Variant

I walked over to one of the bodies and gagged but rested my hand on it’s face.

“Hell’s forge!” I spoke the incantation and blue and black flames came to life from my hand covering the goblins body.

I focused only on the part that normally dropped however and used the technique to refine the teeth ever so slightly before cutting off the energy as I was getting low. Steeling myself I raised my weapon before bringing it down right on the goblins chest with the axe side. the ribs split open to reveal the magic stone that was intact and trying not to throw up again I reached into the cavity and tore it out causing the body to burst into smoke and embers that got sucked into my tattoos.-

“Well at least I know that wasn’t just a freak incident now.” I muttered as I tried to sense if there was anything different about my tattoos or body but there was nothing at all.

The magic stone in my hand was bloody and about the size of my thumb but perfectly intact with a shifting smoky looking energy within its black crystalline form. On the ground though I saw something that improved my mood immediately, a full set of teeth that were white. Before jumping to any conclusions though I went through the gruesome and unsettling process of extracting the stones of the other three goblins and didn’t get any drops at all from them which told me that I was right. If I refined the drop before harvesting the stone from an intact body I could get that drop guaranteed.-

The next step however was checking if the teeth I got this way were the same as a normal drop which meant I unfortunately needed to go hunting for more goblins. I didn’t need to worry about blood though as with a quick flex of my cursed technique it all burnt away. Once I mentally prepared myself I walked further into the dungeon to search for more goblins. The monster spawn rate in the dungeon was based on the power and depth the monster was on. As a result the dungeon churned out a new goblin once every twenty minutes or so which was why adventurers weren’t constantly fighting over the things if they were even hunting them.-

After reaching level two which was a point most people easily achieved in time with effort most adventurers ignored the goblins because they weren’t worth fighting. Then of course you had the second sort of adventurer that killed everything that moved and ignored the dropped stones despite the fact that doing so could result in a variant popping up simply because it was unprofitable. I unfortunately came across one such variant this dive though it was thankfully a new one and not out of my strike range but definitely close. See I was prowling the stone path of the dungeon when just up ahead I saw the damn thing.

At first I thought it was a person because it was about as tall as the average human and had pale grey skin so I thought it was just some shirtless dude down here, I was wrong. The variant seemed to sense me and turned before I could call out in greeting and my voice died in my throat when I saw the face of the variant. Long canines and bloody red eyes that made me think of a predator staring at prey. 

“Oh shit!” i shouted as I quickly reached into my pouch and took out a mana potion that I popped the top off of and down the moment I realized what I was not more than fifteen meters away from. 

There was no saving the vial though as the variant charged rapidly with a rusty sword in hand which forced me to toss it and focus on the threat. 

“GRRAAAAAH!” the thing screamed viciously as it swung the blade so fast that I barely dodged it by leaping to the side.

‘I need to grab it.’ I thought immediately recognizing that I was outmatched in physical stats.

Magic though? Oh I had some real nasty ideas about how I could use my cursed technique in battle. Admittedly one of them was to straight up rip off Mahito and transfigure my opponent in a way that renders them harmless or at least less likely to harm me. In this case I was going to seal the goblins mouth and nose before letting it suffocate to death. I know really fucked up but you couldn’t convince me that the alternative of this thing probably bringing me to the point of near death from a direct clash would be a better option.-

I figured out how I was going to grab the variant in no time at all and I was frankly not that thrilled at the idea but it was admittedly the best I could come up with. When the variant charged at me again I steeled myself and moved towards it instead of away. I didn’t get stabbed or slashed thankfully as I wrapped my arms around the thing like a very aggressive hug before activating my technique. I definitely got slashed across the back after that however as the cursed flames consumed the goblin variant and its lips and nostrils fused shut and it tried it’s hardest to get me off.-

Once my work was done I punched the variant in the nose as hard as I could before distancing myself. I could feel the cut on my back but it didn’t hurt too much thanks to the adrenaline and while the variant clawed at it’s face after dropping it’s sword I snatched said weapon. I couldn’t help but grin when I held it as my technique told me it counted as from a living thing. Reaching into my pouch I grabbed the health and mana potion before downing them both and putting the empty vials back.-

I felt an itch from my back and my energy reservoir threatened to over fill since the effects of the previous potion I took were still in effect. This time it was intentionally done as I activated my technique and began to refine the sword so that it became a guaranteed drop. Once I felt I had done enough I crossed my fingers prayed to Hestia and used my cursed technique on myself to try and heal the cut on my back. The pain vanished as surprisingly the technique didn’t hurt me at all when I used it on myself. –

Even more surprising was that the energy burnt by the technique was the lowest it’s ever been and I suddenly realized I had been putting the carriage before the horse. My technique was meant to be used on me but using it on things outside myself was the extension of the technique and thus a massive energy sink. Looking at the variant that had collapsed at this point with a blue face and was in it’s final throws as the life fled it’s body I sighed and walked over to it and sank it’s own blade through it’s chest to retrieve the magic stone.

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