The Good Goblin

I apologise for how haphazard I have been in my attempts to convey what has happened over the last two and a bit years. One thing leads to another and my brain just kind of follows the strings sometimes and I end up talking about something way off track. I will try to keep to specific areas now. I shall give you updates on the various people in my life. Starting from people on the outside of my circle and moving inwards.

I have already discussed Kin’Ayesha and the kobolds. I suppose I should explain to you what happened to all of the cultists who survived the disaster.

Obviously, as you would expect, people weren’t exactly welcoming the cultists with open arms. Many people simply wanted to execute them and move on. But others made the argument that they were tricked and manipulated. After a lot of debating, the duke presented them with a choice. They either get exiled or they work for the knights for five years. After five years, assuming their superiors within the knights believe they have earned it, they will be allowed to live freely and carve their own path within the city.

Only twenty-three cultists survived the invasion. Two of them were children. Four of them weren’t from Kataravonia originally and thus weren’t allowed to join the knights. So, they had to be exiled. A further seven chose to be exiled. Only ten of them ended up joining the knights. I can’t pass comment on the ones that were exiled. Only the gods know where they are now. But most of the ones who joined the knights have blended in well. There are a couple of trouble makers, but there always are in any group.

They’re officially titled as the probationary knights. But most people seem to have taken to calling them ‘plebs.’ Which I’m pretty sure was an insult initially, but seems to be mostly used as a term of endearment now. The programme has become very popular and there is talk of doing it with low level criminals in order to free up spaces in the prisons. The knights could always do with more manpower and this way the criminals can potentially have a steady job in five years instead of just being released back into poverty and resorting to theft again.

As for the two children. They would be the ones that were saved at Madame Laurent’s. Henry has been taken in by Olly. More on him later. The girl with the badly burned back… her name is Jessica. She has been taken in by Rosario. I think he has a soft spot for her because of the burns. Especially after losing Phoenix.

Jessica is twelve now. She is rather sullen and sarcastic. Keeps to herself mostly. Although she does seem to have developed a friendship with Charlie, probably due to the fact that he works at V’Rel manor. She doesn’t really leave the manor. Which is a shame. She’s the right age for Tadwick’s friend group and, to be quite frank, it could do with another girl in it.

Rosario… well… he has put on a brave face. Publicly he has been stoic and centred. Not just publicly, now that I think about it… I think he has been trying to be strong for his kids. But I know this has hit him hard. I spoke to him on his own about everything, explained about Clive and the whole watcher thing. He listened to me without saying anything… he shed a few tears and said that he always knew she was the most important person in the world. He just wished she could have been here longer.

He was a pillar of strength to the community during the rebuilding. Putting a lot of his own funds into things. Insisting that the public housing and communal areas were repaired before his own property… which was very much the opposite stance to most of the nobles.

Recently, he has had a lot of interest from the ladies of noble birth. Likely in an attempt to elevate their station. He has also had a lot of interest from the ladies in general… which is likely due to the fact that he is young, fit, and rich. Kiyui says that being so obviously well-endowed isn’t hurting their interest either. He has however turned down all of this interest. He says that he has only ever loved one woman and he will not dishonour her memory by laying so freely with others. A stance that I admire him for. He clearly loved Phoenix deeply.

Rose and Violet took the loss of their mother quite hard initially. But they are very much their mother’s children and it wasn’t long before they returned to their rather stoic and serious natures. That being said… having Charlie about the house over the past couple of years does seem to have helped them develop a vague sense of levity. I have every confidence that the two of them will grow into fine young women.

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I briefly mentioned Wynrun earlier. Well… other than taking on Fang as his apprentice and latterly marrying her, he has been very busy with his work. He has been trying to repair his mech that was very much destroyed. But the time that he has been able to spend on that has been limited. He has spent most of his time with Fang making prosthetics.

He made himself a very fancy prosthetic leg that is similar to the one he made to replace Charlie’s arm. But a lot of people lost limbs during that assault. And the materials required to make such elaborate prosthetics are rare. So, he charges rich people extortionate prices for the fancy prosthetics which allows him to make standard prosthetics for free for those who are not so financially gifted. It took him well over a year to make enough prosthetics for everyone that needed them. Which is why he has only just managed to fully fix his mech.

Also, recently he has been endeavouring to use a dark-vision artefact to create a permanent vision enhancer for Chlamydia. These stones are normally single use. You place it over your eye and it sends out these weird green waves that allows you to see in the dark for about thirty minutes. They are unfortunately very rare and they break after use. Nobody knows how to make them; they are simply found in old ruins. So, Wynrun is attempting to reverse engineer one and turn it into a kind of false eye that will allow Chlamydia to see.

This is probably a good time to mention Chlamydia. As you are likely aware, she was badly injured by that massive plant. Unfortunately, she was so badly injured that she needed to be treated immediately. If she was able to be cocooned by Svampe instead, then she would have made a full recovery. As it stands, the healing that she received saved her life, but left her with lifelong problems.

Fortunately, due to her thick jacket, trousers, and boots, the bulk of her body was only mildly harmed by the acid. The problem is her hands and head. She struggled to use her hands initially. But after a lot of mobility exercises and a weird exoskeleton thing that Wynrun made her, her hands are now mostly usable.

Her eyes however are another matter. The acid melted away her eyelids and destroyed her eyes. Making a prosthetic arm is one thing. But making a replacement eye that can send images directly to the brain is another. I have every confidence that Wynrun will be able to do this with time. But it isn’t an area that he has worked on previously, so he is starting from scratch. Well… not entirely from scratch… he has the dark-vision artefacts. If he can work out how they work then that will boost his progress massively. I just hope that he can do so soon.

Despite the blindness and disfiguration that she has suffered. She remains much the same as she always has. She continues to support Damecus and the gardens. She also appears to have grown quite fond of Gnasher. I hasten to add, not in the same way that Smutisha is fond on Gnaw. She appreciates his assistance and refers to him with affection rather than as a servant. Even scolding Gentle when Gentle refers to him in a derogatory manner.

Gentle… urgh. Not much to say about her. She is the same terrible human being that she always has been. Insisting that her residence was fixed before the orphanages. Campaigning for the deaths of all of the cultists… even Henry and Jessica. Demanding Kin’Ayesha be killed for being a necromancer. Demanding Iliya be dismissed from the knights for speaking to her the way that he did at V’Rel Manor. Demanding that Chloe be fired from the knights for not stopping the cult sooner, despite the fact that Chloe was the only one who considered the missing persons suspicious and was the only one who put any effort into investigating the situation.

Just… urgh… she’s a horrible person. The shit that she pulls borders on the kind of shit that you would expect from a naff villain in a stage play. Seriously… all the good people that died in that assault and she somehow managed to survive. Let us just move on to literally anybody else before her existence depresses me.

I briefly mentioned Ilija before. After the dust settled, I tracked him down to thank him for everything that he did on that day. Finally bought him that drink. I wouldn’t have made it if not for him. He brought that sword to Phoenix as much as I did. He’s a nice guy and we continue to go for drinks from time to time, even now.

I also found and thanked Kimmy (A.K.A. Wu) after she was de-petrified. She has a husband and three kids. Which rather took me by surprise. Turns out she is older than I thought. This is the problem with humans… it can be so difficult to guess there ages sometimes.

Kimmy and Ilija have both been promoted for their deeds and they have since joined Chloe’s unit. What with them losing Flynn and Lucas. They also have a probationary knight called Steven who is a mage. The unit seems to work well together, which is good. They all seem to get Chloe’s sense of humour and general way of being, which helps a lot.