Goblin Heavy Dependence

Chapter 257 I think I arrived at the wrong time.

His mental energy, far more resilient and abundant than that of mages of the same level, surged forth from the void like a floodgate opening.

Violet was in a daze, only feeling that her whole body was floating in the water, without feeling any support.

Before them lay an endless darkness dotted with countless glittering lights, while out of the corner of their eye, they could vaguely glimpse the vast outline of the continent of Aifara.

"Astral Plane..."

She murmured to herself.

In her previous life, she was far from being a legend, and was merely an academic mage who spent her time with various experimental equipment. Naturally, she had never come into contact with this mysterious realm that her mentor had mentioned countless times, a vast and boundless place containing countless rare and precious treasures and materials.

Unexpectedly, after being reborn, he did not even embark on the path of the extraordinary. However, according to the plan, he had just reached level three when he was fortunate enough to step into this legendary plane located outside the material world.

Violet was very interested in taking advantage of this moment to exercise her scientific spirit and find some things in the nearby astral plane to study in depth.

Unfortunately, being able to temporarily escape the material world and arrive here is all that her trump card, [Veiroel's Interdimensional Exile Technique], which she retrieved from the river of time, can accomplish right now.

To move freely, she must wait until she has her own mage tower or makes sufficient preparations to fight against the various deadly radiations and dangerous enemies that fill the astral plane.

For now, all we can do is float here and wait quietly.

The spell waited for the special environment of the astral plane, which was loosely connected to various planes, to completely banish the red dragon, and then teleport the caster back to the material world.

Deep within her mind, one of her few remaining trump cards, enough to reverse most of the desperate situations she might encounter, was completely exhausted.

Violet's mental energy was also completely drained.

The last wisp of the dragon's roar, filled with rage, vanished into the boundless darkness.

She felt incredibly dizzy, as if the whole world was spinning around her.

An unprecedented feeling of weakness burst forth from all parts of my body.

Before they could even fully appreciate the wonder of time travel, the solid feeling of the earth beneath their feet, which had been empty before, began to resonate.

"came back."

Violet thought to herself.

Suddenly his legs went weak, and his overexerted body nearly collapsed.

"laugh."

The staff, entirely grayish-white and resembling a clean marble, is deeply embedded in the damp soil at its end, with mud splattered on its body.

His hands trembled as he supported the staff, using this magical artifact—enough to buy an entire street in a remote town—as a walking stick.

Violet barely managed to avoid falling completely and tumbling awkwardly into the mud.

Of course, getting caught in the rain is unavoidable.

Given her current state, she can't worry about anything else.

Having just been teleported back, my clothes and hair were already covered by the torrential rain.

Suppressing the dizziness churning in his head, he forced himself to stay conscious so as not to faint on the spot.

Violet looked ahead.

All that met the eye was emptiness.

The footprints were barely visible on the muddy ground, gradually fading under the wash of rain.

At this moment, even though she had already anticipated it, a hint of disappointment still showed in Violet's amber eyes.

Before casting the spell, she had instructed her teammates not to leave for the time being.

He also explained to them that the spell might take some time, hoping that they would be able to help him after his return.

Right now, there's still a long time before the agreed-upon thirty minutes are up.

The empty venue... already indicated their choice.

Come to think of it, it's true that I only joined the team temporarily and even used some underhanded methods for it, so I don't have any good relationship with my teammates.

To be honest, if it were me, facing a fully grown red dragon whose breath alone could burn a person to ashes, I wouldn't stay in one place any longer for the sake of survival.

After all, if the banishment fails, it will not be the spellcaster who returns to the material world, but the red dragon... Staying in place means waiting to die.

From a rational survival instinct perspective, leaving is the most sensible choice.

Violet comforted herself in this way.

My brain felt increasingly dizzy, as if I was about to faint and collapse at any moment.

And that's when.

A pungent, bloody odor suddenly rushed into my nasal cavity along with the moist air washed away by the rain.

This startled her, and her previously listless spirits lifted slightly.

He turned his head and instinctively looked in the direction from which the smell of blood was coming from behind him.

What came into view was a familiar figure lying motionless on the ground, the blood flowing from the wound soaking the mud below.

"Sawa!?"

Violet exclaimed in surprise.

He stumbled forward.

Even without careful examination, the gruesome wound that pierced through his neck from behind, revealing the grass below, already identified him as a "corpse."

They hadn't even had time to find out the truth behind the encounter that had caused his strength to soar.

The girl's primary goal in joining the team was to become a "big shot" who would stir up trouble throughout the entire Panyun Province, and one of the most heinous traitors on the alliance front...

Just die?
For a moment, the powerful impact left Violet somewhat at a loss.

Her first reaction was not to think about what the escort team had encountered after she left, nor to look for other surviving teammates or to be on alert for possible enemies.

Instead, he focused his last bit of attention on connecting with the invisible tributary of the river of time deep in the void, and began to check the deviation rate of the current world line development.

In order to prevent the continent of Aifara from falling into the endless natural disasters of the fusion of different dimensions as it did in her previous life, "world line offset rate" is her most important and only goal after her rebirth.

Sava, the Dragonborn, is the first target to be eliminated in Violet's plan that could cause a shift in the world line.

As she expected, Sava's death, as the sinner who suddenly betrayed her in her previous life and caused the entire resistance front to collapse, should bring at least a 0.05% deviation rate.

Although I'm not personally taking action now, since the other party died prematurely, the timeline should be altered accordingly.

“I can accept 0.03% or even 0.02%, not just 0.05%.”

As she prayed in her heart, her thoughts reaching the river of time, Violet suddenly froze on the spot.

"How...how is it possible?"

"A 0.3% offset rate!?"

That's almost six times what she expected!
"why?"

"Where did that extra 0.25% come from?"

Along with the first surprise after being reborn came an unprecedented and immense question.

0.3% may seem small, less than half of one percent, but if you know that this percentage is based on an entire timeline and the entire future continent of Efala.

Then one can realize the enormous changes it represents.

Even in Violet's plan, she would wait until she reached at least level 7 in the future and was able to use the middle-ring spells she had memorized in the spellbook on a daily basis before she would begin to work on the operation of setting the offset rate to one decimal place.

But now, what was clearly just her initial plan to test the waters after her rebirth has inexplicably brought such great benefits...

After the initial surprise, the situation spiraled far out of control, stemming from an unknown source of shock.

Her cheeks were incredibly pale from the exhaustion of her mental energy. She leaned on her staff with both hands, her chestnut ponytail swaying in the air with her head.

Violet desperately wanted to find the source of this change in the timeline.

Immediately, a long wolf howl coming from behind a small hill not far to her side caught her attention.

Clenching her teeth, she slowly and carefully moved her body toward the direction from which the sound came.

At the same time, he casually took out a small bottle of blue medicine from his waist bag and tilted his head back to gulp it down.

Even though his head was throbbing with pain as if a thousand needles were pricking it, he still forced his mental energy to touch the crystal at the tip of the staff in his hand. While completing the protection, he also prepared to reveal another trump card.

Step by step. The beige robe, soaked by the rain, hung limply, and the small leather boots, stained with mud, left faint footprints on the ground.

The rain seemed to be getting heavier and heavier.

The chaotic roar of raindrops hitting the ground seemed to be the only sound in the world at that moment.

The path around the hill isn't actually very long; even children from the fields could easily run and play along it.

But from Violet's subjective perspective, this was the longest stretch of road she had ever traveled in her life.

Sometime later, the strange wolf howl had disappeared.

Instead, there was an increasingly strong and pungent smell of blood.

She was eager to see what was happening behind the hill, but deep down, while she felt a sense of anticipation, she also felt an indescribable resistance.

It's like that experimental result in the lab, which was barely completed after months of countless adjustments.

The expectation of success and the fear of failure linger in my heart at this moment.

Finally, Violet rounded the hill.

The first thing you see is a stiff corpse lying motionless on the ground.

The head was gone, and only the blood gushing from the severed neck was scorching hot in the rain.

Judging from their clothes and appearance, they shouldn't be members of their team.

Then, two arms, one on the left and one on the right, which seemed to have appeared out of nowhere, lay quietly on the meadow stained with blood.

It's like a doll that's been taken apart by a naughty child.

And finally, in the very center of the arena, stood a gigantic, ferocious black wolf, seemingly born from the abyss of hell, born of shadow and darkness.

Rumbling--

Thunder rumbled across the sky, and dark gray clouds churned, brewing an aura of death.

A fine curtain of rain enveloped every inch of sight.

Seemingly sensing the gaze from behind, the black wolf, with its jaws clenched and closed, put down the headless corpse in front of it and slowly turned around.

The wolf's howl echoed quietly in his mind, and his cold, sharp black eyes, still brimming with residual violent killing intent, met Violet's amber eyes.

The girl's body stiffened instantly, feeling a chill rush from her tailbone straight to the top of her head, making her body taut and rigid.

My vision suddenly blurred for a moment.

The next second, the giant black wolf was washed away by the rain.

His tall, imposing figure, wielding an iron-gray longsword, appeared even more sharp and cold.

The dark eyes that met his gaze were subtly magnified, as if swallowing his last remaining consciousness into a black hole.

In an instant, the nightmares that had plagued her for countless nights—the omen of death, the blood-soaked ground of entrails and severed limbs, the towering skulls—all came back to haunt her.

The shadows deeply etched in my heart from my past life, accompanied by indescribable boundless fear, burst forth from my soul.

Gollum-

A sticky, damp feeling, still warm from the previous day, landed on my face. It was as if something had suddenly fallen from the sky and rolled all the way to my feet.

Violet subconsciously looked down.

Face up.

His lifeless eyes, filled with fear, met the girl's gaze.

She stood there, stunned.

Lying quietly at my feet was Terry William's head, covered in mud and blood.

boom--

A blazing bolt of lightning struck down from the clouds, accompanied by a deafening roar that shook the heavens and the earth.

Having already reached his limit after casting the spell, his severely depleted mental and physical strength finally gave way under the terrifying impact of the scene before him.

The head of a dead body that rolled to the ground became the last straw that broke the camel's back.

Violet's frail body, leaning on her staff, suddenly twitched twice, then her eyes rolled back, revealing the whites of her eyes.

He fell to the ground with a "thud".

He completely fainted.

hold head high--

The howl of wolves rang out once again.

With a cold and aloof demeanor, the figure transcended spatial barriers and arrived in an instant thanks to combat skills.

Xia Nan took two quick steps, bent down, and placed his finger on the girl's upper lip.

I breathed a sigh of relief when I felt the breath on my fingertips.

He got up and scratched his head.

"When did they get back? There wasn't a sound at all."

I thought another enemy was coming to ambush me, but it turned out to be a teammate who had finished casting a spell.

At the same time, he wondered if Violet had fainted as soon as she saw him because she had exhausted too much energy from casting the spell.

However, since she has returned alive, according to the other party, the red dragon should have been banished to another plane.

This relieved Xia Nan.

Recalling Violet's earlier instructions, he bent down, took out a bottle of light blue potion marked "VI" from the mage girl's pouch, and forced her to drink it while holding her head.

"That should be enough."

Xia Nan pondered to himself.

He then left Violet lying in the mud and turned to head towards the half-elf.

He certainly prioritizes things.

The red dragon has been banished, and both of his enemies have been beheaded by him, who mistook them for goblins.

There is no longer any danger on the field.

Feeding Violet the medicine she had specifically instructed him to drink was the most he could do after confirming that she was still alive.

Haian and Wood seem to be seriously injured over there; he needs to hurry over and see if there's any chance of saving them.

"Save the young master first!"

They had only gotten halfway there when Wood's hoarse roar came from the open space to the side.

As if he had just woken up, this usually resolute and composed middle-aged man was now lying weakly on the ground, his left arm empty, with a pair of daggers scattered around him.

Upon seeing Xia Nan, he ignored the gushing blood from his severed arm and endured the excruciating pain that would trigger the body's protective mechanisms. With his still intact right arm, he reached into his waist pouch and tossed over a bottle of treatment potion with significantly more refined packaging.

He reached out his left hand and caught it from a distance.

Xia Nan didn't stop walking, and in the blink of an eye, she arrived beside Hai An.

Without any unnecessary movements, he poured the entire bottle of potion directly into the half-elf's mouth.

Plop—

Pus and blood mixed with silvery-white venom gushed from his wound.

The rapid breathing gradually weakened and then calmed down.

Although he did not fully recover, he has clearly survived.

Xia Nan stood up and gave a thumbs-up to Wood, who was pale-faced and anxiously watching him, indicating that there was nothing seriously wrong.

Then he quickly walked over and helped bandage the other person's wound.

With that, the battle was completely over, and the wounded had all received treatment.

Xia Nan only hoped that the spoils from cleaning up the battlefield later would be enough to offset the losses of their escort team on this trip.

(End of this chapter)