"It's been three years. It's normal for you to have a hard time adapting." Barbera's sister comforted her.

Barbara had been staying at her sister's house in Eston for the past week, she was laying on a couch rubbing her temples.

"We'll start looking for a new place for you soon, okay? One without kids?" He sister continued.

"I'm sorry Mabel. It's just... when he gets too close so suddenly."

"Yeah, yeah." Mabel said comfortingly.

Goblins, with their childlike appearance, would often traumatize women towards boys. Just moments earlier Barbara had kicked her own nephew so hard he had required healing magic.

At least she's alive. Mabel thought to herself. That's more than we had hoped for.

"Has the leadership mentioned me?" Barbara said, sitting up straight.

"They said to give you time to recover."

"I've been locked up for years. Believe me, I've had enough rest for the rest of my life."

Mabel thought about it for a bit. "If you're ready, the our guild would like to know what the Adventurers' Guild was told."

"An evolved goblin type."

"Evolved? Hobgoblins?"

"Yeah" Barbara wasn't very engaged in the subject and was studying the stitching on her glove while talking. "Just hobgoblins for now. It started last year when the elf was captured."

Mabel was a lot more interested. She leaned forward and stared in the distance, analyzing the situation. "So no ogre's or oni yet. That's good, but still, that's a step above monsters usually found in Eston."

"Maybe they'll send the Nightshade hero to deal with it." Barbara suggested.

"Laurus of the Hidden People? Not likely, he's too high-level to bother with E-level enemies."

Barbara chuckled at the mention of the Adventurers' Guild's unnatural threat classes. "No? What is he? D? C?"

"The Nightshade hero is a C level, but they say he has a potential way higher." Mabel answered soberly. "Anyway. The leadership has a bandit camp stationed in that wood to report on orcs, they might see something."

"Yeah, you could tell them or whatever. I don't want anything to do with the wilderness anymore. Maybe I can go back into smuggling."

"I'm sure the Thieves' Guild would be overjoyed to have you working with us again, Barbara."

----------------------------------------

Goblins don't tend to get to choose their own name.

In the first place, a goblin's name is more like a consistent insult they're called by, first made up by whoever was present for the birth. That's why they had names like 'First', 'Dumb' or 'Kicker'. Generally there wasn't much need to tell each other apart, except for keeping track of enemies, in which case the insult would do fine.

Right now two goblins, previously of the Horns clan, before that of the Drool clan and in the future hopefully of the Scratch clan, were given the rare chance to choose their own name.

As some of the oldest goblins in their surroundings and having grown up in a society without much concern for personal care, they had no shortages of traits that would make for appropriate insults. They were missing patches of hair, their teeth where browned and even black at some place and their skin showed its signs of wear and tear. But they could choose the names themselves, and they'd rather be called something cool.

"Fighter." Kicker suggested, hacking the frosted earth loose with a spear.

"Strong." Scratch said, climbing out of the hole while lifting a carved wooden bucket.

Scream laughed, he was also helping dig the well. "You no fight. You no are strong."

"Am strong" Scratch said, showing off to nobody in particular by lifting the heavy bucket over his head.

"Water!" Kicker exclaimed.

"Water?" Scratch got a confused look on his face while emptying his bucket., that didn't seem like a very good name.

"Water! Water!" The two goblin in the hole became excited and plunged their hands into the damp soil where ground water was leaking through.

"Ah! Cold!" Kicker whined, tucking his icy hands under his newly gifted cloak.

"Cold is nice name." Scream said, still digging with his hands.

When the well was done the bucket was affixed to a beam that was suspended above it with the long rope. Whenever they wanted the goblins could rake up a bucket of muddy water from the ground in the safety of their own square. Scratch designed a filtration system of rocks and gravel in a large clay tank from which the muddy water flowed with the same clearness as river water. Naturally, he still had the kids distill it further before it could be used for anything.

Kicker chose the name Digger and Scratch went for Laugh. Which weren't particularly ridiculous.

----------------------------------------

Currently there were eleven goblins in the cave.

* The leader, Scratch

* The warriors, Kicker, Biter and Teeth

* The crafters, Second and Quiet

* The harvesters, Dumb and Fat

* The prisoners, Scream, Digger and Laugh

It was slightly packed when they were all in the same room together, which happened at night when it was time to sleep.

Now that they had a firm grasp on creating wooden building materials Scratch felt confident in expanding the cave using scaffolding against collapse.

The prisoners were send to the mines to dig out rooms in the shale layer. Four different rooms were planned, all directly connected to the existing tunnel. They had been given newly forged metal pickaxes for the job, unfortunately the tools where rather large and with Scratch lacking expertise in blacksmithing they frequently broke and needed repairing.

The biggest issue was food. They were now feeding themselves with harvested insects, ground up into paste. But that wasn't a long-term solution.

Scratch discussed it with his warriors.

"If it goes on like this we won't last the winter."

"There's no animals Scratch." Kicker said.

"There's no fruits or nuts." Biter added.

"Look here." Scratch had a plate of shale in front of him, with a little rock it was easy to draw clear and readable lines on its surface.

What he had drawn was a recognizable image to all of them. A map of the surrounding are, complete with rivers, streams and use trails. However, at various places he had marked the area with circles and crosses.

"After we defeated Horns the main group fell apart. I discussed it with Scream and the others, these are the locations they likely fled to. The safer spots they knew about, to hole themselves up in."

Teeth grabbed the plate and rested it on his lap, saying nothing.

"You think they'll have food?" Biter said, looking over Teeth's shoulder.

"We'll go take it!" Kicker cheered.

Teeth just gritted his teeth and grasped his new sword-like weapon.

"That was my plan at first too." Scratch admitted. "But I've reconsidered. There's a yearly occurrence of humans coming to the forest to kill goblins."

"That...!" Teeth jumped up but Scratch stopped him with a hand gesture.

"Specifically to kill goblins. That's not what you saw before. In any case, I think it's better not to remove too much of the buffer between them and us."

Kicker and Biter looked at each other with a confused look. "Uhhm..." "Don't kill them?"

"That's right. Rather than fight, we can trade with them. We have plenty of stuff goblins don't have access to. Even if foodstuff is hard to get right now."

"What's trade with them?" Kicker asked.

"You know. Offer something in exchange for something else. We have vases and clothing and such."

He plotted out a path for them to take while saying that.

"If they don't have anything but they think they can get something, offer to come back later when they've had time to prepare."

"So, we won't be fighting." Teeth said, as they were about to set out with the sleigh full off wares.

"Not unless they attack you." Scratch explained again. "We don't want to lose anybody else."

"But, if they do attack. Than we'll be fighting back." Teeth said, staring at the ground clenching his fist.

Scratch was aware some sort of emotion was going on, he patted him on the shoulder. "I don't know what to say..." He turned around. "Hey Second! Can you come deal with this?"

----------------------------------------

"They killed Tyrone, they killed my boy Tyrone!"

The gaudy looking man, dressed in a bright sports jersey, with gold plated jewelry adorning his neck and arms, was pacing up and down the apartment.

His host was calmly rolling a cigarette, dealing with heated situations like this was part of helping run an organized crime syndicate.

"Come on, nigga, say something!" His guest demanded.

"Say something?"

"Yeah!"

"Come to my apartment, in the middle of the day, which you were supposed to never do, saying 'this and that are wacked, do something', and I'm supposed to drop everything and help you, what? Avenge him?"

"Come on man. Tyrone. You went to his bar mitzwa and everything."

"Don't insult me, I knew Tyrone just as well as you did, I trusted him more than I trust you. You think you'll honor his memory starting a war?"

"No." The gaudy looking man had a shivering lower lip as he pointed at his host. "They started it, those goddamn Chinks shot him. They. Declared war. On us."

"I'll cut you some slack, seeing as how you're grieving and all." The host declared, putting the cigarette in his mouth. "Go home. Get some rest. Never tell the Syndicate what wars to fight."

His subordinate was about to leave, but turned around again. "So then the Syndicate doesn't fight at my side. Maybe the Syndicate isn't my homeboy no more. Maybe the west district is in this along."

The other man stopped himself from lighting his cigarette, he sighed. "Sit dow." He said.

His guest was apprehensive, but he obeyed, placing his large brightly colored form into the more muted designer chair, forming a striking contrast.

The host put his cigarette away in his breast pocket and began to speak. "What do you think the Syndicate does? Is it just a big name to hide behind so the local gangs are afraid of you?"

"Shit, man. I know the Syndicate gave me everything, but..."

"No buts. I'm not lecturing you about gratitude, or loyalty. Forget about those, that's master morality."

"Uh, what?"

"Listen to this. You are a district manager of the narcotics division, alright?"

"Shit man. Sure?"

"The Syndicate takes its cut, not for franchising, but for the careful moderation of your work environment. Capiche?"

The man in the chair fell silent, he had a strained look on his face.

"Bribing the cops. Drugging the water. Driving down property values." The host was counting the ways the Syndicate kept the neighbourhoods suitable for selling drugs. "And yes, sometimes, teaching respect to gangs that think they can disrespect the brand."

"What is this pussy shit, because they're not a gang they don't count? Why shouldn't I go over there myself with Clevis and Bu-"

"This is different." He interrupted him. "Because it interferes with the business of the armaments division. The weapons exchange has priority over local brand strength. You get that? Because our access to unregistered weapons is vital to all branches and layers of the organization."

The guest stood up and got in his face. "Tyrone is worth less to you than a bunch of forty sevens? Man. Do you ev-"

"I said; sit. down." The host pushed him at the center of gravity and toppled him backwards onto the chair again. "Now I wouldn't trade anybody for a gun." He crouched next to the man to get up close. "But blowing this deal won't bring anybody back, you understand?"

"What about some justice?" The guest said, still challengingly.

"There's no such thing. It's a made up word, alright?" Me made a little joke. "For cops putting away teenagers. So they can live with themselves." It didn't land. "Listen, I don't want you to end up like Tyrone, but you will. Unless you can get rid of this sentimentality, these emotions. They're not helping you, they're not helping the people around you. They're making you irrational, there's no bigger target than a clouded mind, not junkies, not the excommunicated, not 'pussy shits'," he tapped his forehead, "but the idiots."

He didn't send the man home with an eased spirit, but he had dissuaded him from a revenge plan at least. He chalked the rage up to a mind ravaged by drugs and a macho culture. Later, when he was reincarnated as a goblin, he didn't think he'd have to deal with the rage filled bloodlust among different tribes anymore. This could be characterized as naive to the point of absurdity.

----------------------------------------

"Is this yours?" Huckabee showed the captured goblin the makeshift stone axe they had found.

First stretched his arm to receive it but his captor showed no sign of handing it over.

"Who made this? Was it a goblin?" He continued.

First clenched the bars of his cage in rage and stared at him intently.

"I know you can talk. Even normal goblins know a few words. But now you're keeping quiet."

Still no response.

"We kill goblins. Normally. Normal goblins."

It was strange how guilty he felt over threatening the boy like this. Usually he had no reservations about cutting the cretins down when trekking through the forest, but in full light and with the clothing on a goblin was just too similar to a human child.

He sighed. He would have to tell Harkness he couldn't get anything out of the captured goblin. Dee would laugh at him again and they would have to go look for hobgoblins while there were still orcs about. Why would the Guild know what kind of monsters were around in the forest anyway? They weren't the ones that lived here, Harkness and her bandits did.

"Then kill me." The goblin said.

"What was that?"

"I won't talk about my brothers. So just kill me." He tried to be stoic while saying that, but his voice cracked and his hands were trembling.

"Your brothers. Are they orange with little horns?" Huckabee tried. The glint of recognition in First's eyes was all he needed.

He stood up and left, letting the weapon clatter on the ground in front of the cage.

----------------------------------------

While the warriors were making their trek, meeting up with various isolated splinter tribes, the others were making incremental changes to the base.

The snow was all mushy and wet now and it had rained, water had leaked into the cave and Scratch had had to design a little diagonal roof over the chimney that would keep rain out but not keep smoke in.

The different workstations on the square received protection from the elements too. They had taken the time to build mud huts around the bloomery and anvil-rock, the fireplace, the butchery and the well. The building were made out of clay packked againstt woven wood, wth pointy roofs of freshly cut branches, whose stillgreen leaves kept out he rain. They even build a stilted roof to protect the wood stockpile from any rain. From a distance it started to look like a little village. Goblin town.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

"I think it's time to start considering a wall again." Scratch mused, staring at the little structure Second and Slow had build when they were little. A large pile of shale rock had been stacked against it, the result of the new mining effort.

"Maybe we should focus on the new rooms for now." Dumb said.

So it came to pass that when Teeth and the others returned with foodstuff and treasure they had a furnished dining room to eat it in.

It was a table carved out of a large tree trunk and the chairs were basically just logs. But it was refined eating, especially with the new iron cutlery, forged by Second, who had developed a talent for tinkering.

The goblins were overjoyed to finally be able to make use of the room they had worked so hard to complete, so they were eager to dissect what the warriors had brought.

This was the collection of traded for goods.

* A monstrous deer.

* Two horned rabbits.

* Three sacks of flour. (Stolen from a human farm.)

* A living chicken.

"The chicken stays fresh until you kill it." Kicker explained.

"But you do need to feed it." Biter added.

They properly bled the dead animals and kept the chicken in the smithing hut for the time being.

That day they ate roasted rabbit with crushed burdock roots as vegetables. They did it at a table, on plates with forks and knives.

You see. Scratch though to himself. Weakness is a state of mind. I don't need to just accept the lifestyle that witch assigned to me. Only the body I can't help.

"Did these always have horns?" Fat wondered aloud, staring at his dish.

"Maybe it is evolved form." Laugh said, who had grown more eloquent over the past days.

Scratch stopped chewing. "Evvolf fworm?"

"Yes." Scream explained. "Creatures can become... stronger creatures. With magic. Evolve."

Scratch quickly swallowed. "Can goblins evolve? Have you ever seen something evolve?"

"I... uh not seen. Missy tell-" He corrected himself. "-told me about it. Missy is human mother."

Laugh was eager to add to the conversation. "Can happen suddenly -BAMF!- because monster is too strong."

Scratch stopped enjoying his meal, he was thinking deeply now. Evolution. I don't need to accept what was given to me at all.

----------------------------------------

That night the warriors, who had had to sleep in the snow during the trading trek, were given their own sleeping quarters.

The mined area had been decorated with drawings and woodcarvings and they each had their own bed, a fur bag filled with moss to make it soft. Being further underground the area wouldn't lose heat as fast during the winter, it was slightly warmer than in the communal entrance area, even without the fire.

For now Scratch was sleeping with the others on what he called the 'goblin pile' in his mind. They weren't always laying on top of each other, but they were certainly sharing the floor.

Let me reset my priorities. He thought. I've been focused on surviving until now. Now I'd like to gain back some dignity.

He played with some pebbles and ordered four of them in a row.

The goddess sought to punish me with a new life. But really, her sentence can be broken down into four bad aspects.

To begin with. I was given a deprived life. Where food and other commodities are hard to get.

The second aspect is that I'm hated. Those who want to kill me are not hard to find. He thought back to the time he lost his eye when he decided that.

Thirdly, I'm a weak creature. I can't defend myself against most enemies.

And lastly. I'm ignorant. I was placed in a world with different rules that I don't understand.

He looked at the different pebbles that he had assigned the different curses.

Let's put off being hated for now. I'll focus on that after I achieve the other goals. He took the pebble and placed it to the side.

Deprived. I've been making progress. After we make it through the winter, maybe we can do some agriculture.

Ignorance. I can't make plans for now. Only stay alive and keep my eyes open. Maybe it should tie in with undoing hatred and learning from humans. He placed the pebble to the side with the other one.

But weakness. He picked up the pebble. I had resigned myself to it. But it's the biggest one, without it the others would be so much less significant, and if the older goblins are right...

"Scratch" Kicker interrupted his thought process by climbing up from deeper in the cave. "I can't sleep. Can I lie with you guys?"

Scratch put his finger to his lips. "If you're really quiet." He whispered.

----------------------------------------

Nothing else interrupted the night and Scratch was left staring at the ceiling, wondering about evolution, until he drifted off to sleep.

But evolution had to wait, because he had three sacks of flour to concern himself with the following morning.

The goblins that had procured it had eaten it straight from the container, indeed, one of the sacks had a few handfuls removed already. Flour wasn't considered good eating, but it'd keep you alive when starving. They'd traded them for a single iron knife.

Scratch had bigger plans for the stuff, he wanted to try his hand at baking bread. It wasn't likely to be very good bread, missing yeast, salt and a variety of other ingredients, but it would compliment their current low-fibre diet.

The flour mixed with a few drops of water would turn into a dough-y substance that could be rolled into balls and baked on an iron plate, for this they used the fireplace that kept the communal home warm at night. The things baked unevenly and the outside would burn before the inside was dry, on top of that they were bland in taste and thick in texture. However, the others were very happy with the product, eagerly burning their fingers to get them out of the fire.

Scratch left Quiet to further streamline the process, which he did by baking the bread in the shape of large flat loafs and mixing edible herbs into the dough. It filled the place with a pleasant aroma and distracted the goblins from their work. They all collected around the fire and Scratch had to tell them to go back to work.

He took the opportunity to tell Dumb and Fat that there was enough wood harvested now and that they could stop logging. He had come up with the idea to make more underground rooms to protect them against the more extreme temperatures near the surface, they could use the holes made by digging for iron as a starting point and mine them out in the deeper part of the tunnel. So the tribe was going to need mining support scaffolding, and more miners.

"Now that we've got some more material." Second said, while scraping the deer hide. "Maybe we can make some clothes for the visitors."

"Call them the prisoners for now." Scratch muttered, pondering on the size of the deer's enormous skull and dog-like teeth.

Second had purposefully waited until Kicker and Biter had set off again with Teeth before addressing the subject. Teeth was the biggest opponent of the prisoners' familiar treatment in the tribe. He resented them for the loss of two of his brothers by their friends.It wasn't unreasonable, they had made allies with Small and Last, who had later turned against the cave tribe over petty reasons. If nothing else, they could be accused of being criminally poor judges of character.

Scratch cared mainly about the labour they provided. But Second felt a kinship to them. They had lost family, just like he had, he wanted to help them.

"It'd look and smell a lot better." He tried, appealing to Scratch's own sensibilities. The goblin loincloths they wore didn't cover much and smelled of rot and decay. "And we need to replace the lost shoes anyway."

"I suppose." Scratch said, done playing with the animal remains now. Suddenly it seemed like he had thought of something. "Yeah. Yeah. It'd be for the best. Let's get one of them out of that stuffy old mine too and help us with it."

So they set up shop at Scratch's old workshop spot to start sewing four additional cloaks and five additional pairs of shoes. The extra cloak was to replace the one Second had given to Growler.

With Quiet manning the stove the ones recruited for the job were Scratch, Second and Laugh.

Rather than give them each a product to work on, Scratch organized them into an assembly line. Laugh would cut the material according to their instructions, Second combined the materials into the right shape and did some preliminary stitching and Scratch would complete it. Scratch reasoned that Laugh could learn by watching and it was best to give him the most straightforward job for now.

"So, Laugh, are you enjoying your time here?" He asked while they were working.

"The food... and the warmth... is good." Laugh was concentrating hard on doing his job and simultaneously conforming to Scratch's standard for proper grammar.

"Good. Good. That's nice." Scratch concluded it was the amenities that made it worthwhile for him. "Have you lived in a lot of different tribes?"

"..." Laugh was silent for a moment. "More than one."

"Did you see a lot of evolved goblins?"

"Uhm... No. I saw... only... only Horns, Biter, Spitter and Last."

The orange goblins from the derelict village.

"But you didn't see them evolve."

"...No."

"Did, whats-her-name, Missy... ever tell you about what causes evolution?"

"Scratch, I don't think-" Second began when Laugh stayed silent, but Scratch hushed him.

Laugh stopped cutting when thinking about Missy, he stared into the distance. "Only stories."

----------------------------------------

Laugh did have some fairy tales about special goblins. One about a goblin that was smaller than the others but discovered that he had special magical powers. (Scratch almost dismissed it as fiction, but remembered that in this world magical spells wouldn't seem that out of place.) And a few of stronger, bigger goblins that used their strength to become leaders. One version had become quite exaggerated over its continued retellings, it was the story of a goblin 'king'. The king was supposed to be as big as a house and rule over all the goblins in the world. Human kings bowed to him and payed him tribute.

"That obviously never happened." Scratch commented, through his sewing.

"It could have." Quiet said softly, when bringing them a piece of torn bread and a cup of broth each. "Kicker talked about a group hiding in a big, big abandoned house with a shiny chair as wide as this cave."

"That is wide." Second commented.

In any case, Laugh had enough stories to keep them entertained while they worked, and when he ran out Scratch began to sing. The others hummed along but they didn't know the words.

----------------------------------------

Small had a destination in mind when fleeing the cave tribe. He had been traveling with Scream and the others out of necessity, but he had his own group he could count on. His brother and cousins had wasted little time splintering from Horns' group and stayed together as a tribe. Loud always had had the nature of a patriarch, rather than a servant. Even under Drool and under Horns he had been defiantly counter to authority, without challenging the leader directly, forming a smaller tribe of loyalists within the larger tribe.

"Is Last." He said, introducing his friend. "Travel with Scream and Growler."

With those words suddenly Last was part of a tribe again.

The home of their group was a hole in the ground, they had put branches and leaves over it to camouflage and protect it. However, it had still filled up with rain water. As a consequence all of them were caked in mud. For food they hunted bugs and scavenged dead animals, in doing so they had to stay together in groups to discourage local large cats from killing and eating them. The same day the two arrived one of Small's brothers had been dragged off, despite their group tactics.

"We go get woman." The patriarch declared. "Get bigger group."

He held up a large butcher's knife. As a weapon it was much more impressive than Drool's old knife.

"Mother... is dead." Small said miserably. Small was under the impression that he would be as disappointed by the news as he was himself. His only good memory was of being held by her just after being born.

Loud didn't seem very distraught by the news. "Drool take our woman. We take other woman. Know place of humans."

Last stood around awkwardly while the muddy goblins looked at his shoes.

This place seemed decidedly worse than the last, but Small had taken him along for the betrayal, he couldn't go back. It made him want to cry, but he steeled himself, he would almost be a year old soon. Crying was for newborn.

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"So there are hobgoblins in the forest? Are you sure of this?" Lydia Harkness played with her throwing knives while her subordinate was reporting to her.

She had been a knight once, but even then she had dressed more for maneuverability than defense. Currently she was wearing combat gear, as she always did nowadays, it commanded respect in the lawless community of bandits. She didn't have a office as such, but her tent functioned as a base of operations for controlling the bandit camp. It was bigger than the others and had a desk in it, behind which she sat, leaned back and digging her small weapons into the wood.

"As sure as day, boss. Your intel was right. The kid we caught- I mean the goblin. It's his family that made the weapons."

She still didn't look at him. "Well, that's alright then. Isn't it?"

"Boss?"

"If it was by the orcs, that would mean the two races had started to work together. But if they just have a few hobgoblins, we don't have to deal with a unified force."

Huckabee sighed in relief. It looked like he wasn't going to be send out to confirm the rumour.

"That is..." Harkness began. "if we're absolutely certain."

Huckabee looked at her incredulously. She had heard it from the Thieves' Guild, she had heard it from him, what else did she need? It wasn't like it was rare for hobgoblins to take over goblin tribes and arm them with better gear. In his own hometown hobgoblins were all around and they'd often wield weapons looted from dead adventurers. Did this issue really require that much skepticism?

Meanwhile the bandit leader was mulling something over.

"I have tried to get the Thieves' Guild to post a request at the Adventurers' Guild in my stead. But they're too scared they'd expose themselves. Those bastards! Aren't we always sticking our neck out for them?"

Huckabee didn't quite know what to say or where his leader was going with this tirade.

"Huck. I'd like you to explore the ancient goblin king's palace for me, and take Dee with you. If the goblins are organizing, that's where they'd do it."

The order made Huckabee jump, he started sweating. "I-isn't that near where we think the orc camp is?"

"Then. Do. It. Sneakily! We have to nip threats in the bud before they become a danger. That's how we protect ourselves. Understand?"

"Y-yes, boss." Now he'd done it. She was angry with him.

"Dismissed." She threw in some knightly formality to get rid of him when he didn't get the conversation was over.

"Y-yes." Huckabee hurried out of the tent, thoroughly on edge.

Lydia wasn't in a particularly good mood herself. She leaned on her desk and folded her hands into one another. She had pretended it had been her own decision, but the order came from up high, the leaders of the Thieves' Guild used their leverage over them more and more every single year. The bandits were little more than their attack force right now, minions that guard smuggling routes. It used to be a lot more equal, when the bandits had control over the goods stolen from caravans and the thieves bought it from them. But that was before her time at this side of the law, nowadays they spend their time on a leash, waiting on hands and feet on a reward the thieves had no incentive to hand out, but only they could offer. That promise of return to society is what kept her people going, so they had to continue doing the bidding of that horrible anonymous leadership.

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Goblin King

Family: Demons

Threat Level: A

Reward: Not Standardized

The goblin king is a demonic entity that enters the overworld by possessing the body of a newborn goblin. Its demonic magic causes the body to swell up massively, making it resemble a highly obese and gigantic goblin, nearly immobile in its swollen state. The goblin king posses a wealth of knowledge and a variety of spells, but its strongest power is to inspire the loyalty of goblins and other subhumans with its tremendous size.

The appearance of a goblin king is an international threat, if left to their own devices these beings will eventually unify enough monsters to take over the world. There have been instances of a demon king being a goblin king. The slaying of a goblin king is considered a quest of level A, meaning it can only be issued by nobility and the reward is decided by the requester.

A goblin king on their own is quite weak, they rely on massive amounts of goblin and hobgoblin footsoldiers to fight form them.