Welcome to Fareast. What is the Fareast, you ask?

Well - it’s a village,

surrounded by miles of thick pine woods. In this village lived many strange beings from
strange places - beings who did not belong in the human world. Fareast was
surrounded by forests and pine woods. Its outskirts were defined by otherworldly
barriers, their origin unknown to anyone. The village was sealed tight by an enclosed
dome. Nothing got in or out. However, this didn’t have much significance to Fareasts’s
residents. The barrier kept them safe, it kept them happy, that’s all.

The happiness in Fareast was due to many elements. For one, the residents of
Fareast had no need to gather any resources- other than food. Trees were not chopped
down and valuable minerals were left alone. Nobody cut down forests or mined the
rocky hillsides. They were able to acquire everything from ancient methods, some called
it magic.

Now, humanity may have been excluded from the village, but there was an
exception. There was one particular human that was rumored to live in Fareast. He was
a mysterious, fairly odd fellow, known only from the elders’ stories. His name was
believed to be Jimbo Wagglebean. However, no one had ever witnessed his presence.
The legends claimed he was an old wizard, tall and mighty. Regardless, Jimbo’s origin
was truly a mystery, even in the legends, he’d been there since the beginning, many
believed he’d be there until the end.

One day, a little goblin man was doing his daily chores. He was known as a
merchant, not a very successful one, but a happy one nonetheless. He survived by
collecting mushrooms and selling them at the markets. This goblin’s name was Grendel,
he was thin and bony. He preferred peace and quiet to the stereotypical loud ways of
his kind. He was unlike other goblins, he was kind, careful, lived a routine lifestyle.
Grendel avoided any sort of adventure, taking the same routes every day. His lifetime
career of selling mushrooms had fulfilled all of his desires, and he had no intent to
change.

Grendel lived on the outskirts of Fareast, near the barriers. He wasn’t exactly
wealthy, so he traveled into town, to the markets, in order to sell his mushrooms. It
didn’t matter much to the young goblin anyways. Grendel appreciated what he had, life
was luxurious to him.
On his routine journeys, Grendel noticed something strange. He was getting less
mushrooms, and less customers. He was suddenly missing things, almost as if he had
misplaced them. Something was off.
On the seventh day of the first full moon, Grendel came across a completely new
object. A hole. It was as if the ground had suddenly been deleted. ​This didn’t exist
before,​ he considered. He knew that there was a tree present where that hole was now.
This hole was far too deep to have been made by any tree roots. Something was
changing, and quickly. It wasn’t right.
 Fearing this mystery, Grendel fled with what he had, off to the village market.
That afternoon, he did not manage to sell any mushrooms. There was nobody there to
sell any mushrooms to.
Grendel noticed something then. He was completely alone. Fareast was a ghost
town. There was nothing to be seen in the market, the village had been abandoned.
This is wrong, ​he thought. Grendel scurried off, going back out to the very spot
he had found the hole. He had grown a fear for all this change. This was not right. It was
not the routine. The outskirt woods felt suddenly insecure, eerie. The trees were
different now, unwelcoming, unfriendly. The hole threatened him with uncertainty. He
was so afraid, he just ran.

Having trusted his gut, he noticed that everything was changing, quickly. The
barrier was no longer visible. Everything was dark. The trees were suddenly dying,
falling apart. Grendel could not outrun this change, he wasn’t ready to leave what he
had behind. He ran with all he had, until the world fell around him.

Splash​. The goblin landed in a somewhat shallow lake. Had it been any deeper,
he would probably have died. He must have fallen through the ground. Grendel stood
up and took notice of the pitch black darkness. Yet, he knew where to go, and pushed
through the pitch black of the chamber. All he wanted at the moment was to turn things
back to the way they were.

Unsurprisingly, in this moment of need, the wizard himself, Jimbo Wagglebean,

showed himself. It so turns out, he was a meagerly sized wizard slightly taller than
Grendel. Unlike the legends - Jimbo was an old, frail wizard, his back went out many
eons ago. He used his staff as a cane, navigating the darkness with a bright gem
meticulously placed at the tip. Grendel’s splashdown had the wizard surprised,
concerned, even. The heart of an old wizard like Jimbo wasn’t ready for such surprises,
much how Grendel wasn’t ready for change.

The goblin was unprepared to see the legends come true, even when they
weren’t true. This old wizard was hopeless, there was no possibility of this dusty old
man sending him back home. ​Was he even a wizard?​ He looks like an old gnome.
Considering his name, no wonder he’s been hiding down here all this time.​
Wagglebeans,​ he thought, ​what human names their kid Wagglebeans?​ ​Jimbo
Wagglebeans!?​ He was thouroughly dissappointed, but had nowhere to go.
The wizard was his last chance.

Wagglebean looked at Grendel, and smiled. “Finally.” He says to the goblin.

“Someone has finally come down here to meet me. Would you like an autograph, little
one?” The old wizard couldn’t swallow his euphoria, grinning like a madman. Now, the
goblin wasn’t quite used to an old human smiling him, so this was pretty for out of his
comfort zone. It was some time before the wizard finally let him go from his sight, now
with a stern look on his wrinky face, mostly hidden behind a long white beard.

“What have you come down here for, youn’n?” Wagglebean asked. Grendel
didn’t have much of a response to the somehow expected question. He shrugged,
overcome with uncertainty. Honestly, he didn’t want to be close to the wizard. Grendel
thought for a moment, and finally stated with confidence, “I have a problem.”
Jimbo was dumbfounded, finding the goblin’s sudden outburst to be quite
astonishing. He had believed himself to be a legend, but this goblin would not even
address him by his title! ​This would do​, Jimbo thought. ​This goblin could be the key to
everything!​ His conscience was clear, the little green guy would be his puppet.

Grendel took an uncanny notice of the wizard’s bipolarity. He was as comical as

he was serious. He wondered if it was the isolation, stuck down here in this cavern for
all of these years? Maybe even decades? Centuries? He was tempted to flee, but there
was no choice, the only way out was to follow.

Jimbo wanted to know more about the goblin. He took a good look at him,
observing his characteristics. Compared with even with his own height, the goblin was
astonishingly short. He considered the peaceful mannerisms, despite the panicked
attitude. ​This one was different. ​He thought, ​maybe he is the right one​. “Right’o, then.”
He said, mostly to himself. “What is your name, greenie?”, he asked. “Grendel”,
responded the goblin. Jimbo thought, ​that’s a very nordic name.​ Grendel was different,
unlike any other of his past subjects. It was time to take him deeper. He raised his staff,
pointing it to the skies of the cavern, and he slammed it down with a loud crack.

Grendel was abruptly thrown to the ground after the wizard pulled his magic. This
was far too extreme for him, he had no clue where he was going, only that he was going
deeper. Thuds echoed, the thundering roar of the ground suddenly filled Grendel’s
eardrums. The floor was falling, quickly, it was falling faster than he, and soon he was
levitating. The wizard flew next to him, laughing, “It never gets old!” Grendel wasn’t sure
whether to share in the wizard’s deranged golly or if he should panic. Something about
this whole scenario wasn’t right. He remembered his purpose, and this joyride wasn’t it.
He needed to fix things.

The floor started slowing down gradually and allowing them both to land. They
arrived to a library. Grendel was astonished. The library consisted of massive aisles of
colorful books in all directions were hidden down here. The library was grand, well lit,
and incredibly well maintained. The aisles gleamed and the floors sparkled. A surprise
hidden deep underground. Grendel was shocked, he could not see the end of any aisle.
The whole of Fareast was built above this archive, nobody had ever seen it before him.
​ he very thought scared him.
He was the first to discover this. How can he be the first? T
 Jimbo rushed off into one of the many aisles, no longer paying much attention to
Grendel. He was in a hurry, and as a result, he pushed off deeper into the library
without much attention to Grendel. The goblin decided to follow suit, not having much
choice in the matter.

After a long time of walking, trying to keep up with the speedy wizard, Grendel
noticed the books and archives of the library changing. They were darker, worn out. The
books had changed from the colored bindings to faded black ones. The welcoming,
grand aura of the library had transformed to an uninviting darkness. The shelves were
dark, worn and many had cobwebs.

Jimbo stopped walking suddenly, causing Grendel to collide into him. He turned
around to face the goblin, and boomed, “This is the Archive. It supports all the living
beings of Fareast. No book may ever leave this place. These books are all bound
together.” Grendel looked at the books on the aisles that surrounded him. Astonished,
he saw one that had a faded green cover. Unknown characters were written in golden
stitch. He took the book and opened it to reveal enscriptions, mos of which he could not
comprehend. “What is this?” he asked with concern.

The old wizard looked at him with the darkest look man can give. “This.” He
sternly stated, “This is…. ….power.” He took the faded green book from Grendel’s
hands and stuffed it into his old grey robes. “Soon, all of these books will burn. If the
archives are destroyed, Fareast is-” He stopped before he could finish his sentence,
choosing not to inform the young goblin of the dark truth. ​These books control his very
existance. I made these books, I made this power, and I intend to destroy it. Fareast will
grow too strong for its own good.

The sudden introduction of a new theory was confusing. If books supported all
the life, and they were the very base of power. If they controlled existence, everything,
even, then the one who controlled them must be very powerful. Perhaps Grendel had
underestimated the wizard.

Grendel noticed the wizard taking a moment to think. He used that time to look at
another book. He noticed the book slowly crumbling away as he touched it. All of the
books were centuries old, many of them poorly preserved, turning into dust.

“I know what you must think, young goblin,” the wizard said quietly. “These books
span many…​ other ​worlds, not just this one.” Concerned, he pointed out, “This is the
only remaining archive across this timeline. The rest of them have all been destroyed by
catastrophic events. The power present in these archives holds the ability to travel, not
just through worlds, but through ​time and dimension.”​ Jimbo carried on, “One of these
dimensions has a problem. Something is actively burning every archive. It is collapsing
the very existance of​ everything.​”
 Grendel wondered why anything would do such a thing. As he was about to ask,
Jimbo carried on, “An old wizard wants to destroy it because of the power it contains.
He wants to destroy me. He wants to destroy​ you.”​ Jimbo looked at Grendel, and
resumed, “I have chosen you to help me fight. He will come here soon.”

Grendel was shocked. ​He​ was supposed to fight someone who was a destroyer
of worlds? Putting it that way, Grendel felt powerless. He had no way to fight, no
training, no weapons, no armor. He was about to ask Jimbo what the plan was, but the
wizard had vanished. Grendel was alone with the books.

The goblin was unsure what he was to do next. The gravity of his situation was
unprecedented. If he chooses to flee, he dies along with the whole world. If he fights, he
takes the weight of the world on his shoulders. He doesn’t even know how to fight.
There is no winning in this situation. Maybe exploring could help him find the answers
he so dearly desired. So, he kept walking down the aisle, noticing the books became
older, some shook dust off as he walked by. A few books were torn, others in absolutely
decrepit condition. Other books were basically dust. Grendel took notice of one
particular archive, placed very high up in the aisle. This novel was tainted red. Grendel
could just barely see it, but he knew he had to get it.

The goblin began his climb, pushing upwards. He managed to climb all the way
up to the archive, and pulled it out. He heard voices, faint voices, coming from the
bloodstained pages. He muttered to himself, opening the novel, and was thrusted off the
shelves by the sheer strength of the pages. They screamed at him in anger and pain.
The archive fell down, hitting the floor and dissolving.

“Mongrel!” roared Jimbo as Grendel hit the ground. “You just took off! You even
managed to destroy an archive!” The aisles shook, and then Grendel noticed. This
place was actually alive. Every single archive had a heart and soul. The books were
alive. He had just taken a life. The gravity of his crime hit hard, how was he to kill his
supposed enemy and carry that weight? He couldn’t even destroy a book without feeling
bad.

Jimbo picked Grendel up from the ground and brushed him off, pardoning the
murder. “Come now, we must protect these archives, not destroy them.” He took off,
traveling deeper into the darkness of the aisle. Grendel followed, now unsure whether
the wizard was to be trusted. He had just comitted murder, purely by accident, and to
Jimbo it meant nothing.

Further down, Jimbo began to pick books out of the shelves. Many of these
books have not been for a long time. They were covered in a thick layer of dust. After
collecting twenty or so, the grey wizard set them down in a stack. He climbed to the top,
and once again, raised his staff. Smashing it down onto the books, he blinded Grendel.
 Temporarily blinded, Grendel noticed something strange. His body felt heavy, he
had lost his ability to move. He was surrounded by darkness yet again. Far above him,
he could see the same hole he just jumped through. Complete darkness took even that
from him.

The young goblin jumped out of his bed. ​What a strange dream, ​he thought. To
think that he could ever meet Jimbo Wagglebean. Grendel followed his routine, he got
dressed, stepped ou-

There was no outside. There was nothing. No pine forests. No tall grasses. No
welcoming flowers. Not even a mushroom. What he had just experienced was real, and
something had gone horribly wrong.

Grendel’s world was taken away by confilict he had little to no involvement in. He
had been dragged into the end of his own world. Grendel was a refugee in a war that
was not his, he would not survive.