Flotsam

It is said that there is a perfect home for everyone in the Kytaran Sea, some island that would appear to have been specially built for the purpose of housing the lost, if only one were to look hard enough. This very well may be true of most of the peoples of the Gadrian Material Plane, but if there was one group of people so maligned by the universe that they truly did not have a home, it would be goblins. The villains of children's story books could be said to have fared worse than any during the centuries long Nightmare War, and even during the times before. Goblins have always been a staple slave fodder in dark elf, orc, demon and dragon armies, and when left to their own devices they don't seem to fare much better. Needless to say, goblins pushed to flee the Ikaran supercontinent have more than a little mistrust of the other sapient races, and the idea of permanently settling anywhere out in the open, as all islands are by definition, leads goblins to pursue other kinds of shelter.

Flotsam is a massive, goblin made flotilla, consisting of parts of shipwrecks as well as native Kytaran timber of a thousand varieties, hobbled together in a thousand places. Since it first graced the endless waves of the Kytaran Sea, it has become the home of over one million goblins. It houses taverns, forges, animal stalls, hotels and many other amenities that only goblins would be so hair brained as to put on the open ocean. Even with the enormity of its scale and the chaotic nature of its inhabitants, Flotsam has managed to stay afloat for more than 150 years, and still grows ever larger with each passing moon. The fact that this floating, oblong garbage heap even exists is a testament to what limits fear and desperation can push engineering to. Even more surprising, this massive architectural feat was originally built by only handful of goblins.

Born to Die

There is not a single example among the civilized races of Ikar, races that once arrogantly called themselves the Good Races, that do not teach their children as early as possible to hate and fear the goblins. Elves, humans, halflings, dwarves and any other examples one would choose to list all have dozens of stories and cautionary tales, making goblins out to be little more than savage monsters who would kidnap or devour any lost child that didn't listen to their parents. In truth, goblins tend to be as good or evil as whoever is in control of the tribe, it just happens that the entire race is engulfed in a system of abuse and mistreatment that no goblin, or ruler of goblins has ever been of the mind to break. More wrathful races of the past, peoples such as orcs, dark elves and lycanthropes, make a habit of capturing and enslaving entire goblin tribes for use as arrow fodder in their armies. the only times those goblins manage to escape are under the leadership of some powerful, no doubt vengeful hobgoblin or bugbear, goblin subspecies born to goblin parents in times of great strife. That hobgoblin or bugbear will take the place of the free goblin band's leader once they lead the tribe to break free of their captors. But a being born from hate cannot lead a gentle life, and so, many goblins unfortunately turn into the same hateful monsters of the storybooks under the guidance of a bugbear.

Things only became worse for goblin kind at the onset of the Nightmare War, when orc kings and dark elf raiding parties raked the surface of Gadria for anything intelligent enough to hold a spear and be told to hold fast. The vast goblin tribes of the northern Ikar's Teeth Mountain range, and those of the Yellow Plains were decimated in the course of only 50 years, and less than five percent of those goblins remained free. Those that were put in chains did not have a long life to look forward to. Most were used as probing forces in the many skirmishes against humans, elves and dwarves, before dwarves lost their freedom to the human empires and elves disappeared into the Baggodh Tree. The goblin masters did not waste any valuable supplies or healing magics on wounded goblin soldiers, and instead left the miserable creatures to see to their own needs, so long as those needs could be met while fighting or on the march. As the Nightmare War raged on, the number of goblins on the surface of Gadria dwindled less than a hundred, and no creature born after that point could honestly claim to have seen one until long after the Nightmare War had ended.

In the Cracks

Those few goblins that were able to avoid the slavers noose were typically those that were small enough to hide in places that a dark elf or an orc would not think to find a goblin. In disguised hollows under huge boulders, within solid seeming tree stumps and from beneath piles of the corpses of their former kin, goblin children could escape unnoticed in the cover of night, and behind the backs of retreating armies. These newer generations, for goblins do not live longer than 50 years under the best of circumstances, had never known life outside war. Gone was the plucky ferocity of the small green folk, only to be replaced with the fear of a people hunted. However, if there is one trait that can apply to all of goblin kind, if not to all individuals, it is their ability to survive through these struggles better than any other sapient race. Goblins no longer thought to attack those people who so clearly outmatched them, and only thought of escaping this accursed land that held nothing but enemies for them. Without ever being seen by the last armies of the Nightmare War, or by the budding civilizations that came afterwards, all of the goblins fled as far as they could away from all people of sapience, most often to the southwest. They never took enough food to be noticed, they never left any tracks, and they could never be found sleeping anywhere that they could've been discovered. Under the inscrutable eyes of the Acredian Empire, and around the insatiable maw of the Shadow Accord, the goblins of Ikar conducted an organized mass exodus of the continent in complete secrecy.

Goblins took on a nautical life after enough of them had emigrated to the frozen shores south of Bone Bay. They lived in caves of hollowed out pumice, with entrances that were nearly invisible to those who did not already know where they were. Communities came into existence more out of necessity than any goblins individual desire to work together, but instead of the hobgoblins and bugbears that once ruled solitary goblin tribes, these small fishing villages were typically ruled by those goblins that were best able to provide food for the community stash. This meant that, as goblins take on the qualities of their leaders, they quickly found themselves thriving more than surviving on the fish and seaweed bounties of the Great Ocean. When coupled with the fact that this inhospitable surrogate home was so far from any sensible human communities, goblins were able to lead a quietly prosperous existence much more quickly than many of the other peoples of Ikar, who were still licking their wounds after the Nightmare War.

Goblins of the Southern Coast

The goblin fishing villages continued to thrive for decades to come after being first colonized, and the goblins enjoyed an unprecedented era of peace. They built small yet immeasurably tough fishing boats to skim the shallow waters of the Southern Coast for the fat Ice Fish on the seabed. Those goblins who did not fish built complex farms of edible seaweeds in tidepools, and many more dexterous goblins found a knack at carving scrimshaw, building crab traps and even smithing the lumps of Salt Iron that wash up on the coast's pebble beaches. Leadership in the pumice hovels soon began to lean towards the goblins with the most finely honed survival skills, and later to those that proved to be the most intelligent, and under such tutelage, every goblin became greater. More importance was placed on the individual lives of goblins, a trait that had never occurred to the quickly reproducing race, and fewer children were had per family. The million strong hordes of the time before the Nightmare War had become as much memory as hobgoblins had, as these more pragmatic modern goblins knew that a key part of their continued survival lied in being unnoticed, and that meant keeping numbers small. In the earlier days of these settlements, such precautions were seemingly unnecessary, as there were no other forms of sapient life this far south. As time moved on, however, the ravenous Acredian Empire began to spread its tendrils in every direction across Ikar, and goblins began to spot humans more and more often. No Acredian scouting party ever saw any goblins, but the naturally furtive nature of the goblins as well as stories of hiding from larger forces to ensure group survival had both been passed down through the generations. The goblins knew that it would not be long before the accursed human empire found them, and that something would have to be done to prevent that. Goblins do not keep a written history; they do not even have a written language. The identity of the goblin to first suggest escaping via the sea has been lost to the ages, but that does not mean the goblins do not remember them. According to the goblin storytellers of Flotsam, the goblin who first suggested the creation of a massive flotilla was known simply as The Clever One.

Goblins of the Sea

The Clever One, we do not know their gender because the goblin language does not differentiate between genders, even with living individuals, seemed to have been elected leader of the villages at the acceptance of their proposal Work on the flotilla began immediately. It was originally, and currently in a way, constructed of whatever meager supplies the goblins were able to find, as there were no trees growing this far south. In the end, Flotsam was created using strung together bits of driftwood, chunks of buoyant pumice and the tough, inflated bladders of the occasional seal. Over the course of around two years, more pieces would be added to Flotsam to allow for growth in population, and as materials for expansion became available. During its conception however, Flotsam needed to be ready to hold all living goblins, as well as anything they might need to survive, on the assumption that they would not find land for a very long time.

As the completion of Flotsam grew near, the Clever Ones fears of an attack came true, though not from the source the goblins had expected. More and more human scouts had been seen coming from the north, and it was to that direction that the goblins directed most of their attention, unaware of the dangers lurking to the south. A powerful elven wizard, thought to be Vormar the Merciless by most accounts, had taken notice of what seemed to be the last goblins in existence, and had begun to plot their enslavement even as they built their escape. As the fates would have it, Flotsam was to be completed the day after Vormar unleashed his draugr minions on the village, but the clever goblins had anticipated such an attack for weeks and had a plan to counter it. As far back as the first planning meetings for the flotilla, the goblins had built Flotsam to be ready to float as soon as possible, and the latter phases of construction would be dedicated to making her more comfortable. Flotsam had been ready for deployment one month into building and had spent these final few weeks tethered in the water. When the first scouts caught site of the approaching ranks of undead humans, the Goblins of the Southern Coast sprang into their evacuation plans. Lite stores of dried meats and seaweeds had been prepared ahead of time for quick stowage, and much of what was scooped up and ran inside by the fleeing goblins were tools for prolonged survival, such as fishing nets and carpentry tools. Every goblin of the village was safely aboard the fast-departing Flotsam before the first draugr arrived in the deserted village, and they did not land on another shore until long after every goblin present had long since passed on.

Life Among the Waves

At a glance, Flotsam might resemble an enormous clump of driftwood that has somehow merged together, but the constantly growing flotilla had more comforts hidden about her timbers than most monarchs of the day. The only aspects of construction left that the invading draugr had prevented was an extra set of stores for food, so the goblins needed to fish nearly constantly at first. It wasn't long before goblin children had begun to be born with magical abilities, much to the delight of their parents, who had come from lineages that had historically shunned and hated magic in all of its forms. These prejudices had been long forgotten, however, and the Goblins of the Sea saw any unique abilities as useful, and encouraged their young mages to practice their powers, carefully, for the benefit of all goblins. Soon, the goblins had created both chemical and magical means of preserving food, collecting water, and propelling Flotsam in whichever direction they wanted to sail. The goblins had finally achieved complete freedom for themselves, something none of their forebears had ever been able to accomplish. Had things continued in this manner, goblins would have, unexpectedly, become the first race of sapient creature to know total peace. Instead, the fates had decreed that the goblins must face one final hardship as a people, a hardship that came in the form of a famine.

Food stores on Flotsam were impervious to any kinds of decay, and many sections of Flotsam had been relegated for the cultivation of nutritious algae, fungi and hermit crabs, so goblins were by no means starving when the schools of fish began to disappear. In reality, this had only happened because Flotsam, under the guidance of goblins with no knowledge of geography, had drifted into the deeper waters of the Great Ocean, where there never has been any fish. Because the goblins did not know this, they believed they had merely been stagnant for too long, and that they would find other schools of fish if they would only search a little further for them. Unfortunately, Flotsam had drifted too far to the north, and the floating mound of logs had caught the attention of an Acredian Frigate, out on a deep patrol. The medium sized imperial ship had not recognized Flotsam for what it was, but the barrel man high above the deck had noted movement among the timbers, and so the captain of the vessel ordered his crew to bring them up to the thing. The goblins noted the approaching ship far too late to be able to make any rational reactions to it, though at first, they attempted to hide among the branches in the hopes that the humans would tire and wander off. The Acredian Empire is not known for leaving well enough alone, however, and the captain of the frigate ordered his mages to inspect the flotilla. The goblin mages, a demographic that now included over half of the population, felt the magical probe of the Acredians, and believed that they had already been found out. Assuming this to be some kind of attack, the goblin sorcerers each conjured walls of tremendous force between Flotsam and the Acredian ship. The walls were conjured as an ordinary wall on its side, and it was large enough to span both ships. One goblin mage had the idea to raise the wall themself, which they did by adding a caveat effect spell to the conjuration produced by their family. This only caused Flotsam to glide along the surface of the sea as a stone across ice, and at the same time, caused the Acredian ship to collapse on its side. Unbothered by the fate of their assumed pursuers, the goblins took advantage of the momentum offered to them by the walls of force and continued to push Flotsam along this path to the west, thinking that if there was fish anywhere in the sea, there was sure to be some far away from the dreaded human empire. Not many weeks after the encounter, just as the stores of food were beginning to show the bottom of the barrel, fishing lines began to catch again, and the goblins were able to dine on some of the strangest fish they had ever seen before. It would be many years yet before the Goblins of Flotsam realized that they had travelled to the Kytaran Sea, and these magically mutated fish were helping the magics that already reside in the goblins to ferment and grow ever sharper.

The Magic Within

Goblins have never been a species that has been comfortable with magic, rather, they have historically associated magic with those who have oppressed and enslaved them. Magic had not been naturally occurring in goblins before the Nightmare War, nor had there been any goblin mages while they were living on the Southern Coast. But somehow, those goblins that had been conceived after the construction of Flotsam had commenced were all born with some measure of magical ability. This conundrum has frustrated anthropologists for many years, but it has never seemed to bother the goblins of Flotsam, for even to this day, these are the only goblins left in the world. The goblins are confident that they know exactly why they gained arcane powers, as it lines up perfectly with their belief system, namely the belief that what goes around comes around, and that anything useful to one's entire tribe is a blessing. When the goblins stopped trying to fight their way out of every misery, they lost the shackles that kept them from truly existing as higher life forms, and as a species, goblins had achieved magical powers. Flotsam itself became a conduit for the magical plane, and every goblin, whose lives are forever tied to this symbol of their everlasting freedom, is granted a measure of her powers. The villains of the storybooks have at long last found the perfect niche in which to live, free, unafraid of recapture, and happy to share the seas with any who would be willing to do the same, so long as they do not come too close to Flotsam without being invited.