Goblin King: My Innate Skill Is OP

Chapter 373: Evolution

"Why would I?" she replied calmly. "It was convenient."

"So your whole hostage argument doesn’t even make sense then," I said with a frown, but she turned away in response. And leaped down from the table, casually walking toward the far edge of the room, her tails swaying lazily behind her as though this conversation no longer interested her.

I sighed. Typical. Whenever the conversation stopped going her way, she immediately acted like it no longer mattered.

I continued watching her quietly, still trying to understand why she had allowed any of that to happen in the first place.

Because honestly? It felt suspicious.

Her actions didn’t match the cold, grumpy creature she constantly presented herself as.

This was the same fox that usually acted irritated whenever Zarah got too close to me, yet somehow she’d willingly spent the entire night sleeping comfortably in her arms.

The behavior genuinely didn’t line up with the version of Ariel I’d gotten used to.

Part of me wondered if there was some hidden motive behind it all.

Some kind of ploy.

Maybe she wanted something from Zarah. Maybe she wanted something from me. Or maybe I was simply overthinking things again.

But no matter how much I thought about it, I genuinely couldn’t come up with anything.

Maybe it really was exactly as she’d claimed. Zarah was warm. Comfortable. So Ariel simply took advantage of that and went back to sleep without caring about anything else.

Nothing deeper than that.

Still...

If that truly was the reason, then she was eventually going to need to find another source of warmth.

Because, regardless of the reason, Zarah was still my partner, and the possessive part of me didn’t particularly enjoy the image of someone else getting comfortable with her so easily.

Even though someone was a cute-looking fox with four tails.

Just as I was about to turn away and start getting dressed for the meeting, something suddenly caught my attention.

I froze mid-step. Then slowly looked back toward Ariel again.

Something about her looked... different.

At first, I couldn’t immediately place it, but the longer I stared, the more obvious it became, causing my eyes to widen slightly in shock.

I took a slow step toward her. Then another.

Ariel immediately noticed the sudden attention and quickly dashed sideways across the room, her tails puffing slightly while a scowl formed on her face.

"What?" she asked suspiciously. "What are you staring at?"

I narrowed my eyes while continuing to look at her properly.

Then it finally clicked completely.

"Your tails..." I said slowly. "...It increased by one."

The moment the words left my mouth, Ariel’s expression visibly stiffened. Then she stared at me, her neck bending forward.

"...You just noticed?"

The disbelief in her voice sounded almost personal.

I didn’t respond immediately.

And somehow, my silence only made Ariel look even more offended.

She actually moved backward slightly while staring at me in disbelief.

"I cannot believe you’re only noticing now," she said. "I’ve had them since yesterday."

I blinked. Then genuinely gasped.

"Wait, seriously?" I asked. "I didn’t notice anything like that yesterday."

Though honestly, in hindsight, that wasn’t too surprising.

Yesterday had been absolute chaos from beginning to end.

Between dealing with Caius, preventing a battle, handling the oaths, overseeing the tournament, integrating an entirely new group into the clan, and planning for the King’s Games, my brain had been overloaded almost the entire time.

Noticing Ariel suddenly gaining another tail somehow never crossed my mind.

Ariel, however, still looked deeply unimpressed by that explanation.

And noticing she was starting to get genuinely irritated, I decided it was probably smarter to immediately change the subject.

"So..." I said while clearing my throat lightly. "How exactly did you gain another tail?"

Ariel sneered slightly after hearing the question.

"How else?" she replied. "By evolving."

"You evolved?!" I exclaimed in complete shock.

Ariel stared at me afterward with such a stunned expression that it almost looked like she was reconsidering our entire connection.

Her mouth parted slightly while she just... looked at me.

Then, after a long pause, she let out an exhausted breath.

"Why are you always so lost about everything?" she asked.

"It’s not my fault," I defended myself. "I already told you things around the clan have been insane lately."

Honestly, I was starting to get tired of repeating that explanation to everyone.

For some reason, however, Ariel didn’t get angry this time. Instead, she simply exhaled again and accepted the answer far more calmly than I expected, which honestly surprised me a little.

Maybe she’d finally started understanding how chaotic things had become around the clan lately. Or maybe she just didn’t care enough to continue arguing about it.

Either way, I wasn’t complaining.

Still, my curiosity quickly returned.

"So..." I said while looking at her tails again. "How exactly did you evolve?"

Ariel said while turning away again.

"You clearly weren’t paying enough attention to notice, so why does it matter now?"

"Just answer me already?" I said. "Remember, I promised yesterday I was going to start taking you more seriously."

Ariel glanced at me from the corner of her eye.

"You didn’t actually promise anything," she replied flatly. "But whatever."

She flicked one of her tails lazily before continuing.

"During the time you left to acquire the garnet, I explored on my own for a while and hunted monsters. And after killing enough of them, I finally reached the level required to evolve."

For a brief moment, the first thing that came to mind was:

’You went out alone without telling me, risking our lives?’

But the words never left my mouth.

Because honestly, I didn’t really have the right to criticize her for that.

Not when I had been doing the same thing. Throwing myself into dangerous situations without informing her first, despite the fact that our lives were linked together.

If anything, we were both equally guilty.

So instead of wasting time lecturing her over something I had no right to criticize, I simply...