"This one ought to fetch us a pretty penny!" a man said.
"You got that right! This goblin looks like a teenager goblin, it's the perfect age for beginners to use for training!" Another man that was walking beside him replied. The two men started to walk out of the Jetai Forest whilst carrying a metal cage with a small green goblin inside.
The goblin was about 3 feet in height and wore nothing but a small brown rag over its private parts. It had a couple of scars and fight wounds on its body and was looking around itself peculiarly.
'Where... the hell am I!?' Akira thought in his head. 'Don't tell me! I've actually been turned into a goblin of all things!? The weakest most pitiful creature in any novel or story!' Akira was distressed, confused, and devastated.
Right before his transmigration, he had just bought a brand new novel that was leaving the shelves as quickly as it was released called "Title of Goblin." It was an extremely popular novel that piqued Akira's interest. On opening the book, Akira was suddenly transported into the body of a goblin that happened to be inside of a cage at the moment.
Akira decided to calm down a little bit and when he did, his senses came back to him. He felt a painful stinging sensation on his rib and arm. 'This... cuts? It seems that I've just been in a fight, it was most likely these bastards that are carrying me that cut me.' Akira thought to himself.
He was holding back the urge to scream out loud and make a scene because of the pain, he could only hold it in. He didn't want the two to notice him at all, in case they might suspect something, however, Akira soon realized that was a stupid reason to worry in the first place.
He was just a weak goblin, and from what he heard, he was being sold off to some rookie as a training partner. Of course, Akira knew that becoming this so-called "training partner" would most likely mean the end of his life. He would probably become a "first kill" and a source of experience for a rich noble who was trying to get to the top the easy way.
Before thinking of anything else, Akira surveyed his surroundings once more and tried to gain a sense of understanding of his situation. It seems that he had just been transmigrated to another planet, and since he was a goblin he could only assume that the world he had been transmigrated to was one with magic and creatures like goblins that he had seen in countless novels.
At first, the thought of a magical world excited Akira, but he soon realized that he wouldn't be able to live much longer and experience this "magical world" if things were to continue the way they were, then again, he couldn't do anything about his current situation.
He was a weak goblin compared to these humans that were at the very least stronger than him. Looking around, Akira could see that they were in a forest of some sort. Although he was starting to gain some information, he wanted to simply cry because of his situation.
'Oh god, who cares where the hell I am!? I'm going to die for fuck sake!' Akira had seen many novels and knew that he was the fated "main character" or at least something like that. If that was the case, why was he going to die with no options!?
He then stopped worrying for half a second and realized that if he was to truly be the main character, there must have been a way for him to get out of this situation. Crying and whining wouldn't help, so he started to look for something that could help him.
Almost instantly, he saw a key chain attached to the back pocket of one of the goblin hunters.
This gave Akira a glimmer of hope and a smile appeared on his face.
"Why's this goblin smiling? Does he not know his current situation?" One of the goblin hunters laughed. "He's a goblin! You expect him to have even that much knowledge!" The other one continued.
'You bastards, you will see how much knowledge I truly have!' Akira said in his mind before preparing to reach for the keys. Although he was in a cage, his scranny goblin hands could still fit through the holes of the cage.
Looking at the keychain some more, he saw 2 items on it, one was a key that was obviously for the cage, and the other looked to be a small knife. This forced Akira to stop for a moment.
A thought came into his head that he quickly froze too. An option that he thought of was to kill the goblin hunters, but he couldn't even think of such a thing before freezing on the spot. Although he had read countless novels where the main characters would kill as if it was nothing, he never understood how they could do it.
He could never become like that.
The thought was instantly discarded. His escape was what was the prevalent mission here. He needed to get those keys. Slowly, he inched his hand closer and closer to the gey chain and quickly grabbed it out of the back pocket of the goblin hunter.
'Heh heh heh, I've actually done it.' Akira thought in his mind. He quickly used the key to unlock the cage door and waited until it was the perfect time to escape. When the goblin hunters were deep in conversation, Akira tried to quietly open the door and dash out.
However, the cage door made a loud creaking sound that quickly alerted the hunters. Akira didn't care, he dashed it.
"What!?" One of the goblin hunters said as he quickly turned his head to look at the goblin cage. The door was left open and he could see the goblin running away. It had already gotten quite far.
"Let's go! We can't afford to lose this thing!" The other goblin hunter said as they both left the cage and ran after the goblin. Multiple emotions were occurring at once in Akira's head. The biggest of which was fear.
The hunters were started to close the distance between them. As Akira looked behind himself, he saw the hunters throwing multiple blades at him. He tried to dodge them since he was quite nimble, but he had no experience or strength yet, so most of them gashed him all over his body.
Akira exclaimed in pain as he continued to run. No matter what, he couldn't stop running, for if he did, it would mean his end. He had already come this far, there was no way he was stopping now.
"Dammit! We let it get away!" The hunters said as they stopped and breathed heavily. Thankfully for Akira, these hunters weren't the fittest and their cardio was horrible due to this. The hunters gave up and started walking away from Akira. As they did, the sun started to set.
Akira finally stopped himself and caught his breath, he felt like dying at the moment. His chest was in extreme pain from the non-stop running, and the number of gash marks on his body wasn't helping in stopping the pain any bit.
He found a tree to sit under as he watched the sun slowly set. After it started to turn almost completely dark, Akira decided that it wouldn't be safe under this random tree and that he had to find a cave of some sort to stay in for the night.
Thankfully, many beasts lived in caves so it wasn't too hard to find. Akira spotted a cave inside of the mountainside and headed inside. It was quite a small cave, having a 4-foot entrance and being 4 by 4 meters wide and still. It was still enough for Akira however.
The cave had some old spider webs and some vegetation growing in one of the corners of the cave.
Akira fell on his knees with his hands on the floor. The pain and suffering of this day brought on a flurry of emotions that hit Akira all at once as tear droplets started to drop on the stone floor beneath him.
Akira was sort of smiling while biting his top lip and pulling it down. He didn't know what to do. Where was his family? Would he never be able to see them again? Although he never had a good relationship with him, he still loved them.
Was this truly a world of magic? Could he achieve greatness here that he had been dreaming of his entire life ever since the age of 4?
Akira had many questions, but no answers, all he could do was wipe his tears and lay down, instantly falling asleep despite the wounds and injuries on his body.