After Lenis called out to “Basile”, she immediately rushed over there. Strangely, instead of going towards the black-skinned man, Lenis was heading towards the penguin.
As Lenis got closer, the penguin got more frantic and kept waving its… flippers around, as if it was saying, “This is not my fault, it was that black guy over there who came and challenged me.”
The penguin was full of intelligence, its action was very humane. One couldn’t help but wonder if there is a human under those thick and bulky “penguin suit”, but its screeching immediately dispelled that thought, no human could make a sound like that. It was a genuine penguin cry. ⌈1⌋
When Lenis got in front of the penguin, she called out, “Basile! Didn’t I warn you not to get into any more fights without my permission? Remember what you did at the barn last night? All the magic beasts are now scared of you, because of that you can no longer stay in the barn!”
“What?! You mean that penguin is Basile?! T-Then who is that black-skinned man over there?” It seemed like I was the only one surprised by this sudden change of event, and I was so sure that black-skinned man was the one called Basile too. Everyone here already knew Lenis’ familiar was that giant penguin.
“What happened last night? Did something happened at the barn?” Hearing Lenis’ words, Sheena stepped forward to ask, ignoring my question.
“Listen to this Sheena!” Lenis turned around and talked to Sheena as if complaining, “Yesterday, because the black goblin had unknowingly occupied Basile’s favorite spot, it flipped out and beat every magic beasts in the barn black and blue. Because of that, Basile was chased out by the barn owner.”
Lenis stopped for a while to catch her breath, then she let out a sigh and said, “Haa… I wonder why is it so hot-headed, it must have lived the life of a king before, it’s kind of hard to put it under control with that proud and haughty attitude. I had to look for a new place for it to stay last night because of what happened at the barn last night.”
“Wait… It beat every magic beasts in the barn black and blue? When I go to the barn last night, every magic beasts looked fine to me though.” Sheena tilted her head and poked her right cheek with the index finger.
“Arf…” Just at this time, the black-skinned man walked over with the little fox in his arm, then he said, “It was this little critter who healed everyone in the barn.”
(Ah… so that’s why that “Lion King” scene took place in the barn last night?) I thought to myself while feeling convinced.
“Futaba!” Sheena shouted when she saw the little fox, she tried to hug it but little Futaba quickly broke free from the black-skinned man’s embrace and jumped onto his head.
Sheena puffed her cheeks at this, she thought to herself, “Mu… why is both of my familiar like this? All I want is to cuddle them…”
Then, the million dollar question had finally been asked by Albert, “Um… by the way, who are you? Are you perhaps the new barn owner?”
“Ah… um… How should I break this to you…” The black-skinned man was hesitant to answer, or more like… he doesn’t know how to answer. This made everyone suspicious of him, but somehow or the other, I had this feeling of deja vu, it felt as if I have met this guy before.
However, no matter how much I think about it, I just couldn’t relate it to anyone I have met before, I mean… it is impossible for this kind of person to exist in the old world and furthermore, I had only been in this world for a few days at best.
Then I suddenly thought of the wildest possibility ever, “Could he be a reincarnated person?! I mean… since I had been reborned as a spirit, it’s not totally out of the question…”
Just at this time, the two goblins, Fiore and Giga, got beside the black-skinned man, I couldn’t see the shadow of Zain anywhere, but due to our spiritual link, I can somehow sense that he is closeby. In fact, he is very close to the other two goblins, I doubtfully looked behind the black-skinned man, and I still couldn’t see the shadow of Zain.
When the black-skinned man finally decided to open his mouth to speak, I suddenly realized something and shouted before he could say anything, “AHHHH!!! Could you be… Zain?!”
“Heh… Took you long enough.” The black-skinned man, Zain, scratched his head proudly and continued, “That’s right, I am Zain. It seems like I have evolved into a rare variation of hobgoblin last night.”
My jaw dropped in surprise, I mean… I have heard of this evolution thing before, but knowing about it and seeing it with your own eyes are two different things. The change in physique is really too much, and in such a short time too!
It seemed like I wasn’t the only one surprised by this though, Lenis, Irina, Sheena, Albert, and the others who heard about this had gaping mouth. There were too surprised to even speak, monster evolution is a very rare event even in this world. Generally speaking, most monsters would born and die as their original species, evolution only occur once in every hundred years. We are very lucky to have observed this miracle with our very eyes.
The reason why goblin and the likes were stripped off their title as demi-humans and were classified as monsters is because of their ability to evolve. This is a characteristic that is only found in monsters. Therefore, to this very day, the goblins, hobgoblins, ogre, lizardman, and other such demi-humans are still classified as monsters and are hunted down for subjugation request on a daily basis.
By the way, it was Sylvidia who told me about this classification thing. There’s no way I would know something like this.
“In-… Increadible! Marvelous! This is a miracle! I never thought I’d see it with my own eyes, it is really true that the monsters can evolve into a higher species! Hahahahaha!” Albert was overjoyed.
The other students were also excited by this event, I was left confused, “Why are they so excited over this?” I couldn’t help but ponder by myself, until I hear what the students were saying;
“Then, that means… if we work hard…”
“That’s right… our familiar might be able to evolve too!”
“Alright! I’m going to work harder, not only on magic, but on strengthening my familiar too!”
Just saying, the fact that the monsters can evolve is already a well-known fact and it is the foundation of the Mysteria Summoning Academy, but since their summons are all high breed monsters, they never thought they could compete with them in familiar battle.
But now, a goblin, supposedly the weakest class of monster in Halkeginia, had just successfully evolved in front of their eyes. They couldn’t help but feel hopeful that their familiar might evolve one day too.
- By the way, just asking; What kind of sound do penguin make? (In text form) ↩