Gideon stared at his own reflection in a muddy puddle on the outskirts of Thalendor, and what he saw made him want to scream in rage.
His pointed, elegant ears, the symbol of his Rare Race of High Elves, had vanished. In their place, only ordinary, rounded human ears remained. His skin, once flawless and exuding a faint magical aura, now looked pale and lifeless under the heavy sun of Elysium.
"Damn them... a thousand times damn them," he hissed, clenching his fist so tightly that the knuckles turned white.
Around him, Rick, Silas, and the rest of the group also wore expressions of defeat. They had all been reborn as ordinary humans after the massacre in the Mythlorien Forest. Sure, most of them had been human before that, so for them, aside from losing a level, nothing had changed.
The deaths of the Blue Slime and the White Fox stripped Gideon of his Noble status in Thalendor, something he had intended to use to control the city government and the region’s profits."Boss, the company is demanding results," Rick remarked worriedly. "Their sponsorship was based on your Rare Race.
They’re threatening to cut our investment credits in the real world."
Gideon turned to him, his eyes filled with hatred. "Do you think I don’t know?! We’ve lost our privileged access to the elven capital, and those guards now look at us as if we were beggars. Without the convenience of being elves, we can’t even get into the luxury stores."
The reality was cruel. As humans, they were just another "plague from another world" to the inhabitants of Thalendor. The qualitative advantage Gideon had vanished without them even knowing why!
"We need money. Lots of money. And we need it fast to buy items that make up for the loss of our Bases," Gideon ordered, adjusting a suit of common steel armor, which now felt much heavier on his less agile body. "While I was still an elf and wandering around the market square, I made contact with a mercenary scout. He told me about a farming spot that ordinary hunters avoid because it’s too dangerous and complicated."
"What place?" Silas asked, cleaning a cheap iron dagger.
"The Shadow Cliffs," Gideon revealed. "A nest of Gremlins lives there. They’re fast and organized creatures, between Levels 9 and 13. The main thing is that their eyes are worth a fortune in Thalendor for making perception potions. If we can get a large stock of eyes, even if just from Level 9 Gremlins, we’ll be able to fund new gear and maybe even buy information on where to find a new Rare Base."
The group nodded, greed overcoming fear. They knew that if even elves and beastmen avoided hunting these monsters, hunting Gremlins as humans would be a challenge, but they had no other choice. It was either this or returning to the real world as failures.
The journey to the Cliffs was exhausting.
Without the natural agility of the elven race, Gideon felt every climb and every obstacle in the forest as a heavy physical burden. With every step he took, his resentment toward the Slime grew more and more. He remembered every detail of the sensation of the blue mass binding his limbs and the murderous intent emanating from that "useless" creature.
"I’m going to make that Slime pay... I’m going to turn it into jelly soup, and if that bastard is a Player, I’m going to find out his identity and end his life no matter what it takes!" Gideon muttered to himself like a mantra.
After a few hours of marching, the terrain began to change. The towering trees gave way to twisted rocks and deep crevices. The air grew colder and more metallic, making it clear they were entering Gremlin territory.
"Silence," Gideon ordered, raising his hand. "Gremlins have absurd visual perception. If they see us first..."
He stopped speaking abruptly. Rick and Silas stopped too, keeping their senses on high alert.
BOOOOM!
A muffled explosion, followed by the unmistakable sound of flames crackling intensely, echoed from a crevice just ahead, in the heart of the cliff.
"What’s that? Another hunting party?" Silas whispered, crouching behind a rock.
Gideon advanced cautiously, climbing a rise to get a view of the valley below. Rick followed him, readying the staff that now glowed with a mana far more unstable than before.
Down below, the scene was one of total carnage, but it wasn’t what they expected. A group of five Gremlins was being easily slaughtered!
In the center of the battle, a white blur moved with impossible speed, leaving trails of white fire wherever it passed.
With every lunge, the creature shattered the Gremlins’ shells as if they were made of paper. And anchored to the fox’s back, a black mass pulsed with overflowing energy, firing strands of web that bound the surviving Gremlins and ice spikes that pierced the monsters’ vital points with precision.
Gideon felt his blood boil. He would recognize that duo anywhere in Elysium.
"It’s them..." Gideon hissed, his voice trembling with hatred. "The Slime and the Fox who killed us!"
"They’re hunting in our spot!" Rick growled, the panic from their last encounter replaced by a thirst for revenge. "Look at them... they’re at Level 11 now. The Fox has evolved—she has two tails!"
Gideon watched the duo’s flawless coordination. They were dominating the Gremlin nest with an ease that bordered on an insult.
They’d come worried about facing a dangerous battle against these monsters, which would be their chance to make enough money to stand out again, only to be robbed once more by these hateful creatures!!
"They’re distracted by the nest..." Gideon analyzed, a wicked, twisted smile spreading across his face. "They must think they’re invincible, but just look... the Slime is spending Mana to trap the scouts, and the Fox is panting after running at top speed for so long. They’re wasting too many resources..."
"What are we going to do, boss?" Silas asked, his hand already on the hilt of his dagger.
"Revenge," Gideon replied coldly. "Rick, prepare your most destructive spell. Silas, circle around the flank. We’ll wait for the moment they deal with the nest leader. When they’re in that split second of exhaustion after the kill, we strike. We won’t fight fair. Just as they did to us, we’ll hit them from behind, break that fox’s leg, and watch the Slime disintegrate without its mount."
Gideon drew his sword. It no longer glowed with the emerald light of before, but the hatred he felt now was an energy more potent than any racial buff.
"You stole my future and my dignity," Gideon whispered, looking down at Lohan. "Now, I’m going to steal your lives. Let’s see if your Base can regenerate a pincer attack while you’re surrounded by enraged Gremlins."
The eagle’s group, now reduced to desperate humans, began to take positions in the shadows of the rocky crevices.
The sound of battle below remained intense, with Lisa’s flames illuminating the cliff face, though neither she nor Lohan realized that the "ghosts" of their past were now acting as the true predators, waiting for the perfect opportunity to turn Astralis Requiem’s triumph into a slaughterhouse.
The group’s hatred was so great that they still believed they had only been defeated because they’d been caught off guard; now that they had the upper hand, even if those two creatures had evolved, they didn’t care, after all, what could an evolved Slime possibly do?