Odyssey of the Blind God

There was no point for Mathias and Nial to advance towards the center of the Island, right now.

Bella was sleeping soundly, and they would rather avoid being attacked than to face anyone hostile.

As such, the two young men had decided to leave the small battlefield and find a rather secure spot without too many beasts around.

They had to research the armaments they had found on the corpse of the Lesser Goblin Shaman.

But that was not all as they had thoroughly checked and emptied the small base of the Goblins, without leaving anything valuable behind.

Happy with the outcome of the battle, the two were walking through the forest and shared their opinion of the given situation.

"Do you think that a more intelligent type of beast is behind this? That there is someone else who is helping the Goblins advance?" Mathias asked all of a sudden.

Their earlier topics had been rather ordinary and revolved around whether mankind knew about the existence of the runic armaments, or not.

This included the existence of something similar to elemental rings, with which one didn\'t even require the possession of an elemental affinity.

Both young men understood that there was a big difference between a fire elemental affinity and the fire elemental ring that could only create a small fireball of a standard size and might.

However, even then, for someone, who had already bound an ability or affinity to their mana core, the existence of the fire and ice elemental rings was shockingly great.

Each of the rings could materialize and control one fireball or icicle at a time.

Because of that, Nial and Mathias had decided to wear the rings that slid into their fingers pretty easily.

There was not too much discomfort, and even if it would feel odd, the use of being able to manifest a total of 10 elemental attacks was more valuable than a subtle itching sensation on their fingers.

"A more intelligent type of beast helping the Goblins? Don\'t you think it is possible for more advanced Goblins to manufacture runes?"

Nial had never really thought about the intelligence of beasts.

But even then, he had heard a lot about the fact that Goblins were said to be more intelligent than other types of beasts.

They were also bi-pedal and hunted in groups to make up for their weak strength.

As such, Nial thought that it was possible for some Goblins to know about specific runes, which allowed them to create the armaments he and Mathias were wearing right now.

While thinking about Nial\'s answer, Mathias\' gaze kept flicking towards his friend more often than he would usually look at him.

However, this was mostly owed to Bella, who looked like a sleeping beauty while resting on Nial\'s back.

Her entire body was tightly pressed against that of Nial, making Mathias wonder how his friend was able to act as if he was unbothered.

After all, it looked like Bella was snuggling up to him, even if it was unintentional!

\'I should have insisted on carrying her around…Fuck!\'

But what Mathias didn\'t realize was that Nial was trying hard to distract himself by talking to his friend.

His senses were a lot more sensitive than that of someone else, usually causing severe headaches.

This meant that even a subtle touch from others could lead to discomfort for Nial.

Right now, Bella\'s body was tightly pressed onto him, her scent lingering around him, while her shallow breathing pierced through his ears as if a whirlwind was attacking his eardrums.

It was disturbing, but also quite helpful as Nial was able to experiment with his senses.

His highly sharp senses prevented him from having any weird thoughts too, which was exactly what Mathias was having, making him regret his decision to allow Nial to carry Bella around.

However, what both didn\'t know was that Bella would have twisted Mathias neck the moment his thoughts would have reached her.

Nial was walking through the forest, but even if he was rather careful, it was not as if he had the time to focus on paying too much attention to providing Bella with great service and comfort.

After a few minutes of silence, both Nial and Mathias started thinking about different things, and Nial couldn\'t help but mumble,

"Do you think the government knows about these elemental rings, the beast controlling necklaces and so on?"

Asking this while simultaneously materializing a fireball in front of him, Nial clearly understood that the complex mechanism of the fireball creation ring was much higher than most of mankind\'s technology.

That meant if the government knows about all of the runic armaments, they would be far more secretive about disclosing those kinds of things that could allow mankind to grow stronger.

After all, it should be able to make use of the runic armaments by researching them thoroughly.

Nial was not even able to imagine all the miraculous deeds they would be able to achieve with the researched intel.

However, dreaming about it was not exactly helpful either.

As such, he could only sigh deeply, shake his head, and make up his own theories.

"I have no idea…and If I were, to be honest, I\'m not sure if I want the government to be oblivious to the runic armaments, or if I want them to know about it!"

Mathias said, before shrugging his shoulders and sharing his opinion.

\'Is he too excited about the runic armaments to be shy, or what else is making him act like this again?\'

Even if Mathias didn\'t notice it right away, Nial understood that his friend was rather comfortable right now.

After the fight, he hadn\'t acted shy, timid, or even resumed to be quiet.

He found this to be relieving because he knew that he would have gone insane if no one would have been around to talk to him about what they had just witnessed.

The fact that the Lesser Goblin Shaman had runic armaments was already more than enough to feel like they were suffocating, but what both Nial and Mathias didn\'t speak about was the human language pendant.

It allowed the Lesser Goblin Shaman to speak a few words in the human language.

This was truly fearsome to Mathias, while Nial only felt like he was missing out on something big.

Yet, in the end, they were unable to tell what was going on.

In their opinion, reaching the Teradan military camp as quickly as possible had become a necessity.

It was completely different than their initial plan to become stronger, work on their teamwork, and fix their mistakes without the Instructors by their side.

However, it was certainly necessary to share their intel and retelling of their battle with Goblins with the Instructors of the Teradan military camp.

They had to find out whether mankind was aware of the runic armaments, whether it was the existence of the mass-produced marked devices, the beast controlling necklaces, the human language pendant, the mental attack pendants or the elemental rings!

With that in mind, Nial and Mathias didn\'t even feel comfortable resting too long.

But even then, it was necessary to allow Bella to rest and wake up with renewed energy to continue fighting by their side.

Their team was the smallest, and it was important for the three of them to be in their peak condition.

As such, upon finding a good location to rest, they stayed there, while continuing to discuss the runic armaments, a possible plan to find the Teradan military camp as quickly as possible, and testing the armaments for themselves.

Using them was quite easy, and it didn\'t even take that long before Nial and Mathias gained some proficiency in creating a fireball and an icicle.

Even utilizing the mental attack with the use of one of the pendants was rather easy.

"Just where are these runes from…" Nial mumbled. It was already dark and just a few hours left to midnight.

He was a little bit tired, but Nial had allowed Mathias to rest as he had used up the most mana during the rest of the day.

It was time for him to wake up his friend soon to change shifts in guarding their temporary resting spot.

All of a sudden, he felt that Bella twitched a little.

She was lying on a blanket next to him and Mathias and regained her senses after sleeping for nearly half a day.

Rubbing her drowsy eyes, Bella could recall only some words that had reached her mind when she had been sleeping.

"The rings, and so on…I think they\'re from a newly emerged dungeon…"

Bella was still tired, but she had wanted to tell Nial and Mathias about the things she had in mind.

"Newly emerged dungeons…"

While repeating these three words, Nial recalled the twin element dungeon and the fact that the number of newly emerged dungeons had increased during the last few weeks.

There had also been far more dungeons with unique beasts that the humans living in Katu had never encountered before.

Nial had even heard about new types of dungeons such as temples, castles, and ancient ruins.

Recalling this, he knitted his brows before mumbling.

"Soo…the Goblins could come from some place that either allows them to get hold of the runic armaments, or they learned to manufacture them by themselves with the use of whatever they found in the dungeon they came from?"

He thought that his mind was going wild with what he imagined.

But, when he visualized that Bella was nodding her head, Nial could only take some deep breaths.

"Doesn\'t that mean there might be multiple such dungeons that inhabited intelligent beasts that lived in a community of some sort? With what will they come at us next? Other elemental rings? Highly advanced crossbows, bows, or other weaponry? Explosive devices?"

Nial felt as if his mind was spinning, and Bella couldn\'t help but agree.

There were too many things that had happened during the last few weeks.

She might not have gotten as much intel as it was in the past, but she knew that the government was mostly oblivious to the existence of elemental rings.

Replacing an affinity with the use of armaments would be a revolutionary decision for the government.

But at the same time, the government had no idea how to create items that could use elemental affinities, not without the use of invaluable materials!

Bella\'s drowsiness had now been replaced by curiosity.

She looked around, only to notice that they were resting somewhere quiet inside the forest.

As such, she could switch her focus to the elemental rings and other armaments that Nial just handed over to her.

He felt as if Bella was more knowledgeable than both him and Mathias in that regard.

Thus, he stayed quiet and waited for her to do something. She peered at the weapons in front of her intently and let out a gasp.

"Are the runes alive?"

Hearing this caused Nial\'s eyes to go wide and her next words just made his jaw drop to the ground.

"No…that\'s not it… The runic armaments are constantly being empowered with the surrounding mana as well….just what is that??"