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A vein pulled the tightness of Rodrick\'s face. He raised his hand, and I was so sure that he would swing that force into Lancelot\'s face but managed to pull back at the last minute.

The fury on Rodrick\'s face was replaced by a daring twisted smile. "Count your luck. I\'m in a good mood today. I can fail you," he gave each one of us a hard look, "all of you. But since I\'m a fair man, I will give you a second chance to redeem yourself."

I snorted inside. He just wanted us to live to be meat shields for them when the time came.

I could just get out of here and retake the test next month. That was the safest option. But something inside me wanted to stay and observe the situation until the end, confident with the skill I had to flee when my life was in danger.

Lancelot was the same. He could be a lot of things, but he was no fool. That confidence of his that was borderline arrogant was not without reason. I was so sure that he had some kind of skill to save his life at the last minute like I do.

Rodrick gave a lasting glance at Lancelot before he ordered at the others. "Capture those goblins and make them talk."

This was to advance the plotline of the story, to reveal the hidden Silvestre Sanctuary where the demonic nuns reside.

"Ara. They seemed to be missing one," Lilian exclaimed with fake surprise. "That sickly pale guy."

They didn\'t even remember Gorio\'s name.

"Who cares?" Edgar bristled and went into chasing goblins to wrinkle their neck for answers.

And like that, Gorio\'s case was closed.

No one mourned. No one cried. And no one would remember him.

A pig\'s death.

Everyone moved on. Even Gina forgot the man and went after Lancelot with her heart shape eyes.

Mikaela spat the blood from her mouth just inches from my feet before she left a glare, and joined the others.

Felix trotted after Gina without sparing me a glance or a word.

Not that I minded it.

In the end, the goblins divulged the following information:

"O\'gella recently met with a group of women with pale skin and red eyes who bestowed \'almighty powers\' upon the shaman. The shaman has been using these powers to turn the other goblins into fallen goblins."

That we knew already.

"O\'gella tasked the goblins with capturing humans for the \'pale women.\' They recently handed a man and two women over to them but were allowed to keep the old man."

And when the questioning was over, the goblins pointed to the \'pale women\'s castle, finally opening the map to Silvestre Sanctuary.

Also, we could apparently lift the curse that struck the fallen goblins and bring them back to their original cowardly self. Unfortunately, the only healer of our group lacks the necessary ATP to unlock any restoration spell or similar magic.

By doing so, we could probably earn the goblins\' gratitude, and they might even take arms and fight with us against the dark nuns.

Too bad.

Next, we freed Erthan from his cell for the reason that he might give us a quest.

And we were right. He did have a quest, but like usual, Rodrick\'s group was the one who accepted it, while we only looked at the side.

Erthan pleaded for us to help him find his daughter Emira and her husband, Martus. He recounted how goblins and spiked friends attacked their carriage as they were traveling to his brother\'s town. They were all dragged back to this camp and locked in cages where a female half-elf was already held.

Soon after, three women with alabaster white skin and glowing red eyes, wearing nuns\' robes, came to collect them.

Erthan wasn\'t sure why they didn\'t take him – "too old for their taste, I guess," he said – but he was certain that they were going to eat the others or something even worse. He was not sure where they had been taken, but the women\'s outfits suggested that they may have some connection to the Silvestre Sanctuary, a small convent located a few miles away.

Erthan promised Rodrick\'s group that if he was reunited with his daughter, he would give them the [Arcanist\'s Amulet] he was wearing under his shirt as a reward. The magic amulet had been a family heirloom for generations, but he had no idea what it does and had no personal use for it.

It seemed to be valuable for Rodrick and his gang\'s faces lit up upon the mere sight of it.

Now I was curious about this amulet.

\'You should . . . get it for yourself . . .\'

I know.

You didn\'t have to remind me.

"Uhm . . ."

Gina\'s unsure voice woke me up from the trance. I looked at her face, which was a good distance from me. She shied away and asked in a frightened voice, "Aren\'t you going to come?"

I found that the others were already walking behind Rodrick and his group. Treading the path that the goblins had pointed out for them.

"Leave her there," Mikaela spat, voice full of venom. "She would do us a favor that way."

Gina hesitated, but in the end, she followed the others and left me to my silence.

At this point, I would gladly see this quest to the end, just to spite Mikaela.

\'Kill her . . .\'

Not yet.

\'Kill her . . .\'

"I said NOT yet!" I snapped, startled and quickly looked to see if the others heard my outburst.

I sighed when they were still walking forward without looking back.

I shook my head, deliberate and hard, to shake away this creeping darkness inside of me.

Surrendering my positive attitude to the witch had left me open to all negative things.

It was in this moment that I realized . . . that positivity that often got me into trouble . . . was my last line of defense against the darkness that was slowly consuming me.