Sara and Kurt had found themselves as the minority species unless you counted Layla which they mostly didn't as she seemed to be the most accustomed to the change. The idea that they were now sharing the area with dozens of goblins, and who knows how many gnomes would have been completely unthinkable a week ago, now it seemed to be the life they were living. Humans had always thought they were the pioneers of civilization, and humanity was lucky it didn't start with Kurt and Sara as they couldn't help but feel in the way. The gnomes were great builders, and the goblin held great strength, meaning construction and guarding was already covered.
All of the gnomes looked the same but there were several distinct breeds of goblins, there were warriors whose muscles budged, and carried curved swords, and spears. There were scouts who were much leaner but faster on the run, they carried bows and arrows, there was a blacksmith as well, but it seemed he was just one of the warriors whose build was different simply because of the work he was doing. The shortest of the goblins, where the shamans the one that came originally seemed to be the leader of them. There was only one brood mother, but there were also two warlords, one for the warriors and one for scouts.
The problem was they were all doing a lot, the gnomes were still building fortifications, and various other things like, chairs, benches, lamps and various other humanities. And the goblins, even though many were standing guard while much of the rest were building various structures for their homes, they had a few huts around the pillar but along the wall of the canyon near the pillar they had also begun to dig out a cavern structure. To say the very least it was noisy.
The pillar was starting to look habitable, the Ivy was out of control, the waters from the slot had become a proper waterfall, and the basin any day now will begin to overflow and that would mean the river may start coming. The Pillar now had a brick wall around it, this contained a few huts, and the gate, which was always guarded now. The gate itself was self contained as well, meaning coming out of it put you into a 'death zone' completely in the open surrounded with nowhere to go. It was all very basic at one level, yet inspiring at another. Gnomes weren't known for fine craftsmanship, but could get the job done.
Kurt had found himself again looking at the murals on the walls, and found that some of the goblin shamans had made use of one of the rooms at the ends of the hallways. The ones that were they seemed to be doing some strange ritual in it, he had decided to stay away, but reminded himself to find that first, Kurt wished he'd asked for his name, if he knew anything about the murals, it seemed like something they would know about.
He found himself going to the workshop training area level, and found four goblins taking use of it. Kurt had wanted to see if any of them would train him. He had never really held a sword and thought that would eventually need to change. Kurt never thought that was the type of life for him, but with the new powers and abilities he had gain it just seemed inevitable.
However, watching the goblins he realized they probably wouldn't be much help beyond sparing. He could see he was faster and stronger but only because of his boost, otherwise he would have been completely out match. But the problem wasn't the thought he couldn't learn from someone that was slower and weaker, it was that goblins were not humans. They had similar features, outside of their skin color, it was that their legs and arms were not the same, they had a limited range, but explosive power. They walked with a hunch that seemed never to fully straighten, and curved much more than a human spine, they lacked flexibility almost everywhere. This meant they wouldn't have any forms right for him to learn and Kurt wanted someone to correct that for him, a true teacher. Even the most basic things like a thrust of a spear as a human and a goblin were completely different from each other because of these differences.
It would be worth it to have a few spars sometime, but Kurt felt there was no one there that could teach him how to properly use a sword. He also felt he wanted a straight blade than the curved blades the goblins used. He continued to watch for a while taking mental notes of what he saw. One of the benefits of some of his abilities is he seemed to remember things a bit more clearly, not picture perfect, just he was able to accurately recall much more details. He would have to ask the blacksmith if they had to make him a blade, he felt that wouldn't be much of a problem.
He had finally found Sara, she was looking at all the rooms, most likely trying to find the best one. They were all basically the same.
"Damn, I guess any of them will work. That stupid what the point of being the first to pick a room if it's not the best one," said Sara.
"Well I'm probably just going to choose one close the door, you know what they say, it's all about location in the real estate game."
"You think I could get one of the gnomes to build me a house."
"They are not your slaves."
"Ohh come on they would love to, those little guys are great. And are they not? They seem to be in the service of this place. Don't we like top positions?"
"Well," Kurt hadn't really thought of it, "I guess I am."
"Then what's the problem?"
"They all seem to be very busy."
"We'll get on that for me."
"I'm not your servant."
"You're my employee though, I'm the one going out there getting the money, all you do is run around outside whenever you want."
"That's what you told me to do."
"Exactly, and now I'm telling you to politely ask the gnomes to build me a house, I mean isn't that what we are doing generally, seems like everyone else is getting their living conditions taken care of."
"I'll talk to Layla about it, but she will probably insist, mine will be bigger, and nicer, and with a better view."
"See, was that so hard?" said Sara.
"Aren't we forgetting something?."
"What?"
"Please?"
"Pretty please Kurt, my bestest friend in the whole wide world…" she said, pouting her lips.
"Two worlds", Sara broke character and laughed, then Kurt joined her. The smiles turned from fake to real.
"So we are really doing this?" said Kurt.
"I guess we are, we should probably head back. I think I wanna bring stuff here, at least a few sets of clothes, basic necessities."
They headed outside to the gate, it was guarded but one of the shaman goblins was there as well. His stick seemed to have a crystal on its top.
"Ohh are you going through it? Do you mind if I watch? I can't seem to figure out how it works, at all." said the goblin.
Kurt suddenly made a dire realization, what was actually stopping these goblins from basically invading earth? To Kurt he was looking at portal right to the cave entrance on the other, he could see it clear as day. "What do you mean?"
"Like for example how do you turn it on?"
"On? It is on."
"Really?" The shaman looked at the gate.
"Why what do you see?"
"Nothing, the other wall," he walked up right to the gate, walked into the gate and disappeared, "I don't understand how you do it?" Then a goblin appeared on the side of the gate, walking around it. He hadn't walked through the gate, he had walked through the gate as if it was not even there. That somehow relieved Kurt, how had he not even thought about it before?
"Wow, that is really weird," said Sara.
"What do you mean?"
"You can't even see it can you, it's like nothing is there at all isn't it."
"I mean I can see the frame of what looks like some sort of doorway but no door is there, why? What do you see?"
"My world, where the gate entrance is right there, I'm just going to walk right through it," and Sat did just that. The goblins' eyes widen.
"What? I don't understand, she's just gone." Sara was waving at Kurt from the other side of the door, and the sounds also didn't travel through the gates. "There was nothing, Not even a chant, or a…anything, she just walked through the air. If anyone comes we will have no warning at all, the High Shaman won't like that." The goblin looked at the walls surrounding the gate. "This will have to be more guarded."
Something wasn't sitting right with Kurt. It was a good thing that somehow the gate didn't exist for the goblins, but if that was true, how had Layla come through? She made it, but doesn't that actually raise a lot more questions? She said I had this pull right. Without me it wouldn't have been possible.