In a distant technological goblin plane, the sky was not blue but bronze.
It glowed with the reflection of furnaces that never stopped burning, and the mountains were not majestic but wounded. Their sides were torn open by drills and metal claws, their ribs exposed in the form of glittering veins that had long ago run dry.
The goblins had carved roads through stone and built bridges of steel between cliffs, and massive gears turned day and night, creaking like old beasts that refused to die.
Goblins were not tall, nor were they graceful, but their eyes shone with a sharp and restless light.
They wore thick goggles, gloves blackened by soot, and belts full of tools that clicked and clanked as they moved. For centuries they had been proud. Their metalwork was unmatched.
Their banks held wealth beyond counting. Their machines could bore through mountains and refine minerals into alloys that sang when struck.
Yet now their pride felt heavy.
