Work wasn’t so bad. I liked it better than school, at least. I’d thought, early on, that I’d miss all the free time I used to have, but that didn’t really happen. Sure, I missed being able to watch anime and eat junk food, but when meals came I was so starving even the slop tasted like the best thing on earth. When the sun set, flopping down and going to sleep was the best thing in the world. I remembered what Grub had said about freedom and stuff, and decided to save up most of my experience points too. I didn’t even take the one day a week for better food and shelter like Grub did. It was all the same to me. Of course, I was smart enough to make sure to save a bit in case my pick needed replacing.

Weeks passed. I got to know a lot of the other slaves. Some were nice enough. Others were just bullies who tried to use their being-much-larger-than-a-goblin-ness to get me to do their work. A smack from Grub and a warning that I was his bitch usually sent them packing. What a sweet guy.

One day as I received my daily experience point, my arm vibrated a bit harder than normal and light flashed briefly around me. Grub raised his eyebrows. “You leveled, Bitchard!”

“Huh?” I turned my warty hand palm-up, summoning my Hero Core.

HERO Core v4321.61.7.5.34 || Pritchard || Lv 1 Goblin Classless || 0 EXP / 0 GP

STR 9 || CON 7 || DEX 12 || INT 14 || WIS 8 || CHA 6 || 1 Attribute Point Available

“What!?” All my hard-earned experience was gone! All that work for nothing! Weeks of my life down the drain. What if my pick broke right then? What would they do to me? I hastily checked my tool, breathing a sigh of relief that it seemed in fairly good condition. Well. I’d just have to work longer and build the experience back up. At least I’d gotten an attribute point from it. Maybe I could increase my Strength and make the work a bit easier.

My Hero Core began to blink, catching my attention. Grub was saying something about disabling automatic leveling, which was interesting, but not as much as the text blinking on my core’s translucent, holographic display.

=Primary Class Selection Available=

Barbarian (13 CON Suggested)

Cleric (13 WIS Suggested)

Fighter (13 STR Suggested)

Rogue (13 DEX Suggested)

Sorcerer (13 CHA Suggested)

Wizard (13 INT Suggested)

Interesting. Looked like a set of pretty classic, er, classes. Notably stuff like Bard, Monk, Paladin, and Ranger were missing. I wondered if they were subclasses or if they just didn’t exist in this world. “Hey Grub,” I said, “what class are you?”

He grunted, and showed me his core.

SLAVE Core v4165.32.14.59 || Grub || Lv 6 Ogre Excavator || HIDDEN

“Good Slave Class,” he said. “Bonus to sand dug. Bonus to find treasure. Proficiency for digging tools. But low level fifty cap.”

“Huh,” I said. “Have you found any treasure?”

He counted on his fingers. “Three gems. Traded to Slave Core for experience. Excavator good class. Grub highly recommend.”

Interesting. Not that I could actually choose Excavator, but for a Slave Class it didn’t sound too bad. “What happens if you reach level cap?”

“Start fresh for Prestige Class. Better abilities, higher cap. Or reset class, get feat. Feats very useful. But Grub no recommend levels. Tell core “no accumulate experience,” or will take all work experience. You never leave here then. Grub thought Bitchard knew all this.” His eyes narrowed. “Grub thought to level Strength and rebel one day. Grub was fool. Should have saved experience to buy freedom. Bitchard no make Grub’s mistake.”

“Well I appreciate the explanation. Don’t worry, I don’t intend to level any more.” I disabled, leveling, banished my Hero Core and started walking toward the food line before it grew too long. I thought a lot that day, and that night, and the next few days, about what class I should pick. Each class suggested a primary attribute score of at least thirteen, and each also had a brief description of their abilities and features. Each sounded pretty useful and interesting.

The logical thing would be to choose Rogue or Wizard, of course. I could use my one attribute point to raise Dexterity to the suggested thirteen, or to boost Intelligence to a relatively high fifteen. But all the classes sounded pretty awesome. Sorcerers could sort of make up the rules of their magic instead of using predetermined spells like Wizards and Clerics did, and both Fighter and Barbarian were really good at smashing things in their own right. As a Barbarian I could even fight naked if I wanted to, though I’d be restricted to pretty simple weapons and wouldn’t have access to the anime-level fighting maneuvers of a Fighter. And of course Rogues were great at stealing, sneaking, and assassinating. I might be able to escape the sand mines just by leveling Rogue a few times and using my abilities to sneak away. Then again, the slavemaster and a lot of the guards were werewolves, so they could probably just pick up my scent.

All the classes were good choices, but none of them really stood out to me right then. Well, I had all the time in the world to decide.

One day as we were digging, I felt a tremor in my wrist and yelped, almost dropping my pick. “What? Did I get another experience?”

Grub laughed. “SIlly Bitchard, you never worked hard before in life? Exercise experience hidden attribute. Bitchard gained point of Strength from work. Must have baby strength to level from so little.”

I popped up my Hero Core. Sure enough:

HERO Core v4321.61.7.5.34 || Pritchard || Lv 1 Goblin Classless || 8 EXP / 0 GP

STR 10 || CON 7 || DEX 12 || INT 14 || WIS 8 || CHA 6 || 1 Attribute Point Available

“Woah!” I flexed my still-flabby, still-green arms. “That’s awesome. I bet I can dig even faster now!” If I could get my sand quota done even faster every day, I could spend the remaining bit of time helping Grub use his Treasure Excavation ability to try to find treasure. It was a slim chance, but he’d offered to split experience rewards fifty-fifty with me somehow if I helped him. Enthused at the idea, I raised my now-seemingly-lighter pick and slammed it into a crack in the wall, expecting some bits of sandstone to fall away as I pried at it.

Instead, with a light hissing sound, a stream of fine sand began to trickle from the crack. I frowned. “Hey Grub, is the sand supposed to be…”

Grub bellowed and threw himself at me as the crack splintered suddenly wider, and with a sound like thunder mixed with a roaring river the tunnel began to collapse around us. My ogre companion had pushed me out of the way, but the rising sand was almost to his waist. He threw me over his shoulder and began to wade as stones fell from the ceiling around us and the wave of sand that had been waiting for a path of least resistance for who knows how long torrented at our backs.

I could hear Grub choking as fine dust blew around us in clouds, and though my own lungs hurt I could think of nothing but panicked fear. The light of the tunnel’s entrance was close now. Just a few more yards…

A section of the ceiling fell on us and broke upon Grub’s back. With the last of his strength Grub hurled me toward the entrance, and I screamed as I was pelted by stones and buried up to my shoulders in sand. “Help us!” I screamed. “Someone, please!”

There was a commotion outside. The slavemaster shoved his head through a hole in the collapsed entrance and saw me buried there. “Hold on. We’ll get you out. Who else is in there with you?”

“Grub, the ogre, he’s—” I heard a scraping at my back. I twisted my head as much as I could, and saw an arm sticking out from under some rubble, twitching and grasping and clawing at the sand. “Grub!” Gruuuuub!” It stopped moving. “GRUUUUUUUB!”

It took hours for them to dig us out. I was kind of surprised they even bothered. Like, the overseers had definitely treated us better than I would have had any reason to expect, but still. We were slaves.

I didn’t look back at Grub’s arm. I just kept my head focused ahead. I’m not too much a man to admit I was bawling my fucking eyes out. When I had been extracted, two werewolves went in with a big plank to leverage the rocks off Grub’s body. They had to partially transform to gather enough strength, hair sprouting all over and muscles bulging. I almost threw up when they dragged Grub out and flopped him onto the ground under the pale moonlight. His skin nearly glowed in the light, and after the slavemaster closed Grub’s eyes, my friend almost looked like he was sleeping, were it not for the caved in ribs, shattered legs, and blood crusted around his mouth.

When they stepped aside, I hobbled over to Grub’s body, and fell to my knees at his side. “He pushed me out of the way,” I whimpered. “He threw me. I’m only alive because he threw me.”

The slavemaster stood beside me, and I was shocked to see sadness in his eyes. “We’re all slaves here,” he growled. “We all look out for each other, as it is. Grub was a good man, for a slime-bellied ogre.” He glanced down at me. “Sorry, kid. It happens. We’ll bury him in the morning.” And the werewolves began to disperse. The ordinary slaves had long since departed.

I put my hand on Grub’s arm. It was cold. But then a window appeared above his chest, startling me.

The Owner Of This Slave Core Has Designated You As Inheritor

Take Inheritance: 582 EXP / 4 GP

I gasped, and my heart began to pound, and it had nothing to do with the kind, final gift my friend had given me. The window had reminded me of something. I still hadn’t chosen my class. I quickly flipped open my Hero Core and with trembling fingers selected the “Cleric” class option. A description window popped up, the same one I’d read a half dozen times now.

Clerics are agents of the gods and other divine beings who govern reality. They invoke divine energy to heal wounds, cure diseases, break curses, pronounce blessings, and shine light in the darkness. They wield heavy weapons and armor, but are prohibited from wielding edged weapons. As they regularly communicate and curry favor with their deities, clerics possess the authority to invoke miraculous events in times of need. Some clerics of legend have even raised the dead to life.

Firmly, I pressed on the Class Select button, and my world became dark. A mass of stars swirled around me, then, but they didn’t seem to cast light on anything. A voice boomed in my head. A CLERIC MUST FOLLOW A DEITY OR SPIRITUAL MASTER, it said. WHO DO YOU SERVE, PRITCHARD OF EARTH?

“Whatever power brought me to this world, listen to me!” My shout rang through the nothingness, and some strange movement stirred in the great beyond. “Fate, or God, or whatever you are, you chose me to come here for a reason! I’m not dead like all the others because you’ve got some purpose for me, right? Or was this all just a big joke!” I looked around, but nothing answered me. I lowered my voice. “Please. Grub’s the only person who’s been kind to me in this shithole of a world. You clearly want me to do something for you. Bring Grub back and I’ll do whatever you want.” I raised a hand. “Promise.”

The stars shifted and formed into a face, and I flinched away from it. But the face grew smaller—or was it just further away?—and was attached to a body with many arms and legs. The face itself seemed to have no features, but it was as though eyes and a nose and a mouth were there somewhere just outside the corner of my eye.

"Thou seeketh to extract a promise from me, human?”

“Who are you?” I asked, heart pounding.

It seemed to smile, though I could still see no mouth. “Fate, or God, or whatever I am. I have brought thee to this world, human. I have indeed a role for thee in the cosmic game of which thou could’st never know.”

“Oh?” I shrugged my knobby shoulders. “Gonna be kinda hard to do that with this pathetic body, don’t you think? The Dark Lord said if I was supposed to be anyone special I’d have been incarnated in a better body.”

“For the Child of Red to allow thee to exist unmolested, suspecting nothing, it was necessary thou incarnate into the form of a goblin, the most pathetic of the creatures of Evil. Thou art weak, and cannot threaten the Child of Red, and yet are Evil, and so he hath no reason to kill thee out of turn.”

Child of Red? Interesting title for the Dark Lord. I supposed what the… being… said made some sense. Didn’t make my life with a tiny wiener any more palatable, though. “All right. Sure. Like I said, I don’t care what you want me to do. I’ll do it, but bring Grub back.” I hesitated. “C-can you do that?”

“Human, if thou knew what I can and cannot do, thou would weep for fear and for pity. If thou wish it to be so, we may contract in this manner. Know only that things will be set in motion this night that cannot be undone, if thou chooseth this condition. I ask instead thou choose a treasure, an omen, a power or portent of brighter days that thou may hope in the coming darkness. Choose any such thing and I will grant it, and it will be for better than this.”

“No.” My voice was firm, resolute.

The being laughed. “And so shall it be.”

The world flashed into being around me again, and in my hand was a brand of light, and around my brow was a crown of fire. I was seeing myself from a distance away, and in the light of my hand and my crown and of the moon above, a halo of radiance illuminated the canyon for a great distance. My slave robes flapped in a howling wind, and the werewolves were running back to us. I had awakened many of the slaves, and they were rising, and rubbing their eyes, and looking on in awe from wherever they had been sleeping on the canyon floor.

Eleven points of light in a circle sprang from Grub’s chest, and began to connect with lines that formed a star or knot. I saw myself open my mouth, and raise my hands to the air, and the voice that boomed from me was not my own. “Come thou from the shadowed halls, Gu’rrub, son of Ho’rrof, son of Re’rris! Come thou on the lines of the sun to the land of living things! Be thou remade!”

And fire sprang then from my hands and mouth, and flowed into all the holes in Grub’s head. He began to twist and writhe and roar, and then sat up and took in the deepest breath I’ve ever seen a creature breathe.

And I was in my own body then, and had my arms around him, and was crying, and Grub was embracing me in return. “Bitchard,” he said. “Bitchard, I back, I back!”

Behind me the werewolves were snarling and barking at each other with fearful and angry tones. I ignored them, pulling back from my friend and laughing up at the sky, at whatever power had tried to kill us both and failed.

And then with a cracking bolt of black and reddish lightning, the Dark Lord was there, and he looked pissed.