Chapter 55

Divine was still indulging Jemisha’s questions.

And at the same time, he was keeping watch over his other disciples with his Qi sense.

Lubia and Samael were still deep in the crowd, but Divine felt Oni approaching.

[+1 Blood Qi Essence]

That was already the sixth death since he let the goblings roam the cavern.

Most of them occurred in the vicinity Oni had crossed but always shortly after he had already walked on.

On the last stretch of Oni’s way to them, the gobling encountered the chieftain groupies, who were still ogling Divine from a distance.

They immediately took a shine to Oni.

Not only was the gobling dressed similar to the Great Divine, but he also had the most impressive figure these female goblins had ever seen.

The females had never even imagined that an adult goblin could grow this fat let alone a still growing gobling.

How abundant and regular had his food intake to be?

They stared and tried to touch his fleshy body, completely fascinated.

Oni’s appearance screamed of wealth, luxury and comfort to the female goblins.

Trying to attract the rich gobling’s attention, their clamoring quickly became louder and turned competitive.

One groupie pushed another out of the way, pulled down her rags and shoved her tits right in Oni’s face.

Another grabbed Oni’s hand and wanted to pull it between her legs.

Unfortunately for the groupies, Oni was too young to have any interest in them.

They didn’t even have any food on hand.

Instead, they were blocking Oni’s way to the best-smelling cooking fire in the whole big cavern.

Unflustered, Oni just bulldozed through the crowd of female goblins.

The females didn’t get angry, even the ones who got hurt by his rough pushing, they only looked after Oni longingly.

Some followed him a few steps until they reached the strange region where the air suddenly felt uncomfortably oppressive for them.

The Great Divine was still sitting in the center of that region.

“Hello Master.” Oni smiled when his eyes caught sight of his master in their search for food.

Oni waved at Jemisha, and she nodded back.

Jemisha had clutched onto their master again, cuddling into his side.

Jemisha used every chance to be close to their master.

Oni pondered if he wanted to occupy the place on Master Divine’s other side, opposite Jemisha, since Lubia was still away and Oni wanted to be close to their master, too.

But then Oni caught sight of the untouched bowl of food that stood before Divine.

That answered his pondering and Oni immediately sat down opposite of his master, right in front of the food.

“Master! I’m back! I’m sorry, I got lost in the crowd earlier. Where are Samael and Lubia?” Oni apologized and immediately mentioned his still absent siblings.

Escaping blame and shifting blame was something the goblings were getting better at every day.

It was one of their natural talents.

“Samael and Lubia are not back yet. Surprisingly, they got lost in the crowd, too. What a weird coincidence, don’t you think, my disciple?” Divine spoke seriously and didn’t let his amusement show.

“I don’t know what happened. We were together and suddenly there were tall goblins all around me. And I couldn’t see you anymore. I searched for you the whole time, without stopping. And now I finally found you master. I’m so relieved.” Oni still had hope he could escape punishment and put on a pitiful expression.

The problem with his performance was the gobling had first finished talking and his expression had only changed afterwards.

Just like a fake tantrum, where the shouting and the table-hitting weren’t in sync.

Divine raised one eyebrow at his fourth disciple, communicating his disbelief.

“Wipe the grease from your chin, Oni. We will talk about this later, with the others.” Divine planned to discuss their experiences with everyone later, so that they could all learn something.

Oni grimaced, lowered his head and wiped his face with his expensive robe, that had cost goblin lifes.

Looking down, the full bowl entered his sight and his mind again.

“So, what is this? Can I get a taste?” Oni shifted gears from worry to food seamlessly.

“Help yourself.” Divine watched Oni grab the bowl with swift hands and was impressed that not a drop spilled with his tempo.

Oni drank half of the soup in one go.

The pudgy gobling let out a satisfied groan while he chewed the pieces of meat.

“How is it?” Divine was a little curious about the taste of Witchtooth’s cooking, but not enough to eat it himself.

“It’s good. Worse than Lilith’s but better than everything else.” Oni quickly finished the bowl and then got up to get himself a second helping.

The fat gobling only had to present his empty bowl and immediately Witchtooth’s servant filled it for him.

What a double standard.

[+1 Blood Qi Essence]

Not far away another goblin died and donated to Divine.

Divine could hear a scream full of anguish and rage coming from somewhere behind the chieftain groupies.

Divine looked in their direction and the females smiled and giggled.

They didn’t even turn their heads to find out what was going on behind them.

They only had eyes for Oni and Divine.

So normal was a scream of despair to them…?

Out of precaution, Divine followed the despairing goblin with his Qi sense.

It got obvious very quickly that the goblin was heading in Samael’s and Lubia’s direction.

A coincidence?

Could be, but Divine didn’t think so.

Divine extricated his arm from Jemisha’s grip and stood up.

“Wait right here for me! I’m going to get the others.” Divine ordered his two disciples and employed the Stepping Light Traversing Shadow movement technique.

Because there was no free way through the crowd, Divine stepped on the heads and shoulders of the goblins.

He was so quick that he was a blur to the goblins’ eyes.

Only the goblins who got stepped on really noticed him.

Not even six seconds and Divine was already on the other side of the cavern.

Samael and Lubia were only a few steps away.

They hadn’t noticed his arrival yet.

Divine quickly hid himself.

Using the illusion technique from the Miracles of Light, Novice Compendium, Divine made himself invisible by bending the light around him.

Since he wasn’t very accomplished in this technique yet, he could only move slowly and there was a blurry haze around him.

But it was enough as long as he could avoid attention.

Samael and Lubia stepped closer into his field of view, looking well and happy.

There was some blood on Lubia’s hands, but it didn’t seem to bother her.

The two encountered a goblin who was smashing two stones at each other above a collection of little dry sticks.

They stopped and started watching him with curiosity.

In Divine’s cavern, fire was either made by rubbing wood or with Qi, so the two goblings didn’t even realize what that goblin was trying to do at first.

Samael thought the goblin was making good carving stones.

Lubia thought it was a game.

Until they saw the sparks and understood.

Samael lost interest but Lubia was even more curios now.

To the side, Divine was still keeping the worrying goblin in his Qi sense.

The anguished goblin was searching for something not far from here.

Maybe the goblin didn’t want revenge on his disciples, and Divine had misinterpreted it.

Divine would wait a little longer and then collect Samael and Lubia if nothing happened.

The moment the anguished goblin found his disciples, Divine knew his first thought had been right.

With a murderous look in his eyes and a rusted knife in his hand, the anguished goblin walked straight at Lubia.

The surrounding goblins were sensible about danger and stepped away from the vengeful goblin.

Only Samael and Lubia had no clue of the danger approaching and continued watching the other goblin make sparks without managing to light his fire.

Divine stayed his hand and just watched.

Divine was their safety net today, and not their bodyguard.

The murderous goblin was almost upon his disciples and the two idiots still hadn’t noticed anything.

Divine just wanted to intervene, worried that they would just die because of a sneak attack, when Lubia noticed the goblin, they were watching failing to make a fire, looking behind them with a scared expression.

Lubia turned around just on time to duck beneath a stab to her head, escaping only narrowly.

She dodged the next strike with more ease.

Lubia didn’t even think to draw her dagger and just rushed the fully grown goblin.

She tackled his midsection with a cackle and they both went down.

Landing on top after a short struggle, Lubia started pummeling his face with relish.

Her brother Samael just stood frozen to the side, not knowing what to do, and stared.

Divine was still watching, too, and he was pretty impressed with Lubia.

Not that she fought very efficiently or even passably, but at least she got it handled.

Maybe Divine was too careful with his disciples.

Maybe they would get by better with less supervision than he would’ve thought.

“Ahhhh!!!” Lubia cried out in pain and stumbled back.

The goblin had freed his hand with the rusty knife and had slashed at her face.

Lubia had had her mouth open in laughter and the knife had slashed right through her cheeks, exposing not only her front teeth, but also her molars.

She clamped her hands on her mouth and tears started running down her face.

Samael let out an enraged shout. “Rahhhh!!!”

Pulling out one of his best carving stones from his pouch, Samael smashed the goblin’s head in before he could attack Lubia again.

[+1 Blood Qi Essence]

Samael didn’t stop hitting the goblin’s head and more and more blood splattered around.

Divine appeared by Lubia’s side to inspect her wound.

Softly, he pulled her hands away from her face.

It looked gruesome and bloody but it wasn’t overly serious.

Lubia’s tongue was unhurt and only her cheeks had been slashed.

Divine channeled healing light into his hand and covered Lubia’s mouth.

When he removed his hand, the healing had closed her wounds but had left some scars.

Lubia looked like the green little sister of the Joker now.

A permanent smile of scars in her face.

Divine still had a lot to learn about light Qi and healing, and he still needed much practice before he could do it flawlessly.