Chapter 5

【Purple Alder Firewood】

【A common type of wood from the night forest, oily, suitable for making torches.】

After wiping his hands, Xiwefu Lingxin tried using the gathering skill on a tree by the roadside and found that it actually worked.

However, while gathering the goblin corpse only took a few seconds, gathering the tree took several minutes, and the results were not very impressive.

"Why did such a big tree end up as just a thirty-centimeter piece of firewood after gathering?" Xiwefu threw the short stick on the ground, grumbling to himself, and continued walking forward.

On the way, Xiwefu encountered several more goblins, some of which were even holding rusty short knives, classified as level 2 strong goblins.

Fortunately, their magic resistance seemed to be quite low, and it only took about five hits to finish them off.

In fact, because goblins generally have low intelligence, many times they would charge at Xiwefu after taking three hits, only to be severely injured by the fourth hit. Their fear of death would then take over, and they would turn and run, only to be finished off by Xiwefu from behind...

Unfortunately, these strong goblins with rusty knives didn't yield much when gathered. The best thing Xiwefu had obtained so far was a piece of a rusty blade.

According to the description, collecting a certain number of these could be used to forge high-quality weapons in a forge.

As for where the forge was... who knows...

Xiwefu sat on a tree stump and ate the last piece of portable food he had.

This food, which tasted a bit like osmanthus cake but had no flavor, was very practical. It could quickly replenish stamina and speed up the recovery of magic power. Without this support, Xiwefu's meager magic power would have been exhausted halfway through.

However, since he had eaten the last piece of his supply, he needed to leave and return to the camp before his magic power was completely depleted.

After sitting for a while and feeling somewhat recovered, Xiwefu stood up, stretched a bit, and continued walking along the animal trail.

For some reason, Xiwefu felt that the sky above him was getting darker the further he went, and the forest was gradually becoming darker as well.

After dealing with two strong goblins and gathering a piece of a rusty blade and a pair of underwear (which he discarded), Xiwefu considered just leaving.

However, he suddenly noticed a faint flicker of light not far away.

Was it a new camp or the location of a boss?

He had already noticed that the logout option on the back of his hand had turned gray and unselectable, suggesting that he could only leave the instance when he was in a camp.

Xiwefu reached into his bag and felt the emergency potion and the return crystal, then gathered his courage and walked towards the light.

As he got closer, he realized that the light came from a not-so-large campfire, on which something seemed to be roasting. However, next to the campfire were two strong goblins and an elderly goblin with a large bump on its nose. The old goblin was wearing a tattered robe several times its size and holding a magic staff that looked no different from a branch. It was sitting on what seemed to be a bamboo basket, waving the staff and making strange howling sounds. The two strong goblins sat obediently in front, as if listening to a lesson.

The scene looked quite ridiculous.

But Xiwefu couldn't laugh.

He couldn't move while casting spells, and dealing with two strong goblins was already challenging, let alone the presence of what appeared to be a goblin spellcaster.

As one of the key points of goblin mutation, goblin spellcasters are classified as level 3 monsters. According to the knowledge and experience left by his predecessor, the strongest known goblin spellcaster was level 9, just one step away from being classified as a dangerous monster.

If they progressed further, goblin spellcasters could be infected by elements and mutate into various sub-species of goblins. Many of these are explicitly listed as dangerous monsters with a level 10 or higher, meaning they were absolutely beyond Xiwefu's current capabilities!

Fortunately, the opponent didn't seem to be that difficult to handle. Based on his predecessor's experience, it was likely that the goblin spellcaster had become one in its old age, with a level 3 classification.

However, even so, if the two strong goblins were to engage him, the goblin spellcaster would still pose a significant threat.

While Xiwefu was pondering, he suddenly noticed that the two strong goblins sitting in front of the goblin spellcaster, with their backs to him, seemed a bit off.

So he quietly circled around from the bushes to the back of the spellcaster and found that the two strong goblins had actually fallen asleep due to the spellcaster's howling...

If he didn't take this opportunity, he wouldn't be a穿越者 (穿越者 means "穿越者" in Chinese, which can be translated as "transmigrator" or "穿越者" in English, but in this context, it's better to use "transmigrator" to maintain the cultural nuance).

So he decisively cast a magic missile at the back of the goblin spellcaster's head, hitting it squarely.

The goblin spellcaster's howling immediately turned into a scream, and the two strong goblins woke up, charging at Xiwefu with their knives, looking fierce.

However, Xiwefu didn't hesitate and cast another magic missile, this time directly hitting the goblin spellcaster's face, even interrupting its spell and sending it back into its stomach...

Seeing the strong goblins about to reach him, Xiwefu started to panic.

Wasn't it said that goblin spellcasters have weak constitutions and are easy to kill? Why was it still alive after taking two magic missiles to the head?

But he gritted his teeth and cast another magic missile. This time, the sound of the missile hitting the goblin spellcaster's head was not the previous loud 'snap' but a 'thud' like a watermelon bursting.

However, Xiwefu didn't have time to confirm the results of his third magic missile. He rolled to the side, barely dodging the fierce attacks of the two strong goblins, but still received a deep half-inch cut on his arm.

At first, the wound was numb and didn't hurt much, but soon waves of throbbing and stinging pain followed, even causing Xiwefu's mind to go blank for a moment due to the intense pain.

This was not a good sign.

The pain not only hindered his movement but also distracted him from casting spells. As a result, Xiwefu couldn't focus and couldn't even cast a magic missile!

Ducking another attack, Xiwefu pulled out the emergency potion from his temporary pocket. The finely crafted glass bottle contained a green liquid, enough for a small sip.

Without hesitation, Xiwefu drank the potion, and the burning pain in his wound immediately turned into a soothing sensation. The severe cut began to heal visibly!

With his mobility restored, Xiwefu first checked the goblin spellcaster and found that its green body had fallen to the ground, and a pool of red and white sticky substances had formed, indicating that it was dead.

Dealing with the two remaining strong goblins was troublesome but not scary. He just needed to keep a certain distance and use magic missiles to wear them down.

Unfortunately, one of them fled when it was too injured, otherwise it would have been a complete victory.

From the strong goblins, he gathered more rusty blade fragments, but from the goblin spellcaster, he obtained something different—a ruby about the size of a thumbnail, though he couldn't see its attributes for some reason.

But that wasn't the most important thing. The most important thing was the bamboo basket the goblin spellcaster had been sitting on. According to Xiwefu's guess, it was likely a common item in most RPG games—a treasure chest.

{Piaotian Literature}