[At the Entrance to the Goblin Underground Labyrinth]
A Spatial Gate the size of a fist suddenly appeared. The gate rapidly expanded, and then two men and two women stepped out of it.
All four wore self-heating fur coats, but their footwear was a mixed bag. Some wore Adidas, some wore Nike, and one woman was even wearing high-heeled knee-high boots.
As soon as the crew-cut man leading the group entered the cave, he frowned and said, "Do you guys smell that? This cave is full of the smell of blood."
"I smell it too!", The woman in the knee-high boots pointed her longsword at the two goblin corpses lying near the cave entrance and said, "There! Someone killed them!"
"No way!", The crew-cut man looked shocked, "We just saw on the treasure chest distribution map that this cave had refreshed. How could someone get here before us?"
"Let me check the bodies first!"
The woman in the knee-high boots carried a somewhat aloof air about her.
Her heels clicked against the ground as she walked over to the goblin corpses. She crouched down and used her slender fingers to move aside part of a goblin's armor. After examining it, she said, "One is a Red-Cap Goblin and the other is a Green-Cap Goblin. Both were killed by Fireball, so the one who killed them must be human."
"Harriet, you're making that up, aren't you?", The crew-cut man looked at her skeptically, "These goblins aren't even wearing hats now. How can you tell what color they were?"
"Kaleb, weren't you listening when Archmage Gonnegal was teaching us last time?", Harriet narrowed her eyes at him, "Archmage Gonnegal said that when goblins are born, you can tell their talent type by the color of their pupils."
"As for the color of the hats they wear, that's just to make it easier to tell their status apart. Green-Cap Goblins are the lowest-ranked goblins, basically the commoners of the entire race. All the hardest work is done by them."
"So the goblins you usually see mining are generally Green-Cap Goblins."
"As for Red-Cap Goblins, their genes are only slightly better than those of Green-Cap Goblins, so they usually serve as supervisors and team leaders over the Green-Caps."
"But among goblins as a whole, Red-Caps still have very low status."
"Above them are Yellow-Cap Goblins, Orange-Cap Goblins, Blue-Cap Goblins, Purple-Cap Goblins, Black-Cap Goblins, and so on..."
"Blue-Cap Goblins can be considered the peak of goblin physical strength. They have extremely strong defense and attack power, roughly equal to a Level 5 human warrior in combat ability, but their defense is even stronger than a Level 5 warrior's."
"As for Purple-Caps and Black-Caps, they're special goblins."
"These two types can't appear through inheritance. They only emerge through mutation. However, the better a goblin's physical condition is, the greater its chance of mutating into a Purple-Cap or Black-Cap Goblin."
As Harriet spoke, her heels clicked across the floor as she walked toward several other goblin corpses lying nearby.
This time, however, she did not lift their armor. Instead, she lightly moved their chins with her fingers and examined them.
The flat-headed Kaleb asked from the side, "Then what's special about Purple-Caps and Black-Caps? Why are they at the top of goblin society?"
"Purple-Caps awaken magical abilities, though goblin magic is fairly limited and is usually earth magic," Harriet continued explaining, "It's said that this underground labyrinth was remodeled by a Purple-Cap Goblin using earth magic back then. That should give you an idea of how powerful Purple-Cap Goblins are."
"As for Black-Cap Goblins, they possess leadership abilities."
"They are natural kings in the goblin world. Their numbers are extremely small, but every one of them has terrifying combat strength and command ability."
"As for their exact abilities, I don't know much myself."
"Hmm... These goblins weren't killed by humans. It looks more like they were killed by some creature's claws. Nearly every strike was fatal. It seems like it might be a human's pet."
As she spoke, Harriet used a torch to illuminate the ground.
Kaleb laughed, "You can even tell it's a human's pet? Harriet, what are you, a prophet?"
"Found it!", Harriet suddenly pointed at a cat paw print on the ground and smiled, "The thing that killed these goblins was a cat!"
"Damn it!", Kaleb cursed, "Someone really beat us to it!"
"Sister Harriet, Brother Kaleb, this is bad!"
A skinny young man quickly shouted in alarm, "The platinum treasure chest marked on the map is flashing! It looks like it's about to disappear."
"What?"
"What?"
Harriet and Kaleb cried out at the same time.
The reason they had begged Archmage Gonnegal to open a Spatial Gate and then risked coming to this awful place was simple. Since they couldn't explore surrounding territories during the day, they had turned to sweeping through the underground world instead.
After finally locating a rare platinum treasure chest using a map capable of predicting treasure chest locations, they rushed here as fast as they could, only to discover that someone was about to take the platinum treasure chest before them?
How could they accept that.
"Quick!"
Harriet shouted, "Come with me right now! If someone really dares steal our treasure chest, then we'll take it back."
"Hmph! They even dare touch the property of the number one lord in District B!", Kaleb cursed as he followed behind, "I think this group is tired of living! Do you think they'll immediately drop to their knees once they find out our lord is Flame Dragon?"
"You know, that's actually very possible. Hahaha!"
Everyone burst into laughter.
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