Chapter Twenty: Goblin Butter?
Three players, their ankles tightly bound by strong ropes, were slumped against a tree, yelling and screaming, their cleavers and guns falling to the ground.
The beams of their fallen flashlights darted about, finally illuminating the figures that had just appeared before them.
It was a group of humanoid creatures, each between 1.4 and 1.5 meters tall.
A dozen or so goblins with pale green skin!
These goblins weren't ugly; aside from their slightly curled ears, they looked quite similar to humans.
And they were clearly predominantly female.
Except for two elderly male goblins with white hair and beards, and one thin, small goblin, the rest were all female goblins based on their physique.
These goblins wore crude rattan armor, or even clothes woven from tree bark and animal hides. Their faces were painted with strange and terrifying patterns, and they carried sharp stone spears, uttering eerie shouts as if trying to appear even more frightening.
To the goblins' surprise, the three human prey showed no fear whatsoever. Instead, they exchanged glances and burst into delighted laughter:
Blue and White Sky: "Holy crap, holy crap, goblins! This is definitely a brand new plot point! We're rich! The reward is guaranteed!"
Most Beloved Qianqian: "Artist, you deserve a bonus! These goblins are actually quite aesthetically pleasing to humans. They're practically a bunch of green-skinned, pointy-eared humans, much more pleasing to the eye than those disgusting goblins in comics."
Huo'er Gai: "Although they look like goblins, they might not actually be. It's hard to say right now. We might get eaten soon."
Blue and White Sky: "Eaten or not, might as well report back to the resurrection point. How about we call out 'Old Black Daddy' a couple of times and see if he can hear us?"
Huo'er Gai: "Old Black Daddy! Old Black Daddy!"
In the Divine Realm Heaven Temple, Ren Zha, who had just locked onto Lost Eden, sensed the prayers from a true believer and immediately turned his gaze towards it.
Having absorbed various life forces, the divine essence of other deities, and the residual divine power within the artifacts, his divine domain had expanded considerably. The area where the players were located also fell within his divine domain, and he immediately saw the three players hanging upside down.
He raised an eyebrow, a slight smile appearing on his face.
Goblins?
Finally, he'd encountered native intelligent beings!
And goblins capable of using tools!
Although many works of art from his past life portrayed goblins as ferocious, cunning, and foolish creatures, Ren Zha, as a deity, especially having absorbed the souls of the Fish-Man God and the Kobold God, had gained considerable information about the divine realm and naturally held no prejudice against goblins.
As an upright deity, how could he possibly be racially discriminatory!
The nature of any intelligent life form is ultimately shaped by its environment; goblins also come in many varieties, some with gentle personalities.
The appearance of native intelligent beings means that Ren Zha can develop his own followers among them, instead of being limited to human player followers.
While human player followers are useful, maintaining their existence in the divine realm requires a constant drain on divine power.
These native followers don't have this problem.
In the future, he can use human player followers to recruit native intelligent beings as followers.
Hmm, in that case, the two sides don't seem to understand each other's languages, so he'll need to add an eternal divine spell.
Divine power surged, and a brand new eternal divine spell immediately solidified within Ren Zha's divine realm, named—Spiritual Words!
Having done all this, Ren Zha began preparing for his journey to Lost Eden.
First, there were the items for trading, then the servants he could bring.
He's a god after all; it would be beneath him to go alone.
After all, it's his first time going to such a place.
In the forest at the edge of the divine realm below, the divine spell had just been cast when the three players hanging upside down from the trees suddenly understood the goblins' words:
"They're humans! Humans from a legendary race! Are we inviting disaster?!"
"Don't worry, even among humans, many are weak. These three should be. Our Igor tribe isn't afraid of them."
"I'm afraid there are many more humans behind these three… I just discovered today that all the Blackscale Giant Lizards east of the tribe have vanished, not even a single egg left. The ground is covered in blood; they've likely been wiped out. We must find out..."
"Never mind, whatever these humans' origins, since we've captured them, let's take them back to the tribe. We need these excellent seeds..."
The last, older goblin spoke, delivering the final word.
Hearing the goblins' words, the three players hanging there couldn't help but beam with joy:
"They can understand goblins! It seems like there was a version update!"
"Tsk tsk, so this is the closed beta? The update is timely!"
"What do these goblins mean? Are they going to carry us back and eat us?"
After a brief exchange, the goblins in front of them understood them as well, and they looked shocked.
Then, the goblins exchanged glances, stopped talking, and several of them tied the three players up tightly with ropes, inserted sticks in the middle, and four goblins carried each human away.
The three players were now filled with excitement, craning their necks to look ahead with anticipation.
Tonight's all-nighter hadn't been in vain; they must have triggered some kind of story quest, which explained the appearance of these goblin NPCs.
Besides Old Black and the NPCs from God War, this was the first time they had encountered other NPCs, and they were incredibly excited.
Sensing the three humans' excitement, several goblins with grotesque markings on their faces whispered among themselves:
"Are these three humans inferior? Idiots?"
"Even legendary races have inferior offspring? But thinking about it, it's normal; there are bound to be some flawed varieties."
"If all else fails, we can sell them as slaves. We should be able to get some things in return."
As they spoke, the three players were carried by the goblins through a forest and over a hill, arriving at a stream.
Before their eyes came a clearing in the forest, dotted with dozens of thatched and branch houses, showing clear signs of life, and some young goblins were running around happily.
This was a small goblin village!
Seeing a dozen or so adult goblins carrying the three human players, dozens of goblins immediately emerged from the surrounding thatched houses, cheering loudly around the hunting party.
Blue and White Sky: "A goblin village here? What a discovery, brothers!"
Serves Me Right: "I wonder if these goblins are good or evil. According to the game's 'Gods and Demons Battlefield,' we're supposed to help Old Black develop a follower clan or something. Are these goblins any good?"
Most Beloved Qianqian: "Wait, this village has a story. Look, none of the goblins here are adult males; they're all old, weak, and disabled."
The three players, bound and gagged, whispered amongst themselves, their faces full of curiosity about their surroundings.
At this moment, the goblin hunters who had escorted them back took the basins of water from their comrades and washed the paint off their faces, revealing the faces of female goblins.
This goblin tribe truly seemed to have no adult male goblins.
While these adult female goblins weren't exactly stunningly beautiful, they weren't unattractive either; a few of the young goblins were quite pretty.
"Damn, I think we've triggered a cannibalistic event. These goblins' eyes look weird, like they want to eat people!" Huo'er Gai clicked his tongue. "These NPCs are so realistic!"
However, the expected cannibalistic scene didn't occur. Several female goblins escorting them whispered to an elder-like goblin for a while, then ordered the three human players to be carried into three separate thatched huts.
"Brother Lanbai! My dearest Qianqian! What's going on? Can you hear me?" Huo'er Gai, tied to a bed made of straw, shouted, but couldn't hear the other two at all.
Is this some kind of hidden event?
Something's weird.
Just then, the curtain of one of the thatched huts was pulled open, and a fully developed female goblin walked in.
This female goblin, seemingly one of the goblin hunters who had captured them earlier, had now washed off her face paint. If you ignored her green skin and hair, and her distinctive goblin ears, she would look like an ordinary girl next door.
She was even kind of cute.
The female goblin muttered to herself:
"This seed doesn't seem very intelligent. Is it really a good seed?"
Hearing this, and looking at the surrounding environment, and the way the female goblin crawled towards him, he immediately recalled some hentai anime he had watched before, and understood what was happening.
This is a hidden eroge scene!
She wants to borrow his seed!
At this moment, he was instantly overjoyed, feeling a little thirsty. He never expected that a serious game like *Gods and Demons Battlefield* would have eroge scenes. He wondered which programmer with thick eyebrows had hidden this scene inside.
I'm still a child!
Please don't pity me just because I'm a delicate flower!
While pondering this, Huo'ergai carefully observed the female goblin crawling towards him. He thought she wasn't exactly beautiful, but she was still quite cute. Crucially, at only 1.45 meters tall, she was practically a natural loli, exactly what he wanted.
This kind of scene only exists in the closed beta; it'll probably be completely removed in the official release. I'm going to savor it…
At this moment, the female goblin had already climbed onto the bed. She first untied one of Huo'ergai's hands, then began earnestly removing his armor.
Huo'ergai's face flushed red, eagerly awaiting the exciting moment.
"Ah—!" A piercing scream suddenly came from outside, followed by the howl of a wild beast and an evil laugh.
"Enemy attack! Enemy attack! It's the lizardman hunters!" the goblin cried out in panic, followed by frantic running.
The female goblin, her face contorted in panic, grabbed a stone spear and dashed out, leaving the dreaded Huo'er lying there.
"Aaaaah, you beast! Who! Who interrupted my butter experience!" Huo'er untied the ropes binding her, retrieved the submachine gun left behind by the big-faced cat from her belongings, and roared as she charged out of the thatched hut.
From the two thatched huts nearby, Lanbaitian and Zuiai Qianqian, wielding pistols and kitchen knives respectively, rushed out with equally murderous expressions.
"Oh ho ho, look what I found! Three fresh and delicious humans!"
In the center of the village's main road, a lizardman in armor, wielding a battle sword and carrying the corpse of a young goblin, spoke, his tongue flicking.