When he finally wakes up and realizes there’s seemingly no one around, his first move is to run… To his camp I suppose.

  I had brought him into one of the buildings, sat away, treated my wound and watched over him. It took him at least a FEW HOURS till he woke up. I thought I'd die to olderness on the spot, but fortunately, he’s finally awake and running away from me… I might wanna watch him closely, to not lose him.

  I go after him and if I didn’t do so at that moment, I would have lost him. He’s pretty damn fast between the buildings and the mostly empty space in there makes a very pretty disgusting maze of it.

  It’s even harder for me since I’m trying to be at least a little bit stealthy, not to lose the goblin while also scanning the surroundings in case of another sneaky patrol. It might go really wrong if one of these rogue type hobgoblins ambushes me.

  I’m sure I would be able to avoid lethal damage from the first sneaky attack, but a hit would go through for sure. I won’t bet on me to sense him sooner, before he attacks. With that in mind, I take extra care to notice even the slightest moves in the air.

  The fleeing goblin makes sure not to cross too many streets, running mostly through buildings and just occasionally, when it’s a must, crossing.

  We travel a long way, which gives me a lot of time for thinking… like why was it actually hard to defeat that hobgoblin? Because if I compare it to the fight with Reapshade, in this one I’ve felt in a way more pressure.

  Was it maybe because my new trait wasn’t that fired up, respectively, I wasn’t that fired up?

  Lunatic’s Exaltation (Unique)

  

  The battlelust of the exalted knows no bounds, and neither does his strength. The deeper he throws himself into the fray, the more his body surpasses its limits, fueled by sheer will, joy and exhilaration. Lunatic becomes one with his inner demon, exalting himself into higher highs. The pain that would cripple others only sharpens Lunatic’s instincts, and exhaustion serves as nothing more than a whisper in the back of his mind.

  May his laughter echo through the battlefield, and his strength know no bounds.

  Also the trait does not seem to make much sense, except that it kind of does? Like physically, something like this is complete nonsense, but it has its own making-sense-twisted-logic.

  We continue deeper into the city; the buildings getting taller, turning into skyscrapers and I have to let my little green friend continue alone - the goblin contamination becomes a real problem here. They’re still only normal goblins so I could continue following him a bit further, but it’s only a matter of time until the hobgoblins show up too. And I don’t wanna be close when that happens. They would notice me.

  ***

  With the green pollution problem in place and since there is no need anymore to directly watch that goblin, I adopt a different approach to the problem.

  I think those parkour guys with hoodies and daggers in their sleeves would be proud of me.

  The majority absence of glass in the windows plays to my advantage as I jump from one building to another… Please do not ask me how many times I missed. I have, again, some of my ribs broken so it’s painful to speak and even breathe.

  It’s not as easy as it sounds.

  But I’ll be okay.

  The streets beneath me are changing fast as I overcome them with such an ease …I only, before every jump, have to check the streets for sneaky patrols, to have a safe jump over. The regular ones are hearable from two streets away, but there are always some that remain silent and prepared. It looks like there might be some “professional” groups and some highly “unprofessional” ones.

  If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

  At one point, a few blocks behind, there was a very loud group which decided to take a rest exactly at the same place as the sneaky squad was patrolling, which resulted in a fight. It was quite funny. The battle looked like a fist fight of lilliputs.

  The louder, and more numerous group won; of course.

  For the whole time of parkouring above the streets, I follow the example of goblins - avoidance of a clear space. I do not jump from roof to roof to avoid being grabbed and dragged away from above.

  My boosted stats are making it possible, but I still have to avoid mainstream streets… or surge across them.

  ***

  A river winds through the center of the city and beyond that river, I find the center of the infestation - a big shopping center with an adjacent multi-storey car park.

  I am watching it from near the top of the building approximately a kilometer away. From the interior leftovers, it looks like a casino with private rooms above.

  They are swarming there like insects, head on head. There must be hundreds of them. Most of them are sitting around fires, cooking animals or fighting each other, but it’s hard to tell from this far away.

  Of course, a lot of them are also outside in the nearby buildings, and there are also patrols constantly coming in and going out. If I drop down to the ground, I would be noticed immediately.

  A small relief is the absence of women and thus children in there - I don’t wanna kill children. Even the goblin ones. I don’t wanna kill woman either, but that’s a bit different - if they attacked me, I would show no mercy to them, no matter their missing dinga-ling.

  Still, the fact of not seeing any woman does not mean there aren’t any, they may just be hidden in the shopping center. But, what I see and what gives me chills is a bit further away. A few kilometers I would say.

  There’s a tower, at least fifty meters taller than any other - the highest building in the city. On the tower, is a big nest, and in the nest is a big harpie.

  The big harpie - something like a mother perhaps, is surrounded with harpies constantly circling the tower and the sky around is filled by them too. It’s like a cloud.

  I can’t see much more from this far, but I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t want to be closer… Like how the hell would I be supposed to fight that? With the goblins, they’re at least on the ground so I can reach them but the harpies can simply swarm me from above.

  “No thanks” I whisper in the air.

  Actually that’s a good question. Should I take the goblins head on? If my Lunatic’s exaltation gets going, it might be possible. Otherwise definitely not.

  Turning around and going somewhere else is completely out of the question.

  Like where else would I want to go and what else would I like to do? Better than a goblin genocide?

  The last idea is to lure them out little by little, maybe by showing myself to some patrols, fighting them, letting some goblins flee and bringing in reinforcements. Killing the reinforcements too and continuing like this until the number of green shits is low enough.

  But let’s be honest to ourselves… That wouldn’t be fun at all.

  ***

  My strategy planning time ends sooner than I thought… No but seriously. Why would I need a strategy for this?

  At the corner of the parking building a commotion breaks out and from over the river a numerous group appear. That alone wouldn’t be something special as for the short time I’m… planning my strategy here, it happened a lot of times that a bigger group came back with food and stuff. But this time it’s different.

  They have prisoners.

  There are three of them in the middle of the green group. One, I suppose, is a girl as she has a bikini and the other two are unidentifiable at this distance. Oh yeah, and one of the two is probably knocked out since the girl and the non-knocked out are carrying him.

  It’s weird. I normally don’t help others if it does not benefit me, the encounter with elves is a perfect example of it. But for some reason, I’m not feeling like leaving those completely random strangers there for the green bastards.

  From where I am, I see it first in my area, but soon, the green idiots all under my position start to swarm towards the parking lot.

  For some reason, capturing and bringing in prisoners seems like a big event, those guys cannot miss by any chance… Which I do not complain about at all - it makes my work a bit less annoyable as they are all in one place.

  They gather from all directions and it makes me dislike them even more. I might have an aversion to them already. They are like bugs. Disgusting, swarming little things, both ugly as fuck. And they stink.

  “Wait, that actually means…

  …

  “Terminator exterminator, huh.”

  If I had a flamethrower, this situation would be a dream. I can see now, what people got with the fire mages all the time. In situations like this, being a living flamethrower must be a better feeling than being a playboy.

  Whatever, just some intrusive thoughts. Time to move on.

  Initially, I thought of an epic landing, down on the street but now it seems pointless. On the empty street would be a shortage of appreciation.

  Maybe it’s better this way. I certainly wouldn't have thought it through enough and I wouldn't have realized that I am eight fucking floors high.

  Although my stats are overally boosted by my levels, my bones are still annoyingly fragile… I have no idea how I would attack a goblins nest with broken legs. No idea at all.

  …

  Let’s take the stairs.