My planet is infested with Goblins

Lord Governor Marcellan Rusk had stopped asking his clerks whether more reports had arrived. By the second morning after sending his emergency letters toward the royal capital, the answer had become predictable.

Messengers entered Eastwatch from almost every road that still remained open, some carrying sealed reports from village officials, others arriving on exhausted horses with nothing more than hurried testimony from guards, farmers, or minor nobles.

The large provincial map in Marcellan’s council chamber had become crowded with wooden markers. Red pieces indicated confirmed attacks, yellow pieces marked sightings, and black pieces represented settlements or patrols that had simply stopped responding.

What had begun with seven strange scouts outside Brackenford had spread across enough territory that the governor could no longer look at any individual marker without seeing all the others surrounding it.

General Cedric Halvern stood beside the map while another clerk read the latest letter aloud. A farming settlement had been attacked during the night. The goblins had burned buildings outside its walls, killed several guards, and withdrawn before the local defenders could organize a pursuit. The report estimated forty attackers, though the writer admitted that darkness made the number unreliable.

A second letter waiting on Marcellan’s desk claimed that a patrol had disappeared along a forest road farther north. Another described green-skinned soldiers approaching a fortified manor, observing its defenses from several directions, and retreating before the garrison could engage them.

Marcellan rubbed his eyes.

"How many reports since sunrise?"

The chief clerk checked the pile beside him.

"Nine that concern the creatures directly, my lord. Another six involve refugees, missing merchants, or roads believed to be unsafe."

Halvern glanced toward the unopened letters.

"And yesterday?"

"Twenty-three reports considered credible enough to record."

Marcellan looked at the map again. "Credible enough" had become an important distinction.

One frightened farmer claimed he had seen thousands of goblins filling the forest. Another insisted the creatures could disappear into the earth. Halvern had thrown both claims aside, but even after removing obvious exaggerations, there were too many confirmed sightings to dismiss.

A military aide entered carrying another sealed message.

"My lord, this came from a fortified estate southeast of the main road."

Marcellan held out his hand.

The report was concise. Goblins had attacked a group of laborers outside the estate, then disappeared into nearby woodland when armed retainers responded. Later that same day, another group had been seen studying a bridge several miles west.

Marcellan placed the letter on the table.

"They are everywhere."

Halvern shook his head.

"We do not know that. Maybe it’s just random parties running around."

Marcellan pointed at the map.

"Then tell me what you would call this."

"I would call it a force spreading its scouts over a large area. That does not mean every marker represents a separate army."

"That is supposed to reassure me?"

"No. It is supposed to stop us from imagining ten thousand enemies every time a shepherd sees twenty."

Marcellan walked closer to the map. The markers did not form a clean front. There was no obvious line showing an army advancing from east to west. Some attacks occurred close to roads, others near rivers or isolated settlements. Several villages had been struck only once and then ignored, while others reported repeated goblin activity nearby.

"What are they doing?" Marcellan asked.

Halvern studied the pattern.

"Scouting, probably"

The governor looked toward him.

"Scouting for what?"

"Roads. Bridges. Defenses. How quickly villages send for help. How quickly we answer. Which settlements have walls. Which roads carry supplies. Which patrols are easy to isolate."

Marcellan’s expression hardened.

"You believe all of this is reconnaissance?"

"Not all of it. Some settlements are being attacked properly. But if they wanted only to burn villages, they would not spend so much effort watching roads and withdrawing from defended positions."

This causes a headache on Marcellan more than a simple raid. Raiders could be hunted. An army deliberately scouting how his province worked represented something entirely different.

He turned toward another clerk.

"Any word from Captain Mercer?"

The clerk looked down.

"No, my lord."

The answer had become equally predictable.

Marcellan stared at him for several seconds.

"Nothing from Brackenford?"

"Nothing official."

Halvern stepped closer to the table.

"The roads near that area are clearly compromised."

"That company should have sent something by now."

"If Mercer was able."

Marcellan looked toward him sharply.

"You think Second Company is gone."

"I said nothing of the sort."

"You keep refusing to say it, which is odd."

Halvern did not respond immediately.

"We do not know what happened to them."

Before Marcellan could answer, another official hurried into the chamber carrying a badly folded note.

"This came from travelers who approached within several miles of Brackenford yesterday afternoon. They turned back after seeing smoke and armed creatures along the road."

Marcellan took the note.

"They saw the village?"

"Only smoke, my lord. They heard fighting for some time."

"How much smoke?"

"They believed buildings were burning."

Marcellan lowered the paper.

"Mercer had one hundred and twenty professional soldiers."

Halvern’s voice remained controlled.

"He also had to reach Brackenford first."

The governor understood what he meant. If the road itself had been attacked, Second Company might have entered the battle already weakened.

The thought irritated him because there was nothing useful he could do with it. Sending another company down the same road without knowing Mercer’s fate could simply repeat the mistake.

A clerk interrupted carefully.

"My lord, there are also more requests for troops."

Marcellan stared at the stack of petitions.

"Of course there are."

"One settlement requests sixty infantry. Another asks for cavalry. A noble household wants soldiers sent to protect its granaries. Several villages are asking for engineers to strengthen their palisades."

Halvern shook his head before Marcellan could respond.

"We cannot satisfy them."

Marcellan turned.

"I am aware of that."

"If we divide the remaining garrison into twenty-man detachments, the enemy will destroy them separately."

"And what do I tell the villages?"

Halvern answered without hesitation.

"Bring isolated families inside their walls. Store food. Close unnecessary roads. Stop sending five or six men into forests looking for goblins. If they have scouts, keep them near the settlement and make sure they can return quickly."

Marcellan gave him an irritated look.

"So our grand provincial strategy is telling people to hide behind wooden walls."

"Our strategy is not sending our soldiers to inevitabledeaths."

Outside the council chamber, the consequences were already reaching Eastwatch itself. Refugees had begun gathering near the city gates.

Some came from villages that had actually been attacked, carrying bundles of clothing and whatever food they could bring. Others had fled because neighboring settlements reported goblin sightings.

Rumors moved faster than official information. People claimed the eastern countryside had already fallen, that entire armies of green creatures were marching toward Eastwatch, or that the king had abandoned the province.

Marcellan had ordered temporary camps established outside the walls rather than allowing everyone into the city. Families with relatives in Eastwatch could enter after inspection, but the rest were directed toward guarded camps supplied from provincial stores.

He disliked leaving frightened civilians outside, but Halvern had reminded him that opening the gates to thousands of uncontrolled refugees would create its own danger if Eastwatch eventually came under attack.

Another messenger arrived before noon. His horse had collapsed near the gate, forcing soldiers to carry the man into the administrative district. He reported that his settlement had been struck by organized goblin infantry supported by ranged troops.

The defenders had held for less than an hour before abandoning the outer streets and withdrawing behind a smaller fortified compound.

"How many attacked?" Halvern asked.

The messenger shook his head.

"Hundreds, General. I cannot give a better number."

"Did they pursue when you fled?"

"Some did. Others stayed with the village."

"Were they organized?"

"Yes. They had signals. Horns, I think. When one group moved, another covered them."

Halvern added another red marker to the map.

Marcellan watched him.

"You still do not want to call this a campaign?"

"I called it a campaign yesterday."

Marcellan realized he had not noticed the change. Halvern was no longer speaking about scattered incursions either.

The governor leaned over the table.

"If they keep moving west, how long before they cross into neighboring provinces?"

Halvern traced the roads with one finger.

"If these reports represent the full extent of their scouting screen, not long. Some sightings are already close enough that a few days of movement could put them across provincial boundaries."

One of Marcellan’s advisers looked uneasy.

"We have already sent word to the king."

"The king is weeks away," Marcellan replied.

"Warning the neighboring governors may create panic throughout the east."

Marcellan looked at him.

"Villages are burning now."

The adviser fell silent.

Another noble tried a different argument.

"If we send military warnings across the region and this turns out smaller than we fear, trade will stop. Roads will close. Every local lord will call up men unnecessarily."

Marcellan gestured toward the map.

"Look at it."

The noble hesitated.

Marcellan continued.

"I spent the first day worrying that Eastwatch would look foolish for reacting too strongly to seven creatures in a forest. I am finished making decisions based on how foolish I might look afterward."

Halvern nodded slightly.

Marcellan called for fresh parchment.

"We warn every neighboring province that could be threatened if this expands."

The clerks immediately prepared themselves.

"Do not guess enemy numbers," Halvern said. "That will only create confusion."

Marcellan agreed.

The letters described only what Eastwatch could confirm. An unknown green-skinned humanoid military force was operating across the province. Multiple settlements had been attacked.

The enemy possessed organized infantry, ranged troops, scouts, and an established command structure. Patrols had disappeared, roads had become unsafe, and several settlements had ceased communicating entirely.

Marcellan added instructions rather than demands. Neighboring provinces were advised to strengthen important settlements, increase watches along eastern roads, and avoid sending small detachments into woodland after goblin sightings. Any confirmed encounter was to be reported immediately to Eastwatch and the royal authorities. Most importantly, local military commanders were warned that the hostile force might cross provincial boundaries without following the major roads traditionally used by invading armies.

Halvern read the final draft.

"Add that we still do not know their point of origin."

Marcellan nodded.

The clerk wrote the sentence.

That absence of an origin remained one of the most disturbing parts of the crisis. No border fortress had reported a major enemy army crossing into Caldris. No neighboring kingdom had declared war. There had been no great column of soldiers moving through the mountain passes. The goblins had simply begun appearing inside the province.

By late afternoon, multiple copies of the warning had been sealed. Marcellan deliberately sent several couriers along different routes so that the loss of one rider would not prevent the message from spreading.

Some would ride directly toward neighboring provincial capitals, while others carried copies to military forts positioned near the boundaries between administrative regions.

The governor watched the couriers assemble below the western gate from the window of his chamber.

Behind him, the provincial map remained covered in markers. Several new reports still waited unopened on the council table, and clerks continued moving through the corridor outside.

Halvern joined him at the window.

"We warned the king first," Marcellan said.

"Yes."

"Now we are warning half the east."

"Better before they need the warning than afterward."

Marcellan watched the first riders leave Eastwatch and separate at the western crossroads, each carrying the same message toward a different part of Caldris.

He could no longer pretend the danger belonged only to Brackenford or even only to his own province. Until the royal court responded, Eastwatch would have to survive with whatever forces and information it possessed, while the provinces around it prepared for the possibility that the same enemy might soon appear on their roads.

By sunset, the warnings were spreading outward faster than Eastwatch’s soldiers could move. For the first time since the goblins appeared, the neighboring provinces of eastern Caldris were being told plainly that they should begin preparing for war.

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