The Goblin King

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Fierce ruler of his kind, the Goblin King is ruthless and greedy. Eager to gather as much shiny treasure as he can, he hoards ancient technology and dreams of someday conquering Torch City, reason enough to have all his minions scouring The Ruins for all the artifacts that they can find. His slow goblin mind even has wit enough to plan an invasion of Torch City, dreaming that one day all the shiny lights would be under his rule and that all the wonderous artifacts would be pillaged by his troops.

**Early Life**

Even the King forgot the times when he was human. His real name is Maestor Jonathan Renly, leader of The Camp.

Jonathan never saw daylight and was born shortly after the Great Darkness fell. During those times of turmoil on his home planet, both his parents were killed. All the craziness the ensued immediately after The Blackout left him with a deep feeling of resentment against all that was human. As a youngster, he was raised in a hut right outside Roisan - or what is now known by the inhabitants of Torch City only as The Ruins.

Jonathan found happiness in that small resemblance of a home. He was trained in the ways of the Old Ones by his aunt, who would more than fill the emptiness caused by the disappearance of his parents. He grew up to be a brilliant young tinkerer, sharp-witted and full of questions - which he dared not pose, since he was also the most timid of boys. One would always find Jonathan scouring deep within the woods of Roisan for old technology, fascinated by his aunt Solice's tales of flying vehicles and light sources filling all the roads which once connected various parts of the planet.

Solice taught him all the algebra she could remember, and still continued to shape his life long after falling gravely ill during her 76th year. Her last gift to his nephew was a weird lighting contraption which was in their family since before she could remember. She wore the magical device around her neck at all times and never believed the old nay-sayers who lived before The Blackout and argued that it was a very common finding - called LED Glowing Light Sticks - in the Old World. Her grandfather even went as far as suggesting, on his deathbed, that he gave it to her in her childhood only as a toy bought from a store selling thousands, and not part of an inheritance of their family's precious artifacts.

Solice grew up before The Blackout, but her memory was deeply shaken by the events the changed the planet, and was never able to see clearly in her mind's eye the life she lived before. It all felt like a dream, the only real thing being the hut near the forest of Roisan and the basic algebra calcus she engaged in daily to pass the time.

Drawing math symbols and simple equations by running her left finger in the quicksands around her home, she taught Jonathan everything she knew.

**The Years of Solitude**

After the death of his aunt, Jonathan fell into the deepest of depressions. As days passed, he withdraw more and more into himself, to the point where the constant storms and rains near Roisan would tear holes in the roof of his hut. But Jonathan didn't care. All he could think of was were the raindrops somehow finding their way deep within the quicksands to Solice's body and resurrecting her aunt's conscience. He didn't wish for her to be raised from the dead. He just wanted to hear her voice again, even if that voice would scold him about his math, even if it would only be spoken in one of those tones of disappointment heard after his first degree equations didn't add up.

His skin turned blue at first, and then black. Deep wrinkles with dirt-filled crevasses would ornate every inch of his body. His eyebrows turned ashy and his eyes could barely be seen buried deep in their sockets. His was the face of a monster. But he was still human. Almost 4 years passed until he talked to another human being. By chance only, not by desire.

A stranger open the one-bolt hanging, shaky, mold-infested wooden board Jonathan called door. The stranger's eyes were weirdly colored, one blue and one green. He looked around in disbelief, failing to see Jonathan crouched near what was once a table. Cockroaches roamed freely in the hut, and the stranger at first thought it was another dead end. Another empty hut. He expected to again find the bones of the former owner scattered by the winds in the backyard. "They'll will be of some use, at least" the stranger thought. Jasmine couls user another femur back at Camp. The doctor would thank him. God knows the wounded and the cripple would. This would be a great day if he were to find two femurs. He would, however, never manage to find his brother. He had almost lost hope when he saw something moving beneath the table. It was too big for a dog, but somehow looked like one. It seemed asleep. Carefully, he gave it a nudge. Jonathan jumped to his feet, gloriously opening his crossed hands and letting the wind carry the blanket that covered him. The stranger couldn't believe his eyes. Could it be really Jonathan?

**The Forgotten Brothers**

After Jonathan found out he had a twin brother named Nathaniel, the two of them reluctantly headed back to Camp. Nathaniel was the leader of a small group of survivors. They all ate mushrooms, since mushrooms were the only thing one could grow in the surrounding quicksands.

After cleaning himself up, Nathaniel found Jonathan to be a handsome middle-aged man. In fact, all three woman from the Camp wanted only to talk to Jonathan. Jasmine, the old medic woman (who was actually something weird called "stock broker" in the Old Days) was keenly attracted to Jonathan's looks and his new-found effervescent personality.

The Camp grew under the twin brothers, with more and more survivors of the Blackout finding their way within its walls. The Camp was situated in an abandoned nursing home, overlooking a hill. The quicksands were less deep here and you could see mushrooms everywhere. The weather was softer. People were actually starting to forget about The Blackout. Jonathan forgot everything he knew about math.

People started to call Jonathan and Nathaniel the Forgotten Brothers, since after one would take residence in their Camp, one would forget most of the misery that took place during The Blackout. Life was simple in the Camp. When Jonathan joined, there were only 6 people. After not much time, the community grew to over 50. Nathaniel jokingly called Jonathan Maestor, to celebrate his affection for him. The name sticked.

**The Mushrooms**

After decades of eating nothing more than bees, bugs and mushrooms, people started dying. Those that didn't began to always feel sick. Nathaniel died early on. Jonathan was not there to bury or mourn him, since he himself was tied to a bed in order to protect himself from the rages he would go on because of the pain.

At first his skin started to swell. Small bladders appeared everywhere. His face was covered in them. A milky liquid spurted out with force from them every time they would pop. The pain made Jonathan unable to sleep. He could not lay on his back. He tried sleeping with his back in a vertical position and his legs crossed , but as soon as sleep would catch up with him, he would fall and hurt himself. He started to hallucinate. Nobody was there to help him. Everybody from The Camp, a group of now more than 200, was either dead or in pain from the same ordeal as Jonathan.

After the bladders, came the itching. His skin turned red from the blood. His hands suddenly grew bigger and two of his front teeth grew unnaturally large. His lower lip started to hang and he could not speak anymore. No matter. There wasn't much more to say anyhow. He felt his intellect leaving him, and he was unable to think about the most basic of tasks. Yet, somehow, he started to feel another sense developing. He could "feel" his friends from the Camp in his head. He knew where they were. He could even command them at times. All of them looked like him now.

Giant, red, monstrous lumps of muscles, filled with bladders and dim-witted. But Jonathan was the smartest of them all, the smartest Goblin from The Camp, even if he had the mind of a 5 year old.

He had enough wits to command his goblin minions to march back to Roisan. He heard a voice telling him to look for lost treasures, for a glowing LED stick and for other artifacts. He would forever be entrenched in the search.

Perhaps the Gobling King finally got his wish.

Solice is now speaking to him.

In a way.