Goblin King: My Innate Skill Is OP

Chapter 395: Manacores

At this point, I had enough cards in my hand that I no longer needed to know every detail before acting. As long as the situation wasn’t completely beyond my ability to handle, I trusted myself to adapt.

The alpha wolf had been dangerous. Just not dangerous enough.

Ariel stared at me for several seconds.

A long, silent stare. The kind that made it feel like she was trying to figure out whether I was a genius or an idiot.

Eventually, her ears twitched, and she said:

"That’s not an answer."

"It is an answer."

"No, it isn’t."

"It really is."

Ariel’s eye twitched.

I, meanwhile, continued smiling.

After a moment, she let out a slow breath and shook her head.

For some reason, she looked even more troubled than before.

"Aren’t you being too rash? You do know your life is my life, right?"

I blinked. Then a grin slowly spread across my face.

"Is that your way of saying you were worried about me?"

"Worried?" Ariel scoffed. "Get over yourself, goblin. Why would I be worried about you? You can handle yourself."

I nodded seriously.

"Fair enough."

"So?"

"So that brings the conversation to an end, then."

Ariel’s ears twitched. For a moment, she just stared at me as if she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Then she let out a sharp huff.

"You know what? I’m not even going to say anything anymore."

"Why?" I pouted. "I like our tiki-taka conversations."

Ariel immediately turned her head away.

"Harrumph."

I burst out laughing. For some reason, watching the fox get frustrated while talking to me brought me an unreasonable amount of joy.

Maybe it was because she always tried so hard to maintain an air of superiority, only to end up annoyed a few minutes later.

Or maybe it was because her reactions were just too easy to read.

Either way, I found it amusing.

Ariel, meanwhile, seemed to find absolutely nothing amusing about the situation.

Her tails flicked irritably behind her while she deliberately refused to look in my direction.

That only made me laugh harder.

Out of curiosity, I decided to check her status screen. More specifically, her loyalty.

And to my surprise, it had increased by five points.

I blinked and checked it again to make sure I wasn’t imagining things.

Nope. It had definitely gone up.

I wasn’t entirely sure what had caused it. Maybe it was the fight. Maybe it was something else entirely. Trying to understand how Ariel’s mind worked was often an impossible task.

Still, I wasn’t complaining. If her loyalty continued rising at this rate, it wouldn’t be long before it reached fifty.

And when that happened, an entirely new set of abilities would become available to me.

To her as well, now that I thought about it.

My gaze slowly shifted toward Ariel. She noticed immediately.

"...What?"

I narrowed my eyes. The thought of Ariel gaining access to my skills was honestly a little terrifying.

She was already troublesome enough as she was.

Giving her abilities like Warp and some of the others in my arsenal felt like the kind of idea that would eventually come back to haunt me.

Ariel’s eyes narrowed suspiciously.

"Why are you looking at me like that?"

"No reason."

Ariel looked unconvinced. But she didn’t press the issue.

With the alpha dead and no sign of further resistance, there was no longer any reason to hesitate. So we headed into the cave. This time, Ariel took the lead without the slightest bit of caution, a glowing Soulflare Quill floating beside her and illuminating the darkness with a soft azure light.

The deeper we went, the wider the cave became. And it didn’t take long before we arrived at an open chamber.

The moment I saw it, my eyes widened. The [Manacore] deposits were everywhere.

Unlike the cores harvested from the wolves, these weren’t embedded inside creatures.

Instead, they protruded directly from the cave walls and floor like mineral veins. Hundreds of crystalline formations stretched across the chamber, glowing with a gentle bluish light that illuminated the entire cavern.

The sight was almost surreal.

The crystals varied in size, some no larger than a fist, while others were nearly as large as my torso. Dense streams of mana flowed within them, pulsing faintly beneath their translucent surfaces.

For a moment, neither Ariel nor I spoke.

There were simply too many of them.

And every single one represented value.

A slow grin spread across my face. Talia was going to lose her mind when she saw this.

Ariel dismissed her Soulflare Quill and stepped deeper into the chamber.

A small gasp escaped her lips as her eyes moved across the countless mana crystals embedded throughout the cavern. Her eyes gleamed with excitement, and her tails swayed behind her in wide circles, making it painfully obvious how pleased she was by the discovery.

I couldn’t really blame her. The sight was impressive.

Every wall, every pillar, and even parts of the ceiling were covered in glowing deposits of manacore stone. The blue light radiating from them bathed the entire cavern in an almost dreamlike glow.

At this point, the theory was practically confirmed. The Inferno Wolves hadn’t simply evolved naturally. They had been influenced by their environment.

Living for generations in close proximity to such an absurd concentration of mana-rich crystals had undoubtedly altered them, gradually turning them into the creatures they were today.

I grinned. There was enough manacore stone here to make this entire trip worthwhile. In fact, "worthwhile" was underselling it. Talia was going to have a field day when she saw this.

If these crystals could be processed the way she believed, there was likely enough material here to enhance armor for every goblin in the clan and still leave a considerable amount unused.

The mission had been a complete success.

At least, mostly. My smile faded slightly as I looked around the chamber.

One thing still bothered me. There were no wolves.

Not a single one. I slowly swept my gaze across the cavern.

The alpha was dead.

Most of the pack had died outside.

Yet according to the title I’d received, there should have been surviving members somewhere.

’Had we really killed them all?’

I frowned as the thought crossed my mind.

That would be such a waste.

If I had dealt with the alpha wolf before wiping out the rest of the pack, things would’ve turned out very differently. I’d probably have an entire group of wolves acknowledging me as their Alpha right now. The Night Riders would’ve practically built themselves.

I let out a sigh.

What was done was done.

Still, something continued to bother me.

The alpha wolf had been unusually protective of this cave.

Every time Ariel or I had approached it earlier, the beast had reacted almost immediately, leaping into our shadows.

I glanced around the chamber again.

Was it the manacore stones it was protecting? Or was it something else entirely?

There was no way for me to know now. The alpha wolf was dead. And any answers it possessed had died with it.

But moments later, I got my answer when a sudden wave of heat swept through the cavern.

At the same time, Ariel’s fur stood on end and spun toward one of the deeper tunnels, her lips pulling back to reveal her fangs.

I immediately followed her gaze and saw an Inferno Wolf.

Unlike the others, this one didn’t emerge charging or snarling.

It simply stood there at the mouth of the tunnel, watching us.

Without hesitation, I activated [Analyze], and a floating text appeared above the inferno wolf.

[Inferno Wolf - Matriarch] [Level 55]

My eyes narrowed.

"Matriarch?"