Gi awoke to find that the daylight had risen. The same soft sunbeams from the day before shimmered down sporadically throughout the Playground. Just off to his left, the waterfall they’d started their journey near roared loudly as it dumped into the lake. A soft mist had laid on his face and whiskers from his time laying there uncovered.

He shifted to stand, tearing out of a webbing he'd been trapped in when a small weight on his chest caused him to pause. A small river stone that had a dark leather thong ran through its tip had been lain across his neck. He pulled it up, studying its almost teardrop like shape, but he didn’t recognize it. As he studied its design, a small system notification popped up.

Gi’s Pendant - A symbol of Gi’s discovered fervor for the Goddess Danna.

Another gift from Danna. He knew that she wanted him to be strong, but was that really enough to repay her? How could he be a better follower for her? In the forest, his purpose had felt so clear. It still was, but how did that purpose translate into action? Another thought had him check his traits and the new trait he'd received as a reward.

[Rally] - Provides a miniscule increase to stats for worshippers of Danna other than self within a medium radius.

The trait seemed like it was for larger battles once he'd spread the word of Danna more. It didn't have any immediate use, but was that her goal for him?

With no answers, he squeezed the pendant in his fist and said a small prayer for strength and wisdom. Standing up out of the small copse of grass with a groan, the first thing he saw was Poe divebombing something across the river. Gi’s body creaked as he took a few steps closer, making him feel far older than he was.

A goblin was rooted near the far bank with its feet in some sort of strange webbing while Poe attacked it from above. The dragonfly’s slightly creepy jaw and tongue mouth combo not being as useful against the more intelligent foe. Each time Poe swooped down, the goblin would slap the tongue away right as it exited the mouth. With Poe’s size, it sent him careening off course. The two had reached a stalemate.

Gi considered the situation for a bit and realized that he might finally have a solution to his information problem. He dove into the river. The swim was made harder by the fact that he couldn’t move his arm, but he managed to pull himself up on the other side and approached the two fighting monsters.

“Poe, that’s enough. I’ll handle it from here.”

The goblin eyed Poe warily as he flew and landed behind Gi. His eyes then turned to Gi himself and he flinched backwards. Gi glanced down and realized that the scars from his Old One patron were still there. Nothing much he could do about it so he’d take the intimidation factor for now.

“You speak?” Gi asked.

“What’s it to you?” The goblin said and Gi blasted off an [Arcane Bolt] into the ground near the green humanoid’s feet. They quickly changed their attitude. “I mean… yeah, I speak. What do you want me to say?”

Gi snorted. “Glad we’re on the same page. First, are you from that Coalition in the hills?”

A disgusted look played on the goblin’s face. “As if. Bunch of suckers is what they are.”

“Interesting. What makes you say that?”

“When I left the Spawning Pools, Krayli scouted me out and took me back to their compound. It’s run by this golem called Hillin. Apparently, he’s got all his tasks filled up, but is trying for the Heart Orb. With the way the Playground is set up, that means either whatever baddie is in the Eldritch Forest or the Fighting Drakes. Both are fucking suicide.”

Gi checked his Tasks and rubbed his good paw against his chin.

Tasks:

Symbolism - Accept a Focus for your species. (Complete!)

Ego - Capture Body Orbs from Elites; Optional: Capture a Heart Orb from a Leader

Power - Complete a Dungeon run.

“Heart Orbs come from the leader, neh?” Gi asked. “So basically this Hillin character is creating an army to fight the Ghasts so he can target the leader of the supplicants.”

“Supplicants?” The goblin asked, but Gi ignored him.

“You might be worth keeping around after all. Tell me more about these Fighting Drakes.” Gi had killed the one in the Eldritch Forest, but that one had been corrupted and wounded so he wasn’t sure how powerful they were or what Traits they might have. He hadn’t been able to use his own Traits while under the Old One's influence either.

Relief swept into the goblin’s eyes. No doubt if the roles were reversed, he would have killed Gi regardless. In fact, he’d probably stumbled over here to kill the injured monster he saw from a distance if he had to guess. Whatever his current thoughts, he started speaking quickly. “The Fighting Drakes are the faction over by the mountain on the other side. They are pack creatures and run in patrols of at least four or five. Sometimes more. They’re stronger and faster than any other monster here in the Playground and on top of that they know some kind of martial art. Trying to fight one by itself generally means death. In the packs they run? The height of stupidity.”

He hadn’t seen any martial art, but the Drake had bested him when they were both corrupted. He supposed that was indication enough that he couldn't defeat one on their own. He'd relied heavily on his excellent stats in every fight so far and his unskilled fighting style wouldn't cut it against a superior opponent. If you only had two options of leaders, the Fighting Drakes definitely weren’t the ones to take on. “Wait. Isn’t this Hillin a leader? Wouldn’t he already have a Heart Orb?”

“Psh. He wishes. Only established species have leaders. Something that happens in a later stage as best as I can tell.”

“I suppose that makes sense. What other information do you have? Any knowledge on the tasks themselves?”

“Are you just going to kill me once I tell you?” The goblin finally asked. Gi laughed.

“No, no. I have much better plans for you. You’re going to be part of my crew.” The goblin simply stared at him for a long minute trying to figure out if he was serious. “Come on now, it’s better than taking my [Arcane Bolt] to the face. Besides, I won’t use you as Ghast fodder.”

“Okay…” the goblin said, cautiously. He recognized that he didn’t have much of a choice. “Well, I only know about two of the Tasks anyways. For the Dungeon one, you gotta find a Dungeon portal and hop in. If you complete whatever task is inside, you succeed and you’re an Elite. Krayli and Hillen have both completed it as far as I can tell. For the Body Orbs, you gotta kill three Elites. That’s it.”

“Perfect.” His mind was already whirling with possibilities especially some that could take advantage of his newest crew member. “What else?”

“Come on, you’re pokin’ my poon here, guy.”

“I’m pokin' your poon here, Boss” Gi corrected.

“Fine, I know where a Dungeon portal is. I’m not sure if they’re reusable or not so I was holding it out for myself until I managed to get some more info about what’s inside. I can take you to it if you want, Boss.”

“We’re going to have a very good relationship.” Gi gestured to Poe. “Get him out of the webbing.”

Poe flew over and started using his jaw to free the goblin much to his complaint. Once free, he crossed his arms and turned on Gi. “Thanks for the rescue sort of. Now stop calling me him. I’m a woman and my name’s Nori.”

****

Nori led the strangely scarred otter and his damn dragonfly across the Playground. A few random monsters popped up, but one of those mega blasts from the otter was enough to cripple them for either the dragonfly or Nori herself to finish them off. In fact, by the time they’d reached the small copse of woods between the Fighting Drakes territory and the Eldritch Forest, she’d doubled her current Soul Orbs to fourteen.

Honestly as much as she hated being forced into his stupid gang, it was already better than what Hillen offered. That dumbass town was for monsters that had given up on getting out of the Child Stage on their own. Well, that wasn’t Nori. At least… not completely.

She pulled up the latest prompt that she’d received again.

Accept Boss Gi's offer to join his gang?

Accept: Change goal to "Rise or Fall Together"

Reject: Keep current goals. Progress 0/3 Completed.

Betray: Change goal to "Steal An Opportunity"

There was no firm time limit but she had a sense that she'd need to make a decision over the next day. No progress had been made on her tasks yet. It wasn't easy even with her strong Traits to best an Elite and she still had no idea about a damn Focus. She was confident she could take any monster of her standing one on one as long as they didn’t cheat like that damn dragonfly, but the established Elites were never alone.

Taking either of the Accept options might streamline her ascent out of the Child Stage, but did she really want to just be a lackey for some megalomaniac? Being forced to obey... She shuddered. No, she didn't like that. And betrayal? Like most monsters, she was naturally selfish, but was this otter’s opportunity really the best she could do?

Without sharing her inner thoughts, they marched through the forest until they came upon a giant tree that had massive hole in its trunk. Despite not presenting any reflection, that hole shimmered like a mirror somehow both infinitely black and infinitely vibrant.

A prompt appeared as soon as they were within a few steps of it.

Enter into the Dungeon Stream?

It was the same one she'd seen before and from the look on the Boss's face. He was seeing it as well. He turned to her with a grin. "You did good today, Nori. Makes it easy to forget that you were just trying to kill me."

She shrugged off his accusation. "We're monsters. We kill things."

"True. I suppose I should go in now. In the wise words of Danna, I can’t hold back now."

"Who the fuck is Danna?"

"Watch it," Gi said and for the first time, his little furry face turned angry. His blackmail and forced enlistment had been fairly casual before, but now the threat of his terrifying sunbeam attack seemed very, very real.

"Uh, sorry?" Nori said, after taking a solid step back. Why couldn’t everyone just fight claw to claw like proper monsters?

"Danna is a Goddess. Show some respect."

"Right. Yeah, right. So, uh, what is she the Goddess of? Um, respectfully?"

"She's the Goddess of Strength and... Family… Light? Oh and water probably."

Nori was flabbergasted. Did this guy not even know what his Goddess was about? Yet, he seemed so fervent. This guy was a nut job. Fucking great. "Sounds nice," Nori said diplomatically.

"I'll tell you all about her when I get back. For now, try and find some more intelligent monsters that are part of Hillin's camp. Maybe... Five or so. It's best if you trust them enough to join the crew. If not, just make sure they are greedy enough not to tell Hillin or Krayli. Got it?"

"But what's the actual plan?"

Gi grinned wildly. "You're just gonna have to have some faith." Before she could say more, he sprinted towards the tree and jumped through the dark portal.