Excerpts from: Aritiparitie’s Comprehensive Study of the Scourge known as Goblinkin – Chapter: On Goblin Diversity
“…found across nearly all known lands and regions. Yet often appear more different to each other than humans to elves or gnomes. The hobgoblins are an excellent example, they are nearly the height of a man and are known for their cunning and skill at fighting. When first encountered in the Lands of Steel, they were thought to be a new people, but soon revealed themselves to be just the same as the rest of goblinkin, though better organized and more disciplined…”
“I have come to the conclusion that goblins are some of the most magically reactive creatures in existence. Goblins that grow up in an unclaimed region when exposed to a magical domain will adapt extremely quickly. While there hasn’t been properly documented research on how long it takes, mostly due to the volatile nature of goblins, I estimate that they could possibly adapt in under a month… Previously adapted individuals remain unchanged however even when being introduced to a new domain. I have theories as to why this is, but they are yet to be confirmed.”
Grobby grumped as he tromped through the chest high grass. Hrokky had led them since the tribe had been destroyed by the big orcs in lots of metals, and he hadn’t eaten anything all day. This was somehow Hrokky’s fault, he was sure, but he wasn’t sure what to do about it. All the hunters had been the ones to fight against the big orcs in lots of metals along with the matriarch, but they all died. Now there was no food. He had chased a rabbit earlier, but it got away. Not sure how it saw him when he had come up behind it, but it was probably Hrokky’s fault. He stumbled slightly one a tuft of grass and growled at it threateningly. It didn’t press the issue and Grobby nodded satisfied that at least the grass was afraid of him.
After a short grumbly march Grobby finally arrived back at the temporary goblin camp. The campsite was beneath the boughs of a copse of pine trees. The trees formed natural tents, though the detritus was quite prickly for even the goblins tough soles. They had cleared it from beneath the trees so they could sleep and used the dead wood and needles to make a small fire. Hrokky at least knew how to start a fire, though so far most of the goblins hadn’t had any luck at catching any animals to cook.
A quick glance around showed him that nearly half of the surviving goblins were out, and the Hrokky appeared to be one of them. This didn’t make Grobby any happier, instead it only made him surer that Hrokky was a bad leader. His grumbling stomach soon distracted his own grumbling, and he began to investigate the makeshift campsite for some spare food.
The other goblins in the camp were focused on their own tasks. Prokky was scratching at a piece of wood with a piece of broken rock, whether it was supposed to be a spear or a bow Grobby, and probably Prokky, wasn’t too sure. Dannira was scrapping pieces of grass with another rock and trying to braid a rope or string from the fibers, but it didn’t look like it would be very long or was strong enough to tie anything together with. Frokky, Prokky’s brother, was making a ball of pine sap, pinecones, and pine needles while giggling in a sinister manner. Grobby avoided the sticky mess that Frokky was turning into. Tammira was pounding some nuts and roots and mushrooms into an unappealing lumpy paste with two dirty rocks. That looked promising, well actually no it looked positively unappealing, but Grobby was hungry.
As he approached Tammira looked up and gave him the stink eye. He froze for a second before his stomach urged him on with another grumble. Keeping eye contact and moving very slowly he inched his hand towards Tammira’s work. Her eyes kept on his as she glared, before all of a sudden flicking down to his approaching hand. With a hiss she pounced at him her rock swinging towards his head. With a screech he dove back and scrambled away from her as she chased him around the campsite spitting and hissing at him. Most of the other goblins stopped their work to watch the excitement unfold, hooting and cackling and yelling encouragement to either Tammira or Grobby. Except Frokky, he was occupied with his sticky ball… and giggling.
Grobby scrabbled around trees and under boughs with Tammira in hot pursuit. Eventually making a full circuit around the camp and landing a hand in the paste Tammira had been working on while he passed by. The hand was quickly brought to his mouth, and he only had a chance to clean off one finger before Tammira tackled him to the ground. With a deranged cry she raised the rock high and Grobby covered his head in terror while still sucking the paste off his fingers.
Before she could bring the rock down on his head or arms a clawed hand caught her wrist and pulled her off of Grobby, still screaming and kicking. Grobby had the chance to sit up before someone caught him by the scruff and lifted him off of the ground. It was Hrokky, with Broggy and Kroffy holding Tammira. They had taken the rock away from her and were trying ineffectively to avoid her scratching claws.
“Stop!” Hrokky shouted, his voice booming over the campsite. Tammira settled down, but she was still breathing heavy. Grobby finished licking the paste from another finger and moved onto the next, hanging in the air quietly.
“Grobby, you too grabby.” Hrokky warned, but Grobby looked at him silently with wide eyes still sucking on his fingers. Hrokky sighed. “Tam no attack other gobbos. Even if they grabby.” At the last part he gave Grobby a stink eye, and Tammira hissed again in response, but offered no other complaints.
Hrokky was a head taller than most of the other surviving goblins, aside from Broggy and Mattira, and all three were the eldest survivors of the tribe. Hrokky was taking charge at the moment, but Broggy was a bit of a loner and Mattira was easily distracted. There were only fifteen goblins left from the tribe, and none had entered adulthood yet.
“Broggy found lotsa trees, and big water place. Lotsa food, show ‘em Broggy.” Broggy released Tammira and upturned a bag that was made from some leaves and sturdy piece of vine. Out of the makeshift bag fell a couple of snails, some frogs and a few newts. He shook it and out plopped some algae as well. It didn’t look, or smell, appetizing but as Grobby finished sucking the paste of his fingers his eyes were fixed on the creatures. Unfortunately for him, he was still being held aloft by Hrokky and watched in sadness as the creatures were handed out among the goblins.
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The goblins settled in for the night, those who had gone exploring during the day coming back as the sun fell towards the earth. Hrokky made a fire from the rest of the leftover pine needles and sticks and one of the frogs that hadn’t been eaten raw was cooked over the fire. The group chattering and bickering over the meager meal until all fell asleep beneath the pine trees. In the morning they awoke to find it raining, fire long extinguished by the falling water. None of them wanted to go out into the rain, but they had no food and no more fire, so the group tromped across the heather following Broggy and Hrokky.
Grobby and Frokky walked with their mouths open towards the sky and tongues sticking out trying to catch as much of the rain as they could. It also meant that they often stumbled into the other goblins or over the grass, which earned them a few bumps and scratches. By midday the rain let up, but the clouds stubbornly remained. The goblins shivered from the chill of being soaked to the bone, but soon saw the trees and pressed on. Reaching the trees Broggy led them along the edge of the forest until they reached a bog.
Ferns grew thick, and there were only a few scraggly trees poking up from the islands within the wetland. Hrokky split them into two groups. Most of the goblins would search for food in the bog, while Broggy, Prokky, and Dannira would go into the forest to find a place for the goblins to stay. Hrokky and Frokky went into the forest a little ways to find some dry things and make a fire while the rest went off to their tasks. Grobby entered the ferns and crouched instantly disappearing beneath the leaves. He half crawled as he looked through the mud for toads or newts.
The first newt he found was snatched up and munched on the instant he laid eyes on it. It wriggled a bit in his mouth, and the tail almost escaped him, but he slurped it back in and burped after finishing his snack. Hrokky had told them to bring the food back so they could cook and share, but Grobby was too hungry to care. After the fourth toad he finally started to feel a little less hungry and saved the next newt he came across, or at least half of it, the other half made for something to chew on as he searched.
A toad and a frog in one hand, and one and a half newts in the other, he headed back to towards the other goblins. Depositing the squirmy little creatures with Tammira, who it appears had once again taken on cooking duty, he crouched down next to the fire and watched quietly as the others came back. Broggy’s group had returned saying they had found a rocky bluff in the forest with some natural crevices that were nice and dry and would make a good place to sleep. They had also managed to kill a strange rabbit with antlers that had charged at them when they had startled it.
The strange rabbit was torn apart, and meat stabbed onto some sharp sticks and was now roasting over the fire, a fire that looks suspiciously like the pinecone and pine needle ball that Frokky had been making the day before. The frogs, toads, and newts were also stabbed onto sticks, or at least laid beside the fire on stones, to cook.
The goblins quickly adapted to their new surroundings. The forest was full of strange and dangerous creatures, that the goblins were often forced to hide or flee from. They returned to the grassland and bog often for food, but rarely ventured deeper into the forest. As the weeks passed, they subtly changed in ways they didn’t even notice. Their footfalls grew quiet, and they were able to slip between gaps that should have been too small even for small creatures such as themselves.
Hrokky had made himself a headdress out of fur and antlers from the strange rabbits and was starting to look like a proper chief. Frokky had been enamoured with the wisps that appeared over the swamp since the first night that he had seen them and was always finding, or making, new or more burnable things. Grobby usually wore clothing made completely out of ferns and often spent most of his day in the bog looking for the amphibian that inhabited it. Some of which were much larger than expected. Broggy was still exploring farther and farther each day.
Some of the goblins had also come across strange creatures similar to themselves but made of waterlogged wood in the water when Prokky and Dannira had tried to go spear fishing. The pair had barely managed to escape and now the goblins stayed well away from the waters edge, and when they did go to the bog, they wore ferns like Grobby. After three weeks three weeks the goblins had changed significantly from what they had been like before. Now much sneakier, and much less bold, the goblins had become boggarts. Their feet were long and flat, and they padded softly wherever they went. They walked with a hunch and their ears grew long and sharp, able to flick and tilt to listen. The tribe’s village, though it was barely more than a campground, had none of the boisterous shouting and bickering, though they still did fight, especially Tammira and Grobby.
They met some of the other forest folk as well, though met is a strong word, witnessed might be a better word. Stags with enormous racks of antlers leading herds of deer through the woods. Leshy and spriggans as they wandered the forest caring for the trees. Broggy even got to see a sprite lord and his dryad lady ride by with their entourage as he crouched in a bush. Fairy knights leaping their wolpertingers right over him.
Frokky though, was the one to witness the Wild Hunt pass by as it patrolled the borders of the forest. He had been watching the wisps one night when he had heard them. At first, he could hear the howls of the coin-shith, they sounded close, and he had hunkered down beneath the ferns too afraid to even peer out from the leaves. Then as they sounded as if they were moving farther away, he had peeked and seen them pass by in the trees. A great host of antlered beings all prancing and charging along, a dread figure at their head. They had sounded like thunder, and all the forest was silent during their passing. Even the wisps had hid away.
The only of the other forest folk that they had truly met were the pixies. The two kinds of creatures had instantly formed a rivalry and all sorts of nasty tricks were played on each other, wasps’ nests and poop dropped onto the goblins, and pixies captured and tied up and dunked in the bog as fish bait. Though, ultimately there had been no fatalities, (the pixies had launched a rescue, and a nixie had arrived which made the goblins scatter) and a kind of grudging respect for each other began to grow, though the goblins still hissed when they saw a pixie, and the pixies would still drop shit on the goblins’ heads.
And so, after only a few weeks, these goblins became boggarts, creatures that would one day become renowned for being some of the sneakiest of all goblinkin, and also some of the most feared. This small tribe would grow and spread throughout the forest, and even beyond. Some would rise to infamy or nobility, while many others stayed true to their humble beginnings. Picking bugs and newts from the mud for a snack.