Dark Fate: Book 2 – The First Night
: Chapter 12

Talia smiled at me, and said, “Oh, Master! It is incredible. I picked skills from my race and profession, like you asked me to. I can’t believe all the things I know now!”

I nodded appreciatively. “Good choices, my pet. From now on, I will allow you to choose your own skills, since you’ve proven you have a good eye for your advancement. I know you won’t make me regret this, yes?”

Talia flushed with the praise, and said, huskily, “Oh, no Master! You won’t be disappointed with me at all, I promise you!”

“Good girl. Now, come on. There’s still one thing left to do before we’re done in this dungeon. We must claim the core and I will bend it to my will.” As I spoke, I let go of my transformation, and returned to my new ‘natural’ form, pleased to replace that my new armor shifted with me. Seeing the question in Talia’s eyes, I simply smiled, and said, “If I’m going to claim the dungeon, then it is only fitting that I claim it as myself, instead of wearing a false face.”

With that, I turned, and headed for the next room. The dungeon was a newborn, naturally, and it only had the basement room, plus one more that it had dug out behind the wall. I was not expecting any more monsters, since the goblin Chief was clearly the dungeon’s boss monster, and that expectation was upheld. However, to my mild surprise, the room was most certainly not empty.

The room was a square, with packed dirt walls and floors, reinforced by the dungeon’s mana. In the center of the room was a glowing green crystal gem, set upon a stone pedestal, filling the room with an unearthly light. That was, more or less, what I had expected to see.

What I had not expected were the other occupants of the room. Twelve stone slabs rose at five-foot intervals along each side wall, six on a side. Draped over each slab was a naked woman, beaten, bruised, but alive. Each woman was held in place by stone bindings that looked to have grown out from the stone slabs, securing their necks and wrists, and keeping each woman in a kneeling position.

Most of the women were only partially conscious, but one, more alert than the others, turned her head fearfully at the sound of our coming into the room. Her screams alerted the others, and several more screams joined hers, as the women attempted, futilely, to escape their bonds and replace some way of getting away from the big, scary demon. Of course, given what I knew of goblins, they probably would have reacted the same way to any male that came into the room.

Looking around, I saw that one of the women, closest to the door on the right-hand side, was watching me, cautiously. Despite her injuries, she appeared to be in better shape than the others. She was still scared, but defiant as well.

The results of [Appraise Value] sparked my memory. Kayla was one of the people who lived in an apartment on the second floor. I’d seen her a couple times at building events, but that was all. We ran in different circles, and I hadn’t seen her the last time I went through the Apocalypse. She, like Talia, had been lost, presumed killed by the goblins.

Now, it seemed, there was a darker story to that. It was a good reminder that, despite all I knew from my last time through this, I was not all-knowing. I simply remembered everything I had known before, and while that gave me a huge advantage compared to normal people, it also meant that any gaps in my knowledge that had been there before were still there now. I couldn’t just assume I would know everything that is going on, especially as I changed things in my present more and more from the way they worked in the past.

I turned to Talia. “Check the women. Let me know which ones the goblins have had their way with. We’ll need to deal with those ones first.”

“Yes, Master.”

As she went off to check the women, I turned back to Kayla, looking down at her. She was an interesting replace. The Wheelman or Wheelwoman class was, essentially, a combat driving-focused class, primarily focused on ground travel. While it was limited in its abilities for melee combat, put them at the controls of a vehicle, and they could make a semi with a full trailer of cargo dance like a ballerina. Put them behind the controls of, say, a tank, and they would ruin your whole year.

Transporter, too, was an interesting profession. It was a variant of the Courier profession, focusing more on long-distance transportation than urban deliveries. One of its base abilities was a massive expansion of their Inventory space. I knew they gained some kind of benefit while trying to fight off people who would try and steal their packages, but I didn’t remember exactly what off the top of my head.

The woman looked back up at me, and said, “So, what are you going to do to us?”

“That depends entirely on how much the goblins have done. These goblins may have been pact-bound to the Dungeon, but there has not been enough time for them to be fully converted to dungeon creatures. Do you know the difference between ‘wild’ goblins and ‘dungeon’ goblins?”

“How the hell would I know that? How the hell would YOU know that, demon? The whole damn world only changed a few hours ago!”

I smiled at her. “Let us just say that I have information that you do not. Anyway, both types of goblins are, for the most part, male, and reproduce by taking females and forcing their seed upon them. I’m sure I don’t need to go over the exact mechanics for you, as no doubt the goblins have already given a demonstration to you. In either case, goblins will breed with anything they possibly can, and attempt to breed even with things they can’t, much like some of the more perverted humans.”

“The difference between Wild Goblins and Dungeon Goblins, then, is in what happens after a goblin mates with their partner, whether they are willing or no. You see, Dungeon Goblins have their numbers supplemented by the Dungeon itself. They are stronger, smarter, and better able to fight and kill intruders. This comes at a cost, though you would be hard pressed to replace any adventurer, especially female adventurers, that are unhappy with the change.”

“Wild Goblins are creatures of twisted and chaotic magic. Their… fluids, therefore, are also magical. Mating with a Wild Goblin, whether it is male or female, essentially transmits a magical STD to their non-goblin partner. Not only is pregnancy all but guaranteed, but the non-human partner will begin taking on goblin characteristics, as they start changing.”

Kayla’s eyes opened wide in horror at what I was saying, but I continued on. “After a single mating with a Wild Goblin, the change takes, at most, a month to complete. Usually it is finished in a week. The more someone mates with a Wild Goblin, the faster the transformation happens, so that, if the entire tribe focuses on a poor soul, it can be less than twenty-four hours from the initial seeding to the final transformation in body and mind.”

“Of course, this is only true within races of the same Tier or lower. A High Human, which is a second-tier race, might be able to resist the change from a Tier One goblin, though they would still be impregnated for sure, but the Tier Two goblin races would change them all the same. A Tier Three race would be completely unaffected, and the odds would be against the seed even taking.”

The Wheelwoman grit her teeth. “But, the blue boxes said something about Magic. There has to be some kind of magic to stop this, right?”

I nodded. “Oh, certainly. Of course, the earliest that Priests and other healing-type classes will gain access to it would be around level 10, unless they are truly blessed by their chosen deities. Some, like Paladins and Monks, may be able to resist the change in their own bodies as early as level 6, but they would not be able to help others do the same.”

“Undead creatures are immune to the change, of course, and some of them can turn others to be like them. But I wouldn’t get your hopes up of having any sparkly vampires show up. You’re more likely to get mindless zombies at this stage.”

Talia returned to my side. “Master, ten of the women are showing signs of… use. There is some green pattern tracing across their skin, spreading from, um, down there.”

Another surprise! “Only ten? I thought for sure that we would be forced to deal with all twelve.”

Kayla spoke up. “I was the last one brought in. Me and that girl on the other side, there. We got to see what they were doing to the others. They were about to start in on us, but the big one yelled something from the other room, and they all left, grabbing weapons as they did so. Then, you showed up.”

I nodded as I appraised the other ‘lucky’ girl. She looked to be in her early twenties, but I knew the Kayumi family. They lived on the floor above me, second generation immigrants from Japan, which is why her name was in the Western style. Except, I knew that Hibari was the mother of the family, and was forty-two. She had clearly benefited from the System’s activation.

“Hello, Hibari. I must admit I didn’t recognize you for a second. How are Hoshi and Hideki? Were they at home when everything changed?”

Hibari, who had been silently watching me this whole time, teared up at the mention of her husband and son. “We—we tried to get out of the building. But the goblins were waiting by the doors. There was some kind of green smoke. I saw a goblin spear Hoshi, but my head grew heavy. I tried to fight it, but I passed out. When I came to, I was here.”

I nodded. “The goblin shaman probably used a sleeping cloud spell. That and a healing spell are the first two things they get, usually. Not terribly powerful, especially if you’re ready for it, but it doesn’t surprise me that some level ones fell victim to it.”

Hibari’s eyes narrowed in sudden realization. “You know too much. If you were a demon brought on by this System, then I could understand you knowing about the Goblins like you do. But knowing my name, and the names of my husband and son? That is not something a demon of the System could do. Who are you?”

I smiled at her. “Ah, you don’t recognize me because I’ve had a bit more of a change than you have. You would know me as Zayn Greene, the guy who lived in the unit under yours. We met a couple times at building parties.”

“As for how I know what I do? Well, that’s simple enough. I know it because I’ve lived through this all before.”