Chapter 7

Another 230 years have gone by and a lot has happened. The goblins have constructed various settlements throughout the forest and their number have grown considerably but the goblins individually are quite weak or so I thought.

It turns out goblins also grow stronger with age.

A goblin reaches maturity at 7 year old, At the age of 50 they grow taller and reach 6 feet tall and become hobgoblin. After 150 years of age they sprout horns and reach 8 feet tall becoming ogres. Ogres have tremendous physical capabilities and have natural regenerative capability. I suspect that these ogres can further grow into something even more stronger but currently the oldest ogre is 350 years old and it seems like they can still live on long her so we'll have to wait.

Gobbo now resembles an ogre which shows that he has grown stronger as for me I have reached the length of 15 meter and I am around 1.8 meter in diameter. My head resembles a dragon, my neck also has a long feathery crest. My golden scales have become armor like plating, my back also has bone spurs sprouting out of it which continue down my tail but my body is still like a snake as I have no limbs. I have changed so much because my dragons have increased in number. There are about 1500 adults, 300 old dragons and then finally there is Tiamat who is not 500 years old and has reached a new stage of a dragon's life. She is now an elder dragon. Tiamat has sprouted 2 large Antler like horns on her head, she has reached a length of 30 meters and now stands 5 meter tall. What are the stages of a dragon's life you may wonder?

0-10 years hatchlings, Can breathe little amount of fire.

10-30 years juveniles, Can fly.

70+ adults, Can reproduce and have bronze like scales.

200+ mature adults, Have grown bone spurs on their back which continue down their tails and have iron like scales.

300+ old, Stronger scales and some scales have become fused forming armor like plating.

500+ elder, Sprouts horns which may vary in shape for individual dragon.

These are only the stages I have discovered so far and Tiamat is still showing signs of growth confirming that's dragons can grow even more powerful.

In these past years we have also come in contact with 2 new races. The first race is that of Orcs which resemble the orcs from lord of the rings and look very ugly and the second race is that of scarabs who are large sentient scorpions and the largest one which we saw was the length of 5 meters. The scarab live in the desert and their God Kharak was actually friendly towards us but the god of orcs was hostile from the beginning and led a large horde to invade the forest but it was decimated by the dragons. They didn't dare to set foot in the forest but made a fortress from stone blocks on the periphery of the eastern region of my forest.

Me along with Gobbo and Kharak have decided to form a pantheon together. Goblins get protection from dragons and in turn they help supply them with minerals from mines. The scarabs want reliable allies incase some strong enemy shows up. The Dragons are the currently the strongest followed by scarabs and lastly the goblins. This is the current ranking but the position of scarabs and goblins can change as we don't know their full potential.

The goblins having proper hands have started building temples dedicated to the me The great serpent, Kharak the scourge of Sands and Gobbo the great. All of our idols are built in a same temple to promote a sense of unity between the three races and since all of the three races are long lived and grow stronger with time they easily formed deep friendship with each other. Some scarabs even started living in underground Caverns built by dragons and the dragons have also started settling in the desert. Goblins are also building pyramid like structures in the desert. All of us 3 gods worked together to make a common language which would allow all species to communicate with each other. It took a few months and a new language was ready and we named it Dracolis.

While all of this was going on we got the news that the orcs are amassing near the eastern fort they built along with sighting of goat men. A war is suspected to break out soon.

But i'm sure that the orc god and the god of goat men Baal don't know that this time all of us are working together. But if those orcs and goat men are planning to invade my forest even after witnessing the wrath of my dragons then they most possess something that could challange my dragons. Me and my fellow gods gathered on top of Mt.Draconia .

"Should we figure out their intentions first or shall we rush them before that are prepared", spoke Kharak who looked just like a large black scorpio with spikes coming out of his exoskeleton.

" We should first talk with them to pry out some information as if they are planning an attack then they must have something that could challange the dragons and currently I am not aware of any creature that could challange an old dragon head on. " I expressed my concerns.

"Let me talk to them first, i'll pretend to be the owner of these lands. They won't consider me much of a threat and would probably slip out some information. " Gobbo declared his plan and his form shrinked down into that of a regular goblin and his aura was concealed.

When did he learnt to do that I wondered?

We agreed with Gobbo's plan. In 3 days Gobbo will visit the eastern fort.