The sun, which Lilith had not seen for days, managed to pierce through the putrid fog here on the far fringes of the realm, illuminating a primitive but bustling goblin village. This place bore no resemblance to the tranquil Valley of Darkness. Here, chaos reigned, thick with the stench of raw meat and the clamor of sharpening steel.
In this single, isolated settlement, no fewer than five Heroes had been reborn. It was a stark illustration of the terrifying scale of this world: if there were five of them in a place so forsaken by the gods, then across the entire continent, the forces of "Order" had to outnumber the Demon Kings tenfold.
The leader of this group was a goblin inhabited by the soul of a man named Korgath. Before the "Awakening," this goblin had been a mere hunting captain, but now, with the soul of a Hero, his body had swelled with muscle and his skin had become as tough as cured rhino hide. Korgath stood in the center of the plaza, leaning against a gargantuan, jagged club fashioned from the bone of a giant wolf.
Beside him stood the other four players: Skitter, an agile rogue with poisoned blades; Vrak, a crazed pyromaniac with a primitive wand; Grul, a heavy-armored brute; and Mila, the only one in the group who focused on healing magic and casting curses on enemies.
Korgath had gathered not only his fellow players but also thirty adult, powerful goblins. These creatures, though primitive, were not mindless. They looked at Korgath with a mixture of terror and devout adoration. They sensed that their captain had become something more - a monster among monsters. Their instinct told them one thing: stay close to the strongest, and you will survive and feast.
"Today's plan is simple!" Korgath announced, baring his teeth. "We're heading to the northern marshes. We're hunting Mud Hydras. Their meat gives a hell of a kick, and we can sell the hides to the trader for armor schematics. I don't want to see any slacking off! If a Hydra devours someone, too bad - more exp for the rest of us!"
"Hey, Korgath," Skitter spoke up, toying with a knife. "Some of the goblins in the village were saying that past those marshes, deep in the forest, there's a territory called DARKNESS WOODS. Supposedly, it's crawling with wild monsters to hunt. Maybe we should do a little reconnaissance after the Hydras?"
"Patience, you twig," Korgath guffawed. "For now, we grind levels on the Hydras. We need to be so strong that the first Demon King we meet in the future pisses his pants just at the sight of us."
The remaining goblins howled with delight. The sight of Korgath, who could crush the skull of a wild bear with one hand, gave them a sense of security they had never known. Under the command of these "new" leaders, the goblin village had stopped being the prey of the forest - it had become its deadliest predator.
Soon, the entire group set off toward the marshes with a loud stomping and the clatter of primitive steel. The five Heroes led the way, followed by thirty goblins ready to kill and die at the command of their new gods.
***
The northern marshes were a place that seemed to crave the death of every visitor. A thick, yellowish fog hovered over the bubbling ooze, and the smell of sulfur and decay choked the throat. This was the habitat of the Mud Hydras - gigantic, three-headed serpentine monstrosities whose scales were the color of rotten green, camouflaging them perfectly in this cursed terrain.
Suddenly, the surface of the mud exploded. Three Hydras erupted from the depths simultaneously, roaring with inhuman voices. Each was over five meters long, their maws dripping with corrosive slime.
"FORMATION! GET 'EM!" Korgath roared, driving his bone club into a clump of tough grass.
On command, the group of thirty ordinary goblins rushed to the attack. They fought in a brutally primitive fashion, but their numerical advantage made them effective. They swarmed the first Hydra, stabbing it with rusted spears and short swords. The Hydra snapped its jaws, tearing the head off one of the goblins, but the others didn't react to their companion's death at all. They bit into its tail and climbed its back, slashing at the soft underbelly. The monster's blood sprayed across their green faces, and they howled in ecstasy, intoxicated by the scent of slaughter.
However, the Heroes were the ones who truly showed why they ruled this wilderness. While thirty goblins struggled with a single beast, the five players took the remaining two Hydras for themselves.
"Vrak, light their asses up!" Skitter yelled, vanishing into the mists thanks to his [Shadow Walk] skill.
Vrak, the mad pyromaniac, raised his bone-wand. "[SULFUR FIREBALL]!" he shrieked. A bolt of green flame shot from the tip of the wand, striking the second Hydra directly in its middle head. The beast roared as the fire began to consume its slimy skin, which acted as fuel rather than extinguishing the blaze.
At the same time, Grul, the massive brute, charged the third Hydra. "[TITAN SHELL]!" His body momentarily flashed with a grey, stony light. When the Hydra tried to bite him, its teeth simply shattered against his shoulder with a loud crack. Grul grabbed one of the beast's necks with his bare hands and slammed it to the ground with inhuman strength.
"My turn!" Mila raised her hands, and black ribbons of energy began to coil around the Hydras. "[BONE WEAKENING CURSE]!" The monsters' bones creaked, and their movements became sluggish.
Then Korgath stepped into action. He moved to the front of the group, his club emanating a blood-red aura. "[SKULL CRUSHER]!" He leaped high into the air, performing a mid-air flip, and brought his weapon down with monstrous force on the main head of the monster Grul was pinning. The Hydra's skull exploded like a ripe watermelon, splattering everything nearby with brain matter and blood.
Right beside them, Skitter suddenly materialized behind the second Hydra, the one Vrak had set ablaze. "[ARTERY SLICER]!" His two daggers danced through the air, executing lightning-fast cuts on all three necks. The heads slumped into the mud almost simultaneously, held on only by flaps of skin.
The three Hydras lay dead in less than two minutes. Meanwhile, the ordinary goblins were still stabbing the carcass of the first beast, making sure it wouldn't get back up.
Korgath spat out the monster's blood and wiped his face, baring his teeth in a predatory smile. He glanced at his experience bar, which had ticked visibly upward. "Haha! Did you see that? These overgrown earthworms didn't even scratch us!" He laughed, kicking the limp head of the monster.
Skitter sheathed his knives and looked at the rest of the team with a grin. "Nice warm-up. But these rewards... they're still too small. I want something bigger."
Korgath turned to the surviving twenty-eight goblins, who were looking at them with authentic terror and worship. "GET UP, YOU GREEN SCUM! Pack the hides and teeth into the bags! We haven't got all day! We're going deeper into the swamp; there must be nests! MOVE IT!"
The entire day was marked by slaughter. By evening, the area was littered with Hydra carcasses, and the goblins' bags were bursting with resources. The five Heroes walked at the front, laughing and planning their next steps, feeling their stats rise with every passing minute.
The system of this world was brutally fair, though at first glance, it seemed to favor the Heroes. The mechanics of gaining power differed diametrically between the two factions, creating a dynamic relationship between "hunter" and "prey."
Heroes like Korgath and his crew possessed a massive advantage at the start. Their souls entered the bodies of beings already existing in this world, inheriting their natural strength, stamina, and experience level. Korgath didn't have to learn how to swing a club from scratch - he took over the body of a hunting captain that was already a killing machine. However, this gift had its dark side.
Despite the fact that the five of them had been butchering Mud Hydras for twelve solid hours, their experience bars had moved barely a millimeter. The point threshold required to level up grew exponentially for them. After a whole day of slaughter, their level had increased by only one.
Worse still, their magical arsenal was tragically meager. The Hero System was rigid; ordinary inhabitants of this world receive only one opportunity to gain a skill, and that is when they manage to reach Level 1. Never again does the system grant them a choice of an additional skill; if they want a new one, they must learn it from zero through training.
The Heroes were also restricted by this rule because they entered the bodies of ordinary beings who had unlocked a skill at Level 1; any other skills they possessed were only there thanks to prior training. The only concession for the Heroes was that they now received an additional New Ability, allowing them to gain one new skill every ten levels.
This meant that someone like Korgath, though physically powerful, had only one skill up his sleeve. They were like mighty but simple hammers - they hit hard, but they couldn't do anything else.
The situation was entirely different for Demon Kings like Lilith. She started from absolute zero, at Level 1, with a body that still had to adjust to its new form. However, Demon Kings were "blank slates" with infinite potential. Every time they leveled up, every time they unlocked a hidden talent or built a new facility on their territory, entire trees of powerful, diverse skills opened up before them.
In this phase of the game, the Heroes sowed terror. Their brutal strength and high base stats - gained by inhabiting beings that already existed - allowed them to dominate the battlefield. But time was working against them. While their development was slow and limited, the Demon Kings, provided they survived the first few days, would begin to evolve at a terrifying pace, accumulating dozens of spells and passive buffs that would eventually transform them into true deities of destruction.