An Unremarkable Dagger

Un'Goro Crater.

Primeval tropical rainforest.

Temporary camp of the Zutona Trolls.

The trolls whispered among themselves, their curious gazes fixed on the tent in the center.

"His Majesty carried a hairless monkey inside just now? What kind of creature was that? How could there be hairless monkeys in the mountains?"

"Not a monkey, right..."

"Not sure. But His Majesty must have his reasons for doing this! His Majesty is our leader!"

"Wait... no. I think that animal is called a hu... human? Lord Zangar and I went to the little green skins' city to sell things before, and we saw creatures like this."

"..."

While everyone whispered and discussed what the thing His Majesty had just carried inside was,

Dezla, the voodoo sharpshooter and temporary commander of this elite troll force, appeared before them.

"Dismissed. Go prepare what you should prepare, and do what you should do!"

"And... the witch doctors have already said it. That is not a hairless monkey! It is an intelligent species, just like us trolls! They merely come from another distant continent. They are called 'humans'!"

Perhaps Dezla was not the most outstanding fighter among the trolls, but her tactical skill and Tonatiuh's deep trust in her gave her great prestige among them.

Everyone listened to her.

The trolls gradually dispersed.

Their whispers had merely come from curiosity. Before Tonatiuh appeared, the Sandblood Tribe had been a fairly decent desert troll tribe in the Tanaris Desert.

They spent every day digging through the sand for food and had never left the great desert. At this time, humans had yet to set foot in Kalimdor on a large scale. Aside from a few goblin cities, most trolls in Kalimdor had never even seen humans.

Compared to the towering Zutona Trolls, the slender and graceful female mage really was only about the size of a monkey...

But then again.

The former Sandblood Trolls had been like other trolls: cruel, savage, and tormented by hunger. They ate almost anything they could catch that was edible besides trolls, and intelligent humanoids were no exception. That was why other races called them man-eaters, and why their reputation was utterly abysmal.

This troll tribe that had transformed from Sandblood Trolls into Zutona Trolls had once been typical man-eaters as well. There simply had not been many "people" in the great desert for them to "eat."

But after migrating to Un'Goro Crater and bathing in the miraculous radiance of the Eternal Statue for a year, both their minds and bodies had rapidly undergone transformations.

They had become taller and stronger. The hunched spines of the male trolls had begun to straighten, while their formerly brownish-white and dark brown skin was evolving toward blue-white. Beyond the physical changes, the trolls' brains were evolving as well. Under Tonatiuh's demands and the system's alterations, they were progressing from a primitive tribe toward an early civilization.

Tonatiuh had given them civilization. They had to be civilized and keep clean. The large bathhouses scattered throughout Zutona, along with mandatory daily bathing, had even become a compulsory legal order.

The Eternal Statue—or rather, the system—had also given the trolls active minds, enhanced thinking ability, greater curiosity, and increased affinity with the Force.

If they had been trolls of the past, when one of their people caught an animal they did not recognize and brought it back, their first reaction would have been whether it could be eaten and whether it tasted good.

Now, the Zutona Trolls were curious instead: What exactly was this thing? Where had she come from? What did His Majesty want with her after catching her?

This was progress.

It seemed like an insignificant sort of progress, but it was the greatest difference between savage races and civilized ones.

After driving away the trolls, Dezla simply took up guard duty with her brother outside the central tent.

Inside the tent.

The human girl lay unconscious on a soft bedroll made from tanned Devilsaur hide that Tonatiuh had prepared, her face haggard and pained.

The towering Tonatiuh sat cross-legged beside her while the three most outstanding witch doctors in the army treated her.

The witch doctors checked her breathing and pulse, then used voodoo spells that could kill as well as save to examine her body.

"Your Majesty..."

After finishing their examination,

the lead witch doctor spoke softly.

"This human fell badly on her back and injured her bones. But that is not troublesome. The troublesome part is that the condition inside her body is extremely chaotic."

"We tried to heal her with witch doctor magic, but our power could not even enter her body. We called upon Lord Tonatiuh's power. His Supreme Majesty's power can heal her, but it can only ease her pain."

"We are helpless."

"Perhaps Lord Zangar has a way, or perhaps the mercy of the Loa gods can heal her."

Tonatiuh nodded.

"Tonatiuh's mercy is only granted to Their believers. She is not a believer, so she can only experience Their mercy indirectly through you."

The witch doctors looked at one another.

"Supreme and exalted Majesty..."

"Most supreme Majesty..."

They muttered prayers to the supreme Loa gods. Tonatiuh waved his hand. "Leave. Her injuries are beyond our ability to treat. They are related to magic."

"As you command, revered Majesty."

The witch doctors withdrew from the tent.

Tonatiuh lowered his head and glanced at her pale face and the faint yet incomparably chaotic layer of blue energy surrounding her body.

Though he was not a mage and had no real knowledge of arcane magic, even if he had never seen a pig run, he had eaten pork. Having read so many webnovels, Tonatiuh guessed that she had likely been harmed by magical backlash or something similar.

Compared to her injuries, Tonatiuh was more interested in something else: a black, curved dagger that Modera had used to stab Aegwynn.

"This thing... feels awfully familiar." Tonatiuh examined the dagger. It looked ordinary, made of something resembling obsidian, and was battered and worn.

However...

The most conspicuous feature was a huge eye, like a relief carving, located between the grip and the serrated blade. It was extremely eye-catching.

It was not large. In Modera's hand, it looked like a small knife, but in Tonatiuh's hand, it could only be called a little dagger.

The longer Tonatiuh studied it, the more it resembled a certain weapon.

He muttered to the dagger, "Xal'atath, Blade of the Dark Empire?"

The moment the words left his mouth,

the weapon, which had looked like an utterly ordinary obsidian dagger, began changing violently. Light started to emerge from it...

Tonatiuh instinctively tightened his grip, and as he exerted force, the dagger's dazzling radiance abruptly dimmed, as though he had pinched it painfully.

Before he understood what was happening, a woman's shriek rang out in his mind:

"You filthy, slovenly bastard, what did you do to me?!!"