After they had finished off this first group in the last area of the goblin town, they directly moved on to the next after looting whatever they needed to from the Goblin corpses.
This time around, Eisen wouldn't try the same type of attack if there was a Goblin commande since the risk involved was simply far too much. Not only was it a waste of time or pills to replenish all the health that he would lose, but if Eisen was ever going to miss a commander or if it was able to dodge, Eisen would basically be completely done for and be nearly instantly killed by the whole group of Goblins the moment that he would hit the ground.
It was a good chance to try it out at least once, but it wasn't a good idea to continue this in the long run, so they chose a different tactic from then on.
Whenever they met a group of Goblins with a commander as its leader, they would try and distract some of the regular goblins so that they would investigate and one side of the Commander was exposed, after which Yamikuma with Jyuuk on his back would run toward him. Before they reached that spot, Jyuuk would jump forward and use either the force or explosion cap, this always depended on what types the other goblins were, to attack the feet of the commander, leaving all of the goblins to stagger, which gave Yamikuma enough time to push away the most threatening goblins to a good distance.
After that, Eisen, Bree, and Aotori would follow. Bree and Aotori both would attack the physically weakest goblin together, while Eisen helped Jyuuk out to kill the commander as quickly as possible.
Once they managed this, the other goblins would feel their moment of weakness approach, giving the group the chance to finish all of the goblins off.
They did this for about an hour until Yamikuma actually evolved! He reached the peak of Rank 2 quite a while ago already, but according to Jyuuk, there were some kinds of requirements for the darkness bear to evolve. What those requirements were wasn't actually mentioned, but Jyuuk said that he figured it was simply about killing a certain amount of monsters, as that was the simplest reason for now.
And not only Yamikuma evolved, but something else happened as well! Aotori's chicks grew up enough to participate in combat, and shortly afterward, Aotori evolved into a Frozen-Eagle! She grew slightly in size, and her feathers changed from somewhat translucent in some areas and glittering like ice, all the way to being made of an ice-like substance that was cold to the touch, but apparently couldn't melt, at least not in these temperatures.
But most importantly, as Tsurishika didn't need to protect and take care of the chicks anymore, the five young eagles, as well as the stag, were able to do a little bit in combat. It was a mostly simple distraction, but this was already enough to give them a little bit of experience for their efforts!
This would hopefully be enough to have them evolve soon enough and let them attack. It didn't matter too much to Eisen, though, since this was probably going to be long after Jyuuk and Eisen split up again.
After all, the way that Eisen and Jyuuk would play in the future was largely different. Eisen would probably stop fighting in large amounts like this and spend some time simply crafting, while Jyuuk seemed to be the type of person that would prefer a combat-related playstyle.
And Eisen also didn't want to bring Jyuuk to the place the mysterious cat told him about to finish the quest since Eisen didn't know what would happen if he just brought someone with him. He and Bree decided together that she also wouldn't come. Again, just in case. Eisen didn't know what kind of creature that cat actually was, and didn't want to risk anything.
Either way, for now, with the help of these other six beasts that would help distract the goblins, it was possible for the group to advance even faster.
As such, it didn't take long for them to reach the final stronghold of this town, the Goblin Castle. On their way, Eisen managed to gain three more levels, meaning that as long as he leveled up one more time, the most important and hardest part of the quest would be done.
Eisen put one stat point from leveling up into his AGI stat to bring it to 100, giving him the effectiveness-increase for this stat, and then put the other points equally into INT and WIS, meaning that both of them were just one stat point away from 100.
There were two guard units stationed in front of the gate leading into the courtyard of the castle, which the group managed to take care of relatively quickly, after which they snuck inside and hid wherever they could while getting closer toward the throne room of the castle, where Bree suggested they looked for the Goblin King.
Apparently, the Goblin King counted as some kind of 'Field Boss', and as such would give a lot of experience compared to other rank 4 monsters, but then again would give you quite a hard fight. Especially when it came to goblins, who were known to be incredibly greedy, you should expect to find some treasures.
"The Goblin King's level shouldn't be that high, so I'm sure we can handle it, even if just barely." Bree explained as the group got closer to the grand wooden door that leads into the throne room that was apparently completely detached from the rest of the castle. Overall, the 'castle' wasn't actually that big. It only consisted of this large central room, thick walls, and two watchtowers.
"Got it. If the Goblin King is in there, we shouldn't expect it to be alone, right?" Eisen asked, and Bree nodded in reply.
"Mhm! Especially because there aren't any Goblins out here… they might have all gathered inside with the king." The Fey-kin explained.
"Jyuuk, there are a few windows on the sides of the hall. Can you look through them with one of the Eagles to see how many Goblins are waiting for us?" Eisen asked and the Monkey-man nodded in response.
"Yes, I will try." He said and looked at Nagaretori, the smallest and quickest of the five young eagle siblings.
Nagaretori's eyes turned complete white the same moment that Jyuuk's did, showing that their sights were now connected, and the small blue eagle took off.
Not long after this, Jyuuk began to talk about what he could see. "There's a large Goblin sitting on a thrown, that seems to be the king, and there are five groups of Goblin Commanders kneeling on the ground in front of him, with 25 more goblins directly behind them, also bowing down. The king seems to be holding some kind of speech. It doesn't seem like it's ending any time soon." He explained, and in response, Eisen closed his eyes and scratched his beard in thought, which was when he got an idea.
"Bree, give me those flasks we found in some of the buildings around here. Oh, and empty glass bottles, please." Eisen said with a grin, and Bree tilted her head but did as the old man said, laying about a dozen small flasks onto the ground in front of Eisen. Even while closed, they gave off a strong alcoholic smell.
Eisen took some of the glass bottles that Bree gave him next and activated his transmutation, forming them into small, hollow glass balls with an opening at the top and only a quite thin layer of glass.
Then, he grabbed the flasks and filled up these balls with the strong alcohol one after another, then completely closed the glass balls up again with transmutation.
"Eisen, what are you going to do with those?" Bree asked curiously, and Eisen handed out the different glass balls to everyone in the group.
"Well, what we're going to do now is throw these at the goblins, and then light all of them on fire. The moment I open this door, throw them inside toward them as quickly as you can, okay? This is our best chance at weakening them for now. I suggest that when the fire spreads inside, we storm in and take care of as many Goblins as we can, and preferably some of the commanders as well."
"That sounds like a great idea, actually! Let's do it!" Bree smiled brightly and Jyuuk nodded in agreement as well, but first gave some of the spheres to his eagles, one to each of the newly-born, and two to Aotori.
While they were all preparing to throw the balls into the hall, Eisen got out one of the flame-enchanted mana crystals and prepared to activate it.
He slowly moved to the door and nodded at Bree and Jyuuk to make sure they were ready, and then quickly pushed the door open. Immediately, the six Eagles flew inside and dropped the glass balls onto the group of goblins while Eisen, Bree, and Jyuuk threw their respective glass balls into the crowd as well. When Eisen noticed that the Goblins and the areas around them were now covered in the strong alcohol, he poured his mana into the enchantment and threw the burning mana-crystal into the room.
The moment that the flame came in contact with the alcohol's fumes, an explosion shot outward and lit up the room, slowly burning down whatever wood or fabrics were inside and spreading further through them. Luckily, some of the windows broke during that explosion which let the smoke escape to an amount while the flames continued burning.
The goblins screamed loudly and that was the party's signal to attack. When the first goblins came rushing out of the fire, they were immediately met with one of three different weapons. A Sword, a Pole, or a Hammer.
Due to them not carrying their weapons and being already damaged through the fire, the Goblins were barely able to fight back in the slightest, which meant that one after another the Goblins fell. And this was only accelerated once Eisen and Jyuuk started getting rid of the Commanders, as the common goblins got a de-buff one after another, and all of this while hidden from the King through the flames.
After a while, the fire burnt out and what was left was only the party surrounded by a mountain of Goblin corpses, while the Goblin King was watching in a mixture of disgust and boredom.
It stood up with what seemed like a sigh and grabbed the gold-layered cane leaning onto the throne while its cape made of simple animal hides fluttered around behind it. The Goblin King readjusted the crown on the top of its head and stepped down the stairs in front of itself onto the scorched carped.
When it stood there in front of the party, they could see that it was about as tall as Eisen was.
The King looked the party up and down and scoffed at them, after which he held his cane in front of himself as if preparing for combat.
Eisen looked to his left at Bree, and then to his right at Jyuuk, nodding at both of them to make sure they were ready to go. The fire didn't do that much damage to them, but it still drained a little bit HP just due to the immense heat alone, so Eisen didn't know in what condition everyone was.
The first to move was Bree, who raised her arms to cast a de-buff spell on the Goblin King and then cast a buff spell on herself and her teammates. Noticing the change in its condition, the King reacted as well and jumped forward at immense speed, so fast that Eisen could just barely react. He held his Zweihänder in front of him and blocked the attack while the King's cane slid along the side of the blade and was caught by the parry hooks.
Taking that chance, Jyuuk swung his pole forward while having the force cap equipped and hit the side of the King's chest, pushing him back. This gave Eisen the chance to slash at it, but the sword barely cut into the Goblin's skin.
Noticing that the Goblin King was planning a counterattack, Eisen jumped back and looked at Jyuuk, who quickly commanded his beasts to keep it busy.
Eisen turned to Bree and pointed at her hammer. "I need you to help me out. With my strength alone I can't pierce the Goblin's skin. Jyuuk, can you use the Frost Cap in the center of its chest? Then I will stab my sword at that spot, and Bree, you please hit the end of my sword as hard as you can at the same time, alright?"
The both of them nodded at him and Jyuuk quickly screwed off one of the caps he had on his pole, then screwed on the Frost cap.
Just at the moment that the King wanted to swing its cane at Aotori, Jyuuk commanded her to move aside quickly and then took that chance to enact the start of Eisen's plan, stabbing the pole forward so that it came in contact with the King's chest, freezing over a small area of it directly above the Goblin's chest.
Instantly when Jyuuk moved away, Eisen followed up and stabbed the tip of his blade toward that exact spot, and simultaneously with the impact onto the frozen skin was sped up with the support of Bree's hammer hitting against the hilt, giving the sword enough power to just slide through the front of the Goblin's body, but… it stopped when the blade hit the mana crystal that seemingly replaced the Goblin King's heart.
And due to the immense vitality that creatures in this world had, the King wouldn't just die from that. It grinned at Eisen and grabbed his shoulders, trying to dig its claw-like fingers into his body.
But Eisen wasn't dumb, he knew the density of Mana Crystals as well as their position. And even if it hadn't been there, this attack probably wouldn't have directly killed the Goblin King anyway.
So, Eisen twisted his sword around a few times to create a large enough hole for the most important part of his plan.
He pulled the Zweihänder out of the Goblin King's body and threw it to the ground, grabbing the last of the glass balls that he just prepared and stuffing it right through the hole that Eisen just created, placing it in front of the Goblin's mana crystal heart.
This startled the King so much that it let go of Eisen to try and get rid of this foreign object, but it was too late, as Eisen already expelled some of his mana which he immediately infused with the Flame of the Earth element to push it into every little nook and cranny that it could enter, and then stepped back while mentally commanding the Earthen Flame to turn into pure fire and turned it up as hot as he could.
The heat broke the glass and caused an explosive flame to shoot out of the Goblin King's body that only opened up more space that was then filled with Eisen's own elemental flames, surrounding the mana crystal to disconnect it from the Goblin's body.
And as such, the Goblin King lost much of its strength, but it was still standing, with the strength and vitality of a Field Boss. So, Eisen turned the heat down and dissipated his element at the exact moment that he pushed his arm through the hole in the Goblin King's chest, placing his fist around the cold mana crystal before he pulled on it with all his strength.
The last thing that the Goblin King saw was its own mana crystal before it dropped onto his back, dead.