Drakar’s POV:
Drakar Nightshade was the ugliest goblin in the Nightshade tribe. Not only were his features not similar to any other goblin in the tribe. His reptilian snout, big reflective eyes and forked tongue which made him look vastly different from the other members of his tribe. To make matters worse he also had bluish-red scales covering his body, unlike the beautiful blue-green skin of his brethren and worst of all a thin tail-like mutation, which made him stand out from his tribe like a sore thumb. His adoptive parents told him that his ugly features and defective mutation might have been the reason his birth parents abandoned him as a baby, and that he might be a new goblin subspecies.
Despite his parents and siblings best efforts, being the most hideous goblin in Nightshade tribe did not make his childhood a pleasant experience for Drakar. To overcome his plight Drakar had decided to become the strongest in his tribe, as like any true goblin knows, Drakar knew that only true strength can change the opinion of a goblin, for goblins always follow the strong. With firm resolution Drakar set out with his three siblings - Grub, Quib and Wizzle, as well as his only friend Kragga to make a war party of five. After immense efforts such as venturing into the deepest forests to hunt the biggest prey, by fighting off enemies five times their size, and getting war credit in the war against other tribes, Drakar’s war party reached the exalted status of being the number one war party in their tribe. And with Drakar being the leader of the said party, finally started enjoying the fruits of their effort.
Drakar became the most exalted Goblin War chief in the Nightshade tribe. After innumerable life and death struggles, Drakar had recently ranked up to rank - C, which according to the goblin elders only five other goblins have managed to achieve in the history of their tribe. Drakar had even led his party through life and death, helping his siblings and only friend to reach the D-Rank. Until recently, out of the around one thousand goblins in his Nightshade tribe, three hundred were under his command. Goblinwomen threw themselve at him disregarding his hideous visage, colour and mutation. He had become the protector and vanguard of his tribe as well as a candidate for the next Goblin chief. Drakar was a prime example of a winner of life, He was a character who rose up from the very bottom of society and through sheer perseverance and hard work managed to carve out a high place for himself within it.
And Drakar’s beautiful dream life would have continued if not for the damn humans who suddenly decided that his tribe was a nuisance. All the effort Drakar had made to make his tribe prosper had been wasted when the humans nearby decided to exterminate the goblin population. Their around thousand strong population had been reduced to around four hundred after many skirmishes and raids with the humans. When half the population had been decimated, the great shaman sage - Slinkshadow Nightshade along with the current chieftain Vorkus Nightshade came to the difficult decision to give up on their ancestral ground and move the entire tribe to a safer place. The tribe started evacuating into the direction the shaman pointed out, after communicating with the spirits, while Drakar was given the important task of vanguard and scout. It was Drakars responsibility to find a safe and prosperous place for settling down in the direction pointed out by the shaman sage.
It has been forty days since the start of the evacuation. Drakar had taken his war party as well as forty subordinates with him to scout out the nearby area and hunt for food for the tribe following behind him. He knew that this situation could not go on for much longer. All the rations that the tribe had brought with them had already been depleted. If you examined the injured, sick and old as well as women and children, anybody could think even with their toes, that the extended travel has not been kind on them. Their previous travels had led them through dry plains and areas close to human settlements, making it unsuitable for their tribe to settle down. Just as their tribe had almost given up hope, and was on the verge of making the decision to abandon their weaker tribe members, they luckily entered a forest, which led them to be able to replenish their supplies and give them hope that they might soon find a suitable environment. Currently Drakar was making half of his subordinates search for a suitable cave system or forest valley with abundant food sources where the tribe could settle down, while the other half of his subordinates were hunting for rations.
As Drakar was contemplating the situation of the tribe and how to solve it, one of his subordinates came back running, requesting an audience, interrupting his train of thought. “Lord Drakar! Lord Drakar! I found something… I found something!!!” A metre tall squirt with beady eyes and overly large ears flopping about rushed up to Drakar.
“Silence!.. Is this how you report to your superior, Snik? How many times do I have to tell you guys that we need to keep discipline like the humans, and then you wonder why they are always winning against us.” Drakar tried to once again start the hopeless endeavour of disciplining his subordinates. Right as Drakar was about to launch into another lengthy lecture about why goblins needed discipline, and how this would help them to reach greater heights and eventually defeat the humans. Snik interrupted him with what he felt was much more important news than Lord Draka’s droning lecture, which would start to change into a buzzing sound in his ears after a few minutes. “But lord Drakar, I found it… I found a huge cave with lots of food… it looks super and we can settle there.”
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“What!? Why didn’t you say that earlier.” Drakar scolded.
Snik felt betrayed. Wasn’t it Lord Drakar who interrupted him as he was bringing important news. However Snik did not have the courage to blame Lord Drakar, especially about his famous Discipline Lecture and thus could only endure the scolding silently.
“What are you still bumbling around for? Tell me in detail what you found?.” Drakar reprimanded poor Snik once again. Snik started explaining with an aggrieved expression. “Well it is a three hour travel distance from our location. I found a secluded valley among a few mountains. Which I thought might be a good place for our tribe to settle down, when I wanted to be sure and scouted out the nearby mountains, I saw a huge cave entrance halfway up one of the mountains.There seemed to be a forest and abundant food to hunt in the cave. Of course I did not enter it, since you instructed us to not enter caves or other enclosed places without backup, Lord Drakar! But the cave seemed to be pretty big, from what I saw from the entrance, And I think I also heard the sound of running water.”
Drakar thought for a moment, Snik’s description seemed to be tailor made to meet all the requirements of their Nightshade tribe. Their tribe preferred areas with less sunlight and thus lived in caves or forested valleys. But never could Drakar have imagined that Snik would find a forest within a Cave. Is that not the most perfect living place for their tribe? With a forest right in the Cave, they did not even have to go out to get food, and could directly hunt the animals in the forest. And it seemed like the cave even had a water source. As expected the direction pointed out by the Great Shaman Sage could never be wrong. Now Drakar just had to explore the cavern and check what was in the cavern. Such a prime location must surely be occupied by some other tribe or strong creature.
It just never crossed Snik’s or Drakar’s mind that a forest growing inside a cave was an unnatural existence.
Drakar blew the horn to summon back all his subordinates. After a few hours all his underlings were gathered around him. And thus Drakar started addressing his subordinates. “This time Snik here seems to have made a great contribution to our Nightshade tribe. Snick found a prime location for us to settle down. However, we must scout out the new location and remove all the hidden dangers. Therefore, the scouting team will be coming with me to appraise the new location Snik has found for us. The hunting team will take all the prey and return back to the main camp. Inform the elders to start setting off in this direction, and to be prepared for war. We might have to deal with another tribe to take the location the spirits provided for us. Afterwards, Snik will provide you with the direction the tribe should be setting off to, we will also be leaving markers along the way. This will be the new beginning of our tribe. May the ancestral spirits be with us!!!”
“May the Ancestral Spirits be with us!!!” All the Goblins shouted back and then started running around like ants to get ready and carry out their War Chiefs instructions. Excited murmurs could be heard as the hunting team started preparing the prey, and the scouting team started packing up the tents and other necessities. Everyone had the feeling that this time they had really found a place to settle down.
After all the preparations were done, Drakar’s War Band of forty five goblins split into two groups, with twenty of them setting off to the main camp which was a day's travel distance away. While the other group consisting of Drakar’s War Party and the Scouting team set off after Snik, to check out their new Goblin Utopia.
After a few hours of travel, Drakar and company reached the location Snick had found for them. Drakar saw a secluded valley in between three mountains filled with coniferous trees, Halfway up one of the mountains was a huge Cavern opening several dozen metres wide pointing towards the valley. Humongous trees seemed to be growing towards the upper parts of the mountain where the cavern was located. The valley seemed to have a refreshing feel taking away all the fatigue from their hours long fast paced travel.
Even the valley seemed to be a good place to settle down with only three entrances, which was difficult to attack and easy to defend. Drakar thought even as he could not wait to check out the cavern, which must have been even better. However, since it was almost twilight and Drakar valued discipline among his troops, and thus must be the role model to them, Drakar pushed down his impulse to directly explore the cavern right there and now, and decided to set up camp first before scouting out the cavern the next day.
“Listen up everybody, we will be setting up camp in that valley there. Scout out the valley to make sure there will be no dangers. Five of you will be taking night watch in a two hour rotation each. Nobody is to enter the Cavern tonight. We will be doing an initial appraisal of the Cavern tomorrow as a War band. This matter is too important for our tribe, for anybody to mess up. Anybody who goes against my orders this time, will be killed. Let this be my only warning. Do you understand?”
“Sir, Yes Lord Drakar!!” The Goblins in their oversized helmets and tree bark and metal armour saluted while standing in two lines, as Lord Drakar likes it.
“Okay, Scouts set off. Check whether this Valley is safe enough for us to set up camp for tonight.”