Tailed Warrior of The Unknown Race

Chapter 5

One of the last things I probably would've expected myself to stumble into—now that I've established that I'm in an isekai world—is to be in the heart of a goblin nest.

Now, maybe much later on something like this would've happened during some random adventure quest, but none of the prerequisites have yet to happen. For example, I haven't stumbled into a medieval city, where I meet the clerk of an adventure guild with two massive personalities and start off as an E-rank adventurer. I didn't go to the weapon shop and meet the bald muscular guy that gives me a good deal off for my weapons cause I looked like a 'good lad'. Nor did I stumble across a mysterious noble girl with even bigger personalities, who was running away from some random street goons. Hell, above all things, I've yet to even gain my special overpowered abilities that would make me so strong that my own series wouldn't see past season two because of how generic and slow-paced the plot would become.

No, instead, I find myself sitting on this thin bed of straw over a literal slab of stone, my whole body numb and sweating profusely beyond what I've ever been through before in my life.

Why so? Well, it's all due to hours worth of unadulterated manual labor at the coal veins.

Yes, that is correct, I am now a coal miner.

' … agh, fuck me…' I groaned internally, putting a soot-covered arm over my equally stained face. This… this was fucking miserable. Sure, I should really not be complaining when all of this was far much better than what I was trapped with in the beginning, but I wasn't used to this sort of work. Waking up before the sun rises—which is strange, cause we were fucking underground—, eating a cold breakfast of mushy and brown mushrooms, and then picking up my pickaxe and going straight to work. Nothing more, nothing less. And our lunch break doesn't even count as a break since we still work as we eat the mushrooms being passed around.

This… this is what my life has become. Yet again, I've found a sudden and large shift of pace within my day to day activities… I guess it's more productive than what I was doing in the wild.

But why, some would ask, am I a coal miner in the middle of a goblin nest? Shouldn't I be like, I dunno, pillaging some random countryside village? Attacking a traveling caravan? Well, normally yes, I probably should be joining in on that. But given that I was in the middle of an impressively advanced goblin society, and more so because I was also thirty levels underground, I got placed into the resource department.

With another groan, I roll over to my side, glancing towards the corner of my room. Just like it was ordered, I was moved into layer thirty. Apparently, there was a passage leading to a second ravine that had the same layout as the first but just went much deeper. It only further showed me how large this place was. Forget a city, this was a whole country inside these mountains. My room was pretty big for one small guy like me. In fact, from the other rooms I've seen, it's almost as large as the elite rooms around here. That technically would mean that this was the first time my protagonist's benefits have come into play for me…

… pshhh, nah. As if I had any in the first place. But at least this sort of confirmed my fleeting thoughts that these goblins had a social classing.

While the room was big and all, with a literal horse walking about, it made it feel cramped. I mean, Mustang is fine and all—he's been doing pretty good since we were taken into this nest, in fact—but it gets sort of tiresome after a while. I'm still skeptical of whether having a horse down inside a cave is a good idea in the first place. Heck, I'm still a bit skeptical if I should even bring him along. But, again, he seems to be relatively fine, so I don't think there's much to be worrying about there. They feed him a lot anyway.

The telltale signs of fairy twinkles brought my attention up to Bluey, who was hovering with a brown clay cup next to me. With a grateful smile, I silently took the offer of water and sat up to drink the content. Bluey was just another thing altogether. I'm not even sure what her intentions are, but she stayed ever since we came in here. Just like Mustang, chilling around and helping every once in a while with the bare minimums. But I can't even argue against the fact that she really was out of place. In fact, I support it. Even before all of this goblin/ogre stuff happened, I always had the questions in the back of my head on what a fairy with a winter outfit was doing in the heart of a humid rainforest. She seemed like more of an ice-type than a rainforest-type.

Nonetheless, having these two around has honestly helped me. Am I calling them my emotional support? Perhaps… I've been in two near-death situations already, one of which was a much longer duration of time than the other…so, yeah. I doubt I would've had the resilience to keep doing this coal mining shit for the past week and a half now all by myself.

Yes, that's right. One week has gone like that. Time flies fast as fuck, especially under such monotonous and extreme conditions. It was obvious from the start that I wasn't going to come under their wing without compensation, and so I've spent this time just contributing as much as the other average goblins. And, of course, it was all unpaid labor; my only real reward was food and the clothes on my back… erm, loins I mean. I was only given a loincloth, but that's besides the point. Me working in the mines was also part of my training, which—after reluctantly agreeing to Erk's request due to hours of persistent nagging—hasn't really started due to my current physique. As Erk had said in his overly simplistic way of speaking, 'work in mines gives muscle for real training'.

And so, not only was this all a sort of liability, it was also a requirement for this unskippable training of mine. Yeah, so fun… wish my OP powers would kick in any moment now…

Suddenly, amidst my silent lamentations, a large shadow obscured the entrance of my room, making everything turn dark. Without the luxury of a door, I normally get these sorts of situations frequently.

Erk's head popped in, his grin looking uncanny under the low and deep shadows. " Brother Sean, hurry! Time to train!"

" …Ugh, I'm coming…" I groaned, snapping out of my fatigue, guzzling down the rest of the water, and handing the cup to Bluey, who soundlessly took it. Yet another thing about my miserable situation is that I have rudimentary training right after a long day of mining… which goes all the way until midnight, too. That normally leaves me with a few hours of rest… arguably the worst part of all of this, in my opinion.

Oh, how I wish for my eight hours of rest… at least this guy remembered my name…

… yeah, this shit is miserable… but liveable.

"... and so, that is what has been happening thus far."

" I see…" I hummed and nodded slowly after Father Rod's speech. We were in his throne room, with him sitting on his throne and me at the base of the dais cross-legged. "... So basically humans and elves have been and still are at war for over two hundred years."

" Indeed," Father Rod nodded sagely, rubbing his wrinkly chin, " such commotion is what we goblin folk avoid. I advise you, son, that you too avoid such battles in the future."

" Yeah no, I don't plan on joining in any time soon," I waved my hand dismissively while leaning back with a sigh.

As one could deduce, Father Rod was currently lecturing me on the lore of this world. It was due to a request I made a while back, which really I had thought would be turned down by him but was surprisingly accepted. Today was the first day of these lectures I was getting, but I was already beginning to get a large picture of where the hell I was.

To cut it short, this world had about everything you'd expect in an isekai situation. Dragons, slimes, elves… you name it. And speaking of elves, humanity was of course fighting against them because of some political conflict. I gloss over that since it's a trope that has been overused a lot, so nothing really shocking about it.

As for geography, the continent I'm on is named Flowdern, and it currently has two major nations; Skylark and Larion, the former being elf and latter being human. Skylark was far east while Larion was far south. Technically there was a third nation in the west, but it was really just a province of Larion called Aeirith. From what Father Rod said, they just do a bunch of fishing there, while Skylark and Larion have a bunch of orchards and farms respectively.

Now currently the goblin nest I was in is up north, far from either Larion or Skylark. It would explain the evergreen forest surrounding the mountains… but it wouldn't explain the rainforest that I was in not far off from here. A northern climate shouldn't even work out for a rainforest biome, but I guess I should know by now that I can't really set my world's standards with this one. That aside, this also explains something about that outpost I was trapped in… as much as I'd rather not remember anything about it. Since the outpost was supposedly far away from the southern human nation, it must've been the checkpoint of an exploratory mission, or like a frontier of some kind. Why, then, would they need slaves? Probably to help with carrying heavy loads and whatnot, but seeing that none of that happened I doubt that was their main reason. Nonetheless, none of that changes or justifies the horrendous inhumane crimes committed in that hellhole… and I'm glad I'm out of there.

" Is there anything else you'd like to know, son?" Father Rod asked. I noticed we sort of went silent for a moment.

" … uh, hold on…" I thought for a moment of what else I wanted to know. I already covered the basic info on the nations and whatnot, which really wasn't super necessary for me to know right now but was still some good context. My next best question, then, would be the power scaling in this world. "... ok, so how do you guys do things around here? Magic? Soul stuff?"

" Magic…" Father Rod hummed thoughtfully before shaking his head, " we goblin folk cannot use magic… that is a discipline best suited for humans. However, we do in fact have this 'soul stuff' as you said. We refer to it as soul puppetry."

Soul puppetry? So like some sort of voodoo magic? Well, no, he just said goblins don't use magic… and that it's only restricted to humans. I honestly doubt that last part, but seeing that I'm a stranger to this world, I can't really counterargue anything without seeing things firsthand.

In any case, this would mean that I won't be able to learn magic anytime soon… of course, that being under the pretext that I can even use magic in the first place…

…

… hold up, do I even have a mana pool or whatever? Surely I do, right?

…

Maybe I could try…

With that thought in my mind, I closed my eyes and silently tried to feel myself from within. Sure, it was goofy and irrational to try and feel something intangible, but irrationality and embarrassment was long thrown out the window. If I could really use magic, then I probably have mana or another spiritual source of energy, and the most basic way to figure that out would be to try to feel it from within. There's nothing to lose from trying, so even if I didn't feel anything then at least—

Disrupting my monologue, my mind was distracted as I suddenly felt a small and strange warm feeling growing within the center of my chest.

'... huh?'

Utterly perplexed, yet not wanting to let it go, I ignored everything else as I hyper-focused onto that one warm spot on my chest. The sensation was… strange. Yes, it was warm, but it lacked warmth all together. It was as if it was just the concept of warmth itself alone… but I did not contemplate it any further as I continued to focus on it. It began to expand, and the more it did the more my eyes widened in shock.

Could this really be—

DWHOOOSH

Like a flashbang, my body was suddenly enveloped with a brilliant white light, greatly overshadowing the orange hue from the torches within the throne room. Following closely to this spontaneous explosion of light, I felt a huge amount of drainage within me—like water in a water balloon draining from multiple small holes. Despite the fact that I hadn't even processed what the hell had just happened, I began to panic from this draining feeling; it felt as if my very life was slipping away from me. Perhaps it's because of this panic that the white light dialed down in intensity, transforming into a dim and grayish hue surrounding my body.

As everything calmed, I sat there frozen still, now with a light-gray jagged-shaped aura enveloping my entire body. The air around me picked up from this aura, causing dust to pick up and the curtains to lightly flap.

"... interesting," Father Rod simply hummed in response, staring at me with a neutral yet seemingly intrigued expression.

For my part, I was beyond speechless. I didn't even know where to start thinking. The warmth, the explosion of light, the drainage of energy, the increase of energy… there was too much to process. And yet amidst all of my questions, one thing that I couldn't help was the absolute shit-eating grin on my face.

'... holy shit…' I stared down at my open palms. The more I focused, the more I could see the aura emitting from my pores, like water vapor from a cold drink. My muscles, my bones… everything. I felt more than I ever had felt before. Even if I was feeling my energy leaving, I also felt like I was stronger. It... it was…

… man… my op powers have finally kicked in…

" Son, is this your doing?" Father Rod asked aloud, reminding me of my current situation.

" Huh? O-Oh, uh… yeah," I nodded sheepishly, removing my ogling gaze from my body, " I… I think I just unlocked my… magic… powers…"

" Hmm… given you are no common goblin, I suppose you do have magic."

"... I'm not a—"

" However, I've never seen a magic like this," Father Rod frowned slightly, leaning forward and opening his eyes wide to fully see me, " within my life of one-hundred-seventeen years, I've come across and faced many magicians and sorcerers, yet none have shown what you've done now."

Momentarily distracted from learning of this old goblin's age, I lightly shook my head and flexed my hands. " …So… you're saying that this isn't magic?"

" No, son, I simply mean to say that I've never seen this before. It could very well be a new branch of magic."

New magic… hehe, hell yeah. That's what I'm talking about. That's op protagonist powers for you.

But… that just begs the question of how I should use it now. Should I even be using it? I wasn't even prepared to get a sudden power boost… I'm not complaining, though. I think the best thing I can do now is to just take time to study this new power. If what Father Rod said is true, then the only person who can really help me out is myself.

' Great, so I got my special powers. Hell yeah. But it's also draining me a lot, I can feel that much. So that means I gotta suppress it more, and then—'

" Brother Sean!" With a booming and solid voice, Erk bursted into the throne room. In his wide stride, one of his arms accidentally smacked one of the goblin guards, sending them flying to Narnia. Unaware of this, Erk was about to talk but paused when he saw me. He blinked before snorting. " … brother Sean is white now?"

Deadpanning at the ogre's entrance, I huffed in exasperation. " No, man, this is just my power being unlocked."

" Power? Brother Sean strong now?"

"... I guess? Haven't really done anything yet."

" Good!" Erk beamed, suddenly closing in the distance. To my dismay, he lifted me up from my tail, which inadvertently caused my aura to dispatch completely. " Then we go train now! Stronger and faster, too!"

I hissed loudly, kicking my legs and arms out uselessly as my tail exploded with pain. " Owowowowow—shit! Stop dr—ow—dragging me by the tail, dumbass!"

Erk merely bursted out in oblivious laughter. " Haha, I not drag you, Brother Sean! I lift you!"

… this guy pisses me off.

If I were to tell someone that I've been living in a goblin nest for a month now, they'd think I'd be crazy. But sure enough, it happened.

For one month I've been in this goblin nest. Yes, I counted the days this time; I'm not exaggerating. Has it been a good time? Take a wild guess. Does that mean I've been trapped underground for a month now? Hell no. Even the goblins don't do that… erm, unless you're the nobility, or whatever. While it was more so part of my training—specifically my training on hunting for food—I followed Erk frequently to the surface, so I got my fair share of fresh air. I, of course, always brought my two companions—Bluey and Mustang—with me. Even if they really didn't do much, I couldn't just let them rot down in the caves forever. It also served as a way for Mustang to get some fresh air, too… cause, guess what? The damn horse has asthma. Yep, asthma in its true form. Nerfed the one strong attribute of his species… sort of have to pity the guy.

But that's besides the point. The point I'm getting at here is that I've lived with goblins for a month now, and life with them was as monotonous as one could imagine. My 'superb efforts' in mining coal had been recognized and I got a promotion, but that wasn't really something to be proud about (I didn't complain when they gave me my own private bathroom because of it, though). Probably the most interesting thing to happen after that were the times I wandered around the different levels of the nest. Most of the place was just the empty barracks for the goblins, but there were a few sections that were kind of interesting. For example, these goblins had a sort of bartering system amongst themselves, and so there was this small strip of stalls on layer fifteen where they sold all sorts of rocks and leaves…

… yeah, I wasn't impressed either, but it was a nice change of pace from the emptiness.

I did find the time to mess around with my new powers, but they came out with some mundane results, unfortunately. I managed to get control of how to turn my powers on and off and also how much to output, but I couldn't really do much like make a fire spell or something. Just never worked out. But even if I couldn't really do magical spells, learning how to control my powers has really helped me. I was becoming less tired after a day's worth of coal mining since I could put in more effort, and I could actually see some muscle growth in my arms and upper chest because of it. Erk had also noticed this too after he commented to me during one of the hunting sessions, and so just recently he decided that I could move on from the mines and into the main training that he had been holding off. Gladly, I accepted.

That, of course, led to my current situation, where I was within the steep tunnel of an abandoned railway, far away from the activity of the goblin nest. Erk had gone off to get something, so I was simply sitting against the rough rocky wall and counting the dust particles in the air.

After some time, I could hear the sound of carts approaching. I look down at the end of the tunnel to see Erk coming from the corner, pushing minecarts in front of him.

' I wonder what those are for,' I stood up, patting down my brown loincloth for no particular reason. When Erk came into full view, I could see a total of three carts, all of which were filled to the brim with freshly mined coal.

" Brother Sean, are you ready?" Erk's loud voice asked. I noticed on his shoulder was a bundle of brown rope.

" Ready for what…?" I responded cautiously.

Erk walked over to the front of the carts and began tying one end of the rope onto the coupler. " Brother Sean will take carts to top. Deliver to short men, then continue training from there."

I blinked at Erk's explanation. Take these carts to the top. And deliver to short men? That… the only description that matches with that are dwarves. And… I guess that sort of makes sense, given the mountainous terrain this goblin nest was in. Does that mean that the goblins have some sort of trade network with dwarves? That's… pretty diplomatic for these green guys.

I brought my attention to the other side of the railway and… frowned. " You want me to take these carts up this slope?"

" Yes, that is your training," Erk nodded curtly, finishing up tying the role. He then approached me and—without warning—forcefully pulled me close.

" Hey, what the fu—" I couldn't get anything more out of me before I suddenly felt scratchy rope tied around my body. Within seconds, I found myself tied up by the torso—arms and everything restricted. Frantically, I looked back at Erk in alarm, who was smiling at me with contentment. " The hell?! What's this for?!"

" No running for brother Sean," Erk said almost amusedly, turning around and beginning to walk back towards the nest, " I come tomorrow for food and water. Try your best!"

" H-Hey, wait!" I called out, but he kept walking away, disappearing behind the corner. Distressed, I tried shaking off the ropes, but they were extremely tight. The tight confinement… it felt awfully familiar. It was familiar because it was exactly what I went through over two months ago. My breath gradually became rapid and uneven. I was beginning to panic quickly.

'... shit, no, calm down…' I tried to coerce myself, but it didn't work. I was having the fight or flight feelings and it wasn't helping whatsoever. Even… even with all the time that has passed, I still haven't come to terms with the hell I've been through. It's still fresh in my life, and… and it's beginning to show now.

I bit my lip with furrowed brows, shaking my head violently in an attempt to get the resurfacing memories out of my head. It was a poor attempt, but it calmed me just slightly enough from going outright crazy. I needed to keep a level head. Sure, Erk just fucking tied me up and left me in a damn empty cave. Yeah, pretty shitty of him to do. But it's for my training, right? I can't just get angry so easily, right? It's for training…

…training I didn't even want in the first place.

" Agh, fuck you Erk!" I swore loudly, kicking my feet out in uncontrolled rage. Woefully, I was unaware of how close I was to the coal carts, and so my bare foot was greeted with the sharp pains of stubbed toes. Yelping loudly, I stumbled unceremoniously onto my butt, curling up as my foot flared in pain. As much as it sucked, my stupidity had managed to distract me from my panicking state.

For a moment, as the pain slowly but agonizingly receded, I closed my eyes shut in shame. I felt embarrassed… embarrassment which I had thought I had left behind a while back. Not once since being freed from that captivity have I even panicked like this before. It… it's justifiable, but I don't want to go down this sort of route. I've been trying to live as calmly as I can, in fact—even trying to find the good out of my situation. I can't… I just can't let something like this make me completely break.

No… I want to keep strong. I want the strength to carry my burdens and still enjoy this new life.

'... ok… ok. I'm good now… phew… glad no one saw that,' with a somewhat clearer head, I awkwardly stood back up and stared up towards the steep railway in front of me. Even though I don't claim to be some math guru, I could roughly estimate that this was a forty-five degree slope. And Erk wants me to… apparently pull these carts up this slope… with nothing but my own back muscles…

…

… you know what, I've come this far. I might as well give it a shot.

The winds of the northern mountains were strong, powerful, and unrivaled. No person who dared trek the white slopes of this jagged terrain was safe from the monstrous strong gusts, which could toss even the largest of boulders.

Despite this, within the corners of these towering pillars of mountains was a large caravan of soldiers, cladded in iron armor and adorning red clothes. Finding shelter within the crevices of the rocks, numerous mysteriously blue campfires burned brightly and without smoke, serving as the warmth to the harshness of the terrain.

" Sir Silver!" One of the many soldiers approached a man at the edge of the campsite, who was staring down the edge of the cliff. " Here are the new reports on the assault on Ivory Outlook."

Not moving his gaze, Sir Silver extended his armored hand out, to which the unnamed soldier gave a letter rolled up in red ribbon. The man unwrapped the scroll, briefly skimming the contents before scoffing with a frown.

" Tch, incompetent fools cannot even handle a bundle of damaged goods," Sir Silver scoffed, carelessly tossing the letter back towards the soldier, " that pile of rubble is no longer of concern to us. It's obvious they've fabricated a lie to cover their failure to ward off a nightly assault."

" But sir, there is great evidence that a large creature had attacked the outpost," the soldier explained, albeit with a hint of fear, " t-there was a trail of massive footprints that led—"

" As I said, it is no longer our concern," Sir Silver repeated firmly, giving a side-glare towards the soldier, " our focus now is the oral deposit, and Baron White should know that."

Slightly deterred from the glare, the soldier nodded without the slightest of resistance. " What are your orders then, sir?"

" Prepare the wyvern pellets," Sir Silver declared, turning around and walking back towards the camp, " we will commence the attack once the last of their envoys departs."

" Yes, sir!"

" …. Mmnh…"

With a tired groan, I blinked and my eyes opened. My vision was met with rock and metal railing. Slowly, I lifted myself up, but realized that my hands were restricted, and most of my body was numbed from sleep. This realization brought memories back into my head, causing my body to jolt and rapidly jump up to my sleepy feet. Such quick action caused me to wobble on the spot as I looked around at my surroundings, finding myself in the same spot I was in for the past few hours.

My shoulders slacked as I let out a defeated sigh. " Damn… zero progress, huh?"

I looked over towards the carts, seeing that they were seemingly unchanged. Yeah, this was definitely crazy. There's no logical way I could pull these things, much less up a slope. I must've passed out from overexerting myself…

It just goes to show that, while I had protagonist powers, I was far from being strong. It's best I stick to dumbbells if I want to get stronger, but I doubt Erk would agree to that. That jackass seemed pretty adamant that I do this… like geez, might as well toss a newborn into a mma fight while we're at it.

'Maybe I could just remove some of these carts and…'

I frowned and shook my head. No, I won't do that, no matter if it made things easier for me. This was supposed to be my training, right? Sure, I never asked for it, but this definitely has to be some help to me. Especially now that I'm in an isekai world… where the best bet of survival is through my own two hands. That is, unless they have guns around here… which I highly doubt.

Besides, it's not like I can even remove these carts in the first place. The rope restricted how far I could walk, which was about three-fourths from the end of the first cart (yeah, these were pretty elongated carts).

While contemplating this, my stomach growled loudly. Unfortunately, I didn't have a big feast before this all started, so I was running on an empty fuel tank at the moment. Erk did promise to come back with food, but that hasn't happened yet, meaning that 'tomorrow' hasn't arrived yet…

"... well, no point sulking," taking in a deep breath, I warmed my legs by running in place before jerking forward into a hard pull. My leg muscles tensed, my back flaring out. Yet despite my best efforts, the carts didn't even move an inch. I wouldn't be surprised if they instead moved backwards.

And there's chapter 5!

I'm aware this may have been a bit fast-paced, but I doubt anyone would want to drag this out more than it needed to be. And if there is someone interested in what Sean had done within his time in the goblin nest, then... I can just make a special chapter or short story series. Of course, that's something that'll only happen when this story is deep in enough for me to consider that.

I'll take this moment to respond to the reviews;

-start-

Cyberpolaris: Thanks for the review! Glad to know I've met your tastes!

francesco99: Hate to break it to you my friend, but I'm gonna be adding the 'magic battle academy' trope somewhere in this series. And as for the 'horn dog' thing you're talking about... well, there's a reason this story has a rated M version in my profile lol. Though, don't worry, Sean isn't going down that rabbit hole anytime soon. For now, yes, he's in a survivalist mentality, but that should be changing a bit in the coming chapters.

And no worries on the Dragon Quest/Chrono Trigger suggestion. I'm glad you mentioned it so I will for sure take a look into it, even if I don't take any ideas from it

-end-

As a final note on this AN, I will just give a very basic layout of the world building so far, just to make it easier for myself and the reader(s);

Flowdern - Name of the continent

Larion - Human nation (south)

Aeirith - Province of Larion (west)

Skylark - Elf nation (east)

Goblins - live in the north

That will be all for now. Thank you for reading and have a good day/night!