John's mind finally landed on two people. Alrick and Zedrik. The tax collectors. The ones who had ordered the village massacre because the women weren't attractive enough to rape. The ones who had stood by and watched while soldiers cut down men, women, and children like they were threshing wheat. The ones who had laughed about it afterward.
John grinned. Ohohohohoho. This was going to be gooooooood.
He leaned back in the gaming chair, naked and sticky, his yellow eyes gleaming in the glow of the monitors. The map was still zoomed in on the territory where Alrick and Zedrik operated, a mid-sized region in the eastern part of the continent. Lots of villages, lots of farms, lots of people who had probably suffered under those two bastards for years. John's mind started spinning, turning over possibilities like a puzzle box.
The rapist and the necrophile. That's what they were. Zedrik had been the one grabbing women during the tax collection, groping them, rating them like livestock. And Alrick, scarred and empty-eyed Alrick, had asked if he could keep the corpses while they were still warm. Still warm. The image made John's stomach turn even now, even after everything he'd seen and done.
What was the best thing to do? How did you punish men like that? Death was too quick. Too clean. They deserved something slower, something that would make them feel every second of what they'd done to others.
The system pinged softly, curious.
Your degenerate self is thinking something. I can tell. What is it?
John just grinned wider, his teeth flashing in the monitor light.
"It will all be revealed. Soon. But not yet. I need to set some things up first."
Cryptic. I hate it.
"You love it."
I tolerate it. There's a difference. And I wont tolerate it much longer
"ooo soooo scawy"
John laughed and stood up from the chair, stretching his arms over his head. His naked body was still covered in drying cum, streaks of white across his chest and thighs, but he didn't care. He had more important things to do than shower. He pulled up the system interface and selected his goblin avatar, the one he'd used in the village. The one with the silver-gray curls and the handsome green features and the armor that made him look like a real adventurer.
The teleport hit him like a wave, folding reality around his body until the game room vanished and the forest replaced it.
John blinked, orienting himself. He was standing at the edge of the goblin village, right where he'd frozen time before. The sun was still in the same position in the sky, the clouds still frozen mid-drift, the goblins still locked in place like statues. He had stopped time when he left, and now he was unpausing it.
He looked around at the scene. Goblins everywhere, in various states of undress and various stages of sexual activity. The slender femboys, the busty females, all of them frozen mid-moan, mid-thrust, mid-grope. It looked like a porn set that had been hit by a time spell. John almost laughed at the absurdity of it, but he had business to attend to.
He raised his voice, letting it carry across the clearing. "Alright everyone! Listen up!"
Time resumed. The goblins jerked back into motion, some of them stumbling, some of them looking around in confusion. The busty female who had been riding a femboy a few feet away blinked and looked down at herself like she wasn't sure how she'd gotten there.
"We need to hurry up!" John continued, gesturing with both hands. "Fun time is over for now. Everyone needs to get back to base. Sorry, but no orgy today."
A collective groan rose from the crowd. Dozens of yellow eyes turned toward him, disappointed and frustrated. One of the slender femboys, the one John had been with earlier, pouted so hard his whole face scrunched up.
"But leader!" the femboy whined, crossing his arms over his flat chest. "You promised! You said sex party!"
"I know, I know," John said, holding up his hands in apology. "And we'll have one later. I swear. But right now I've got stuff to do. Important stuff. Leader stuff."
Another goblin, a thicker male with a scar across his chest, stepped forward. "What kind of stuff?"
John thought fast. He couldn't tell them the truth, that he was leaving to go punish some human nobles on the other side of the continent. That would raise too many questions. But he also didn't want to leave them with nothing.
"I'm going hunting," John said, nodding firmly. "Gonna bring back food. Lots of it."
The reaction was immediate and dramatic. The goblins' faces lit up, their disappointment forgotten in an instant. They started murmuring among themselves, excited whispers spreading through the crowd like wildfire. One of the older females, her green skin wrinkled and her yellow eyes sharp, pushed to the front.
"Really? You'll hunt for us?" she asked, her voice crackling with age. "The old chief never hunted. Said it beneath him. Too busy fucking our asses to actually do his job."
Someone else chimed in from the back. "We've barely got any meat left! Been living on roots and scraps for weeks!"
"And the few hunters we have can't keep up with demand. Not enough strong males left after the chief ran everyone off."
John listened to the complaints, nodding along. The old chief really had been a piece of work. More interested in dominating his own people than in taking care of them. No wonder the village had been struggling.
Another goblin stepped forward, this one young and skinny with big, hopeful eyes. "At least this new leader is going to take care of us, right?" He looked up at John with an expression of pure, earnest trust.
John felt something warm flicker in his chest. These little green idiots were counting on him. They'd accepted him as their chief after he killed the old one, and now they were looking to him for food, for safety, for leadership. It was a lot of responsibility, more than he'd really thought about when he'd decided to take over.
But he wasn't going to let them down.
"Hell yeah," John said, puffing out his chest. "I'm gonna take care of you. That's what leaders do."
The crowd cheered, a ragged, raspy sound that echoed through the trees. Twenty minutes later, after much shuffling and grumbling and last-minute groping, the entire village had packed up and started the trek back. John walked at the front of the column, his boots squelching in the mud, his silver-gray curls bouncing with each step. The goblins followed behind him in a loose, chaotic mass, still chattering excitedly about the promise of fresh meat.
When they reached the village, the sun was starting to dip toward the horizon, painting the sky in shades of orange and gold. John turned to face the crowd, raising one hand for silence.
"Alright," he said. "I'm about to go hunt. I'll be back before dark."
A murmur rippled through the crowd. One of the busty females stepped forward, her massive green breasts swaying with the movement. "Are you sure you don't want someone to go with you, leader? The deep woods can be dangerous. There's wolves, and bears, and sometimes worse."
"Yeah!" another goblin added. "The old chief never went alone. Always took a group of guards."
John grinned, wide and confident. "Pshhhhh. Nawwwww. I'm strong as hell. I can handle a few wolves."
He flexed one arm, showing off the muscle beneath his armor, and the crowd erupted into cheers. "GOOO LEADER! GO LEADER! GO LEADER!" they chanted, their voices rising in a rhythmic chorus. John started walking toward the tree line, and the chant followed him, echoing through the village even as he disappeared into the shadows of the deep woods.
"Go leader! Go leader! Go leader!"
The sound faded as John pushed deeper into the forest, the trees closing in around him, the light dimming to a soft, greenish glow. He walked for a while, letting the village sounds fade completely, until all he could hear was the crunch of leaves under his boots and the distant call of birds.
He was alone now. Finally. Time to hunt.