Rush walked silently through the mushroom glade, the shadows from the huge, oak-sized stalks obscuring him as he moved.

This was his favourite time of day. The twilight slowly ebbing away. The moss muffling the sound of his footsteps as he walked, concealing him as he stalked his prey.

He was close now. So close, he could hear its sobs. They were the halting cries a new slave lets out when they think they’re alone and no one will see their weakness.

Humans, Rush thought, they’re weak, snivelling fools, raised with love and attention. They rarely survive long down here in the dank, mushroom forests before someone mercifully kills them.

He studied this one as he prepared to take its life. She was taller than him, her stringy, brown hair, dirty from neglect. She wore loose overalls that would provide little protection from the stone spike he held in his hand. It was likely that she had little in the way of possessions, excluding the meat on her body. However, the flesh alone made her death worthwhile.

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He crept closer, hefting the makeshift knife, waiting for the opportunity to make a killing strike. Suddenly, a foul odour shrouded him like a blanket, suffocating him with fear and making him pause.

Something huge dropped from above, crushing Rush and trapping him between the bulk of the creature and a mushroom stalk. He screamed but refused to give in to the pain. Life had taught him to run when possible, but whenever it wasn’t an option he fought like a demon. In a frenzy, he lashed out with the dagger, screaming, ‘Draal dholaar!‘ as he desperately attempted to free himself.

He frantically plunged the dagger into the beast‘s side once, twice, before a leg kicked out and he flew backwards. Pain flared, as his head bounced against a rock, and everything went dark.

Life in the twilight gloom of shadow mountain was brutal, rough, and often very, very short for a goblin slave.