Chapter 167

Time Was Happening.

Thrush

Satiation: 55%

Composition:

54% Dreambon

20% Fish

08% Cheese

04% Wood

04% Beer

02% Warthog

01% Goblin

07% World

100% Ethereal

02% Red Bestie

There wasn’t much left of the scent of goblins. I had searched the wilderness around the Mist Hidden wall for lost goblins and brought them to the shore. The woods now smelled of the gritty musk of pollen, warm green leaves, damp earth, and the afterbirth of freshly cracked cocoons.

From the cushioned seat on the threshold of my yurt, I watched small and giant fireflies fly by. With all the goblins I’d had to carry behind my teeth, my taste buds had come alive. It was when my belly then thundered that I felt it was a good time to pause and raise my Satiation.

The smoke on another filet of purple tuna had gone a few hours over, and the meat was drier than usual. Some of the cheese I had topped it with was black and flaky. The fish truly looked like a slab of oak, bark and all.

I feasted on the treasure. My fangs split the filet like a ship split water. The blackened cheese crumbled in the wakes of my bites. Though the top layer of cheese was unrecognizable, I felt the moldy colors of blue cheese flush through my veins. I felt my eyes take on green and blue speckles. My eyes bounced in their sockets, and my irises pumped like veins moving bulbs of blood. My tongue became soft and the vapors that bent the air wreaked of wet sock.

As I ate, I found my thoughts drifting from something to another. My feasting was mindless which drew me to frown. Something was off. Was it the smoke? I greatly enjoyed the mistake of too much smoke, so that couldn’t be it. Was there something wrong in the flavor? What flavor was mightier than smoked cheese over smoked fish? So, no, it wasn’t that.

I wondered if perhaps a dreambon would help center me—a nice big juicy one that cracked open like a snapped twig.

The first dreambon tasted like pomegranate. The second tasted like raspberry and bones. The third…

Oh, the dreambons weren’t cutting it. Was there something off with me then? Three was hardly any to get a good snack in. That had to be it. I cracked one open and spilled its seeds onto the ground.

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“Nightream eternal.”

Each seed cracked open the way that acorns split when they fell from trees onto stones. Taproots pierced the earth, and sprouts flung their shells off as they shot up. Buds instantly produced leaves. Flowers popped open, then died, then bore fruit.

Among the dreambon plants, one of them bore red leaves. The red was as dark as crusted blood. It struggled to produce fruit as it danced in its instant growth.

A dreambon evolution? Already? It had only been several millennia since the last one. If that were the case, then the dreambons with the belts of silver which I had been gorging on won’t be around for much longer. How different would the new one look like?

Ah, memories filled me. The sky had been grey for centuries. Across the world, magma frothed the great waters. My dreambons evolved just when the air was beginning to thin of the grit of ash. With my nose batting at the trunks of the plants as I sniffed, I searched the plants for the previous dreambon fruits. With the evolution complete, I never saw them again. Not only did they die with time and evolution, I could not dredge my memories for them.

But this dreambon, which will likewise see its end to a new dreambon, gave me my Composition.

Ah, those flavors. They were scrumptious. No matter how hard I scratched my head, nor worked my tongue, I could not remember their flavors.

Time. Time was happening to me. This evidence of an upcoming dreambon evolution meant that I was in for a new era. The evolution happened too quickly last time. Was it two thousand years until the new plants overtook the previous?

I couldn’t wait to share with Boggo and Ella. They were sure to still be around. Besties lived for much longer than that, after all. Yes, I would have to be patient and meanwhile look forward to sharing them with the besties.

It struck me that I wouldn’t be sharing the new dreambons with the humans or the goblins. I felt a pang. I felt a pang of…sadness? A ball of gas bubbled up my throat, and I burped. Ah, no, that wasn’t sadness. It was the ghost of cheese and smoked fish. My tongue searched the slopes of my fangs.

I was still hungry! It was time to collect.

“Eternal ends.”

The dreambon plants withered in place, composted where they shriveled, and scattered as dust. Dozens of ripened dreambons pelted the earth.

While I ate, I again and again grew more dreambons. Their creamy centers slid down my tongue. Their seeds delivered notes of spice to my palate. The juices flowed like warmed honey.

But something was still missing in the flavors, just like the smoked cheese and smoked fish. A bandit’s spoon seemed like it too was missing something. So did a pile of crispy leaves, and so did a handful of river stones, and so did freshly shed antlers, and so did the exoskeleton of a deep sea humanoid.

When I paused after a satisfying gulp, a deep quiet pervaded. Though there was no wind, it was a quiet I hadn’t heard in years. A quiet that was with me before I met Hawkin. Had it already been more than two years since then?

Time. Time was happening to me, and it was happening to my friends too.

Will Hawkin die first? Will Barnacle-eyes? Humans and goblins didn’t live as long as besties. However, Abigail was going to live centuries longer than Hawkin, so it was possible. I could share some with her in a few hundred years before she passes. We could reminisce about Hawkin, unless Hawkin reached diamond rank…

And what of Barnacle-eyes? How long did goblins live for? Could she achieve longevity through her quest path? Slime-tooth looked thrice as old as he smelled.

I’ll have to ask him.

I broke dreambon after dreambon between my toadish tongue and the roof of my mouth. Their juice cascaded down my throat and bubble in my gut.

Ah! Still, something was missing.

Whatever it was eluded me, just as I caught an altogether different kind of stink than that of cheese.

“I smell twelve lost little goblins.”

After collapsing my yurt into its backpack form, I followed the scents and waded through the fern. I burst free of the fern with a magnificent toe-shaking burp. Leaves shook on shrubs and in the canopy. Twelve little goblins fell back from my sudden appearance. My gaze settled on the goblins. And since the percentage of cheese was growing in my Composition, one of my fangs broke in half in crumbles. The goblins screamed their lungs raw.