Goblin King: My Innate Skill Is OP

I kept walking toward her, each step steady, deliberate.

Her aura flared in response, pressure rolling off her in waves, as if warning me to stop. But it didn't deter me. Not even a little.

So she acted.

The fiery quills hovering around her tails snapped inward, converging into a spinning, spiraling disk of blue flame. A heartbeat later, it detonated outward, unleashing a torrent of fire that roared like a living beast, flooding the air in front of her.

The flames poured out in a stream, a deadly flamethrower that scorched the earth black as it surged straight toward me. Trees cracked and hissed as their bark seared under the heat, the ground itself bubbling in places.

But I didn't move. I didn't even flinch.

WHOOSH!

The inferno swallowed me whole.

The flames connected, heat licking against my skin, the air warping as the torrent pressed down with crushing force. Ariel pushed harder, the fire thickening, her intent clear—she was trying to burn me to ash where I stood.

Which was insane, considering what she'd told me. Our lives were linked. If I died, she should die too.

Or maybe… maybe that wasn't true.

Why had I taken her word for it so easily?

The possibility burned sharper than the flames themselves, but before I could dig deeper into the thought, the torrent sputtered out.

Ariel cut the attack short, her chest rising and falling with controlled breaths. "I almost overdid it," she said coolly, her tails flicking as her aura pulsed. "You made me forget—I'm not supposed to kill you, goblin."

Her tone dripped with arrogance, but her confidence faltered the moment her eyes met mine.

Because I was still walking.

One step. Then another. Calm. Unhurried. My silhouette cutting through the smoke and heat.

Her expression shifted instantly, her molten eyes widening. Her jaw twitched, and though she didn't say it, I could almost hear the thought screaming in her head.

What!?

The attack hadn't touched me.

The searing wall of fire had been brushed aside, distorted harmlessly by the shimmering veil of [Fractured Existence].

The SSS-ranked skill let the flames wash past me like nothing more than a gust of hot wind.

I kept walking, unshaken, while Ariel's molten eyes darted in confusion, her mind scrambling to understand why her attack had done nothing.

I didn't waste the moment.

Taking advantage of her shock, I surged forward—no [Warp], no tricks. Just raw, physical speed. My body blurred as I closed the distance, Gravefang already arcing down in a brutal swing.

Ariel, caught off guard, tried to react, but she wasn't fast enough. My blade bit deep into her arm, the cut opening with a sharp spray of blood.

She let out a pained whimper, her tails lashing violently as she leapt back, putting space between us.

But I didn't give her the chance to recover.

I pressed forward, closing in again, when her flame-quills detonated outward—dozens of blazing projectiles exploding from her like a storm of burning bullets.

They screamed toward me in a deadly rain.

But I didn't stop.

With nothing but speed—pure, sharpened agility—I slipped through them. My body twisted, bent, and weaved, each quill missing by inches, the heat brushing past my skin. Every step carried me closer, every breath narrowing the gap between us.

With 67 points in agility, my speed was beyond what it had ever been—enough for me to move like a speedster. Think Dash from Invincible, weaving and darting in bursts of near-impossible motion.

The quills weren't just projectiles; they carried a secondary effect, erupting into fiery explosions the moment they struck the ground or a tree. Each detonation rocked the forest, showering sparks and searing bark, but I slipped through the chaos untouched, carving a path straight toward her.

The fox was still reeling from the cut I'd left on her arm, wincing with every movement. Her confidence was bleeding out with her, but I wasn't about to let up.

I closed the gap again, Gravefang raised, weaving through the rain of quills until I was right in front of her.

My blade came down in a brutal arc, but this time, she was ready.

"You screwed up, goblin," she spat, her molten eyes flashing.

Her body flared with blue light as she activated the same skill I'd seen her unleash against the badger. [Blazing Mirage].

She exploded into a storm of afterimages, her form splitting into multiple figures that danced and darted around me. Illusions, but solid enough to kill if I misjudged them.

From every direction, the air lit up with a surge of quill-blades, dozens of blazing projectiles moving around me.

I didn't move. I stayed rooted in place, Gravefang steady at my side, watching her carefully.

It seemed my stillness only offended her more. The mirages surrounding me all mirrored her glare, their faces twisting with annoyance. The flaming feathers that had been hovering in the air suddenly shattered, breaking apart into countless fragments of blue fire.

They scattered like leaves caught in a storm.

The fragments swirled in tight, violent arcs, circling around me faster and faster until the air itself seemed to howl.

Then they began to merge.

Fragments joined into ribbons, ribbons into waves, each line of flame curving until they formed a blazing spiral.

And in the space of a breath, I found myself trapped at the center of a tornado made of fire.

The heat was stupid, pressing in on every side, the air sizzling and warping as though the world itself might melt. My instincts screamed at me about what this would do to flesh and bone.

But I didn't flinch.

[Fractured Existence] wrapped around me like a veil, and the flames warped as they closed in, bending unnaturally, refusing to touch me. Fire that should have seared through skin and muscle slipped aside as though reality itself refused to let me burn.

"Damned goblin… die!" she roared from outside the swirling inferno.

The blazing tornado shrieked as it tightened, its walls of fire spiraling inward.

Then, with a cosmic-like sound—like the very air was tearing apart—it collapsed in on itself, converging on my position.

For a heartbeat, everything compressed into a single point.

And then...