"Good to know I left my mark," Adam said in a mocking tone, his voice carrying easily over the still air.
The goblin glared at him with a feral look, its sharp teeth bared, but it didn't rush in immediately.
It could smell the blood of its kin all over Adam and even with its savage mind, it understood what that meant.
The human standing before it was not the same weak prey it had met the day before.
Adam's smile stayed fixed, but underneath it burned a deep, gnawing rage.
This was the goblin that had almost ended his life.
The one that had dragged him into despair and pushed him to the edge of death.
When he'd first entered the rift yesterday, his luck had been atrocious.
Instead of encountering ordinary mob goblins, which would not have made much difference, he had stumbled upon an elite, unranked, Level 1 monster.
It had overwhelmed him with ease.
And despite Adam trying to fight back, the difference in strength made it hopeless.
Still, due to its nature, the creature had let its guard down and by sheer desperation, Adam had managed to wound it badly, with his Common Knife and used the moment of shock to escape.
But before he fled, the beast had raked his side with a poisoned claw.
That poison had spread fast, and within hours, Adam would have been dead if not for his rebirth.
"I'd like to thank you," Adam said quietly, it almost seemed sincere.
The goblin snarled, its jagged teeth flashing, but its expression shifted slightly to one of confusion, as if his words didn't register.
But Adam didn't care as he continued to speak, with his voice turning lower and colder at each word.
"If not for you, I wouldn't have gained this power." His expression hardened, eyes burning with quiet fury.
"And to show my appreciation… I'll make your death slow, so slow infact that even in whatever passes for your afterlife, you'll still have nightmares of it."
The goblin's yellow eye narrowed into a slit. Its claws dug into the ground as it crouched low, preparing to attack.
No matter how much stronger this human had become, he had still dared to wound it and that, it could not forgive.
Adam shifted his stance, lowering his center of gravity as his hand tightened around the handle of his Common Knife.
The wind fell silent and the moment the tall grasses stopped moving.
They dashed at each other.
****
This goblin was nothing like the ones Adam had faced before.
It was an elite; an unranked level 1 elite monster, far stronger than the common mob goblins that had filled the plains so far.
Everything about it screamed danger: its lean, muscular frame, its sharper claws, the malice in its single yellow eye.
Against a normal martial artist, this thing would have been a nightmare.
And yet, despite all its power, it was the one being manhandled.
Adam had overpowered it from the very start, each exchange ending with the goblin staggering, bleeding and retreating.
The reason for this was simple.
Adam possessed an E-rank special talent.
Even though he hadn't yet stepped into the formal ranks of a martial artist, his talent alone put him leagues above the average awakened.
The difference lay in something every martial artist understood intimately, Star Power.
Essence was the energy martial artists cultivated, it was the fuel that powered both them and their spirits.
But Star Power measured the effect of that energy, it was the quantifiable strength behind techniques, speed, defense, and destruction.
In simple terms, essence was the current while star power was the lightning.
Just like watts measured electrical output and stats measured the power of a game character. Star Power was the scale for the insane things martial artists and awakened could do.
And the gap between Adam and the goblin wasn't small, it was a chasm.
The goblin's Level and special talent granted it a Star Power of nine.
Adam's E-rank talent [Rapid] pulsed at a Star Power of fourteen.
The results were obvious.
The goblin's body shot backward like a ragdoll, crashing through the grass and slamming hard into one of the scattered trees.
BOOM!
The impact split the bark, echoing across the plain.
Its single yellow eye widened, filled not with hatred, but something closer to disbelief.
To the goblin, Adam was the monster.
The elite goblin tried to get away from Adam, but its body was in ruins.
Two legs were gone, its arms mangled, its gut torn open so badly that its intestines spilled onto the grass.
Yet, despite all that, it wasn't dead.
Adam had made sure of that.
By now, he knew the goblin anatomy by heart. After all the ones he'd dissected during this run, he knew exactly which cuts killed and which didn't.
He had kept this one alive on purpose.
The goblin's eye trembled as it looked at him. All it could see were cold, emerald-green eyes, so calm and merciless it made the soul chill.
"Pray we don't meet in your next life."
Shluk!
The Common Knife plunged down quickly, piercing the goblin's heart cleanly.
Stopping the twitching.
As the plains fell silent once more.
Adam exhaled softly, pulling the blade free as he looked down at the corpse.
That wasn't as satisfying as I thought it would be. Exhaling softly at the thought.
Adam proceeded to dig through the goblin's chest, his fingers brushing against something solid and smooth.
He pulled it out, wiped it clean, and slipped the granulite into his backpack.
The bag was already filled with harvested organs from earlier kills, leaving little space left as he added the important parts from the elite goblin.
He glanced at the remains, then shook his head.
"After this, I need to get a storage item or better yet, a spatial talent to make collecting drops easier."
Although it was easy to kill monsters now while carrying a backpack, it might be different in the future.
Straightening, Adam's gaze fell back to the corpse of the elite goblin.
"Speaking of talent…" he said quietly.
Placing his left hand over the creature's chest.
Essence flickered faintly through his veins as he activated his special talents [Connect] & [Equip].