Moving Day

[Venessian]

Nestled amongst the intertwined tree roots and loose soil of the Coronian woods was a jutting dagger of bedrock. Framed by a pair of blood-red canvas flags bearing the emblem of a single, bleeding eye, the rocky monolith housed a pitch-black cave entrance, ominous and dark, leading down into the bowels of the otherwise beautiful landscape.

A small campfire loosed a lazy trail of grey smoke which was lost amongst the canopy of treetops almost forty feet above the ground. A pair of creatures, small in stature but muscular in frame, poked at the embers, attempting to coax a larger flame from their cooking fire. The yellow-skinned beasts had coarse, wiry brown hair which covered a large portion of their bodies, with long, yellowed fangs that curled their lower-lips downwards in a meanacing perma-smile. The two creatures, known to most of the world simply as "goblins", conversed in their whiney, gutteral language.

"Wot do you tink off da new meister?"

The larger of the two beasts looked at his smaller counterpart, who had posed the question.

"Hims bigger, ya? Him's horns put a quick end to da old meister. Very powerful... Dangerous, with trickey majicks. Him'll bring lotsa meatses fer us Blood-Eyes when we serve hims good, eh?"

"So many meatses! Cuts dem meats from da bones, and doesn't even wants it fer himself! No no!"

"More meatses for da Blood-Eyes, eh? Him's can have all dem bones him likes so much. Bones for da meister, meats for the Blood-Eyes, eh?"

Vanker, as he was called by his peers, was now one of the largest (and therefor one of the highest ranking) members of the small goblin clan. His son Hodder, who was sharing the meal, poked at the sopping wet chunks of pink flesh that turned over the campire on an iron spit. Their elevated status garunteed them the choiciest morsels before the others were allowed to feed.

"I dun like the dorf meatses. Always tough, and thems beards is hard to peel from dere ugly faces. Takes all da meatses off wiff dem, eh?"

"Har-har, best meats is in da face. Dorf cheeks is always fat. Elf faces is too skinny right? But we's gonna be eatin nuttin but dorfses till thems start to co-operate with the meister."

"Whats meister want wiff all dem dorfs anyways, eh?"

A trio of the long-bearded dwarves had been taken prisoner as per the goblin-master's orders, and the last of the three had been done away with earlier that day after a failed escape attempt. Vanker ripped a piece of the quivering flesh off the spit and popped it into his greedy mouth, hardly cooked through. He chewed with a juicy, sucking sound and his offspring was quick to join in.

[Venessian]

The seemingly shallow cave decended on a sharp angle before leveling out again far beneath the forest floor. No torches lit the solid stone walls and only creatures that could see in the dark, or visitors who brought their own light, could navigate the stone hallway which ended at a wooden door. The single, sturdy oak portal marked the entrance of Clan Blood-Eye's domain. Beyond the door was a cavernous hall, set up in a natural cave with circular benches carved from native stalagmites. A throne made from equal parts steel and bone, boiled down to a polished white, loomed at the caverns fore front, although none sat there.

Small humanoids moved about the hall, the largest of them bullying the smaller ones into doing their bidding. There were twelve in total remaining in the clan, many of their number lost when clan leadership had changed hands several weeks prior. Goblins left their lair at night, raiding anyone that they could overwhelm in numbers. During the day most of them slept, only a few remaining awake to guard their cave from within. That morning, the majority of the yellow-skinned creatures stirred from their rest prematurly, grumbling to themselves. Most of them bore pick-axes and shovels, and were covered in dust, dirt, and debris.

Vanker and Hodder, temporarily in charge of the vile tribe, returned from their late-morning dinner, moving to the center of the cavern and collecting status reports from their scampering lackeys.

"Hoi! All yous listen! Come afternoon, dem dodgey humes from Radasanth is coming wit da meisters effects, ya? Get dem rooms dug and done or hims'll make yer bones walk. Hey, yous! Come find me whens Gordo 'in his bunch gits back with anudder batcha dorfses, eh?"

The two superior goblinoids finished assigning individual tasks that were too menial to tend to themselves, and made their way through a door carved into the cavern's eastern wall. Beyond, another steep, rocky tunnel angled further into the lair's belly. The second stone passageway had been excavated by efficient dwarven slaves, captured at the cost of several goblin's lives. Once they had outlived their usefulness or gave the ever-hungry beasts a reason, they fed the hungry tribe. The selfish monsters were more than content to sacrifice some of their own for the chance to gain more power, food, and favor for themselves under their new master's reign.

[Venessian]

Vanker and his ward made their way down the recently constructed hallway, passing large stone doors that were so heavy, they required two of the stronger goblin warriors to open them. The crude hunks of grey slate concealed cramped and non-descript holding cells, little more than shallow pits. It was there that slaves were sealed away without food or drink for days on end to make them weak and compliant. When Gordo Crunchbone and his raiding party of five returned from their hunt, the dank holes would hopefully again, contain stocky mountain dwarves captured on the nearby hillside. The Blood-Eye's old leader delighted in torturing the few humans that strayed too close to the cave-lair. Now, under the rulership of the cunning necromancer, slaves met more unsettling ends in the dungeon's west wing which the dark wizard had claimed as his laboratory, store room, and personal quarters - off limit to all but the senior members of the clan.

Next, the pair passed the kitchen, conviently located next to the holding cells. Its inelegantly fashioned wooden door was slightly ajar, not quite fitting into the hollowed out doorjamb. The salty, distinct smell of carrion and fresh blood wafted out through the cracks and gaps, and made Vanker's tongue roll across his almost simian lips, hungrily moistening his pointy incisors. So inviting were the cries and pleas for mercy from the humanoids being "freshly prepared" in the macabre kitchen.

Small branching paths broke off from the main corridor as the miners, both goblin and dwarven, slowly extended their fearsome master's realm. The coming years would hopefully bring the merger of other goblin and monsterous humanoid tribes into Clan Blood-Eye, bolstering its numbers into a formidable fighting and raiding force. For the time being, the necromancer's influence and wealth was just enough to control the single, weak-willed goblin band.

Currently, only a few dens had been excavated and were hastily furnished with straw beds and shoddy wooden tables constructed by the goblins who were just beginning to learn the intricate art of tool-making from their more intelligent kin. The limited resources of the primitive group left much to be desired in the dungeon's eastern reaches.

The pair of goblins checked all the sleeping quarters, making sure all of their minions were awake and hard at work. The master rewarded service, but was quick to punish those who bilked on their duties, and goblins were not traditionally known for their work ethic.

[Venessian]

"Raid leader's back! An him's brought a prisoner eh!?"

Clan Blood-Eye re-united in the central hall around mid day, invigorated by the excitement of a successful hunt. It wasn't until after the creatures had poked and prodded their quarry that they realized that their numbers were lesser by two.

"Just one dorf's all ya brought back? And it looks like Gordo's gone and lost a few of our brothers, eh?"

Vanker postured infront of his fellows, putting on a brave air, until the raid-leader stepped forward.

"I get tings don. Oli and Gras are don. And so's da meister's bidding, ya?"

A dangerous hunter's frame was adorned with armor of bones and leather, small tokens of past raids decorated his yellow skin on sinuey thongs. The femur of some large creature, possibly ogrish or giant, was fashioned into a greatclub with one side serrated and saw like, stained brownish orange from frequent use. Gordo wore the mighty weapon on his back, and as long as he had it within reach, none of the other warlike beasts dared challenge him.

"Dis be a smit. Show dem, yous!"

The master kidnapper gestured to the two surviving members of his raiding party, who were burdened by large packs. The minions went on to produce mallets, tongs, fans and even a full-sized smithing anvil, and enough iron ore to produce a few short blades or spearheads.

"Wot, not smiley no mores, eh Vanker?"

The alpha goblin sneered at his second in command, who roughly shoved his ward, chanelling the cowed creature's frustrations. If a battle broke out between the two top competing monsters, the odds would surely be in Gordo's favor, but Vanker was intelligent, and had more sway over the clan when a leader was needed. Gordo Crunchbone's aversion to thinning out his own herd and sacrificing his inferiors to further his own goals were known to all the tribe.

Both goblins were locked in stare. Crunchbone's hand inched towards his peace-making greatclub, before both had their intentions stolen away. The much larger stone door on the hall's western wall grinded open, a chill mist rolling out between the cracks as the savage humanoids turned their heads at their new master's arrival.

[Venessian]

High atop the trees of Corone, loomed vast mountain ranges. In the midst of one such range emerged one of the land's largest mountains, Mt. Karnak. Only the heartiest of monsters could survive on its rocky craigs, sheer cliff faces, and trecherous valleys of jagged stone. Two such races were the mighty stone giants, and the ancient, long-horned goatfolk known as the Ibixian.

The Ibixian people were as industrious as they were reclusive. Xenophobic in nature, their nearby neighbours the giants were their only contacts with the outside world for a very long time. The two people traded freely, but were always wary of the territory boundries that separated them, their peace a tenitive one. The chaotic giants crafted jewelery, musical instruments such as drums and pipes, and other fineries of stone that the noblest of the ibixian coveted. In exchange, the Ibixian craftsmen fashioned items of magic and strength and shared the most mundane of them with the giants.

But the peace was shattered almost a year earlier, when the Scepter of Joril Gravelhand was stolen from the Valley of the Colossus. The Ibixian people pleaded innocence, but grew hostile as the giants continued their accusations, spurred on the lies of the Ibixian tribe's mediator, Venessian.

Venessian the Betrayer.

In the present day, both the Ibixian people and the remaining giants dot Mt. Karnak in small bands, scattered to the chill mountain winds. The Scepter of Joril Gravelhand was now in the traitorous necromancer's possession, and the secretive arcane beast required a laboratory to study the magical relic. Having since secured the services of the goblin tribe, Venessian laired in the west wing of the Blood-Eye's dungeon, beneath the woods that lay in the shadow of Corone's mountains.

The mist that crept out the stone archway glowed with a ghastly blue radiance, visible even in the blackness. At first, nothing stirred except the dancing tendrils of seemingly cottony fog, but after a short moment, a great, white-furred hand clasped the stone door frame. The grasping hand was over-sized and well formed - as large as Vanker's head - with lean ropey muscles, and sported thick, blunt fingernails caked in god-knows-what.

The great-horned beast stalked out of the hallway, head low and glaring about the room with eyes that were black and pupilless, as if devoid of thought or process. It had the head of a goat, with starch-white fur accented with ribbons of bright red, fresh blood. Long tatters of cloth emblazoned with arcane runes, hung from the beast's shaggy white fur and formed a loincloth at its trunk. In a similar fashion to Gordo, bones, stones, and other mundane tokens of witchcraft hung from its thick wrists and wrapped around the tufts of fur on the emaciated goatman's leg-joints. His round hooves, wide as barbarian's tankard, were black and flaked with bits of grey matter and gore, but the wizards most intimidating feature were the massive ebony horns that spiraled from the crown of his oval head, to the snowy fur of his flanks.

Fully emerged, the goatman crept amongst the gathered goblins, stalking about and drawing close to each as he passed, fully examining them one by one. Even the powerful Gordo held his breath under the necromancer's gaze. He and his people were a superstitious lot and there was no history of magic use amongst their kind. They were unnerved by it, not knowing truly how far Venessian's domain over the undead reached. They knew only that he was larger than them, stronger than them, smarter, and his magic robbed even stout warriors of their breath and lifeforce. The vile beast knew exactly how to play the weak-willed monsters, using them and guiding them to do his bidding with promises of dark power, gold, and most of all, fresh meat.