47. The Goblins (After-Battle) 2

"Can you guarantee they made it to the nest?"

Her brother's voice brought her back from the dark memories that would never leave her.

"Hmmm...gruuf, there are more.. chances."

"Aaahhhh, and how much food and... 'emergency ration' do we still have?"

"For us, enough, for the nest, not."

The first goblin responded. Almost 300 warriors would have come for this invasion, of which less than half of those who actually participated and even fewer returned, which is why there were so many casualties along the way from the lands darkened by the black mist, which humans called Corruption, infested with sneaky and dangerous monsters. As for the price they had to pay to open a hole in the dome of light of humans in the green lands.

A technique that the "Master" had shown to his parent, a quick way to enter protected human lands, obviously at the cost of lives and which living beings are most available?

"Right, I sent some of the first attackers to flee as soon as things started to get casualty in the ranks and that they should look for food before heading back to the camp, that should help a little. I also remember seeing a few others manage to get into a from the humans' stores. They must have gotten some food too, maybe even seeds!."

'Not that it would help much'

Yag thought, goblins are not farmers but diggers and hunters, even if they had seeds it was against the goblin way of life to stay still in one place and wait for the food to grow. This would leave them vulnerable and deplete local resources even faster, considering how quickly goblins reproduce.

But Gromb-go always had more different ideas, it was one of the reasons why they got along well, female goblin warriors weren't common, they weren't rare but they weren't common, maybe 1 in 10 male goblins. If you consider the size of goblin communities and the role of mothers in it, this wasn't a very bad estimate for female warriors.

However, it was very unusual for a chief's daughter to become a warrior, they were generally tasked with mending serious wounds, helping with the birth of new members and being the main supervisor and preparer of ritualistic poisons in cases of cannibalism.

But as in their father's community, this position would not be different from a cook who delivered babies. No one questioned Yag's choice, they even expected her choice because they considered her as monstrous as her father, and she knew it. After all, she was the only one who not only ate her mother's flesh but also killed her mother, the only one of her father's children to do so, giving her a negative status, to say the least, in the goblin community in general.

Needless to say, she hated this comparison with her father, hated the way they looked at her, and above all, hearing people say how much she looked like her mother, and how it made her even more monstrous than what she had done. In order to let her mother's memory be forgotten and not be seen as equal to her father, she took the sharpest stone she could and made a point of cutting up her face as best she could, leaving it unrecognizable from her mother.

Which ironically was seen as an act of courage by the parent, making him appreciate her even more, increasing her hatred for him.

The only one who didn't see it that way was Gromb, he was the one who made the helmet she wore so that members of the community wouldn't compare it to either her mother or her father.

For these and other reasons, she considered him family but not a friend, this would imply even more affection for him, and she couldn't bear to lose another member like she had lost her mother.

"Divide those who still have energy into two groups. One will stand guard at the top of the trees and hide on the ground, the other will go back a little closer to the human camp and wait for anyone who is still alive."

The three nodded and dispersed, leaving only the two of them in a corner near the wall. Gromb-go recovered and slid to the ground, Yag did the same soon after, his legs were already at their limit since the fight.

They both stared at the sky in silence for a while, the difference between the sky here and the sky in their clan's lands was still impressive. Bluer and seeming to expand outward than the darker, almost reddish color that seemed to want to be crushed every time they looked up, but which was still as fascinating as that blue sky.

"He finished."

Gromb said after a while, maybe seconds or minutes.

"We won't have to worry about him anymore."

"Not with him, with the Master, it could be different."

She said in a voice that was thicker than when she was younger, so much time wearing the helmet and avoiding speaking since that day ended up leaving her a little hoarse.

"True....."

He said as he unknowingly played with a blade of grass.

"Do you have any idea how to deal with him? And the other... things he can order or do?"

He asked looking out of the corner of his eye at his sister, the only one his father trusted to present to his master. The only one who had any idea how dangerous that creature was.

"No."

He responded immediately, because there really was nothing he could think of, or even if he had any way to protect himself from him. Killing him was even more unrealistic, the best warriors were unable to tickle their father and comparing him to the Master, it would be like comparing an ant to a mountain.

Gromb closed his face and said nothing for a while, just continued twisting the blade of grass in his fingers. After a while he seemed to have an idea, or rather he seemed to accept something.

"Let's unite with the goblins here."

He said out of nowhere, Yag took a few moments to assimilate what he had said.

"HOW IS IT???!!!!! Cofff,cofff,cofff,coff"

Joining another tribe is not an easy thing for goblins, they have strong ties with their own tribe, taught by their mothers since birth and reinforced by warriors and fathers. Therefore, joining another clan would imply submission to the other clan and forgetting all the teachings of your own, still being able to follow them but never in a broad way.

But that wasn't why Yag was shocked, it was the simple idea that any clan could accept theirs, after all whatever the reason they would be filthy cannibals who didn't show the slightest respect for the dead, at least that would be how the others clans would see them.

"Do you really think they will accept us?"

"An ordinary clan? No, definitely not." He responded calmly.

"Then-"

"But!"

"Here there is at least one clan that is not common, if we explain and show how we are. You and me. They can accept it, their leader seems to be more... much less like him."

Gromb said, and even if someone didn't understand the "goblin language" they could understand the pure hatred Gromb had when he mentioned it. His hatred for his father was in no way inferior to hers, just like the other brothers, but they preferred to leave him aside and accept his way of life, still always keeping the hurt at their core but transforming it into cruelty that they took out on others. weak.

But Gromb-go's hatred was a little special, since the day their father tried to force him to kill his mother he gave him an alternative. If he didn't kill his mother he should kill his sister who had just been born, not Yag, that was another sister, one who never had the chance to live.

She, like his mother, was killed by her father because he refused to do this act. Goblins are also not against the consumption of young ones, but never their own, it would be common for parents to kill themselves so that the young have something to eat and for parents to eat their children even more recently born. But another time, when your parent was minimally reasonable with something he demanded of others.

"How can we be sure?"

"That's what I was going to ask of you."

Yag stood still for a while and soon understood, she was the only one with a war boar still alive, they could carry a lot of weight and still be fast, at least faster than a human running at full speed in a straight line. Means of transportation, strength to defend herself and also being the daughter of a chief (no matter how hated and feared she was), made her the ideal messenger/mediator for a possible junction with the goblin tribe to the northeast, according to what the scouts who returned said.

"The point still remains, do you think, that they will, accept us?"

For goblins it would be easy to tell if someone was an "honorable" cannibal or a "dirty" cannibal, the venobo used before death released a characteristic smell that remained in the goblins for years, in contrast when it was not used another more pungent smell , dirty, stuck to the goblin. Both were easy to detect for goblins, orcs and trolls, as they were all from the same ancestral "family" with some similar customs, at least when referring to cannibalism.

"..... I can only trust that you will make it, we cannot stay there. The Master knows where our clan is, he knows our numbers, and he knows how to cause us the worst pain."

Gromb said remembering the lands that his clan occupied, a rocky cave with a water mine in the middle of a valley, one of the only places (he knew) that could still support a number greater than 700 goblins. A place given to them by this same Master, he would certainly have his plans for the goblins, perhaps he wanted to transform them all into monstrosities like their father, or his brothers. And that was something he wouldn't allow, it was the oath he made to his mother and sister that day.

Yag also knew this, and agreed with him but still had no doubts, would this really be the best way or would it just be the only way they would have.

She then found herself thinking again about the young human with a bow who had almost been killed by his father. She didn't understand why but she felt like she couldn't let him die at that moment so she shouted some nonsense about superior genes or something like that, she was still embarrassed about what she had said. It was strange but she had the feeling that they would meet again soon and she also felt that this hadn't been the first time, why?