Silent. Fast. Efficient.
Don's Agility of 35 let him close the distance before the goblins even registered his presence.
The Executioner's Edge remained passive—he didn't need it for this. Just steel, skill, and cold calculation.
The first goblin died with Don's sword through its throat. The second turned, mouth opening to scream—Don's hand clamped over its face, muffling the sound as his blade found its heart.
The third managed half a yell before steel silenced it permanently.
The fourth and fifth tried to run. Don caught them both within ten meters.
[+20 XP] × 5
[CURRENT XP: 945/1200]
Five bodies. Still warm. Blood pooling on the moss.
Don stood among them, breathing steady, his armor splattered with goblin blood that looked almost black in the crimson twilight.
And his stomach growled. Loud. Insistent.
He needed food. And he'd just killed five potential meals.
Don looked down at the nearest corpse. Green skin. Tusks. Yellow eyes staring at nothing. A monster. Not human. Not sapient in any way that mattered.
Just... meat.
His hand moved to his sword, using the blade to cut away a chunk of flesh from the goblin's thigh—the meatiest part, relatively clean, away from the organs that might carry disease.
The piece sat in his palm. Dark green meat. Still bleeding. The smell was wrong—metallic, sour, like spoiled meat mixed with copper and something else he couldn't identify.
Don's stomach turned.
Every instinct screamed at him not to do this. This was wrong. Unnatural. Even if they were monsters, even if they weren't human—
His stomach growled again. Louder. Painful.
The Abyss didn't care about human morality. It cared about survival. About strength. About what you were willing to do to claim power.
[Are you really going to eat that, little seed?]
Madness's voice carried genuine curiosity, no mockery for once.
[Goblin flesh. Raw. Probably tastes HORRIBLE. Probably makes you want to vomit just thinking about it.]
"Yes," Don said simply.
He raised the meat to his mouth.
Hesitated for only a fraction of a second.
Then bit down.
The taste hit him immediately—bitter, metallic, wrong in every possible way that taste could be wrong.
The texture was rubbery and tough, resisting his teeth like old leather. Blood filled his mouth, tasting like iron and rot and something acidic that burned.
His stomach rebelled violently. His throat tried to close. Every fiber of his being screamed to spit it out, to vomit, to stop—
Don forced himself to chew.
To swallow.
To keep it down despite his body's protests.
The meat went down like swallowing broken glass.
And then—
[ANALYZING CONSUMED MATERIAL...]
[GOBLIN FLESH DETECTED]
[SPECIES: COMMON GOBLIN (LEVEL 2)]
[EXTRACTING PROPERTIES...]
Heat flooded through Don's body. Not painful, but intense—like liquid fire flowing through his veins, spreading from his stomach to his limbs, settling into his muscles, his bones, his very cells.
His vision swam for a moment. His heart rate spiked. Every nerve ending in his body suddenly screamed with sensation as something fundamental changed.
[ABSORPTION SUCCESSFUL]
[LEARNING AND ADAPTATION: PROCESSING BIOLOGICAL DATA]
[NEW SUB-SKILL CATEGORY UNLOCKED: DEVOURED TRAITS]
[PHYSICAL ENHANCEMENT DETECTED]
[STRENGTH: 33 → 34 (+1)]
[AGILITY: 35 → 36 (+1)]
[VITALITY: 25 → 26 (+1)]
[TRAIT ABSORBED: NIGHT VISION (COMMON)]
[TRAIT ABSORBED: ENHANCED SMELL (COMMON)]
[MADNESS: 17% (No change - target too weak)]
Don gasped, stumbling slightly as the changes settled. His muscles felt denser, more responsive. His vision sharpened—the darkness of the forest becoming clearer, details emerging that had been hidden before.
And smells—he could suddenly distinguish individual scents in the air. Blood. Rot. The camp in the distance. Other goblins.
He could smell them.
[Oh. OH! Little seed, your body ADAPTED! Your skill didn't just absorb KNOWLEDGE—it absorbed the goblin's PHYSICAL traits! You're not just learning from books anymore—you're learning from FLESH!]
Madness's voice carried genuine excitement, almost awe.
[Do you understand what this MEANS? Every monster you kill, every creature you consume, every SOURCE of power you devour—your body will adapt, will TAKE their strengths, will make them YOURS!]
Don stared at his hands, feeling the new strength, the subtle but undeniable improvements. His stats had increased.
His senses had sharpened. And all from eating one goblin.
One.
He looked at the other four corpses lying in the moss.
Then back at the camp in the distance—hundreds of goblins. Hundreds of potential meals. Hundreds of stat increases waiting to be claimed.
The taste had been horrible. The act itself morally questionable at best.
But the results...
The results were undeniable.
Don's yellow eye burned brighter as cold calculation settled over him like a comfortable cloak.
"The Abyss rewards the strong and devours the weak," he murmured, quoting the second rule. "It never specified WHO does the devouring."
He crouched beside the second corpse and cut away another piece of meat.
This time, he didn't hesitate.
The taste was still awful. His stomach still protested. But he chewed mechanically, swallowed efficiently, and waited for the notifications.
[ABSORPTION SUCCESSFUL]
[STRENGTH: 34 → 35 (+1)]
[AGILITY: 36 → 37 (+1)]
[VITALITY: 26 → 27 (+1)]
Again. The third corpse.
[ABSORPTION SUCCESSFUL]
[STRENGTH: 35 → 36 (+1)]
[AGILITY: 37 → 38 (+1)]
[VITALITY: 27 → 28 (+1)]
The fourth.
[ABSORPTION SUCCESSFUL]
[STRENGTH: 36 → 37 (+1)]
[AGILITY: 38 → 39 (+1)]
[VITALITY: 28 → 29 (+1)]
The fifth.
[ABSORPTION SUCCESSFUL]
[STRENGTH: 37 → 38 (+1)]
[AGILITY: 39 → 40 (+1)]
[VITALITY: 29 → 30 (+1)]
[TRAIT ABSORBED: POISON RESISTANCE (COMMON)]
Don stood slowly, wiping blood from his mouth with the back of his hand. Five goblins consumed.
Fifteen stat points gained—three per goblin, distributed across his physical attributes.
His body felt...
different. Stronger, yes. But also more.
Sharper. Faster. More durable.
As if the goblin's natural attributes had merged with his own, enhancing what was already there.
And the night vision was remarkable. He could see clearly now despite the dim crimson light, picking out details that would have been invisible before. The enhanced smell let him track the patrol patterns of other goblins through scent alone.
He'd gained abilities that would have required months of training or expensive magical enhancements.
All from eating monsters.
[You're not even DISGUSTED anymore, are you?]
Madness's voice carried something like satisfaction.
[That first bite—you almost vomited. Your whole body rejected it. But now? Now you're eating them like RATIONS. Fuel for the machine. Resources to be CONSUMED and CONVERTED into power.]
Don didn't respond. Because Madness was right.
The taste was still horrible. The act still technically cannibalism—or at least its monstrous equivalent. But his Iron Will's passive effect kept the emotional impact distant, muted, manageable.
And the practical benefits far outweighed any moral concerns.
He was in the Abyss. Morality was a luxury for people who weren't trying to survive in a realm designed to break souls.
Don checked his updated status:
Strength: 38
Agility: 40
Vitality: 30
XP: 945/1200
Excellent progress. But five goblins out of five hundred was barely a dent.
He needed more.
Don looked toward the camp, hidden beyond the trees. Another patrol would leave soon—they seemed to send them out every hour or so. Predictable. Systematic. Perfect for exploitation.
He had time. He had a method. And now he had proof that his approach worked.
One week to reduce five hundred goblins to a manageable number.
One week of hunting, killing, feeding.
By the time he launched his final assault on that camp, he'd be so much stronger that even their leader wouldn't stand a chance.
Don's lips curved into something cold and sharp.
The hunter had awakened.
And the prey had no idea what was coming.