any screw up could have her killed.

“Okay, then hold your breath and stay here.”

Asher spoke quietly and raised himself up. He hid his traces and entered the goblin’s camp in the silent darkness of the night. Occasionally, the goblins wandered around in their sleep. But their movements were silly and obnoxious because they were incredibly drunk off the human liquor they had stolen. Asher entered one of the huts that the goblins had set up, whilst avoiding waking the hundreds of goblins laying around, silently.

“Kaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!”

“Kruk Kruk!”

Inside, some goblins were tangled together and making love with each other. Asher nudged the dagger into the back of the goblins that were making love with one another, skillfully and silently.  The goblins that were all inside the hut, were picked off one by one, as Asher slit their throats quickly and silently, until he was the only living being inside the hut.

‘I’ll have to clean up two more huts.’

More than that, the smell of blood was getting too thick. If Asher played his cards right, he could cause enough chaos to buy at least two more days for the territory. Asher quickly moved to the next hut closest to the one he was in, and killed the goblins in that hut as well before peeking his head out to pick his last target.

‘That one.’

In the middle of the area, there was a larger hut than any other. It wasn’t just a larger sized hut, but it was also made with a bit more detail than the other makeshift huts. It had kept bothering Asher for quite some time and he decided to check it out. There was only one reason Asher felt bothered by it.

‘Goblins have no ranks between them…. So why is that hut like that?’

Goblins were a very… unique bunch. There were no skilled ranks between them, and in general their species was just too dumb as a whole to even come up with the brains of something like societal ranks. That was why such a hut, bothered Asher about the implications it held.

What was rather fortunate for mankind, was that goblins had not a single inkling of intelligence, and neither did they have any kind of ranks between them like shamans or magicians. Goblins were already a very densely populated species with a high reproduction rate, so if they did have these ranks, it would likely be the Goblins being the species that endangered humanity 50 years ago and not the demons.

Yet… he couldn’t help but feel like the hut was designed for the presence of a leader. Asher tried to separate these thoughts and push them away, but couldn’t as he approached the hut.

“Keruk… Keruk…” (T/N : I’m gonna assume this is how goblins snore LOL)

Inside the hut, there was a slightly darker colored goblin than the ones he had encountered till now, but it didn’t look any more different than that. It wasn’t bigger than any of the others, nor better dressed.

Asher stopped his step slightly when he noticed the slight difference in skin color, but soon he took out a dagger and approached the goblin. Asher was right before the goblin, when he stuck the dagger towards its neck to puncture the goblin’s esophagus. But for some reason, right before he could do so, the dagger caught on something.

“Shit…”

Asher murmured in surprise. A black thread held his arm back. When Asher focused his eyes carefully, he noticed there were black threads all around Goblin he was trying to kill. He had been fooled and placed in a trap.

“Hah.”

What kind of goblin did this, he thought and chuckled lightly. However, his expression turned cold as he suddenly heard the sound of a horn get blown outside the hut. The other goblins had been found out and sounded the alarm.

The sleeping goblin opened its eyes at the sound of the alarm. Its eyes suddenly widened and fixed themselves on Asher, who was in front of it, and howled.

“KRUKKKK KREEEE!”
(T/N : wtf is with these sounds lmao, someone just send me back to reading goblin slayer already lmao)

***

Quang!

The hut collapsed. Asher bounced off and landed on the floor. It quickly became noisy as the other Goblins started to wake up one-by-one and attacked Asher.

“Kerak Kree!”

Asher found himself in a dogfight. The approaching goblin stabbed with it’s spear and Asher parried it quickly, breaking the wrist of the goblin and stabbing his knife up the jugular of the goblin.

Quickly seeing the goblin in front of him fall, Asher grabbed it’s spear that was mid-air and turned his body to throw the spear he had caught into the chest of the nearest Goblin. Yet this was only the beginning of the waves of green monsters starting to close in on him.

‘Fuck, I’m in trouble.’

Asher clicked his tongue and kicked his foot down onto the ground with a mighty stomp.

As if an earthquake had occurred, the earth shook violently as Asher stimulated his unique aura into his foot to make the ground quake. The goblins lost their footing as Asher then sprinted through their ranks cloaking himself in a dark robe as he reached Reika’s location quickly.

“Ah, Asher! What’s this….”

“We’re caught. It was a trap, we need to run right now.”

Asher normally would never be frightened of such mere goblins. But these numbers were dangerous and he was still not as powerful as he’d like to be in order to slay them all here without raising suspicions. More than that, he needed to get out of here quickly at the sudden appearance of a simple trap. It was just a trap, but everything leading up to that point, indicated something was off.

Goblins were a bunch of low-intelligence mongrels that looked like walking snot. They had set a trap? This was rather unique and was not something Asher could bother to explain in detail to Reika right now.

“Krahhhh!”

A goblin suddenly jumped out of the bushes, but Asher didn’t even react or look at it, as he simply brought a spear out of his wrist brace’s spatial pocket and stabbed it. Asher then stood up and kicked the goblin off the speartip into the incoming goblins that were chasing after him. Asher turned his head back towards Reika and spoke.

“We need to run away for now. Don’t make me repeat myself.”

Asher had spoken this time, with no signs of his indifferent or nonchalant attitude. His eyes had narrowed and turned cold as he looked at the incoming Goblin horde.

“O- Okay.”

Reika hurriedly replied and kicked off the ground in the opposite direction of the goblins and retreated. She cleared the way through the bushes and Asher quickly followed suit.

“Kyaaaaaaa!”

Another goblin suddenly got in his way as he was about to leave but Asher just smiled at it. His arm moved in a blur and the head of Goblin didn’t even have time to react in shock as its head just slipped to the floor spurting blood.

Asher turned to look at the goblin and then turned his gaze back to Reika’s figure that was moving on ahead.

“It’s really getting dangerous.”

Not only would it get dangerous for their territory with this odd development, but also for other humans in other territories who did not have capable warriors like Asher.

Asher clicked his tongue and started to move again, chasing after Reika..

***

“Oh, my gosh.”

Reika’s breathing was going in and out at a rapid pace as she felt exhausted. She suddenly swung her sword at an incoming Goblin, who appeared in front of her.

Her arms moved quickly and the Goblin’s body was diced into several pieces with one move from Reika’s swordsmanship. She had killed goblin after goblin with Asher as they were retreating.

“I think it’s already been two hours….”

“Reika, one thing to know about these creatures, is that they do not easily give up on their prey. Once they set their sights on a target, there are only two options for them. Either catch it and kill it, or collapse from exhaustion and die.”

“Araa!”

Asher avoided the incoming spear from another goblin stabbed his sword right in between the goblin’s eyes. The light from the Goblin’s pupils faded as it fell to the floor with a thump.

“Keruk! Keruk!”

“Kreeeee!”

“When will it end…”

Dozens of goblins had already been slain by the two as they retreated. Reika groaned with an exasperated look on her face.

Seeing this and an incoming group of goblins, Asher clicked his tongue and started to stimulate his unique aura into his right arm that was gripping the sword and slashed sideways.

BOOM!

The trees on all sides of the forest broke apart and shattered from Asher’s swing, let alone the bodies of the goblins exploding from the sheer power of his strike. The splinters of the bark from the trees that had shattered pierced into the next wave of goblins that were out of range from his blow, as blood spurted out from their bodies.

“KEEEK!”

“KRYAAA!!”

‘There are two more times left.’

Asher gripped his throbbing arm. He had already used his power three times whilst escaping. Reika had seen this but did not speak a word as she was busy just trying to survive. He only had two more times to use it, as no matter how hard he trained, right now he could only use the power 5 times in a day.

“There should only be a few more coming. We need to split up and you’ll take care of these ones while I take care of the rest.

“Wait what? Why?!”

“You’re approaching your limit and will only become a hindrance for me at this point. “

No matter how talented Reika was, it was only her first time in a real battle. On the contrary, she had endured will till now. However, it was not nearly even close to half the work. Hence why Asher noticed how exhausted she was and told her to head back after she took care of a few more of them.

“But-“

“Don’t be stubborn.”

Asher’s cold reply shut Reika’s mouth up.

“You agreed to follow whatever I told you to do if I let you come with me. Are you taking back your word right now?”

“No… I’ll do it.”

“If I’m correct, if you leave, they’ll only chase me since I was the one who attacked their base. I can outrun them so I’ll be letting you regain your stamina for a bit. I’ll be back later.”

“Okay…”

Asher slowly moved through the forestry and disappeared through the darkness. Reika faintly felt Asher’s presence completely disappear as she then realized she was by herself now.

“Fucking hell….”

She cursed out loud. It was a curse that an aristocratic and young lady, would never utter out loud, yet Reika couldn’t help it,

“I’m just being a hindrance to you?”

To help her regain her energy, he forced himself to take the hard path and attract the goblins in another direction. But what about it? She had been the one to put him in such a dangerous situation. She couldn’t help but feel helpless at how selfish she was.

“I want to be stronger….”

She wanted to be stronger so that she could stand side-by-side with Asher. She wanted him to feel proud of her. For the first time in her life, she felt helpless and inferior to someone in so many ways when she met Asher. Yet instead of giving up, she continued to train. But, it was still not enough for her.

“Kkkkkaruk.”

Suddenly, Reika heard a Goblin cry out loud for a moment. She hurriedly lifted her sword. A Goblin slowly approached her, trampling on the pieces of wood that Asher had completely shattered apart earlier.

“Kaaaaak.”

The goblin that came into her view, was not much different in size from any of the other goblins they had faced until now. However, the weapon was not roughly made of crappy and carved stone, but was carrying a sharp, human-made spear.

In addition, the body was a bit different from the other goblins, even if it was similar in height. It was slightly muscular, and had clearly developed such muscles from repeated training.

The Goblin stared at Reika with a sharp and murderous glint in its eyes.

“…you want to try me?”

Reika took a pose as she taunted the Goblin. No matter how tired she was, She could easily handle at least one goblin. But instead of running away from her, the Goblin did something completely unexpected. It stroked its chin with amusement like a human being.

“You are a rather interesting human being aren’t you.”

“!”

Reika’s pupils dilated with shock. That Goblin could speak the human language? She had never seen that be written down in the literature and books she had studied about the goblins of the past. Even if Asher was here, he would be shocked too.

The Goblin snorted with a chuckle at Reika’s shock and started to twirl the spear around itself and took a proper stance. It was unlike any goblin that she had encountered.

“You look like a proper swordsman. I hope you won’t be boring like the last human being I killed.”

The Goblin twisted the corners of his mouth into a malicious grin. Leica swallowed her saliva down, anxiously. Something was seriously wrong with this Goblin.

“Oi, take a position already. I don’t want you to die on me without even trying. Tsk.”

The goblin clicked it’s tongue in annoyance at Reika’s blank stare as he then spoke to her, telling her to get in stance. Reika shook her head belatedly realizing if she didn’t prepare herself properly, she would die here. Shifting her foot into the ground and narrowing her eyes in concentration, Reika took her stance properly.

At that moment, the spear moved.

Bang!

“Ugh!”

Reika bounced off with a moan as she barely defended herself properly. She managed to hold onto her throbbing wrist and ease the pain a bit. The movement of the spear was incredibly fast and trained. The Goblin didn’t hesitate to wait for Reika, as it thrust the spear again.

Hurriedly, Reika brought the sword in position and defended herself as best she could.

Kaga Gagak!

The spearhead grazed at her whole body as she was trying to defend as best as possible. She couldn’t even think of a counterattack because she was so focused on trying to stop the spear’s movements. She wanted to be able to even scream at least; but, she couldn’t.

Why the hell was a Goblin so proficient with a spear? No… why was it like this in general? It was too much!

As soon as the Goblin gradually started to realize Reika was not doing much to entertain it, the spear stopped moving.

“I don’t think that’s all you have, is it?”

Goblin asked with disappointed eyes as it looked at her haughtily.

At that moment, something within Reika snapped. Her fragile ego, completely broke and was reborn anew. Her competitive spirit started to flare up within her as she suddenly shouted out.

“Then block this you shithead!”

Her hand shook. The sword in her hand rushed towards the Goblin with pure precision and stayed true to Lepenia’s swordsmanship, drawing afterimages.

There were dozens of sword trajectories drawn in the air from her unique movement due to the flexible nature of Lepenia’s swordsmanship. Anyone who had mastered Lepenia’s swordsmanship to Reika’s degree of mastery, could be counted on one hand. The movements she had contained with her sword, had even left Van Ester bewildered with how talented she was.

But something was dastardly wrong here. The Goblin smiled at the sword’s images being drawn in the air that were closing in on it, and moved it’s spear suddenly with a swift movement.

Kaga Gagakakakakagak!

The spearhead started to paint an afterimage. Unlike Reika, the afterimages created from the spear were due to pure speed and technique, unlike Reika’s that was just pure technique. Due to this, the images of the spear wiped out Reika’s attack in a heartbeat. As they suddenly disappeared in front of her, the view between them became opened up again.

“Uh….”

It was a movement similar to hers. But the power displayed by this goblin was weird. It wasn’t even remotely possible in her mind. That movement that the Goblin in front of her had just displayed, was the movement of those who were at the Peak of Mastery with their respective weapon. It was something that Reika was aiming to be.

Yet, she saw this from a Goblin.

Reika stared blankly at Goblin with her jaw dropped in disbelief.

Chapter 29 – Fin