Goblin King: My Innate Skill Is OP

That I would step, dodge, or reposition like any other creature bound by normal movement.

But my innate skill had never followed convention. It ignored distance. It ignored positioning. It allowed me to warp freely without the constraints she was trying to impose.

I could warp out of the way.

I could use [Swap] once again and turn her own attack back on her, just as I had done before.

But, I didn’t bother evading.

I stood my ground and let the attack hit me.

The compressed blast struck with enough force to crater the earth behind me, tearing through my position in a violent surge of pressure. My body absorbed the impact, energy dispersing through defenses I had layered long before stepping into this clearing. It wasn’t painless. It wasn’t negligible. But it was survivable.

And more importantly, it bought me time.

As the residual force dissipated around me, black ink spilled forward again, not explosively this time, but deliberately. It surged across the ground in thick waves, spreading outward and then upward as it reached her.

She reacted instantly.

For something so massive, the matriarch moved with unsettling speed, sidestepping, pivoting, even managing to unleash additional blasts toward me as she tried to keep distance. Each attack tore through the clearing, but none of them stopped the advance of Deathroot.

Because it didn’t need to be fast.

It only needed to touch her once.

A single tendril caught her hind leg.

That was enough.

The ink latched on and tightened, spreading upward in branching streams that crawled over her hide, slipping between the layered plates of flesh as though searching for something beneath. The moment it secured purchase, the feeding began.

She roared and thrashed violently, the ground fracturing beneath her weight as she dropped and rolled, trying to crush the ink beneath her own body. Her tusks scraped across her own skin in desperate arcs, gouging deep trenches as she attempted to carve the spreading mass away.

It didn’t work.

The more she struggled, the faster it spread.

Her crimson glow flickered erratically as the power she had drawn upon began to thin. The aura that had felt so overwhelming moments ago started to collapse inward, rage draining from her posture as her strength bled away into the ink.

And the moment that frenzy faded, the devouring accelerated.

Without the excess energy fueling her resistance, Deathroot moved unchallenged, surging across her torso and up toward her neck. I walked toward her slowly, watching as her enormous form trembled under the weight of what she could no longer fight.

”You… you cannot be a goblin,” she said, her voice no longer thunderous, but strained and uneven. ”The power you possess… is not something any goblin is capable of wielding.”

”That is true,” I replied calmly.

Even among the Chosen, what I carried wasn’t normal. The combination of abilities I possessed, wasn’t something that fit neatly into expectation.

But as Drugars’ Avatar had once said, I wasn’t normal.

I was an anomaly.

And I didn’t quite dislike that.

The system reacted almost immediately as the last of the matriarch’s vitality drained into Deathroot.

[You have levelled up]

[You have levelled up]

[You have levelled up]

[You have levelled up]

The notifications stacked in quick succession, each one carrying that familiar surge of expansion through my body and mind.

Four levels from her alone.

Seven in total from wiping out the entire herd.

That was worth the detour.

Then another notification appeared.

[You have received 1000 skill points]

[You have received skill: Aether Compression (Active) – A]

[Aether Compression (S-Rank)]

Description:

The user gains the ability to compress ambient atmospheric aether into a highly condensed projectile of directed force. Through rapid pressure concentration and controlled release, the user may generate ballistic bursts capable of striking targets at extreme velocity without visible manifestation.

Unlike conventional energy attacks, Aether Compression relies on density and pressure rather than elemental projection, making it difficult to anticipate or visually track.

Effects:

– Fires near-invisible ballistic bursts of compressed atmospheric force

– Exceptional penetration capability; effective against fortified armor, dense hides, and reinforced structures

– Internal shock transfer upon impact, capable of rupturing organs or destabilizing internal defenses

– Minimal external energy signature during charge-up

Cost: 100 MP

I stared at the description for a moment, the implications clicking into place almost instantly.

So this was what they had been using.

Compressed atmosphere turned into a near-invisible projectile that struck with the force of a high-velocity cannon round. It wasn’t flashy, but that was exactly what made it dangerous. Hard to see, harder to predict, and fast enough to punish hesitation.

An efficient and practical execution tool now another weapon in my arsenal.

And more importantly, another skill I could share with my clan.

Ding!

[You have reached the threshold required to evolve.]

[Evolution taking place.]

”Immediately?” I muttered, genuine surprise slipping into my voice.

The last time I had undergone evolution, it had been violent. Agonizing. My body had felt like it was being torn apart and rebuilt piece by piece, bone grinding, flesh reshaping, senses overloaded with unbearable intensity.

So...instinctively, I shut my eyes and braced myself, expecting that same brutal transformation to hit without warning.

But didn’t.

There was no tearing or crushing pressure.

Instead, a subtle tingling spread across my skin, light and steady, like warmth soaking into muscles after a long rest. It wasn’t painful. If anything, it was refreshing, like I had just downed a high-grade healing potion and felt it circulate through every vein in my body. Strength flowed through me in a smooth surge rather than a violent spike, reinforcing rather than reconstructing.

I opened my eyes slowly.

The world looked the same.

And yet… not.

My senses felt slightly sharper, as though someone had adjusted the focus on reality itself. The details of the environment stood out more vividly. The texture of bark on nearby trees. The fine cracks in the scorched earth. The faint shimmer of residual mana still dissipating from where the matriarch had stood.

Scents layered themselves clearly in my awareness. The damp, mineral-rich smell of earth. The metallic tang of burnt flesh that still lingered in the clearing. Even the faint, almost mint-like undertone that accompanied the black ink of Deathroot as it fully settled back into me.

It was subtle.

But undeniable.

Then another notification chimed, crisp and deliberate, and the system interface unfolded before my eyes once more.

Ding!

[Evolution Complete]

[All Base Stats +15]

[500 Skill Points Awarded]

[Dimensional Sovereign is now Dimensional Overlord]

[You have received 4 new class skills]