Handsome as always, the Goblin King above goblin kings glowers on his throne, he has tossed some of his goblins out for his own entertainment. Yes, for his own desire to escape ennui born of long life and the terrifying power he weilds, many goblins face the terrors and joys of the world beyond his castle. But all horror and fun will fade from the goblins' minds once they die and return to the goblin king they have offered their mortality up to.

Only if a goblin becomes a noble, severing their fate from their beloved and capricious monarch will the cycle of death and respawning end only then will a goblin have but one life to live. This does not bother the Goblin King.

No, what has disturbed his wild temper that spins from brighest joy to lightless black... is where he currently sent his goblins. Well one of the places anyway. He had taken up multi-vision watching, but one scene was larger than the others.

A decaying city surrounded by silent monstrous pine trees. The pumpkin that grow throughout the city have far more vitality than the inhabitants of the city. Instinctually they know that the days of Ellaholm being a glorious capital of the Magic Empire of Midnight Ellalund are long gone. The vassels keep the pretense of empire only for their own wallets. The cityfolk try not to think about the missing midnight hour, long gone for many generations, of the disturbing curse the imperial family is under. So in a city that once upon a time was filled with song and dance, only the cries of the geese that seem like the true owners keep Ellahulm from being as silent as the Hungering Pines that seek to devour all.

Within he sent his goblins, regular ones, knights and nuns of the Prince of Grooms. He chose on a whim, but now...

Before his vision is one of many noble estates that like mold on a log can be found throughout Ellaholm. If anything this estate could be said to be even poorer and meaner than their peers. They probably even secretly ate pumpkins and geese, considered the food of the homeless.

Yet there was one who could not even have pumpkin and gooseflesh. The goblins surrounded her inside a grand pit of ashes of monster pines. A young elf woman just beyond childhood, a budding flower neglected and abused such you would expect it to wither. Yet golden eyes still shone, the sheen of hair greener that the most vibrant grass could not be consumed by soot, and all the malnourishement and beatings could not obscure her moonlight skin. Even the King had to admit she was remarkable and with the nobility that radiated from her bones, her very being, even the ragged sackcloth she wore gave the illusion of being proper clothes.

One who had become a woman while having lost her true name, called only Ash the Liar if she was fortunate.

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