The trickster god had made it about a kilometre before her speed seemed to vanish, and she started to heave for breath. Her Alacrity domain clearly didn't allow her to travel far before her constitution told her to stop. While gasping for air, she pulled up her special notepad and made a note of the first potential game mechanic she had come across.
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Satisfied, she quickly realised that the game wouldn't allow her to sprint again before she could effectively have travelled the distance normally. That made sense. Otherwise, her Alacrity Domain would definitely be much more powerful compared to the Journeying Domain.
She continued to travel, enjoying the feeling of the grass around her and the earth underneath her feet. It was an interesting experience for sure, and Riez couldn't believe that anyone would have sacrificed this world to make a mobile game. This experience was amazing! She could feel the sun baking on her skin and the soft winds that cooled her down.
Riez was simply enjoying the world, savouring every movement she made and every moment she got to experience this wonderful creation. She couldn't get the smile off her lips, which always seemed to take on quite a smug look. However, she was starting to grow a little tired from the walking when she finally spotted what had to be a camp of some kind.
It looked slightly primitive, and there were definitely a lot of people moving around despite it not being larger than ten to twenty tents. Riez rolled her shoulders and activated A Familiar Face, allowing her to blend in with the creatures up ahead.
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A Familiar Face
Type: Activated ability
Energy usage: Varies
Full effect: Blend in with a populace or group. Assuming they’re not actively vigilant for intruders, no one will bother you unless you wish otherwise, and you will intuitively know how to act, speak, and conduct business so as to avoid drawing attention. This blending works even with entities who look nothing like humans.
As she got close, she discovered that she was heading into an encampment of orks and goblins, and for a moment, Riez hesitated. However, her divine power pushed her forward, telling her to walk with confidence so she would not stand out.
She slipped among the orks as if she had been with them her whole life, none of them even blinking as she made her way through the camp. It was an interesting atmosphere as the greenskins yelled at one another, and most arguments were settled through violence rather than discussions.
Riez walked past what she estimated to be the only shopkeeper in the camp. The massive ork shopkeeper stood in an open tent where many different wares had been laid out. The shopkeeper's massive fist was wrapped around the throat of a struggling 'customer' while it was talking to another customer as if it was a totally normal way of doing business.
The items on display were various pieces of armour. Some of it was crudely made, while what seemed to be of higher quality was clearly something looted from other races. There was also an assortment of weapons, though none of those appeared to be anything other than Orkish craftmanship.
None of the people, however, seemed to even give a second glance to Riez as she moved among the tents. She walked between them for a solid hour, counting around a hundred orks and around twice that for goblins. She even noticed a pair of trolls outside the camp. This number of greenskins combined with how few tents there were, was a clear indication that the tents all served a purpose other than sleeping.
All the tents had been 'arranged' around a pile of loot. They are set up with little regard for walking paths, but they have been set up from the pile and moving outwards. The heap seemed to be made mostly of trash. However, on top of it, a goblin was sitting, directing anyone who came near to throw more stuff on the pile. Riez instinctively knew that by getting too close, she would be asked to throw her tribute on the pile, which she had no intention of doing. So she circled it while exploring the camp.
The goblin in the centre was clearly the camp's leader, and based on snippets of conversation, they went by the name Money Gobz. The greedy little goblin clearly seemed to have a knack for getting valuable items, though primarily from others in the camp.
Having seen this display of wealth and power, Riez couldn't help but feel like messing with the goblin leader. After all, getting some of the massive loot pile the goblin was sitting on would come in handy... probably... She might be a tiny bit jealous of the massive heap of goodies.
Leaning on the power of A Familiar Face, she made the leader goblin notice her just as she made her way towards the pile of loot. The goblin was clearly about to speak, but Riez gave the leader a deep bow. The sight of someone willingly showing respect to the goblin was definitely an anomaly, making the pale green creature blink.
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Riez smiled a mischievous smile, getting a proper look at the goblin for the first time. It was buried halfway down to the waist in various shiny metals and trinkets. Many of the items had bitemarks, the source becoming clear when the goblin picked up a random item and bit into it as if the taste of something valuable calmed it.
The goblin itself was clad in what might be considered a noble outfit, made from cloth with long coattails that would be dragged through any mud or dirt when the goblin walked. Chains upon chains of shiny valuables were wrapped around the goblin while a small pair of spectacles were placed on the long green nose. All in all, it was supposed to give the goblin a dignified look, but it gave the impression of it all being just a tad too much, more than anything.
"Who you be?" The goblin leader didn't seem surprised that Riez had suddenly appeared, but it was obvious that it hadn't seen the goddess of trickery before. If anything, it had been surprised by the gesture of deference.
Riez paused for a second, unsure of what to say. However, she remembered one of her new powers... The power to lie.
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Liar’s Flawless Grace
Type: Constant
Energy usage: N/A
Full effect: Your lies can never be detected as such by magic or other special abilities, including those of the Deception Domain. Lesser foes will always believe them unless they are completely implausible, emotionally intolerable, or would oblige them to self-harm.
"Me be new goblins!" She said with an eagerness that she found surprisingly natural.
The goblin leader gave her a look, but apparently, it wasn't considered a worthy foe since the ostentatiously dressed goblin just nodded as if accepting this claim as normal, meaning that her power had worked on it.
Money Gobz picked up some shiny trinket from the pile it was standing on and examined it. It was pretending not to be interested in Riez, but still continued to talk to her. "New goblin is rare. And you not be dead, extra rare. You gotz name yet?"
Riez felt how "A Familiar Face" tugged on her, telling her that it would be highly unusual for her to have a name as a new goblin. If she wanted to blend in, she would have to say no. "No!"
The goblin leader threw the trinket it had been examining over its shoulder and let it clatter to the ground. "Great! You be Pink Gob from now on. Me needs some helps with camp, and Pink Gob going to help!"
Riez couldn't really decide if she was being punished for interrupting the goblin or if the leader just wanted to avoid doing some of the tasks that were clearly its responsibility.
She finally just gave in and nodded. "What cans me helps you with?" Her voice fell naturally into a more nasal tone.
Money Gobz grinned and started to list out a lot of tasks. Many of them clearly something the leader invented right there in the moment, but the rest indicated that the camp was preparing to move out soon.
Based on rumours, it sounded like this place was moving towards A'kastin to join up with the legendary guardians protecting the Tree of Life.
Riez paused for a moment, wondering how best to prank the leader, but decided that betrayal could be fun, too. As such, she got started on the tasks, pretending to be an invaluable new member of the camp. She found herself exceptionally skilled at managing the orks. In part because she could lie to essentially all of them, and none of them would be able to call her out on it, but also because of her high charisma.
It seemed that she could catch the ear of any ork willing to listen, and any goblin that saw her was more than happy to obey.
The more Riez worked on gathering people around the camp, the more she let her power slip, allowing people to see her. It took her less than three hours to get completely ingrained into the ork society to the point where she was accepted without having to use her "A Familiar Face".
She was honestly quite proud of herself. The only point where she met any difficulty was when she had to wrangle the trolls that were associated with the camp. The two of them were currently tearing up the land in some misguided attempt to build some trenches. However, the circle they were making didn't have the camp in the middle, or inside the circle at all for that matter, making the whole exercise futile. Riez got the feeling that they had been put to this task not because they were exceptional at digging but because they wouldn't be in the way of anyone else.
The trolls were massive beings, at least twice the size of the biggest ork that Riez had seen, and it was unclear if they understood language at all or if they were even able to comprehend instructions. Had it not been for Riez's passive power to allow her instructions to be understood no matter what, she would have been nervous.
Even so, she instructed them both to return to camp and gather the pile of valuables that Money Gobz had been standing on.
They didn't seem to react much at first, though with lumbering steps, they started to move. Their grey skin was pale in the fading light and especially when contrasted by the red grass that made up The Endless Plaines. The feet and hands of the trolls seemed oversized beyond parody, each hand and each food at least twice the size of their heads.
Riez went around to the various tents and instructed them that they needed to start to wrap things up, and as she finished up the last of the tasks and the sun began to set, the camp was slowly getting ready to move on in the morning.
Everywhere she went, she could hear the orks and goblins talk about the new Pink Gob. She sensed an opportunity. She was quickly becoming the most influential greenskin in the camp, despite her skin not being green. She could challenge Money Gobz for the position as leader of the camp.
She considered her opportunity. Riez had wanted a small crew that she could use to prank people with, but it would be hard to find appropriate people out here in the middle of nowhere. But did she really want a whole tribe of orks, goblins and trolls to command?
Riez sighed and shook her head. She might as well try. What was the worst that could happen?
So, as the camp was slowly getting ready to travel the next day, the human goblin made her way towards the camp centre, where the goblin leader was trying to guide the trolls in how to pack the massive amounts of 'riches' in the right order.
Riez grinned and pointed at the goblin before loudly proclaiming her intentions. "You no longer strong. Me be strongest goblin. ME new leader!" The cracked speech was a vital component in appealing to the other greenskins. She had to appear as one of them, otherwise her claim as the new leader would never be taken seriously.
Money Gobz turned around. Its eyes narrowed as it took in what it had expected to be a friend but turned out to be a traitor.
The fancy goblin spat to the side as if it had tasted something bitter before speaking. "You no be strongest. You be weakest! You be dumbest too. Me be leader, and me be smarterest!"
Riez put on a smile and laughed loudly at this proclamation. "Smarterest? You be smarterest in only one thing! You be smarterest in being dumberest!"
The sound of sharp intakes could be heard around the camp, as the verbal smackdown Riez had just delivered was apparently so severe that it might as well have been a physical blow. Money Gobz even stumbled back a couple of steps, as if it had been wounded by those words. It avoided stumbling over some of the junk it had collected by sheer luck.
"Well, me be..." It was clear that the goblin was fishing for something, and having no comeback for what Riez had considered a fairly mild burn, there was only one thing to do. "ME BE IN CHARGE! TROLL! KILLS PINK GOB!"
The trolls turned their attention towards Riez. They had seemingly been the only ones who hadn't been listening to what was happening around them. However, the order to kill something had pulled their attention far quicker than anything else.
Riez swallowed hard, and in the setting sun, two massive trolls started to lumber towards her.