Carefully, I made my way to the door leading to the grand chamber, stopping every few steps to listen for any sound that might indicate a creature in the vicinity. Luckily, everything was quiet apart from the steady dripping noise of the water drops hitting the floor tiles.

I cracked open the door and peeked into the big room. No movement. Nothing that would indicate any immediate danger. As confident as I could be, which was not saying much, I opened the door fully and slipped into the wide-open space. After having spent the last few hours in a tiny, secluded room, I felt incredibly exposed - any goblin entering the chamber would spot me immediately, and I’d be right back to fighting for my survival.

Mentally berating myself for my carelessness, I cast Shadow Skin. While the spell would not work particularly well in a brightly lit room, it was certainly better than nothing at all and might give me an additional second or two to react to anything happening. And there was enough trash laying around, ranging from chairs and tables to silverware, and even a few skeletons to provide a modicum of hiding opportunities. Nothing that would protect me from an alert enemy… but perhaps enough to evade a distracted goblin running through.

So where to go?

One option was to go back to the kitchen area since there had been food there before. The downside of that was that I knew that there were plenty of goblins around and the dark corridors also increased the probability of surprise attacks by another shadow cat.

If there was another one.

The alternative was to explore more on this side of the dungeon and hopefully find some food like that.

Or an exit.

The thought of being able to see the sun again decided it.

I could still go back to the kitchen if my exploration ended up with no success, but I had a little bit of time before it got that urgent.

With renewed determination, I began to investigate the rest of the grand chamber.

There were three doors on each side of the room, two of which I had explored already. The other four did not turn out to be much more interesting, as they seemed to be a mix of reception areas, strategy rooms, and… well, rooms that I had no idea what purpose they might have served at one point or another.

And then there was, of course, the set of big double doors on the other side of the room. The tracks of heavy usage led directly toward those doors, making it abundantly obvious that I was likely to encounter some type of enemy on the other side of that gate. But then again, I was also fairly confident that goblins and other monsters were present throughout the dungeon, so it did not really change all that much.

Sword at the ready, I approached the door, each wing of which turned out to be made out of one solid slab of wood. The size of the tree this had to have come from boggled my mind. Not that I hadn’t seen sequoia trees and the like… but to see a slab like that as a fixture was something altogether different. The wood was dark and felt extremely solid and dense to the touch, almost like mahogany. And the whole surface of it was artfully carved with scenes of humans fighting monsters of various ilk, slaying them with magnificent swords, lances, axes, or magic. Running around the edge of the door was writing in golden letters in a language that I did not know.

Or perhaps it was not language but runes?

Probably those were a thing in this world, judging by the weird room I had been in for the transfer assessment.

More importantly, the doors were slightly ajar, and I could make out another brightly lit room on the other side, a place that seemed to be entirely empty, apart from a grand staircase, with what must have formerly been a magnificent rug covering the steps. Not much of it remained, but one could still see the luxurious fabric that had been used and the level of detail incorporated in the weaving.

The light came from another one of those stunning chandeliers, similar to the one in the grand chamber, but with small faces engraved in the metal and leaves and fruits arranged in a winding pattern around them.

At the beginning and the end of the handrail of the staircase were little pillars with shards on top and to the sides, probably the remainder of vases or perhaps statues. Similarly, along the walls to both sides, there were little alcoves with sculptures that were partially smashed. I could still see that they had, at some point, depicted humans in armor, but it was impossible to make out more detailed features. It seemed as if someone had methodically used a hammer to destroy all the artwork in the room.

Nervously, I climbed the stairs, ready to bolt at the slightest sign that someone was coming.

But, for once, I was lucky. Everything remained quiet.

On top of the staircase, a wide corridor continued straight, its walls covered in vibrant, colorful murals, lit by the occasional oil lamp hanging from crude hooks in the walls. Clearly, those lamps were not part of the original design, since they were far too primitive compared to the rest of the fixtures around.

Which meant that something important was ahead, something that caused the goblins, and I had no doubt that it was them, to go to the effort of installing lights along the hallway. Or perhaps it was merely a matter of safety for them. After all, they had to be worried about monsters preying on them as well.

And as much as I preferred the bright light of the chandeliers over the gloomy, flickering light conditions in this hallway, the poor visibility made me feel a whole lot safer, especially in conjunction with the Shadow Skin covering my body in everchanging shades of darkness.

Every few yards, there were doors on each side of the corridor, and, about twenty yards ahead, I could make out another set of double doors. One of the doors was wide open, allowing me to see what was beyond - a large room, at least ten yards wide, and roughly fifteen yards long.

Trusting the camouflage provided by my spell, I crept closer until I could make out more details, just stopping briefly at each side-door to make sure that I was not trapping myself between enemies. The big room had little alcoves on the walls contained statues made out of dark material, perhaps obsidian, depicting heroic figures or kings. On the walls were tattered remains of banners or flags, separated by huge halberds attached to the stone with metal clamps.

At least fifty or sixty torches with light crystals instead of flames were placed in regular intervals along the wall, and a magnificent golden chandelier was hanging from the ceiling, bathing the room in blindingly bright light, almost like a miniature sun.

A few steps into the room, back turned to me, five huge goblins were standing around wearing the heaviest armor of any goblin I had seen so far. It was not exactly plate mail, but odd pieces of steel armor mixed together with leather armor and some chain mail. The whole thing made them look almost like vagabonds but probably protected them quite well. Certainly, I was not fancying the idea of going up against them without having armor myself.

In addition to their armor, they were also bristling with weapons, to an almost comical degree. One of them had knives stashed all over its body, a battle-ax, and a saber. Another one was carrying an enormous halberd that was clearly too big for the goblin’s relatively small frame, and it also had a sword on its back that was almost as tall as the goblin itself. The other three goblins had multiple swords and knives in various belts, and each had a crossbow slung over their back. And while not particularly attentive, they were clearly there to serve as guards.

Which, naturally, drew my eyes to who, or what, they were guarding. At the center of the room was a small, raised platform, with a large crystal sphere in its center, that shimmered in a red light coming from deep within. For a second, a burgundy spark danced across the matrix of the crystal, only to disappear in its depth again.

I stared at the gem, unable to tear my gaze from the mesmerizing view. There was something mysterious, and… powerful about this sphere. And it called to me. Even more, I felt overwhelmed by emotions, ranging from fear to a feeling of safety, from boredom to excitement. And curiosity.

I almost took a step forward before I was able to catch myself.

Suddenly, the color of the crystal changed to a lush forest-green, only to quickly revert to the bright blue of a glacier’s permanent ice.

Immediately, I felt a coldness, the freshness of a winter day with a clear, blue sky, snow flurries dancing through the air. And razor-sharp rationality settled over me, making me analyze every step I had taken during the last few days.

And then, the crystal changed to a translucent white, with small white lights racing over its surface. Instantly, I felt the urge to move, to dance to a tune that no one but me could hear. I wanted to run, no matter where it wou-

With an act of pure willpower and determination, I tore my gaze from the gem and suddenly felt clarity return to me – not the clarity I had received from the blue crystal, but real awareness and consciousness.

Not ready to look at the mysterious sphere again, I shifted my gaze further, and, weirdly enough, only now noticed the giant throne situated on a raised dais behind the pedestal. It was the size of a car, at least, and seemed to be made out of a massive block of marble, with heroic scenes intricately carved into it.

And on the throne sat the fattest goblin I had seen so far. It was grossly overweight, with massive roles of fatty tissue bulging around its barrel-like waist, filling the throne like a humongous pudding dumped onto an armchair, oozing into all the available nooks and crannies and beyond. The obese goblin easily weighed more than four or five of the other goblins together, hitting at least seven hundred pounds, if not more.

On its head, it carried a golden crown, tastelessly adorned with gemstones and an assortment of … teeth? At least it looked like teeth from where I was. Perhaps some sort of monster trophies the king, or dungeon boss, or whatever that fat bastard was, had collected in its prime.

Fatty did have a huge morning star resting across its lap, a weapon big enough to require a mountain of a man to swing. Or a giant. Certainly, more than a morbidly obese goblin that would have a hard time to even stand, much less swing that monster of a weapon.

Maybe it had a special rolling attack and then smothered opponents with its fat rolls…

Having inspected the goblin king and finding him wanting, my eyes were invariably drawn to the smaller goblin standing right next to the throne. It was the oldest goblin, by a fair margin, that I had seen so far. Its back was bent, and wisps of white hair cascaded from its head to all sides, partially covering the wrinkly skin of its face. The frail-looking arms and legs did not indicate any great strength, but the goblin did wield a strange looking staff with a skull attached to the top.

Based on role-playing games I had played in the past, the set-up was almost comically cliché. The fat dungeon boss, in the throne room, protected by a handful of guards and presumably some type of priest, or shaman or some such. And if this were not my new reality and my life at stake, I would surely have chuckled at the irony of all of this.

I clearly did not want to mess with these guys, though.

Comical or not, I had fought already too many of the goblins and barely had managed to get out of those scuffles alive. Especially the goblin wizard I had encountered across the mushroom field had scared the bejesus out of me. And that old geezer sure as hell was a magic-user.

Heck, I guess everyone might be a magician now since even the goblins all seemed to have some mana inside of them. The question was only whether they could actively use the mana, and for the standard goblin grunt, my gut feeling was that they could not. Or only in non-combat related ways.

Perhaps those bigger goblin guys could, though. Thoughtfully, I used Mana Vision to eye the guards in the throne room, trying to figure out if there was anything overtly different about them. But, no matter what type of vision I used, they just looked like big, dumb goblins. Or perhaps hobgoblins, since they were so much larger.

None of this helped me to get food either.

But, presumably, these goblins needed to eat as well. So either the food had to come from somewhere behind the throne room, through the two little doors I could see on the far side of the room, or it had to go through the hallway I was currently in. Given the well-trodden path through the grand chamber, directly connecting the throne room to the kitchen, I figured that it was the latter.

Which meant that I could perhaps ambush the food delivery?

But if I did that, I was going to alert all goblins that something fishy was going on. Unless I could shift the blame on one of the cat monsters. And to do that… any fighting would have to happen on the other side of the grand hall, somewhere in the dark. Of course, I could also just steal food from the kitchen, but even there, I would typically encounter goblins, I figured.

And I did not want to disrupt the supply of food… I had to think long term. Just ambush the occasional food delivery service and then vanish into the darkness. At least until I had found an exit from this underground shithole.

And if I eliminated additional goblins in the process that was just gravy on top.

In fact, I wondered how many goblins there were around. After all, I had already killed like fifty of them. Was that just a drop in the bucket, or had I killed a sizeable portion of the goblin horde?

I turned around and quietly retreated back toward the grand chamber and the now-familiar corridors on the other side.

As I approached the kitchen area, I started hearing the grunting noise and guttural screaming of goblins making their way through the hallway in my direction. The flickering light of torches and even a couple of glowing crystals carried by the goblins lit up the darkness, giving me ample warning of the approaching monsters and a fair idea of what I was dealing with – a group of three gobs, two of them with weapons at the ready, nervously scanning the surrounding darkness, and the last one struggling to carry a heavy basket.

And the delicious smell drifting toward me made it quite obvious what was in that basket.

Fuck, I was so hungry.

But one against three? Certainly doable, but I needed to make sure that I got all of them. I definitely did not want one of them to get away and warn the rest of the gobs that a human was still running through the dungeon, ambushing the food delivery. They might suspect anyway that I was still around, but the less proof they had, the less effort they would put into flushing me out.

Since only two of them had weapons at the ready… if I could take them out in a surprise attack, I should be able to chase after the unarmed one and catch him before he warned the others.

Maybe.

I needed a distraction so that they wouldn’t take off running immediately. Or a trap that would catch them. But to come up with some sort of trap, I needed more time than just a few seconds, and I was unlikely to get a better opportunity for food any time soon. I guessed it would be several hours at the very least until they would bring more. And by that time, I would be hungrier, weaker, and with not that much better prospects than right now, because, frankly, I could not think of a particularly good setup for a trap in these tunnels.

The mushroom trap had worked because I had enraged the goblins beyond reason, and, arguably, because I had been facing overwhelming odds, which made the goblins confident enough to rush headlong after me in pursuit. With three goblins… even if I got them angry as hell, they were as likely to run away as to rush at me.

But perhaps I could at least distract them for a moment.

Quickly, I retreated to the four-tunnel intersection and put light crystals every couple of yards into the corridor leading toward the cave, before hiding in the opposite hallway leading into the darkness. Maybe the light crystals would catch the goblins’ attention or even tempt one of them to go off and investigate, perhaps it wouldn’t. But I had nothing to lose.

A few seconds later, the group of goblins had made its way to the intersection. I was close enough by then that the putrid smell of the goblins overpowered the tempting scents coming from the food basket, and I could see dirt crusted hands and filthy clothing of the goblins handling the food.

But beggars can’t be choosers. I needed that food, regardless of the lack of hygiene of the cooks. And probably amber mana could deal with food poisoning.

At least I hoped so.

Just as I had expected, the goblins noticed the trail of glowing crystals and froze in confusion. Or perhaps it was fear. And it was the perfect opportunity to go in and do some damage.

Quietly, I approached from behind and chopped into the neck of one of the armed goblins, almost decapitating it. Even before the body dropped to the ground, I flicked off the blood from the blade and lunged at the unprotected back of the next goblin. With a sickening, squelching noise, the blade slid into the lungs of the goblin, causing it to croak briefly, before collapsing to the ground.

The last goblins whirled around, with panic written on its face. Immediately, it dropped the basket with food and started racing back toward the kitchen, screeching in fear.

Cursing, I sprinted after it, trying to reach it before it could get away. And slow as I still was, the healing and rest had sufficiently increased my physical abilities to catch up within a few seconds, but not before the goblin had reached the door and started banging on the wood in a full-blown panic.

And the response was immediate - I could hear guttural shouting and the clanging of weapons from inside the kitchen, and I was sure that within seconds, all hell would break loose.

Shit. This whole ambush attempt had turned into a giant cluster fuck in a hurry.

Mad at myself for not positioning my attack better and cut off the kitchen as a retreat, I slammed my blade into the back of the disgusting little creature and turned around to rush back to the intersection to grab some of the food. In addition to a few pieces of meat, I took a partially burned mushroom and a couple of strange-looking fruits that smelled quite appetizing.

When the door to the kitchen banged against the wall, and the bloodthirsty screams of a dozen or more goblins reached my ears, I picked up the light crystals, put them in my pocket and took off toward my hiding spot as fast as I could.