Day 11-20/Day 14

When I woke up, my body had changed so much that it couldn’t compare to how it was before I went to sleep.

The changes to my body shocked me, I thought hard about what I heard yesterday before I went to bed. I see, so this is a Rank Up, huh. The mysteries of this world make me shudder.

No, no, from my own experience I can understand however, the natural laws of this world are so amazing that it’s beyond scary.

After killing and eating the Orc yesterday, in one night I went from the physical body of a 7-9 year old, to the size of a medium-sized human. My physical strength, eyesight, and hearing had increased dramatically, even the abilities I had gained before yesterday had also become more powerful, you see?

This is scary. Even though my body had grown a ridiculous amount, I didn’t feel any sense of discomfort at all from my new form. Even though such a huge change should’ve made me go insane, that didn’t happen in the least.

Even though my body had grown so much, I didn’t feel any muscle pains from it at all, instead, I felt overflowing power that was incomparable to before, like a temporary feeling of omnipotence. Freaky, right? Seriously.

Now, if I was an ordinary guy I would’ve probably be so happy that I would do stupid things until the feeling passed, however, the reality is that I wasn’t even close to being as powerful as I felt, and therein lies a trap.

That’s why the rules of this world are scary. Now, that aside.

It was interesting to watch Gobukichi, who had grown bigger as well, just stand there with a confused look.

It seems that he also passed over level 100 after the battle with the Orc yesterday, causing him to undergo a Rank Up. However unlike mine, his skin didn’t turn black. In fact, I couldn’t see any difference in his skin colour at all, he was still the same old green.

Well, let’s put that aside as well.

What interested me the most was his face.

He no longer looked like an ugly Goblin like he had used to be. His naive look, in some aspects held some attractiveness. His ears were still pointed, and his nose looked somewhat hooked. Nevertheless he looked a lot like a human. Having green skin might not be very human-like, nonetheless his looks were approaching to that of a one.

Then, what about me? Wondering this, I checked the obsidian knife for my reflection.

What I saw was, with black skin, my face from when I was young before I reincarnated. …Yeah, as one would expect I was completely stunned until it settled in. For now, I went to the wall close by our sleeping place, grabbed a caterpillar-like mystery bug, and started munching on it from the head.

After I had calmed down, I grabbed Gobukichi and went to look for the Goblin Elder.

That’s because if I didn’t make use of the Goblin Elder at times like this, his existence wouldn’t have any point at all.

Just in case, because it felt risky, I wouldn’t mention the [End and Origin]-ruling [Divine protection of the Great God] that I also received. What I learnt was:

Upon turning into a Hobgoblin, my body and appearance became closer to a human. The reason for this is unknown. It’s one of the mysteries of the world. Apparently because of the hobgoblin’s human-like appearance, they could even live in human towns. However, there is a long past of Goblin slavery, and most of those coexisting with humans are still slaves. Those with good looks have become sex slaves for human perverts. The difference between Gobukichi’s and my skin color is because I am of a subspecies. Subspecies are generally stronger and have special abilities when compared to the standard one. Unless special conditions are cleared you can’t become a subspecies, which is why they’re rarely seen, so apparently I’m kind of unusual. Furthermore, my skin color is black. Black is the symbolic color of the oldest god of the world, the one who controls the beginning and the end of something-something. Even among the subspecies mine is the absolute rarest while being the strongest, and with studying, they’re capable of learning the strongest magic possible. Also, to the believers of this god, I’m somewhat like a living idol, an object of worship. If that’s not the case, then parts of my body are thought to be materials used in rituals to communicate with the god, so I have to be careful when it’s late in towns and stuff. Religion is scary no matter what world you’re in. How should I put it, becoming a Hobgoblin when not even a month had passed is supposedly very strange in the first place. The old man who’s still a Goblin said so, so it’s probably true. By the way, of the Goblins who left to work away from home, (apparently exactly 40 Goblins), only 3 had turned into Hobgoblins. Also, because Gobukichi and I had become Hobgoblins before we left the cave, we were allowed to freely use the human women in the cave as we’d like. We also received the right to take things from the warehouse, and use them however we want.

Oh-. Is that so-?

…Yes, because he was kind of long-winded, I ignored most of what he said by repeating those those words and pretending to listen. Particularly around point 3, and the reason for that is obvious. Like I said before, no matter what world one is in, religion is scary. Even more so now that I’ve obtained the [End and Origin](-ruling), and [Divine protection of the Great God] characteristics with my Rank Up. It makes me think that it’ll probably turn into more trouble than it’s worth. I thought that this was something I should hide it as long as possible.

As expected, we didn’t even consider going hunting today. I practiced martial arts together with Gobukichi in order for us to accustom ourselves to our new bodies, the sparring was especially intense. Gobukichi’s power was too much for him to know how to utilize it, making him quite warlike.

Though I, who has had an interest in many different forms of martial arts never lost, I could conclude that Gobukichi’s power was at least somewhat stronger than how he was before. As expected, it seems like his abilities are specialized in being the vanguard.

He wasn’t very intelligent or quick, but his offensive and defensive power had increased tremendously, making him a powerful tank and damage dealer, a hybrid character. Once we concluded our martial arts practice, the afternoon was dedicated to replacing our now too small old armor.

Since I’ve grown, the horn and obsidian knife I’ve been using have become too small for me to handle effectively. However I’ll just have to bear with it today, my venom by itself is an adequate weapon, so I can overcome this handicap for now.

That’s why today the plan is to use the stockpiled materials from the Armored Tanukis, Night Vipers and various other monsters to create new armor.

We used the armored shell from the Armored Tanukis, and the snakeskin from the Night Vipers, to create new equipment. I was satisfied with the results, the armor we created was light, flexible, and quite robust.

To put it simply, it was an armor based off of leather. We didn’t make cloaks, but since it looked like light brown leather clothes, with long sleeve arms and full-length pants it should be alright. The metal shells were placed in strategic locations, which further increased its defensive capabilities. We thought about our freedom of movement while creating it, so when we tried it out, it performed far better than expected. It barely obstructed us at all.

We even finished crafting Gobumi-chan’s armor that we couldn’t complete earlier because of insufficient materials.

Since it’s mainly made out of 7-colored bats it looks a bit gaudy though. It somewhat gives the feeling of being a national costume from somewhere.

By the way, the food tonight was prepared from horned rabbits caught by the other Goblins.

It wasn’t filling enough, it was still better than nothing. Since it tasted good I pardoned them.