Tishina’s scent could not be found anywhere near the entrance, but I still mostly had a path back to the goblin village at least. Now that the humans had left the labyrinth, there should be a significant drop in mana from outside, meaning the tunnels shouldn't be shifting around as much. Though me, Tishina, and ‘Sozdatel’ — assuming he’s humanoid (though his name does sound elvish) — are still down here, so it's quite possible the lower end of the tunnel has moved to a different place.

Regardless, it'll be faster to walk down that way than to try and find a new path.

* * *

Since the tunnel was still there and built at walkable angle, traversing down into the labyrinth would go much faster this time.

I took Dolosus Lupus form and sprinted down, stucking my snout periodically into the air and sniffing around. For the first hour or so of travel, I found little of interest. Just dirt and the faint smell of the goblin village. It reeked of death, blood, and poor hygiene. At least it proves the tunnel is still mostly connected to the goblin village.

By the end of the first hour, when I was only a mile or two from my destination, some more scents became more easily distinguishable. First was Tishina’s scent. As luck would have it, Tishina's trail was not entirely gone. In fact, its source was still close, suggesting she hasn't moved much. Likely still recovering from her rank-up, if I had to guess.

Other than that, there were other scents. Closer and more distinct. One was blood and ash, somewhere around the trap I had set in case they found my trail. The other scent…

Apparently, lightning has a smell.

* * *

Vasiliás stared down at the corpse of Prinkipas, memories of the boy filling his mind.

It had been a decade or two since they met. Prinkipas was still little more than a baby then, and it was tradition for the hobgoblin king to raise their own heir. Since Prinkipas was the first male hobgoblin to be born since Vasiliás himself, that meant he would have to raise him. But Prinkipas’s mother refused to give him up.

Sure, Vasiliás could have simply forced her to, wrenching the baby out of her arms then ignoring her plea to return him. Or he could have convinced her that the child would have a better life with him. Either way, killing her wasn’t necessary. But she was openly defying him, and mercy was not in his nature.

Prinkipas never forgot that, but it was better that he didn’t. Anger would make the boy stronger, as it had for Vasiliás.

Or, at least that’s how Vasiliás used to think. Truth be told, Vasiliás came to like the boy. He was stronger than Vasiliás was at his age, yet kinder. Prinkipas even had a following of goblins, actively working to serve him not out of fear, as they did for Vasiliás, but out of admiration. Fotia the pyromancer, for whatever reason, had even grown to love him.

Vasiliás regretted not apologizing to Prinkipas. He regretted treating the boy the way he did. But kindness was not in his nature, and no apologies could fix what he had done. And now, it was too late.

And what had Vasiliás’s last words been? What had Prinkipas experienced in his last moments?

Fotia, Prinkipas’s most loyal supporter, betrayed him. Then, after Prinkipas’s self-depracation, Vasiliás agreed that he was a burden, and left him behind.

Vasiliás should have been there. He could have thrown himself in front of the blast, or rushed him back to the village while there was still a chance to heal him.

But he’s dead now. The boy Vasiliás had raised. The son Vasiliás had chosen.

Grief had never been in Vasiliás’s nature, but he cried all the same. The emotions Vasiliás had been holding in flowed out…

And the voice filled their void, overtaking what little sanity Vasiliás had left.

* * *

I dug my claws into the rocks to keep my footing as a vibration shook the tunnels. I’d experienced enough C rank monster roars to know what they felt like, even if this form didn’t have eardrums for them to blow out.

The scent of lightning approached at an alarming rate, and the illusory clones I had sent out started disappearing one by one, basically melting before they could relay what they saw.

But it wasn’t a mystery to me what destroyed them. The hobgoblin king was coming, and he’s pissed. I could feel his dream mana from here, and it felt corrupt, somehow. A few of the goblins I’d come across in this form before felt this way, but all of them still had something resembling sapience left. This hobgoblin, however, had nothing of the sort. Maybe it comes with his higher rank and proportionally stronger voice, or maybe something pushed him to become like this.

Either way, I should get out of his way. There’s no humans to protect, but I’d rather not lose this form.

I turned the other direction, sprinting as fast as I could while phasing walls of stone between us. The hobgoblin ran through them without slowing down, the hesitance in his pursuit from before completely gone. There was still a decent amount of distance between us, perhaps even enough to transform, but he was gaining on me quickly.

I kept running, and with only a few dozen yards between us, transformed into a Petra Vermis. I made a tunnel perpendicular to the one I was on, filling in the space behind me with labyrinth stone. I hoped it would be able to block what mana detection he could use through his aura, and run past me. My hopes were in vain.

The rock around me crumbled with an earth-shattering smash of his hammer, slowing my movement. I could feel his footsteps behind me, and his electric aura burned and tingled at the same time. He grabbed me with one arm, pulling me out of the tunnel I’d made, and throwing me on the ground behind him, where he raised his hammer into the air of the tunnel, and smashed it down onto me.