Day 3 (Part 1)

Day 3

In a cave, dimly lit by fluorescent crystals, 12 childlike figures can be seen sleeping peacefully. In contrast, another childlike figure, sleeping in the center of the cave, is tossing and turning violently in his sleep before he suddenly sits up gasping for air.

"... *Exhale* Wha-What happened?" he asks himself after taking a moment to calm down. "I feel- I feel like I'm forgetting something important, I mean I'm even crying and yet I can't remember why." he said while wiping tears from his face/eyes.

(Rai P.O.V)(P.O.V Switch)

"Fuck *Sniffle* this is a bad way to start the day." I said, wiping my tears. "But at least I can sit up and move around now." I said before starting to stand, "Urgggh, God it feels like I haven't moved in years." I groaned while stretching. Looking down I notice that there's a loin cloth made from some animal fur tied around my waist.

"Since when has this been here, and who put it on me?" I question before proceeding to look for the exit, which happened to be behind me.

"I should go somewhere else before I wake someone up." I mutter as I begin to carefully move between sleeping goblins on the way towards the exit, but before I made it 2 steps forward an annoyed voice sounded out from my left "Too late for that."

Startled, I look to the source and see a goblin, with their back against the wall and arms crossed, looking back at me, with an annoyed look.

"I'm sorry, I had trouble sleeping. I didn't mean to disturb you." I said in apology.

"Don't worry about it, I wasn't really asleep anyway." he replied, "Besides we're all gonna have to get up soon, at least that's what Elder Chie said when I saw her earlier."

'Then why'd he say something like I woke him up, and who's Elder Chie?' "You mean the old goblin among the ones to feed yesterday?" I said with a bit of confusion

"Yep."

"Why's she called Elder Chie?"

"I don't know, that's just what she told me to call her." he said, a bit annoyed.

"How long 'til she comes to get us?"

"I Don't Know."

"What does she want from us?"

"I. Don't. Know."

"Wher-"

"I DON'T KNOW! Stop asking me so many questions, I was born the same day you were. Why would I know?" he shouted, fed up with all my questions.

Embarrassed, I apologize "My bad, you just seemed to know a lot."

"Not anymore than you do. Not after telling you everything I learned from my brief conversation with Elder Chie" he grumbled

"Well do you-" I start before being interrupted, for the second time, by the brightening of the fluorescent crystals in the ceiling and the entrance of the old goblin, Elder Chie.

When she saw me and 'Fuck, I don't know his name.' I think while looking at the goblin I've been talking to.

As if sensing my predicament Elder Chie smiled and greeted us "Good morning GobuRai, GobuEdo. It's good to see you two up and ready for the day."

""Morning Elder Chie."" Edo and I greet simultaneously. Ignoring Edo's following glare I ask her what's been bugging me.

"Uh, Elder Chie," I say, grabbing her attention, "What exactly are you gonna have us do?"

Her smile gets a little wider before she replies with "Give me a moment to wake the others and then I'll tell all of you together what the plan is for today and answer your questions about what's going on."

"How lo-" Edo starts to ask a question, but stops when Elder Chie snaps her fingers and water balls, about the same size as a baseball, appear above the sleeping faces of our litter mates. Then before we can say or ask anything, they drop as Elder Chie has a big, somewhat scary, smile on her face.

When the water splashed onto the others, without fail, all of them woke up. There were a variety of different responses ranging from: shocked gasp to drowning gurgles, and even angry shouts.

Seeing how she woke up the others I look over to Edo, and see a similar shocked, but relieved expression on his face, that's no doubt on my face too.

After giving everyone a moment to gather themselves, Elder Chie lets out a small cough before speaking. "*cough* I'm glad you're all awake, and I hope you all slept well, but we need to get the day started with, so everyone get up, dry off, and follow me for some breakfast." She finished before walking out the cave's entrance.

After her departure we all stood still in a moment of stunned silence before one of my litter mates, I don't know the name of yet, rushed out the cave following Elder Chie. That one goblin broke the rest of us out of our shock and we all left after them.

leaving the nursery cave I found myself in a short corridor that Elder Chie and the first goblin that followed was waiting at the end of. Once we all gathered at the end of the hallway Elder Chie gave us a last warning "Stay close to me, I don't want us to delay anymore, by having to go look for one of you, because you got lost." Seeing everyone nod in acknowledgement she moved a fur pelt that blocked the hallways exit and led us into a massive cavern.

'This place is HUGE!' I thought in awe.

This cavern has to be at least 8 times bigger than the nursery cave I just came from. There's also quite a few goblins in this mega cave; If I had to guess, there are around 30 goblins doing various tasks, such as sparring, standing around and talking, or just moving between other caves. A few were even odd looking, well odd looking when compared to the rest of us. They weren't only taller, but every single one had hair. A couple of odd goblins even had skin colors other than green, which I didn't know was possible.

Unfortunately before I could continue looking around Edo called out to me.

"Rai, come on."

"Oops, my bad Edo." I apologize while scratching the back of head

"Yeah, whatever. Just get in line behind me." he grumbled

"Line...?" I question, but I then notice that my littermates are lined up and being ushered into a nearby cave by Elder Chie.

"Yep it seems like wherever she's taking us wasn't far."

"Apparently not." I comment while lining up behind GobuEdo at the end of the line.

After waiting in silence for a moment, I was the last one to enter before Elder Chie let down the pelt behind me. Inside this new cave my littermates are sitting at what seems to be a crude desk. On top of the desk are bowls of mashed up bugs and a side of bread. Standing at the other end of the cave there is a female goblin with black hair, wearing a leather tube top and shorts. While I was busy looking around Elder Chie had made her way to stand next to the female goblin and begin to speak.

"Alright, by now I'm sure all of you have noticed the food on top of the desk, you can go ahead and start eating. When you finish GobuAiko, here, will teach you all some general information that you'll need to know, so that you can be productive members of tribe." Elder Chie informed before gesturing to the goblin in leather now identified as GobuAiko. Unfortunately most of my littermates stopped listening after Elder Chie said they could eat. Only four of us listened the entire time: me, Edo, and what seemed to be two female goblins. Or at least they seem to be female since they had brown and blonde hair, respectively, and are wearing clothes like GobuAiko except made from fur.

Not bothering to think too much into it, I decided to dig in and start eating. Taking my first bite, I can't help but praise how delicious it is. 'Oh my God, this is amazing. I'm not sure it's the bugs they use or if they add anything to it, either way I can't get enough of it.' A few minutes later we've all finished eating and are looking up towards Elder Chie and GobuAiko.

"Well it looks like all of you are ready and eager to learn, so I'm going to leave everything to GobuAkio and I'll see you all later." Elder Chie said before walking along the side of the cave and through the pelts covering the entrance. Seeing Elder Chie leave GobuAiko decided to speak up to gain our attention. "Alright now that the Elder is gone we can begin. So as She said earlier my name, for now, is GobuAiko and I was born 2 litters ago."

Immediately after GobuAiko finished her introduction, quite a few of us had questions .

"What do you mean for now?"

" Why is she called Elder Chie?"

"What's up with those large goblins we saw on the way here?"

Etc. etc.

Overwhelmed GobuAiko motion for us to call down. "Now, now, I know you have a lot of questions, but I assure you as long as you let me speak I'll answer all of them on time." Hearing what she said all of the questions stopped and all eyes were on her. Noticing the stares GobuAiko took a deep breath and began to speak. "*Exhale* As you all should know on an instinctual level, we are members from a race of monsters called goblins. And the unfortunate truth of the matter is... the truth of the matter is we are the weakest intelligent species in the world, but that is only when we're on our own.

That is only the situation when we fight one on one with another creature because just about anything kills us when we fight it on our own. That's why we, as a species, fight others with the power of numbers. In any given goblin tribe there's at least 20 goblins and in the bigger ones hundreds.

There are also other benefits to us being so weak and that's the fact that we reproduce and grow the fastest out of any other race, unless you include insects. An average goblin takes 7 days in gestation and 4 days to be fully grown ready for battle. So you only need 11 days to have a battle-ready goblin."

At the beginning of GobuAiko's speech most of us had lowered our heads in shame and anger, but by the end we had beaming smiles and faces full of pride. Besides this was only the intro to everything she has to say.

"We are also the most virile race, being able to impregnate a member of Any other race; some might take more effort than others, but at that point it's a question 'When will they be fertilized?' not 'If they'll be fertilized?'

I'm pretty sure someone asked about the taller goblins outside and my comment about my name, right? Well, those goblins are in fact no longer goblins, or not normal ones. They've {Ranked Up} into a higher species known as Hobgoblins. {Ranking Up} is a natural thing that just about any monster can do as long as they reach the requirements. The natural {Rank Up} for us goblins is of course Hobgoblins; while some get blessings causing different skin colors and other varying traits, all Hobgoblins have goblin ancestry. On the topic of {Ranking Up}, in our tribe whenever someone {Ranks Up} they are given a new name, signifying a new chapter in their life.

You should have seen 5-6 of them out there. In fact they aren't the only Hobgoblins we have in the tribe, there's another half a dozen currently leading hunting teams to gather food. Now just because we have more than 10 Hobgoblins, don't underestimate how difficult it is to {Rank Up}. Most goblins tribes have 1 or even no Hobgoblins if they're unlucky. Actually the average goblin is lucky to live for a year and the only reason we haven't gone extinct is because of our great virility.

Due to our short life expectancy we tend to be quite barbaric, our tribe was the same as -maybe even worse than- our sister tribes. That was until Elder Chie came along. Rumor is that she was just like any other goblin until a month or two after she was fully grown, that's when she started preaching about us being able to do things differently and all types of other things to improve the tribe. Alas the leader of the tribe at the time didn't want to hear anything about it, he was a firm believer that females should only be used to breed and as back up rations if necessary.

Fortunately a majority of the horde at the time was females and they were very receptive to Elder Chie's idea. So in the dark of the night they worked to kill the upper echelon of the tribe, the Hobgoblin leader, and usurped power. Most of the males at the time were slaughtered except the rare, open-minded few who believed in Elder Chie's cause.

Ever since then our tribe has thrived! Since Elder Chie and a few others from her generation have taken charge they've implemented many revolutionary ideas, like hunting in groups, the division of tasks based on abilities, and this, what I'm doing right now, is something she calls teaching. What you will learn today will help you understand a lot more things than if we left you to figure it out on your own. Later you'll even be able to go to the different departments, to learn what they do and how to do it, so that you can figure out what you want to do to contribute to the tribe. Because as Elder Chie says 'Those that don't work, don't eat.'!

As of now we have 4 departments that you can choose from: The Hunters, The Butchers, The Crafters, and The Breeders. The Hunters are the ones that go out hunting for food, so that everyone can eat. They also bring back materials for the tribe to use. The Butchers break down the prey and materials, The Hunters bring back, into usable components for the Crafters.

The Crafters have the most diverse set of tasks. The Crafters not only cook the meat processed by the Butchers, they also tan the fur and leather from the animals, they then sew the leather and fur into clothes. In addition they make the things we use on a regular basis, such as the bowl you ate from and the desk you're currently sitting in. And finally The Breeders, they are a group of goblins and Hobgoblins that focus solely on breeding with each other and the foreigners The Hunters occasionally bring back.

Now if you ever want to go out with a hunting team or pay a visit to the breeding caves, you are more than welcome to do so, but not just anybody can go help The Butchers and Crafters. Especially The Crafters because those two handle important materials and tasks that can affect the whole tribe. Such as cooking, if you undercook the food or mix certain foods together you can end up making the whole tribe ill...."

GobuAiko then spent the next 2 hours, or at least I think it was 2, explaining about our immediate surroundings. In summary, we live in a huge forest that we call "The Five Elemental Forest". The forest is ruled by 4 Beast Kings, each that excel in control over the elements of Fire, Earth, Air, And Water, and a group Dryads, collectively referred to as the Rulers of Nature.

The center is the turf of The Rulers of Nature. North of the center is ruled by The Air Emperor, who is a large unknown species of bison. To the East is the territory of The Earth King. He's a land based species of dragon. The South is controlled by the Sea Matriarch, who's a special breed of sea serpent. Finally the West is ruled by the Dusk Sovereign. He's a particularly violent species of bear.

Apparently we live in the Earth King's territory, alongside a few more monster tribes. Nearby there's no other monster tribe, but a few dozen mile to the south is a tribe of Lizardmen, to the west is a few groups of Minotaur and Ogres, north there's some large tribes of Kobolds and Orcs, and Finally to the east is the home of The Earth King. No one goes there unless they have a death wish.

"... Alright, that should be everything I was supposed to teach you, does anyone have questions?" GobuAiko asked after finishing her lecture. A few hands shot up, showing that some goblins had questions. GobuAiko pointed at a female goblin with blonde, short hair " Ah, yeah you."

"What department are you a part of, and what do you, specifically, do?" After the blonde asked her question most of us were waiting for the answer, but one particularly skinny goblin didn't seem to like her question. "What type of dumbass question is that!?"

GobuAiko, not liking his response, shouted "HEY!!! Watch it... wait, what's your name?"

"I am GobuKo!" the bigger goblin said, while hitting his chest.

"Well GobuKo, do you have a better question?"

"Of Course. You said later we'll go to the different departments later, right? Well my question is, do we have to go to all of them if we already know which one we want join?" GobuKo asked with a look of pride on his face.

His face only got more smug when he heard the first part of GobuAiko's response. "Hmm, not a bad question, especially because I'm sure others have the same one. Doesn't change the fact that you're dumb for cutting off, what's your name sweet heart?"

"GobuUra."

"What a sweetheart," GobuAiko said before looking back at GobuKyo,"now, GobuKo, you're a part of the same tribe as GobuUra correct?"

"Yeah." He responded almost pouting

"And she could very well be in charge of making the food you'll eat, or even watch your back when you go out to hunt, right?" GobuAiko said in a leading tone, obviously trying to get him to reach some conclusion on his own. GobuKo for all he's worth wasn't getting it though. "I guess so, so what?"

'She could kill him if she really wanted too.' I thought, seeing where our temporary teacher was going.

Massaging her temples GobuAiko decided to tell him what she's trying to say "Oh God, She could kill you if she wanted too. Whether she poisons your food, kills you while you're out hunting, or even just causes a certain course of events that ultimately leads to your death."

"She wouldn't dare!!" GobuKo shouted

"And why not?!" GobuAiko yelled in response

"We-well, isn't there some rule against it?" He asked with a bit of desperation

"Foolish" mumbled GobuEdo

" I don't know if you've forgotten or you're just that stupid, but we are first and foremost Monsters! Even though we're more civilized than other goblins, Might Makes Right. As long as she can manage to do so, nobody is gonna care about your death, except maybe Elder Chie. Even if she does, she won't do anything about it." GobuAiko responded before sighing. " And that goes for all of you. There's little sense of family among us, the only reason we work together is to survive, and the only reason we're not as bad as other goblins is because of Elder Chie. Never forget the fact that Elder Chie and the Council took charge by killing not only the previous leading class, but all males who didn't want to conform to their new way of life."

GobuAiko let us sit in silence for a couple moments

"That's all for class. You all have a hour of free time before you'll meet me again outside this cave, and then we'll tour the departments."