Mysterious Fog World: Eldritch Nexus

“Drake, I have an idea.”

Drake smiled when Aria said the words he wanted to hear.

“Sure, tell me about it. If it's good we can try it”, said Drake encouragingly.

Aria got over some of her fears hearing Drake say that. She told them her strategy to deal with the goblins on the outer periphery.

The more Drake listened, the wider his smile got. Even the twins showed intrigued expressions as if they were seriously considering her advice.

“So, how is it?” asked Aria after she told them her plan.

Drake didn't say anything and went inside the trailer. Aria got desperate seeing that, she thought he didn't like her idea.

However, the reality was far from that. In reality, he loved her idea. But it needed a few things, so he wanted to buy them from his shop. He didn't want to expose the secret of the shop to her till she became his followers, so he went inside the trailer to pretend that items were present in the trailer and he merely brought them out of it.

He purchased two sound recorders, two speakers with a range of a few kilometers, and four walkie-talkies with a fifty-kilometer range. Drake and the twins didn't need them because of the chat system but since Aria was with them too, he bought them for all so that Aria could contact them through it and when they talked together, they could pretend to be talking through the walkie-talkie. Other than that he also purchased many barrels of gasoline.

He brought out the sound recorders, speakers, and walkie-talkies. The sadness on Aria’s face evaporated when she saw him coming towards them with the items. She was confused as to why he bought such items for the adventure but pushed it to the back of her mind because she was very excited that Drake considered her opinion.

He passed both the speakers and the sound recorders to the twins. Then he distributed the walkie-talkies, one each to the group.

The twins understood the reason for him providing those items to them. He was ready to follow through with Aria’s plan.

He gave all of them detailed instructions based on Aria's plan. He asked for Aria's inputs in between who was more than happy to provide them.

After discussing all the details, he looked at each of them, smiled, and said, “Let's rock and roll!”

—------------

Goblin Tribe, Outer Periphery

That day was yet another normal day in the lives of the goblins living in the outer periphery.

Some goblins were sleeping.

Some goblins were talking.

Some goblins were walking.

Some goblins were fighting with each other. One was even fighting the air, maybe he was fighting an invisible opponent.

Some goblins were eating. They were eating an assortment of delicacies ranging from various monsters to bipedal creatures like humans, beastmen, etc. One was happily chewing on a broken thigh, that looked too much like a human thigh.

Some were busy fucking women of different races with blank eyes. They lost the will to live.

Just another peaceful day in the goblin tribe.

But, their peaceful day was ruined by the roars of their leader.

GROWL

GROWL

GROWL

All the goblins showed fear. They stood, picked up whatever weapons they could find, and followed the direction of the growl. The goblin who was chewing the thigh directly took it with him, intending to use it as a club.

They kept on running after the growls as the growls kept getting distant. They ran for a few kilometers but didn't find their leader.

On the way they were joined by many goblins but none stopped to think. They were too idiot to think, hence they just followed the growls.

After more than ten kilometers of running they slowed down as they found that the owner of the growls was near. There were already more than five thousand goblins in the group.

The goblins walked slowly to find their leader. The goblins in front noticed strange greenish-brown smoke. They normally ignored smoke but the strange smoke made them fearful.

They wanted to stop but the growls kept on urging them to continue. Their fear of their leader trumped the fear they felt for the mist.

As the front goblins came in contact with the smoke started choking. Their bodies became purple and within seconds they dropped dead.

The goblins just behind them were scared seeing that and wanted to stop. But the goblins behind them had no idea what was going on. They just wanted to find their leader quickly. They pushed the goblins in front of them.

Those goblins became the next victims of the poisonous smoke and died. Those goblins too stubborn to move were trampled by their brethren and still died.

The idiot goblins kept on going in the smoke and kept dropping like bowling pins. Their bodies were trampled by the goblins behind them.

Whenever the goblins slowed down to check the strange behavior of their comrades in front, the growling increased in volume which put the goblins again in a state of urgency.

Thousands of goblins died like that and only a few hundred remained. Their fear of the poisonous smoke finally surpassed the fear of their leader.

All of the remaining goblins turned around in extreme fear and started running away. But they didn't notice that the heads of their comrades were falling behind them one by one. They were too panicked to notice the sounds of multiple heads falling on the ground.

In minutes, all the goblins died of decapitation. None found out how they died.

A figure materialized near them who turned out to be Ayame. She quickly picked up all the loot dropped by the dead goblins. After picking it all up, she ran towards the location where the majority of the goblins died. There she found Yumi already busy picking up the loot. She joined her to pick up all the items.

A while ago, a few minutes later after the goblins left their huts, two figures went inside. They were Drake and Aria. They went through each of the huts of the goblins, collecting anything of value.

Whenever they got too full, they would offload all the items in the trailer. When there was nothing to loot they drove for a few hundred meters and stopped and then started the process again.

Finally, both groups met with each other after completing their tasks. They took around two hours to massacre more than five thousand goblins and loot their homes.

All the girls were excited to see the progress. Even the normally expressionless twins showed unbelieving and excited expressions.

Seeing the girls' excitement and eager eyes, Drake only said with a smirk, “Let's continue.”

After another two runs, in less than eight hours the group of four had massacred all the goblins in the outer periphery and looted their homes as well.

As they regrouped for lunch, Drake thought back about how a seemingly simple strategy helped them do something next to impossible.

—------------

“Let's rock and roll!”

Drake and his group separated.

Yumi ran towards the center of the group stealthily to track the goblin leader. When she found him she stealthily recorded his growls in the sound recorders.

She ran back to the pre-decided location where the rest of the three were spreading the various poisons they brought with them.

After spreading them, they spread gasoline over them with some dead wood and leaves.

Yumi came and passed one sound recorder to Ayame and then ran back to keep an eye on the goblin leader and alert them if he came too close to them.

The rest put the poison on fire and left the place.

They drove in the truck and left Ayame a little far away from the goblin huts and drove further ahead.

Ayame quietly went near the goblins' hut and played the goblin leader's growl on the speakers. When the goblins started to follow the voice, she sprinted towards the direction of the burning poison.

She kept her speed slow enough that the goblins were able to follow but kept her figure hidden from them to not be found by them

She passed by many settlements and as the goblins there heard her, they would start following her just like the goblins from before.

Drake and Aria used that opportunity to loot the huts of the goblins as they left their huts.

Running for some time, Ayame reached the location where they turned the poisons. There was not much fuel used so the fire didn't last long but was enough to burn all the poisons. A dense wall of smoke was created because of that.

Drake's group had already consumed the antidotes hence they were not affected by the smoke.

Ayame went to the other side of the smoke and waited for the goblins.

When the goblins arrived, they kept on dying. Mostly died from the poisonous smoke, while a few stubborn ones were trampled into meat paste by their brethren.

After only a few minutes, only a few hundred goblins remained too scared to continue and ran away in the end.

Watching the remaining goblins run away, Ayame sent a message to Yumi and ran after them.

{Ayame: I’m done. Come back.}

She ran towards them and kept slicing the necks of the goblins one after the other. Soon, she killed them all and none found out how they died.

After collecting all the dropped items, she returned and found Yumi who had arrived after reading Ayame's message and was collecting the dropped items.

After they collected everything, they regrouped with Drake and Aria who were done with their tasks as well.

After the excitement of the first run, they completed two more runs and killed all the goblins in the outer periphery.

Drake and Aria's tasks remained the same all three times but the twins alternated between their tasks to receive the Eldritch Points alternatively.