Vraz and Strum meandered their way through the mildew-ridden forest, Strum felt the stirrings of another deep headache. His feet were caked in mud and his mood continued to plummet. All the while, Vraz drifted along, whistling the same tune the dwarves had been singing. The only saving grace to this conundrum lay in the fact Vraz didn’t get along with the rest of the Shadow-Axe tribe. A simple request and he agreed to keep his lips shut about the dwarves.

  What were they going to do about bearded squatters getting close to the tribe? Strum had no idea. He could bring it up with the chieftain, but doing so would result in Rurk rushing to attack the dwarven clan.

  Angering the dwarves would be a death sentence. None of their goblin fighters held a candle to the tactics, weapons, and coordination of a dwarven clan. If the chieftain acted exactly like Strum predicted he would, the tribe was well and truly fucked. Strum would have to try and resolve it on his own without getting the tribe riled.

  Vraz spilled what he knew about the Honorstone clan; they lived in the western mountain ranges and skirmished with the Rust-Moon tribe often. Now and then the opportunistic goblins would spot a merchant caravan making their way to the dwarven hold for trade, tempting the greedy goblins to launch raids. Unfortunately, the Rust-Moon tribe learned a costly lesson. Inciting dwarves to violence always ended up costing goblins much more than the dwarves, significantly weakening their tribe to the point that when the Shadow-Axe tribe arrived they could no longer put up a fight for their survival.

  Such shortsighted thinking was a common flaw and led to the downfall of many goblin tribes. The only difference was that they have Strum and Regis. There wasn’t a guarantee the dwarves would ever run into the Shadow-Axe tribe, but if they kept coming this close, all it would take was a single goblin spotting the bearded bastards to cause a whole host of problems.

  The walk back to the tribe was spent in silence. Vraz didn’t seem too concerned, his level-headed attitude and uncaring nature to the fate of the Shadow-Axe tribe suited Strum’s purposes just fine; In the end, his allegiance for better or worse was tied to the dungeon. Currently, Regis and by extension, Strum were tied to the Shadow-Axe tribe, and sure, Strum grew up in the tribe. But ever since gaining intelligence a pragmatic piece of him couldn’t put aside the fact just how primitive and useless the majority of these goblins were.

  He wasn’t an emotional goblin who readily attached himself to things for sentimental value. He prided himself on rationality and being able to leap on opportunities. That’s another way to consider this; not a problem. But an opportunity. Strum scratched his forehead and took a deep sigh. The truth of the matter was that relying upon goodwill from a tribe of goblins for survival wasn’t a good long-term strategy. Either Regis had to take command of the tribe, which the dungeon wasn’t interested in doing, or they would have to find a different solution.

  The question was, how would the dwarves react if they discovered Regis. Strum knew that sometimes civilized races fought one another over ‘ownership’ of dungeons; however, that was typically the result of an actual functioning dungeon, one that tempted adventurers in with rewards and treasure.

  Even if the dungeon could be dangerous, adventurers and dungeons formed a mutually beneficial relationship. Something abnormal like Regis? It was hard to tell. If Strum was a paranoid cave-squatter, he might just destroy the core to avoid any kind of risk. Then again, I am a paranoid cave-squatter and I’m working for the damn thing. Am I really thinking about brokering a deal with those hairy pink creatures?

   It posed an interesting conundrum.

  “One second,” Vraz interrupted his thoughts. Strum flashed the scrawny goblin an annoyed expression, but Vraz wasn’t looking at him at all. The goblin’s eyes were trained on a nearby tree with a plethora of dark red orbs hanging off of it.

  Not apples. Strum squinted as Vraz ran off and began to scale the tree. “What are you doing?” Strum called after the goblin. It was rare to see Vraz excited about anything. Let alone some weird tree.

  “This can be used for something,” Strum heard the scrawny goblin mutter to himself, before calling out in a louder tone, “Hey! Strum, you mind helping me carry a few of these back to the kitchen with us?” Strum sighed and nodded. Of course, the only one to walk away from this little expedition without any new problems or headaches would be Regis. Lucky bastard. The red orbs began to fall to the ground as the goblin got to work harvesting the tree.

  With a head full of problems and different approaches for solving them, Strum followed Vraz back to the caves, then to the kitchen, depositing the mysterious red orbs that he didn’t care a single bit about.

  “Pomegranates,” Regis hummed as he floated near the red-bordering-on-purple orbs that Vraz had brought into his kitchen. The seafoam green goblin cocked his head and looked at the core with a confused expression. Go figure such bestial critters like goblins wouldn’t know a thing about such a sophisticated ingredient. If it isn’t mushrooms or meat, they have little use for it. Regis let his senses roam over the new ingredient, brief whispers of old memories swirling within him; each different concepts for a plethora of dishes.

  Some of which were outside of his grasp. A core issue of his restaurant was in difficulty to procure a variety of ingredients. This particular one was something he would never have expected to cross into his domain for the foreseeable future. But now that it was here…

  “Vraz. Do you happen to know the whereabouts of a beehive?”

  The scrawny goblin narrowed his eyes. “I do. Chef,” the goblin admitted reluctantly.

  “Good. Grab one of those pots. And a knife. It may also be prudent to carry a torch - Smoking the hive would be the wisest course of action. However, I’ll leave the methodology to you. Regardless, I require you to extract some combs…” Vraz’s eyes lept open and his brows rose with each word hummed by the dungeon core.

  “You’re joking,” the goblin half-begged.

  “I’m afraid not, my daft employee. The recipe requires honey. While the hive may perish, their honey is vital,” Regis hummed and floated around the kitchen.

  “Can’t we just make another recipe?” Vraz frowned, itching his arm. There was clear alarm in the goblin’s eyes. Regis, of course, was aware that bee stings hurt. Though, how a floating gem could be aware of such a pain remained beyond him. The information came to him like the recipes that constantly filtered through his mind; just a natural thing that he understood. And that formed a clear basis for his employee’s reluctance to collect the necessary ingredient.

  “No,” Regis responded. It wouldn’t do to pamper his employees. If Vraz was going to receive proper training, the goblin needed to learn that sometimes the best recipes were the ones that cost the most. In this case, the price for this particular dish would be pain. “If you want to thrive as a chef, you must learn sacrifice.”

   Vraz rolled his eyes. “I’m not going to get stung to death by bees for a simple recipe.”

  “You owe me. Besides, learning this recipe is far more beneficial to you than me,” Regis was nothing if not shameless. Besides, he really wanted to cook this recipe. It was a far cry from the usual mushroom-onion-meat fanfare that he typically served the goblins. If it took a little bit of guilt and coercion to get his employee to cooperate, well, that was just standard kitchen politics.

  The goblin stared at him silently. Before releasing a small ‘fuck’ and then grabbing a knife and bucket. A few heavy steps down the cave tunnel leading away from the kitchen later, and Regis was left alone.

  Or mostly alone. He could feel the small tug between himself and Strum. His most loyal employee was somewhere nearby; while the connection mostly allowed Regis to always know the hobgoblin’s location, a smidgen of the hobgoblin’s mood could be felt through the bond. And right now something was dwelling on the hobgoblin’s mind. The moment Vraz vanished down the hall, the hobgoblin headed straight back towards his domain.

  “Regis,” Strum said, his face still. The crystal floated around the hobgoblin’s head, curious. It wasn’t often that something bothered his employee. For the most part, Strum stood as a pillar of certainty. An abnormal constant in the chaotic storm that was a goblin tribe. “We have a problem.”

  “What? Do your suppliers wish to murder my goat again? Tell them no. We cannot afford to lose the sole source of production for milk and butter we have available to us in this primitive circumstance,” Regis cut off the goblin, already annoyed. It seemed all of his employees were determined to give him trouble today. First Vraz making a fuss about getting honey, and now the growing and gathering goblins causing more issues? Sometimes Regis wished he could line all of the useless bastards up and give them a good verbal thrashing to whip them into shape.

  Strum shook his head, not even a trace of a smile visible on his thinly pulled lips. “No, Regis. Vraz and I spotted dwarves nearby. They must have been the ones to kill that dire wolf. If the rest of the tribe finds out about them, I’m pretty sure it will lead to the Shadow-Axe tribe’s collapse.”

  “So? What does a bundle of dwarves have to do with my restaurant? These goblins are hardly food connoisseurs. I’m sure we can branch out and discover a better customer base. All it would require is some marketing…” Regis began to trail off, trying to do the calculations in his head. Goblins didn’t have much essence - nearly as little as wild animals. Essence quantity seemed to vary from species to species, as far as he could tell. Therefore the most logical option was to try to reach whatever demographic had the most natural essence - and thus, the deepest wallet for his food.

  Besides, Rurk had been a thorn in his side, and it would be good to see the uppity little goblin get a thrashing. Strum opened and closed his mouth as rubbed his head. “Let me put this in terms you can understand; You’re a weird dungeon. People’s natural reaction to strange things, especially highly dangerous things like dungeons - is to get rid of them before they cause problems. They will discover you while destroying the Shadow-Axe tribe. Then they would probably just eliminate you.”

  Regis paused as he parsed the new information. Why would they want to get rid of a new up-and-coming restaurant? Sure, I may be a dungeon core, but I’m not dangerous. My food is better than anything those cave dwellers could whip up… Unless… With a slight hesitancy, Regis asked a question. “Strum, do you happen to know if these dwarves have a competing restaurant?”

  Out of all the things the hobgoblin expected the dungeon to say, inquiring about competition clearly sat last on that list. “Why would that matter?”

  “Well. For them to so easily desire my restaurant’s destruction - I must have some sort of competition in the market who desires that outcome. The only logical course of action is to establish myself to these dwarves as superior to whatever puny little dump they call a restaurant. Strum. You must contact these dwarves, and then offer them a sampler of my cuisine.”

  The hobgoblin’s jaw hung open and his eyes bulged. Of course, such a feeble-minded creature like Strum would take a few moments to appreciate the delicate field of marketing and promoting yourself as a business. It was, after all, new to the hobgoblin.

  “That’s the dumbest idea I think I’ve ever heard,” began Regis’ loyal employee. Strum shook his head and muttered under his breath. “...And sadly, I don’t have a better plan. It might work. Probably won’t. But doing nothing is just as bad of a risk…”

  “Good. Then I will have a dish ready for you later today - once Vraz comes back. We’ll utilize the pomegranate to make something… Unique. If these dwarves’ palates are anything like the goblins, then it’ll be simple to captivate them with my dish.” Strum simply shook his head.

  Both of their attention turned to a racket of swearing and grumbling. A significantly swollen Vraz stumbled into the kitchen, his eyelids unnaturally puffy and his lower lip malformed. There were a dozen inflamed bumps on his arm turning an odd purple. He glared daggers at the core and dropped a bucket filled with honeycomb on the ground. “You will never make me do that again,” the goblin slurred.

  “That won’t be necessary - It’s important for aspiring cooks to understand and appreciate where their ingredients come from - how else would you know how to treat it with the care it deserves?” The goblin didn’t reply but continued to glare at the core. Regis let out a pleased hum. “We’ve wasted enough time discussing your trivial grievances. Let us get to work, we have a new potential customer base to impress.”