【】

After the unpleasantness with the new captives, Scratch and Mac went down to the deepest part of the cave to attend to the livestock.

At the last moment, Mac asked Haruto, the eldest of the new litter, to join them and carry the candle.

The group had become more proficient at candle making, it was a skill brought over by Barbara, the most important human member of their fellowship. Using animal fat and some string they were able to create stumpy light sources that could last for hours.

The confines of a cave made a smokey hearth ill advised, and in the deepest recesses of the cave, even goblins couldn't see much more than outlines. So light was procured using loads upon loads of candles, the dining room was lined with a thick residue of used-up candles. A failed earthenware cup was used to carry around a candle in less visited places, such as the bird pen.

Haruto held the candle cupped in his hand as he followed his elders down the hallway, past the rooms and depleted mining pockets.

When his light lit up the writing on the wall, he tried to read it out loud, as he had learned from his mother. "Scre-am was-"

"Scream was here." Mac said. "He fought for us, even if we weren't brothers."

"Hmpf." Scratch grunted. "He was lucky to have our shelter."

The cave was not very long, and they reached the end shortly.

At the far end stood the wyrm shard, embedded in the wall. A creaking noise emanated from the object.

"I-is it supposed to make that noise?" Mac asked nervously.

"Not really, but it has all day." Scratch said nonchalantly. "If he has some problem with us, he can tell me tonight." He then turned his attention to the birds in the bird pen. "There you, go, didn't starve without us, did you?" He mumbled as he threw a handful of seeds and crumbs into the simple pen.

The multi-headed geese quickly crowded the stuff, pushing away the cockatrices that had limited orientation with their blinders on.

Mac climbed over the enclosure and approached the feral creatures himself, his hand cupped with the feed.

"I still don't understand how you do that." Scratch said, watching the heads patiently wait their turn to eat out of the goblin's hand.

"You have to be sensitive to how they feel." Mac whispered while stroking one of the geese's neck.

"These things don't feel anything but hatred." Scratch authoritatively stated as one of the creatures menacingly flapped its wings at Haruto, who was trying to follow his older brother's example.

-

As it stood, Mac was the only one capable of being in the pen with the monsters without being attacked.

He gave special attention to the cockatrices, who couldn't see very well, when he discovered some unnatural materials lining their nest.

"What's this? It has writing on it."

"Give it to me." Scratch held out his hand from the outside of the pen. "Ah, fuck, it's more of those cards."

"Cards? What cards?" Haruto wanted to know.

"These creepy hidden camera cards." Scratch spread out the world memories as a fan. "They appear after you die."

Mac had handed them six cards, most of them showing human adventurers.

"Here. Try to read them." He told Haruto. "Since you're so good at it."

"Uhm, 'Albin, Dark S-' uh. 'Sor-'"

"It looks like it says sorcerer." Mac whispered, looking over both their shoulders.

The card showed an ominous looking person, their face completely covered.

"It's the magic guy we killed." Scratch explained. "We used his tongue for the salve, and his face for the fake bounty. The others are his comrades."

"'Briar, Rogue', 'Alexander, Vanguard', 'Desmond, Bard.'" Haruto read the names of the cards one by one.

"I guess those are their professions, what are these others?"

"So, this one says... 'snare of an Evil God'" Haruto sounded out the words.

On the card stood a chaotic image of the different humans fighting each other and the birds, while being surrounded by black mists.

"And one of ours." Scratch held up the last card. It said "cunning goblin". The figure was shown setting a pit trap.

"His name isn't there, is that Scream?" Haruto asked.

"No, that's Dumb." Mac answered, shakily.

"A lot of us have died over the weeks, huh?" Scratch reminisced.

"Bwuuh-" Mac formed a whine in the back of his throat, and the tears welled up in his eyes.

"You stop that." Scratch lightly slapped the side of his head. "Don't you get how self-centered that sort of thing is? We all miss them, don't try to get our comfort over something like this."

Mac strained his face to suck his tears back in. "Okay."

"Good." Scratch gave him a comforting hug around the shoulders with one arm. "Let's go back and do our little performance."

"Hold up, there's more of you now."

Scratch stood on top of the tower as his siblings carried their stolen and make-shift music instruments onto the structure.

He was looking over the slums of refugees to see close to thirty wild goblins loitering about in the loincloths. The setting sun stretching their shadows.

"Uhhm, so... it's.... they fled the pig too." Haruki timidly brought up.

"Pig? The orc. So you thought, 'let them walk in, no need to tell the boss'?"

"It only happened just now... so..."

Scratch waited for Haruki to finish his sentence, but he straightened his back to show he had nothing else to say.

"Get these chumps documented you ditz." Scratch wagged his finger at him. "Who's their leader? What do they want? How long will they stay? That sort of thing."

-

Eventually, the preparations were made for the planned concert, and Scratch took the time to explain what was going on to the guests. The lute was already in his hand.

"Everyone!" He yelled out. "We have a few customs here. Every morning we exercise and meditate, and every so often we make music together in the evening. I believe it strengthens the sense of community, and it's just fun to do. So we'll be starting soon, you can clap along, try not to distract the musicians, okay?" There was no answer. "Good. Second, show us what you've got."

Second started drumming the beat on the drum, made of horse skin over a hollow tree trunk. It was a song Scratch had taught them, but for the youngest it was the first time participating themselves.

Mac started singing, but the rest followed sometime after, when Scratch started strumming his snare instrument.

I've got my ticket for the long way 'round

Two bottle whiskey for the way

And I sure would like some sweet company

And I'm leaving tomorrow. What'd you say?

When I'm gone, when I'm gone

You're gonna miss me when I'm gone

You're gonna miss me by my hair

You're gonna miss me everywhere, oh-

Most of the guests were at least a little perplexed by the performance. They had hardly ever come across music in their short lifespans.

But something inherent to the mind made them sway with the melody and several started to softly sing along.

After seeing my friends get captured and dragged into the cave, I sneak around the forest to find an unguarded spot to enter the camp.

The goblins have a guard mind the entrance of the cave at all times, and a lookout on the podium on the other side of the camp. I find a place near the side of the cliff where I can climb over the wooden barrier without being noticed, but invading the structure built into the side of the cliff is impossible.

I'd be seen, wouldn't I?

I click my tongue. I need a distraction. If a group of adventurers were to attack the front of the goblin camp, that'd be way too convenient!

I sit in my hiding spot for hours, waiting for the sun to go down all the way, so I can sneak in while it's dark.

I wonder if Angelica is still waiting for me.

She has to be, right?

During all this time, the orc doesn't come out of the cave once.

-

I wake up from the sound of music coming from the front of the camp.

"A bard?" I crane my head but can't really see what's going on. It sounds like a bunch of kids singing along.

The words seem faintly familiar to me, it goes like "when I'm gone, when I'm gooone", I think I've heard it before.

I then notice that no goblin is standing in front of the door anymore.

In the future, the cave entrance will be a wide hall shaped like shark's mouth, but now it is covered up by a brick wall, apparently.

I have to take a few deep breaths to gather my courage. I don't know what I will encounter if I break into that cave, but Xandra is there, and I need to save her.

Well, if you don't enter the tiger's lair, you can't steal its cubs, or something like that. I make a run for the door.

-

The door is a flimsy wooden plank. There's no lock that needs to be picked, and I throw it wide open.

The inside is totally different from the blood god's dungeon in the game! The space is much smaller, and made out of wood with furs on the ground.

The place is empty, except for a goblin and a captured woman wearing rags.

I'm confused over where I am, I only notice the goblin laying on the fur in front of me after he's noticed me. He jumps up to scream but the woman behind him grabs him from behind and strangles him, the words get stuck in his throat.

She looks at me expectingly as she holds down the monster.

【I-I'm Rudy.】I say eventually.【I'm here to save you.】

【Brittany.】She says.【How many of you are there?】

【My friends got captured, did you see them come through here?】

Brittany sighs as she lets go of the goblin, it's fainted.【Scratch didn't want them. He said he had enough 'bitches' and let the river goblins have them.】

Eeeh!? River goblins? Is that some kind of special type?【What are you saying?】

Brittany walks past me to peek out the door.【This place belongs to a goblin named Scratch. Recently goblins from the river have come nest nearby.】

【What about the orc?】

She looks at me in confusion.【There's no orcs here. Please help me escape here, I've been locked in a room for days.】

【I have to save Xandra.】

【Look." She points at a podium at the other side of the camp.【The cave goblins and the river goblins are having a celebration. That's where the river goblins live, and where they're keeping your friends, if they haven't already killed them.】

I nod. All the goblins in the same place, around the prisoners. That's no mission for a rogue.

Is it time for me to give up on Xandra and the others?

【Help me cut my rope.】 Brittany asks.

I use my dagger to cut the thin twine that binds her feet together. It's a short rope, just long enough for her to make little steps, but not to run with.

【We can come back later.】She states.【I also want to save Barbara. She's been my friend, and I-】

A loud sound comes from somewhere behind us, shaking the entire building with a noise like a tree falling down.

【What was that!?】

【It came from the mines.】

【There's mines?】

Brittany storms out.【We have to flee now, before Scratch and the others come to-】

Countless glittering eyes stare in our direction as the goblins approach the cave.

【-investigate.】

【Run!】I shout.

And we run, sideways, away from the goblins and away from the cave.

"Sorry big guy, I can't fall asleep after everything that happened." Scratch stood over Cyclophan's wyrm shard.

The previous evening it had fallen through the wall of the cave into an underlying cavern.

It hadn't been too long a drop, and the floor below could be reached by any goblin lowering himself from the hole and letting himself fall. The cave itself was relatively wide, compared to the narrow tunnel that led to it, it was a roughly come shaped pocket of air in the earth, although more uneven, and the tunnel breached it right at on side.

An underground river was briefly exposed to air within the deeper cave, the side its flow crossed through the corner of the space, creating a little waterside with a strong pull at the far side.

-

"We don't have any of your blue grass, and I can't sleep for you to give me a creepy nightmare, so I can't discuss this development with you." Scratch sat down and dangled his little legs over the side of the hole. He had had to climb past the sleeping birds to get there, even though he knew Cyclophan could perceive anything that happened in his cave. At least, could until now.

The wyrm shard started to creak. The sound came from the object turning almost imperceptably slow, and grinding against the stone.

"What is it buddy? Little Timmy fell down the well?"

The thing creaked again.

"Let's do it like this. One creak for yes, two for no. Is that acceptable?"

The thing creaked.

"Iiis that... unacceptable?"

The thing creaked twice. Taking away any uncertainty over the first creak possibly being a coincidence.

"Good, now then. Yes-or-no questions.... Are you damaged?"

Two creaks.

"Is your shard?"

Two creaks.

"Was this whole fiasco intentional?"

One creak.

"What the hell man you scared us! You're just digging a deeper cave."

Again, Cyclophan dutifully made the vessel creak once.

"Well, we captured the runaways, if you care to hear about it. The intruder was a boy, just like one of the other ones, so we don't have much use for him. Do you? I mean alive."

Two creaks.

"We could kill him. But frankly, he's just a kid. I mean, not that I have anything against killing kids. Sometimes you've gotta whack a tod, no skin off my back. But if we don't have to..."

Cyclophan was silent.

"I think this hole makes a nice bookend to your little dungeon here. We can keep the livestock there to fuel your magic, and away from our home."

Two creaks.

"Well I'm not capturing anything stronger."

One creak.

"I'm not! And we're not keeping the strays either, they need to spread out over the region. We can't sustain a dense population of goblins." He was referring to the refugees.

Cyclophan creaked a single time once again.

"We're already turning into a pilgrimage destination. Some warlord is causing trouble in the forest and they're all telling each other to come here, that's what Haruto got from the new ones. You think I can placate that many alpha males, and prevent them from banding together and just take over the place?"

Two creaks.

Scratch stood up. "Good. I like this way of communicating, I think we should make this new standard."

The shard made a loud and violent crackling noise at the suggestion.

He put his hand to his ear. "I counted one. I'm glad you agree. Well, so long, I'll decide what to do with the prisoners in a bit."

It was early in the morning when the court was opened.

"Order! Order!" Scratch pounded on the table in front of him, using a hammer usually used for smithing.

During the current charade, he did not allow anybody to refer to it as anything other than a gavel.

He was perched on the side of the tower, so he could look down on the people displayed below him.

The recently captured housebreaker, and the attackers of the previous day were bound and kneeling on a patch of dead grass, the older woman had her stomach healed by Cyclophan's creepy salve and was fully conscious, though a bit anemic.

Second and Fyro stood on either side of the captives, on stacks of planks, elevating them above most others but not as high as Scratch's platform.

All around them stood the rest of the tribe and many of the refugees, they had been called over specifically to witness this.

-

"The court is in session." Scratch did not stop banging his gavel while talking. "I have announced before that within these borders, only I get to decide anyone's fate. So I figured we might as well make it official, it's called jurisprudence, and it's what civilized people do."

He pointed the blunt object at the young boy that had been captured.

"You. What's your name?"

With an unsure expression, the boy looked around him, to see his fellow prisoners. He exchanged a sad look with the girl his age, and then turned to the judge. "My name is Rudy, and I'm-"

"Rudy. Do you understand the accusations levelled against you?"

The boy was dumbstruck.

"What is this charade!?" The older male human called out. "We won't be subject to your-"

Scratch nodded to Kicker and Biter, who were standing behind the shackled prisoners. One pulled back his hair, and the other slit his throat. The man slumped to the floor.

"You are held in contempt of court." Scratch commented casually.

When the other humans were about to scream he banged his gavel once again. "And so will any of you if you don't respect this procedure." He turned to Rudy again. "You are accused of killing goblins and stealing our property. To determine your culpability, that's a real word don't give me that look, you will be judged by trial. I now give word to the prosecution, my brother, Second."

Second cleared his throat, straightened his back, and looked at the words he'd written on a piece of bark. Scratch had given him instructions on his function, but the exact case was determined by himself. "Scratch-"

"You will refer to me as 'your honor'"

"Err, your honor... Rudy has been captured fleeing our home, after having cut the shakles of Brittany, our captured woman, because he wanted to steal her away from us. We demand... that he is sent away with... all his stuff taken."

"No." Scratch stated. "You demand that he is killed. You're the prosecution, you're supposed to go for the worst you can manage."

"But you said that I could decide what-"

"Order!" he banged his gavel again. "I give the word to the defense, Fyro, you have the floor."

"Thank you." Fyro didn't have any piece of bark or paper in front of him, he just started talking. "Guilty! Guilty! Guilty! Off with their heads! They should be-"

"Enough, enough!" Scratch banged the gavel for the so-manieth time that day. The crowd had erupted in a murmur. "Everybody quiet! You!" He pointed at Loud, the now disfugured goblin that was quite possibly the only one not making a sound. "Be silent or I shall hold you in contempt of court." Loud's lower lip started to tremble.

Scratch sighed. "Fyro, Second, switch roles."

"Huh?"

"Switch around, Second, you're defense, Fyro, you're prosecution."

The two goblins stepped down from their platforms and walked to the other of the two identical objects.

-

"Prosecution." Scratch demanded. "Call your first witness."

"Right.... uhhh." Fyro let his finger glide of the mass of people present. "Mom." He decided.

"Who?"

"Uh, Barbara."

Barbara was brought forward to testify.

"Go on then." Scratch demanded. "Ask her a question."

"Mom. Where's Brittany now?"

"She's been put back in the cell."

"Why?"

"Because she tried to escape when rudy released her."

Fyro looked at Scratch and raised his shoulders, with a 'that's it right?' expression. "No more questions?"

-

Scratch banged the gavel. "Defense, your turn."

Second looked at the words written down and then threw them over his shoulder. "Barbara, where was Brittany, when she was captured again?"

"I mean, why are you asking me this? I wasn't even there-"

"Please answer the question."

She sighed. "I don't know, somewhere near the perimeter, I guess."

"Aha! And isn't Brittany allowed to walk around the premises freely, since a few days ago?"

"That's right."

"Even so far as near the perimeter?"

"That's true."

"Now then!" Second turned to the public, and then to Scratch. "Brittany has never escaped. What Rudy has done was merely... breaking something, the shackles around her feet, but he never did take away anything that belonged to us, 'cause she never left, so..."

"Very interesting." Scratch said. "The court will take this into consideration. Prosecution, I believe you have a piece of evidence?"

"We do?" Fyro perked up.

"You do. The.. the thing. Come on now."

-

"Ah!" Fyro comprehended the situation when Haruki handed him the man-made pouch. "I call the owner of this bag as a witness."

"He can't." Somebody said. "He's been held in contempt."

"Oh, uh, another adventurer."

"You're allowed to call upon the defendant." Scratch advised.

"Right. Rudy, is this your bag?"

Rudy looked at Scratch with a fearful look.

"You may speak now."

"Uh, no, it's not my bag."

"Who's bag is it?"

"It belongs to Dave. It... belonged to him I guess."

"Well there's goblin ears inside!" Fyro dumped the contents of the item on the ground.

The crowd began to angrily scream and sneer, prompting Scratch to pound his gavel again and threaten more contempt.

"It's... we kill goblins. That's just..." Rudy looked for the right words, "the common sense of this world!"

It was dead silent.

"What did you say?" Second asked him.

"Stenographer!" Scratch demanded.

"Yes!" Linus uprighted himself, after having been following Scratch's unreasonable demand of writing down everything that was said on a piece of slate. "Order order, contempt contempt..." He read through his record to the relevant part. "Its we kill goblins thats just the common sense of this world."

"There you go, Second." Scratch said. "Do you need that repeated to you again?"

"No... it's fine." Second stepped back and lowered himself to the ground. "No more defense."

"Okay, good. Then we can go straight to the sentencing." Scratch commented. "I'm getting sort of tired of this charade anyway. Fyro, how many ears in that bag?"

"Eight, I think."

"Okay. That's four dead goblins, combined with the attack here that's six. I hereby sentence you each to a fine of six goblin lives, to be repaid in any way you see fit."

"H-how would we-" Rudy dared to ask.

"Well, for the woman it's straightforward." Scratch mused. "Anyway, court adjourned! Back to your lives everybody."

Gubok was furious. The humans that smelled of soap were supposed to be weaker, but these ones were stronger than he had ever encountered.

His goblins were being slaughtered, he himself had to flee. His future as champion of bloodshed was shattered.

It was that woman, the one with the shiny shield. Her strength was great than his, an orc's. He had clashed with her, and was thrown back, Ragar's shield was shattered.

Now he was hiding behind a warped tree, licking his wounds.

"You." He pointed at a remaining goblin servant, one of two dozen in his entourage. "Get me something to eat." The others had to protect him, he didn't have the strength to defend himself, he was bleeding out.

"Food." The creature said, it was damn near dead of malnourishment itself. "Yeah food, Manshuu give me strength, I can't get up." He groaned.

"Food!" The goblin bit into his open wound. "Argh! You slime!" Normally he would kill a goblin when they became bold, but he couldn't raise his arms from the pain.

The others followed suit and climbed all over him to rip out his flesh with their teeth while he was still alive.

Gubok never could reflect on his actions, his last moments were in too much pain to think about anything else.

heroes

Special people that stand out above the common folk are called heroes.

Throughout history various people from different castes all over the four realm have appeared possessing "cheat-like" competence, meaning an amount of ability so overwhelming, it gives the sensation of cheating at a game to win more easily.

Although most heroes become legendary adventurers, not all legendary adventurers were heroes. The world itself acknowledges the special status of a hero, the world memory showing a glittering border once it appears.

Because of their special qualities all heroes, without exception, leave a significant mark on the world over the course of their lives. Many of the tastier foods we enjoy today were invented by heroes, heroes have driven all technological advancements we know of, and every demon king has required the selfless valor of a hero.

It is the duty of the adventurers' guild to recognize heroes, so they can be called upon in times of great crisis. Acolytes to Vreem, the god of knowledge, can call upon his power to determine the heroic status of an individual. This is called the destiny ritual, done with any adventurer that accomplishes great deeds.