"Can he control it, sister?" Doomo asked, in a private chat, as he watched the event on his phone, as he stood beside the Half Table, at a peace talk that was likely not happening. "Or is this a disaster that I could have averted."

He did not say that last part as a question. It had been an accusation.

Walaria paid her elder brother's accusation no mind. Doomo needed to appear strong for he had lost a lot of face, and so Walaria would allow him his face-gathering.

"He doesn't need to control it," Kalimara answered the part of the question that was for her. She was currently watching from Meteor Academy. "That's an empire killer. We could survive it. But I doubt Goblinhome could unless they show us some things they have been keeping in deep hiding."

"You doubt they could take it down, daughter?" Mother asked, tone clipped.

Empress Cataclysm and Emperor Salvation were watching from the war room of Domol'Takela, along with all of the generals.

"What Category is it, daughter? Cat 6 or 7?" Father asked, adding to Mother's question.

Walaria felt it was a high Cat 6, or low Cat 7.

Cat 5 was a city killer. The most recent Cat 5 was the Apocalypse Beetle at the Battle for Memphi. That one had that disintegration aura and long-beam attack, and an incredible resiliency. It took Mark draining it for several minutes and a competent archmage's constant attack to kill it. There were five or six of those every year. If it hadn't been for all the rest of the Battle for Memphi, that Cat 5 would have been killed a lot easier than it had been killed.

Cat 6s were once-a-year, and a Cat 6 could easily kill even a large city. To fight one of those, Memphi would have needed to request Aurora's help, or they would have needed to not be contending with everything else. They could handle a Cat 6, though. Some cities on Earth could not.

Cat 7s were things that caused Empire to move.

Walaria was glad for Mark's capability, but at the same time… the boy could stand to do less in very specific instances. This being one of those instances. If only circumstances would have allowed him to continue his Understanding Parties; that would have been best for everyone. That Manawork party —the Settlement Symposium as they were calling it— was already sending big waves through arcanaeums all across Aluatha.

A pity that goblins existed.

Kalimara took a moment to answer their parents, eventually saying, "Low Cat 7."

Walaria was all the way in the settlement, still dealing with almost-rebels and telling them not to rebel, but he could still hear the generals in the war room go cold with determination.

Emperor Salvation voiced the next, most obvious question, though of course he put some politicking into it, as he asked, "What is our most economical way to defeat it if it gets out of control?"

Walaria easily answered, "Mark brought it about. He can end it. He can probably bring it home, too. That's a lot of valuable metal there, and it won't have to be purified too much, since it will have gone through a kaiju first."

In the ensuing discussion, Doomo grumbled, though perhaps Walaria was the only one who heard that. Walaria let that pass unmentioned. Doomo needed to gather face, but Walaria knew she had picked a winner with Mark.

- -

The Three Fates of the Settlement of Xerkona stood around a crystal ball, watching.

- -

The metal kaiju ripped through the border lands, growing in size and power as it gathered cables, electronics, metal deposits in the ground, and everything else metal that it could find.

Mark followed, easily able to keep up, Glory shining, and Fear killing what the passing kaiju did not.

Goofy trailed further than that.

Every so often something would fly out from the center of Goblinhome, or from somewhere else. Missiles. Whatever. All missiles detonated long before they hit the metal kaiju. All flying goblins were instantly set upon and ripped apart.

Tormpol, The Storm, was still out there. From tens of kilometers away, from deepening clouds, green lightning flashed across the world and aimed for Mark. One out of every 4 strikes hit Mark's shield of invisible adamantium, and did not touch him, at all. It did flicker inside of Mark's adamantium bubble, though, temporarily disrupting Mark's Protect, invisibility, and Quark's vision of the world. But Quark reapplied spells as needed, and soon Mark could see again through the invisible, Protected, adamantium shell.

Tormpol sent lightning at the kaiju instead, and thick, jagged green lightning struck glittering metal and then grounded itself. Was the kaiju even struck? It didn't act like it. The kaiju focused on the metal in the border lands, slurping up cables and whatever in great flashes of pulling strength.

- -

Grax stood impotent in Hive, the central command of Goblinhome, the light barely flickering around his body. He was still 'shavallian'd, even though Greeplox told him that it should be healed already. Whatever Mark had done he had done very well, and Grax hated Mark all the more for it. Grax watched Mark right now, and Grax hated.

Screens were everywhere, each of them manned by one of BiggestBaddest's bodies, showing Goblinhome's response to the aggression of the Black King.

A lot of the Elders were in Hive. They bickered and yelled at each other, half of them against war, the other declaring that they must war, for if not now, then when!

A lot of the pillars were here, too.

Grax, Greeplox, Sampo, Old Slave. Old Slave moved around speedily, giving and taking orders as needed. BiggestBaddest did the most, though. The others were out there, fighting the elementals that Mark had left in his path.

BiggestBaddest, present in every single monitoring goblin, suddenly stopped monitoring the situation. He turned, and every single person at every station turned. The room fell silent. BiggestBaddest bowed at someone. Who was he—

Wongod had arrived.

He was a perfectly normal goblin, but he could be unnoticed when he wanted to be unnoticed.

Everyone suddenly bowed, including Grax.

Wongod said, "Sue for peace."

Grax clenched his teeth so hard he almost broke his fangs.

- -

"They want to sue for peace?! Now?!" Empress Cataclysm said, scoffing. "KILL THEM ALL."

Emperor Salvation hmm'd.

Cataclysm eyed Salvation, and then she took a breath. "Would there be a better course of action?"

Salvation easily said, "The goblins have been building up for centuries and then the Reveal came and their tools for destruction turned truly insidious. Being able to attack through an AI's internet connection? That's not novel, but actually succeeding at that —for even such a short time as they were successful— is a vulnerability that United Sapients will be correcting as soon as possible, I am sure. I am also sure they have a great many other tricks, and I would like to see them. And so, letting Mark invade Goblinhome is a good thing for Aluatha.

"We won't be able to kill all of the goblins, though.

"4,000 years of history have taught us that much. So an invasion with the goal of infrastructure removal would do a great deal more long term damage than trying to actually kill them. Even if Mark can only go along the border, that would be fine. He can leave the major cities alone.

"In addition, think of all the metal he's gathering. A thousand million tons of steel, copper, titanium, and otherwise is truly useful, not to mention all of the adamantium that the boy will take from the goblins, by way of his kaiju. Perhaps the death metal kaiju is also gathering mithril and otherwise? We will, of course, allow the boy his own adamantium, and whatever other adamantium his elemental might gather, but we're taking all of the rest. And so, I approve of the continuation of this action, as per Second Princess Walaria's suggestions toward infrastructure removal.

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

"We can agree to peace, though, if they would accept some new terms.

"These are the new terms of peace:

"Move out of the way and let Mark take everything he wants. Evacuate the cities. Evacuate the lands. Let the kaiju march unimpeded and let Mark return unmolested. If they get in the way, then they die, and that is that."

Cataclysm nodded as an empress does, and then she calmly conveyed Salvation's rule to the Empire, to all who may be listening, "Leave them nothing but mulch and rocks and bring that metal to the homeland!"

- -

The sun rose on the lands of Goblinhome.

Mark had marched across the border for the last several hours.

The mood in Hive was disastrous.

Grax stood hateful, to the side, the light barely moving around his body. He had regained some measure of control and he could act at about a distance of 10 meters, if necessary. But he was not able to be the Light for Goblinhome. Greeplox had already told him, after he was struck the first time, that it would take him a while to recover. Tormpol was still only at 60% from Mark tagging him, but at least Tormpol could charge up bolts for a while and aim them across the entirety of Goblinhome.

Grax was still mostly impotent.

BiggestBaddest was overseeing the whole event from all of his bodies, organizing defenses where he could, his voice overlapping with itself as he spoke into mics and listened to outposts as they were shredded from the land. Some goblins wanted to fight Mark when they saw how powerful he was. Those goblins were now dead, and they were not the kinds of goblins that could revive that easily. Wongod might bring some of them back, but probably not. Grax had seen BiggestBaddest throw down more than one headset today. It was not a good look.

BiggestBaddest was also a part of the communication network with Aluatha, and those parts of him were discussing the politics of it all with the gathered Elders. The Elder Goblins' voices rose and fell as anger and worry, rage and caution, warred in their gathering.

Grax, Greeplox, and Sampo stood apart from all of that.

Wongod also stood apart, but on the other side of the room. The only one near him was BiggestBaddest, who was answering questions for Wongod. Grax could not tell what they were saying at all. No one could. Not unless Wongod wanted those words to be heard.

Still, everyone could see them. They could see the quiet talking. The humming. The nodding. Those two took up a lot of space, just standing there, to the side.

The Elders' argument filled up all of the remaining space in the Hive.

Wongod was listening to the arguments, and also to BiggestBaddest—

Greepolx said, "I think they're reaching a decision."

Sampo sighed, "Capitulation."

Grax almost felt his teeth crack as he bit down hard on nothing at all. He glared, saying, "This is not over."

"Of course it is not over," Greeplox said, "I doubt the Black King can truly control that thing he made, and when he tries he will fail."

Sampo scoffed. "It is foolish to hope that a competent enemy makes a mistake, but the mistakes of fellow goblins always hold true." He snapped, "We could have avoided all of this if Tormpol would have held back his strike."

Greeplox hummed. "Perhaps, yes, hoping for the Black King to make mistakes is improper. What else can we do?"

"Counterattack," Grax said. "Right now. Go to Total War, right now. They were always going to come in and fuck up Goblinhome, so—" Grax got mad, now. He raised his voice. "We counterattack! Right now!"

Attentions turned toward him. One Elder at first, and then another. Hive was still full of arguments and yelling.

Grax yelled louder, "Everyone shut up!"

More and more people looked his way, and silence soon reigned. BiggestBaddest continued to organize Goblinhome's response in the background, trying to keep various forces alive and to keep the personnel damage to a minimum, but he watched, too. There was no stopping the metal kaiju, though. It was all BiggestBaddest could do to keep important goblins from killing themselves.

So Grax needed to make more powerful goblins.

Grax vibrated the light, speaking far beyond the room, saying, "We were never going to save Goblinhome in the event of Total War. We were always going to do as goblins always have done! Run and scatter and Bite, Bite, Bite. Spread and surround. Return and conquer! Wave after wave of death would bring us life and buy our futures! Goblins die, but we also LIVE AGAIN. So I say we go to WAR!" Grax declared, "TO WAR!"

Another goblin took up the chant, "WAR!"

Another five goblins yelled, "WAR!"

Someone tried to say 'no', to decry the whole thing as wasteful.

But Grax drowned them out, his voice reaching everywhere in the Hive, and then his injured Power suddenly healed, and Grax roared out to the world,

"WAR!"

But BiggestBaddest was silent.

Wongod simply watched, eyes focused on Grax.

And then Wongod said, "No."

All other sounds ceased to be.

"AhhhhHHHHHH!" Grax broke whatever quiet magics infused the air, roaring, "WHY! WE MUST FIGHT! WE MUST WAR!" Grax charged Wongod, roaring, "WHY NOT NOW?!"

Wongod was a physical match for Grax.

Wongod outstripped him in every other possible way.

Grax knew not to actually press a fight, so he did not. He merely waited, furious, venom dripping down his lips, to sizzle green on the ground of Hive.

Wongod spoke again, through the roots in the walls, through the concrete and the dirt, through the very air itself and the light of dawn outside, "We have not had enough time to prepare. We have no true standing army. We have few generals. We have no dragons or archmages, either, as per agreements made after the Reveal. We need all of that, for BiggestBaddest cannot do everything. Not in truth. Not anymore. We must prepare more than this, and it cannot be done here.

"We will be repositioning to D'Australia.

"Grax, you will be our General of the Armies.

"But only if we flee with enough resources intact."

Grax's eyes went wide, and his fangs dripped. It wasn't war. But it was the right direction. It was as much as he could hope to get from Wongod. Grax bowed his head as he knelt on the floor, saying, "Wongod."

BiggestBaddest bowed in every body he had, and soon everyone else followed.

Wongod commanded Goblinhome, "We are evacuating. Take what you need to prepare for a trip to D'Australia. And when you have gathered what you need…" Wongod commanded, "Rip and tear into the walls. Bite the metal you find. Bleed on the metal you find. Kill the lessers of you and spill their blood on the metal. And Witches! You know what I want. Use the humans; they will fulfill their purposes in other ways. As the scion has targeted us, we will target him in return, and he will be one of us, and whatever he did to Goofy he will do for us all."

Greeplox and Sampo roared in unison, the air vibrating with their wyrd power.

BiggestBaddest went to work, orders changing across Goblinhome.

And Grax grinned.

Wongod's voice was terrible and full of power as he said, "Pull yourself together and delay the young scion until the witches can work. Aim for subjugation. Twist the Wyrd and make him ours. And then we flee, with our new pillar flying with us."

"Yes, my god!"

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