Ichor Cell-Chapter 50: Learning Lore I

Alex had been thoroughly impressed by the guild ‘showers’.
They weren’t really showers in the sense he was used to. There was water, yes, warm and perfectly pressurized, conjured from a glowing ring etched into the wall. But the real work was done by the faint mist that drifted from the runes overhead. It wasn’t steam. It didn’t feel hot or cold. It simply touched anything on his skin that the water didn’t break down and erased it from existence.
Dissolved, not washed away.
Each stall had a small sliding panel with various buttons, allowing the user to pick exactly what they wanted removed. Dirt, blood, sweat, ink, monster residue, oil, even stomach acid—apparently a more common problem among adventurers than Alex wanted to think about.
He’d flipped through the options in fascination before settling on the simple preset labelled general contamination. The runes pulsed once, acknowledging the command, and the mist shifted to match. Whatever enchantment powered the system seemed to read the difference between flesh, fabric, and unwanted grime with perfect precision.
It was absurdly efficient. Better than anything Earth had ever managed. No clogged drains, no wastewater, no need for soap or towels—just magic doing the job of a chemistry lab and a sanitation plant combined.
And as he stepped out of the cubicle with fresh skin and breathable clothes, he couldn’t help but think of the saying that advanced enough technology was indistinguishable from magic. It seemed that the people of this world had taken that as a challenge, replicating technology that he knew, and improving it in every way.
For the first time in weeks, he marvelled at the sensation of his clean, sparkling skin.
Granted, he hadn’t exactly had the luxury of staying clean while escaping halfway through a country in a cart, but it wasn’t until he had thoroughly washed himself with the guild’s ‘showers’ that he realised just how
disgusting
he had been.
He was still thinking about it when he rejoined the others in the guild hall.
Grenil looked seconds away from collapsing. The moment Alex approached, the old man sagged with relief and rubbed his face with both hands.
“Alright,” Grenil said, voice gravelly with exhaustion. “I’m done. I’m going back before I fall asleep on my feet.”
Alex nodded. “Go ahead. I’m planning to walk around a bit, stretch my legs. Maybe visit the library again.”
Grenil stared at him with bleary disbelief. “At this hour?”
“At what other hour am I supposed to do it, then?” He asked helplessly. “I can’t exactly go traipsing about the city on a nice, sunny afternoon. Plus, it still beats staying in that inn watching you snore,” Alex waved him away. “Get some rest. We’ll be fine.”
The old man muttered something no doubt derogatory but didn’t argue further. He tightened his coat, shuffled toward the exit, and disappeared out into the cool night.
Duran watched him go, then sighed. “I’ll stay with you. No point going back yet.”
Alex gave a small nod and headed for the door, stepping out into the quiet street.
Alex could never get used to the feeling of a city at night, no matter how many times he saw one. There was just something about it that unsettled him, while also being surprisingly freeing. Like skinny dipping. The thrill of some perceived wrong juxtaposed against the joy of doing it.
“You know,” he said, “I really,
really
hate this sunlight thing.”
“It is rather annoying, yes.” Duran agreed. “However it’s a small price to pay for powers like these. I don’t think you would give it up even if given the choice.”
“I guess you’re right about that.” Alex snorted quietly and kept walking. They turned down another street, then another, yet all the shops and establishments were closed for the night. Apart from the occasional passerby, the streets were as empty as always. From his estimation, it was around three in the morning—leaving them with several hours to kill until sunrise.
“Should we just go to the library?” Alex asked as they turned yet another corner to an empty, dimly lit street. “This is making me pretty depressed.”
Duran shrugged.
Tracing their way back to the square, which still contained some level of activity, Alex skirted past the guild hall and approached the library. Its tall windows glowed with the same steady light as before, warm and inviting compared to the empty streets around it.
“Let’s go.” Alex pushed open the door.
The library’s warm, dry air greeted them, particularly pleasant after the slight chill of the night air. The same clerk from yesterday was stationed behind the front desk, reading some book Alex couldn’t make out. His eyes flicked upward when they approached. A faint flicker of recognition dawned, followed by a faint look of surprise at seeing them again so soon.
“Oh, welcome back.” The man asked, putting his book down. “Are you new to the city? I don’t remember ever seeing you around here.
“Uh, yeah.” Alex replied after a brief pause, surprised the clerk remembered him. “Just got here a few days ago, though I don’t know if I’ll be settling here long term or if it’s just a temporary stop.”
The man made an understanding expression. “Adventurer?”
“Adventurer.” Alex confirmed with a light grin.
The clerk’s posture shifted slightly—something between sympathy and caution. “Dangerous line of work, adventuring. Plenty of people come to Luterra thinking the job is easy because it’s a small city. The forest doesn’t care about city size.”
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Alex raised an eyebrow. “That so? In that case I should probably read up on what I might encounter. You got any books on monsters, magic and the like?”
The clerk gestured vaguely down one of the aisles. “If you want to read up on anything dangerous, that’s a good idea. Knowledge keeps people alive more than steel does. Far right corner. We don’t have a massive collection, but there’s enough to get by.”
“Perfect,” Alex said.
Alex headed toward the shelves, Duran trailing close behind.
On the way there, they passed by several other readers, each immersed in their books. Alex was almost certain that one man in particular was in that exact same chair as yesterday, his form hunched over a desk piled high with dusty tomes. Alex gently scooted around him, scared of disturbing the man.
He quickly reached the indicated section.
The section wasn’t large. Two bookshelves stood side by side tucked along a wall, each sagging slightly under the weight of tomes that probably hadn’t been organized in decades. Some were thick enough to be used as blunt weapons; others were flimsy pamphlets that looked like a single folded over sheet of paper.
Alex reached out and pulled out the first book that contained the word ‘monster’ in its title.
[Monsters of the Western Territories.]
Good enough.
He found a seat at a nearby table and flipped it open. The entries were alphabetical, each page dedicated to its own special monster, complete with a drawing. He skimmed absently.
[Abyssal Eel.]
[A long, black, finless eel found in dungeons, underground lakes and other lightless underwater environments. Its body draws in light, making it particularly hard to spot in its natural habitat but relatively easy in a brightly lit area. But do not be fooled; its natural habitat is where the Abyssal Eel is least dangerous. The light it absorbs is converted into potent light-based magic attacks, and the brighter its surroundings, the stronger its attacks.]
[Rating: Supernatural, but capable of Disaster tier in unfavourable conditions.]
Alex raised his brows at the creature, intrigued. What sort of evolutionary path caused one to be actively hindered by their natural habitat? That would be like humans being particularly good swimmers or a shark that could bite harder on land.
‘I guess magic makes Darwin’s theory not quite as solid as normal.’
He kept reading.
[Acid Grub.]
[A pale, thumb-sized larva commonly found in dungeons and swamps. It secretes a highly corrosive digestive fluid that dissolves organic matter on contact. The fluid is weak against inorganic material but dangerously effective against flesh. Hunters often burn infected areas on sight, as acid grubs reproduce by burrowing into soft tissues. However, they do not intentionally attack living targets.]
[Rating: Mundane.]
Compared to the eel, this one was downright boring. A maggot that used acid to eat. Yippee.
[Ash hare.]
[A small, grey-furred rodent native to volcanic regions and old burn scars. Its fur contains trace minerals that allow it to blend perfectly with ash-covered terrain. When frightened, an ash hare kicks up a cloud of powdery soot to obscure predators’ vision before fleeing. Generally harmless, though their presence can indicate nearby fire-aspected monsters.]
[Rating: Mundane.]
More of the same.
[Arcthorn.]
[A thin, pale serpent adapted to cold climates. Its body is lined with needle-like scales that inflict cuts when stepped on, often causing frostbite due to the serpent’s natural frost poison. Arcthorns are ambush predators that hide beneath the snow, waiting for their prey to step on them and succumb to their poison before eating them.]
[Rating: Mundane.]
A sea urchin in the shape of a snake. Alex rolled his eyes.
Apart from that first one, none of these sounded very interesting or threatening. The ash hare didn’t even seem like a monster, more like a regular rabbit covered in ash. Alex’s disappointment was immeasurable, and his day was ruined.
Flipping back to the front of the book, he let his finger glide along the index before it stopped on a particular entry.
[Goblins.]
Alex shrugged.
He flipped to the correct page and began to read. This entry surprisingly took up two whole pages, compared to the usual one.
Alex’ eyebrows climbed further and further into his hairline as he read.
According to the book, goblins weren’t merely pests—they were a genuine problem. Every sentient race exterminated them whenever possible. Not out of hatred, but out of necessity.
Goblins reproduced too quickly.
A newborn goblin matured in under a month, from the first moment it was shat out by its mother to adulthood.
Surprisingly, all goblins were male by default. They didn’t have females of their own species. Instead, in an impossible perversion of biology, they could reproduce with any female of any other race, no matter the species—human, elf, beastkin, monsters. Even dragons weren’t off limits. The overwhelming majority of such matings produced goblins. But a small percentage didn’t.
Some of those children inherited traits from their mother race, with odds of about one in a hundred.
Humans gave some offspring increased intelligence and sociability. Elves passed on natural magic affinity. A troll might produce a goblin that was incredibly strong and healed from any injury.
The more he read, the worse it got.
In some rare cases—statistically improbable, but inevitable over the course of however many thousands of years goblins have been around—a variant goblin will produce a second variant, one that inherits
both
races’ traits at once.
Such goblins were usually enough to identify as serious threats, often approaching the border of the Disaster tier, depending on the two mother races they inherit.
Alex could guess where this was going.
Sure enough, the author wrote of an incident; one that sparked the world’s goblin extermination policy into existence.
Over 70 000 years ago—a time period Alex had trouble grasping, but one some beings in this world had been alive to see—there was the Goblin King. Now, that in itself was not too surprising. Any goblin with a sufficiently large following would be dubbed a goblin king, with the threshold being at 20 000 goblins.
No. This was
the
Goblin King. The only one recorded in history books and the only one seen since. A monster among monsters. A walking apocalypse.
A tenth-generation variant goblin.
The monster was so far removed from an ordinary goblin that calling it the same species was almost wrong. Each generation stacked inherited traits, mutated them, refined them. Strength. Magic affinity. Intelligence. Physical structure. By the tenth cycle, the resulting creature was something nature seemed to actively regret creating.
The text wasn’t too clear on what exactly its ten racial ancestors were, but it did mention that one of them was undoubtedly a dragon.
Not just indirectly, not diluted through a wyvern or other intermediary—directly. Somewhere within ten generations of its ancestral tree was an actual dragon, and the goblin had inherited far too much of it.
Just a single generation dragonoid goblin was already considered an almost Calamity level creature, a serious threat to an entire region should it be left to grow unchecked. If you added in a troll’s regeneration, an elf’s magic, and a bunch of other stuff on top?
The creature single handedly wiped a country off the face of the planet.
The aftermath was so catastrophic that the surrounding nations were forced into the first global alliance in recorded history. Humans, elves, dwarves, beastkin, even dragons—half of them normally unable to be in the same room without killing each other—banded together for one purpose:
Kill the Goblin King.
It worked.
Barely.
Half the allied forces died. The land the creature had died on remained cursed and uninhabitable for millenia, still marked on modern maps as a dead zone where nothing grows. Even now, guards were posted to periodically check the affected area to ensure nothing remained of the horror’s lineage.
That was why
Alex lowered the book and exhaled slowly.
“Well damn.”