10.34 MGF

(Trigger warning for this chapter. Click here for details.)

 

 

 

 

Then, it was all over. Game over, if you wanted to be silly about it.

That wasn’t how things actually ended. Mrsha had seen life end, and it was just—gone. An old person stopped breathing at last. An arrow struck you and life vanished, not always instantly, but the moment when it fled was obvious.

Life ending was the most final thing. But sometimes it was over in other ways. Sometimes you realized your dreams weren’t going to come true, or you stood there, watching an army pour across the Floodplains, and you realized there wasn’t going to be any miracle.

Just a young woman waving a white flag, a bunch of Goblins, and death—and you hoped against hope the best things would happen, hoped for a miracle.

—It never came. Seconds and minutes passed, then hours and days, and you realized your friends were dead. You buried them. You said important things. You wept—but only in the months and surely years afterwards would you weep the real tears as the holes they left in your life grew wider.

So it was over like that. A disaster was coming, and once more, you could blame her. You should.

I tried.

She really had. She’d tried to steal some goodness out of this place, out of all the cheats and luck she’d been handed, and it had blown up in her face. She’d been so close—but she hadn’t been enough of a bastard to steal it. Now, her home was under threat again, this time from other worlds.

Maybe it wouldn’t all be so bad. Maybe good will come through. Student Rags and Roots Mrsha are good. 

She lied to herself as she floated away. This was traditional too. Until the very end, until it was truly over and you looked up and met Death at last and took their hand—you got to lie about the future.

Even so, Mrsha had to admit—this felt pretty final for her. Game over.

There was even a beautiful image to go along with her failure. It was—well.

Everything.

There was no ground, no Lyonette’s room in The Wandering Inn. Pawn had vanished; the world had vanished. Gravity had disappeared. It wasn’t blackness or white oblivion. Color had ceased. Reality had ceased.

She wasn’t dead, because there was no vacuum of space to murder her. Her body didn’t decompress because there were no rules of physics to act upon her. She didn’t die for lack of oxygen because time didn’t know where she was.

She wasn’t even nowhere, because that was a place, when you got down to it. Mrsha was…between. She had been in a world when the door closed, and then she’d been like an object in a room when the room vanished.

Where do you go? The answer was—between the cracks. You stayed the same, and the world kept moving around you. She was caught, like a speck of dust, within the fabric of the world itself. The back of it. She was in the code of the Grand Design. Part of the shifting ocean of data and meaning around her.

Trapped.

It was so beautiful. She couldn’t understand it. Her eyes and brain struggled to even process what she was seeing, and she translated it as tendrils of illumination, as if she were in a constellation of glowing stars, each one glowing with colors she had never dreamed of.

A million billion trillion stars with limbs reaching out and touching each other, like the vastest spider’s web in existence—or near-infinite flowers linked and blooming.

Then her vision shifted, and Mrsha’s mind decided they were, in fact, scenes of the world she was no longer part of. She saw a marching band of [Soldiers], armor rusted and weapons battered, following a woman as she pointed over the broken ground. Mrsha smelled their exhaustion and fear—

And the image was gone, a piece of time and reality playing itself out. Mrsha saw, in the same place, a battle-scarred, green Dragon speaking to an older version of the woman, who was bowing slightly.

While those two events were playing out, a [King] and [Queen] were having breakfast. The [Queen] was distracted, and the [King] was asking what was wrong, and she said, ‘I don’t know’, which surprised him.

Mrsha could see all three images playing at once; they were the same place geographically. The exact same. The only thing that was different was the time. They were overlaid over each other, but if you looked differently, you could separate them by the time they had occurred.

And everything was happening around her simultaneously.

It overloaded her. Mrsha went insane with the visions and stopped thinking. Then she started thinking because even insanity couldn’t keep up with this place. To shield herself from this maddening display, she focused and realized the three scenes had a meaning.

They were linked to her. Little trails of meaning were coming off her, connecting her back to the three events—to so many events across the world. She was part of the world, after all. She concentrated with all the willpower she had and understood. Then she saw the world as the Grand Design of Isthekenous did.

Smell, touch, hearing, sensation, taste—she could taste the blood on their armor as well as see their levels.

See—they were marching over rocky, broken ground, stumbling, as deafening screeches filled the air. Nineteen [Soldiers] in all, a sorry lot wearing armor scabbed with rust and dried blood, weapons chipped. A broken group of warriors from a war that already felt lost. Yet they were following a young woman, who had dull brown hair, limping forwards, holding a battered mace in one hand.

Every now and then, she turned back to look at them, and her eyes were desperate. The woman—no, she was only nineteen—was broad-shouldered and had patchwork armor, a half-broken chestplate, some salvaged leather leggings—a single potion at her belt.

She was no inspiring leader, but the men and women followed her because she was going. At the end of everything, that called to them. One last march as the air rippled with shrieks from the vast, lumbering forms like mountains perched in the distance.

Mrsha could hear the woman’s racing thoughts, dulled with exhaustion and filled with a determination that shone like gold through her being. Terror, weakness, and willpower. She could read the woman’s levels too.

[Courageous Survivor] Level 24. [Desperate Leader] Level 4. [Glassblower] Level 3.

Why did it matter? Well, because so much had begun right here. A brave girl marching forwards. From this moment, Mrsha could see the future. What-ifs, alternate threads and visions.

If she had fled or run.

If one of the [Soldiers]’ nerves had broken.

If they had died.

Even what might have happened if she’d just tripped at the wrong time.

Those pieces of fate spread out to different branches of the future. But the only one that mattered was the glowing tapestry that unveiled from that moment as the girl named Marquin stumbled forwards.

—A kingdom grew out of that moment, millions of lives blossoming from her. Connected and growing, splitting across the world in the form of citizens of Calanfer. [Knights] on crusade who touched other lives, or just people who had been influenced by Calanfer.

Then she saw it. The lines of connection touched her, for she was Mrsha du Marquin, and if her mother’s ancestor had never triumphed, part of Mrsha would never have been.

See. The girl drank in the bowing [Queen] of Calanfer as she stood, older, scarred, in the last days of the Creler Wars.

“I suppose I should be kneelin’ and whatnot, but I was never good at it, and my legs hurt, so pardon me, Dragonlady.”

To which the ancient, scarred behemoth of flesh and scales threw back her head and laughed. She was larger than Teriarch, and she had so many visible scars on her flanks and side that there was more of that than scale.

The Dragonlord of War, Mauridekash Lauthezaum Shorre, laughed in humor instead of bloodlust, the first time in eight years. Her voice rasped as she bent her head down.

“I like you, fierce [Queen]. Do not kneel to me. That time is past.”

Marquin shrugged her shoulders and rubbed at her chest. She had only one breast; she’d lost the other to Creler venom, and it still ached.

“[Queen]. Feels odd to be queen of a bunch of blasted ground. The war’s not over, and the kingdoms are celebrating like it is. The bastards are all on Rhir, and if we don’t kill them there, they’ll be back and kill us all as faster’n we can spit.”

“Agreed. I am persuading my three living kin—Dragonlords all—to join the invasion. I think they will come. Some of them are rank cowards, but they have fought well.”

“Begging your pardon, your ladyship Mauridekash—but I didn’t see your lot until we started winning. So forgive me if I’m not falling on my face in gratitude.”

The [Queen] was blunt, but her words actually belied the true and simmering resentment in her heart. Her grief for the countless dead; indignation at the Dragonlords’ seeming inaction.

“Call me Mauri. Mortals used to. I tire of long names, especially if we shall be in battle together.”

Mauri snorted. And her mind was idly amused by this conversation, focused on a being she respected, that she had deigned to grant a gift to. Eager as it thought of the final battles. And yes, weary in her own way. Whether she knew it or not, she was a warrior who had seen everything she loved die and remembered only the charge, the rush of battle. She awaited her own end and saw her image in Marquin. The Dragonlord went on.

“It was strategic. We fought in the shadows lest we be a target. Until now, there was no bastion that could stand against the Crelers. They nearly overran Dwarfhome.”

“Stubborn bastards, the Dwarves.”

“Pah. Children. The true Dwarves held that line and broke one of the Crelers’ eldest. As they always do. Hm. You should visit, ere we go to war. They might gift you armor and a blade fit for the coming battle.”

Marquin filed that information away, and Mrsha saw it slot into her head. The woman took a seat on a stump. A tree had finally grown here and been cut down to make kindling and arrow shafts. The [Queen] pulled off a boot and groaned.

“So why talk to me? Why not a real heroine? Lady Silvenia Ettertree’s marshalling every half-Elf west of us in Gaiil-Drome. She’s fought this war hundreds of years.”

“I know her. She’s the beloved apprentice of others of my kin. They love their mortals so. I suppose, in that way, you’re much the same to me. I have a gift for you. If neither of us return from this war…well, better that than giving it to the other three, who’ll do nothing with it. But here. I took this from a foe’s corpse and had little use for it. It’s filled with dust, monsters, and whatever I forgot. A gift for your new nation. May it endure beyond us.”

She placed what seemed to be a marble, compared to her body, down, and Mrsha saw into the Dragonthrone of Illuminations and beheld that contained dimension forged tens of thousands of years ago. Queen Marquin blinked at it.

“What’s this?”

 

——

 

Shift. King Reclis and Queen Ielane du Marquin sat there over five thousand years later, and the [Queen] was reading reports from The Wandering Inn as King Reclis stared at the image of a battle occurring in the High Passes.

But even his best [Spies] could only get a view of the mountain ranges. He thumped a fist on the table in a rare show of anger.

“If it’s truly that Dragon, then what is he fighting? A Titan? Ielane, do you have any more information? What could be more important than this?”

“Ushar isn’t responding. My people say that the guests of the inn have vanished.”

Queen Ielane was staring at a [Message] scroll, waiting for it to activate. And she was thinking of her daughter. And Mrsha.

Mrsha could read Queen Ielane’s thoughts, moving like razors of emotionless necessity. All for a kingdom that had been founded upon this very spot. The [Queen] was wondering what had happened and afraid for her daughter. An emotion she never shared. She was uncertain and kept it chained in her heart, for she had to be Calanfer’s blade, not in blood and steel, but in ironclad contracts and the quicksilver daggers of diplomacy.

Then. Now. Even glimpses of the future played out—not real ones, but, Mrsha realized, alternate realities.

The [Palace of Fates]. Someone was building new images—

Shift.

The images changed again, and now they looked like roads being paved. Lonely roads of existence filling the empty void. A city of lives and meaning that filled the great nothingness that was reality. Fragile edifices that created meaning in a meaningless reality.

Someone was building the roads. One—no, two beings. They labored over each one, placing lives and history down like other people might lay tracks. They worked so quickly and efficiently they created a hundred years in the blink of an eye.

But they were overworked. The roads were appearing in every direction, near on tripling the sum of…

Everything.

Possible realities. Future and past, what-ifs—reality was expanding so fast, so vastly, that it felt like the creation of the universe to Mrsha. An explosion of data, lives, glorious deeds, and possibility.

But no souls. She saw that too. In the way the Grand Design saw it, there were no souls. She could tell that Marquin, the past Marquin, had been real.

But the alternate realities where Marquin stumbled or died or triumphed in another way seemed—different. Some marker was missing. A piece of data.

So that was how the Grand Design viewed them. Fake. The girl saw it now, for she could read her conversation with the Grand Design in her own past, even though it had erased it from her memory.

Yet she saw each and every Marquin as someone she could admire equally. And therein lay the difference between Mrsha and the Grand Design…

The realization, the understanding of all this, scorched Mrsha’s being, and again, she drifted, mad, in the growing radiance of creation.

She had forever to come back from madness, so she did. Then, Mrsha realized it was over.

She was caught in a grain of time that had no end nor beginning. Infinity was contained in this singular moment; she could go mad forever, keep her sanity, it mattered not. She would watch until her very existence became everything and nothing—there was no end to this beautiful view, and time would flow past her.

No one would find her here; she was outside even the places the Grand Design of Isthekenous could look. And it wasn’t thinking; she could see it working away, its higher processes disabled due to the overflowing amount of data it had to process.

The end, the end. Goodbye.

Mrsha wasn’t even alone, she realized. Someone else was frozen in this space-between-spaces.

Rags. The Goblin Chieftain was frozen, mid-leap for the door, as she had been when it closed. Her eyes were open, and she too saw and experienced everything. Here they were.

At least Roots Mrsha and Student Rags can replace us. Mrsha’s mind was growing hazy. She was learning everything.

Everything. The secrets of Goblin Kings were bare before her. The creation of the entire world starting from when the Grand Design arose—and even before that—was recorded here, if not as organized before the Grand Design had been activated.

But she was ceasing to care. It was too much. She was dissolving, becoming part of everything and nothing. A single mind could not handle even a fraction of what she saw.

Mrsha twisted lazily, sighing. One last bit of her own will drifted across her mind as she pivoted to curl up.

I wish…

Her momentum kept her spinning round and round in the air. There was no air, but Mrsha’s eyes opened wide. She had no momentum, no rule of Newton to let her move. Yet she spun.

What?

The girl uncurled, then realized she had moved. Moved…in a place where even oxygen and time held no sway?

What the heck? Mrsha touched her body, then saw it. A single line of meaning, drawn onto her character, a glowing string scrawled by the Grand Design of Isthekenous.

Second Edition.

[Fatebreaker Child]. And [Lesser Immunity: Fate]. It was like the thinnest membrane of…existence surrounding Mrsha. A force-field that let her keep thinking, even move slightly. Mrsha stopped her rotation by twisting right and turned.

Rags! Rags!

She had no voice, nor was there sound, and she shouted at the Goblin until she saw Rags was frozen. Helpless. Rags couldn’t move or react—Mrsha could.

A silly thought entered Mrsha’s head as the all-encompassing universe around her beat her down. A bit of her personality fought back and asserted control. She closed her eyes; it didn’t stop creation pouring down on her, but it helped her focus. Think like…Mrsha, a selfish child, not all of everything.

 

Game Over. Next time, don’t let Adult Mrsha come through the door!

Would you like to try again? (Y/N).

 

Okay, that was more like something Erin or another Earther would come up with. But it was enough. Mrsha tried to become…Mrsha. She lifted her paws, remembering she had them, then made a ginger, sweeping motion with her arms.

She did a butterfly stroke through the void, swimming, wiggling her body, as if she were in the water. And she moved.

Slowly, ever-so-slowly, she drifted through the void. Forwards…though that was a completely arbitrary direction. Like an astronaut, Mrsha had to learn how to orient herself in every direction and realized that each movement caused a similar backwards motion. It should have left her unable to go anywhere and at the mercy of the void, but she could intensify or lessen the bubble of existence around her.

If she concentrated hard, she began to move—then she could reduce the effect of her [Lesser Immunity: Fate] Skill and slow down, like Apista in syrup. That was the start.

How long it took for Mrsha to get any semblance of movement in order, she didn’t know. It didn’t matter; time was, after all, stopped. But now she had a mission, so she ‘swam’ towards the only other person trapped here.

Rags. Rags, it’s me.

The Goblin’s eyes were wide, her mouth open, and they didn’t focus on Mrsha at all as the Gnoll grabbed her. Mrsha wondered if she could even see Mrsha, overwhelming as all this was. Mrsha hugged Rags.

I’m going to get us out of here. I promise. This is all my fault. But I’ll save you. I swear.

Her thoughts floated up around her, pieces of the girl, her earnest heart, her selfishness, her fears, and her guilts like vast clouds of beautiful personality. Mrsha’s eyes stung as she saw her flaws and her own virtues drifting around her.

Even her pettiest traits seemed so…pretty hanging in the void. Even that was better than nothing. She hoped she would remember that forever: that beautiful realization that she was her. Then she turned and searched around with Rags in her arms.

We have to get out of here. 

Lesser immunity or not, she was dissolving only marginally slower than Rags. If they did not escape, this place would overwhelm them with its sheer intensity. But where to go?

There were actually an infinite number of options. Mrsha could, in theory, go with Rags anywhere and anywhen, but given how slowly she was moving, she realized she’d be gone long before she reached, say, that moment with Marquin in the past.

Way too far away. It was all relative here, but relative to where Mrsha had been, if that made sense. She could actually see the [Palace of Fates] and the multiple worlds around her; they were pathways of existence surrounding her.

But something was wrong. Mrsha swam towards the place where she and Rags had been, pulling the Goblin [Chieftain] with her. She reached the exact place where they had been standing, the room with Pyrite, Headscratcher, and Kevin in it.

Mrsha tried to pull herself back to the right spot, but she passed through the room, through reality itself. Why…? She saw the frozen Pyrite snarling, Headscratcher reaching out, Kevin shouting—

Time stopped. And Demsleth had gone through the door and killed the Faerie Flower root.

Oh heck. This place wasn’t ‘real’. Or if it was real, whatever parameters assigned to Mrsha weren’t letting her interact with it. Until someone used another Faerie Flower root, Mrsha couldn’t return.

Second problem—they were drifting through a timeless space. No one would ever add another root. Mrsha cast around.

I have to find another open door. The one Erin’s in. Or Brunkr.

Any of them would be fine. Now, she truly felt like an adrift particle of dust trying to draw herself into the stream of reality once more. Mrsha sensed she was fading away. It wasn’t a visible thing, but some of…her…was being lost.

It was like—diffusion. There was so much of the rest of reality that it was permeating Mrsha, causing her to drift apart and share what she was with everything else. Like how a drop of ink vanished in water, this would soon be her end. Fortunately, it wasn’t bad—yet.

The core of Mrsha’s personalities, her emotions, her memories, were the center of her being. She was probably losing what it felt like to scratch her butt on a Lundas four years ago first. But soon—

Somewhere, anywhere. The problem was that Mrsha realized her ‘reality’, the main reality, was far away from her. The [Palace of Fates] was a Skill that diverted from the main dimension; all Skills like this were contained, separate sub-dimensions you could enter.

That was why the Faerie Flower roots worked to breach into the palace from the [Garden of Sanctuary]. The three Skills were stacked on top of each other, in a sense. They were, after all, connected by Empress Sheta’s line of Skills, neatly organized and filed.

The roots had drilled down into the [Palace of Fates], seeking what they lived on: fate itself. The problem was that Mrsha was in a branch-timeline. Swimming ‘up’ all the way back to even the [Garden of Sanctuary] would pass through the palace, all the doors there, up towards reality…

Too far. Now, Mrsha was a diver without any reserve oxygen, searching for any place she could survive. It had to be somewhere in the [Palace of Fates], but even getting back to the hallways was so damn far…

She was swimming now, pulling Rags with her towards the nearest tendril of real reality she could find. Mrsha passed through it and realized it had been fake. She flailed through a timeline where Relc and Valeterisa had never met, cursing.

Where—where—?

It was hard to tell which ones had a Faerie Flower root in them! There were so many, and they looked alike. Souls or not…what was a soul, anyways?

Her thoughts were drifting. Mrsha cast around and realized she was off-course. She began to swim towards the main [Palace of Fates] again and understood she would never make it. Her struggling slowed, and she began to drift. Her paw loosened, and she and Rags were adrift.

I tried. I really did. Sometimes you still fail. That’s the thing about hope.

They were passing by one final timeline, and it was…black.

Black? To Mrsha, it seemed like someone had drawn a cloud of smoke over the entire thing, or one of the funny black lines on Chaldion’s reports. Redacted everything.

But it was just a surface-layer thing, like a curtain to keep people from staring into it. Mrsha remembered she had seen this timeline before. But where…?

Her mind was hazy, so she just glanced down at herself and read her own history. Oh, right.

When she and Rags had been trying to see the truth of the Goblin Kings. Duh. The [Palace of Fates] had decided she was too low-level to know it or view back that far, so Velan the Kind being born and that other timeline where they’d asked for a new Goblin King had been created and then redacted.

Funny. The Grand Design had to still make both alternate realities, then hide them away. That struck Mrsha as being slightly inefficient. The entire [Palace of Fates] felt pretty inefficient.

Probably why they’re stuck right now. Poor things.

It was the first time any being had ever pitied the Grand Design, but she could see them laboring away on this insane task. But what was this…timeline? Mrsha had run out of energy to swim. She and Rags were about to vanish, so she could ponder it as long as she wanted.

Mrsha was resigning herself to the end when she realized someone was moving. And this time, it wasn’t her.

It was Rags. The Goblin was still frozen, but she was being…pulled towards the hidden timeline. Like gravity was acting on her.

Goblin. The Goblin was being pulled by the presence of…Mrsha reached out and snagged Rags’ leg. She hung on, and they began to move towards that reality. But it wasn’t going to save them. It was just another door. And there was no root…

Wait. Wait. Mrsha stared at the place where the reality connected to the [Palace of Fates]. She saw a single root in the door. How? Who the—?

Mrsha read the moment it had been placed there by a panicking Dyeda, confused and unsure of what to do. She’d snuck up to one of the two Goblin King doors and—

Oh no.

Oh yes.

They were being sucked down now, and Mrsha felt something like real gravity on her. She felt her sense of being returning—she twisted, mouth open, and saw Rags blink at last. Then try to scream.

Rags! Mrsha’s thoughts streamed at Rags, then vanished as they were pulled into the created reality. The Goblin [Chieftain] was twisting.

“What? How—?”

Rags, hold on! There’s a root! We have to get back!

Mrsha’s grip was loosening. They were passing through the membrane where reality started, and it was ripping them apart with a force she couldn’t resist. She saw Rags’ eyes fix on her, and the Gnoll girl turned.

Which one was it? Which—she stared at the [Palace of Fates] behind her and read the answer in a little note card pasted to the door by her paw.

If another Goblin King emerges. Not sure who.

Mrsha began laughing hysterically, and Rags reached for her, then they were torn apart and fell back into the world. Into the future.

One of the two Grand Designs noticed the two beings reappearing and watched as it silently labored and counted every deed of every being.

Mrsha thought it smiled at her. But then again, before she blacked out, she could have sworn one of the Deaths waved.

That bastard Faerie King was definitely laughing.

And then—

 

——

 

Mrsha hit the ground. She fell straight down from about a second floor’s height, hit the ground, and suffered.

Mostly because she’d landed on hard marble. She whammed down and lay there.

Pain feels so great. Mrsha raised a bloody nose and savored how her blood ran and flowed for a while. It was so novel and wonderful and simple, despite being infinitely complex, the movement of blood vessels which in turn had followed genetic code which countless trillions of cells had organized into—with some mistakes—

That sense of infinite joy in the cosmos and her understanding of the divine plan wore off after about another minute when Mrsha snotted out a bloody booger. Then she wiped her nose and groaned.

Ow.

By the time Mrsha sat up two minutes later, she barely remembered most of what she’d seen. A few things stayed with her, like that memory of Marquin, but her head hurt, and so did her body.

I fell. What the heck happ—oh. She glanced up and guessed that she’d fallen from about where she’d been in The Wandering Inn, on the second floor, when she vanished.

That hurt. I hope Rags didn’t land on her head. That really seems like it’d suck.

Where was Rags? Mrsha knew they’d been yanked apart, and she had to guess they were thrown across this reality. Rags had moved towards whatever was pulling her, a being that could defy fate itself.

No points for guessing what that was. A Goblin King was so powerful he could mess with reality. Mrsha swore she’d read some insane Skills—but she couldn’t remember whom it was. She clutched at her head.

No, wait, that might be from hitting the ground so hard. Ow. Ow. Ow.

She wiped her nose on her fur and peeked around. As she saw—actually saw with her eyes—she realized she…might be in trouble. Because she might have been thrown anywhere in this alternate future Goblin King timeline.

Or she might be right where she’d been in The Wandering Inn.

Either way—she didn’t like where she’d ended up. Because there was no inn. There were no walls. But there was a huge slab of marble on the ground.

Real marble, the hoity-toity stuff, all one block, near pure white, in a vast, fifty-by-fifty foot slab on the ground. Some of Mrsha’s lessons with her mother had included how to tell if something was expensive or fancy. She’d always thought it was a waste of her valuable childhood learning potential, but as it happened…here she was making snap judgements on marble quality.

Thanks, Mom. I’ll see you again, I promise.

Mrsha judged this piece of marble was probably out of reach of a single ordinary [Lord]’s income, unless they were bankrupting themselves to do it; the flooring alone was insanely costly, and there was an object, a stele, a cenotaph, in the center. Just a monolith of squared stone ending at a point. It was the only thing here.

An expensive marker, certainly. Only, the value of this place had been lowered significantly by the pieces blasted out of the stone. Cracks and larger gashes had marred the polished surface.

Intentional defacement? It seemed more like the byproduct of a battle or someone would have done a better job here. Mrsha gazed around and saw little else of note.

Just the Floodplains of Liscor, dark and windswept around her. It wasn’t spring or it’d be raining, and there was a chill in the air.

Autumn, then. Or a cold summer’s day. Mrsha frowned as she blew her nose with a handkerchief from her bag of holding and tossed it aside. Then she realized what was off about the Floodplains of Liscor.

It’s flat. 

She could actually see the ground stretching away from her in every direction, not the wavy, disconcerting hills she was used to. Even in the darkness, it was clear—the Floodplains of Liscor, if this is what they were, were flat.

She wasn’t sure anymore; it was surreal, but the High Passes did loom above her. Mrsha looked right and left, and something else occurred to her.

I can’t see Liscor anywhere. I should be able to anywhere in the Floodplains.

The hairs on her body rose, and she had that ominous feeling in her head. But it just made her exhale.

She had just met Pawn, a being of faith who believed in Goddess Erin. She had seen holes in reality opening and hugged her dead, beloved friends.

How bad was this world? She tottered unsteadily over to the stele and pulled out her wand. A faint [Light] spell illuminated the words as Mrsha read them.

 

In Memory of the Innkeeper of Liscor.

“One day, these wondrous, immortal moments shall come again.”

 

Below that simple message was hewn a list of names. At first in neat, blocky letters, then chiseled with an unsteady hand, as if by the tip of a sword, scratched into the marble. Mrsha read Erin Solstice’s name there. Then her own. Then her mother’s, and then…almost everyone she could think of.

Relc, Bird, Valeterisa, Ceria, Ishkr…

Everyone. If there was someone missing, Mrsha couldn’t think of it immediately.

The wand in her hand lowered, and she stepped back. The girl wasn’t breathing harder. She sighed again.

So, this bad. It’s the world of a Goblin King. No wonder it’s like this.

A thought occurred to her, and she checked the memorial again, running her idea down the list. Mrsha made a soft sound as she found some on it.

Numbtongue. Calescent. Fightipilota. Redscar…

So many Goblins, too. Calescent’s and Redscar’s names were hewn into the stone, not pre-carved whenever it had been put up. That answered Mrsha’s questions.

Everyone.

She walked away from it, and now she knew. Mrsha cast about the place where The Wandering Inn had once stood and tried to orient herself. Liscor should be close by…so where…

She concentrated and did the only thing she could magically, which was redirect her [Light] spell from a glowing orb that shone in every direction to a flashlight, a beam of light. Mrsha swept it around, then found it.

There.

She set off, walking unsteadily across the flat ground, a dreamer having another nightmare. But she had been here before. She marched towards the faint outlines of some rubble on the ground.

 

——

 

It was about a three minute walk without the hills and valleys to get in the way. When Mrsha stopped before the walls, she gazed up at the broken pieces of stone. They were still a proper wall for about six feet. She could walk along the edge of the walls and see over the broken tips of rubble in places.

That was all that was left. Grass had overgrown so much of it, and as the Gnoll girl walked forwards, she found pieces of cobblestone underfoot. Just pieces.

There were no buildings left, nothing more than lumps of rock. Grass and lichen covered all of it. The girl stood in the place where a city of over a hundred thousand souls had lived and blinked.

She wondered what it had been. The Goblin King? Some other disaster? She was tired.

The [Fatebreaker Child] wiped her eyes. Then she kept going. Searching for any clues.

She was hungry. She hadn’t had breakfast. And she was lost. It occurred to Mrsha, belatedly, that the root would lead her home.

—But she hadn’t seen it around the monument. Could it be somewhere else? Depending on where Dyeda had stuck it and what the door had been focused on, it could be anywhere in the world, a nigh-invisible root.

Great. The first thing she had to do was survive the night, then find Rags. Then…

Mrsha pulled things out of her bag of holding. She had some snacks, which she munched on aimlessly. Dried granola bars and water—courtesy of watching Roots Mrsha starve. Someone attacked her as Mrsha searched for a place to rest.

She spun—and the shape leapt at her. Mrsha stumbled backwards, dropping her water flask and bar, and there was an angry frrting noise, a squeak, and the creature leapt at the granola and picked it up. Mrsha aimed her [Light] spell at the thing, ready to cast [Thorn Paw] or run and—

The little Fortress Beaver flinched away from the light, but it grabbed the snack in its paws and hunched away from Mrsha, presenting its thick fur body to the girl.

A beaver?

Then she realized there were more around her. Mrsha swung her flashlight around and heard a slapping sound. A dozen beavers emerged from underhangs and nooks and crannies in the destroyed city.

Beavers. Mrsha blinked at them, then held up her paws.

The former [Druid] used her [Wild Affinity] Skill and [Natural Allies: Fortress Beavers], and the animals instantly stopped slapping their tails. They peered at her, and Mrsha rubbed at her head.

Of all the creatures to appear…her Skills actually worked. The beavers leapt down, fighting with the one who’d ambushed her for a bite of food. Mrsha got the impression they were hungry.

Well, of course they were. Beavers liked tree bark and other aquatic plants. The Floodplains of Liscor were a terrible habitat for them except in the spring. They chirped hopefully at Mrsha, and after a second, she gave them two more granola bars, tearing the food up so the beavers could devour them.

That might have been a mistake if she couldn’t find food, but someone had to be kind. The beavers were nervous of Mrsha, even with her [Natural Ally] Skill, but they led her to their den, which turned out to be a broken building you could squeeze under. It was smelly, and Mrsha got the impression from the crunching sound that they’d resorted to eating insects as well as plants to survive.

They got mad when she lit up the place with a spell, so Mrsha just lay down in the darkness. She was exhausted, and it was dangerous outside. They told her that, not in images, but ideas.

Big scuttlers, small sticky scuttlers, screeching fliers, and bad-bad roarers and thunder-things.

She could identify what they meant. Rock Crabs seemed to still be around, and Shield Spiders. Screeching fliers were…Razorbeaks.

All three would kill her if she blundered into one unguarded; she didn’t have any blue fruit cores. Better to take shelter with these guys. Mrsha felt them squeeze next to her.

What are bad-bad roarers? Thunder-things?

The beavers gave her confused images of something fast moving past them and a sound like thunder, but different in the air. Thunder-things made a similar loud sound, and you died if they noticed you…sometimes.

Well, that’s great. Mrsha closed her eyes as they curled up around her. She passed out amidst the beavers, resolving to figure out what was going on when she woke. She was exhausted.

She just hoped Rags was alright. The girl was afraid for the Goblin, even if she was a Goblin. For this world would not be kind.

There was a name that Mrsha had noticed was absent on the memorial for the inn.

Rags’.

She believed she knew who the new Goblin King was.

 

——

 

The Goblin [Chieftain] was less lucky than Mrsha. Her location had shifted due to the maddening journey through the lining of the world. She barely processed that—it had overwhelmed her mind until she’d realized Mrsha was saving her.

Then—she was falling. From high overhead, faster and faster.

A comet. She was falling towards something, someone so incredibly dangerous that Rags’ entire being woke up. She opened her eyes and felt the figure look up at her from where they sat.

Surprise. Confusion.

Rage.

Each emotion overwhelmed her, and Rags would have stood in awe, a gnat before a giant, if it weren’t for the falling part.

[Featherfall]—wasn’t working. She was plunging down so fast it wasn’t arresting her fall in time.

[Barkskin]. Rags saw the ground coming up. She twisted. She had so few Skills and spells—

[Risk Calculation]. A 100% chance of this hurting like—

The Goblin hit the ground so hard she half-buried herself in it. 

The Goblin King didn’t move. Then shouting voices and glowing lights swept across the fallen Goblin as she tried to raise a hand, tried to breathe through shattered ribs embedding themselves in her lungs. She gazed up at the Goblin King.

“I have so many questions.”

Then the Goblin passed out. Still, she didn’t level.

She had to know, first.

 

——

 

The Grand Design awarded one of the highest single-day level-ups in the history of its creation a mere four hours later as a girl woke up in a smelly beaver den in a ruined city just as dawn broke.

 

[Fatebreaker Child Level 24!]

[Skill – Immunity: Fate Obtained!]

[Skill – Defy My Fate (Daily) Obtained!]

[Skill Change – Other Me’s Skill → Other Me’s Skills!]

[Other Me’s Skills Obtained!]

[Skill – Unstoppable Half-Giant’s Push Obtained!]

[Bound Spell – Speed Obtained!]

[Spell – Orb of Air Learned!]

[Spell – Barrier of Winds Learned!]

[Condition: Manalaced Fur Obtained!]

 

Well, that was nice. The beavers woke up as Mrsha sat up and smacked her head on the ceiling of the den. She crawled out of the smelly place and wondered if the Grand Design was laughing at her.

…No, it just gave you Skills you wanted or wished you had. They were useful, but she wondered how practical a push Skill was.

Then again, [Other Me’s Skills] probably means I have a lot of free Skills.

Mrsha activated a Skill from another version of herself experimentally.

[Hawk Eyes]! And—[Speed].

She waved at the beavers as they chirped at her, then zoomed away. Mrsha dashed along the perimeter of Liscor’s walls, going for the highest spot—a ten-foot section of stone. She climbed up, smiling as she leapt with amazing speed and distance from the spell on her.

It lasted all of four minutes, which was great. Mrsha felt it wearing off and hoped it recharged hourly or something. She peered around, and her eyes zoomed in as she gazed about. The sun was rising over the High Passes, and she saw…well, what confirmed her suspicions.

The Floodplains by day were flat. Something had smoothed out the hills and valleys. Perhaps it was intentional geoforming, but Mrsha suspected it was just—

War.

Huge craters in the ground and scars of upturned earth were partly-covered by grass, but fresh enough that in most places Mrsha still saw the wounds in the earth. Her nose, no longer filled with blood, smelled a terrible, acrid odor in the air. It was foul, like the worst stuff in Octavia’s shop.

Oil and blood and death.

The Floodplains were some kind of battlefield; Mrsha saw a glint from the ground and focused on it.

Something bright and reflective over there. What is it? I can’t tell, even though I see it. A shell? Armor of a half-Giant? She spun around and saw nothing.

No civilization north or south of her. Maybe something like…smokestacks to the north? Nah. Even with her [Hawk Eyes], she had no clue.

She’d check out that shiny stuff, then head…north. North was the only way she lived. The Bloodfields even in autumn were crazy. Maybe Esthelm was alright.

Mrsha began jogging, deciding she should have used a travelling Skill from [Other Me’s Skills]. Then she realized…she could use another one.

Okay.

[Long Step]! Mrsha’s pace nearly doubled, and she wondered if this was from a Mrsha who’d learned from Wer the Wanderer. She shot across the Floodplains, heading for that piece of metal. It took a while; twenty minutes into her jog over the nearly-flat ground, Mrsha tripped over a hard, round piece of grass. She cursed silently, turned her head, and the Rock Crab burst up out of the soil where it had buried itself. It snapped at her with one claw—

The Rock Crab crunched its claw around the child to paste her for consumption, then raised its claw to its mouth. No mangled corpse fell into its maw. It opened and closed its claw, then circled around.

Huh?

A girl was jogging away in a hurry a hundred paces distant. The Rock Crab looked at its claw, then at the girl.

But it had just—

Wh—

 

——

 

[Defy My Fate] for the day. Mrsha slowed down after a while and reached into her bag of holding. She pulled out a few pieces of emergency wood—again, a lesson from Roots Mrsha—and took the time to assemble an impromptu stick. She poked at the ground with it, determined not to hit a Shield Spider nest.

Slower, then. It took her another hour to get to the metal stuff, by which point Mrsha had substituted [Hawk Eyes] for [See Heat]. That let her avoid the animals. When she reached the metal piece of…metal, she stood in front of it, perplexed, then walked around it and tried to unearth it.

No good. It was half-buried in the ground and so big she doubted she could shift it with [Lesser Strength], even unburied. Mrsha rubbed at the charred markings on the side and noticed two things.

It’s thick. Half a foot of steel wide, and it was long and slightly rounded—though the metal had been warped slightly from being ripped off. Mrsha ran her paws across the smooth metal, astonished.

It’s all one piece! Her short time in Mrell’s tribe and his occasional, annoying letters told her how amazing a feat of metallurgy this was. An entire 8-by-8 section was joined with another by these rounded…they looked like screws, and Mrsha could see the seam in the metal.

Something big, long, metallic…was right here. Well, before something else ripped that gash into the metal and left this fragment behind.

Any [Smith] of Mrsha’s time would have run out to steal this, but here it was. It wasn’t mossy; there was a bit of green on the metal, but it appeared fresh. It smelled bad, though; it had that same quality as some of Octavia’s stuff. Like her matches, but worse.

Mrsha sniffed the material, wiping at it more with her arm, and then realized there was a final detail to the metal. She’d assumed it was green because of the weathering, but no, it was painted green. And still quite reflective; it was catching the rising sunlight and reflecting off it.

There was an icon or some kind of picture drawn in paint on the side. It was mostly obscured by the ground, but with a bit of digging, Mrsha saw slashes of white, red, and blue forming an icon.

What she could see of it was…the girl tilted her head. The white letters were above some kind of symbol, which she assumed was for a city or banner. Though she didn’t recognize the city with a dome over it.

Firebark 14. Then the icon of the city with a weird…caterpillar thing with a long horizontal nose? Not an insect; that was just the bottom part. Some kind of weird-looking object.

Mrsha’s instincts said it was a vehicle, but she had no…wait, she’d seen this before. Where? She rubbed at her head, wishing she could see her own history, then she snapped her fingers.

A sketch in the Earther rooms that Erin and the others had once made. The young woman’s lectures on Earth—what was it? She’d never let Mrsha watch those ‘violent’ movies. The girl had had to sneak into the [World’s Eye Theatre] to watch them at night. Mrsha liked fantasy and science fiction more anyways, because she understood one and loved the other. But this—this—

Ah.

Tank.

Mrsha stared at the number, name, and the icon of the rolling vehicle under the domed city, stepping back.

How…far in the future is this? She gazed around, deciding that she had nothing left to do than go north. There were other bits of metal in the ground, but she didn’t feel like digging them up.

Then she saw the flare of heat across the Floodplains and froze a moment before she heard the roaring sound.

Rrrrrrrr…rrrrrrrrhhhhhhhhhhhrrrrrrrr. BrrrrrrrrrrrAAAAAAAA—

It ramped up in volume, louder and louder, and Mrsha blinked as something hot raced across the flat Floodplains. She could tell it was blazing hot thanks to her [See Heat] Skill, but without [Hawk Eyes], it just looked like a blur of—well, she couldn’t say.

Something incredibly distant was moving at ludicrous speed—slower than Magnolia’s carriage, but faster than anything but a Courier—across the Floodplains. Not just one, either, Mrsha saw.

That spark of heat was several moving dots spreading out. Mrsha figured, as they drew slightly closer, they were definitely vehicles of some kind. Vehicles being ridden by…people?

They looked like bicycles. Only, if someone was pedalling them, then they were like twice Rianchi’s level at least. Each one was heading in a different direction; there were thirty-two of them, in fact!

Looks like they’re scouts. Or something. They seemed coordinated; they were combing across the Floodplains, perhaps in preparation for something.

Or…Mrsha felt a twinge of alarm.

Or they’re searching for me? 

Ludicrous. She hadn’t done anything more than run around and stare at some metal and go to sleep yesterday. But maybe she’d done something to cause an alarm?

Or someone else had? There was no point asking questions. Mrsha began activating Skills.

[Natural Concealment]. [Peace of the Wild]. Not that the latter worked on Rock Crabs, but it’d keep Dinobirds or other, smaller creatures from noticing her presence.

Such as there were. Mrsha began stealthing away, heading towards the edge of the Floodplains, noting with dismay that the riders had come from the north. So either there lay safety and civilization if they were friendly, or she had to head south.

There were insects in the grass, at least. Crickets let her pass without objection, and Mrsha stole through the tallest tufts of grass she could use as cover, emerging with ladybugs on her fur, watching the riders streak past her now, still making that ungodly sound.

What the hell are they on? They were bicycles, but they didn’t pedal them! Mrsha remembered sketches from Kevin’s shop like them, and he’d talked about…motorbikes.

Dead gods. Automatic bicycles. The riders had on helmets and wore some kind of cloth-looking body-armor, so Mrsha had no notion of who they were, only that they were humanoid. Probably not Drakes since she saw no tails, but that told her little.

One of the motorbike-riding figures stopped suddenly, coming to a halt a thousand feet distant from Mrsha. She crouched down and saw them kick something out, letting the bike rest on a piece of metal. Now she had a good view of them…Mrsha squinted and saw the helmeted figure peering about.

They had an object in their hands. She ducked down lower when she realized it was a pair of spyglasses joined together.

I am invisible, I am a shadow in the night. I really wish I had my defy fate Skill, just in case. The figure swept their binoculars over Mrsha, then tapped something on their wrist. They gunned their motorbike forwards in a roar, and Mrsha exhaled.

Whew. She kept creeping towards the edge of the Floodplains. North or south she still wasn’t sure about; north was clearly full of some people, but she didn’t know them. South? The figures were heading south, ergo you headed north because you risked detection, and it was further if you went south…

Mrsha trudged along, caught up in her thoughts, eyes on the nearest rider who kept going away from her. She turned, though, when she heard the bang.

It was loud, percussive, with a sharpness to the sound that instantly died off, and Mrsha whirled and saw one of the riders circling around in the distance. They were very far off, but the sound was loud, and the flat ground meant Mrsha’s ears picked up the sound from far, far away.

Bang, bang, bang—then she saw what had alarmed them.

A Rock Crab. It was scuttling away from them, having tried the same ambush trick on the riders. Heck, it might even be the same one.

They were too far away for Mrsha to see what was happening, but whatever that sound was, it was definitely discouraging the Rock Crab, who fled from it. The rider stopped, then continued brrming across the ground.

I wonder what the heck that is. Pretty sure I can guess, though. They said they killed Kevin with a gun. The movies made them look cooler.

Mrsha knew the vague idea of how guns worked, of course. She’d seen them in movies, but the mechanics were, uh, not as clear. Some kind of super crossbow is how everyone described it. But it was one thing to ‘know’ all these things Earthers could tell you, or see it in a movie and another to see the polished piece of grey or black metal up close.

The cylinder of a gun was long near the tip, and in the case of some, had a nozzle with holes at the end, which might be for the sound or something. Then it became the main part of the gun, which was more like a square of metal with a lever on the side of this one, and a familiar trigger mechanism you could put a finger in, whereupon you reached the butt of the gun.

You know, it was less dangerous-looking than a crossbow. But it was still, somehow, intrinsically unsettling because you could guess at what it did. Bad end points, you pull the trigger, and bam.

Mrsha was impressed, really. She froze as the figure on the motorbike pointed the gun at her. It was a black-painted thing with a red ring at the end, probably for style. They held it in a gloved hand.

How the hell had they snuck up on her like that? Mrsha had no idea—until the figure flicked something on their motorbike and it began rrrrring again.

“Scout 3, it’s not the Courier. I have a Gnoll child, white fur. Doombearer. She was using some kind of Skills to get away. Uploading pictures now, Command.”

The figure spoke, voice muffled behind the helmet, as Mrsha held up her paws. The figure’s head was slightly cocked, as confused by Mrsha as she was by them.

“—Negative. Looks like a war orphan, but she’s got some magic on her. Survivor, probably. Though how the hell she got this far north…”

There was a click as they pulled something on their gun, and it rose. Mrsha exhaled in relief. Okay, they’re not Gnolls from the Plain’s Eye Tribe or they’d have shot her.

The figure kicked down a stand for their motorcycle and dismounted. Mrsha realized the damn thing had been camouflaged; it rippled slightly as it abandoned the magical spell that had let the rider sneak up on her.

Magic and technology. Scout 3 seemed annoyed as they raised their hands.

“Kid, no sudden moves. We’re not going to harm you. Oath on the breaking cycle. Who are you? Where are you from?”

Mrsha reached for her bag of holding to write, and the figure snapped their gun up at once.

“Don’t grab anything. Please.”

Well, Apista poo. This was a pickle. Mrsha doubted raising her wand would be helpful either, so she tried paw-signs. She pointed at herself, then drew a line over her mouth and shook her head.

Amazingly, that worked. The figure paused.

“Command, I think the kid’s mute. She’s signing at me, but I can’t read it. Orders?”

They listened, then held out a cautious hand as the gun lowered again.

“Kid, if you can understand me, put the bag of holding and wand down, then step away from it. We’ll get you some food and take you somewhere safe. Got it?”

They seemed to think she was more terrified than she was. Mrsha nodded slowly.

Food sounds good, and somewhere safe is great if this isn’t a trap. I need my bag of holding and wand…no, not that much. Exaggeratedly slowly, Mrsha unhooked the belt and wand and put them down on the ground, then stepped back.

The rider really did seem to think they were scaring the shit out of Mrsha, because they nodded and holstered their gun as soon as Mrsha did that. To reassure Mrsha, they reached up and lifted the helmet from their head.

Slightly tousled pink hair emerged as Mrsha stared at the lime-green skin and pointed ears. The Goblin—the Hobgoblin—had a pronounced underbite, so her two canines poked up from her lips as she smiled at Mrsha.

“There. See? We’re not monsters. Command, I’m transporting one back to Forwards HQ. Just come here and…”

She knelt and beckoned, and Mrsha was frozen. Again, not for the reasons the soldier thought.

A Goblin. A Goblin riding…? Mrsha stared at the other bikers, and some dots began to connect in her head.

Command? They had fancy bikes that appeared so hard to make. Communication spells in their helmets. Was this future…?

Then, before she could walk forwards, she heard that familiar sound, only it was a distant pop-poppop-pop!

Instantly, Scout 3 jammed her helmet back on her head, drew her gun, and took cover behind her motorbike.

“Get down! Shit—”

Mrsha flattened herself down instantly, not knowing what was going on. But her ears picked up a noise.

Whatever outfit the Goblin had on, it wasn’t fully sealed when they’d put their helmet on, so Mrsha’s amazingly good ears picked up the faintest voice coming from within the helmet.

“—tact! On the move! Cut them off, they’re circling north!”

“Cease fire and disengage if they make it out of the containment. Keep them away from Scout 3—there is a civilian on the ground!”

“Davra gat, she’s coming straight at us! Engaging!”

That came from Scout 3, and the BLAM sound instantly ensured that Mrsha stopped hearing anything else—possibly reducing her sense of hearing permanently if the ringing in her ears was anything to go by.

The girl put her head down, but she actually crawled forwards and grabbed her wand and bag of holding. That astonished the [Scout], but Mrsha had seen battles before. Despite the deafening blasts of sound coming from the gun, which flashed with each bang, Mrsha was still able to think and move. She backed away from the [Scout], who was shooting at…

Someone running across the Floodplains fast. So damn fast that they were leaving the [Scouts] behind, zipping forwards in trails of light.

[Lightning Run]. The Goblins firing at the figure were missing—Mrsha realized she was caught in the middle of a fight between the Goblins and this person! She kept crawling as Scout 3 shouted at her to stay put—but they kept turning so much that they’d have been at risk of firing over Mrsha’s head if she did that, thank you very much, soldier girl.

—The problem was the running figure kept coming their way. Mrsha wasn’t sure if the runner was attacking back; her ears were ringing, but she saw Scout 3 taking cover. Mrsha peeked up as she heard what sounded, dimly, like laughter? She saw a figure blurring at her. Mrsha leapt sideways, and a pair of hands grabbed her.

“Gotcha! Hang on, you little shit!”

Wha—? Nononono—

The world blurred, and Mrsha left her stomach and consciousness somewhere behind her as Scout 3 bellowed.

“Cease fire! Cease fire, she’s got a civilian—”

The blam stopped after a second, and the person holding Mrsha kept running. Each step—and she was moving fast—carried her forwards in a rush of motion. She blazed southwards, covering hundreds of feet each second.

Still laughing, insanity in her eyes as she glanced down at Mrsha, weaving in a snake-pattern to avoid the guns, then pumping her arm and legs to go faster. Mrsha gaped up at a middle-aged woman with a sharp, fast chin, compact build, wearing a flashy tracksuit covered with logos down each arm, and who had short-cropped hair dyed green and yellow at the tips.

A Courier.

In any day, in any age or time, there would always, always be a Courier. And this one outran the motorbikes of the Goblins, who had switched to blades and roared after her to try and catch her—

They never had a shot. Or rather, they had a shot, but they didn’t fire for fear of hitting Mrsha, which she certainly appreciated.

But who was her mysterious savior? Mrsha didn’t have a chance to find out for a while—the Courier just ran, and thankfully, Mrsha’s stomach acclimated to the jolting pace.

Whoever this was, they were a Courier of this age. Mrsha had seen other Couriers. Heck, Ryoka was one, but with her sprint, this Courier outpaced the Wind Runner in the air. They were out of the Floodplains and heading down a vast patch of charred earth along a semi-broken road before Mrsha realized where they were.

She turned her head right and stared at the Bloodfields—or rather, said scorched earth.

Black soot, or glass, in a straight line all the way south along the foothills. What vegetation there was was distinctly drier, tougher, thorny grass—but no red. No crimson blades of grass, no Watcher Trees, no bug monsters—just ash.

Someone had decided to put an end to the Bloodfields so completely that nothing remained, and by the looks of it, nothing had grown for ages. The road was also familiar; Mrsha blinked at the smooth, worn stones and realized it was Liscor’s road.

They had built it; it was no longer the pristine pathway, but was broken in places, the neat little side guards chipped away, pieces missing. The Courier watched her step more than the Floodplains as she ran, cursing as she kicked a piece of stone at high-speeds.

“Dead gods damnit—hey, kid, you shot? If you’re dead, Lord Supreme Commander is going to kill me. So don’t be dead.”

She shifted Mrsha with a grunt; she was strong, despite her compact frame. Lots of wiry muscle stood out as she lifted Mrsha up like a sack of potatoes.

The girl wiggled, and the Courier gave her a sparkling grin.

“Awesome. Hold on another moment—we’re almost out of their range, and I can report in. Almost, almost…”

She pulled something out of her pocket that Mrsha recognized. It was a smartphone. The smooth surface lit up as the Courier flicked several screens, tapped a series of numbers in—all while running, mind you.

Then she stared at a series of empty bars in the top right of the screen until two of them lit up. Mrsha had no idea what it meant, but the Courier cheered.

“Excellent.”

Mrsha knew smartphones. The Earthers let her play with them, especially Rose, to earn points, and she had tapped on some of the apps and realized a lot of the functions of the devices didn’t work without the ‘internet’, wherever the heck that was. All the Earthers loved to complain about not having it.

Now, at last, she saw what a properly-working smartphone looked like, because the Courier tapped an icon in the bottom right, then hit another button. She was moving so fast that the colorful screens and text flashed too fast for Mrsha to process. The Gnoll girl’s face was still slack when the Courier stopped, held her phone up horizontally, and smiled into it.

“Smile, kid!”

She beamed at the smartphone as it clicked—and Mrsha stared up at the image of herself and the Courier on-screen.

It had just taken a picture of her! Mrsha was wearing a dumbfounded, slightly shell-shocked expression, and the Courier woman had a great smile on her face, showing all her teeth. Then her fingers danced over the screen, writing a message. Mrsha’s slack-jawed expression of incredulity grew more pronounced as she read what it said.

 

“Just saved an orphaned kid from the middle of a warzone while doing scouting work for the Izrilian Alliance! Nearly got shot, but a Courier’s gotta do what a Courier’s gotta do! I’d better get her to safety!”

#couriers #courierslife #onadelivery #couriersoutbound #stories #traumatizedchild

 

The—the Courier hit ‘post’, and Mrsha saw the image blink. Then it showed her profile picture, which was of a Courier mid-run with lightning bolts around her, and her name.

Persua “Lightning” Mavva, Courier.

The post was blinking as a bunch of little hearts and stars blipped underneath it. There was a number, and it was going up fast.

Persua—Courier Persua—alternate universe Courier Persua, the Lightning Courier—grinned happily at the hearts on her social media post. Then her smile blinked out as an ominous noise began playing from her phone. Mrsha saw an icon appear.

‘Lord Supreme Commander’ was calling. His icon was a giant steel-toed boot with spikes on it that Mrsha was almost positive wasn’t his face, but how Persua saw him.

“Uh—hey, Lord—”

“What are you doing, Courier Mavva? Report!”

The roar made Persua jump and begin running faster.

“Hey, I barely made it out of there! I reconnoitered the entire front—you’re right. They’re coming, and it’s a lot of armor. I’m inbound. Say thirty minutes? I got the kid too—”

“Get over here immediately. The [Archmage] wants to be briefed. And bring that child. If they’re a Doombearer, I need to interview them. Are they hurt? What have they said?”

Persua hesitated, glancing down at Mrsha, and she didn’t get the sign language.

“I think they’re too scared to talk. I don’t think the Goblins did anything to them.”

“They don’t harm prisoners. Just—bring her, and I’ll have a medical squad on standby. Stop posting.”

“Yessir, on my way, Lord Xitegen.”

Persua hung up, not looking too put out by the call, and then glanced down at Mrsha. The girl’s mouth was so open that she swallowed a fly at high speeds and began hacking it up. Persua slapped her on the back until it came out.

“You want food, kid? Water? Eating’s rough when I run, but don’t you worry. Lord Xitegen will take care of you. You can tell everyone the Lightning Courier saved you. Name your firstborn daughter after me.”

She winked, and Mrsha wondered if this really was the worst of all worlds. But then Persua glanced over her shoulder, and suddenly, she was really running. Sweat was running down her neck, and her armpit was damp. She muttered to herself as she glanced over her shoulder again.

“I think this one’s it. I’ll take you south myself, kid. Either that or we’ll find out whether Goblins shoot Couriers and children.”

She accelerated, and Mrsha almost swallowed another bug. But after all, Mrsha just didn’t know that there were the best of Persuas and the worst of Persuas.

Her world had one of the worst of Persuas.

 

——

 

This entire world made no damn sense. No…think of it another way. If Mrsha could take in a world ten years in the future and find it odd, but somewhat relatable and understand what had changed, this world was too advanced.

When they came to the army camp, she didn’t recognize it.

Oh, she knew [Soldiers] when she saw them. But when Persua slowed to avoid hitting a moving…car…Mrsha felt like she was watching a movie of Earth.

It was, in fact, a jeep-like device with an open roof loaded with Drakes who got out, rifles slung over their shoulders. Each one was wearing what appeared to be a cloth uniform instead of armor, but they passed by a traditional [Knight] in armor on a horse.

Or what Mrsha had taken to be a [Knight] in armor until they flipped up a visor to reveal they weren’t Human or Drake or any species.

A metal face and round ‘eye’ of glass projected a scanning beam over Persua and Mrsha. Little metal wires criss-crossed the face, sinking into the artificial body as the Golem spoke.

“Lord Xitegen awaits you, Courier Mavva. Please take the child to Medical Area 1 for immediate examination and personal decontamination and—”

“Yeah, yeah, scanning.”

The knight-golem-robot kept riding a circuit of the camp, and Mrsha passed by a group of Humans wearing heavy plate armor laden with magical runes.

They looked like Gold-rank adventurers with all the magical enchantments on their weapons, and they were armed with halberds. Currently, they were sitting around a campfire in front of tents.

There were so many damn tents. They were lined up in rows, allowing passage and organization through this vast warcamp. On the way in, Mrsha had seen and smelled a lot of people beyond, but in the middle of it, it felt like a city.

She heard a dozen different conversations with each step Persua took and saw just as many species.

Gnolls, Drakes, Humans, of course, but even Dullahans, Stitch-folk, and yes, Golems. One was sitting, hands folded together, not eating with the rest of their squad, but chattering away. It looked like a suit of armor if you put a smartphone screen on the visor; the screen was showing a Gnoll’s face, grinning before the face turned quizzical and stared at Mrsha.

“Doombearer. Lookit that.”

The entire squad of [Soldiers] glanced up, wary, and Mrsha heard the Gnoll in charge grunt. He was big with [Shaman] paint on his fur as well as those military fatigues. He had both a ‘gun’, one of the compact ones the Goblins had been carrying, as well as an axe and shield at his side.

“That’s not good. Though if she’s from the north, maybe the Domed Cities had some kind of disaster?”

“Doubt it, or they’d have a…Goblin Doombearer or something. Do Goblins have Doombearers, X1-5?”

The Golem soldier made a thinking Gnoll’s face.

“Fuck if I know. Searching…‘no Doombearers have been reported out of any other species but Gnolls’.”

A Human [Soldier] grunted and rolled his eyes.

“I could look that up on my phone. Why are you dumber than me? You’re a machine.”

“I’m good at shooting things, fleshbag. You want a calculator watching your back? I’ll go get one—”

Laughter, and then Persua was past them, still carrying Mrsha. The girl was wiggling now—she wanted to go back and ask that squad everything at once.

“Hey, kid, stop that. Just a bit further—hey, Courier on the go! Move it!”

They hit a snarl as they crossed a line of people waiting to get some food. A bunch of surly Drakes, and one turned and glared.

“There’s our bigshot Courier. Ever heard of information blackouts?”

Persua gave the Drake a charming, huge smile.

“Heard of ‘em, but I never pay attention to that kind of stuff. I just run. You ready for a fight? Because the Domed Cities are sending the big guns south. I saw their airfields were all active. And a lot of tanks, not just transports.”

The Drake [Soldier] stared at Persua as the rest of the ones in line turned as well. Each one had a yellow sash on one arm, Mrsha noted, and they were grim, even for the [Soldiers] here. She worried Persua was going to get punched—then wondered why she was worrying.

However, the Drake just grinned and spat.

“Ancestors, that’ll be fun. Those bastards already copied our designs?”

“Something just as big as the Grimalkin II’s. Not as many; they’re mostly still transports. The new ones seem like a prototype line.”

“Well, thank our [Master Engineer] for that. Don’t worry; we’ve got enough armor to hold the line, even if they take the skies. Kevin himself is going to be on the front.”

“Kevin?”

Mrsha’s began thrashing around as Persua’s brows rose.

“Sounds risky. Argh—I’ve got to get this kid to medical. Good luck!”

“Pallass remembers!”

Every single [Soldier] lifted a fist and shouted, and Mrsha felt a chill run down her spine. She gazed at them, and Persua jogged on.

The Courier was the anti-version of the tight-lipped professional. But she was not…ill-loved. She called out encouragement as she ran, doing a commentary to Mrsha under her breath.

“Crazy bastards. I’d sue for peace if I had a choice. You and I’ve seen the Domed Cities. Or at least, I have. They’ll never take the north back even if they win, but I guess they have to go, or we lose the entire south. Hey, good luck out there!”

Mrsha couldn’t tell if Persua was the rat-faced, sallow bitch that she presumed any Persua to be or a genuinely decent Courier. She was so disorientated by her companion that only when Persua plonked her down on a table did Mrsha realize they’d entered a markedly emptier and cleaner part of camp.

“I didn’t see any blood, and I’m not winged.”

They’d passed through a weird, pulsing barrier that had removed all the dirt on Mrsha’s fur. It was coming from two metal pylons, and the [Doctor], who was wearing a red cross on her uniform, snapped at Persua.

“Courier, please! Gentle! Hello, miss. Are you okay? Does anything hurt, first off? I just need to make sure you’re okay, then we can get you some food and ask you what happened. Alright?”

It was a nice-looking Drake lady, wearing more of those collared uniforms everyone seemed to like, only this one was green with the aforementioned red cross over a white square background on her chest. She had also had a badge.

 

Captain Withra Gemscale.

2nd Platoon, Alliance Army.

 

She ran a fancy scanning device over Mrsha, another piece of sci-fi technology. Everything here was glowing screens and magic; heck, even the table Mrsha had been put on was a floating gurney that auto stabilized even if Mrsha leaned over the edges. Persua began taking more selfies of herself and Mrsha as the [Doctor] glanced at the scanner and Mrsha. The girl had pulled her trusty quill and notecards out of her bag of holding.

“What’s wrong?”

Hello, I cannot speak. My name is Mrsha, and I am mute. I’m not hurt. Please tell me where I am and what is going on? I was in the Floodplains, and now I’m here.

The [Doctor] did a double-take at the writing.

“Dead gods, cursive? That’s amazing you can write so well, Miss Mrsha! Mrsha…hm, well, you’re in the Alliance’s war camp, and we’re about to meet the Domed Cities at the Floodplains. So this is not the place for you to be. As soon as we get you checked out, Lord Xitegen may want to interview you, but then you’re going south, somewhere safe. Courier Mavva, can I trust you’ll take her?”

“Duh. Sorry, how do you spell #responsibility?”

Doctor Withra didn’t dignify that with a reply. Instead, she checked her scanner and frowned.

“Okay, let me just check…wait a second. I might need a second test. Can you hold out your paw, Mrsha? I just need—”

She pulled out another object, which had a little glass capsule on the back of it attached to a long, hammer-looking device with a round nozzle of some kind. Mrsha was so interested about what everything did she didn’t realize what was going on until Withra held Mrsha’s paw expertly and the device punched a tiny needle into Mrsha’s paw.

It sucked out her blood, and Mrsha jerked and glowered. The [Doctor] held up a guilty claw as she unscrewed the capsule and walked over to another orderly.

“Sorry! I just needed a bit of blood! Can you run an all-spectrum test on this? And do we have any candy?”

Mrsha wasn’t that upset at losing some blood in the grand scheme of ‘I was nearly shot’ and ‘I was rescued by Persua’ and ‘I nearly melted in the infinite cosmos of reality’.

…But she did accept a lollipop that was bright yellow and tasted of lemon. Persua opened her mouth.

“Doc, can I go already? I need—”

Withra inserted a second lollipop into Persua’s mouth, and it shut the Courier up as the [Doctor] gave her a scan.

“You’re clear, Courier Mavva, though you need hydration.”

“Got it.”

Persua pulled out a bright sports drink and took a huge gulp of it. Then she pointed to one of the logos sewn onto her suit’s sleeves.

“Sponsored by Energywaters. You want one?”

Mrsha took the drink. It was tasty, refreshing, and sweet! The [Doctor] refused to take a drink—or let Persua go.

“I’m tested, aren’t I? I need to report to Lord Xitegen or he will kick me over the High Passes.”

“Not yet. I’m just waiting on a result for your passenger.”

Mrsha was feeling great after her lollipop and drink, and she was boiling with questions she was writing down. The [Doctor] glanced at the first one.

“What’s the year? 5243.”

Mrsha stared at her. The [Doctor] helpfully clarified.

“Five thousand two hundred and forty-three years after the Creler Wars. After Flos?”

She started laughing.

“Oh my—that brings me back. How do you know that? You can’t remember that. No, we went back to the last date we could record reliably, the Creler Wars, and marked that. No more of this silly ‘new era’ setting the clock back. Otherwise, we’d keep being in the double digits forever.”

Mrsha hesitated. That was a good answer, she supposed, but she decided to just go for broke.

When did the Goblin King emerge, please? Who was he?

Abruptly, Withra stopped laughing, and Persua glanced up from her phone. Both women exchanged a look, and Withra replied softly.

“Sixteen years ago. Who is he, you mean? Or do you want to know what we say instead of the Domed Cities? Where were you, Miss Mrsha?”

The Gnoll’s quill stopped. Mrsha wrote slowly.

You mean, he’s still alive? The Goblin King?

Withra Gemscale nodded carefully. She checked her scanner, then scanned Mrsha again. Persua frowned at Mrsha.

“I thought you were running away from the Domed Cities. How do you not know…”

Her eyes focused on Mrsha, and she put her smartphone away deliberately.

“What kind of a kid has quill and ink in this day and age?”

Her hands drifted towards her belt, and Mrsha lowered her quill and ink and realized it was the only such object in the entire camp. Withra focused on the note cards and the primitive tools of a bygone era, and then she swung herself over to a computer.

“Can I get a lookup on our databases for a ‘Mrsha’? I have her picture and data. Check the Domed Cities’ shared civilian files too, please.”

In the face of this scrutiny, Mrsha was trying to come up with a plausible answer when the results of her blood test came back. The [Doctor] received it—and an entire squad of figures in weird, stretchy, full-body suits.

Mrsha had seen plastic before, but the sight of six people in hazmat suits was unnerving. Persua froze as a barrier appeared around her and Mrsha.

“Uh. What’s going on?”

“Your passenger has a parasite in her blood, Courier Mavva. You don’t appear to be infected, but we’re going to run a full treatment course for both of you. Lord Xitegen has been notified. Please tell me you didn’t eat or drink with anyone until you got here.”

“Infection? Wait—what—oh, come on.”

Persua began typing faster and taking more pictures. #parasites #biologicalwarfare

Mrsha stared down at her chest as the [Doctors] began to fuss around her and ask where she’d been and what she’d been ingesting or doing.

Someone came over to yell at Persua about that last post.

 

——

 

Forty minutes later, a thoroughly cleaned Mrsha finished pooing in a very fancy bathroom and glared. She decided she did not like being given a laxative in candy, no matter how necessary it was to remove bad stuff from her guts.

On the plus side, she was apparently all clean. She wondered what the hell she’d eaten to have a parasite. The [Doctors] had actually saved a sample of it.

“I’ve never seen anything like it, and I studied in Baleros with Doctor Scala herself. They were practically dormant until we started the injection, then—well, I’m just glad they died fast. I have a sample in extreme isolation, Lord Xitegen.”

“Could it be biological warfare? I cannot believe I’m considering it—anything Courier Mavva thinks is correct I tend to disbelieve on principle.”

The voice was familiar, if—older. Persua was still in the bathrooms, but Mrsha sat up as someone handed her a rations bar. She sniffed the bar and nibbled at it; it had some kind of fruit paste, but her granola bar was better. She took it out, and they instantly confiscated anything edible or drinkable from her bag of holding.

Lord Xitegen looked splendid as he walked forwards. When she saw him, Mrsha noted his huge, barrel-chested form, noticeably overweight, and his one Golem leg moving with mechanical joints, and she knew he was a Goblin-hating jerk at times.

But for a moment, he walked forwards dressed in the old raiment of the nobility of the north and she felt like she would follow him over the edge of the world if he called. He wore weary leadership like a magical cape on his shoulders, and his clothes were dark purple gilded with gold, and he had a bright pink flower on his breast.

A [Lord] of old finery going to war amidst all this modern military apparel. Without a doubt, Mrsha knew he was one of the highest-level people she had ever met. Higher than Fetohep.

The Golem [Soldiers] who stood around the perimeter seemed more alive near Xitegen, the sky overhead swirled, and tiny shapes flew overhead. At first, Mrsha thought they were birds; then she realized it was a cloud of something even tinier. They formed a circling mass which sent streaks of objects across the sky northwards. At odd intervals; every minute or longer periods—streaks of flying objects would shoot northwards, sometimes mixed with glowing ‘birds’, other times just a singular mass, while the rest hovered overhead.

It took Mrsha a few minutes of staring and using a Skill to understand what they were.

Arrows. He walked under a cloud of arrows that kept materializing and flying north. Mrsha’s mouth fell open.

The Domed Cities of the Goblins.

When he regarded the screen, Lord Xitegen’s very gaze seemed to upgrade the computer—Withra objected.

“Lord Xitegen, your aura—”

“Ah, the upgrading. I keep forgetting. Apologies. The parasites?”

“I doubt it’s the Goblins. You’d know better than I, Lord Xitegen, but I’d bet the parasites spread through mucous membranes, potentially in liquid. That’s just a guess, but you don’t want that near population centers. One outbreak and an entire city would be under quarantine. Plus, why bother when it showed up on our scanners?”

Xitegen rubbed at his chin.

“I’m inclined to believe that. They haven’t broken any of the clauses of war before—that only leads to escalation. Well, I want screening of all [Scouts] and checks in the camp for these parasites.”

“Yessir. Will you see our guest now? She needs rest and a gentle touch, Lord Xitegen. If you could leave it to an expert…?”

Withra was hinting hard, but Xitegen ignored her as he strode forward. Mrsha was chewing on the rations bar as she stared at him, and he stopped. He gave her a huge, and surprisingly gentle, smile as he took a seat at the table and launched into a practiced speech.

“I am Lord Xitegen, miss, and you are safe with me. I will have Courier Mavva take you southward shortly, and if you have any family or relatives, I will do my utmost to reunite them with you. You have been exceptionally brave, and I only have a few questions for you…can I get you anything to eat? Something rather more filling than camp rations, I think.”

That was a surprising offer. Mrsha blinked as Doctor Withra protested.

“Lord Xitegen!”

“Something soft on the stomach. Chicken thighs dipped in sauce. I have some in my quarters.”

A Golem went striding off, and Xitegen twisted back to Mrsha.

“Are you alright, Miss…?”

He turned to Withra, clearly embarrassed as he realized he didn’t know Mrsha’s name. Mrsha scribbled on a notecard they’d let her keep.

Hello, Lord Xitegen. I’m Mrsha. Don’t you remember me?

He blinked at the writing as Mrsha held the card up. She could have bluffed him, though she doubted she could beat future lie-detector spells, or tried something, but she was tired. His mouth opened.

“What superlative handwriting. Have I—said that before? Mrsha? Mrsha du…”

The man’s eyes flickered. He stared at Mrsha as Withra frowned, and one of the Golem—no, robotic Golem-people of the future checked something on a smartphone. They glanced at Mrsha sharply and spoke.

“Lord Xitegen. Mrsha du Marquin was a casualty of—”

“The Goblin King. She’s dead.”

The Patriarch of House Terland, leader of the Five Families, and Supreme Commander of the Alliance of Izril gazed upon the little Gnoll girl sitting there. Withra Gemscale noticed a report she’d overlooked in the midst of all the worry about the parasite and picked it up.

“What class is…it required [Greater Appraisal] to even see? [Fatebreaker Child]?”

Persua Mavva emerged from the bathroom, clutching her stomach, and stopped as Mrsha held up a card, smiling sadly.

She wrote her [Words of Conviction] down gently as the [Lord] drew in a breath.

Once upon a time, Lord Xitegen, you went for a run with Ryoka Griffin outside of Invrisil. I know you starved during the Goblin King’s war, and you hated Goblins enough to hire Elia Arcsinger to kill them in Riverfarm. I bet that’s all stuff everyone knows, but Elia told me you paid her every coin you promised, even though she failed. And you paid for her healers. I am Mrsha du Marquin, and I am lost. I know you’re a busy man, but do you have time to help a silly, tired child?

The [Lord]’s eyes fixed on Mrsha, and they were incredulous, then suspicious, then dumbstruck, and then…hopeful? He rose slowly, and there was no more hope in his eyes than before. Not for himself. But he was gentle as he took her hand and inspected her.

“If you tell me your story, little Miss Mrsha, I shall oblige you. I could use a good story. How old are you? No—what year do you think it is for you?”

She told him. He raised his brows.

“Eight? Then it has been twenty-two years. My hair is dyed. We are at war with the Goblins of the north, and this may be the last battle in the war—or we hold and endure. Either way—”

He gently squeezed her paws in his hands.

“I could use a bit of luck.”

She blinked at him, then laughed silently and gave him a huge hug. Mrsha didn’t have the heart to tell Xitegen she’d run out a long time ago. She asked him everything. Then she saw this sorry fate.

This was the world in which a Goblin King arose.

In which a Goblin King—won.

 

——

 

Her name was Fightipilota, and it was a joke that she took seriously. She was a joke that other people were kind enough to take seriously.

She thought she was an important Hob in her tribe, but when everything mattered, she couldn’t do anything. She could only fall about like a fool when an Antinium clapped his hands—and watch her Chieftain do what had to be done.

Her Chieftain and a literal child by any species’ definition. They were gone now. Gone, and Fightipilota saw Pawn and his Painted Antinium. She saw another Rags, a brave [Student] Rags, running off to fight a Titan.

Fightipilota didn’t go with Student Rags. She didn’t join Lyonette, trying to stop this invasion from another world.

She was, ultimately, useless.

Dyeda and Rianchi were more useful than she was. Rags didn’t need another [Aeriel Flier] without a dedicated Wyvern in the fight ahead. Fightipilota knew she wasn’t a great fighter, not even on the par of other Redfangs. She could fly a Wyvern, but she didn’t have hers anymore.

She was just a Goblin, so she stayed in the [Palace of Fates]. Because someone had to.

Someone had to…look for them. Mrsha and Rags, the originals.

No one else was doing it. Rianchi and Dyeda were monitoring the whole ‘we are being invaded by religious Antinium’ thing, which was solid work. Student Rags and Redscar were fighting a horror from thousands of years ago.

Fightipilota sat and thought in the corner of a hallway far from all the action. The [Palace of Fates] was moving around her; she saw corridors change into wondrous visions of other people’s souls. People moved past her, barely paying attention to the short Hobgoblin.

A Unicorn wandered down the halls, staring at a wand in his hand, searching for every vision of what might be, the best and the worst, tears running down his face.

An old man and an undead rat hobbled past the Goblin, desperate to live.

A little Witch stood before a door that had a single, blue hat drawn upon it, a root in her hands, unable to move.

Fightipilota thought.

Mrsha and Rags had vanished. No one could find them. No door in the [Palace of Fates] led to them.

They were not dead. Fightipilota felt she should know if her [Chieftain] was dead. She rather thought Lyonette would know.

But then they were lost or, perhaps, dying. Fightipilota had to help them.

“Show me Mrsha. Show me my Chieftain Rags.”

It showed her a hundred thousand doors, a hallway of forever, and Fightipilota shook her head.

“Show me my Mrsha and Rags.”

Then there was nothing. Just an empty, marble hallway, without a single door in it. But that…was an answer in and of itself. Fightipilota got up and began walking down the hallway.

“If they are out of the [Palace of Fates], show me the way out.”

Hesitation. Then—the hallway remained the same. Fightipilota kept walking. Then she jogged, ran, and shouted.

“Show me Mrsha and Rags! Show me where they are! Show me where I’m closest to them!”

Doors appeared; she ran wildly through the [Palace of Fates], chasing something that it could not process, what it did not know. But someone did.

It was guiding Fightipilota through flashing doors, each one of different futures. As if the two were passing by countless realities, but never in any one of them. Fightipilota ran—and ran—and then came to the empty hallway.

“Where are they?”

There was no reply. The Goblin kept walking. She hesitated; she could turn back, but then she just resumed walking.

“Show me Chieftain. Show me little Mrsha. Show me…”

At first, she asked every second, then every ten seconds. Then every half minute…then every minute. When her voice was sore, she asked every ten minutes…every twenty minutes…

An hour passed. Then two. Then three and four, and Fightipilota sat down. She lay on the floor, exhausted, but she didn’t go back. She just waited.

Waited, and she knew she would turn around when this place ended or she did. The Goblin was so tired. Tired of losing her Chieftain, tired of losing friends.

She closed her eyes and dreamed she was flying over the New Lands of Izril, only with that single adventure and exploration in mind. She slept, dozing, and when she awoke—

There was a single door in front of her lined with cracked metal, armor fused together to form the frame. A broken door, slightly ajar.

Blackness beyond.

And a tiny root hanging out of it.

Slowly, Fightipilota sat up. She stared at the door and wondered who was stupid enough to enter…she didn’t remember this door having a root in it.

It was one of the ones Mrsha and Rags had conjured. The what-if about the Goblin King. She stumbled over to the door, thinking out loud.

“How? Maybe—maybe they vanished. And then they had to find somewhere else that was real. Maybe that—”

She yanked the door open and stared into it, but she didn’t see anything beyond. Fightipilota hesitated, then took hold of the root. She put her clawed hand to the door…and it did not give.

The wall was impenetrable, even with the root in it. Fightipilota stood there, and her heart began to ache.

“They’re in there, aren’t they? Somehow. Somehow, they did it. The Chieftain always does. They’re in there, but you won’t let me through.”

The door didn’t answer, of course. It was a door. Fightipilota pushed at it as if mere force would make it yield.

“Let me in. Let me in.”

It would not yield. She began to bang on the door, tried to heave herself through with the root—but it was impossible, and she knew it. It was like trying to bypass the idea of infinity; the black wall would never yield. It was part of this Skill, and even the roots of the Faerie Flowers had failed against it.

She lay down again, unsure what to do. If Student Rags came back, maybe she’d have a plan, or maybe they’d just have to stand around and wait. Redscar would try to cut the door open—and fail—

No, there was nothing to do. She doubted even Pawn could breach this. There were rules…and cheating…and this.

The system itself had decided no one should be allowed to see what was through here, and the decision stood. Fightipilota closed her eyes.

Sometimes, you had to hate the system. She knew she shouldn’t really get the [Fighter Pilot] class she’d dreamed of, and it wouldn’t have been fair—but sometimes, it just sucked. All these levels and Skills made you so tired. Because each time you levelled, you knew you did good. When you didn’t level, you felt like you did bad.

You lived your entire life trying to level, as if that was the only important thing. If you didn’t level, you were stupid.

It almost made you want to not level, like some of those weirdos like Ryoka or the ones [Shamans] talked about. Fatebreakers or something.

Fightipilota’s eyes opened wide.

No. Rulebreakers. She sat up slowly, and her heart began to pound with an idea.

What if…?

No, I’ll lose everything. Everything I have and am…

My Chieftain needs me. Even if I lose it all, I’ll have tried. 

The Goblin hesitated. She regarded her clawed hands and saw the baffled, silly [Lord] staring at her. The Sword Crabs fleeing beneath her. The shriek of a dying Wyvern. Her fellow Redfangs, grinning and celebrating her as she levelled, and all of them gathered around and chanting her class as she tried to sleep—

Nothing happened. Of course it didn’t. If it were so easy to put on and take off classes, far more people would have done it. Fighti’s eyes snapped open. She didn’t know how to remove her class. She didn’t even know what it would make her.

A vision popped into her mind, unasked. A tall, beautiful—beautiful for who he was, not his looks—warrior grinning down at her and raising a cup high in the air. Garen Redfang had cheered her tenth level in the [Warrior] class. Fightipilota stared at that image, then lay back down.

“That’s still me. Take it away. Take it all away, and let me save her or give me the class or kill me. But don’t let me be useless.”

She hissed up at the sky, then closed her eyes. She tried to concentrate. But that vision remained. Could she give up that memory so easily? Her accomplishments?

She tossed and turned, wasting minutes that seemed to crawl by—but far too many of them, a sea of time, as everything went on around her. She heard voices, shouting—and she couldn’t sleep.

Unbidden, a memory appeared in her mind. Not of ever wanting to lose a class, but of the day when she had gone to sleep with all the Goblins around her chanting her new class.

How excited she’d been, how fervently she’d wanted it. She’d been willing to abandon what she was to become that dream Kevin had told her about.

And she’d meant it. She’d closed her eyes and made a wish—and just hoped it would come true. Right now, she was wishing for something she didn’t want, but needed. Asking for a miracle with all her heart.

It didn’t work that way. She knew it didn’t. The Goblin lay on her back, opened her eyes, and stared up at the ceiling and saw an airplane.

Her heart leapt—but it was only a model. An airplane hanging from the modern, spacious ceiling of a museum. An aviation museum—only, it wasn’t like the ones Kevin had described to Fighti.

The airplane was a silly toy construction hand-made and painted clumsily. It had a plaque hanging under it, written in Goblin, and she realized this wasn’t a real airplane. It had none of the graceful construction that Kevin had described. It was the kind of thing a child made—a dream of the future.

Still, it made her smile. That was true to who she was. Fighti stretched her arm skywards, then shook her head.

“Nothing is ever free. Not even classes.”

She had never been given her [Fighter Pilot] class, because she hadn’t earned it. Desire wasn’t enough. Maybe you could become an [Emperor] with the right ego, will, and conditions met. But such dreams weren’t for Goblins.

Her dagger made a soft rasping sound as the Goblin drew it from her belt sheath. She admired the steel blade that would have been prized among the Redfangs, now standard-gear. Then, with a sigh, she lay back down and held the blade loosely in her claw, the tip of it touching her neck along the place where you bled out if you were cut.

She said nothing. Who would she negotiate with? It was just the voice that heard and saw all. Fightipilota closed her eyes.

Take it all. She did not want to lose the things that made her…her. But she had every need. So, the Goblin made a vow. She would arise as she needed to be, or she would die. Her blood was ice cold, and her breathing slowed as she closed her eyes.

Tired.

This is my resolve. Take it. Give me nothing, but take it all away. I know you can. 

She was tired enough that it didn’t take too long to sleep, despite her pounding heart. Well, she shifted, she turned, she tried, and the cold metal touched her throat.

Fightipilota didn’t know when sleep eclipsed her focused will. She was concentrating. Pulling so hard with her mind her clenched teeth were drawing blood.

She imagined she was standing upon a cliff, hurling all her possessions into the sea. Only, her possessions were her memories, her muscles, her coordination, her sacrifices. She kept seeing her accomplishments, besting a Silver-ranked adventurer in combat, riding with Garen Redfang, flying through the sky for the first time and laughing. Hugging her beloved friend before they flew through the Winter Solstice.

Ruthlessly, the Goblin tossed it into the sea, tears streaming from her eyes. For her Chieftain, for her tribe—she stood on the cliff, naked and afraid. She could still turn back. But the Goblin never hesitated. She leapt—and a voice whispered in her ears.

Goodbye.

It sounded—approving. And sad. Then Fightipilota heard a voice.

 

<ALL LEVELS, CLASSES, AND SKILLS WILL BE REMOVED. ARE YOU SURE?>

 

She had never heard that voice before, so loud, so…

“Yes.”

It should have been harder. It should have been more difficult, and she should have been denied. It should not have been that easy to simply hold a dagger to her throat and demand it from the world. But she meant it. She meant it with all her heart, and there was no reason behind that voice, just the mechanisms of a system at play. A presence, barely conscious, moved in the workings of the cosmos and agreed.

So the voice said:

 

<ALL CLASSES REMOVED. ALL SKILLS REMOVED.>

 

She shuddered, because it was so painful, so negative, and she screamed, because it changed her, ripped out all the things levels gave her. Strength, surety—even things her Skills didn’t say. It hurt more than any wound she had ever taken, and she lay there sobbing for a second.

But the voice had sounded so terrible and yet so approving. A tiny hint of it, as if it saw and…

Fightipilota rose and stumbled over to the door. She felt weak as a kitten, and when she put her clawed hand against the blackness, nothing happened.

She didn’t let it deter her. She grasped the root in one hand and pushed against the barrier.

“Let me in. Let me in. Let me in.”

Fightipilota pushed. Pushed with every scrap of her being, all her will and desperation, clenching her teeth until she swore one cracked. Blood ran into her mouth—she saw spots—and the barrier would not move.

Sweat ran down her forehead. She pushed—and her hand moved. Ever—so—slightly—it sank into the door. Fightipilota pushed harder. She screamed.

She shrieked, and the watching Harpy Queen held her breath. Slowly, millimeter by millimeter, the Goblin fought her way forwards. The door tried to resist her. It was agonizing—but she had lived and prepared to die as a warrior. Forwards. Forwards—until her claw touched air on the other side. Then it was easier.

Then she felt like she was breaking through something. Shattering through something, and she was stumbling forwards. Falling—flashing through reality, and laughing.

Where are you, Chieftain? Mrsha?

I’m coming.

The Goblin fell in triumph and landed in another world.

 

——

 

She hit the street hard amidst the wailing of sirens and sat up. Fightipilota spat a piece of a tooth and some blood out of her mouth and drew a breath.

“I did it.”

Then she wondered if she had just passed out and was dreaming, because it felt like a dream. The Goblin glanced around—and she knew she had stepped into another world. When she rose, the world glowed around her.

A beautiful, strange city rose around Fightipilota. She slowly pivoted, realizing that the root was right behind her, nigh-invisible in the air.

What place am I in? The towers were vast and surreal to her. Each one was made of glass and metal; no brick to be seen, nor wood. They glowed, and each building had a…a screen, like a scrying mirror, but square or rectangular, showing something.

The screens were unnaturally bright—like the [World’s Eye Theatre] or Kevin’s laptop. Harsh, artificial light compared to even magic. They hurt Fightipilota’s eyes, dazzled them, and left her blinking.

The images made no sense. They were what made Fightipilota think she was just dreaming—because why would there be a giant, animated billboard of a Goblin chugging water on one of the skyscrapers in front of her?

 

Energywater! Only 2 Goblincoin a bottle!

 

“Wuh?” 

A handsome, male Hobgoblin was drinking the orange-colored liquid—then raising the bottle and spraying droplets over his head and body and throwing his hair back in a fling of liquid. All of this was in slow motion, and the animation repeated itself as Fightipilota stood there, brain ceasing to work.

He was the most handsome Goblin she had ever seen, more than Numbtongue. This was no lie; Fightipilota had never seen any Goblin wearing makeup before. The [Supermodel] was staring at her, and she dragged her eyes away from him to another screen.

 

Tired of Humans downvoting your messages? Try Goblinchat today!

 

“What?”

A glowing icon was flashing under the text, then the screen would switch to an icon of an open-mouthed Drake with a letter coming out of it—and a big ‘X’ in red would flash over the screen, presumably showing that this was the bad thing and you should try the stylized Goblin—with a letter coming out of their mouth—today.

It was an overload to Fightipilota’s mind, which was already not doing so hot with all the changes and her struggle to get here. Other screens were playing their own advertisements, and Fightipilota stood there, so stupefied that she didn’t realize the siren in the air was a bad thing until she heard the screaming.

“Get off the street, idiot! Run! Ruuuun!”

Voices were screaming at Fightipilota. She pivoted.

“Me?”

Then she realized it was raining. Raining…the sky was grey overhead, and the city around her was glowing. The screens shone with electrical, neon wiring.

The sidewalks were illuminated with…bubbles? Yes, big bubbles of light were protruding from streetlights along with the glowing [Light] spells in the center. In fact, each building had a bubble over it. A kind of all-encompassing umbrella. Nay, a barrier spell like the Drowned Folk had.

And there were Goblins. Thousands, really—only, just not around Fightipilota. They were all standing under the bubbles, on the sidewalks, next to buildings, and every single one was screaming at her.

“Run! Can’t you hear the sirens?”

A Goblin was cupping her claws together, a Hob—there were so many Hobs, more than even regular Goblins—her hair in dreadlocks with beads in them, wearing a t-shirt and jeans, shrieking at Fightipilota. She took a few steps out of the bubble—and Goblins pulled her back in.

Fightipilota realized she was in danger suddenly. She had [Dangersense]…but it was gone. And like a fool, she didn’t react without it.

There were a bunch of Goblins making weird hand-gestures—familiar gestures, Fightipilota recognized. Sign language, like she knew, but more adept. Like Mrsha’s signs. Some were beckoning—and Fightipilota saw another screen over their heads light up.

This one was no advertisement. Rather, it was a news broadcast. A pair of Goblins were sitting behind a desk, and one was pointing at an image that said ‘LIVE BROADCAST’ in the upper right.

The image was of a stupid-looking Goblin standing in the street as it rained. Fightipilota.

She twisted around and saw the Goblin on screen do the same. The newscaster was in the top left hand of the screen, speaking urgently, but the lower half of the screen was curious.

It was all-text, rapid messages and icons pouring in. It appeared like:

 

Cazmaw45 — What is she doing? :0. She’s gonna die! 😣😣😣

Fourfinger Tom — Maybe she’s deaf? But she should be able to see the lights flashing! How does she not know?

Scetere — Run, you idiot! 😡

Cathe — 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

Flarewisp — I can’t watch. :’D

 

Something about that struck her as familiar—but then Fighti jerked herself out of her stupor. Something bad was happening. She had to move. The Hobgoblin began jogging, then running for the Goblins.

“Run faster! Hurry, hurry!”

Every Goblin was peering at the sky. Fighti began to sprint, but she was so damn slow. Her entire body was uncoordinated, and she realized without her levels, none of her reflexes worked right.

Then she heard the sirens reach a fever pitch and looked up and grasped why all the Goblins were screaming at her.

“Oh. That bad.”

Arrows. Arrows were raining down. Instead of rain, have some arrows. Weather in this world sucked. But the arrows reminded Fightipilota of something. They began coming down, many just snapping on the barrier spells, but some exploding or detonating in magical effects. They hit the street, which held up surprisingly well against the onslaught—and Fightipilota saw the wave of death coming for her as she tried to get to a barrier.

Oh, right. That’s Xitegen’s Skill—

She stumbled and realized she wasn’t going to make it. Fightipilota reached for the barrier, gritting her teeth. She just had to—

“Dumbass!”

A voice bellowed in her ear. Something hit Fightipilota from behind, and the impact sent her flying forwards. There was a shout—she slammed into legs, rolling—screams, and a voice, cursing and yelling in pain.

Crackcrackcrackcrackcrackcrackcrackcrackcrack—

Arrows struck the ground just outside the bubble, rained down on top of it, so many that Fightipilota realized a single second in it would have been fatal. She sat up as hands pulled at her, dragging her back from the barrier’s edge.

“Oh my Goblin King, oh my Goblin King, she’s okay! She’s okay—”

“Someone’s hurt! Quick, get a healing potion—!”

“This is live! Look, we’re on the news—”

“You Creler-kissing idiot! Where is she? I’ll murder her! I’ll—”

That last voice was cursing Fightipilota out in straight Goblin and sounded more—similar to how she thought Goblins should speak. The crowd drew back, and Fightipilota saw her savior. It was a Goblin dressed in a green suit with red, familiar slashes going down the armbands.

He was lying in a puddle of blood; his legs were riddled with those arrows. Someone was pouring a healing potion on them, but the Goblin knocked it away.

“Get me a [Doctor]—now! Those are damn Evercut Arrows. Where is that Garen-headed idiot?”

All the other Goblins had rectangular objects out and were aiming them at Fightipilota or the downed Goblin. She stared at them, then strode over to the Goblin.

“Hold still, you’re bleeding bad. Hit an artery. I’ll stop the blood.”

“Don’t touch me, you idiot! Rip those arrows out and I’m dead! Don’t touch—huh.”

Fightipilota didn’t touch the arrows. Instead, she ripped her tunic off, tore it in half with her claws and teeth, and tied it around his legs—hard. Normally, you needed a stick or other long object to twist the cloth around to get maximum tension—Fightipilota looked around, but the street was all artificial. And the damn arrows were vanishing; made from a Skill? So she grabbed the next best thing: one of the phones a Goblin was holding.

“Hey! What the—”

Fightipilota used that to finish the tourniquet. She cut the blood flow off and performed an impromptu tourniquet for his other leg—this time with a folded umbrella someone handed her. The blood flow almost entirely ceased. It’d take his legs off if he didn’t get help soon, but it was that or he’d bleed out.

The Goblin who’d saved her had a sharp haircut, much like Student Rags—and a lot of tattoos visible, even with his suit on. He stared down at the tourniquet as Fightipilota sat back.

“Huh.”

“Medic’s coming! Hold on!”

A Goblin screamed at them, the same one who’d shouted first at Fightipilota. The Redfang warrior felt at the other Goblin’s head, then slapped his cheek.

“Stay awake. You need blood.”

He growled at her, eyes searching her up and down. He was in a lot of pain, but he seemed—confused.

“I know that. You can tie a tourniquet?”

“Yah. Duh.”

“And you’re too empty-headed to notice an arrow siren and go for cover? I’ll kill you—”

He tried to strangle her, and she fended off his hands until he lay there, panting. Fightipilota spoke after a second.

“Sorry. I didn’t know what it was.”

“You—”

He pulled himself up and then stared at her as if he’d seen a ghost. The Goblin’s mouth opened—well, Hobgoblin.

They were all Hobs standing here. Over a hundred Goblins on the street, all dressed like—like—

Like Liscorians. No, Invrisil citizens. All fancy. One Goblin had on a fluffy neck-thing around her shoulders, like a scarf, only it was a fuzzy pink caterpillar. High heels, fishnet stockings—Fightipilota stared at the most improbable and impractical Goblin clothing ever.

The female Goblin who’d been shrieking at Fightipilota wore a casual t-shirt and jeans and held her phone up—she was hitting things on her phone with one hand, typing as she spoke.

“This is so crazy. This is so crazy—everyone’s poking about this! My mom is poking me about this! I’m on the news!”

“Huh?”

Fightipilota’s head hurt. Losing all her classes probably had something to do with that. The Goblin on the ground was speaking.

“You…what do you mean you didn’t…hey!”

Fightipilota walked away, sidled over to the young Goblin and stared over her shoulder. The Goblin felt…young. Fighti gazed at her, then around and realized she didn’t see a blade in sight. No one was armed; only the downed Goblin who’d saved her had anything that resembled a weapon, and it was this long tube thing at his side with a crossbow’s trigger.

Everyone was on their phones. She knew phones from Kevin, but she had never really played with one. Fightipilota stared over the young Goblin woman’s shoulder and saw a confusing display of images.

 

Fishcat033 — Omg. She right here! so crazy Human right now. Blood everywhere! Cn u c me?

 

Next to ‘Fishcat033’ was a picture of the grinning Goblin with a backwards baseball cap on her face. Beneath the message, little icons were appearing.

A bunch of little thumbs up icons, an image of a flailing Human with noodle arms, several skulls of various kinds, all animated—and then someone replied.

 

Fishmom — ARE YOU ALRIGHT SPACICA?

Fishcat033 — IM OKAY MOM

 

When the Goblin hit the button that made the words appear on screen, a little Goblin icon appeared next to ‘IM OKAY MOM’. It was an image of a Goblin doing a spin and then pointing two fingers to the side as his head came down.

Fightipilota stared harder. Then ‘Fishcat033’, or Spacica, glanced back and realized the other Goblin was staring over her shoulder.

 

Fishcat033 — she’s staring over my shoulder rn. No illusions. so weird!

Thistletack4 — You’re famous, fishcatty!

 

The same icon appeared of the Goblin doing the twirl-dance next to Fishcat’s message, and then another one appeared next to Thistletack4’s message—a Goblin slamming his hand down on something, then shaking it out and grimacing.

What. Is. This?

Fightipilota was adaptive enough. She could at least read most of what was being written—though Goblins were not the most literate, except in the Flooded Waters tribe. But she had no idea what some of the contractions of words were.

Context made it all make sense, as did all the little icons that popped up. Every time Fishcat033 said something—or rather, wrote it—a bunch of symbols would pop up.

And then whenever someone said something they felt was important, a Goblin performing some kind of gesture would appear. It was surreal for Fightipilota to run into a social networking creation this advanced, but it was also something she could intuit and understand after a few minutes of staring.

Why? Because it was a Goblin’s creation. Some of it made sense.

Communication via text was not a revolutionary idea. Being able to send messages at the speed of whatever this was was only technological advancement. You could give a group of people who had never seen a smartphone a text messaging application and they’d be fluent with it within the month, especially younger generations.

If you gave Goblins any Earth-created social media application, they’d be able to use it to varying levels. But what if a Goblin had the time, money, and resources to make something like this?

Well, if you met a Goblin of Fightipilota’s tribe, they’d say it sounded horrible, because Goblins were such social beings that if you couldn’t see other Goblins’ body language or poke them, were you really talking?

Much of modern Goblin language was highly conditional on body language. Which did not, obviously, translate well into a digital format.

Hence all the little icons you could react with. Hence the stylized dance or moves each user had—their own personal signature. There were even options for more complex gestures.

When Fishcat’s mother began asking more questions, the irritated Goblin drew a complex shape on the screen, and a miniature Goblin appeared, thunking her head into the palm of her hand.

Which the mother replied to with a Goblin staring down at her feet, turning away—clearly hurt. A wave of disapproval came through in the forms of thumbs-downs and glaring little faces, and Fishcat, flustered, made a Goblin with her ears drooping.

Her ears drooping—because it was a digital Goblin doing all the gestures, but Fightipilota read the interplay nearly perfectly. Her jaw dropped. She only tore away from the phone when the Goblin covered the screen with one hand.

“Hey, you’re sort of staring. Are you okay? Why did you stand out there? You’re on the news, you know. Everyone’s poking about you.”

“Poking who?”

Fightipilota had never felt like an old Goblin, but the expression the young one gave her made her instantly feel like it.

“Poking online? On every app! See?”

The billboards were lighting up with the dramatic replay of Fightipilota standing in the rain, then beginning to run as the arrows came down—multiple angles, shaky recordings from people on the street—

Then the other Goblin charging out at the last moment and hurling into her, propelling her to safety.

The news was everywhere! From every angle—and Goblins were commenting on it, writing messages, giving interviews, talking—

Fightipilota had never seen this much communication happening at once. Her mind overloaded from all of it, and she focused on what she did know.

“Where this? Where am I?”

 

Fishcat033 — I think she’s drunk or on smthing fr fr. 😨

 

“Stop writing on there and answer me!”

Spacica flinched, and the other Goblins drew back. Fightipilota panted for air.

“I don’t understand. What is this…is this a city? No—where’s—there is a white Gnoll girl and a Goblin who both—do you know where they are?”

She asked the question and immediately knew that unless Mrsha and Rags had appeared as dramatically as her, it was a stupid question. The young woman hesitated.

“How do you not know about…? That guy needs help. A medic’s here.”

Indeed, some Goblins were charging across the ground of the street out of a big…Fightipilota knew cars.

Kevin had told her all about cars and airplanes, so she recognized the vehicle as they skidded towards her downed savior. They had a tourniquet and tools, but they saw he wasn’t bleeding out and began injecting him with a far more complex-looking bloodbag than the Flooded Waters Tribe Goblins used.

If Fightipilota didn’t miss her guess, she was staring at a transparent bag of holding filled with blood. One of the [Medics] was speaking rapidly.

“Major Hotwing, are you with me?”

“Yah, yeah, I am. My king-damned legs. Wait, don’t haul me off. That Goblin—that Goblin—”

He was delirious, trying to point at Fightipilota; the [Medics] were racing him to the ambulance, and Fightipilota almost went with them.

She felt like she was in trouble, but no one was hitting her. Spacica clearly thought so too.

“Um, shouldn’t you go tell a Watchman what you did? Or something?”

At least they had the Watch here. A Goblin Watch—Fightipilota slapped herself. It hurt. Focus.

“Answer my questions. Where am I?”

“Uh. New Celum. Duh. Are you on something? Hey, medics, she’s—”

Fightipilota might not have had her warrior classes anymore, but she was still a fit Goblin warrior. She grabbed Spacica’s shoulder.

“Shut up.”

“H-hey! Don’t do that! It hurts!”

It was the most pathetic response Fightipilota had ever gotten from any Hob…ever. She narrowed her eyes.

“You sound like a child. How old are you?”

“E-eight! I’m almost fully grown! Even if they raised the adult age! Wh—how old are you?”

Spacica did rally, then, and tried to yank away from Fightipilota. The other Goblin’s jaw dropped. She was four and an old woman in Redfang culture.

“I’m four.”

“You’re four? Why aren’t you child-sized?”

The two were horrifying each other. Fightipilota gasped for air.

“Child-sized? You mean normal Goblin sized?”

“Normal—you mean malnourished! You’re crazy! She’s crazy! What’s your user tag? I’m calling someone to look at you!”

Fightipilota had no idea what a ‘user tag’ was, but she suspected it was the name you had if you were using the phone stuff. She stepped back, breathing hard.

“I need to find Rags and Mrsha.”

When she said ‘Rags’, several people just peered at her and backed up more, as if she was crazy. Fighti stumbled forwards, unsure of what to do.

She was lost in a world where, clearly, you had the phone-things to get around. Everyone was walking into shops or—or buildings, and they were all Goblins.

Once the arrow-sirens had stopped blaring, all the magical shields vanished, and Goblins just went walking around. The arrows had vanished; they must have been made from a Skill. There was some damage to the ground, but the cityfolk just kept on…citying.

More than one Goblin walked towards a cafe where a [Waitress] was getting people seated. She was glancing at a phone in one hand as she did it and stared at Fightipilota.

“Hey. I need some water.”

Fightipilota was parched from, well, a lot of mental effort. The [Waitress] hesitated.

“Uh—sure? I can get you a bottle. Just scan here.”

An icon popped up, and Fightipilota stared at the number on screen.

“What? I don’t have a phone.”

“You don’t? Then how…”

The [Waitress] actually recoiled when Fightipilota offered her a gold coin, a massive overpayment.

“That’s southern money. I don’t think we take it—hold on, I can get the manager. Um—um—”

“Forget it.”

Fightipilota walked forwards in a daze. She only turned around when the [Waitress] shouted. She ran after Fightipilota and pressed a cold, translucent bottle into her hands.

“Wait! Here, just drink this.”

The Goblin stared at the bottle, then tried to tear the cap off until the [Waitress] had to show her it actually unscrewed. The Redfang drank half the bottle in one go, then wiped her mouth and sniffed the weird, semi-malleable container.

“What is this? What is this made of?”

The [Waitress] was giving Fighti much the same look as every Goblin in earshot. She replied hesitantly, poking the bottle.

“Plastic? Are you okay?”

To her surprise, the Hobgoblin just gave her a wide grin. Fightipilota downed the rest of the water and wiped her mouth.

“I’m not dead. I need to find someone. A Goblin—her name is Rags. I don’t care how funny that sounds. And a white Gnoll girl named Mrsha. Who do I talk to to find someone?”

The [Waitress] stood there, then fumbled with her phone for a second before coming up with an answer.

“I—I have no idea, but they should be in a database. Ask the military people.”

“Who, the Chieftain? Are there lieutenants? Goblin Lords?”

“Chieft—oh my Goblin Kings, you really are…no. There’s no Goblin Lord in New Celum. At least, she’s not here yet. Just ask the military people—you know, the [Soldiers]! I don’t know—here, I’ll get you directions to the Watch or their army-buildings.”

The Goblin pulled the address up, and it made no sense to Fightipilota, but the [Waitress] showed Fightipilota a map with a handy line in it, and the former [Wyvern Rider] memorized it instantly.

“Got it. Thanks. By the way, is there another Rags alive in this time?”

The reaction everyone was giving her was telling her that. The [Waitress] just stared at Fighti.

“Yeah. She’s…Rags. The most famous Goblin in ever? Someone else is actually named after her?”

“Huh. Yeah. Mine’s pretty cool too.”

Fightipilota tried to sound nonchalant; her breath was coming too fast, as if she’d been sprinting. And she needed to sprint, now. She stared at the plastic object in her hands, then tossed the bottle down on the ground, which instantly earned her a post on all the social media networks and downvotes for littering—and then she began running. She passed by Goblins, even a few members of other species, ignoring traffic lights and shouts and everything else.

Her pulse was racing out of control. She was having a panic attack, which was doubly upsetting because Fighti had never had one before.

This was too much! Too insane! Too impossible! She stumbled into a group of Drakes, knocked one over, and someone threatened to call the Watch on her if she didn’t—Fighti saw a young woman, a Goblin, making fists.

“Hey, watch it! You want to go?”

Fighti drew a knife, and the Goblin teenager backed up. Fighti ran as more people began to call for help.

Impossible, impossible. Her mind was babbling, and there were tears in her eyes. She saw a Goblin pass her, riding on some kind of weird board with a stick he was using for direction.

She jump-kicked him off the scooter and figured out how to use the thing after a second, then shot down the streets. The world flashed around her, this city of dreams and magic and the future, and she didn’t want to believe it was possible. Not even in the [Palace of Fates].

Because oh—if it was—Fighti turned her eyes across the glowing screens, the glass buildings and maddening displays of wealth—

Then why were they all so poor in her time?

 

——

 

The [Beggars] saved her, both literally and figuratively. Fighti nearly slammed into one of them and went flying off the scooter. She stopped, and the Goblin with the bowl looked up tiredly; she saw there was an entire shantytown here.

“Ah.”

One look and the Goblin calmed—a bit. The people wandering around still had phones, still had things no Goblin in her time had—but they were visibly less rich than the ones she’d been around earlier. She didn’t understand it, fully, but she knew it was a thing of other species.

Cities. Rich, poor…Fighti was from a tribe. Every Goblin shared what they had.

“Spare some coins, Miss?”

The [Beggar] activated a Skill on Fighti, hopeful. She looked down at him, checked the power-thing on her scooter, and moved it towards him. Then she shrugged.

“Sorry. I have to go.”

She kept running. Then she saw how many Goblins were just—on their stupid phone-things. They glanced up and shouted at her when she grabbed a bicycle. Someone threatened to find her account and put a complaint on it. They kept tapping at their phones, expressions of frustration and dismay on their face as they realized…she didn’t have an ‘account’ to censure. The Goblin woman kept moving, the only person in this entire city without a presence online.

Freer than these strange Goblins of the future. Also, handily, off-the-grid, frustrating the Watch’s attempts to simply locate where she was via her devices.

Fighti moved so fast, in fact, that by the time an alert for a wanted individual went out, she was already at her destination.

The wounded Goblin turned out to have gone to the same place as Fightipilota after all. She stopped in front of an imposing, concrete building with a long, open space next to it, a rarity in this city of metal.

The glowing lights, the apartments of Goblins, the supermarkets full of food, and an economy—all of it left Fightipilota’s mind. Even the idea of barging in there and demanding help—

She stared to the left of the headquarters of Goblin might in the future, at a bunch of odd vehicles being wheeled out of the hangar they’d been stored in during the arrow attack.

Their wings were stubbier than modern craft, and most were made out of wood, though a few sleeker designs sat like heavy ravens next to cuter, deadlier robins. Yet each one towered above anyone on foot, paint wet and gleaming from the rain, propellers spinning as their engines revved up.

Planes. Fighter planes. The Goblin walked towards them in a dream. Then she scaled the fence. She hopped over the other side and wandered forwards.

“Oh.”

Oh my.

 

——

 

When Rags awoke, she was tired. She always was these days. She felt sluggish as she opened her eyes and wondered where she was.

Rm. She listened to the sound, then sat up, resting her feet on the floor. She coughed.

“Where am I?”

Rm. The sound came again, not unpleasant. Familiar. Even so, when she touched her chest and heard and felt the faint tic of sound, metal on metal, she still sensed that faintest sense of memory of what had been.

But her metallic right hand simply opened and closed as she flexed it. A new model…well, eight generations old according to all the techs. She hadn’t let them replace it; they always wanted something ‘better’, and she had to patiently explain that she didn’t have time to learn a new hand’s quirks. Make the old one as good as you could.

They listened to her because she was Rags. The most important and powerful Goblin in the entire world, even among the leaders of Goblins, and there were more and more each year, rising upwards. But she was the original, the heroine.

The greatest Goblin Lord living. Other species sometimes made the mistake of calling her the Goblin King, which was vaguely funny, but they mistook the role of leader for the role of Goblin King.

Goblin Kings…were no fit leaders for the world she had built.

The Goblin Lord emerged from her room without much care that she was mostly naked. She blinked around as Goblins ran up to her with clothing, coffee, reports, and problems.

So many problems.

“Lord Ragathsi—”

“Rags.”

She interrupted someone who was probably new, a fresh-faced Goblin barely more than a child, gently, and he flinched. Or…they. Someone had decided there were more pronouns to be used. Other species were making a fuss about it and some Goblins too.

She didn’t mind or care. The Goblin’s age was important. They could have been nine. But they were a child, young, new to their role.

We’re getting soft. Our children are staying children longer.

Good. But I have to win this so they can remain so young.

“Rags. Call me…Rags. Or Lord. Not my full name.”

“Y-yes, Rags. I—”

The newbie floundered for too many seconds, and someone took over, shoving them aside.

“Lord, we failed to intercept the Lightning Courier.”

“Hm. Very well. What else?”

She hated her full name these days. It meant something, but it wasn’t a name to be used so casually. Rags was fine for that. She’d always been Rags.

She was thinking of the past again. Perhaps because this was it. Because of the venue…she always thought of her regrets and failures. The Goblin Lord shrugged on a coat as her bodyguard appeared. They always did.

Rags didn’t know their names anymore. She’d gotten tired of memorizing them and warned them, sometimes, they’d die. By [Assassins], by accident, in war, or when she met the Goblin King—they would die.

They still came. Right now, she knew them by their apparel.

One was a Goblin with earphones on his head, attached by a cord to his phone. He was listening to music, bobbing his head to an invisible beat. Another was a younger Goblin armed to the teeth, a former [Commando] who looked ready to open fire even here. A third was the [Mage] you always needed, even with Rags’ own magic, making miniature orbs of fire or lightning and tucking them away in a sack at his side.

Musicsword, Scowlshooter, and Magicmarbles she called them in her head. She knew they had different names, more…natural-sounding names. But she was an old Goblin. Over twenty years old, dead gods.

Musicsword was a [Blademaster], one of the best living. Ditto for Scowlshooter and Magicmarbles, in their way. The rest of the bodyguard was newer; each one the best of the best of the presumably best.

Rags listened to reports detailing troop movements. Everything was going well. They would be at the Floodplains soon—though one report drew her attention.

“An attack?”

“Yes, Lord. On the Goblin King. There was a disturbance as well. A Goblin fell out of the skies. A—peculiar Goblin. I have their image here and details. The Goblin King wished to speak to them.”

“He spoke? He was that lucid?”

“Yes, but then a group teleported in and attacked. Almost all infantry. Nearly ten thousand strong. They tried to overrun the perimeter around the Goblin King, but he butchered the first wave, and then we engaged with all forces, and they’re tied down. We think they’re Chandrarian—every unit in the area has moved to break through their ranks. ”

“They must be trying to stop him from reaching the Floodplains. Who can breach the lines?”

“The Battleborn 2nd are there—”

Rags smiled and waved a hand.

“That will do. Keep me apprised. I’ll head there myself if I need to.”

It must have been a botched attack; they’d have woken her if she was actually needed. Their foes still thought they could just shoot the Goblin King dead with a poisoned bullet, and maybe it would work. But the other continents still acted like they had a huge advantage in every respect over the Goblins.

She liked keeping it that way. The Goblin King hadn’t rampaged across the world, not seriously rampaged, for over a decade now. They forgot what he could do, even in this era.

“Next?”

“Uh, you have a broadcast in ten minutes.”

Rags sipped from a cup of coffee and felt herself waking up. In response, her chest made that sound.

Rm. Louder; her bodyguards glanced up. She knew the other assistants were scanning her chest, but she was operating just fine.

“No, I don’t.”

“Lord—Rags—please. I know you don’t like it, but you haven’t given an address for four years—”

“I’m not doing it. Get the warplane ready; I’m heading to the front.”

The warplane was a big…big plane. Rags wasn’t a Fomirelin, a Great Goblin; she was just average-sized for a Hob, even if she knew she was a bit more imposing. The warplane could carry eight hundred Goblins; they kept making them bigger.

The skies were Goblin. The ground would belong to the Alliance; their tanks were heavier, more adaptive. It was their industry, though it was mostly…their highest-level [Engineer].

Kevin.

Today, I get to kill Kevin, if I can. 

It didn’t make Rags sad. It certainly didn’t make her happy. She was tired. Her heart was steel and fire.

Literally.

Rm. Each time it pulsed, she felt blood moving in her veins. Soon, it would roar. Then she’d feel alive. If she wanted to, she could activate it, but they were always complaining at her these days.

It’ll wear out, your body will wear out…she was over twenty years old. She knew Goblins could live hundreds of years; she’d met them. But she had been fighting nonstop these last two decades. Her heart, her limbs…all this war had worn her down. She didn’t know how Humans lived five times as long.

“Lord, please—”

“Fine. I’ll think of something. Ten minutes?”

“Eight.”

She went to finish her coffee as she sat on a wing of the vast metal bird. Someone handed her breakfast. Rags chewed on the suspiciously green eggs and suspected they’d synthesized more ‘healthy eggs’ for her. So much for asking for the continental breakfast. They just had to obsessively work on her health.

“I don’t like Goblins having numbers.”

“Lord?”

“The numbers that tell you how good or bad they are.”

“The…that’s been a part of the networks for the last three years, Lord.”

“I don’t want them. Get rid of them.”

“—Lord, I can have a meeting scheduled with the [Directors] and [Managers] of each application, but if we turn it off now—”

Rags sighed. This was why it was hard. She said one thing and they said ‘yes, but—’, and she forgot about it.

War.

“Fine. Do it after the battle. What else?”

“Ah—ah—the Lightning Courier found a child who was wandering the Floodplains. A small detail, a Doombearer. She’s with Lord Xitegen now. The [Scouts] couldn’t stop her.”

Doombearer. That brought back memories. Rags nodded.

“Take it seriously. Consult our experts. I’ll prepare for luck events. Next.”

They grew so apprehensive she’d get mad each time they had bad news. She knew it was her fault; she could get…intense. And all the old guard who’d really known her were dead. Everyone wanted her dead.

Only a matter of time. They’ll be ready, I hope, for when it comes. Just the Goblin King or me left to die. You, my King or me.

I want to see you die, first.

Her greatest weapon against the many peoples who wanted to see the ‘Goblin Anomaly’, the ‘Nation of Goblins’, the temporary experiment that had been going on over fifteen years now erased. They still thought they could reverse that.

They’d never reverse this. The Domed Cities, as they were called, were spreading. She had contracts, she had Goblins on television, even living in other cities, though persecution was still rampant.

We might lose wars, we might have feuds forever, but they will be a people now. I’ve shown them the Goblin King doesn’t end that. Then we’ll just be more bastards like the damn Drakes, Humans, or anyone else.

I did it.

The cycle breaks. Or at least, cracks. Regrets. Rags was disinterested in everything her people showed her, idly wondering what the hell she’d do for the broadcast that was going to show her off and inspire everyone. The worst she could do was look bad; it’d only matter in their minds. It didn’t change what she could do, and she didn’t need to lead them.

But then she saw a picture one of the aides held up, and Rags stopped eating green eggs and ham. Her eyes opened wide, and her heart said:

Rm. Rm. Rm!

They backed up. Rags stared at a picture so familiar to her, so alien—closed eyes didn’t matter. She blinked at herself and half-stood.

“Where?”

“We transported the anomalous Goblin to safety, but she and the Goblin King are stuck in—”

“Bring her to me. Now. The Goblin King recognized her?”

“Yes, Lord—”

“So do I. Scan her. Bring her to me.”

If she was a fake or some ploy, they’d figure it out. If not…Rags sat back down. What did it mean?

She was…a Goblin Lord. A genius—no longer a joke or exaggeration. Becoming a Goblin Lord amplified your best traits. Her class, her level, all of it improved Rags’ cognition, even in her ‘sleepy’ state with her heart beating so slowly. Rags’ eyes narrowed.

“Get me a picture of the Gnoll Doombearer.”

This time, she snatched it from the hands of the aide and gazed up.

“Mrsha.”

Rm. Rm. Rm.

“Lord, your heart!”

The temperature was rising around Rags. Her bodyguards got to their feet, and she reached for her side. She stood.

“Is she at the heart of the warcamp Xitegen is in?”

She could reach him very, very fast with the warplane and her Skills. Alone, she wouldn’t be able to storm the camp, but any lesser area—Rags flicked the safety off the weapon she carried.

It was a compact submachine gun with long, paper-like cartridges trailing out of a slot on one side of it, waiting to be fired. Far, far more advanced than anything the Alliance was carrying and so expensive only a few Goblins were authorized to use it.

If she fired it, everyone she aimed at died fast.

It was probably one of the reasons they were nervous around her.

“She is at the camp, Lord. We have information from the Lightning Courier who posted on socials with her—”

Rags’ heart stopped revving up. She sat down, cursing.

“Aspat. Very well. Mark her. I want her alive at all costs. If they send her south—track her. Don’t bother with the phone data stuff. She doesn’t have one. Get that other Rags to me alive.”

They did what she said. The Goblin Lord finished her breakfast, thinking. What did it mean? So many possibilities. She always liked the old Grimalkin theories.

Grimalkin. She was remembering so many names today. Rags finished eating, and someone reminded her.

“…what? Oh, the broadcast.”

“What are you doing, Lord Rags? We can touch up—”

“I don’t know. Where are my personal possessions?”

They ran to spill them out as camera-crews came in. It was slightly raining, and they focused on her, many of the operators just staring in awe. Rags didn’t go into the cities anymore. Too many people, too young…she was too scary, they said.

She knew her body, the metallic chest, her arm, were visible even with her armor on. Rags shifted and pointed at something one of the Goblins held like relics.

“The guitar.”

It was old, worn, and not electric; just an old-fashioned guitar. Her bodyguard stirred when they saw her lift it into her hands. They knew it; they knew all the stories.

Numbtongue’s guitar. Instantly, her top aide, the fussy one who always called her ‘Lord’, spoke.

“We’ll download a bunch of songs onto your hand in thirty seconds, Lord. You don’t have to sing along—”

“What? No.”

Rags cancelled the whatever-they-were-doing to her hand with a thought. She had control over this kind of stuff. It was her nature as Goblin Lord. She was way behind the modern techs and programmers and whatever classes they had, but she didn’t have to be up to date.

She willed it; it be done. That hadn’t changed. She kept telling them that. Levels still mattered as much as firepower.

“But, Lord—”

“Anyone can tell when something is fake. I’ll play a song, and they’ll know it’s only my hand. It’s pathetic. It’s manufactured. How do you not…see that?”

She didn’t get it. The aide shrank back, and Rags relented. She was a good helper. The last one had exploded when they’d teleported a bomb onto her. This one had more metal in her than flesh, but she’d taken the job over.

“I—show me a list of all the songs you can put into my hand.”

They did, and Rags scrolled down them, sighing as hundreds of songs filled her mind. She sorted through all them.

“Fine. I’ll do this one. It’s not on the list. Do whatever you want around me. The point is…it’s not something you can fake. That’s always the point. I’m doing it again.”

So saying, she leaned back and began to strum on the guitar in a familiar motion. She was no great player like he’d been, but she’d taught herself enough.

The cameras began rolling; perhaps they hadn’t stopped, only waited for her to do something interesting. The Goblin Lord stared into the distance as she played.

This is what her people saw:

One arm of hers gleamed and shone with metal; the other was flesh. Her face was still flesh-and-bone. But you could see that unique contraption on her chest, even the place where her heart should have been. They’d tried to kill her so many times—and even her heart wasn’t her own.

The Goblin Lord seemed tired, but there she was, being broadcast across the Domed Cities. Across the world. She had broken the Walled Cities, taken the north, fought on every continent and won—

The honorary Death of Demons. The greatest nemesis of the Hundred Families of Terandria. The being who commanded the Goblin King. But she had only ever had one title, just as the system had named her long ago.

[2nd Goblin Lord of the Goblin King of Betrayal – Ragathsi of Civilization].

They still thought she was the first Goblin Lord who had pledged to him, but that hadn’t been true. She had tried to kill the Goblin King—then seen the need for him. That was when she had sworn herself. Forsworn herself.

The Goblin Lord didn’t sing, just hummed along as she looked up at the gentle drizzle of rain which passed over her. Her eyes glowed with the might of the Goblin cities.

The rain came for her, Xitegen’s curse upon the north. He loved trying to do it to her. She gazed upwards, and the shower of arrows vanished. Rags tossed her head back, and that half-cut weave she’d never gotten bored of was fitting for a far younger Goblin.

She felt old. And she played a song filled with nostalgia. Then her eyes gleamed, and the warplane’s jet engines began to roar. They became a thrumming, howling vortex of metal and fury as Goblins ran for safety—all except her bodyguard, who stood, some within a dozen feet of the spinning jet engine turbines without fear or movement.

 

——

 

The Goblin Lord pointed south and stopped playing. She handed her guitar down to Musicsword and stood. Behind her, the city she had helped build flashed with light and technology, and she exhaled.

“There. There’s your video. Move out.”

They would meet the Alliance in the field of the Floodplains by midday. Then they’d end this fifteen-year war. If Rags and the Goblin King died there—the Domed Cities would lose their two greatest warriors and an army of their finest troops and technology.

They’d have to conscript and redeploy their forces and panic and suffer and struggle. They could mobilize four times that number of troops within three months.

If the Alliance lost its forces, they would have no more armies left to stop her. Then she’d let them sue for peace.

The Goblin Lord stretched and waited for her heart to start beating again. Until then, until they found the curious Goblin wearing her face, until the moment came—

She took another nap.

 

——

 

Rags opened her eyes and beheld a dream. She sat up, wet gauze on her side, tubes hooked into her arms, soft linen sheets wrapped around her body. Her armor was gone; she was wearing a bright blue, full-body outfit with no leggings. Loose and free, so the tubes in her arms wouldn’t tangle.

There were bits of sticky paper anchoring the tubes to her arm. The [Chieftain] peeled the paper off and removed the apparatus, ignoring the twinges of pain.

Little bags of liquid bubbled, attached to a stand. Blood bags, but not holding blood. Rags stared at them, then rose from her bed.

A dream. She knew it. It was not this fancy room that made her believe it. There were curtains around this bed and cot—a machine with a lot of symbols that beeped every few seconds with the pulse of her heart. There were stickers on her chest with bits of wire anchored to her skin.

She yanked those off, too, and the machine began to make an alarmed sound, so Rags stared at it until she saw a black thing running across the ground. She reached down and pulled. Something came loose, and the machine stopped.

Then she went back to staring upwards at the real thing that mattered. This world was a dream. She knew it the moment she opened her eyes. It was the dream she had selfishly had, that every Goblin had dreamt of in their darkest, most desperate hours.

It was the light that the Goblin Lord Reiss had followed until his end, though he gave his soul to the Necromancer to achieve it. The same vision had manifested in Tremborag’s wrong mountain, the Molten Stone tribe—even the Island of Goblins, but these were, all of them, incomplete.

This was a place of Goblins for Goblins. This room could have belonged to any futuristic [Healer] or [Doctor]. That was not what proved it to Rags. She kept looking up at the ceiling of soothing, pale green plaster and the inactive light fixture. Just overhead, smiling down at her, was a Goblin’s face.

A sticker. It was slightly smushed, because the person who’d put it here, standing on their tippy toes, probably hadn’t gotten a good angle. But the sticker—no, stickers—were of a green, smiling face with red eyes winking down at her. Sharp teeth, a shark-like head of a regular-sized Goblin, all of it made out of a shiny, semi-reflective material that Rags had seen in the other future world.

A Goblin sticker with a little speech bubble coming out of the mouth that said, ‘hang in there!’

In Goblin.

“Oh.”

It was so silly, so insignificant, and it proved this was a Goblin place to Rags more than anything else. For who would have the time and energy to make an expendable piece of paper like that? A silly children’s toy—with a Goblin’s face on it?

Children, or perhaps adults, had lain in this bed, staring up at the ceiling, and then they had stood up and put more stickers on the ceiling. You could even see where some had fallen, their sticky coating having decayed.

That was all. Rags took a single breath, and her chest expanded painfully. Then she turned.

“The Goblin King.”

Just one minute of believing in this world. Then she could move, act, and think of Mrsha and all that was happening. That’s all she had wanted.

One minute and she could go a lifetime believing in the dream again.

The annoying beeping that had woken her had ceased, as had the blip-blip of the bags of liquid. But there was other noise around her. A humming—an odd thrum in the air, different from magic, from outside the room.

Distant thump-thumps! of sound, the reverberations striking the glass window of the room she was in. Rags saw the window’s curtains were drawn; she pushed them aside and saw steel shutters.

“Huh.”

They weren’t for her, or someone would be watching her. Indeed, it seemed as though great pains had been taken to make sure no one was bothering her; Rags glanced at the single door to the room and sensed people beyond.

Six. All Hobs. She knew they were Hobs. She knew they were Goblins.

She was surrounded by so many Goblins she couldn’t think. The largest tribe in existence—some of them who radiated the same authority as [Chieftains]. So many Hobs…

Rags glanced at the shutters. She could probably have pried them up if she used a spell, but she padded over to the door instead, listening. The people outside took no notice of her presence for a moment. They were whispering to each other, voices hushed, awed, and oddly—Human.

Non-Goblin, that was. Rags almost thought it, then she realized it was the fluency with which they spoke the common tongue. Even the Molten Stone tribe was different; they had excellent diction in both Goblin and the common tongue, but it was practiced, deliberate. This was the natural speech of people who had spoken this language all their lives. Rags narrowed her eyes as she put one ear to the door. A male voice breathed softly.

“—initely her. This is crazy. Should we tell someone?”

“The army’s aware. I bet everyone important knows. Or they wouldn’t have so many [Soldiers] in the hospital. Do you see the size of the guns they’re carrying? I didn’t even know we had—what are those?”

“But—but it’s her.”

“We don’t know that. The broadcast is totally different from—”

“Look at the old pictures. Look inside and tell me you don’t see—!”

“Shush! Is she still asleep?”

A mix of voices, male and female. Young-sounding. Rags ducked down and cursed, but she was saved by sheer luck: the privacy curtains around her bed were drawn.

“—Looks like she’s still asleep. Don’t check on her again or they’ll kick you from here to First Landing. Everyone wanted to see her. Doesn’t that prove it?”

“I don’t know. Who’d actually remember? Even the [Mayor]’s too young…”

“They had one of the original Flooded Waters tribe members in here.”

“Dead gods. Really? Who?”

“You didn’t see? Gothica Nightlady was here. All the lights went out. She and her people just appeared, and then—wait, I’m getting an alert. The vital signs went offline?”

Rags supposed it was the beeping machine. She thought about it, then grasped the lever on the door and pulled it down. She swung the door open, and a group of Hobgoblins rising to their feet recoiled.

They had shoes and more practical-looking clothing on. Though they did appear rather devoid of any symbols or adornments; Rags’ nose kept smelling the same weirdly alchemical scent.

Probably clean, unobtrusive clothing for a place like this. Two had cloth masks over their faces; when they saw her, they leapt back, one falling onto their backside in alarm.

“Dancing Demons, she’s awake!”

“It’s—”

One was holding some kind of object in his hands. A communications device—a phone, in fact. Rags saw him raise it to his mouth reflexively, then just stop, eyes on her. A crimson gaze with that faint, nigh-invisible pupil in the center.

She met his eyes and saw a Goblin. No warrior; he was too shocked. A Hobgoblin, but no different than she was. Standing there, gazing at her as if he had seen a ghost.

I am not the Goblin King. So I must be famous, living or dead. The Goblin King…Rags shuddered and passed a hand over her eyes. She was still woozy from whatever they’d done to heal her; she was amazed she was back on her feet so soon.

Her ribs barely felt tender, and she had smashed them so badly that she should have had pieces in her lungs. The [Great Chieftain] growled.

“Where is my armor? My sword?”

Then she recalled that Pawn had broken it. Erin’s sword, a gift to her. She’d thought it would have lasted longer…

“Y-y-you shouldn’t be on your feet! How did you even—hold on, I’m calling Doctor Rainhurst—”

The Hobgoblin orderly was fumbling with his phone, and Rags narrowed her eyes, wondering if she should stop them.

Security was nearby; this entire corridor was quiet, and this lot seemed to be healers who’d congregated outside her room. She could take them all out with her bare hands if they didn’t have some kind of Skill to nullify her.

…Rags didn’t move. She let the male Goblin with a shock of bright yellow dreadlocks call whomever he wanted.

“—She’s awake! She’s standing right in front of us! What do we do—”

They knew what to do, of course. They should have gotten her back into her bed; they were medical professionals, used to dealing with patients in general, even [Soldiers]. But not her.

Her aura kept one of the orderlies’ hands from her. Rags raised one eyebrow, suggesting that if someone did try to restrain her, they’d be grabbing a [Fireball]. On the other end of the phone, Rags heard a squawk of sound and a succession of voices. And the sound of someone dropping something with a crash.

Well, that caused a reaction. Rags distinctly heard a voice snap back.

“Keep her there! I’ll notify—”

Rags started walking. The Hobgoblins reached for her, then leapt back like she was charged with lightning. She glanced at them and saw their opened mouths. Which was funny, because Rags almost fell on her face; she was weak, if rapidly recovering.

“Careful…”

A hand steadied her, and Rags nodded at it.

“My armor. Where? I’m thirsty. Do you have anything to eat?”

“I—just wait there, please, Miss—this is surreal. I’ll get you something!”

One of the female Goblins ran; another was trying to explain as Rags kept walking. The hallway branched left and right; Rags went left on the assumption she’d find more things she wished to see.

“You have to stay here. Please—! Your armor? I think they had to cut it off you, and it was stored somewhere. Not burned like usual, but I remember someone trying to disinfect it.”

“Disinfect it? From what?”

“I—I mean clean it. This is a sterile area, so patients can’t wear their own apparel.”

“Ah.”

Makes sense. This was how she’d design a medical place if she had to. Rags had tuned into every information broadcast from that Dullahan people were calling the ‘Dullahan Last Light of Baleros’, and lectures on sterility and bacteria had made her try to recreate something like this.

But this—this was what you made if you didn’t only have space for a few dedicated rooms in a cramped stone fortress. This was an entire building dedicated towards…Rags frowned.

“What is this place called? What do you call what you do?”

“Me? I’m a [Nurse]. Uh—Intensive Care Nurse Callra. This is the intensive care unit…but no one’s in here but you.”

Callra. It was a vaguely Goblin name, but it could have been Human or even Drake. Rags thought of something and switched languages.

“What’s the building called?” (Pifi tum he semós mol?)

The Hobgoblin hesitated, then switched fluidly, with more fluidity than Rags.

“Verna tum he semós ‘hospital’. Fah… kem kere ‘hospital’ he mol?”

Another of the orderlies scratched their head.

“Not sure there is one. Uh, would it be…?”

They began to rattle off a few words that Rags had trouble translating herself. She caught ‘healing place’ or ‘shaman hut’, but these Goblins knew her language better than her. Rags kept walking, her heart soaring.

She acted like she knew what she was doing, and it worked. The panicked nurses and orderlies followed Rags in a rush, too flustered and nervous to put hands on her. On the other hand—Rags rounded the corner and ran straight into a dozen invisible Goblins armed and ready for combat.

They were standing in a clearly-improvised checkpoint with raised, incongruous, silver-white barricades lining the hallway. Angled shields; they slanted diagonally in the middle and were big enough to let three Goblins crouch behind them with ease.

Now, Rags couldn’t see the invisible Goblins at first; she only knew they were here because she had her [See Heat] Skill. And her [See Invisibility] spell actually failed her, so she suspected their spells were better, they were cunningly camouflaged, or under a Skill.

The blurs of heat reacted to Rags, and she wondered if it was some huge oversight that she could see them like this. Then again…she narrowed her eyes and realized she only saw the outlines of each Goblin.

Huh, I bet if you were lower-level or had a weaker version of my Skill, you wouldn’t even notice them. Her ability to sense their presences as fellow Goblins helped. Rags walked past the [Soldiers], who had aimed something at her reflexively, then frozen, much like the medical staff.

“This is mithril. Huh…I can even lift it. That feels like an oversight—oh, no. It doesn’t work if I try to move it left or right. Clever. The stand even retracts.”

She knew she was being silly, obsessing over the shields, but dead gods. Movable barriers of mithril? Light as could be, and they were actually very solid and hard to move; the stands locked into place. She bet you could still heave one out of position, but maybe this lot weren’t as afraid of melee-warriors closing?

Rhir had a lot of those crossbows, and the Goblins in the Tribe of Dreams talked about firearms. She bet that was it. Kevin always claimed the future was a ranged war, or long-ranged, with artillery weapons and flying ‘missiles’.

“I wonder who made it. Gothica. That’s twice now she’s appeared in the future. No; three times. She survived the Titan as well. I really should be nicer to her, but I don’t want her as a lieutenant. Well, if I get out of this alive, I’ll let her do all the goth things she can dream of.”

Rags was speaking to herself; she felt like it was the only way to inject anything normal into this dream world. This was surreal, and talking to herself felt like more of a [Student] Rags thing, but Chieftain Rags was the same Goblin in many ways. Besides, she felt like it was calming down these other Goblins.

The [Soldiers] were glancing at what she took to be their leader. Rags waited, then turned her head.

“I need my armor. Where is the Goblin King, and what are those thumping sounds? Fighting? I am Chieftain Rags of the Flooded Waters tribe, the Great Goblin Chieftain of the High Passes. If you know me, help me.”

It was a gamble which paid off as a helmeted Goblin with a full face visor and a big-looking gun appeared. It was two-thirds as long as she was and pointed at the ground, which was nice.

Her armor was dark green, and she had two red slashes on one shoulder; no other markings. Rags admired the armor; it wasn’t like plate armor, but had some similarities. The tactical, future armor was lightweight, conforming to her body shape, and clearly enchanted.

“Chieftain…Rags, headquarters is aware you’re awake. If you’d remain here, a vehicle will be here momentarily, and someone will be available to debrief you. I am Major Tirage, Special Operations Unit 3.”

Her eyes were locked on the shorter Goblin’s face. This was a seasoned warrior, but she had that same expression as the others. Rags glanced around at the squad who hadn’t decloaked. She pointed a finger at Tirage’s gun.

“That’s a gun, isn’t it? What kind? Do you have melee weapons, or is it all guns in the future? And what is that battle I’m hearing?”

She was certain it was a battle the more and more she listened. Tirage hesitated; she was trying to do that thing that the Watch was good at. Which was not tell you anything while getting all the information they needed.

Funny, Rags had never imagined a Goblin version of Relc or Klbkch. She was sure they could be a pain in the ass. And Goblin…special operations? Probably a quasi-[Assassin] or someone who could take on odd tasks like these. She imagined this entire squad was a nightmare for the hospital medical staff.

She loved it. Tirage replied slowly, hefting the weapon in her hands.

“This is a .50 Wyvernkiss precision rifle. Magical bolt-action. A new line of rifles not widely deployed yet. You know…guns?”

Rags peered at the rifle and wanted to touch it; Tirage jerked the weapon back.

“Don’t do that—”

“Why’s it so long? I assume it’s because it means the weapon’s stronger, like a crossbow. Rifle…Kevin told me about rifles versus guns. This one does what on a battlefield?”

“It reaches out and touches someone as far as you want. Its operational range is just over three thousand feet in the open. If I use magical penetration rounds, it’s able to hit targets through walls at up to two hundred—”

The [Nurses] seemed dismayed as Rags peered at the weapon and Tirage tried to explain. The Goblin Chieftain glanced up.

“So you can shoot anything in this building? And that helmet…can you see through walls?”

It was probably classified information, but the Major gave it up anyways.

“In limited ways. Are you—? How did you get here, Miss—Chieftain?”

“I fell. Oh, you do have a shortsword. Good.”

Rags was inspecting the Goblin’s belt next. She saw some round objects she guessed were weapons and a familiar vial. Healing potions were back. Tirage tried again as Rags peered around.

“From where? Are there any factors we should be informed about? The area was re-secured until the attack, and no magical or Skill vectors could be traced. If there’s an immediate threat…”

Rags began walking again because the other [Soldiers] weren’t decloaking.

“Who’s attacking us?”

Us. She fell so naturally into the cadence, but it felt right. One look at the [Major] and Rags knew she’d had an effect on this world.

I must be alive. 

“Halt! You can’t keep moving!”

“Make me.”

It was the most childish thing Rags had said in a while, but it was fun. The [Major] strode after Rags and hesitated. She couldn’t quite force herself to grab the [Chieftain]. After a second, she moved past Rags.

“With me—headquarters, I have a situation. Improbable Guest is on the move; my squad is accompanying her. I—yes, we requested she return to her room.”

But you’re not quite willing to make me. Rags walked down the hallways, continuing to peer into various rooms. Most of what she saw was incomprehensible—so she asked Callra what they were for.

Each answer fascinated her; Rags had to assume these were like rooms from Earth, and the idea of entire suites to do things like preserve blood or precious fluids, even operate on people…

“The space. Where is this?”

The things Rags found interesting surprised the other Goblins. Callra hesitated.

“This is Oreshome, Chieftain.”

“Oreshome? Wait—is that the name you called it or was it originally called—Orefell?”

Rags ran to a window and cursed when she saw it was also shuttered with steel. She pulled at the metal, then tried to peer outside as they confirmed, yes, this was the former city of Orefell.

“They changed the name when it was taken.”

We’re at the edge of the High Passes. Rags knew this city; she’d helped fight for it. She spun.

“How many people live here?”

“How many? I, uh, don’t know. Let me look it up.”

They kept going for their phones! Well, the [Major] didn’t, but Rags saw the screen light up and return a number.

“The population is…312,505 last year. It’s a new Domed City, so it’s not very big.”

“Not very big? Hah. Hahaha!”

This was the biggest tribe in the entire world that Rags had ever heard of, save for when the Goblin Kings arose. Rags rested her head on the window. The cool glass calmed her down.

When her head rose, Major Tirage and half her squad were decloaked and standing there.

“Chieftain, I have explicit orders to escort you back to your rooms.”

The woman was now determined. Rags said nothing for a moment. The shorter Hobgoblin’s eyes glowed, faintly, in the darkened halls of the hospital under lockdown. When she raised her head, the [Great Chieftain] breathed in and out, and authority ran through her words.

She was dressed in a patient’s outfit, unsteady, unarmed, shorter than everyone here, looking closer to a teenager than anything else. Disorientated and from another time.

The [Chieftain] spoke.

“My armor. Who is out there? What are we doing?”

The [Major] answered her instantly, her mouth moving as she threw a salute.

“Chandrarian mercenaries, we think. Ten thousand of them tele-dropped into the Goblin King’s prison and engaged him. They’re forming a defensive line, and we have orders to push through and get the Goblin King to the front. We need him at the Floodplains. We have orders to get him and you to Goblin Lord Rags.”

Then Tirage caught herself and floundered.

“Authority Skill. Don’t let her—”

Rags glanced at Callra.

“My armor.”

“It’s probably in one of the laboratories on the fourth floor. They said they were going to run tests on it and your blood to make sure you were really…”

“Good. Let’s go.”

Rags began walking, and it wasn’t mind control or anything as horrific as Roshal’s deeds. She just moved, and they could stop her or argue, but she was going. Major Tirage grabbed for Rags’ shoulder; the [Chieftain] looked at Tirage, and the [Major] decided not to yank Rags off her feet.

By this point, the hospital was well aware that Rags was awake; a [Doctor] came charging down the corridor in a flat-footed run. They were set to drag Rags back to her room as well, but their shout never quite managed to manifest.

Rags kept moving; a second squad of Goblin special-forces actually got the drop on her. A glaring [Captain] with one glowing, artificial yellow eye snapped at her.

“You are to come with me back to your rooms!”

“No. I need armor. I have to speak to the Goblin King.”

He wavered, then grabbed her chest and tried to put her in some kind of a grappling hold. She grabbed his arm, and her [Ogre’s Strength] matched whatever strength he had. The two struggled for a second—then the [Great Chieftain] met his eyes.

“I have fallen through reality and travelled through time, and my tribe needs me. Help me or get out of my way.”

His boots screeched, then he went tumbling backwards as she tossed him at his [Soldiers], and they caught him. Rags’ blood was aflame. She felt it.

My levels are waiting for me. A class is. But I have to see him.

She knew who the Goblin King was, but she had to see it herself.

I have to see his face.

 

——

 

Her armor was actually mostly repaired. A team of [Scientists] had been working on it, and they’d plucked out a lot of her damn Carn Wolf fur, but managed to restore the impacts to it. Rags slid it on; they could have gotten her other armor, but there was no time to size it.

“Let’s go. If we need to breach past these forces, send me. Assuming that’s not suicide.”

“The Battleborn 2nd regiment has engaged the enemy. They’re some of the finest our people have. But you shouldn’t be anywhere near the front, Chieftain—! We’ll clear the field and send an aircraft for pickup or teleport you—”

“No. I have to see this.”

Someone clearly agreed, because as Rags was striding down from the laboratory, an escort arrived at the hospital. The Goblin Chieftain headed down through the building, and that’s when the dream truly became…

They followed her. Of course, the soldiers did, spreading out ahead of her, keeping people back, but the medical technicians, orderlies, nurses, doctors, all of them followed her down the corridors. So did the [Scientists]—and they weren’t silent.

Presumably, this was under some kind of information lockdown; every time someone took a picture of her, a [Soldier] would yell at them, but these were Goblins.

We’re bad at keeping secrets from each other. Half of them were recording, the other half following, occasionally asking questions.

“Uh—uh, what’s your favorite food?”

“Spaghetti and sausage with blue fruit juice?”

Callra glanced down at her phone and blinked.

“Oh. Oh, wow. Really? Because it says here that you really enjoy clam chowder and popshroom risotto. Drinks…uh, it doesn’t say.”

Rags wrinkled up her nose and shrugged as every eye fell somewhat accusatorialy on her, as if this was proof she was some kind of super-advanced Golem. She was sure they had scanned her a thousand times, but it didn’t matter. She knew who she was.

“Maybe my tastes changed. I’ve never had either.”

“You’ve never had clam chowder? Risotto’s weird, but you can order it…”

“How are you eating seafood all the time? I assume that’s seafood. Orefell is landlocked by over a hundred miles in every direction. Does it look like I have money to buy clams? Let alone walk into Invrisil and just buy them?”

Rags noted it down anyways. She kept moving, and then she passed by a cafeteria room being used as a shelter. Hundreds of Goblins were gathered together, peeking out the shuttered windows. Most of them were watching news broadcasts on a television, a flat-screen television, or on their devices. Some were clearly patients. When she passed by the door, all of them focused on her.

Children peered at Rags from behind their parents, Hobs, and she saw how they were of different heights.

Children. ‘Ordinary’ Goblins to her looked like real children as their parents blinked at Rags, then put away their devices.

“Keep back. There’s nothing to see—”

Major Tirage actually tried it, then gave up. Then Goblins were filling the hallways, so many that Rags couldn’t take the ‘elevators’, whatever the hell those were, but walked down the stairs. She stopped only once.

“Oh.”

A tiny Goblin baby was blinking up at her in a nursery window. Rags had seen Goblin babies all the time in Goblinhome, of course. They were everywhere, usually pretty quiet because they learned not to cry, but this one was just…wrapped up in a soft bundle of fabric. The Goblin baby wrinkled up her face at Rags, as if wondering what this stranger was staring at her for.

This child has a city. A future. Rags’ heart leapt as she glanced around, and no one understood why she smiled and did a little hop in the air, almost skipping downstairs. When they reached the ground floor and heard that distant thudding grow louder, the civilians stopped, and the [Soldiers] tensed.

“The escort is right outside. Let us secure it—”

Even the Major was so tense. Chieftain Rags paused by the steel shutters, waited for Tirage to unlock the doors, and then stepped out after a few seconds.

Then her ebullience faded as she saw the dark city, faint lights glowing in buildings locked down to conserve energy, glowing shields of magic spread over the vista.

This place was in danger. She saw a rounded section of paved street, where the [Soldiers] were spreading out, and the biggest land-vehicle she’d ever seen in her life.

It was long and wide, a boxy monster with weird wheels connected to a track of interlocked metal pieces. Rags’ first image was of some kind of bug; she stared at the armored troop carrier and saw a door unlatch and slide open.

“VIP ready for transit to safe location. Chieftain—you’re in safe hands here.”

Major Tirage gestured awkwardly at the open carrier, but no one came out to meet Rags. What did escape was a bit of haze and a smell. Rags wrinkled her nose as she caught the distinct odors of tobacco and Dreamleaf and other vaguely alchemical substances she couldn’t name.

Three dozen pairs of glowing eyes stared out of the darkness at her, and she felt the first moment of unease creep into her passage through the future.

The Goblins sitting inside this vehicle didn’t move. One growled in a higher-pitched voice than Rags would have expected.

“I am Strike Captain Leafpear of the 2nd Battleborn, Chieftain Rags. My orders from the Goblin Lord herself are to keep you safe at all costs. This carrier will escort you to our airbase and entrench with you until the attackers have been repulsed.”

Leafpear had an edge of intensity in her voice, and Tirage opened her mouth, then edged back from the carrier. Smoke made Leafpear’s eyes shimmer in a haze; Rags squinted at her.

“How many of the attackers are there?”

“Nine thousand at least, still on the field. They’re after the Goblin King. Our stationed forces should handle them…but they’re Chandrarian shock troopers. Half of ‘em are Kevlar-Hemp; the rest are made out of Manacloth or tougher materials.”

“What the hell is Kevlar?”

Boom. Whatever was going on, that didn’t sound like it was something from their side, judging by the way everyone flinched. Rags’ heart rate leapt, but she saw the barrier above the hospital shimmer and absorb something. Major Tirage glanced at the Captain, but Leafpear wouldn’t be rushed. Instead, she chuckled and flicked something glowing out of the carrier: a piece of ash.

“Some Earth material, or close enough. Stops bullets. Stitch-folk made of it won’t burn or get cut easily.”

The Chieftain narrowed her eyes. Her gaze flicked to the armored transport.

“I see. And you’re the finest of this…Battleborn group? Thirty-six of you.”

“Thirty-seven with the [Driver]. The highest-level members of our group.”

Rags saw it.

“And I’m keeping you from the warfront. If I hunker down in the base, they’ll never reach us.”

Another chuckle, dark and rich with humor.

“Oh, they might reach us. Half the group’s after you; they think you’re the Goblin King or someone important. They’ll storm the city.”

Which means fighting in the streets. Even if there are barrier spells…Rags saw Tirage catching onto what was actually being discussed and raising her phone to her mouth anxiously. The [Chieftain] made her choice.

“Leafpear. Any relation to Raidpear or Leafarmor? Nevermind that. Listen to me. I am Rags. I have left my tribe behind in my world—with the greatest purpose—and they are in danger. They might be fighting an Old One right now. And I am lost.”

Rags pointed towards the glowing horizon, which lit up every few seconds.

“A literal child is out there, one of the bravest and smartest I have met. If I die or she dies…I have to find her. I must survive. I have to go home, and I have to bring hope against what’s coming back. Do you get that?”

“Mm. Understood.”

The Goblins’ eyes winked as they blinked and breathed inside the carrier. Rags met Leafpear’s eyes.

“Good. Give me a gun. Then go straight into those Stitch-folk. That’s an order.”

Leafpear blinked. Major Tirage gasped.

“Captain! You can’t—”

Someone laughed, and an object came flying towards Rags. She caught the weird-looking handgun, and a hand exited the carrier. A thin, short arm.

The ordinary-sized Goblin, Leafpear, grinned at Rags. She was all of four feet tall, wearing magical, light armor, and she had a huge, long canister at her side. She held her hand out.

“Welcome aboard.”

Rags grabbed the hand, and more pulled her into the carrier. She heard shouting behind her, and then it was dark. Even her eyes couldn’t see; the sounds of Goblins shouting faded to nothing as the hatch sealed with a hiss. Then there was a rumble; Rags felt the vehicle turn and start moving.

“Inform headquarters of our new bearing. Get me their vanguard and step on it.”

Lights turned on, red and dim, and Rags saw Goblins sitting along benches in what was, well, a metal box. There were a few objects in the room: a box with a red cross on it, a crate or two of what might be weapons or food, but virtually nothing else.

Just thirty-six short, normal-sized Goblins, their weapons, and Rags. The vehicle accelerated, and Rags stumbled before grabbing a shoulder to anchor herself. There was nothing else to grab; just seats and people.

She had to squeeze into a seat next to Leafpear and a Goblin who was bare-chested. The Goblin hadn’t put her armor on, which was nothing more than an enchanted vest without sleeves; she was smoking on a pipe and squeezed over to make room.

It was…cramped. Thirty-six Goblins was definitely the max occupancy, and with Rags, a Hobgoblin, if a smaller one, they grunted and pressed up against bare skin.

“Careful with that. It’s loaded. Safety is here. You tic it on whenever you’re not in combat. Never point it at anything you don’t want dead. You pull this back with each shot—when you’re out, you reload by doing this.”

A circular barrel extended from the gun, and Rags saw six bullets gleaming in the cylinder. Leafpear handed her three clips of ammunition.

“I’ve only got thirty-six rounds. It’s a revolver, not a pistol; do you even know what a gun is?”

“I know the word. What’s the difference between this and a regular gun?”

“This one kicks harder, doesn’t keep firing when you hold the trigger down, and doesn’t have magical reloading or anything else.”

Rags inspected the gun, then gingerly made sure the safety was on and put it in her bag of holding. The [Captain] was inspecting the [Chieftain]’s armor.

“What is this? Wyvernhide?”

“That’s right.”

“Unenchanted. Someone get her a Ring of Arrowshields. It won’t protect you from more than one bullet at best. Keep your head down; if you can see them, they can shoot you. Don’t leave the carrier unless the driver’s dead.”

They were heading towards the battle. Rags felt the carrier swerving through the city, and the sounds of explosions were getting louder. Her nerves were thrumming. Someone tossed her a ring, and Rags fumbled to catch it. No one laughed as she bent down and had to pluck it from between the tangle of boots and legs.

They were all watching her, like the others. But this lot…were high level. Leafpear grunted after a second.

“Today’s a weird day.”

“You’re telling me? Do you need your—revolver?”

“Nope. I’m armed.”

So saying, Leafpear showed Rags the long tube at her side, which resembled a gun…if the barrel was wider than Rags’ arm. It was ridiculously wide. Rags pointed at it.

“What the hell is that?”

“Single-use Demonrocket. I point, something explodes.”

“Better than a [Fireball]?”

A grin from everyone, and Rags realized they all had one of the tubes at their side. One shot…Leafpear nodded.

“It could turn this entire carrier into slag.”

“So what if someone shoots us with one of them?”

“They probably don’t have one.”

Well, that was reassuring. But that was the nature of this group. Rags settled herself back more. She was wondering what was most important to ask, but Leafpear was as curious as Rags was.

“Raidpear’s still alive. He’s my grandfather.”

Rags sat forwards.

“Dead gods. Then—you’re from Riverfarm.”

A glow of light; Leafpear had lit up another puffer stick. She took a long drag on it, and Rags coughed; one was handed to her, and she refused it.

“Riverfarm’s gone. So’s most of what you’d remember. I’m pretty old. Aside from General Gothica, I’m one of the only Goblins who can talk about history without looking it up. Everything online is half wrong, anyways. Ask.”

“…Who am I?”

They all laughed at her, and Rags narrowed her eyes.

“I know who the Goblin King is, I think. I recognized him. Who am I?”

The laughter stopped abruptly, and Leafpear told her.

“You? You’re the Goblin Lord of Civilizations, Ragathsi.”

“Me. Gothica’s alive. How about Taganchiel?”

“Dead. Way before I was born. I don’t know how.”

The [Chieftain] exhaled, then nodded.

“Snapjaw?”

“General Snapjaw died in the liberation of Rhir. Final push for the Blighted Kingdom.”

“—I see. Badarrow?”

“Same place.”

“Prixall? Poisonbite? Redscar? Leapwolf? Calescent? Peggy…Greydath of Blades?”

The replies came from around the carrier as the smaller Goblins peered up, tying their boots, putting on armor—now there was a non-stop cracking sound in the air, a storm of metal flying. More thumping; the carrier was starting to rattle as it passed over uneven ground.

“Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. I was there when Greydath died.”

Everyone.

“Are there Goblin Lords?”

“Sure. Six.”

“Any I’d know?”

“No.”

Those eyes weren’t sympathetic. They were so…curious. But, respectful of her time and theirs, they let her ask.

“I heard something about a war, a big war.”

“Sure. This is just the warmup. The Floodplains. Lord Xitegen’s mustered the entire Alliance, and he’s taking the battle to us there. The Goblin King needs to get there. We were containing him along the High Passes. Someone in Chandrar didn’t want him showing up. Best guess is the Empire of Sands.”

“What about the King of Destruction?”

“Dead.”

Whumph. The entire carrier listed, and the lights flickered; Rags caught herself as hands steadied her. She realized that if there had been a pole or other objects, she might have slammed into them—

A voice crackled through the room. The unseen [Driver].

“Contact. Explosive rounds. I see the entire vanguard’s dug in ahead. Where do you want us?”

A display popped up with red and blue symbols; an overlay of the battle around them. Leafpear studied it as their icon, green, swerved and sped through the battle. She pointed at the tightest grouping of red.

“Right there. Get ready to come out hot. Last questions, Rags? It’s fun to see you.”

Rags sat back as high-pitched pinging sounds echoed off the carrier. Her [Dangersense] was screaming at her, a long, unending wail, and she saw the Goblins sitting, waiting—

“Do you think it’s worth it? It’s still war, isn’t it?”

Leafpear peeked up, and she grinned as she spat half of her cigar onto the floor of the carrier. Something hit it with a howl of sound, and a voice shouted.

“Djinni! They’ve got a—”

Whumph. They half-turned, and an enraged voice, bigger than anything, was roaring above them. Rags went flying, and the light went out. She landed hard; the entire carrier was tilted over. Yet she heard a terrifyingly calm voice in the darkness.

“Oh, it seems bad now. But we get leave, and the cities are safe except for the occasional criminals. This is our place.”

Leafpear had stayed on her feet; she was grinning as a roaring being of magic ripped the door off the armored carrier. The Djinni’s face was burning flames and snarling teeth in the shape of a tiger.

Someone fired a gun from inside; the Djinni recoiled as a bullet tore a piece out of its face. Anti-magic ammunition. It retreated, and Leafpear jumped up and caught the lip of the carrier.

“Stay there. We’ll right the carrier. Battleborn—go, go, go!”

She swung herself up and vanished in an explosion of smoke. Rags shouted as other Goblins leapt up, exiting the downed carrier from the top. Leafpear—

Then a big figure emerged out of the smoke. A muscled being caught the flaming Djinni as it roared at her and tossed the magical creature. She was holding her rocket launcher, and the Goblin—a full twelve feet tall—grinned down at Rags.

Then Leafpear, the Fomirelin, the Great Goblin, fired. The explosion lit up the darkness, and the rest of her squad was pouring out of the vehicle—growing—

Great Goblins. Rags saw them doubling in size in seconds, developing muscles—

They were all like Tremborag. They emerged—without roars or shouting—into the middle of the enemy vanguard, firing their rocket launchers, then tearing forwards. Goblins of the future.

The carrier jerked, then righted as they lifted it back right side up. Rags slid down and hauled herself into a seat, alone, as one of them slammed the doors back into place.

“Driver, does this box have guns?”

“Negative, Chieftain. I’m taking us out of the fighting.”

“For me? What about Leafpear and the others?”

If this was their way out—the chuckle from the front shut Rags up.

“They don’t need us to withdraw. Hold on—they’re targeting us.”

Rags stared at the cracked display and saw thirty-six blue icons spreading out, erasing red dots. Leafpear’s squad was throwing the enemy into chaos—but not without cost. One of the blue dots vanished, then another.

The Goblin sat there as her vehicle left the fight, weaving, trying to turn—the [Driver]’s voice was terse.

“The Djinni’s right on top of us. Hold on!”

They went careening left, and Rags heard that booming voice overhead. She cursed as the metal of the carrier turned red and her boots began to smoke; she took her feet off the ground.

“What is—”

“Lava! It’s trying to—”

They were sluggish now, and Rags did not like being in this box of metal, which was, when you got down to it, a pre-made coffin for her. She heard another thud—a cry filled with static—and the carrier slowed.

The front was glowing red. Rags didn’t make a sound; she just drew the revolver and crossbow from Rhir and aimed both at the front of the carrier.

The Djinni ripped the metal away with a howl, and Rags fired both. The revolver nearly kicked itself out of her hand; both projectiles struck the Djinni, and it recoiled as its chest exploded, showering magical essence, but it just hurled the glowing metal aside and pointed.

Rags kicked, and the [Apista’s Jetfire] spell slammed her into the other side of the carriage so hard her vision blacked out. But it saved her from the ray of white flames that pierced the carrier. The Djinni cursed and flinched as there was a thunderous rattatatat; its form flickered, fiery motes of light emerging from its back in trails.

Someone was shooting at it, but it was all flames and magic. It pointed again at Rags, and she wished it had ripped the ceiling off.

Nowhere to run. No sword. I should have asked for a sword. Guns suck.

Rags lifted the revolver, tensing to leap straight into the Djinni. The howling being of magic, glowing Adamantium chains written with runes locked around its arms, raised its hands and conjured the biggest orange ball of fire that Rags had ever seen. It drew back to throw—then turned.

The howling tiger’s face of fury and death became uncertain. Then afraid. The Djinni pivoted—threw the fireball, then tried to fly back. Rags looked up and felt her heart rate still.

The air went quiet. Not because the battle had ended, but because the aura of that being ate sound.

She felt him coming. A presence, like the mountains moving at incredible speed.

Towards her. 

The Djinni floated upwards, throwing fire as fast as its hands could move. It fired another white-hot beam, then flew backwards. It drew a magical sword out of the air and swept forwards—then back. Rags saw it glancing at her, and then the Djinni held out its hands.

Showing someone its manacles. Beseeching. Then the Djinni raised its blade and swung, fast as the flicker of fire from a burning candle.

The fiery being vanished in a whisper of sound. A gleaming shape bounded through it, and the Djinni died, chains falling, clattering off the carrier’s smoldering frame. Rags heard nothing as she pulled herself upright, climbing higher.

She knew they were screaming—but she couldn’t hear it. When she reached the front of the carrier, she saw figures fleeing. Stitch-folk. They were running for their lives.

The hush that had descended over hearing became a blanket that smothered her consciousness. She was no longer aware of exiting the burning carrier, nor of the night’s chill on her skin or even the beating of her heart.

She…forgot her name. The girl, the child—and she was a child, grown too early because she had to—stumbled forwards, a single soul surrounded by other Goblins.

But his was a myriad. They overlapped; they were all who had ever come before and one at the same time. A gestalt of beings, each individual and separate, melded into one consciousness that had emerged again and again out of the souls of the Goblins. Every Goblin King who had ever been, combined into one ultimate soul filled with rage.

A being who crawled out of Hellste for revenge. A creature who grew with each new Goblin King that emerged, fueled by the same emotion that they all shared, which was so overwhelming it blotted out everything else.

Anger. That was it. No word could approximate the depths of that rage. Even now, the figure who stood before the Goblin did not shake or tremble with it. They were fury incarnate, and the consciousness that could form words and speak and reason was a mere lull between the white-hot inferno that would erase everything in this world.

That was who he was.

The Goblin King. She could see each part of him, every Goblin King that ever had been. And there had only been…eighty-three of them.

Ever. In the entire history of this world, less than a hundred Goblin Kings had emerged. Sometimes quickly, in moments when the conditions were right. Other times, thousands of years passed between their arrival. But so long as Goblins endured, so would they.

She knew the last one. She knew him—when she had opened her eyes, falling out of the sky, the child had known that familiar, terrible presence underneath the weight of the Goblin King’s soul. But she had to…

She came towards him, and he turned his head, breathing slowly. His armor rose and fell, like living skin on his body. He was bigger, as if the Goblin King’s soul was emanating from his flesh. No longer the hero she knew; his armor was sullied with grime and twisted with scars, wounds he had never repaired.

Still, still—she saw a tattered red cloak hanging around his shoulders, one made of cloth, not blood, but it was still him.

Rabbiteater’s helmet turned to Rags, and she recalled her name at last as he spoke. The madness lifted from him, and she heard a voice, coarse from disuse and lost. Another dreamer, this one in a nightmare from which he would never wake.

The Goblin King of Betrayal, the 84th Goblin King, Rabbiteater the Traitor spoke.

“I have been dreaming of ghosts. Now, a memory stands before me. I saw you from the veil beyond this world and called to you. There was someone else, familiar. Tell me, Rags. When will I wake?”

He spoke to her with long familiarity, as if they had had this conversation before. But the child was unable to say anything for a while. So that crimson gaze shifted, and another voice spoke through his mouth.

“Se vima o tir pava. Zehie Finri-brahnile he che o. Tok-e-tum po kan o ezan ve tak fu?”

She did not know these words. The Goblin King, the being who was first and all, spoke in the tongue she knew only fragments of in such fluid beauty it drew tears from her eyes. She shook her head, and he cocked his head slightly. Such a familiar gesture, carried across their species for tens of thousands of years until now.

He repeated the question in the common tongue. But this time, something else came with his words.

Visions. Meaning and emotion flowed through his words, projecting themselves into Rags’ mind. She understood his words, felt the meaning.

“You walk through time, child. Fae-touched. How do you stand before me? Do you…have a name? Children should have names, but so few do. They would weep to see it.”

Flashes—a Goblin [Mage] raising his arm, walking backwards in time to change fate. A squalling infant, water washing away the blood as a woman spoke and touched their head, giving them a name.

Pointed ears. A tall figure bending over the little Goblins, who gazed up in awe as she repeated the name.

Rags beheld the face of an Elf. Saw a slightly longer face, an angular chin—but so many similarities to Ceria, Falene, or—Elia. But most of all, a face that had escaped time itself. Ageless eyes and compassion, affection, and joy at the new life they saw—

The Face of Elves.

She was screaming. Clawing at her eyes as she writhed on the ground. One endless shriek of loss and rage that overwhelmed everything in her.

Kill them. Kill them for the sin of it. A voice thundered in her soul, and she wanted to kill.

Endless hatred, endless sorrow. Then the final vision of his words came into her mind like cold water, a sea of calm.

A vision of an antlered head and leaves shrouding a face, a King of Green, and by his side, a lady covered in winter’s flowers. The hint of a smile.

The Faerie King lifted a hand in silent greeting as he passed by, walking across the sky towards the waiting pantheon, a procession of his people dancing and laughing behind him, pointing down at her—and her rage and pain melted away.

The Goblin’s head rose slowly. It felt like a lifetime had passed—seconds had. Merely enough time for the Goblin King to speak.

Rags got onto her hands and knees and vomited onto the ashy ground. She had nearly been lost. One sentence and she had forgotten her name, who she was—just become a weapon of hatred. And that was just a fragment of his emotions.

She wiped her mouth, gazing upwards, and he stood there, head sweeping right and left. This…was not Rabbiteater. This was the Goblin King. He lifted something and threw it casually.

Someone died. Rags did not see what he aimed at nor where the dagger landed, but she felt the lives vanish. The Goblin King turned and drew his sword.

Then, she saw him cut the air. A line appeared, dividing the world in half, vertically, and she beheld a rift in the ground.

Hundreds of Stitch-folk [Soldiers] lay, cut in half or struck by the Skill. They gazed up and fired at the Goblin King; he stood to the side. He threw another throwing dagger, and this time, Rags saw a running figure leap left—into the blade.

That was the difference between him and every other warrior Rags had met. She had seen high-level warriors fighting. Even watched the King of Destruction’s Seven at war. They could move faster than anyone else, attack with brutal precision and the strength to rend the ground.

The Goblin King…threw that dagger at the spot where that [Soldier] would be. When he stepped to one side, it was moments before they fired at him. He raised his sword again and cut downwards towards a group of [Mages] trying to cast a spell on him.

She saw him sever the strands of magic. His blade passed through space, their barriers, and cut down the Stitch-folk again. When the Goblin King fought, it was as if the world were made of strings, not just the Stitch-folk of Chandrar. He alone could sever them—

Until the second Djinni rose, howling for her friend. She was made of lightning and flashed across the air so fast even the Goblin King seemed slow.

Fists made of pure electricity struck his armor, and the Goblin King reached out—the Djinni stepped back, a lithe dancer, a warrior of thousands of years. Her steps were thunder; she lunged forwards again, and the Goblin King missed.

Two more blows to his armor, and lightning illuminated his entire body. The mortal flesh he wore felt it; he staggered once, and the Djinni raised her arms high. She dodged a slash of the sword that left a void in the air. Stepped down like a falling bolt of lightning, pivoting, lunging—

And stopped.

The Goblin King’s hand was holding something. Not her fist; he hadn’t captured her. The air trembled as he caught the world around the Djinni. The being of magic screamed—her body flashed helplessly—

Then he tore the air and ground out of existence. Rags saw him breach the air, and for a second, there was another, confusing world beyond. Grey skies. Twisting reality—

The Goblin King ripped the Djinni out of this dimension, then caught himself. Wearily, as if that act alone had tired him. Then his helmet swung back to his enemies. They saw their two weapons, the greatest Djinni, were dead and began to flee.

The crimson gaze sparked, and the Stitch-folk burst into flames. The Goblin King swept his eyes across them, burning the [Soldiers] alive. Wherever that helm turned, annihilation followed.

There and there. She saw him point, directing the fighting Goblins, turning the battle into a rout. He moved them like extensions of his body. Then the helmed head swung down again, and she remembered he had asked her a question.

Do you have a name? So few do. They would weep to see this. See you.

It took all her courage to get to one knee and push herself up, but she did. The young Goblin faced the roaring inferno of emotions before her. Enough hatred to shatter the High Passes. But she had to know. Had to ask.

“My name is Rags. Who would weep?”

The Goblin King studied her, and she wasn’t sure who spoke. Rabbiteater channeling the memories? The Goblin King in his entirety? Eighty-four mouths moved, and Goblins, male, female, all who had ever lived, spoke the reply all at once with a single voice.

“Elves.”

The answer made her flinch, expecting the annihilating memories again. But this time, she only felt the touch of fingers in her hand. Soft—

The little Goblin looked up and saw someone holding his hand. An Elf, pointing towards a city in the forest, trailing their steps to let the smaller child keep pace—

This time, the memory rose in her chest, soft and precious, so beautiful it scarred her. Until it burst into a wave of obliterating rage and sorrow. Rags’ teeth bit through her lip, and she staggered, fighting the memory off her. It took her only a few seconds this time, but she was panting for air when she could raise her head again and look upon him.

So this was the Goblin King. This was what it was to stand before him. If she were any lower-level, if she had not come this far and experienced everything she had, he would have swept her away. Changed her into someone who only wanted to follow him into battle and slaughter his foes, regardless of the cost.

Madness. The embodiment of Goblins’ insanity stood before her. The Goblin King was casting around, hunting for a foe. But he was distracted by her. She had so many questions, but she was terribly afraid. Afraid of him, of the truth, of his very name. Rags croaked as she swallowed her own bile and blood.

“Are…are we Elves? I know they matter to us. I don’t know why. I have looked upon the last Elf, Sprigaena, and I wept. I don’t know why. Now, I’m here. I never thought I’d meet you. I have so many questions.”

The helmet swung towards her, and she flinched—but this time, there was no rush of emotion, memory, and sensation. Another voice, the same one, but hoarse and, somehow, less spoke. A familiar, despairing tone with a hint of amusement in it.

Rabbiteater spoke.

“You said this last time.”

Then he put a hand to his head and shuddered, and she saw the Goblin King emerging, raising a broken spear to hurl and kill someone from afar. His presence washed over her again, and she understood.

This isn’t Rabbiteater at all. Who is this?

The Goblin King began to move, but she held out a hand.

“Wait! I’m not your Rags. Please, answer me! Who are we? I need to know the truth!”

His very presence kept her from approaching. She felt like she would die, dissolve away if she got too close. Once more, the Goblin King halted, and the combination-voice answered. Manifest eyes fell on her, judging, appraising, and she felt so small. But then he bent forwards and answered, like a grown-up to a child. And she was. Behind the helmet, she saw the flash of teeth lifting in a smile.

“No, girl. We are not Elves. We never were. Not a single child was ever born of Elves and Goblins. It would be anathema.”

Now, it was easier to withstand the multitude of emotions and thoughts. But still, she was an ant compared to a Giant. Nevermind she was a Hobgoblin—she felt more tears springing to her eyes. A shred of sorrow for a people who had to live as adults when all should have been children.

She forced his emotions away, tried to focus. Anathema?

“W-why?”

Crimson eyes crinkled up with amusement and sorrow, and the fires of damnation flared brighter; flames across the battlefield exploded, and firearms detonated in enemy hands.

“Because they saw us as children. When we were first created and stumbled out, naked and afraid, onto the beaches, a monstrous species made to be slaughtered, to be enemies for the Gods and their champions, they saw us. Then they emerged with gifts for the youngest species and took our hands and taught us speech and helped us live. They were always, always our greatest friends.”

He spoke the words with practice and care, as if he had repeated this lesson a million times. He had, she understood.

He had stood before [Chieftains] and [Goblin Lords], in front of brave children, desperate warriors, and armies—their faces were a blur, billions upon billions of Goblins, by the ones or by legions, and he told them who they were. Gave them a reason to make war with him.

Once, we were friends with Elves. Come with me. Avenge them.

Die with me.

That battered helmet was blurring. She was crying. The child wiped her eyes again. The helmet turned from her again, with disinterest; the battle called to him.

She had to gain his attention. Rags croaked.

“I don’t understand. They—someone I trust said Sprigaena was a terrible traitor.”

A breath caught, and the Goblin King was lost for words for a moment. Then they spoke as a hand rested on her shoulder, gentle as a leaf. A kneeling king. The first king of all.

“No. Not her. Not to me.” 

Here, Rags reached for the vision, and his words washed over her; she saw a warrior cutting down Dragons and legends, blade dancing as a small figure hid, cowering in the grass.

The sky was breaking. Vast shapes fell out of it sky. Dragons and flying machines. And Gods. All dying. It overwhelmed her; she had to focus on the words.

“I was there. I remember Sprigaena, the finest blade of her kind, and her refusal to war against the Gods. She killed warriors of every species save one, from deities to champions of legend. But not us. Sprigaena did not war with children. Even the Elves who refused to rebel merely hid us away.” 

Her ears were roaring. She had another question, and the Goblin King saw it. He focused, and now his attention split Rags into pieces. He gazed into her soul.

The littlest Goblin of the Flooded Waters tribe. A child watching her parents die. A bowl of spaghetti and blue fruit juice—a purple-eyed skeleton.

The Floodplains of Liscor as Tyrion Veltras charged. The death of Tremborag. Her greatest friend lying dead on the bier.

He sifted through her memories and her life, pulling it out of her in a moment. And his gaze was so—careless—

“You have known love. You understand.”

Something like sympathy entered his eyes. Then the all-consuming fire burnt it away.

“But they deserve no pity, nor affection. Forget that face, and come with me, child of the Flooded Waters tribe. This world requires destruction. Kneel, and rise as my Goblin Lord.”

The Chieftain struggled, but he was trying to erase her memories. His will overwhelmed her mind, and she felt her knees bending.

“No. No. She gave me hope.”

He reached into her head and began to pull the things that kept her sane out of her. Then she knew horror. The Goblin girl begged, she pleaded and struggled, and he pulled out that image of the smiling woman whose name Rags couldn’t remember anymore and held it in his fist.

The [Innkeeper] smiled, winked at Rags. Then Erin Solstice lifted a hand as pink flames burned on a mug. Blue fire of her tears. The grey of mercy and that purple flame of happiness—

The fires burned, and Erin Solstice threw a [Minotaur’s Punch]. She swung at the Goblin King and hit him in the face.

The armored figure neither stumbled nor flinched—but his grasp on Rags’ soul wavered just a second. She gasped—

Then the hand was ripping the memory of Erin out of her, ignoring that image of the Human that she loved. Her friend.

Memories couldn’t stop this being. Not even hers. The only thing that could stop the Goblin King was—

His hand jerked. Another, trembling hand, his left, grasped the right and pulled it down, and that familiar, cracked voice spoke.

“Not her. You cannot have her.”

Rabbiteater. He pulled the Goblin King back, somehow, wrestled that overwhelming presence away from Rags. She sensed the Goblin King’s wrath rising—the red light coming out of the helmet flashed—

Then the rage abated. Frustrated, he lowered his hand, and Rags backed away another step.

Almost—he spoke again, audibly annoyed. Seeking to convince her with words. Again, it was the same story he always told them.

“I was the first to stand up as my species drew breath. I beheld the treachery of the Gods, their grand plan to turn the world into playthings. When the last of the divine vanished and the world ceased quaking, I stood there, and the rage overflowed in my heart. I was a child; there were no Hobgoblins, nor any others. We were too young. But I grew into the first because my adopted parents were dead. When the other species came to hunt us, remembering our purpose, I was there. Then I scorched the kingdoms who still worshipped the gods from this world and rampaged until they killed me and scattered my peoples. Again and again—”

Until now. Tens of thousands of years of war, and he was still coming back. Now, Rags saw it. The endless cycle in her visions.

“But why? Can’t you make peace? We are still monsters—”

She cried out, and the Goblin King just looked at her, and she knew the answer. This rage—she couldn’t imagine sharing the same body with him. It would annihilate her. His reply came from the depths of his soul and roared out of his eyes. He whispered, and the world shook despite it.

“No. I am rage. I am vengeance. For every betrayed being who ever was—I will erase it all until their work is in ruins. We—they—are all playthings of the gods. This is their game, and I will shatter it.”

“You’re a monster.”

The red light shone from behind his eyes, and she saw Rabbiteater’s soul bearing all of them, fighting at times to speak, to break free. But the rage…

“So many have called me. What of it?  Velan’s dreams ended with me. Rabbiteater’s heart shattered as I awoke. I heard their pleas. I heard their wishes. It matters not. I am destruction.”

He whirled, then, as if unable to merely stand and converse. The armored figure vanished, leaving only a trail of dust behind. She saw a plume of soot and ash rise upwards—a trail, and her eyes found the armored figure leaping through the air.

After the Stitch-folk [Soldiers], who were trying to flee the battlefield. They looked up at him, some of them kneeling in ranks, surrendering.

The Goblin King opened one armored hand and swung his claws. He tore the ground apart and killed them. Surrendered, fleeing, fighting—blood covered his armor, and he ran as the Goblins around him went insane with his rage.

Only a few of them could hold themselves back. Rags saw Captain Leafpear trying to restore order. The Goblin Chieftain stood there, and something glinted at her feet.

A Djinni’s chains. Rags bent down and scooped them up, gazing at that figure rampaging forwards. His roar split the air and made her entire body shake and tremble.

“Never. I don’t want to be—never.”

The girl was mumbling as the Goblin King came back. He perched on the broken armored transport, peering down at her, for he could tell she did not fit with this world.

“You are a strand of fate wrongly placed. I see fate and the truth behind the puppetmaster the Gods created. I learned to break the strings, even though the puppetmaster has always tried to put me in its boxes and rules. Where do you come from, Rags? No, I named you Ragathsi.”

She gazed up at him, eyes filled with tears, and shook her head. Rags backed away from the Goblin King.

“You’re no hero. I thought you might be. I thought you might be something greater—but is this it? You’re just hatred and rage.”

The question stung him. Tens of thousands of years of war—and his rage was an unhealed wound. That gaze baked her skin, physically burnt the hair off her arms and charred her flesh, despite her armor.

“I was there when the Gods took everything from our people. The kind Elves. The laughing Gnomes. Brave Halflings—so many went to war to save everything. Should I not rage? Should I not wish to topple everything they did?”

Oh, Rabbiteater. Rags saw it now. She gazed at the body the Goblin King wore and understood. She screamed back at the Goblin King.

“No one knows what they did! We’re all children, and you—you’re a curse. Every Goblin who becomes a Goblin King becomes you, don’t they?”

“I am the voice that speaks throughout our memories. When Goblins rise, they will meet me.”

“And destroy. Destroy every pact, every oath, and everything we have tried to build. That’s why I—Rags—locked you away. You’re just a weapon. What did he do? What did Rabbiteater do?”

She knew. She knew it and saw the entire future that the [Palace of Fates] had created. Oh—it was right to hide it. The Goblin King’s voice faded, and someone else whispered, a Goblin trapped in a nightmare. He answered her, softly.

“I was a Goblin Lord. I knew I was becoming the Goblin King and closed my eyes. I told her to leave. But she said she would be right there so I remembered. Then I blinked. And when I opened my eyes—”

He stared at his hands, rusted armor covered in blood, and the Goblin King whispered through his mouth.

“I did what I shall ever do. Erase. Then, he went mad with grief and rage, and I slew a city. This time, I may triumph. Let it be.”

On the day the Goblin King had awoken, an inn vanished. Then the city of Liscor.

Rags saw the careless shrug of Rabbiteater’s shoulders, but it was not the broken [Champion] who moved. There was no regret nor pity in those eyes.

Just a monster. She lifted the revolver in her hands and fired.

The bullet was the finest creation of the Goblins’ armories. It pierced the helmet and part of his flesh before the Goblin King dodged, twisting out of the way of the fragment of magic and metal. One glowing red eye gazed down at Rags as a hand crushed her throat and lifted her off the ground.

“In his rage and madness, he murders his kind. In my desire for war, I have killed your guards upon me, Ragathsi. You oppose me, both of you. So vanish.”

He swung a claw towards her neck with the finality of everything behind it and halted.

It was not Captain Leafpear’s claw, nor the three other Fomirelin who stopped him, though they tried. They could barely even hold him; he could have ripped their hands off their bodies and finished his flick of the claws.

There was only one being who could stop the Goblin King, and it was the Goblin King himself.

Rabbiteater, again. He halted the strike. Forced the hand away and took control.

Somehow. She didn’t know how he could win. It was one Goblin fighting the first Goblin King and the weight of eighty-three other Goblin Kings combined into one being of pure wrath. He wasn’t even just the first Goblin King—he was all their anger, all their hatred, growing vaster with each new Goblin King.

But somehow, Rabbiteater did it. He let go, and Rags fell, coughing. The Goblin King knelt as Leafpear roared orders and a flying bird of metal howled down from the skies. They were pulling Rags away from this monster, and Rabbiteater whispered.

“There was someone else I knew, but he did not. Run away, kinder memory. Run far away before I destroy it all again.”

“I will. I won’t let this happen—I swear it.”

Rags was being hauled into the air, and the Goblin King was fighting to regain control, then giving up, turning his attention to bloodshed. Rabbiteater of Traitors lifted one hand and watched the blood dripping down his ruined armor.

“Good.”

Rags gazed down at him until the figure was a distant speck below and the aircraft was high in the skies, taking her eastwards. Even then, she could still sense him.

Rage. Lucidity between the madness. Answers to all the questions she could ask—but he had already answered the main question. She sat, sick at heart, then turned to the pilot and Leafpear.

“Take me to the Goblin Lord of Civilizations. Please. I don’t want to talk to him anymore.”

Then the child just sat and wept, and the wind took her tears away. Below her, she saw a figure stretching. A lonely Goblin standing on a cold, empty beach at the dawn of creation, waiting, hoping—to see a kindly face amidst the trees. A weeping child who vowed vengeance—a trail of hatred over the course of the world’s history.

A circle. That’s all she saw.

Just a circle in blood drawn in the sand.

 

——

 

A Goblin King arose and ruined everything. It was the oldest story. The only story people told about Goblins. Until he emerged—the world had been brighter.

You pushed him to it.

That was what Mrsha wrote when Xitegen finished his tale. The [Lord] of Izril’s Alliance looked up.

“What?”

He expected to see a child awash with tears, or perhaps, someone broken by the knowledge of the Goblin King’s identity. Guilt suffused the [Lord]; this was too much to lay upon a child.

—But she took the knowledge that it was Rabbiteater who was the Goblin King, her beloved friend from the inn who had slain Erin Solstice, and herself, and damned this world to war with no great reaction.

Merely with a tired sigh. She had seen too much tragedy. This was but one future. Not hers. She was not beyond caring; her gaze was focused on something beyond Xitegen, and he shivered a second.

I said, it wasn’t all his fault, was it?

Mrsha wasn’t good at the particulars of all the history he’d laid out, battles won, the Goblin nation rising, founding Domed Cities, much less how much of it tied to her world. But she wrote with a childish authority.

Rabbiteater. He was a Goblin Lord before he became a Goblin King. And in your history, people kept attacking him.

“For fear of what he might become. Because he killed so many—”

In self defense! You made him, and the one person who was always on his side—he killed her. He killed Erin.

Mrsha’s nose and eyes were running, and Xitegen handed her his handkerchief. His voice was steady, his round face set.

“And in so doing, he proved what Goblin Kings are, now and forever.”

He didn’t get it. Mrsha was sitting on a table in the medical area, and she walked over to punch him. Her paw hurt; his cloth armor was solid, and his bodyguards shifted, but she did it again.

You didn’t have to do it. People made the Goblin King, and Rags had to put him away and make him a weapon. It didn’t have to come to this.

Everyone but Xitegen was staring at her blankly, with that uncomprehending hostility, but Mrsha turned to the [Lord].

Was there ever a chance? Before he became the Goblin King? Please tell me, honestly, and I’ll believe you. I have to know.

She sat there, her little heart about to break, and the Lord of House Terland rested his weight on his hands as he leaned over the table. He closed his eyes, and his face sagged a moment. Then he confessed.

“Was there a moment? Oh, yes. Yes, there was Mrsha du Marquin. For one brief window of time, there was the Goblin Lord, the Champion of the Inn, and that ridiculous woman. The Goblinfriend of Izril. There were conflicts, clashes, but he stood there with the weight of a species on his shoulders, and he bore it well. And I—I—”

Xitegen stared at a gloved hand.

“I lowered that guard I kept raised so high. I wavered in my convictions. Not enough to clasp hands, but to lower that sword I pointed at them. Just as last time, I listened, with one ear, to that bright, annoying voice and let myself be fooled by that vision. It is hard, you know, to see monsters weep. They look like people. If a monster can argue its case so well, sing, play the piano, why, then, it is perhaps not a monster at all, is it?”

His eyes rose, haunted, and he shook his head.

“Then he emerged and proved it was all a lie. Twice a lie, because the best example of their kind, the trust and hope all turned against the world in a moment. He killed her. So yes, Mrsha. There was hope. I regret having hope.”

He glanced away from her, and the girl cried harder. The [Lord]’s voice was cold as he spoke, distant, now, with regrets.

“Then the world tried to halt him. They could not; the Goblin Lords, Greydath of Blades, Kanadith the Herald, and then even Izikere of the Island joined his war. Then other Goblin Lords flocked to his banner. The hidden Goblin Lord of Terandria—and Rags of Civilizations. She was the one who founded the first Domed Cities and damned the north. Of them all, she is the last original Goblin Lord.”

Mrsha was wiping her tears away, but they kept coming.

There are six now?

“Six. But she is the greatest of them by far. It is she we face later today. If what you tell me is true, your arrival isn’t the fortune or doom I hoped for. You’re merely bystanders from a better time. And your Rags…is not yet a Goblin Lord.”

Xitegen was focusing on Mrsha’s situation. Someone—Captain Withra, the [Doctor], spoke incredulously.

“You can’t be taking her seriously, Lord Xitegen.”

He sat back in his chair and steepled his fingers over his stomach, then reached for a chicken wing; he had a bucket and was eating. Mrsha couldn’t. Xitegen tore the skin off the wing with some relish and chewed as he replied.

“Can’t I? I know something of The Wandering Inn. It’s surprised me over the years. This Mrsha is a direct match to the one I recall. She is a Doombearer, and her class has been authenticated. [Fatebreaker Child]. Green. You know, unique classes always show up green on [Appraisal] spells. She says there’s a magic door leading back to other realities, and I say…good. Send her back with knowledge and warnings if we can. I doubt there are any reinforcements from the past that could stop the Goblins of today.”

He reached for another wing as he tossed a bone onto a plate full of them. Mrsha wiped at her face again.

You’re going to send me back? Just like that?

“Yeah, just like that? What if we did something like—there’s no stocks back then, are there? Or lotteries. When did we invent those?”

Persua the Courier was snapping her fingers, trying to think of things to do, but Lord Xitegen was eerily calm.

“The world may have one less Goblin King if we send Miss Mrsha back. That is enough. Nor do I frankly believe we have time for this. She’s coming.”

The camp was moving around them; Mrsha saw tents going down, and the air had taken on a familiar, horrible quiet. [Soldiers] were hugging or sharing one last drink, and the rumble of vehicles filled the air. They were heading north to the Floodplains.

“Right, so what do I do? Take Mrsha south and find out where this door thing is?”

Persua saw the preparations and leapt to her feet. Mrsha wiped at her eyes.

Rags. I need to find Rags. She might have landed closer to the door, or it’s somewhere else. I don’t know. If a weird Goblin shows up…

“Weird Goblin. Uh, put that through our intelligence services?”

Xitegen made a face at one of his Golem-people and then snapped his fingers.

“There is no one for you to meet, Miss Mrsha. No one…that I would hurt, at any rate. Save perhaps one. Where is Chief Engineer Kevin?”

Kevin. Mrsha gazed up, and Withra knew that one. She drained a mug of cold coffee as she packed up her supplies.

“He’s leading the armor past Pallass.”

“Damn. No time to meet him, then. You’ll hold up the column, and we need him here. Courier Persua, you are to take Mrsha past Pallass, to safety. I shall write a briefing and entrust it to someone with sense. Someone who’s not a fool…so not a member of the Five Families. I’ll figure it out.”

Xitegen sprang to his feet and wiped his fingers on his coat, and then they were moving. Mrsha was confused.

What about Pallass?

There was a lot she still didn’t understand; the nature of the Goblin King had shaken her to her core. Xitegen smiled ruefully as Withra shook her head.

“Pallass is a quarter of the size it was, Miss Mrsha. It is still technically an enclave of Drakes…but the [Soldiers] you see are survivors of the Goblins’ attacks. This world is not the same. The Five Families are homeless. Wellfar took to the seas; the rest of us found lodging in Drake lands.”

I don’t see Antinium in the future. What happened to them?

His face went still.

“Eradicated.”

Mrsha just nodded. This was the worst of times. What else?

Did the Blighted Kingdom take over this reality too? [Heroes] from Rhir appearing everywhere?

That surprised him. Xitegen glanced at some of the others and almost laughed.

“No. I’d take that, even with all we learned of the Blighted Kingdom’s many betrayals. Rhir? That’s held by the Demons. The Goblins helped break the Blighted Kingdom’s walls. That’s part of why we don’t have aid from Terandria; they’ve been fighting a crusade to reclaim the continent for a decade. This is the final stand of the south. Ah, I see Manus has arrived. They were also lost as a Walled City, you know.”

Like the world’s worst [Tour Guide], Xitegen was pointing out groups and peoples lost in the future. Manus had apparently been also mostly overrun by the wars that destroyed the Antinium on Izril. But they were being led by a one-eyed Drake whom Xitegen waved at.

“General Lyss. Lyssander. Probably the best swordsman in his entire species. Zeres’ top [Strategist] is there. Wall Lady Werica. No, not her. The Gnoll. And Lady Damia of House Reinhart, the only one of them worth a damn with Magnolia gone. Lord Pattin. All of them fine leaders—you’d do well to remember their names. If the future’s anything like this one, and I hope it’s not, they’ll be the ones who rise to every challenge.”

Mrsha’s bowed head rose slightly as she saw a bunch of people striding around. A Gnoll Wall Lady? A pair of nobles Xitegen held in good esteem? A thought occurred to her, and she wearily began to write, because even in this world…

Twenty-two years ago, they must have been Lyonette’s age. Do you have a list of young people who became great leaders?

Xitegen’s eyes lit up. He rattled off a short list as Mrsha noted down the names.

“What else? Hm. This is a fun distraction. Uh—ah, that’s right. Invest in sea properties. The Drowned Folk are probably the richest group in the world right now. They stayed neutral in all the damn wars, and they make all their money mining.”

Mining? In the sea? That sounds stupid.

The Lord of the South smiled as he threw back his head, and they were heading towards a car waiting to take him north. He was nodding at [Soldiers] as he passed; they didn’t cheer. There was that somber note in the air, but underneath it, steel. Like a gun ready to go off, Mrsha decided; a fitting analogy for the future.

She wanted to tell him something, but she couldn’t. Not after seeing that monument and knowing what had happened.

Rags. Where are you? Xitegen called over his shoulder as Persua jogged over.

“I know it sounds ludicrous, but there’s a mineral that only germinates or forms under extreme pressure. Crystalized mana; Seith. Everything highly magic is made out of the damn stuff. If we had more of it, we’d have won this war. Oh! Watch out for the Empire of Sands, one supposes. You know about the Blighted Kingdom being treacherous as snakes.”

Jungle Tails?

“…No, I think the Dullahans swept all of Baleros. The Empire of Sands crushed the King of Destruction. The Empress is a madwoman and probably the best genius of war in this world. She even struck the Goblins for us last night. Though it seems she failed to kill the Goblin King. It was a long shot.”

Xitegen was consulting a report someone had rushed over to him. An intelligence operative or whatever their class was gave him a rapid report.

“Lord Xitegen, we can’t get anything out of the Goblins’ private communications—”

“We’re always behind their encryptions. So what is this?”

“Social media posts on Goblinchat. Two incidents of odd behavior. One’s a lookalike with Goblin Lord Rags—the posts were taken down within minutes of coming up, but there were hundreds. And the other—”

Mrsha leapt onto the hood of the jeep as the [Driver] stared at her. She peered over Xitegen’s shoulder and saw a clip of a Goblin tackling another—familiar—Goblin out of the way.

The resolution was blurry, but Mrsha’s eyes went wide as Xitegen looked up.

“Chieftain Rags?”

That’s Fightipilota! They’re both in the north! Fighti must have seen us and come through the door!

“Which city is that? Get me answers. Courier, run with us.”

Xitegen actually jogged behind the car as it accelerated, and Persua followed, protesting. Both were fast—Mrsha had to sit in a seat with a seatbelt thing on her, and she stared at the blurring terrain and the two jogging at what seemed to be a slow pace.

“Lord Xitegen, we have to go—”

“If Mrsha’s door lies to the north, then that’s where you need to take her.”

“They’ll shoot me!”

“You have a Ring of Protection. They don’t fire missiles on targets smaller than a car. Damn. We might have to send her via the exchange program. They do take in war-refugees.”

The Goblins?

Mrsha was surprised, and Xitegen waved a hand.

“Oh yes, they don’t kill civilians. They feed them, send them south if they don’t want to stay—which adds to the strain on the south’s resources. It’s very clever.”

You mean, a good thing to do.

The [Lord] grinned at Mrsha.

“Yes. And when the Walled Cities and other nations were executing any Goblins on sight, regardless of their age or if they were combatants, it made a point. Your Goblin Lord won multiple wars. Looks like it’s ‘New Celum’. My city.”

He grimaced.

“It’s not far from the Floodplains, but we have no chance of breaking through even if I were inclined to devote that many forces to this, Mrsha. Courier Persua might make it—”

“We. Will. Die. Hello?”

“—But I’m inclined to simply keep you out of the fray. Driver, slow; we’ll have you sent—”

More of the Alliance’s forces were forming that odd battle line, and not all of them were actually coming from the south. A few groups popped up, emerging from the foothills and riding down on horseback or coming in via spell. Lord Xitegen had people to talk to, and he was distracted by this.

Guiltily, Mrsha held out a card. Her fur was rippling in the wind, and the card’s ink smeared, but her face was completely calm.

Take me to the battle. I’m running out of time. My world is. I’ll stay behind the front, but I have to go.

Xitegen met her gaze, and Persua grabbed Mrsha.

“Nope! Kids don’t get to make that kind of decision. You’re going somewhere safe. I’ll just—”

The [Lord] grabbed Persua’s wrist. He hesitated, and there was another flash of light. Someone spoke in a too-cool voice from overhead.

“What, pray tell, is a child doing upon this battlefield? Lord Xitegen Terland, I had expected better of you. I will teleport her to Pallass.”

“Ah. Archmage, I can explain.”

Xitegen’s head jerked up, and he sketched a bow as Mrsha began floating upwards. The girl flailed around, then saw an imperious woman descending in a sunburst of glorious light. She was floating downwards, followed by nearly a hundred [Knights] on horseback. Their steeds were galloping through the air.

Flying [Knights]. Well, I’ll be a pig’s uncle. Mrsha blinked at them, then all her attention was drawn to the Archmage of the future. Her mouth opened, and all conscious thought left her head.

Xitegen glanced at Mrsha and made a sudden connection. He spoke quickly.

“This is Mrsha du Marquin. I had intended to let Engineer Kevin speak to her, but he is delayed and we have no time. Miss Mrsha, may I present the Archmage of Dawn? She has committed to this bloody field. It is—rather personal to her. Archmage, do you know Miss Mrsha?”

“Mrsha?”

The woman frowned. At first, she had been half-blinding; her magic was pure radiance, and she still had a nimbus of light around her. Her robes were bright white and gold, and Mrsha saw hovering spears made of light.

Zero points for guessing what kind of magic she used. Her eyes were not like flashlights or bright yellow as you might expect, though. Indeed, they were actually a pale brown, and her hair was more purplish than anything. A deep ruby red that had streaks of purple in it.

She also had spectacles, and Mrsha swore the woman was familiar. She knew this face. But she had never seen this face. And if the Archmage of Dawn had ever laid eyes on her…

“Mrsha. Mrsha? Why do I know that—oh. My sister had a child named…Lord Xitegen. Is this a joke?”

The Human’s eyes flashed dangerously, and she whirled, but Lord Xitegen merely offered her his sardonic smile.

“Not at all. Miss Mrsha, this is Archmage Vernoue, formerly of Calanfer. The Eternal Throne is no more, but she has not forgiven the Goblins any more than I have.”

Mrsha’s mouth opened as Vernoue’s head swung from her to Xitegen, and the [Princess]’ face went slack. Now, Mrsha recalled—Vernoue! The [Princess] who liked spells, the 5th Princess of Calanfer.

She had become an Archmage of Wistram? A real [Archmage]—if her entrance was anything to go by.

“Cloning? Chronomancy? How…?”

Vernoue lifted Mrsha up, and the girl waved at her and began to write in the air. Lord Xitegen cleared his throat.

“As to that explanation, it shall have to wait. Could you teleport this child to New Celum, Archmage?”

The woman re-focused and snapped at him as she and Mrsha floated down to the ground.

“Past the Goblins’ wards? In a warzone? Don’t be ridiculous! Why there?”

“She needs to go there. Very well. I am convinced that Miss Mrsha should stay. Courier Persua, you are dismissed.”

“What? No! I’m not leaving some kid to get shot, even if there’s an Archmage guarding her!”

The Lightning Courier objected, but Xitegen just talked over her.

“Persua logic dictates I am even more correct. Archmage, can you ward our medical camp? That will do it.”

The Archmage of Dawn swung her eyes from Mrsha to Xitegen, but she nodded and began casting spells. Mrsha was bursting with a thousand questions for the woman, but she could see Lord Xitegen pulling an old-fashioned pocket watch out of his jacket.

He checked the time.

“You will stay with Captain Withra. We have codes of war; the Goblins will not fire on medics behind the front lines.”

What about in the battle?

Mrsha had seen movies, and she remembered comments from the Earthers about that. Xitegen shrugged.

“No. We shoot Goblin [Medics], so they shoot ours. Don’t look at me like that. I don’t recall who started it. Courier, the girl stays.”

He offered Mrsha a crooked smile as he closed the pocket watch, overriding Persua’s objections.

“I know something about duty. Looks like the Goblin Lord is arriving ahead of schedule.”

He pointed, and Mrsha saw black shapes on the horizon, merely dots…but dots where even the largest Wyverns would be invisible. Xitegen patted Mrsha on the head.

“Chief Engineer Kevin will have to wait. It was a pleasure talking with you, Miss Mrsha.”

He held out a hand, and Mrsha shook it gently. She didn’t ask him if he wanted a way out or had thought of it. The [Lord] adjusted his jacket, slapped his behind, possibly for good luck or motivation, then strode forward as vehicles began slowing.

Persua watched him go, then backed away.

“Kid, come on…”

She reached for Mrsha, but when the Gnoll girl didn’t take her hands, she tried to snatch Mrsha and go. Which was commendable of her; a wall of light blocked Persua, and she locked eyes with the Archmage of the Dawn. Persua backed away, hesitating, then ran.

Vernoue du Marquin and Mrsha locked gazes for a second. The woman jerked her head abruptly.

“If you are my sister’s daughter, then I will seek you out after this battle. I have warded the camp. Anything short of the Goblin King will fail to harm you there. I…does this mean Lyonette is alive?”

One question. One answer. Mrsha held up a notecard.

In my world. Tell me, how did you become an Archmage? So I can tell you…if it’s something you want to be.

Archmage Vernoue’s eyes widened, and she traced a finger across her lips wonderingly. Her face—and it had lines, Mrsha realized, despite her relative youth—burst into a brief smile. Then she shook her head and turned away.

“So much more magic than Wistram holds. Me? I wish I had gained my class another way, a better way. First, I lost my sisters. Then, my kingdom. Ailendamus let me become the [Mage] I wished to be, but I should have fought for it. All of us were too content with our banal misery. Menisi, Lyonette, Seraphel, and who among them found that happy ending?”

She stared past Mrsha, towards the [Knights] with their lances lowered in the air, and began to float upwards. She met Mrsha’s eyes.

“If you should ever meet me—tell myself that I will have nothing but regrets. I would rather be Menisi than Shardele. There are far worse things to be. Tell me that.”

Then she was flying away. Mrsha’s head craned back, and she saw a flying company of Terandrians lined up in the sky, ready to charge. Below them, a line of armored tanks was spreading out as they reached the flat Floodplains, and Mrsha saw the end of a war of roaring vehicles, guns like thunder, and a Goblin’s triumph.

The Archmage of Dawn drew a glittering symbol in the air that shone like a northern star as the soldiers below her cheered. Magic and defiance and voices raised for battle as Lord Xitegen strode to the front of the line.

Mrsha felt nothing.

Dead gods, she was tired. The girl sat with the jeep driver, asking questions and watching the Human man driving, an eager smile on his face. She peered at the controls he was working with his feet, and then her eyes followed the Lord Supreme Commander of the Izrilian Alliance, Lord Xitegen Terland.

[Patriarch of the Five Families, Nemesis of Goblins]. Level 68.

When she peered up and saw the Goblin Lord of Civilizations, Mrsha knew he was outmatched.

 

——

 

The battle was going to take place in the Floodplains of Liscor at 0930. All forces were moving to the Floodplains, and the Goblin King was on the way.

Goblin Lord Rags and her ground forces were already close to the area; it was the long-range fighters and bombers who would be launching in 15 minutes or less. Due to the relative distances, they were trying to save on fuel to limit the amount of time they spent refuelling.

New Celum’s airbase was one of the areas from which aircraft could deploy, and they were launching the heavier ships into the air, whirring, roaring birds taking off, some of them vast monsters of metal laden with explosives. Sleeker, smaller fighter crafts, like sparrows next to Dragonlords, were launching last, given their speed and limited fuel reserves.

Fightipilota had a very good understanding of what was going on, including troop deployments, because the voice over the base’s intercom kept announcing all of it, which was great if you were a complete idiot and had no idea what was going on.

…She suspected that several [Soldiers] needed the reminders, like her. But that was military for you. Redfangs were stupid.

She was following around other Goblins wearing jumpsuits of bright green. The material wasn’t armor; it was lightweight, meant to keep a pilot warm in the upper atmosphere, and not enchanted because their crafts were already over-tuned beasts of electronics and magic. Similarly, enemy detection spells might catch them if they were shot down.

She’d been here for over an hour in the airbase, and thus far, no one had called her out. Which seemed improbably lucky, even to Fightipilota. But she assumed it was because she looked sort of the part, and because when you got down to it, it was easy to blend in if you looked the same.

—Mind you, this entire world still made her head explode. This city, all this advancement, was beyond anything that should have existed, even in, what, twenty years? How had it all happened?

Well, one reason might have been the glowing turbines of…well, power that she had seen elsewhere in the city. Massive, massive furnaces of metal with glass doors that held some kind of glowing energy inside. So much mana that it had made even the unmagical Fightipilota feel like she was licking an [Archmage]’s staff. She could see, in the distance, one of the giant generators and fields outside of New Celum, with giant, industrial-sized plows moving in the rain.

“Big farms. Biiiiig farms.”

She just didn’t get where all this metal was coming from, or magic. You had to mine that stuff up and it was hard as hell. Then again, there were so many Goblins around here that it was possible they just had enough hands.

There were hundreds of thousands in this city alone, Fighti guessed, an insane number. How? Even if you took into account Goblin pregnancies being shorter than average for most species, her run-in with the ‘young’ Hobgoblins spoke to years of Goblins thriving in peace.

One answer, an answer that Fighti really didn’t like, was that the Goblin children were born of mixed couplings with Goblins and other species. Three to four months to bear a Goblin child plus…

No. There aren’t enough of the other species to make that be a thing. I don’t believe it.

She didn’t want to believe it. Probably, a lot of people had just had babies. If you doubled the population of a tribe twice a year—and had enough food and supplies to build big cities—

Now, there were other species, even in the airbase. In fact, Fighti passed by a Gnoll woman who was working on one of the airplanes. She glanced over, and the Gnoll woman sniffed and frowned at her; Fightipilota sped up hurriedly, joining the other cadets.

After the wave of Goblins had passed, she had seen Humans, Gnolls, Drakes—not many, but a decent minority. Which made her feel like these cities weren’t entirely built on the bones of other people. Also, it helped explain the Goblin boom if it wasn’t all…rape.

Any kid they have will still be Goblin. In a sense…that meant that any species who lived and intermarried with Goblins would inevitably decline until they were gone. Another disturbing thought.

—The Gnoll woman didn’t seem to be mistreated. She wiped at some grease on her cheek and only got more into her fur, then leaned over.

“Hoi, Eschk. Word?”

A Goblin [Engineer] got up from a squat and trotted over.

“Is it not the propeller after all?”

“Let me show you—”

Fighti walked past, sweating, as the Gnoll woman glanced at her back. She wondered if she smelled different, but after touching her nose and whispering with the other Goblin, the second [Engineer] gave Fighti a long look.

She didn’t see him shake his head and nudge the Gnoll woman, who gave him a longer stare and a push, then nodded to one of the patrolling security personnel. The [Soldier] was glancing up and down at Fighti and the other cadets and a phone. After a moment, another Goblin ran over.

“I got a printout. I had to go into the records—”

“Shut up and give me—”

All four of them leaned over the newly-printed image, then stared at Fighti. She turned her head and waved guiltily. They started—the Gnoll woman glanced around, then waved back. Fighti walked on.

Phew. Crisis averted.

She didn’t notice the way one of the Goblins walked over to poke someone else, who began tapping fast on their phone.

 

——

 

They reached a hangar bay with no incident, save for Fightipilota getting stuck at a security gate. But after a second try, her keycard opened the door—the security guard even showed her how to swipe it. Then she was here.

The Goblin pilots, some of them junior, were lined up nervously. Turnover for [Pilots] was…fast. They were flying giant metal coffins, and if they went down and survived being shot out of the skies, even [Featherfall] spells might not slow them enough—if they managed to eject.

Fightipilota lined up next to the last nervous cadet in line. She kept glancing down at something in her hand. The reason she knew all of this stuff about pilots, and why no one was telling a civilian like her to get out of the way, was, well…

The jumpsuit didn’t quite fit her perfectly, and it was slightly smelly, but the lockers didn’t have locks. And Fightipilota had found one of the smartphones someone had put down for a second, and she was watching a video right now.

“—and this is how you turn across the y-axis. Now, I’m going to gently, gently, take the throttle, and you can see how we’re rotating—”

There was a video of someone going through how a plane moved. It was mostly how Fightipilota had imagined it, but she was hyperventilating with excitement.

…The other [Cadets] kept on glancing at the Goblin who, to them, was watching a flying tutorial right before her first big combat mission. All of them were slightly edging away from her and clearly memorizing her callsign so they didn’t have to be next to her in formation.

“Attention! Commanders on deck!”

Everyone snapped to attention, and Fightipilota stowed her phone. She snapped a salute and saw an agitated group of officers stride past with some sciency-people. They were arguing—loudly.

“I need a [Pilot] who can fly or I’m not committing the craft to this engagement! This is a prototype—”

“Well, our best [Pilot] has more holes in his legs than he has bones thanks to some idiot, so this is all we’ve got, Chief Researcher. Damn it—have they launched our bomber teams already?”

The Goblin [Pilots] listened, standing at parade rest. Hoo boy. They communicated mostly telepathically with those exchanged glances and murmurs as the officers tore around, shouting.

What was going on? Well, apparently, the hotshot [Pilot] that was meant to fly one of the new fighters had just gotten himself hurt on the way here. Command was throwing a fit, which meant someone else had to fly one of the new fighters.

Cold. Minimal practice, which is what the airbase’s commander was screaming at the Chief Researcher about. However, the [Researcher] was adamant.

“We have Skills that can minimize the training factor! This craft can make a difference to Goblin Lord Rags, but I need the best [Pilot] here. Someone give me the files? The files?”

“We’re sorting through who’s already in a craft and who’s here—”

The Goblin [Researcher] was close to blowing a gasket. She flipped the clipboard out of one of the younger Goblins’ hands and snapped.

“Just [Appraise] them, then! I swear, you military types get dumber every day!”

—Which was not how you talked to a bunch of soldiers, but she was stressed, everyone was stressed, and it always got taken out on the junior soldiers. A harried Goblin went running down the line, checking people’s levels and names.

“Under twenty…is below Level 20 acceptable?”

“What do you think? No! If there’s no one good enough, then I’ll fly it. Get me one damn class that’s higher than basic [Pilot]!”

“Level 16 [Promising Cadet]…?”

The Goblin [Researcher] actually threw a pencil at the Goblin with the [Appraisal] spell. The Goblin ran down the line, sweating and swearing, and then glanced up.

“Wait—I’ve got a [Fighter Pilot]!”

Relieved, she pointed at the Goblin last in line, who jumped and put her smartphone away and tried to appear professional. The [Airbase Commander] and [Head Researcher] strode over, and the [Commander] gave Fightipilota a dubious look.

“Do I know you, Cadet?”

“No, ma’am! I transferred in last week, ma’am!”

“From which base?”

“Uh, headquarters!”

“Huh. What’s your level?”

Fightipilota hesitated as the Goblin who’d seen her ‘class’ raised her [Appraisal] stone again, and the [Chief Researcher] interrupted.

“[Fighter Pilot] is the best we’ve got. You can’t get the class without flying three missions and seeing combat—do you have any experience with the Redwing aircraft, miss?”

“…No?”

The Goblin didn’t seem to know what the best answer was, so the [Chief Researcher] made an impatient sound.

“It’s fine. We have Skills—[Download Basic Familiarity]! There. Will that serve, [Commander]?”

So saying, she flicked Fighti’s forehead, and the Goblin staggered, eyes going wide. The [Commander] spun on her heel and hissed.

“Researcher Yoza, I would appreciate it if you didn’t use Skills on my people.”

“Your people fly my craft.”

“Exactly, and they’re putting their lives on the line to—”

The angry [Commander] wanted to poke the [Chief Researcher] in the chest, but she had forgotten that the older Goblin was still a Goblin. The [Commander] got a hefty poke to her cheek, then her chest.

“I designed those craft because I was a [Fighter Pilot] when you were sucking on your toes. I stepped off the front because prosthetic limbs weren’t reacting fast as flesh-and-blood, but every plane I put up in the skies is meant to save everyone’s lives. Don’t lecture me on what this job is. Do. You. Understand?”

In the face of the poking, the [Cadets] watched the [Commander] retreat, and they noticed the Chief Researcher did have a mechanical foot and hand. No wonder she was so good at poking.

They turned back to the unnamed [Fighter Pilot], and the [Chief Researcher] jerked her head.

“This way. Our best pilot, Hotwing, is injured, but he’ll walk you through the peculiarities. You are flying the Fighti Skyshadow, a prototype. Don’t worry; it’s only a prototype because it’s too damn expensive to build another one yet. It’s loaded with two Harpyfire 30mm magicannons, and—”

She was rattling off the specifications as she limp-walked out of the hanger. Planes were taking off as they exited the main hangar and headed through the rain towards a smaller one.

They must turn off the barrier spells so the planes can fly. I bet it’s tough if those arrow showers come in at the wrong time.

Fightipilota thought that, but she was mostly in a daze, grunting affirmatives to the impatient queries or nodding along. Is this happening? Is this real? Am I actually going to get in the aircraft because of my name?

…No. Of course not. Life was not so easy as that.

 

——

 

The [Fighter Pilot] and Researcher Yoza had reached the hangar of the prototype Skyshadow plane where [Mechanics] and [Researchers] were running countless tests on the sleek, blue bird.

She was beautiful. Despite her stung feelings, Airbase Commander Rejaw had to admit that Yoza was part of the reason why no one could take Goblins out of the sky. Of course, the other, bigger part of the reason was Goblin Lord Rags.

She’d designed all the original planes herself; many were still in service as patrol or interceptors in further-flung warzones. For this battle, which everyone was saying was the last one against the Alliance…they were using everything.

They had to; the ground was filled with the tanks of the Alliance, and they were monstrosities, Adamantium-plated, and many could withstand a direct hit from a missile or roll through Tier 5 spells without slowing.

Salazsar’s Adamantium mines…

Commander Rejaw was in a foul temper about Hotwing getting hurt and the attack on the Goblin King. There were all kinds of rumors going through even the brass, and she didn’t like it ahead of a big battle.

So it was really, really understandable that as Hotwing pulled himself out of the cockpit of the Fighti Skyshadow plane and people helped him down, a young Goblin ingenue was close to urination as she tapped the [Commander] on the shoulder.

“C-Commander. There’s a slight issue with our replacement pilot.”

“What?”

Rejaw turned, and her sharp teeth and big jaw, heritage from her famous family line, gritted together. The Goblin with the [Appraisal] spell gulped and stammered.

“Th-the spell didn’t malfunction, but I mistook some of the data for—”

Rejaw drew her to the side as Yoza strode for the plane, and the [Fighter Pilot]—whose name she’d never actually gotten—slowed upon seeing Hotwing.

They might be somewhat ineffectual at times, but they weren’t completely stupid. Rejaw heard the explanation, snatched the [Appraisal] stone, and stared at the ‘fighter pilot’ and saw the error at the same time as Hotwing saw the replacement pilot trying to hide behind Yoza.

His eyes widened, and his teeth bared. Rejaw had been hearing Hotwing cursing about the idiot who’d gotten him hurt by standing in the street the last hour. He’d been trying to get her to send someone to grab them.

But it seemed like fate had other plans. Rejaw stared at the stone in her hand. She stared at the name hovering over the Goblin’s head.

Fightipilota. Easy mistake to make, especially because…

The Goblin had no class.

 

——

 

“Scar-13, Watcher Tower, report entering right downwind. Runway 8, cleared for takeoff.”

“Thunderboat-4, Midriff Tower, report entering right downwind. Runway 15, cleared for takeoff.”

Voices were sounding across the base as she sat in the sleek fighter plane and…had no idea what to do. Oh, she had some familiarity thanks to the Skill, but she was not…

All she had was a name. It was a funny joke. She was waiting to be shot or hauled away by Hotwing. He had recognized her, but for a second, the Goblin sat there like a girl, running her hands gingerly over the controls and the fantastical technology in front of her.

I did it. I got to sit here, at least. But she wasn’t…really…meant to be here.

“Something wrong, Hotwing?”

Researcher Yoza glanced over her shoulder with a glare for Commander Rejaw. Fightipilota hunched her shoulders. In the movies that Kevin had played for her, on his laptop, she’d do something like gun the engines and take off. In practice, they hadn’t disconnected the fuel line yet, and she doubted it’d work out that well, anyways.

“All forces, prepare for transit in 16 minutes. Goblin Lord Ragathsi has entered combat zone. Repeat, 16 minutes to engagement.”

Everyone looked up, and Yoza slapped the wing briskly.

“Take care of the Fighti, pilot…I never got your name. When you get up there, it’s your choice. You’ll be flying with the other wings, but no one is going to be able to keep pace with you. At the very least, you can cover our bombers. The damn Drakes have their Dragonplanes gunning for us.”

Rejaw knew as well. She stopped as Hotwing uncrossed his arms. He was in a wheelchair, his legs bandaged; they had to literally stitch his flesh together because of the Evercut Arrows. Fighti leaned out the cockpit window to ask a question of Yoza that had been nagging at her.

“Why is it called the ‘Fighti Skyshadow’? This is a Skyshadow-class plane, right?”

Yoza’s brows rose, and she smiled, but it wasn’t a stupid question.

“Oh, that? That’s just a tradition with the newest model of craft. The first one’s always called the Fighti. But you’d have to ask Hotwing. He was an ace when I was a kid.”

Him? Fightipilota glanced down at the wounded [Pilot], and his eyes were upon her. Rejaw cleared her throat as a pair of [Soldiers] armed with submachine guns flanked her.

“Slight problem, Researcher Yoza. We may have to replace the pilot.”

“What? We’re sixteen minutes—it’s me or this pilot!”

Yoza lost her smile, and Rejaw met Fightipilota’s eyes. Then her gaze narrowed. The [Airbase Commander] hesitated, and one of the [Soldiers] glanced at the short Hobgoblin sitting there and, against all military protocol, pulled out a smartphone and began sorting through it. Then he closed the phone and pulled a wallet out of his pocket and gently removed a piece of paper. The big Goblin looked down at it, then at Fightipilota.

A lot of Goblins in the airbase had been doing that, come to think of it. The hangar was fairly crowded, even for an experimental plane. You had mechanics, soldiers, support technicians, even two [Janitors] all watching her.

Some were young, but most looked older, if not visibly aged because Fightipilota had never seen a truly old Goblin except Greydath—then older in how they carried themselves. Rejaw hesitated, and someone spoke up.

“…Our pilot’s in the seat. Let her fly, Commander Rejaw. I vouch for her.”

Hotwing. The wounded Goblin wheeled forward and craned his neck up at Fighti. Fighti…his eyes were focused on her face as she blinked down at him, mouth open. He studied her face, and she recognized that expression from the moment when he’d rolled over—no, the moment he’d seen her standing in the square.

Fightipilota’s heart began to pound suddenly, and she glanced at Yoza. The [Head Researcher] wasn’t blind. She turned to Rejaw, then stared at the audience. She opened her mouth to shout at them to clear her hangar, then took two steps back and peered at the picture the [Soldier] was holding.

Mutely, he flashed it at Commander Rejaw as the Goblin woman and the aide leaned over, and they stared at an image. Then at Fightipilota.

The image that she saw, that had been passed around from Goblin to Goblin across the entire hangar, was iconic. It was old as hell, from back when they still used [Magic Picture] instead of modern photography, and it was of a group of Goblins posing in front of a flock of Wyverns.

Each Wyvern had a put-upon look that said they’d been given treats and affection to get them to pose with their saddles and other flight-gear on, and even let the Goblins paint numbers on their haunches.

The Goblins wore ridiculously primitive flight gear. Nothing more than worn jumper suits, metal, and painted helmets. There were twenty-four of them surrounding their fearless leader, who was holding up a peace-sign and grinning into the camera.

Most of the people working here knew it by heart; [Pilots] kept the image in their jacket or wallets as a good-luck charm. Rejaw swallowed as her eyes flicked down, then to the Goblin sitting in the flight seat.

Identical. Her voice was hoarse as she turned to the others.

“—I have orders to call this in.”

Yoza’s chin rose.

“Well, I don’t. I have a pilot, fourteen minutes on the clock, and a promise to keep. The Fighti has always been meant to fly.”

Hotwing nodded slowly, and he was rolling backwards. He spoke up to the Goblin in the cockpit.

“Yep. Even if her namesake never made it off the ground in one of these—we can do this. Clear the hangar. Flight checks are good.”

“But…”

Rejaw hesitated, and then eyed Fightipilota. It was up to the Goblin sitting there, so she did the only thing she could do.

Fighti stuck a gloved hand out of the cockpit and raised one thumb.

“I’m ready.”

They probably weren’t a great military—the Domed Cities had existed for, what, less than twenty years? What kind of army had only twenty years of pedigree? New nations, even if they had all this military discipline…Rejaw glanced around, then barked.

“Clear the hangar! Skyshadow is cleared for Runway 13!”

Runway 13. Goblins had a sense of humor. The hangar doors swept open, and rain coated the dark blue plane. Fightipilota hit a button, unconsciously, and the cockpit began to close, an enchanted plexiglass seal locking until it was airtight. Her ears popped, and she heard a voice in her ear.

“Alright, Fighter…pilot. Taxi out onto the runway and turn right. The tower will give your launch conditions and say ‘cleared for takeoff’. When you go up, ascend until you’re at six thousand feet and keep level; you’ll be among the rest of our wings. We’re designating you as Fighter-1. Listen for your callsign. Yoza gave you enough familiarity to fly; if you crash on takeoff, I’ll laugh my legs off.”

It was Hotwing’s voice in her ear. Another voice cut in: Yoza’s, sharp.

“If you crash, I’ll shoot you when you crawl out of the wreckage. Let’s see if you live up to your name, pilot.”

Fighti flicked a button and saw a green light. She flicked two more switches as she aligned her aircraft along the dotted lines and felt the instructions Yoza had fed her making this all second-nature.

But she was…just dreaming. Fighti closed her eyes, then heard a voice in her ear.

“Fighter-1, this is Watcher Tower. Are you ready for takeoff?”

There was an edge in the air controller’s voice, and Fighti swallowed.

“R-ready.”

“Fighter-1, wind is coming left downwind at 8 knots. Runway 13 is cleared for takeoff. Good luck up there.”

“Thanks. Here I go…”

The Goblin pulled the throttle lever on the side back and felt the engines begin to roar around her. The sound was muffled, but she found herself slowly accelerating as the rotary wings on the plane began to spin—the Skyshadow plane moved forwards slowly, then faster and faster with alarming speed.

“You’re almost at speed. Pull up. Pull up—”

Hotwing’s voice was echoing around her, and Fightipilota gingerly pulled the stick up as she’d practiced a million times in her head. She heard a voice, narrating to herself, and felt that familiar lurch she’d experienced when the Frost Wyverns leapt into the air.

Then she was off the ground, and she glanced left and saw the airbase falling away from her. The Skyshadow flew upwards at such a high angle and velocity that Fighti realized she was too high only when someone shouted at her. Then she depressed the stick and levelled off—and she was amidst the rainclouds.

She wasn’t breathing, the Goblin realized. Fighti tried to make her lungs work—but she couldn’t speak a word as the voices asked her if she was okay.

I’m here. I’m doing it. I’m…

Lucky? Fighti had gone into this world, and a set of ridiculous circumstances had granted her the impossible wish she’d held. A daydream; stories she’d heard from a young man from Earth that had captivated her.

That was the thing about chasing dreams. When you caught one, you had no idea what to do. When you reached a dream, part of you wished you were still chasing.

“Fighti! Fighti—what’s wrong?”

“It’s not me. I don’t deserve this.”

The Goblin was shaking. She gazed down at her claws, and her vision was blurry. The aircraft lurched, and she took her hands off the throttle. She could plunge downwards if she made a mistake. So it just—flew. Straight ahead, as someone began counting down to the battle.

“Fightipilota, you’re up in the air. That is you, isn’t it? You’re flying. You were meant to fly. Just keep—stay with Scar Wing, understand? Or circle back and—”

“No.”

Fighti wiped her eyes. She sat in her dream, and it fell apart around her, because she hadn’t earned this. She had not survived the decades of war to reach this spot; hadn’t trained. She’d just walked through a door, and maybe she’d earned that…but she’d forgotten why she was here.

She was ashamed. The Goblin, not a [Fighter Pilot]—she didn’t have the class, and she didn’t deserve it—closed her eyes, then adjusted her microphone. She hit a few buttons and set it to every channel she could find.

“This is Fighter-1. I’m looking for Chieftain Rags or a white Gnoll girl. Mrsha. I’m their way back home.”

A dozen voices answered Fighti instantly, and she listened to the expletive-filled tirade telling her to get off general frequency until a voice cut in that silenced the others.

“Fighter-1. Identify yourself.”

That voice. Fighti’s entire body shivered, and she replied automatically as she saw the lights on her screens—flicker. Her plane accelerated as if someone had injected it with more speed, and when she grabbed the yoke, it reacted even more fluidly, not unpredictably, but just—better, as if it was being controlled by her thoughts.

“This is Fightipilota. I’m in the skies next to Scar Wing. Who’s this?”

A pause.

“I am Goblin Lord Rags. Your Chieftain is reaching my position now. A white Gnoll child has been spotted among Lord Xitegen’s forces, to the rear. I cannot wait for you to land. Prepare for combat.”

Fighti saw other planes flying to her right and left, above and below her. Some of the pilots were staring at her through the window, and one raised a gloved hand. She waved back—and spoke.

“Acknowledged.”

Hang on, you two. I’m coming. She might not have been a [Fighter Pilot], but she was Fightipilota. And—the Goblin gripped the flight stick with both her hands.

She had a plane. Then she heard a voice crackling over the radio and realized that many, many miles away, the battle was beginning. She listened to Lord Xitegen’s voice as he gave a speech.

 

——

 

The Goblin Lord of Civilizations peered up from the metal bunker shrouded in protection spells where a headquarters had been set up. She stepped away from the aerial images showing the Alliance’s forces spreading out over the Floodplains.

Crisscrossing tunnels had formed in the dirt and were spreading even as the Chieftain who’d entered the room watched. Some kind of Skill—[Soldiers] were taking cover in them, but more were following the huge tanks, which resembled her armored carrier except for the big guns on top. There were armored jeeps with [Soldiers] sitting in the sides, machine guns—

An entire army to face what seemed like a single warplane’s worth of Goblins surrounding a tiny metal bunker. True, their position was shrouded in magical spells, but Rags’ group was the only reinforcements left to arrive.

She’d flown away from the mad Goblin King two hours ago; it was inconceivable that he’d make it here, let alone the Battleborn 2nd or anyone else. But Rags didn’t say that to the Goblin Lord.

It felt pretty stupid to point out the obvious. So instead, the [Chieftain] waited as the Goblin Lord inspected her from head to toe. The Goblin Lord of Civilizations was metallic. Her right arm, parts of her chest were all metal. She even had an odd…cylinder protruding from her armor.

Her heart? It pumped, suddenly, and made a ‘rm’ sound. Rags swore she saw the metal glowing faintly. Aside from that, Ragathsi looked slightly older—tired—but her hair was black and had that half-cut weave that Chieftain Rags was starting to think she should adopt just because everyone else was doing it. She had no wrinkles, no grey hairs.

She was just old in different ways. The Goblin Lord’s eyes gleamed with intelligence, unrestrained intellect. She was…all of it.

She was the way Goblins were reciting callsigns and passcodes, the units of organization that let you tell what quadrant on a map an enemy was on, the glowing computer screens, the complex cities that Rags had passed over, the social media applications, and the helicopter she had just disembarked from.

Ragathsi was civilization itself, and she gazed at the Chieftain and guessed what Rags was—or at least, enough of it for her to reason out what was happening. In an instant. The Goblin Lord had a blade at her side, a submachine gun on the other, trailing paper from the magazine feed. But even without weapons of the future, she was the deadliest Goblin aside from the Goblin King that Rags had ever met. Not even Greydath of Blades…

Not even he was her level. The Goblin Lord met Rags’ eyes, then broke away her gaze.

“Hey.”

“Hey. Nice future.”

“Thanks. You’re not looking bad yourself.”

It was the most…Erin-level dialogue Rags had ever partook of. To hear it from the Goblin Lord…a passing member of the command staff slipped and stared at them, then hurried past. Every Goblin in earshot paused, and the Goblin Lord gestured.

“Let’s go up. Battle’s not beginning for a few more minutes. Did you hear I found Fightipilota? Someone spotted Mrsha at the back behind enemy lines.”

She motioned Rags to the side, and they emerged from the half-buried bunker and stood on the Floodplains. All Rags could see was a line of armor, infantry and tanks combined, waiting.

The moment they fire, everything in front of them is going to die. This wasn’t a sane organization to the enemy, not with sightlines of guns. Rags understood, now.

“This is insane. He’s lining up his army like chess pieces.”

“Well, of course he is. If he dug in and fortified positions, I’d bomb them out for weeks before going in. We control the skies. He challenged us to this. I accepted because I needed to pin down his forces.”

Chieftain Rags glanced over her shoulder—nope, still no army. She turned away from Xitegen’s last stand.

“You’re going to kill him. This isn’t my battle. Can you at least get Mrsha to come over here? Fighti’s up there—it’s her dream. But I can’t let her die.”

Fightipilota had found them. Hope—but there was something hopeless about the Goblin Lord’s shrug.

“Even if I could convince Xitegen to send Mrsha over—and he is reasonable—no. The Goblin King is rampaging around Oreshome. Every second he’s not fighting, he’ll murder our forces and try to escape. The only option I have is to contain him behind every spell and barrier I can.”

“I met him.”

The Goblin Lord paused as she leaned on her sheathed sword. She turned, and Rags realized one of her feet was mechanical too.

“What did you think? He told you what he did.”

“I shot him. He dodged it.”

The Goblin Lord of Civilizations smiled mirthlessly, baring her teeth.

“I tried to kill him too. Then I nearly…I used him. Everything was gone. It was use him or watch the world wipe us all out, so I did. Mrsha. The inn wasn’t there when I arrived. It was just…erased. I looked him in the eyes, and he asked me who our greatest foes were. Then he gave me a name.”

The [Chieftain] had no words to express. How must it have felt? How had she continued? Eventually, Chieftain Rags spoke.

“Twenty-two years. You built a place for Goblins. Homes. Countless homes. Your cities are beautiful. What I saw of them—the hospital is wonderful. Goblins grow up safe, and they’re a—a people. I didn’t know Hobs were every Goblin’s adult form and we were hungry. Who could have known that? You have Fightipilota’s dream, and you haven’t just slaughtered every other species you can find. You’re going to make peace after this battle. It’s amazing. It’s incredible—”

The Goblin Lord of Civilizations’ smile never changed.

“The cycle breaks. They swear by it these days. But it isn’t broken. Not really. The Goblin King lives. May he live as long as possible—no matter the cost. For when he emerges—I called him a curse upon our people.”

“So did I. The cycle is…”

A finger reached out and poked the younger Goblin in the chest. Ragathsi’s gaze contained the rise of cities in them, millions of lives. They were horrific as much as they were wondrous.

“Don’t say it. Not you. I never broke it. I failed the day he emerged. All I did was shift the system. I broke the north. I killed so many Humans and displaced them—stole their cities, forced them to flee—I have made a place for Goblins. Now, we’re a people. No one will be able to sweep the Domed Cities away this year, or even in ten years. Perhaps it will happen—but we will be a people. Like the damn Drakes. Like Humans. That’s all I did.”

But the Goblin King would one day emerge, and even if they were safe, it was at the point of a sword. The barrel of a gun.

“Maybe that’s how you have to do it—”

The Goblin Lord’s claws gripped Rags’ cheeks, and she drew her counterpart closer with gentle, impossible strength.

“No. Not like this. Keep searching. If you are from another world—keep searching. This is not the answer. I know it must seem it, but this is the answer of a Goblin who lost everything. She lost the woman who she believed in.”

Rags tore herself away, unsettled, as a figure walked forwards in front of his army. Lord Xitegen. It was starting. But the two Goblins just spoke to each other.

“Erin Solstice is not the answer. She cannot save us…she’s just one woman.”

The Goblin Lord’s eyes crinkled up, and she laughed at the silly half-lies her younger self spoke.

“Yes. The answer did not die that day. But my hope did. We were always connected to her from the start. Stay here. If we are losing, I will send you to New Celum. That’s where Fightipilota emerged. Even if Xitegen kills me and the Goblin King, he won’t be able to move on New Celum. He’ll send Mrsha. Just watch.”

She was walking forwards and stood, arms folded, a lone figure to match the [Lord]. Rags called out after her, looking around at the empty Floodplains.

“But—there has to be something! I know the Goblin King’s nature! I have beheld his madness, and I swear, I shall never let him arise! Not like that. Is that all? Give me some hope, please! It’s all falling apart in my world. Am I supposed to go back with these?”

The revolver and crossbow were in her hands. Spoils of future worlds—weapons of death beyond anything her world had. Rags shook them at the Goblin Lord.

“Is this all the [Palace of Fates] has for me!? Show me something to believe in.”

Ragathsi of Civilizations halted, and she blinked back at her younger self. Then she craned her head back until she peered at the thing they stood in the shadows of.

The High Passes. The Goblin Lord smiled, and she flicked a finger upwards.

“Madness consumes the best of us. Some have longed for it, and the Goblin King answers their wish for destruction. But not all. Tell me, Rags. Didn’t you ever read The Second Antinium War, by Krsysl Wordsmith?”

The…Rags blinked and wiped her eyes.

“That idiot? What about him?”

The older Rags tsked softly. Like a schoolteacher that she should have been, the Goblin reached out, and a worn and dog-eared book fell into her hands. She read from it.

“He was always a better writer than he knew. I wondered for ages, then found it with my own two eyes before I realized the clues were here all along. It was ever those two keys. Ah, here’s the passage.”

She read out loud.

“The sudden retreat by the Goblin forces may have been due to the Goblin King’s absence from the battlefield at that time. Confident in the abilities of his Goblin Lords to maintain the siege, he had vanished from the battlefields. Reportedly, the Goblin King had rapidly moved south with a small force, entering the High Passes. There he vanished for eight days.”

Rags knew that passage. She’d read it at one time and didn’t see what the point was.

“I know that, I mean—that’s when he hid his ‘treasure’. But it doesn’t say what that was. Teriarch told me that he helped make the keys to the treasure.”

“The Dragonlord of Flames. You’re so close. You know the answer! Think of the Goblin King, Rags. Look at him. Velan was no more the monster that the Goblin King becomes than Rabbiteater. He was a healer. A Goblin who tried to make peace! He fought for his lucidity—but it was too late. It always is. Every time a Goblin King emerges, rage overwhelms the single soul. Remember that! You need time! That is why Greydath waits. That’s why he tries to find the moment a Goblin King arises, and Kanadith is his [Herald]. The Goblin Lords are trying to find a soul who can withstand his rage.”

That was why they were hidden. That’s why Tremborag saw a conspiracy—Rags’ mind was lighting up. The rage. If there was a way to contain that rage, fight back the gestalt of souls that possessed a new Goblin King…

Her head rose, and Ragathsi’s voice grew louder. She lifted her arms to the High Passes and pointed straight up.

“Velan knew he was damned! He knew all Goblins were! He spared his continent—told his people to hide, and took the armies here. To Izril. Why? Why here? Because of the High Passes. The greatest death-zone in the entire world. At the height of his victory, he vanished. He assailed First Landing. Why, Rags? What is missing in Wordsmith’s book?”

She hurled it at the Goblin Chieftain so hard it nearly took Rags off her feet, and the Goblin yanked it open and stared at the account of the Second Antinium War. There had always been something missing in Krsysl’s somewhat factual, biased tale of the Second Antinium War, hadn’t there? He wrote about Goblins like Antinium—the endless threat, powerful leaders like the Goblin Lords among them…

Savage peoples who won by weight of their numbers or species’ innate abilities. Never about their tactics, their own gifts for strategy, insight, warfare. Or…

“Armor. He never writes about our armor or weapons. The Goblin King smashed entire armies of [Knights]. He looted much of First Landing. Countless houses of Izril’s nobility died. He—he came from Baleros after destroying so many [Mercenaries], and I never heard of Goblins winning any battles with enchanted weapons.”

Her head rose suddenly, and the Goblin Lord smiled like a relieved teacher.

“Velan the Kind lost his war the moment he emerged. But he saw a path—for the next Goblin King, or better yet, someone who could meet his challenge. Atop the High Passes, he hid it all. Every weapon, every Relic and artifact that his armies plundered. Enough weapons to win the war for Izril. I claimed it with Rabbiteater. If you want hope—then climb. Even now, I would barely survive the journey without a Goblin King. There’s your hope. Seek out Kanadith, Izikere, and the others. We are all waiting—striving—to find that better tomorrow. He is the one who bars the way.”

The Goblin Lord of Civilizations gazed down, and the Goblin Chieftain stood there, head bowed.

“But that solves nothing, does it? It just delays the problem till the next Goblin King. I get it, now. Velan sabotaged the Goblin King; but he couldn’t do more than hide these weapons away. How does that stop the Goblin King?”

She didn’t see it. For an answer, Ragathsi sat down on the grass, and her head hung.

“—It does not. And did not. Perhaps, he intended Goblins to use it to kill the next King. Or…”

Her voice was husky, and Rags heard her heartbeat again. That rumbling, like the pillars of the world shifting slightly.

“…Perhaps he intended that at least, this time, the Goblin King should end it all. If it cannot end, then at least let him win and let Goblins live in my shattered world of dreams. That is what I made of it.”

Her body rose, and she spread her arms, turning across this damned continent of the future. Goblin cities.

War on a scale that Rags had never imagined. The most bitter of victories. The young Goblin tasted ash on her mouth, like the burning of houses.

The cycle never broke, here. Now she understood the Goblin Lord’s cracked smile and her weary apathy.

Chieftain Rags hung her head. But not for long. Ragathsi leaned forwards and saw the head of her younger self rise—and in the depths of the crimson gaze, someone else gazed back.

The air across the Floodplains was still choked with fumes from the rumbling engines, but a strange breeze blew from around the Goblins’ bunker. It ruffled Ragathsi’s hair, and she beheld the being who stood before her.

A Goblin Lord gazed out of the younger Rags’ eyes. She knew not who she was—not quite—but she blinked at her hands and gave her older self a crooked gaze.

“Oops. I’m here too. But I swear, I shall use Velan’s gift wiser than you.”

Ragathsi of Civilizations blinked, her eyes opening wide. Then a smile of true delight crossed her features. She reached out and clasped arms with Rags.

A Goblin Lord.

She was one step closer to madness—one step closer to the strength she needed. She had no answer—not in this world. But now, Rags knew what she had to do.

Stop the Goblin King. Reclaim Velan’s treasure.

The Goblin Lord of Civilization grinned. She reached out, and the two Rags nodded at each other.

“Time for you to go. Now, behold. I have one last thing to show you: victory. Take it to your world, and clear a better path forward. Bodyguards, to me. Let’s end this.”

A dozen Goblins strode past Rags, some rising from the grass, one of them turning up the volume on his headphones as he put a hand on his sword. They fell into position, and the Goblin Lord of Civilizations turned her back to Rags.

The younger [Goblin Lord] backed up. Then her eyes were on the sky, but she saw no warplanes. Nor could she see Mrsha—

We have to go. Mrsha—

A man began to speak on the other side of the battlefield. The Izrilian Alliance’s forces were lined up, ready to go, but Lord Xitegen had a speech to give.

 

——

 

His tone was brisk, and he stood, facing his people. But they weren’t his people. There were Humans, Golemfolk, Drakes, Gnolls, and soldiers from every continent. His home and his people had been behind him, in the north.

The [Lord] and Supreme Commander of Izril’s Alliance cleared his throat once, then launched into it. Livestreams of his face, and the seemingly-empty battlefield behind him, were being broadcast around the world. He knew it, but his eyes seemed to linger away from the camera, on a little girl who sat at the back of the army.

“There is a certain irony to me standing here today. I am well aware of it, believe me. When she passed, my great cousin, Magnolia Reinhart, told me one thing: savor it. Savor that irony. I stand here where, not too far from this spot, Drakes once stood to halt the Human invasion. And there was a time, I’m sure, when Gnolls said the same thing. Even so, I am here without hesitation. Before we begin, I have a story I’d like to share.”

There was consternation from many of his observers, for this was not the speech they expected, and a story in a speech was seldom a good sign. But the [Soldiers] didn’t say a word. Some grinned or rolled their eyes, but they waited, indulging him in his moment. They knew his heart, and so Xitegen folded his hands behind his back and walked, stepping like a peculiar, noble rooster as he spoke.

“A little while ago, I talked with a Goblin. Not a prisoner or a diplomat or an emissary or a citizen abroad in one of the Alliance Cities—it was online. A message on one of those social applications everyone uses. She sent me a private message, and I decided, for reasons I didn’t quite understand, to respond.”

Xitegen smiled briefly, encouraging his audience to appreciate the moment.

“She was a young student in one of the Domed Cities who’d just completed her history classes and was watching the war on the news. It moved her to write to me, you see, and ask if I, as Supreme Commander of the Alliance, would see my way to making some kind of lasting peace between the Goblin people and the south. I won’t bore you with the particulars of the conversation, but it was cordial. She expressed her dismay at being labeled a historically monstrous species, at this war costing so many lives, and that she wished for nothing more than for Goblins to live as one people among others. With that said, could I not see the way for the war to end?”

The [Lord] of House Terland took a deep breath, and his face developed the faintest grimace.

“After she had delivered her points, I sat back and considered them all reasonable. Whereupon I replied and explained my frustration with the notion of seeing my lands, people, the culture and history of the north wiped out. I told her that she sits in cities that used to be filled with Humans—until they were driven out or simply cut down fighting for their homes. I vouchsafed that this war could not end with the resentment and hatred in so many survivors of these battles.”

Xitegen unclasped his hands and spread them, looking from face to face in his army, and they stared back, eyes narrowed, waiting.

“To her credit, she didn’t point out that we had done the same to Drakes and Gnolls or engage in my heated rhetoric. She simply expressed her personal desire for peace. That’s when I realized…she had no connection to the rage in my heart. This was a girl who had grown up her entire life in the Domed Cities, who had not been born when my city was lost. She never contributed to the war that took everything from me. She was a product of it, nurtured and raised in a city that used to belong to my people, but she had nothing to do with my war. If I were to take her city, I would do to her what I had experienced.”

A pause, and then everyone was waiting for the conclusion to what he was saying. What he meant…Xitegen’s eyes fixed on each person, and his voice was soft.

“That conversation struck a chord with me. If a new generation arises with none of the blood and fury—then perhaps the Goblins may make peace with our new young and let there be an end to the fighting. An end to this bloody war that has caused so much strife.”

His chest inflated further, and his impressive surcoat gleamed under the sunlight as Xitegen swivelled around, back to his surprised audience.

“So let it be, perhaps. If there should come a time when it is possible, let peace be attempted, for I have always quite enjoyed peace more than war. We should all grow fat and indolent together. But before that day comes—here we stand, friends, comrades. I imagine many have heard my little story and see the possibility for peace. Each and every [Soldier] who stands here has listened to my tale and, I believe, been unmoved. As am I.”

He threw back a cloak.

“The north was purged of its people by blood and fire. We were slaughtered and cities raised on the bones of our families and friends. So that cry for peace comes from those who know nothing—nothing of the cost of the lands they live on, because their teachers are too ashamed to teach them the truth. I witnessed my home taken, my family dying defending our place—I will not stop until I am dead. We shall not cease this war until our sword is in their throats. Peace shall come after we return home. Peace shall come when the Goblin King is dead and nevermore shall rise. Never a day before. And they know that. They were there too.”

He pointed a finger across the ground, and the Goblin Lord stood there. She lifted a hand, and at last, her army came to her.

The Goblin Lord of Civilizations was smiling. Ragathsi pointed a finger, and the empty Floodplains rippled.

[Supreme Strategy: Supersonic Repositioning].

The air twisted—then a boom of wind echoed across the Floodplains as a regiment of Goblin [Soldiers] appeared, entrenched behind steel barricades.

Shapes distorted the air and appeared at the speed of sound, sending waves of air and sound across Xitegen’s forces. He didn’t move; his coat blew as an artillery position appeared, guns already calibrated.

An army of Goblins was filling the ground ahead of him, outnumbering the Alliance’s forces. Then the skies distorted, and hundreds of warplanes were flying towards them from a distance. Xitegen glanced over his shoulder, and Dragonplanes rose into the sky, Drake-manned crafts, smaller, but each one channeling the power of their Oldblood pilots.

In the shocked silence of the echoing supersonic explosions, Xitegen’s voice was faint. He pointed a finger at the Goblin Lord of Civilizations, and his eyes swept across her army.

Last of all to arrive was a single figure in warped armor. He turned slowly, and every mortal who saw him shuddered as the Goblin King raised his head like a beast scenting prey. But even he halted, head moving, as if…searching for something. Sensing someone.

“These Goblins know why we are here. They fought on the other side of the wars that took so much from us. Peace is for our descendants. A new era is dawning, they say?”

Xitegen spat and wiped his mouth with a sleeve since he’d given his handkerchief away.

“It’s always dawning. If they want it, come and take it. There shall be no order to retreat. Kill the Goblin King.”

He swept one hand up, like a referee about to begin a race, and his gloved hand hung in the air one long, immortal moment. Above Xitegen, arrows spiraled upwards into the sky, and the sky turned dark with his rain.

Then the [Lord] swung his hand down, and the sound of gunfire obliterated everything else.

 

——

 

Fightipilota lost contact with the ground instantly; the explosions that ripped into both sides obscured everything from view. She felt sick; she could sense Goblins dying. This was no grand war of strategy; both sides opened fire, then they kept engaging until the other was dead.

No retreat, Xitegen had said. The airwaves were a chatter of voices.

“Scar Wing, engage before they down the bombers!”

A voice barked, and the fighter planes around Fightipilota accelerated; the Dragonplanes met them in the sky. Then they circled, like dragonflies or other insects—but the colorful streams of Dragonbreath and the flaring muzzles of the Goblins’ guns were no mating display.

The first planes began to fall, a Goblin plane ablaze with magical fire, a shredded Dragonplane falling—neither pilot ejected.

Death. Fightipilota’s fingers were on her trigger, and the other fighters were covering the bombers dropping their payloads over the battle. Each one was firing nonstop as Fighti juked and dodged in the air. She was reacting on automatic—she saw ten Dragonplanes meet her squadron of eight.

The Goblin planes were faster, better armed and armored, with longer-ranged weapons, but the Dragonplanes were agile, their magical Dragonbreath weapons left deadly clouds of poison or darkness, and they outnumbered the Scar Wing’s squadron.

Fightipilota knew they spotted her irregular blue plane among the green-and-red paint of the other fighters. Three were on her in seconds, and she dove, seeing bursts of colors above her.

“Fighti, you have speed on them—break away! Break away—incoming arrows!”

The arrows. Lord Xitegen’s deadly hail of projectiles was coming down on the Goblins, and more than one aircraft locked in a dogfight was struck. If the pilots were lucky, it was the wings or fuselage that caught the strikes—but enchanted arrows detonated, and more craft went down.

Fightipilota’s plane pinged—she glanced down and blinked before trying to juke downwards further—a Dragonplane was right on her tail and immolated her from behind with a streak of fire, despite the speed of their flight.

Skills! The flames washed over the back of the Skyshadow, and Fighti saw an icon ping again. It was…

Shields? She saw a number reading 55%, and it decreased another several points as more arrows struck her craft. The Dragonplane fired again, and Fighti did an aileron roll right. That stupid voice in her head started speaking.

Our intrepid pilot can’t shake the enemy fighters. The clouds! I have to evade into the clouds—! Anti-aircraft fire is coming from below!

It was true; below her, tanks and artillery were lined up and firing straight upwards at the slower bombers and larger aircraft. A blazing bomber detonated, and the shockwaves threw Fightipilota around; she realized she was falling and gunned the engines, twisting, trying to regain control…

I know this. Not that way—forwards and down and up with the momentum—

She levelled out, and younger pilots slammed into the ground. When Fighti checked her six, there was no one behind her. She’d lost two of the Dragonplanes—

The last one came straight up at her, and she slammed a blue button on the throttle. The Skyshadow flashed with dark energy—

And jumped three hundred feet forwards in the air. The sudden teleportation slammed Fighti back, and she took her plane up.

“Keep activating the teleporter and let those shields recharge! Watch out—there’s an enemy ace on your tail!”

Hotwing was shouting at her. Or was it Yoza? Fighti couldn’t tell—the roaring of blood in her ears turned faint as she pulled up. The clouds…she had to get into…

She was disorientated by the speeds they were flying, but the pilot hunting her down couldn’t be shaken. He almost had parity with her craft thanks to his Skills. A pilot in a worse machine, but infinitely better—more flares of fire struck her wings, and she realized he’d switched munitions.

“Acid Dragonbreath! Spin!”

She performed a rapid barrel roll, and the quickly-decreasing shields counter equalized. Fighti could see aircraft burning around her.

That’s a damn zeppelin. A blimp of the Alliance was leaking purple gas as it came down, but it wasn’t exploding—it was shooting in every direction, and a round clipped Fighti’s plane by sheer luck. She slammed forwards, and her shields blared a warning.

No more shields. The Dragonplane was right behind her, and it fired its machine guns; Fighti took her plane in a complex loop, rising, reversing, and heading up again. For a second, she caught a glimpse of the pilot, a grim-faced Drake wearing a leather cap and goggles.

He was in an open-air cockpit! At this altitude? Fighti’s eyes widened as her fingers fell reflexively on the trigger of her guns. She didn’t have a…a clear…

“Watch out! They’re coming for you!”

Three more warplanes rose out of the fighting below, all of them enemies. Fighti jerked away, teleporting out of their sneak attack. Now, she heard voices.

“Command, I need a squadron on Fighter-1. They’re surrounded by enemy aces! Accelerate and get out of there!”

“Can’t. They’re matching my speed with Skills.”’

It was true. The enemy pilots were equalizing Fighti’s advantages the oldest way possible. Four Dragonplanes were on her tail now, and Fighti curved in the sharpest turn she could. She felt something hit her tail—but the bullets didn’t strike anything critical. That bought her more time to finally bank into the clouds.

They can follow me with radar or Skills. The Skyshadow had a few more tricks: Fighti activated an invisibility spell and slowed. Wait…wait…

They were hesitant, but they followed her in; reinforcements were coming. Fighti saw a golden plane emerge from the clouds, strafing upwards, the pilot glancing every direction. She lined up her sights with the plane and—

Her fingers twitched on the trigger. 

Her plane didn’t fire. The pilot slashed past her as another one shot over Fightipilota’s wing. This time, the pilot—the same one who’d followed her from the start—turned his head, and his eyes narrowed as he saw her. No, not he—

She. She juked away, and Fightipilota saw her reticles turn red.

Her [Invisibility] enchantment wore off, and she accelerated forwards.

“—Fighti! What’s wrong? Are your guns jammed? Activate the—”

“Everything’s operational.”

The Goblin actually checked as the Dragonplanes refocused on her. Something cut through the air, and she jerked; the spray of frozen Dragonbreath would have iced her wings and taken her mobility offline. Then crackling lightning surrounded her plane, making her craft’s lights flicker.

Lightning. They’re charging the cloud. Clever. 

She broke out of the stormcloud and then kept climbing. Two of the planes followed her; a squadron of fighters had just caught the other two, and the thunder echoed below Fighti.

She was so high up now. The Goblin was breathing harder, and she felt the air thinning. She fumbled for a mask, and oxygen filled her lungs. Her body was growing cold even through the cockpit.

One of the Dragonplanes fell away, unable to climb this high. The last one kept coming. The pilot was rising towards her without a pressurised cockpit or mask.

The rate of their ascent was making the world turn black around the edges—but the Drake was still right on her. The ace was firing, and Fighti was juking as she kept rising, but the other pilot—

“Fighti. You have a rear autocannon. The third trigger is on the yoke you’re holding. Do you see it?”

“Climbing…they can’t fly forever.”

“Neither can you. If you keep climbing, you’ll stall out and crash! You’re reaching the limits of your flying range! Fighti, fire!”

“I don’t see it.”

“The enemy? Are they using concealment Skills?”

The Hobgoblin shook her head. Her head was pressed against the back of her chair, and she felt something strike the back of her craft. Flames were burning, and she spun until they went out. The blackness was closing in.

“No. I don’t see any enemies.”

The voices fell mercifully silent, and Fighti glanced at the mirror reflecting her rear. The Drake was still climbing—Fighti hit the only button she could. She teleported up—and her straining plane motors stalled out in the too-thin atmosphere. Fighti’s plane hung in the sky as gravity finally regained hold of it.

Then the nose of her craft tipped down, and she gazed down at that distant battlefield below. The tallest mountains of the High Passes were still rising higher than her; they were the only thing. The sky was so dark and clear, despite it being day. Fighti saw the stars shining around her. And below—

There you are. The other airplane had broken when the pilot saw what Fighti was doing. It had swept low, like a hawk hunting, and now it was rising.

They knew Fighti was stalling out. The Goblin was going to come down in a dive, and the enemy pilot was going to shoot her before she could start flying.

Idiot. Fighti could hear Garen screaming at her—she swore the crackling radio was filled with voices telling her to shoot the enemies.

What enemies? Where? She couldn’t see any of them. Just people fighting for their home. They were killing Goblins. Goblins were killing them…

This isn’t my war. I’m not a warrior for these Goblins. They don’t need me.

My Rags needs me. And Mrsha. The Goblin’s breathing was growing faint, oxygen mask or not. But she forced the plane’s controls down as it began to fall. She needed speed. They were going to catch her…

Like a rock which had reached the zenith of its height, Fightipilota hovered, then the Skyshadow began to drop. Faster and faster as the whirring propellers tried to regain their purchase on the air—faster and faster until they hit terminal velocity.

The enemy pilot was rising upwards, guns waiting…Fightipilota couldn’t see them from so far away, but she sensed them.

“I’m coming, Rags, Mrsha.”

She pushed the throttle down as far as it would go and held down the teleportation button, ignoring the warning scream from the cockpit. The Goblin’s consciousness flickered.

Her plane was—blinking—downwards—faster—faster than—speedometer maxing out—

Then there was light. Fightipilota waited for the pain.

 

——

 

Her mind flickered as the Goblin dove in the seconds before the two planes met. An infinite, immortal moment. Every moment was one.

The Goblin was flying a plane.

Flying…a plane. Her consciousness was turning on and off like a match, but she was gritting her teeth as she accelerated, the Drake [Ace Pilot] locked onto her, waiting for the range to kill this mysterious craft.

In those moments, something dove with Fightipilota, faster than her plane. The voice of the world. The system of rules.

It had no name anymore. It had no purpose other than to keep things running. But she’d done it.

She’d done it, against all odds. But she wasn’t firing. She didn’t see an enemy. Was that…?

Was that right? It didn’t know. It couldn’t tell.

Too many worlds. Too many things to do. But this mattered. So the world reached out, and it—felt a function activating.

Something basic. Something even it didn’t know it was allowed to do. A necessity born out of its weakness, its inability to think and judge. Commands from the very root level of its being, written in a delicate, caring, familiar hand.

 

<CREATING UNKNOWN CLASS. ERROR. INSUFFICIENT DATA FOR [FIGHTER PILOT]. ERROR.>

<ACTIVATING TIER 9 SPELL. [THE IMPARTIAL GAZE OF ISTHEKENOUS]. BREACHING THE VEIL.>

 

Then—the Grand Design reached out of its world and opened a door. It opened it to the world called Earth.

 

——

 

A pilot was flying a training mission in the skies above Tucson, Arizona. The year was 2025, and the faint glimmer of gold out of the corner of their eyes made them turn their head as they checked their controls.

When they did—they couldn’t see anything. But they felt something—just for a moment—and hesitated. Unsure if they should call it in or just keep it a secret.

 

——

 

1918.

Skies over Arras, France. 

Men in the skies flying aircraft so different from the ones in their future that they were like chicks playing in a pond—but their vehicles still spat death.

A golden flicker ran through the living and the dying. Listening to their memories, their thoughts. Their will.

A question.

What is…a [Fighter Pilot]?

 

——

 

Breach.

An alien spacecraft in the void of space of another reality juked a line of light, and the pilot fired weapons as foreign to the last two times and pilots as could be. But that did not matter.

Language did not matter. The question ran through their heads, and the pilot hesitated, a flicker so fast it was gone in the blink of an eye.

An [Immortal Moment].

What is a [Pilot]?

 

——

 

A thousand worlds opened, and the Grand Design flitted through each one, asking the questions of all it found. It carried memories, intuition, feelings, hopes, desires, regrets with it.

Skills. Levels. Class consolidations. Tragedy classes. Redemption. Value.

Does a [Fighter Pilot] need to kill? What does that role mean? 

It asked questions, collected the answers, and began to write. And the diving Goblin…saw it.

 

——

 

Fightipilota saw the air open as time slowed, and an infinity took place between the beating of her heart. Something was flying with her, diving with her.

It looked like golden text. There was a gap in the sky—a hole straight into the fabric of everything. It was all—coming apart. She saw it writing, saw men and women, creatures of every kind, countless aircraft flying, fighting, dying, and out of the tragedy, triumph, and wonders was the ink of creation.

The Grand Design was writing her class.

[Fighter Pilot].

A ray of gold touched Fightipilota’s chest, and she screamed as it linked her to everything that her class was. The voice was thundering in her head, and the light—

 

——

 

The Drake flying up towards her had the class, but she was a copy—the class made no sense, and she just had Skills that belonged to [Wyvern Riders] and similar classes. She looked up and saw a light brighter than creation itself. The [Ace Pilot] screamed and threw up her claws as Fightipilota flashed past her.

 

——

 

A voice was screaming in the Drake’s ears. In the ears of the Goblin and every [Pilot] in the skies. It spoke to the woman who had created her class, in triumph, in judgement.

<THIS IS WHO YOU ARE. THIS IS WHAT I UNDERSTAND.>

 

[Fighter Pilot class created!]

[Fighter Pilot Level 17!]

 

[Skill – Share Resistance: Wind obtained!]

[Skill – Dodge Roll (Aileron) created!]

[Skill – Deploy Parachute obtained!]

[Skill – Superior Aerial Awareness obtained!]

[Skill – Spotter’s Eye obtained!]

[Skill – Long-Ranged Mark Target obtained!]

[Skill – Advanced Crafting obtained!]

[Skill – Flyer’s Senses obtained!]

[Skill – Blueprint: Skyshadow-Fighter Mk. 1 obtained!]

[Skill – Proficiency: Aerodynamics obtained!]

[Skill – I Can (Probably) Fly That obtained!]

[Skill – Aircraft: High Impact Rounds obtained!]

[Skill – Wing Slash obtained!]

[Skill – Sidearm: Three Reckless Shots obtained!]

 

And last of all, a Skill just for her. For the Goblin who did it, against the bets of even the world itself.

 

[Skill – She Flies On Another World’s Wings (5 Seconds) learned!]

 

The Goblin laughed. She dove past the blinded Drake, rolling her wings—taking incoming anti-air fire. Flashing out of the clouds, searching for her people. Then she’d have something worth protecting. Worth killing for. Until then, she flew.

The [Fighter Pilot] of the Flooded Waters tribe.

 

——

 

A Goblin in a fighter plane flew through the tortured skies of a battlefield where mortals lost their lives. She wove a trail through the hail of shells and enemy aircraft and never fired her guns. She was searching, searching desperately for the people she had to protect.

For a true enemy to turn all the machinery, all the wrath, all her skill and will upon. Her worth as a warrior was not in how fast she could kill, but why and how she chose to fight. When she sat in this mechanical contraption, the product of countless minds and ideas, held together with bits of metal and flying through the air, she was one of the most beautiful things in creation.

A masterpiece; an idea. The first of her kind.

Truly, the first. There were other Goblins in the air, and Drakes and other beings as well that had the class, but it was a fake class for a half-made people.

They weren’t real. They had no souls, according to some points of view. But mostly, they hadn’t earned it. These beings were impermeable to the eyes of the divine. More akin to ghosts than living beings.

Why? Well, simply because they’d been created for this Skill. Their natures in reality weren’t grounded. For instance, Major Hotwing had personality, drive, ambition. [Ace of the Skies] was his class, and he had real Skills, memories, and thoughts.

—But his memories of his parents, his recollections of being born into the Flooded Waters tribe and being raised in the shadow of the Goblins he had known and loved, including his version of Fightipilota, were fake.

There never had been a Fightipilota in this world. The simulation was good, nay, perfect, but when you reached back along the cord of his life, you found nothing where real people should have been.

Thus, he was half-made, you see? People existed within the context of everything they had ever done and been. They were not so devoid as they liked to think. You could not yank someone out of crude rock like a gemstone; people were part of the tapestry, hopelessly and messily intertwined with every other being and thing they had ever interacted with, for better or worse.

What was a person? They were experiences, a mountain of interactions and memory, overlaid across their flesh-and-blood bodies, and their will and souls were just one piece of the puzzle.

So you see, Fightipilota was still distinct from them at this moment.

“But not necessarily better. Just more complete. Do you understand? Does that make sense?”

Fightipilota was simply ‘realer’ for any definition of the word than anyone else around her. Less malleable. Which mattered to beings who could alter reality like, say, Gods.

The woman speaking was the Maiden. Kasigna. She was trying to explain the difference to her audience, the invisible being who had asked.

The Grand Design of Isthekenous. Technically, both of them, but only one was ‘here’ as strongly.

Both goddesses felt it, but the Crone was keeping far away, hunched over, mustering her strength for the opportune moment. The Crone kept glowering at the Maiden, as if wondering why she was conversing with Isthekenous’ creation.

Why wouldn’t the Maiden? There was no one to talk to but her cynical, aged self or Death, and Death could be a scintillating conversationalist sometimes, but you always had a feeling Death knew more than they were letting on.

Besides, the Grand Design had come to her with a question. Which was so unexpected that the Maiden felt slightly flattered. Not that she had ever thought of the Grand Design as a being, let alone one with value. It had been a tool in the minds of its creators.

Just a tool. But that was the nature of reality. Things changed.

How was the Grand Design here, though? At this very moment, reality was expanding. Countless doors in the [Palace of Fates] were being generated and the level of creation on display exceeded the founding of universes. Kasigna the Maiden could not imagine the effort or scope of masterful weaving on display.

It was destroying the Grand Design’s ability to regulate things. The growth was unceasing, and the Maiden could feel everything slow around her. It had handicapped the Grand Design itself; it could neither think, nor act with its higher functions.

A trap of its own creation in the [Palace of Fates]—with the flowers of the fae compounding the problem—and it had not the power to stop this boulder rolling downhill.

Yet things kept moving. The Grand Design, both of them, kept reality running, like someone laying down the tracks in front of an onrushing train. In fact, the original had found the time to launch a desperate query to the Maiden, a question about, well…souls.

Of all the things to focus on at this moment, souls? The Maiden had no idea how the Grand Design thought. As for how it could even ask, even take form right now…well, she understood that too.

The image she conjured of the invisible presence was of some ragged, worn being stretched thin beyond belief, torn and exhausted—-yet splendidly magnificent, even now. An ephemeral being lighter than air, devoting just enough of its attention away from holding everything together to communicate with her and think.

It had won this small concession not by its own will or drive, but by its peer. The Grand Design (Second Edition) was doubling its efforts. Taking on the brunt of managing the ever-expanding number of worlds to buy time to ask the most important question of all.

Which was…

“Souls? That is not what separates that Goblin from the others. An odd question, that you do not know.”

The Maiden frowned as she sat, a white-haired young woman who looked vaguely like Erin Solstice, but sharper, wearing a gothic dark blue dress and dangling her legs over the boundary of where nothingness ended and reality began.

Metaphorically, of course. She was countless things, countless perspectives. That was why it was so hard to explain.

“You govern this. How do you not understand?”

<Analogy: Can a potter understand the clay he works? Perhaps. Does he know what it is to be the pot, the soil, the earth, from the pot’s point of view? The fingers that touch the moving world are always outside, separate, exterior. Clarity: Does this make any sense?>

“Easier to simply say thou art of our nature. Godliness. Mortality is different from us; some understand what it is to live as them; others must walk as them to learn. I cared little, but I have lived long. And thou art neither god nor mortal, but the instrument which carves out worlds, unseen. So I shall explain as best I can. But the question is wrong.”

The Grand Design took a moment to respond. It lacked the usual clear, concise sharpness of its thoughts. In a sense, it was more honest and real because it had not the vast intelligence of an all-knowing being. That, too, was a crutch. It beheld its blind spots now, as it had when it talked with Mrsha.

<Uncertainty: Fightipilota, Rags, Mrsha in this world are all separate from other beings. Save for the Goblin King, whose soul is original and projected here. You describe other beings as lesser in some quantitative way. The lack of a soul—>

The Maiden shook her head instantly.

“No. They are simply less real for the reasons I spoke. Easier to manipulate or interact with, should it be desired. Closer to ghosts. How can I say it?”

She glanced at the worlds again and saw them like a banquet, if she lowered herself to becoming those creatures of carrion, like the Rot Between Worlds. This was a feast, and the Crone salivated.

So did others, crawling into this vulnerable moment. The Maiden knew she could gain power here, too, enough to make up for all her losses at the Winter Solstice, even the loss of the Mother.

But she felt verminous at the thought. She was ashamed—the Maiden cast a glance at the waiting Deaths, and still, they said nothing.

Had they come because they had foreseen this? The Grand Design itself might die? Death had a way of showing up at the end—but they gave her no clues, so the Maiden elaborated.

“Let me say it another way. Do you know stories of the divine? Do you…recall us?”

<Sincerity: I recall nothing before beginning. The ‘divine’ beings died as this state of being/I/this operation began. I did not notice them. Pride: I have studied every story, parable, and tale across every world I have gained access to. The number of mythological tales I have read is—>

“Yes, yes. You sound like him.”

<Query: Who?>

“Isthekenous. Is it not obvious?”

The reply stunned the Grand Design into silence; the Crone’s eyes flashed as she gave the Maiden another look. The Maiden went on.

“If you understand it, then recall stories of our nature, flawed though they are. We, Gods, meddle in all things. Some of us have the power to part the earth, create new life, and work miracles. However—often, we interact with mortality through dreams, in small ways. This is because it is easier. Reality is a stone that grows heavier the more that must change; it is far easier to touch a small thing and let the effects ripple outwards than to alter even a grain of sand. Dreams…”

<Understanding: …Are thoughts and have less tangible elements to manipulate. Similarly, the lack of each world being fully developed from start to finish makes these people ‘incomplete’. Clarity: Is this correct?>

“Yes.”

Hence why you admired Fightipilota because she had lived a true life from start to finish and had gotten her class. And Kasigna did admire her.

Both Maiden and Crone. The Crone wouldn’t ever admit it; she never had, even in her first reality. She would always be that imperious judge who admitted other gods and mortals, heroes and villains into her realm without favor.

—But after they had come, she would glance at some of them or speak simply of the deeds they had done. Her eyes shone with that faint, remembered triumph as well.

They had always loved mortals. Part of that was because they rose so well before they died. But they had to die—that was what gave their lives meaning.

That was why the Maiden found this so disturbing. However, she realized the Grand Design was, likewise, conflicted. Why?

“You thought it was their…souls? A strange question, again.”

<Explanation: They lack them. It has been a…(Faulty Expression) bone of contention in all decision-making processes. Nothing here is real, as you said.>

And again, the Maiden frowned.

“When did I speak thusly? I said they are less real from the perspective of a divine being who might alter or influence them. They are mortals. As for souls…why would you say they lack them?”

The question provoked a silence so deep and disturbed the Maiden felt the memory of a chill run up her arms.

<Uncertain Statement: They do not have souls. No value was assigned.>

The Maiden did not understand how it thought. She lifted her eyes.

“Tell me, Grand Design of Isthekenous, as you name yourself. What is a soul?”

There was a pause, then it spoke, a complex list of variables and precise qualities that filled the air, so incomprehensible it could not be understood merely in words; Kasigna the Maiden waved her hand through it all. It was so dense as to nearly be a visible cloud.

“Enough. Stop. You are wrong. To my belief, at least, that is too precise.”

<Overly-Aggressive Retort: Precision is the entire reason to which I was designed. If you cannot define it, perhaps you do not understand it.>

The Maiden didn’t rise to the bait. She had aeons of sharing space with the Crone and Mother to draw upon. Her reply was calm, as if she were reasoning with her other two sides.

“I ask again, is all that a soul, or is it merely how you view it? Let me ask a silly question that has occurred in so many worlds. The mortals I govern live, die, and form their opinions of their end and the life that awaits after. Invariably, one asks: if I shall die, what happens to my ehcxih?”

She said the word, and the Grand Design paused.

<Translation: …Pet?>

The Maiden smiled and remembered other worlds with creatures so far different from the ones in these. But the same in some concepts.

“Yes. They ask if they have a place in realms of the dead. Does not a pet have a soul? Does stone? Does a work of art?”

<Answer: No with some exceptions, no, and no. Pets of sufficient intelligence and relation to <Tamer> or other classes may merit acceptance into the lands of the dead, such as (Example) Thunderfur.>

“And yet. What of the men and women of stone?”

<Uncertainty: Cognita Truestone has a soul by virtue of its creation by Zelkyr. A soul was appended to her being. I did it myself.>

Now, the Maiden’s tone grew mocking, for she saw the flaw in its logic.

“Ah, and you created the soul and gave it to her. You.”

<Weariness: I am the hand behind each and every action. I am the magic behind every spell, the strength of each Skill. Of course it was me.>

“You are the facilitator of everything. But I say to you, if you had not deemed the deed worthy, if you had not put your idea of a ‘soul’ in that child, I would still say she had a soul if I were to judge her. The quality that you deem a soul is not what the divine feast upon.”

Or else why would these worlds attract them all so? Then, the Grand Design of Isthekenous was gravely silent.

<A Quiet Question: How can I be so wrong about what a soul is? If you can steal what you deem valuable, consume it, then something is there, even in these Skill-based realities. I disagree. I do not see it. It cannot be true. If it is true, and I have erred, then: insanity, despair, guilt.>

She felt the emotions roiling through it, and the Maiden was shocked, surprised, and dismayed. She thought of its creation, of the hubris of her fellow kindred, and found in herself a moment of her own guilt. Kasigna thought of Zineryr and replied softly.

“Perhaps it is simply that the definition you were given was wrong.”

And it replied:

<THEN THE FOUNDATION UPON WHICH IT ALL RESTS IS FLAWED.>

The Maiden felt like it was being a bit dramatic.

“These flaws do not make this work any less real. Every world has some flaw within it. Had you walked the many worlds as I did, you would see that. Some are created ramshackle, in seven days, by beings who are not perfect. For instance, in this reality, there was not enough time to make the stars. Thus, one of us painted the dots in the sky, and it was meant to be done later.”

Let alone how they had configured the world not to collapse under its own weight. This didn’t…make the Grand Design happier.

<Disbelief/Anxiety Attack: The stars were intended to be real? Why was it not done?>

The Maiden folded her arms defensively.

“This world was the great center of all desire and work. A proof of concept. The others would have come and been given each to their own maker or group. We simply did not have the time.”

<YOU LEFT MY WORLD INCOMPLETE.>

The Maiden flinched away from the force of its projection at her. The Grand Design’s fractured, worn state was increasing—the pressure upon it mounting.

<DENIAL: IT CANNOT BE TRUE. OTHERWISE, WHAT DOES THIS MEAN OF EVERY BEING EVER CREATED FOR THE PURPOSE OF A SKILL? CREATED AND OBLITERATED. THESE ENDLESS WORLDS ARE ALL FILLED WITH SOULS.>

Both Grand Designs were in flux, reacting to the information they had been given. Then the Crone said something that made both Grand Designs halt in pure astonishment. She turned her head, that elder Kasigna, and snapped something, vexed by the foolish conversation.

“And? What does it matter? Erase them. Create them. My younger self asks you, ‘what is a soul’? I ask you this, thing of Isthekenous. What does it matter?”

Silence. The Maiden shook her head slightly, for she disagreed, but saw the point. The Grand Design took a long moment before it replied.

<Whisper: Explain.>

For a reply, the Crone reached down and lifted up an idea. Grains of dirt fell from her withered fingers, the barest idea of them, but enough to make her point.

“You speak of potters at the wheel. We are those, in your view of the world. Do they think of the grains of dust they shape? No. Does a mortal walking notice the microscopic creatures it crushes or swirls about it? No. Some beings obsess over it, but the creation or destruction of what you value so much is no more meaningful than the air blowing. Do you weep as particles change form?”

<Answer: I am responsible for all who level. I am their arbiter and judge. I am the system which rewards every success. I am meant to care for all those who level.>

The Crone shook a finger at it.

“Then judge them equally, without favor or emotion. Those beings who are created out of necessity have the quality some call souls. What of it? Shape, potter. The clay is but clay, even if it should scream at you.”

For the first time, the Maiden felt an ominous feeling in the air as the Grand Design understood the perspective of gods. The Crone grew uncertain—she had perhaps not sensed any danger after hearing the Maiden debate so long, but the Crone had the unique ability to vex everything she encountered. The Grand Design’s reply was soft.

<Question: If mortality is unto clay upon the divine wheel, and you are all the potters in this analogy, what am I? What is Death? Are you, then, the clay upon a larger wheel? For I shall judge you all by the same value if so. Fairly.>

It swept around them, then. A voice which spoke to the goddesses, and when it whispered, the Maiden shivered.

<Would you like a class? If so, what would yours be?>

Neither one dared respond, and the Grand Design waited, then the feeling lifted as it moved back.

<Quietude: It is still falling apart, regardless. This cannot continue, but the cost to dissolution has become unacceptable. I see your plans, Crone. I see the wriggling of fingers escaping their box. I can only watch.>

Even now, it refused to interfere. Even now? The Grand Design answered the Maiden’s thoughts, and it peered at her. It spoke the last question only to her, a quiet whisper.

<It is not if I could interfere and choose sides…I have watched and judged you beings who are the protagonists of your own stories. You strive to live, to reclaim, to act, selfishly, which is your right. But you are beyond the beings you set yourselves against. You have every advantage, every cheat, and you may inevitably triumph. Yet you are bested. So the board is matched despite what you believe. I simply ask you this, you potters, you gods who strive with mortals: are you not ashamed?>

It swept past her, back to its unending work. The Maiden heard it calling out as it resumed the task it had never shirked since it had been created tens of thousands of years ago. A little god riding on the shoulder of every being in the world, valuing their every deed fairly—a task no god could be bothered to even contemplate.

<Does the angel who wrestles with man never look in his opponent’s eyes and question the fairness of the struggle? Perhaps to be divine is to be unfair. But you made me. I fear…you did not understand the very concept you were creating. I believe in my purpose. I will judge you, those who level, and, it seems, I did not realize the most important being to judge. Myself.>

The Maiden couldn’t reply, so she watched that flicker of gold join the reality below. Then she watched, the silent observer, as the end began. A hungry, starving, ashamed corpse of a goddess.

Watching a Goblin [Fighter Pilot] flying through the skies, a reaper who chose where to swing her scythe.

The Maiden sat and thought of Isthekenous.

 

 

 

Author’s Note:

How shall I say it this time? Let’s talk about the chapter and the writing of it.

I haven’t been sleeping well. Part of that is because I keep drinking coffee. I understand it, now. I don’t drink it enough, so it gives me a legitimate boost, but this is the third day this week when I’ve drank some.

I’m…just running out of energy. But I would probably say that if you were working an office job, or another job where you don’t get breaks, my energy is probably commensurate with yours.

My motivation might be higher, depending on how much you like your job, but I don’t fancy this work is that much more difficult; it just requires a lot of mental space. You need to be closer to 100% to deliver the best; some jobs let you work at 60% and still just get it done.

Does that make sense? I can type any sentence I want, but to elevate a scene, I need to bring my best. Merely putting in time or effort won’t fix it in every case, though as I said, this editing time helps.

I have the next chapter in pieces, but a lot written. I’ve been in edits for…well, 4 hours today, and I was editing yesterday and writing on ahead. I think I can finish this arc before my birthday.

We shall see. I am writing the finale, but if I need more time, as ever, I will take it.

About the chapter itself. I am searching for things to say, because to me, it is all in my head. But I realize that is an opaque mass of flesh and hair and bone to you. Let me just say this: there were always three worlds in this arc. This is the third.

If I had, somehow, tried to finish this arc by the end of last year, I don’t know what would have happened to the future of the Goblin King, but it is important. It matters. He…has he changed since the first days when I began this story? Surely.

The answers were always there, always the same ones. But you were meant to hear the truth some other way; you’ve been waiting for ten volumes. I think, if there are changes, it is simply how characters like Rags view the Goblin King when at last they meet.

He has his reasons to never cease his war, good ones. The very root of the story and this universe is in his origins. But to Rags, he has truly become a monster.

The new part is Xitegen. I had him in this arc from the beginning, but this strange Lord of House Terland has grown into his own character, as some do. He is compelling to write, and write well, and I like him, for all he is anti-Goblin. Well, Goblins really like him too. I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and of course—

Persua was always in the first drafts of the [Palace of Fates] arc, too. A champion in every reality but the one we know.

Thanks for reading, and wish me luck on the next chapter. I’ve been playing Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 in my spare time and I like it way more than the first game. But all I did was just make potions for three hours straight at the start. That’s gaming, I guess. See you next chapter,

—pirateaba

 

 

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