As the group of goblins came back to the village, they put down their bags amongst the others the kids before them placed, near the center of the village, where they were playing around.
As they gathered together, families reconnecting, a certain group of them, including one little mushroom, came together.
"Mom! You should've seen me, I was dodging everyone, no one could catch me-"
"Tag!!"
"Hey! No fair."
Pouting for a minute, before smiling widely, she ran off towards the bags in the center of the conglomerate of kids.
Lula laughed while Cari was looking warmly from behind her; he would be smiling if he had a mouth.
Before Lula headed into the masses of kids running around and playing, she took off the bag and placed it down, kneeling for a moment.
"I'm going to watch the kids for now with the others, you can do as you wish, although it might be a bit dangerous here with so many kids running around, they may not see you."
Cari nodded as he jumped off and onto the ground, re-establishing his glow, he shrunk it before as they were walking back.
'Hmmm, playing with them does sound fun, but I don't think I can keep up with this scale.'
Watching how fast they were chasing each other; what they cross in a second running takes Cari multiple seconds to just barely meet; he had some doubts if he could even keep up with their speed.
But as he watched Lula walk between the group of kids running about, he decided he wanted to do his best.
'I haven't had fun since I was jumping past those tree roots, this looks much more fun!'
He looked for one of the girls and found Lisa passing by.
He jumped up and down to signal her, tuning his glow in sync to be as attention grabbing as possible.
She walked over to him, motioning for the girl behind her a moment.
"What is it Cari?"
Motioning with his body to the kids, he did his best to convey his intent to join.
"You want to...?"
She looked towards the direction he pointed out, just seeing kids running.
Seeing her confused face, he didn't know how to communicate it, however, he thought of something.
He quickly jumped, managing to hit just above her knee, after, he quickly hopped away.
Stopping for a moment, he turned and hopped back.
Gears were working in her head till she got it.
"You want to join us! That sounds awesome!"
She turned back and yelled, unperturbed-
"HEY EVERYONE! THE MUSHROOM WANTS TO JOIN! HE'S GOING TO BE A HERB!"
Cari cocked his head to the side as some looked over, others pausing, just for a moment, before smiling wider, before focusing back on their chase.
"Similar to how we pick herbs picking, those it have to 'collect' the 'herbs', once tagged, they have to go in the pile at the center at any speed in a straight line, but if we tag anyone before getting there, they instead need to start walking towards the center, once there, your now the opposite of you were, herb to gatherer, or to herb, until there is no herbs left."
Listening attentively, the game only sounded more and more exciting.
"Good luck Cari, lets see how long you last."
She smiled mischievously as she ran off, surprising the girl waiting for her as she gave chase.
'Weird how she put it like that, it was like she was impl-'
"Behind you!"
Looking behind him, he saw a few kids eyeing him.
As for why multiple decided to chase him, he wasn't sure, as he was either exhilarated or afraid.
Kicking the dirt, they immediately tried to catch him.
~BAAAIIIII~
Whichever of the two emotions it was, he immediately acted on it, starting to jump ahead, however, they were catching up fast.
'Shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot!'
With every hop, they gained two or even three steps forward.
'They'll catch me!'
Looking around, he hoped to see something to get him out of this mess, but besides a few kids walking to the middle and others being chased, he couldn't determine anything of value.
However, luck came to his side in the shape of another kid, who, upon running up to two of the four boys chasing him, managed to tag two of them when passing.
"Tag!"
"Hey!"
"Dang it."
One immediately sought to tag back, but the kid backed off quick enough to avoid it.
The other tried tagging one of the other two he was with, succeeding, only for him to quickly tag back pre-emptively.
Leading to the three trying to tag each other repeatedly.
Cari, hardly noticed with how loud everyone was as he kept running, still hearing someone behind him.
One of the kids was still chasing him, pausing for only a moment to witness his friends caught, granting a brief respite.
Cari realized he heard less feet hitting the ground paused to look back, only to see one boy closing the distance rapidly, he continued jumping, but to the left, he was getting too close toward the center.
'The closer I am to the center, the more people tagged are there that I am close to.'
Jumping around a kid who reached down, trying to reach behind her to get him.
Seeing that, and with everything that previously happened puzzling him, Cari suddenly realized something.
"There are so little rules, but some certain unsaid ones!"
From not being able to go back, one can pause for a moment, to how a kid can tag multiple at once.
He began to see it as the others do, he even noticed how those chased often seemed to run towards the center, particularly, towards those tagged, and he got why.
"All the more risk for them to be caught, but the same goes for the gatherers!"
He immediately switched back towards running to the center, the one behind him nearly upon him.
Seeing two kids walking slowly towards the center meet, reaching to tag each other, he got confused for a second.
'Wait, what would happen if they tag each other, would they just both be free? NOT the time!'
He pushed himself to run faster, the person behind him about to be on him.
5 meters, 4 meters, 2 meters, 1...
Just as the goblin was about to tag him, reaching down, he suddenly saw two hands reaching for him.
"?!"
"Tag!"
"Tag!"
Suddenly looking ahead, he saw the batch of bags.
He tried to slow down, but he couldn't in time.
He just passed the drawn line around the herbs.
"So... close!"
~Haaaaaa~
Catching his breath for a moment before turning around, as one of the kids, a boy, ran off while the other girl began to chase him, he looked at Cari.
Staring menacingly, Cari inched backwards.
"Good job."
The teen boy commented, before running off, as gatherers locked onto him and followed.
'Forgot that he would become an herb.'
A couple of meters off from the circle, he stared blankly, he would be breathing heavily if he felt tired(and had lungs), but at most, he felt a little tired, and that was mostly in the head, his body feeling just as good as before he started running.
Before he could delve into this feeling, a kid came running straight at him.
Looking at her, he had an idea and began jumping to meet her.
Confused, the girl kept her pace, but imminently on arriving, she slowed to reach out for him, only for Cari pause a moment, squat, and jump straight under her.
Surprise across her face, she couldn't chase, instead, she picked up her pace; she was tagged.
Smug from his idea to take advantage of his height, he sat there for a moment.
Unfortunate that it bit him in the back, as the moment she entered the circle, she immediately shot towards him.
'OH FRICK, SHE WAS A HERB!'
~AIIIIIIIIII~
Cari ran as the girl was in hot pursuit, damned if she was going to fall for the same trick again, running faster than the previous boys who came after him.
Unfortunately for Cari, from both the surprise and her speed, he couldn't concoct any ideas, especially since he was running away from the center.
She reached him, and before he could jump once again, he felt a hand plant itself on his head a tad forceful.
"Tag! ~hufph~ You run- hop, quick... for a...mushroom."
Nodding his head as he actually felt a little exhausted from the surprise and panic gripping his head, going away with her releasing her hand from his cap.
She smiled as she ran off, seeing one outrun what could only be called a horde of kids.
Seeing that, he wondered why that was the case, until he saw large groups chasing after only sole individuals, only one being a duo.
'The game is almost over...wait!'
He immediately began running to the center, he didn't want this game to end without him trying to chase after another, and since there was close to no one walking to the center besides him and three others, although one of them could be a gatherer, or maybe all of them are-
'Not chancing it.'
He was the only one rushing to the middle, the others only making a crawl...
Getting there, and instantly launching back out, he found no one has gotten tagged, however, one of the groups was heading towards one of the tagged.
'It's a chance!'
He began to jump faster than he was used to, a bit unstable, but he handled it best he could, he felt he could go faster, but he hasn't really gotten used to this way of moving quite yet, only slowly getting proficient.
Seeing the kid who was running from them all pushing himself, sweat coming off his head in droves, he was wildly unfocused.
'Perfect.'
Making many small jumps, he began to accelerate even faster, rampantly getting out of control, until he couldn't handle it anymore.
At that deciding jump, he firmly landed, and used all that collected momentum to launch himself up, the first time going higher than he has before, up to the height of a kid's waist, on his next landing and jump, a chest, until...
~WEEEIIIII~
As the herb was about to pass the one tagged, who seemingly ignored him, they heard something and looked up, the wave of kids also looked.
Seeing a green light come from the sun, they were weirded out as it wasn't its common yellow, only to see the descent of a mushroom.
~HIHIHIHIIIIII~
Before the kid could stop himself, he found a mushroom on his forehead.
~ITITIITIITI~
Just as quickly as Cari landed, he jumped off.
'DID IT!'
As proud as he was scared for his life on failing or missing and hitting hard grass and dirt, Cari did his best to express himself, which was in the form was moving his head all over the place, left, forward back, right, like a little jig.
The kid still in motion slowed down as well as the others who realized what 'she' did, as well as the few others who had noticed Cari's war cry.
Standing in silence as they saw Cari dancing without care, they didn't know how to say how cool that looked.
Of course, this also was to his own misfortune.
"Tag."
Freezing mid-dance, Cari looked up to see the previously tagged, but now gatherer...that being the boy who he outsmarted before.
'...'
"Damn."
One kid even said out of the crowd.
Cari sat there to process his amazing moment, ruined, well, that was before he realized what would happen.
Instantly shooting towards the center, the other kids realized what he was doing.
"He's going to be an herb!"
In an instant, the swarm chased after Cari, as the others had already gotten caught.
The kid who Cari tagged watched them run there, only remembering to run as well after a second.
'I wonder if those tagged can chose who they want to tag, it makes sense why only they get to choose who to tag, else anyone who wanted to switch roles can just purposely tag them to free them and run over.'
He was learning to love this game more and more, it seemed simple enough on the surface, however, there were so many ways to take advantage as a herb and even one tagged, to where the game is never boring, he didn't learn enough as a gatherer, but it was worth it to do something he has never tried before, while having fun, two for one.
Cari tried his best, from jumping in odd directions, to the under ones legs trick, however, with the sheer number of individuals, some even cutting off his escape, he was tagged shortly after he made it to the circle.
"Got you! TAG!"
Holding Cari up by the stem to be seen by everyone, everyone laughed, some gasping for breath, few even laying completely in the grass in how much they pushed themselves today.
"That, was fun."
Cari was in bliss of the pure enjoyment of the game along with the kids, to let loose like this, and simply take in what he could only describe as unadulterated joy from not only this experience, but of letting go of any thoughts, to just allow yourself to mess around and relax.
He even felt that if someone were to refer to him as 'her', he'd not care.
...
Maybe.
Once over, the kids slowly walked to their homes, wishing to relax for a while.
Looking around for the girls, he found Amara looking around, only to run over to him.
"Good job Cari, for your first game, that was very well done."
~Liiiii~
Thanking her best he can, he nodded.
"The girls went home, I'm going to watch them, if you want to see my dad, he's over by the infirmary, off to its left side, Mom went to go meet with him."
Cari thought for a moment, only to remember those metal 'pipes' as Lula mentioned before, thinking he could ask about them, he made two peeps.
"Going off to see dad then? Alright, I'll see you later Cari."
She began her walk back to the house.
Watching her, he stayed for a little, going over what had happened, he wanted to make sure to remember it for time to come, once he felt he had gone over it enough, he headed there.
The village now was much quieter, although you could still hear the goblins talk to one another here and there, it was for the majority peaceful, allowing the serenity to calm his energized brain down, he slowed his pace, no longer in any rush.
However, on arriving to see a giant corpse of what looked similar to what he could only know as a pitcher plant, cut up and bundled into pieces, he unconscious got the answer to what reduced Olivia to such a state before.
Yeah, that kind of killed his peaceful mood.
'I'm still not very sure how she lost so much life energy to this, thing.'
Seeing goblins in some silver metal...clothes? Shaped around their bodies, similar to those pipes Lula mentioned, but lighter in color.
Staring at them, reflecting the sun's light, glaring into his own, he only ceased when someone approached him.
"Cari? That's your name, right?"
Looking ahead of him to see one of the goblins in front of him, he realized he zoned out.
He shook his head up and down.
"Alright, the Chieftess had mentioned you'd might come over, follow me, I'll lead you to where they are."
Following the goblin, he saw others patrol around the corpse.
Making small talk, the goblin noticed his stare.
"Quite a beast, isn't it? Gives me the willies how it looks, I can't imagine how those three managed to survive it so long till we got there in the nick of time, glad they did though, not only for their sake, but the Chief's as well, he cares for them deeply, I'm sure you know."
Looking back at the goblin, Cari nodded, before motioning towards him, well, more so mid-jump, knocking on the metal.
"You mean, my armor? Yeah, pretty cool, isn't it, can take a hit and keep going without a scratch. We trade with the nearby village, a few herbs here, near the inner-section tend to be on the more rare and potent side, along with a just selling batches of parts of the plants we don't know how to use, but it seems those humans know how-"
However, he stopped when he saw the Chief's family ahead, conversing with one another.
"Looks like we're here, welp, I'll get back to my post now, nice talking to you little shroom, hope to talk to you again."
He walked away, Cari didn't know how to express bye without being disruptive, however, thinking back to anything, using what creativity that game taught him, he had an idea.
Utilizing his light, and control of life energy, exerting it, the orbs began to appear within it, and they shaped into a relatively large hand, waving to him.
Surprised, before making a goofy smile and waving back.
Cari, feeling delight at figuring that out, turned around to meet with them.
Surprised to hear what the family was talking about