Monsters in the Goblin Tribe

"Gurgle, gurgle..."

As Karl and Hopp carefully explored the canyon, within the goblin encampment deep inside, several gaunt figures were gathered around the carcass of a Giant Lizard.

They had no heads, and their four skinny arms flailed wildly, stuffing torn pieces of the Giant Lizard's flesh into the two mouths located on their chests.

Visually, these monsters resembled two ordinary goblins fused together.

However, they clearly lacked sufficient intelligence.

"Yaa! Kakafuga!"

Suddenly, one of the monsters raised its head, ceasing its feeding.

It stumbled towards the tribe's weapon storage and then, through a tunnel accidentally opened by a Rust Monster, arrived at an underground Ritual Site.

The Blackstone Greatsword was now surrounded by goblin corpses, and under the dark energy emitted by the sword, two of these goblin corpses were slowly merging.

The hastily arrived monster crawled submissively beside the greatsword. As a bloody energy was drawn from its body, the goblin corpses finally completed their fusion.

The newly formed monster crawled on the ground in imitation, while the monster from which the bloody energy had been drained weakly got up. It then led the newborn monster away from the underground Ritual Site.

As their figures disappeared from the Ritual Site, new dark energy surged from the Blackstone Greatsword, selecting two more goblin corpses.

Emerging from underground, the two monsters returned to the Giant Lizard's carcass to begin a new round of feeding.

The newborn monster's body still carried some of the Blackstone Greatsword's power, causing the Giant Lizards in the distant enclosures to become restless.

However, due to long-term domestication, they showed no intention of resisting.

After this feeding, the monsters no longer went to the underground Ritual Site. Instead, they picked up various weapons beside them and began roaming the encampment, as if on guard for something.

After an unknown amount of time, two furtive figures appeared outside the goblin encampment.

Looking at the monsters patrolling the entrance of the encampment, one figure asked its companion:

"Karl! What is that thing!"

The newcomers were Karl and Hopp. After carefully traveling for over three hours, they had finally reached the goblin encampment deep within the canyon.

"Hmm~, hiss~, I can't quite tell. It looks a bit like a Grotesque Aberration."

"Grotesque Aberration? What's that?"

"They're said to be monsters created by ancient fiends from goblins. I've only seen them a few times in textbooks."

Gazing at the strange figures in the distance, Karl's brow furrowed beneath his Power Armor.

While fiends weren't necessarily present around Grotesque Aberrations, these twisted monsters were inherently embodiments of evil.

In Eberron, the phrase "inherently evil..." was often a subjective assessment.

Due to the unique design of the entire universe by the Creator Dragons, the vast expanse of stars had isolated divine influence, causing most intelligent life on the planet Eberron to lack the concept of an "innate alignment tendency."

In the game Baldur's Gate 3, which Karl used to play, red dragons were representatives of chaotic evil.

But in Eberron, the final alignment of each dragon was entirely determined by their acquired values.

Kind, lawful red dragons and evil, chaotic gold dragons both existed.

Even creatures like Mind Flayers, from the alien plane of the Mad Nation, had produced some lawful good individuals after breaking free from the Mad Nation's influence.

However, as a species created by ancient top-tier fiends, Grotesque Aberrations were among the few representatives of "innate evil."

These cruel beings harbored hostility towards all other races and were loyal lackeys of fiends.

"What do we do now? Should we just charge in?"

Weighing the axe in her hand, Hopp looked eager to fight.

This was her first formal battle after reaching level 3.

"Wait a moment, I'll draw one out."

Saying that, Karl raised his left arm and aimed at a distant Grotesque Aberration.

With the whirring of the pulley and the taut string, a magic bolt cut through the air, striking the monster directly.

Thump

The grotesque monster fell to the ground and did not rise again.

Karl: "..."

Hopp: "...What happened to drawing one out? How is this any different from me attacking directly?"

"Ahem, sorry, it was a mistake. Let's just sneak in then. Call me if anything comes up!"

Coughing awkwardly, Karl no longer restricted Hopp's actions. The two split up and slipped into the goblin encampment.

However, as soon as Karl climbed over the wall, a scream from a Grotesque Aberration came from Hopp's direction.

The sound was incredibly loud; Karl felt he could hear it from the canyon entrance.

"Sigh~, why did I expect a barbarian to be able to kill these monsters quietly? Didn't I just charge through everything myself when playing Assassin's Creed back in the day!"

Patting the helmet of his Power Armor, Karl no longer concealed his presence. Relying on the Power Armor's excellent strength enhancement, he leaped over two meters straight up, landing directly on the encampment's arrow tower.

"Pew pew pew..."

The magic bolts and the lightning launcher on his chest activated in succession. The electrical discharges and azure magic bolts created a brief sensation of suppressing fire.

Several Grotesque Aberrations, drawn by the screams of their dying companions, fell victim to Karl's round of ranged attacks.

However, a few had recognized the danger and were firing crossbow bolts at Karl from the shadows.

"Clang!"

A damaged crossbow bolt struck Karl's power armor. Due to the corroded arrowhead and the shot being fired upwards, the bolt was directly deflected by the power armor.

"Whoa! Nice shot, they actually hit me? These guys don't seem so simple after all! I wonder if they have classes?"

Although Grotesque Aberrations generally only had an intelligence score of 8, they could indeed acquire classes.

Normally, though, these would be classes like Warrior or Rogue.

But Hobgoblin-derived Gnarled Aberrations were different; they could even cultivate themselves into Monks.

Seeing that the enemy had counter-attacked and even hit him, Karl didn't dare to continue being careless. Instead, he used the arrow tower's walls, which were only a little over two meters high, to retract his body.

He hadn't forgotten the quality of his power armor's defense.

To put it bluntly, it was just a layer of sheet metal over an exoskeleton frame.

"If only I had a wand of Magic Missile, one blast would take out at least one of them."

An Artificer's primary offensive power was concentrated in their magical items, among which wands played a particularly prominent role.

Back when Eberron's civilization was still in its medieval period, wands typically had only 7 or 8 charges, and once depleted, they had to wait for their charges to recover.

But through the optimization efforts of generations of Artificers, wands in Eberron now had up to 50 charges.

Furthermore, Artificers could also perform emergency recharging on wands.