Stray Soul

“...Well, this is an interesting sight...” I muttered to myself while looking at the goblin village from afar, which was worth travelling for nearly 5 days to see as it was the first sign of civilization I had encountered in this world other than the structure inside of the dungeon.

The village itself was... quite big actually, with dozens upon dozens of crude looking houses inside of it, with a tall wooden structure in the middle, and a 5- or 6-metre-tall log wall surrounding the village, with 2 gates leading inside, one towards west, leading towards the dungeon, and the other towards east, leading towards the river.

And looking at the goblin village, I was equally surprized by their development, and lack thereof.

For once, they were able to make decent looking settlement, and set up groups to go into the dungeon, go hunting and overall resource collection, which indicated that they were good at organizing themselves.

But I was also surprized by the lack of development because I could not see any farmlands surrounding their settlement.

I mean, there was a large clearing around the village, which was clearly cleared out by the goblins themselves as I could see a few goblins going at it and cutting some trees even from here, but the lack of farming was just... surprizing to say the least.

Maybe they had not had enough time to set up their farms? Possibly, but I would’ve thought that’d be the first thing any settlement focused on... other than building houses and making sure they didn’t die in the winter from the cold that is.

“Did I miss anything?” Rifu-san’s voice echoed from the sceptre in my chest. And yes, as you might’ve guessed, Rifu-san is the forest spirit—or the dryad.

And no, she is not actually a spirit, that was just a freudian slip from me, neither are dryads, and other plants beings, related to the spirits, nor are they that close to each other as species.

The only reason why the spirits even decided to bring me to Rifu-san’s node tree, which was then transformed into a spirit tree because the spirits liked it so much, is because they thought she might want to talk with me.

Apparently, she can’t really commune with the spirits easily, and even when she does, they don’t necessarily listen to her, they just do whatever they find ‘fun’, according to her that is.

And why does the dryad, or the plant beings, have japanese sounding names you ask? Well, I’d like to know myself too!

For the last few days, she has been telling me quite a bit about her people and teaching me stuff like the language spoken by the local goblins and something called imperial which is the most commonly used language in this continent, and when it came to our names, she said her full name was Rifu Matoriaaku and that I should call her as Rifu-san.

I was, of course, surprized by the weirdly japanese sounding name, and when I asked her about where her name came from, she just said that she choose that name after she became a dryad, and the system granted her access to the plant being language.

So, apparently, the system just gives out languages to monsters that become intelligent, free of charge, and she just happened to end up with a language that had japanese like naming rules, and she said that she knows that there are other plant being languages, but she doesn’t know them, which is confusing because... the system gave her the plant being language according to her, so does the system just make languages on the spot when a monster gains intelligence, and gives it to them, or does it have a stash of pre-created languages, and it just gives them out from that stash?

No idea, just happy her name is something that I can at least understand and not some stupid thing like breath-of-life or something related to plants or just a weird amalgamation of letters that barely passes as a name.

I am just happy I ended up with Rifu-san instead of Zycie, or some other stupid name.

“No, nothing much. I’ve been just sitting her and watching the goblins move about their day but... do goblins just let their undead go around like this? I know they have some sort of necromancer that can stop them from rotting but having them under the sun like this must not help with their preservation.” I asked her, and after a few moments she responded.

“People living under the Dark Lord use undead and other abominations like beast of burden and front-line infantry most of the time, so it is normal, but I assume the undead you are talking about are not helping the goblins do their jobs?”

“Yes, they are not. They are just... standing there, unmoving... I am not even sure if they are active or not, and where are their handlers or the necromancer? Shouldn’t they stay close to the undead to order them around if needed?”

“The necromancer is probably the leader of the tribe, and even if its not the leader and there is someone outranking them, they probably hold a high position as the tribe’s shaman, so its normal that the necromancer wouldn’t be out and about but yes, it is weird their handlers or other apprentice necromancers are not around to order them around. Other than that, do you see anything important? Can you tell me how the village is designed and such?” She asked, which I found weird because she was the one who guided me here, shouldn’t she know how the village looks?

“And how would I know that?” She asked after I asked her and continued.

“After all, I don’t have any eyes to see, and ears to listen to understand what’s happening there. I have access to the mycelial network in the forest, so I can roughly tell where things are, and when a plant dies, but even the information I get through that is dubious at best.

I can, of course, use mana to increase my senses, or just cast a scrying spell but that would be just a waste of mana, and my time, so I need you to be my eyes and ears so I can make think of a plan.” She said, and what she said made sense, so I just told her everything I was seeing in the village.

“Can you climb over the walls, or charge through them to get into that big wooden structure you talked about?” She suddenly asked, which surprised me, not because she asked something, but because she was just asking if I could sneak or break into the goblin village.

“Well—yeah, I can definitely break through the wall, as it doesn’t seem that strong and with my weight, I should be able to break through it after getting a bit of speed and charge into the wall, and break it, and then go to the wooden structure, but why?

Antagonizing the goblins by attacking their village, where they and their families live, doesn’t sound like the path to deity hood.” I told her what she wanted but added my concern at the end.

“You are correct, antagonizing the whole tribe is bad, but this is how it needs to be. We need to go in and kill their leader and their shaman, otherwise whatever deity they are worshipping will continue to retain control, and we won’t be able to turn you into a deity.”

“You have a point but... can we do it without killing people? I mean, making me deity without having to, you know, execute their leaders and all? Maybe just... convert them or put them in prison?

And I’ve gotta add, while I am confident in breaking through the wall and reaching the big structure in the middle, I am not confident I’d be able to defeat all the goblins, or their strongest warriors, I am just not strong enough to do so.” I said, and I genuinely didn’t want to kill people because they were just in my way.

Imprisoning them? Sure, they were the followers of the literal fucking Dark Lord after all, so I didn’t really have any qualms about imprisoning them or converting them.

But killing because it was convenient? Nope, not doing that.

I am not stupid and... I recognize that I may have to give orders for some people to be killed or may have to kill people in the future myself but... that’s something my future self will have to deal with.

Right now, I just want to have my cake and eat it. No matter how naïve it may be.

“We can try to make you a deity without killing the goblins’ leaders, but then you’ll have to convince the goblins to your superiority as a deity stronger and better than whoever they are praying to right now. Which is, while possible, will take time as people are usually not keen on converting the moment a new deity appears, how ever strong and better the new deity may be.

You will have to spend at least a few months, if not a few years, to convert them.”

“And... is that a problem for you?”

“Not really. Like what I said before, you are not the only one I am helping ascend to deity hood right now, there are more that are going trough their own trials and many more who I’ve got an eye on.

Even if you fail because of your morals, or succeed thanks to them, in the end everything will be the same for me.”

...What a nice way to say that you care about someone. You know, Rifu-san, I am growing to like you more and more with each day we spent together and am totally not regretting choosing to be a deity because I wanted to larp as the emperor of man.

Nope, totally not regretting my hubris and greed!

“But, since you brought it up, what is your rank, William-san?” God, someone saying ‘-san’ after my name gives me the chills. Maybe I should’ve given her my surname?

...Eh, who cares, its too late to change it now, and as I remember referring to people by their name is a sign of being closer than just their surname in japan, so asking her to change how she refers to me might be problematic... though I am not sure she would care, but still, don’t want to bother with that.

“I am H rank, but most of my strength comes from the corpses I possess, instead of my own strength.” I told her, hoping my low rank would not be that much of a problem as I could always just get stronger bodies.

“Is that so?” She said, hopefully not disappointed because I literally could not tell her emotions through her voice, but soon she continued.

“Can you take control of multiple bodies like before with the Phantoms?”

“Phantoms?” I thought but didn’t say it through our link. Must be what she called the Hybrids... but I am going to continue calling them Hybrids because my naming schemes are always creative and perfect.

“Yes, I can. I just need their corpses, then I can use them without a problem. But I am not keen on having a swarm of weak creatures as every body I control has to have a part of my soul in it, so having a few strong creatures rather than many weak ones is more favourable as I won’t have to worry about pieces of my soul getting destroyed because I didn’t act fast enough to dodge an attack.”

“And is there any negatives to separating your soul into multiple bodies?”

“No, none as far as I can see at least. I can control every body that has my soul like I can my own ‘main’ body, and there doesn’t seem to be any sort of delay between my thoughts and the actions my bodies take. The only problem is... well, security, as like I said, I don’t want to make a mistake and lose a part of my soul forever.

The only ‘negative’ part is that my bodies can’t think individually and are connected to me through... means I do not know. I need to control each one individually, which is actually easier than one would think.”

“Then, do you know any creatures that are nearby that you can take control of?”

“Hmm... I know of a really big turtle that is also very strong that seems to have some control over earth, and a really angry bear that is of F rank, so if I can get their bodies, I am confident I’d be able to overpower the goblin’s leaders, and put them behind bars.

But the problem is... they both are stronger than me. If you can somehow help me kill the turtle, then I can take care of the bear myself, but without the turtle I cannot take out the bear, and the turtle is just way, way above my power level.” I told Rifu-san, hoping she’d accept helping me as, while I pitied the reptile that was just in some form of summer hibernation, I also wanted its corpse.

And if I used it to kill the bear, I’d get a shit ton of levels! And be able to overpower anything the goblins may have like what I said before!

I just needed her to help me take out the turtle.

“I have ways of helping you... but you will have to take some risks and won’t be able to get any exp after the battle, is that fine with you William-san?” Rifu-san asked, and I hopped on to the opportunity and told her it was fine the moment she finished talking.

“Fine then, take us to this turtle you are talking about, but I have some things to do so I won’t be here listening to you always, if you need anything, just push some mana into the divine core and either repeat my name or title.” She said and her presence vanished.

Getting down to the ground I realized a goblin was watching me from the trees which was... embarrassing as I hadn’t even realized it.

But it seemed like it wasn’t planning on doing anything so I just... walked off.

Which was, hopefully, not a mistake.