“Hehehehee, Parker stupid.”

Indeed Parker was, but he was a whole lot smarter than you, my friend.

Of course, I would never say this his face.

I just finished the story where Parker, a close acquaintance, tripped and landed on his own birthday cake, he didn’t care much, he didn’t really like cake, but we all laughed at him.

Good times.

“Lord,” it was a king goblin under my command, he had decently high intelligence, near Weler’s, but I guess that means it isn’t much.

“Speak.”

“Goblin’s bored, morale lower.”

“Ah, just go raid that Long-Legged village again, just don’t kill anybody important to the bird, we need to make sure he can see them die himself.”

After all, he did kill a very promising new King Goblin. I gave him a decent supply of soldiers, and then the adolescent bird killed all of them except one, good thing too, the one that escaped has a very good skill.

“Thank m’lords.”

The goblin walked out.

“But promised bird, did we?”

“No, we said nothing about raiding the villagers before the time limit was over, and even if we did, why would we follow the rules.”

A devilish smile went over my face, making Weler smile too.

“We’re goblins.”

Back to MC

“So looking at you, you have a lot of skills, but they’re all low level, so that’s what we’re going to learn, how to level skills.”

I nodded, the room had changed from a small brick room to a much larger one, the size of a school gymnasium.

“Let’s start with a skill you already have at a high level and max it out first, now any pop out at you?”

“Can’t you see my status?”

“No, you have the hide status skill on, but don’t turn it off, disguise status is very rare and very valuable, you should get it as soon as you can.”

So that did do something.

“Well my highest skill level is pepper breath at LVL 10, but it’s already maxed, so aerial movement is next then.”

That skill leveled up very quickly in this dungeon, probably because it leveled up seven times in the death run maze and twice with the harpy.

“That makes sense, but why is it a much higher level than the rest of your skills?”

“I thought you could see my memories, but my starter skill gives me the skills of other monsters, and I fought a lot of fire goblins.”

“I said I scanned your knowledge, not memories, and that is the exact way we will be raising your skills today.”

“Killing monsters and stealing their skills?”

“Yes, as you said, I’m basically a limitless EXP pit, so killing monsters doesn’t hurt me, just kill them.”

He summons a harpy, it bows its head.

“Kill it, don’t worry, it doesn’t have a mind, it’s only purpose is to die.”

Wait what, that doesn’t feel right.

“Isn’t that kinda... heartless.”

He looked at me and then let out a laugh.

“So the murderbird that didn’t bat an eyelash in killing sentient monsters, feels remorse when a monster doesn’t fight back.”

“Well, I was going to die as well if I didn’t fight back.”

“What about against Uneal, I mean the Kobold, he was waiting down the time, he wasn’t going to kill you.”

“He was going to stop me from completing the dungeon.”

“Now you just changed what your purpose is, is it that you don’t kill if you don’t have to, or you’ll kill anything in your way?”

“Isn’t this kind of, wrong? Talking about what you will kill?”

“Yes, yes it is, but you're a monster now, it’s something you have to do to survive. Your people back in your du-, I mean world, had to kill cows for beef, and chickens for chicken, and according to your knowledge, plants even feel pain according to a study from your world, so you’re killing them as well, you just have to kill to survive, it’s the law of the land.”

“What were you trying to call my world?”

“Nothing, now kill the mindless harpy.”

I walk up to it, face saddened, or what I thought was saddened.

What is a way to kill it with the least amount of mental trauma happening to me, flamethrower, or should I just kick it, get it over with, maybe water gun, whatever, flamethrower is most likely to kill.

I killed it with nothing remaining, I made sure of that.

No level up, it will take more than that to level it up.

“Gruesome world we live in.”

“Yes.”

“You want to talk about it?”

“We just did.”

“Okay, I’ll respect your decision, not everyone could do it this way, so let’s do the normal way.”

“Normal way?”

“Of course, normal monsters have to level up skills somehow.”

“How?”

“Use it a lot with your life on the line.”

I thought about this one.

“Okay.”

Better than killing for no reason.

The room changed to one with a line that started where I was standing and ended at the wall.

“Jump as far as you can.”

So I did, using both buff up and speed up, I almost got from one side of the room to the other.

“That’s pretty far, but it’s not hard to make.”

The room disappeared, and what reappeared was the death run setting, along with the gargoyle.

“Get to the end using aerial movement a lot.”

I was off, however after the first jump I realized the gaps between the platforms was much farther apart then they were the first time, I had to use aerial movement on the first one, and the second one as well, I might have to use it on every jump, so that’s what I’ll do.

I completely avoided the platforms and just ran on air, also the gargoyle was keeping up with me now.

I have to actually dodge every button, they no longer do anything to the platform, they are just random projectiles that force me to dodge, sometimes it’s rooms that close, sometimes it’s fire that fills the area, just random stuff.

Then I got the notification…

"Aerial movement LVL 9 leveled to LVL 10." "Aerial movement LVL 10 evolved into Flight LVL 1."

Suddenly the platform of air that I was running on disappeared, I looked down.

A mistake, I immediately thought I was falling, my fear of heights in sixth gear, I thought I was going to die, but the room changed.

I was on the ground with the core again.

“So, now let's show you the basics of this skill.”

“The platform was gone.”

“This skill is one of the skills that feel like there should be a skill rank in between them, but you’re going to have to deal with it.”

“How does it work?”

“I don’t know, I’ve never had the skill, try using it.”

“I thought the harpy would have it, so doesn’t that mean you should know how it works.”

“Kid, it’s good you question the system, but can you not question me about it, just try it.”

“Okay.”

I activate fly and envision the typical thing you would for flying, just hovering for a little bit.

And it works, I hover, but I had a thought, could I do a loop de loop.

Anybody who suddenly learned to fly would want to do a loop de loop.

Completely forgetting about what I was thinking about before, I suddenly raise in altitude.

I arch my back and go up, which makes me go up looking weird, giving me a weird look from the core.

“Did you just try to do a loop de loop and fail.”

“Yes.”

“Well, just try basic movements first, we have to move on resistances next.”

I didn’t have to do anything but envision where I wanted to go, then I found out I could change my position by thinking as well.

So I just combined my thinking, it didn’t take much, by the end I did two loop de loops in a row, leveling it once before the core called me down.

“Let’s start with the resistances, would you like the normal way, or the kill fire spirits way.”

“Normal way?”

“Okay, don’t say I didn’t ask you first.”

What does that mean?

The room changed to heck.

I was in a room full of fire from floor to ceiling, I wasn’t spared.

I was engulfed in flame, though it didn’t burn me like it usually would.

The fire hurt me, but I could still think, the pain was bearable, must be because my fire resistance is LVL 7.

That is good, I’m glad he didn’t send me into a room full of fire with nothing, well I do have nothing, whatever, I’m fine.

However, am I just supposed to sit here and do nothing?

I think I am.

Maybe he thought I would be burning so I wouldn’t be bored.

Well, I have recovery magic, so every time I see an actual burn on me I heal it, gaining me a level in both recovery magic and fire resistance.

Hey, what happens if I put out the flames with water gun.

I activate water gun and it puts out the flames where it touches, but it gets turned to steam in less than a foot in front of me, burning my face I’m sure, so I use recovery magic.

I realize that this could be used to level my water gun as well, so I start spamming that.

Ten minutes later...

"Fire Resistance LVL 9 has leveled to LVL 10." "Fire resistance LVL 10 has evolved into Fire Immunity LVL 1"

ShadowStealers POV

We’re at the new location in the stables, slight snoring could be heard.

The hay is bundled neatly as it was done by Url, I love that guy.

He should be promoted to an earl.

It is nighttime, it’s been 10 days since I fought Kwehzalcoatl and left him unwillingly with Suvunkilbub.

I’ve been having trouble sleeping since then.

I’m just way too excited, my son is getting personally trained by a divine beast.

What else could ruffle my feathers?

“You’re worried about him?”

“Of course not, he’ll survive, he’s stronger than you and you survived.”

She bites me.

“OW, what was that for, it’s true, don’t worry, both of you are stronger than me too.”

“Isn’t that kind of shameful?”

“Nah, we should be proud, think about it, he’s bad at fighting now, but when he’s at our age, he’ll be unstoppable, and since we’re his parents, he’ll protect us, we basically made sure we live long. You catch my feathers.”

“That’s terrible.”

Just after that, the door to the stables opened.

A goblin walked in, carrying a dagger.

I looked at FlashFire, she was starting to revert back to her red color, the color of a fire chocobo.

She looked back and nodded, then we both squawked as loud as we can.

We woke the entire stables up, and then FlashFire fired a fireball at the goblin.

The rest of the chocobo’s noticed, and then we looked at each other and nodded in agreement.

We all squawked and notified the entire village of the trouble.

We got immediate feedback from the warcry of the village.

We all kicked the back of our stalls open and then ran out the back, just as Incha informed us too with her skill, Monster Escape Procedure, it lets us remember what we need to do while escaping.

I run on the perimeter of the village, which is completely covered in goblins, good thing Sholl distorts the air around us or we would have probably have been seen.

I immediately go to my assigned person, Url, who is currently protecting over half the village who are hiding in the building behind him.

The rest of the chocobo’s do the same.

When each person has their chocobo, we scatter, all in different directions, but we all have the same destination.

There is a waterfall to the south, we will meet up a half a mile past that.

I’m currently going north, but that’s just to help us scatter.

This is only one of the escape tactics we have, we have hundreds of them, bigger villages have even more.

After all, our tribe was made after one quote…

Running away is better than being dead.