Cromus barely had time to process Loose Tooth’s expression—the mix of frustration and forced cheerfulness—before another sound caught his attention.
Jagz and Ush. They weren’t speaking to anyone in particular—just muttering excitedly to themselves.
Their eyes flicked across the air in front of them, hands twitching at their sides. Jagz’s grin stretched wide, his excitement barely contained, while Ush’s gaze was sharp, focused.
Cromus straightened, nudging Sais with his elbow. Sais didn’t need to ask why.
By now, they both recognized the signs of class selection.
The rest of the group took notice as well. Athas chirred softly from his perch on Cromus’s shoulder Athas shifted, his six clawed feet lightly scraping against the ground as he tilted his broad, crocodilian head to observe the goblins. His dark green scales gleamed in the low light, black stripes blending into the undergrowth as his tail flicked behind him.
Henry perched on Sais’s shoulder, his clockwork body clicking softly as tiny gears shifted beneath his metal plating. His glass-covered eyes, encircled by delicate gears, whirred as they focused on the goblins. The little mechanical owl let out a soft, rhythmic hoot, a sound both natural and artificial.
And even Loose Tooth had wandered closer, his usual jittery energy absent.
All of them watching. Waiting.
Then, at the same time, Jagz and Ush spoke—
“I choose this one.”
The moment the words left their mouths, the changes began.
Jagz shifted first.
His already lean frame gained more definition—muscles hardening subtly beneath his skin. His arms looked stronger, his posture straightened, and even his cheeks seemed less sunken. The scrawny, underfed goblin he had always been was still there… but there was something more now.
Something capable.
Something hungry.
Jagz flexed his fingers, curling them into fists before spreading them wide again. He sniffed the air once, tilting his head as if testing something new.
Then he grinned—wide and toothy—his sharp canines gleaming.
"Jagz feel good."
Ush’s transformation was more subtle, but no less distinct.
She didn’t gain bulk like Jagz—instead, she seemed to sharpen.
Her body became leaner, her movements smoother, like a blade honed to a finer edge. Even the way she stood shifted—her weight distributed effortlessly, as if she were ready to move in any direction at any moment.
Her fingers twitched, and for a second, Cromus could swear her form blurred—just slightly.
Ush took a slow breath and exhaled.
Then she turned to Cromus, her sharp eyes locking onto him.
"This… feel right."
Her voice was still Ush, still goblin, but there was a clarity in it now that hadn’t been there before.
Cromus exhaled, shaking his head. "Looks like someone increased their intelligence."
Kaazz, who had been silent up until now, let out a low chuckle.
When he spoke, the difference was undeniable.
"Yes. Ush speak… better. So do I."
The words weren’t rushed, weren’t clipped or struggling for structure. He still spoke like a goblin—still carried the same cadence, the same rough edges—but it was more fluid now. More natural.
Cromus narrowed his eyes, studying him. “You don’t just look different, Kaazz. You sound different too.”
Kaazz gave a small, knowing smile. "Mind… not slow. Words come easy." He flexed his fingers, exhaling through his nose. "Strange. But good."
Sais gave Kaazz an approving nod. “That’ll help. More Intelligence means better magic control—less wasted mana, stronger spells. You’ll notice the difference.”
Kaazz flexed his fingers, his expression thoughtful. "Yes. Already feel it. Spells... clearer. Less strain."
Cromus smirked. “Then let’s hope it keeps climbing. Might turn you into a real wise goblin one day.”
Kaazz snorted. "Already wise. Just... now words match."
Jagz, meanwhile, was far less concerned with the shift in speech and far more fascinated with himself.
He rolled his shoulders, hopping in place a few times. Then, without warning, he crouched low and launched himself forward—not at anyone, just testing his own movement.
He moved fast. Faster than before.
He landed with a small skid, laughing, and immediately did it again—this time adding a twist in the air, just to see if he could.
"Jagz like this! Jagz feel STRONG!"
His excitement was infectious.
Even Ush, normally the more composed of the two, smirked slightly.
But just behind them, one goblin stood apart.
Loose Tooth had moved closer, his eyes flicking between Jagz and Ush as they tested themselves.
He wasn’t frowning—he was smiling, truly happy for them.
But Cromus saw it.
The small, fleeting flicker of something else in his eyes.
The way his fingers twitched, just slightly, like he wanted to feel that change too.
The way he nodded along with their excitement, but didn’t say anything.
Cromus felt a familiar tightness in his chest.
He knew that look.
He’d seen it before—in the eyes of those who had been left behind.
And for the first time, Loose Tooth knew what that felt like.
Cromus sighed, noting that he will want to have a talk with Loose Tooth in private later, but for now he would not bring any attention to it, he moved closer to Ush, and Kaazz everyone else following following.
“Jagz, please come here.” Cromus said loud enough to grab the excited goblins attention again and he hurried over.
“Alright if you all are comfortable with it I would like to share character sheets with you, it will allow us to see our stats, skill, spells, and abilities so we have a better handle on our capabilities.” Cromus said all the goblins nodded there consent trusting Cromus, taking turns they all shared their character sheets, Sais also joining in. The information flooding their minds as they. shared.
Name: Ush
Age: 8
Level: 1
Exp: 0/400
Health: 60/60
Mana: 100/100
Stamina: 100/100
Stats
Strength: 8
Dexterity: 10
Constitution: 6
Intelligence: 10
Wisdom: 10
Charisma: 6
Race: Goblin: A race of small, cunning, and often underestimated creatures. Known for their quick thinking, adaptability, and resourcefulness, goblins thrive in environments that would break most others. Their nimble bodies and sharp reflexes allow them to avoid danger rather than face it head-on. However, goblins are often seen as untrustworthy or weak, leading to a -2% penalty to charisma checks when interacting with those who look down on their kind. Despite this, their low profile and agility grant them advantages in movement and stealth. You have night vision, in areas of low light you are able to see normally.
Path: Veilborn Druid: A hunter of the wilds cloaked in shadow, the Veilborn Druid is a silent predator, blending into darkness as easily as a serpent in the grass. Unlike traditional druids who embrace the open forests, the Veilborn walk unseen, using the power of shadows, illusions, and deadly precision to strike down threats before they are even noticed. This path grants access to shadow-infused nature magic, allowing the user to move undetected, cripple foes with venomous strikes, and manipulate darkness to evade danger. As they grow in strength, a Veilborn Druid can summon spectral beasts of the night, becoming one with the unseen world.
Abilities
Scavenger’s Fortitude: Able to digest spoiled or questionable food without getting sick.
Identify (inferior): The basic ability that most intelligent beings, can be used to identify items, creatures, and other humanoids.
Spells
Phantom Fang: Whenever you land a melee attack, a shadowy viper follows the strike, biting the enemy. Applying a weak poison that stacks up to 3 times. At max stacks your next hit deals extra poison damage and slows the target. Cost 20 mana, lasts 30 seconds or until you land 3 strikes.
Umbral Step: You can instantly dash a short distance, becoming semi-invisible for a brief moment. If you dash into cover/shadows, you completely vanish for 2 seconds. Cost 15 stamina per use.
Venomous Mirage: You create a flickering illusion of yourself that moves slightly out of sync with your real body. Attacks against you have a chance to miss, and enemies targeting you become slightly disoriented. Lasts 1 minute or until she is hit twice. Cost 20 mana and 20 stamina. 30 second cool down after use.
Skills
Quick Reflexes: Gain a small bonus to dodging attacks, allowing them to evade danger more easily.
Trickster’s Cunning: When facing a stronger opponent, goblins gain a small boost to Dexterity-based actions, allowing them to outmaneuver foes rather than overpower them. This includes dodging, sneaking, feinting, and other agility-driven tactics that rely on speed and clever movement.
Name: Jagz
Age: 8
Level: 1
Exp: 0/400
Health: 100/100
Mana: 60/60
Stamina: 100/100
Stats
Strength: 10
Dexterity: 10
Constitution: 10
Intelligence: 6
Wisdom: 8
Charisma: 6
This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.
Race: Goblin: A race of small, cunning, and often underestimated creatures. Known for their quick thinking, adaptability, and resourcefulness, goblins thrive in environments that would break most others. Their nimble bodies and sharp reflexes allow them to avoid danger rather than face it head-on. However, goblins are often seen as untrustworthy or weak, leading to a -2% penalty to charisma checks when interacting with those who look down on their kind. Despite this, their low profile and agility grant them advantages in movement and stealth. You have night vision, in areas of low light you are able to see normally.
Path: Berserker Druid: A warrior who has embraced the primal fury of nature, blending brute force with untamed instincts. A Berserker Druid is not a shapeshifter in the traditional sense but instead channels aspects of the wild, enhancing their body with the raw strength of beasts. Unlike calm, wisdom-driven druids, a Berserker Druid fights first and thinks later, trusting in feral instincts over logic. As they grow stronger, a Berserker Druid can manifest more beast-like traits, pushing their bodies to terrifying extremes. Eventually, they may shed their humanoid limits entirely, becoming something that blurs the line between man and monster.
Abilities
Scavenger’s Fortitude: Able to digest spoiled or questionable food without getting sick.
Identify (inferior): The basic ability that most intelligent beings, can be used to identify items, creatures, and other humanoids.
Spells
Savage Shift: Temporarily enhances your claws and fangs, making unarmed attacks stronger and sharper. Each attack applies a minor Bleed effect, stacking up to three times. Duration: 5 minutes. Cost 35 mana.
Thorned Hide: Your skin hardens like bark, reducing incoming damage by 10% for 10 seconds. Anyone striking you in melee takes minor thorn damage. Cost 20 mana.
Wild Pounce: You leap at an enemy, attempting to knock them down or pin them. If the enemy is smaller or weaker, they are automatically knocked prone. If used while Savage Shift is active, the bite deals bonus damage. Cost 25 stamina.
Skills
Predator’s Endurance: When your health drops below 50%, your Stamina regeneration speeds up by 10%. At 25% HP, you take reduced damage for 5 seconds.
Feral Tenacity: Reduces the duration of all debuffs inflicted on you by 25%. Fear effects are automatically shortened, resisted, or outright ignored depending on their strength.
Name: Kaazz
Age: 42
Level: 4
EXP: 1200/2100
Health: 120/120
Mana: 140/140
Stamina: 80/80
Stats
Strength: 8
Dexterity: 8
Constitution: 12
Intelligence: 14
Wisdom: 16
Charisma: 8
Race: Goblin: A race of small, cunning, and often underestimated creatures. Known for their quick thinking, adaptability, and resourcefulness, goblins thrive in environments that would break most others. Their nimble bodies and sharp reflexes allow them to avoid danger rather than face it head-on. However, goblins are often seen as untrustworthy or weak, leading to a -2% penalty to charisma checks when interacting with those who look down on their kind. Despite this, their low profile and agility grant them advantages in movement and stealth. You have night vision, in areas of low light you are able to see normally.
Path: Shaman: A Shaman is a conduit of the elements, a spiritual guide who communes with the forces of nature to heal, protect, and unleash destruction. Walking the path of balance, a shaman draws upon the four primal elements—Earth, Fire, Air, and Water—to shape the world around them. Unlike wizards or sorcerers, who impose their will upon magic, Shamans listen to the elements, forming a bond that grants them power in exchange for understanding. They serve as mediators between the physical and spiritual realms, calling upon elemental forces, ancestral spirits, and nature itself to aid them in battle and in life.
Abilities
Scavenger’s Fortitude: Able to digest spoiled or questionable food without getting sick.
Identify (inferior): The basic ability that most intelligent beings, can be used to identify items, creatures, and other humanoids.
Spells
Tangle: Summons grasping roots from the ground that restrain enemies based on their Strength. Duration: Up to 15 seconds, or until the enemy breaks free. Cost 15 mana.
Erupting Earth: The ground cracks and explodes, sending flaming debris flying. AoE effect: Enemies in the blast take damage and may be knocked down. Cost 30 mana.
Emberstrike: Infuses any staff or melee strikes with flame, making physical attacks burn enemies. Lasts 2 minutes per activation. Cost 20 mana.
Flame Sling: Conjures a small orb of fire and hurls it at a target, dealing moderate fire damage upon impact. Each hit has a 15% chance to apply a Burn effect, dealing minor fire damage over 5 seconds. Cost 8 mana.
Heal (inferior): You are able to spend 10 mana to heal you or a willing target for ten hit points. Cost 10 mana.
Skills
Quick Reflexes: Gain a small bonus to dodging attacks, allowing them to evade danger more easily.
Trickster’s Cunning: When facing a stronger opponent, goblins gain a small boost to Dexterity-based actions, allowing them to outmaneuver foes rather than overpower them. This includes dodging, sneaking, feinting, and other agility-driven tactics that rely on speed and clever movement.
Earthspeaker’s Boon: While standing on natural terrain, you regenerate mana slightly faster.
Active
Broken Shaman: Once destined to be a conduit of the elements, Kaazz’s connection to the natural world is fractured and incomplete. Unlike true shamans, who draw upon all four elements in harmony, Kaazz’s powers are unstable, restricted, and difficult to control. You can remove this condition by absorbing one of each of the natural four elements for a shaman.
Progress: 2/4
“Wait, Wait. Jagz and Ush are only 8 years old?!” Cromus asked
Everyone looked at him like he was questioning something obvious even to Sais.
“Well I assumed they would be very young, most goblins age, quickly reaching adulthood much sooner then other races, I was a little surprised but not entirely, I am more surprised by Kaazz being 42.” Sais explained.
Kaazz nodded. “Many seasons have passed for me.”
“Yeah but still. Kaazz when are goblins considered adults in your village, and how old do most goblins live.” Cromus asked.
“Goblins are adults by 10, and most goblins without classes die around 50.” Kaazz said.
“Man… back home, people were considered adults at 18, but most of them still acted like dumbasses. Kinda makes you worry for the future.” Cromus muttered.
Sais raised an eyebrow. "To be fair, we aren’t much older than those 18-year-olds."
Cromus waved a hand dismissively. "Yeah, but we didn’t act like we knew it all or thought we were smarter than everyone else." He paused, then added, "I mean… I didn’t act like I was smarter than anyone else."
Sais’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Are you implying something, Cromus?”
"Nope, nothing at all." Cromus quickly changed the subject, turning toward Ush and Jagz. "So, how are you two feeling?"
Cromus’s quick subject change landed perfectly, shifting the focus away from his banter with Sais and back to Jagz and Ush.
Jagz, predictably, reacted first.
“Jagz STRONG!” he declared, flexing his now slightly more defined arms and thumping his chest. He grinned wildly, bouncing on his feet as if expecting his legs to launch him forward. “Feel… bigger!”
He dropped into a low stance, clawed fingers scraping the dirt, and in an instant, pounced forward.
The goblins startled as Jagz moved faster than expected—his leap covering more ground than it should have. He skidded to a stop, digging his heels in with a laugh.
"HA! That good! That real good!" He turned to Ush, his eyes burning with excitement. “Ush, do something! Show!”
Ush, ever the quieter of the two, didn’t respond right away. Instead, she took a single step to the side.
Then another.
And another.
It took a moment for Cromus to realize what he was looking at.
She wasn’t just moving. She was gliding.
Her steps were silent, unnervingly smooth. The way she shifted her weight—barely noticeable.
Then, in the blink of an eye, she vanished.
A sharp intake of breath from Loose Tooth was the only sound before Ush reappeared behind Jagz, her movements flowing like a shadow breaking free from the darkness.
Jagz flinched, spinning on instinct, but Ush was already a step away, her stance unreadable.
"Fast," was all she said, her tone satisfied.
Cromus nodded, arms crossed. "More than just fast. That's... sneaky as hell."
Sais grinned. "She’s a ghost."
Ush didn’t smile, but there was a glint of pride in her sharp eyes.
Jagz let out a frustrated huff, shaking his arms. “Jagz strong! Ush sneaky! But—” He clenched his fists. “Need… hit something. Want see how hard Jagz hit!”
Cromus smirked. "We’ll get to that, big guy, but we have more things to talk about."
Loose Tooth had started out watching from the side.
Arms crossed, expression carefully neutral.
But as the conversation carried on, something shifted.
Jagz’s enthusiasm. Ush’s silent satisfaction.
The way everyone—Cromus, Sais, even Kaazz—was engaged, invested, impressed.
He hadn’t meant to, but his feet had carried him closer.
And closer.
Until he was right there beside them, watching.
He wanted to feel bitter. Wanted to focus on that twisting in his gut.
But as Jagz hopped around, testing his speed, and Ush flickered in and out of view, Loose Tooth found himself…
Smiling.
Not big. Not fully.
But enough.
Even if he felt left out, even if he was the only one who hadn’t changed…
He couldn’t stop himself from getting caught up in their excitement.
“Well I think me and you need to talk about something first.” Sais said grabbing him a motioning for him to follow.
“Oookay. Kaazz make sure Jagz doesn’t hurt anyone or runs off.” Cromus said following Sais.
Kaazz nodded and Loose Tooth walked up to stand beside him.
Getting a little bit aways out of earshot of the goblins Henry, Sais, Athas and Cromus stopped. “Ok whats up?” Cromus asked.
“I notice you didn’t lose any level’s and your experience number is grey now instead of black like the ending balance.” Sais pointed out.
“Is it?!” Cromus asked, opening his character sheet.
“You didn’t pay attention after you did it?” Sais asked.
Cromus closed his Character sheet. “No I was too busy eyeing Loose Tooth, I feel for the guy.” Cromus explained.
Sais sighed. “Yeah I get that. but we need to figure out what happens now, do you just need to earn your points back, is there a penalty or what?” Sais questioned.
“You are right and Ill figure that out when I take Jagz and Ush out to level, it can wait for now.” Cromus said simply.
Sais looked as if he wanted to push the matter further but didn’t. “Alright. Also did you notice their stats?”
“Yeah, they seemed to average around 8. When ours were 10.” Cromus stated.
“Right, So is that because they are goblins, the way they received their class, or the fact we was chosen to come here as representatives give us a better start?” Sais questioned more.
“I want to think it’s because how we got here. my worry is will they have negatives to boosting their stats like we did when below 10, and if they will only receive 5 points per level like Kaazz. If they are both they are going to be in a long uphill battle.” Cromus stated that thought eating at him a bit.
“I don’t think they will get the 5 points per level cause how Kaazz got it, I think he has that penalty cause the Shaman before him didn’t pass it on by sacrificing all the experience. the system might have just allowed it to happen with the penalty.” Sais guessed.
Sais exhaled, arms crossed. “Alright. No point in guessing too much—we’ll figure it out as we go.”
Cromus nodded. “Yeah. First step is getting Jagz and Ush some real experience.” He turned back toward the group. “We’ll take them hunting.”
Sais arched an eyebrow. “Going after more Thornspitters?”
Cromus shrugged. “Makes the most sense. We already know what they can do, and there’s plenty of them.”
Sais smirked. “And if things go wrong, we’ve got Kaazz’s vines and your shield to back them up.”
Cromus snorted but didn’t deny it. “Exactly.”
The two of them made their way back to the others. Jagz was still bouncing on his feet, his excitement barely contained. Ush was testing her movements, shifting her weight in a way that made her nearly disappear from focus when she wasn’t moving.
Loose Tooth, standing among them, perked up as they approached, clearly drawn into the excitement even as something lingered behind his eyes.
Cromus clapped his hands together. “Alright, listen up! We’re heading back to the Thornspitters’ territory. Jagz, Ush, this is your chance to test what you’ve got.”
Jagz let out a loud, “HA! GOOD! JAGZ READY!”
Ush simply nodded, her sharp eyes glinting in the dim light.
Kaazz rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Good choice. Know enemy. Better fight.”
Cromus gave him a quick nod, then looked at Loose Tooth. The smaller goblin had a smile on his face—but it wasn’t quite right.
Not forced. Not fake.
Just… off.
Something was building in him, even if he didn’t realize it yet.
Cromus saw it.
And soon… so would everyone else.
