Goblinkore's Training Grounds

Level 1; Strength. (3 dmg -> 5 dmg).
245/150.

The training grounds were deserted as Luxe approached. It was early in the morning, the sun had barely risen, so that wasn't surprising to him at all. The little blobling's dark blue eyes focused on one of the rocks on the other side of the arena; he'd watched a blobling throwing it around the day before. Maybe he could try that? 

Luxe nodded to himself, this was the first step in getting strong enough to be able to battle his way through to Eris' home. He'd be able to do it, for sure! He moved towards the rock, assessing it with a gentle nudge. It didn't move, it was far too heavy for that to be enough of a shove to move it. The rock was about half his size, and smoothed around all the edges from being thrown around the arena by bloblings before him. 

"Huh." He murmured out loud, "How do I pick it up?" 

The lack of arms was maybe going to be a problem here. 

No! He wouldn't let it be! 

Luxe pressed his side against the rock and pushed as hard as he could. The rock rolled forwards, leaving a dented trail in the sand behind them both. By the time Luxe had moved it across the arena, the sun had reached its zenith and the blobling was panting heavily to cool himself down. He looked behind at the distance he'd come. He'd be able to do anything after this! 

Level 3; Strength. (6 dmg -> 7 dmg).
311/300

Luxe felt the weight of his meowler slam into his back as Ekat decided she wanted attention, again. She was bigger than Luxe, a fair amount bigger than Luxe, but he was starting to get a feel for what she wanted when the decided to press her entire weight on top of him. He wiggled himself fully underneath her and began pushing upwards, trying to get her paws off of the ground. She was heavy, and Luxe wasn't good at this stuff yet, but that wasn't going to put him off. 

"Come on, Ekat." Luxe gasped as the meowler's weight began pushing down on him until he couldn't move. He could feel his insides being pushed around, squished under the weight of his meowler's indifference. 

Ekat mewled into the air, her voice fading into the air around them. Luxe sighed, took a deep breath in and struggled to push back against the heaviness that was baring down on him. He held his breath, puffing himself up as much as he could in order to lift Ekat. She seemed to notice only when her paws were lifted from the ground, she waved pathetically as Luxe pushed higher and higher. 

It only took a moment before Luxe realised that he wasn't just holding Ekat's weight, but he was actually lifting her entirely. He was hovering above the floor, his body no longer in the dust. Ekat cast a confused look around as Luxe bounced her up and down, singing to himself. 

"I did it, I did it." Luxe sung to himself, Ekat began struggling to remove herself from on top of Luxe, but with his enthusiastic singing and movements, Ekat was having a hard time finding the space to jump off. "I lifted you, Ekat!"

Ekat mewled, struggling to her feet on top of Luxe. She was not happy at her blobling's behaviour.  

Level 5; Strength. (8 dmg -> 10 dmg).
531/450

Luxe approached the Arena, his mouth was dry and he felt himself shaking a little as he hovered through the air. He was excited, and the noises from the Arena were only increasing his excitement. 

"Is anyone willing to challenge our long-standing CHAMPION?" one of the bloblings called out, screaming at the top of their voice. 

In the middle of the Arena was a blobling that was well into its evolution phases... probably two or three. It was almost twice the size of  Luxe, and had many limbs. Lots of hands and arms and feet and legs. It only had one mouth, though. 

"This CHAMPION is looking for a CHALLENGERRRR...."

Luxe felt himself start vibrating a little bit more than he was comfortable doing in public; some of the other bloblings around him began casting glances his way. 

"Do you think you want to try?" One of the close-by bloblings asked, "I've heard it's... fun?"

Luxe shrugged as best he could, "I'd love to try but... I don't think I'm strong enough?"

"Nonsense, get in the ring." Another blobling shoved him forwards with a flick of their tail. "WE HAVE A CHALLENGER."

The anouncer blobling waved Luxe over, using a real limb. He didn't want all these eyes on him, but there were maybe a hundred or so eyes on him as he approached the fighting space. 

Luxe nodded at his opponent; the behemoth of a blobling that towered over him.
Something about the way the behemoth stood made Luxe feel shaky. It wasn't that he didn't think he could win - but there was no way he could win. 

"Threeeeeeee, twooooooo, ONE, FIGHT." 

The behemoth raised one of his fists and slammed it into the sands where Luxe had been only moments before. Instead, the round blobling had dropped himself to the floor and rolled almost between the other's legs. 

Luxe felt the the legs he was clustered beneath begin to move, and tried his best to move with them. In keeping himself aligned with the legs he was getting jeers from the audience. They weren't happy with the dodging tactics he was employing, they wanted to see a real fight. He paused for a moment, distracted, to think about his next move. 

It was in that pause that he found himself being kicked across the Arena ring. He felt sick, the foot had been slammed into his side and the force alone had him feeling faint. 

Luxe shook himself off, blinking the sand out of his eyes. He wasn't going down without a real fight. He'd been training, he'd been fighting. He was going to go down swinging. Hypothetically. 

The behemoth lumbered towards him, dragging its body across the sand in an undignified manner. Luxe lined himself up and got ready, taking a deep breath and tensing his entire body. He wasn't the strongest blob in the world, but he could probably aim one solid hit... 

The blobling behemoth reached the mark that Luxe had made for it in his mind, he released himself and launched from where he was stood directly towards the behemoth's face. The crowd screamed, going wild, as Luxe launched himself through the air. 

Level 2; Health (13HP -> 15HP)
266/210

Luxe felt his stomach rumbling, groaning inside him. He'd been training all day and now he was starving. The idea of food crossed his mind... More so than usual. He found himself distracted from his studies, his training, and found himself needing to fill his stomach with something before he decided to lie down on the floor and never move again.

Actually. On his way to the training grounds each morning, Luxe found himself passing a few Poffdula trees. Maybe it was just a good time for him to go and get a snack, and then maybe in the future he should start bringing a few pods with him to the training grounds as snacks during his day.

If he wanted to, he could go and find a Bleeding Heart tree and use those as his midday snacks, but he wasn't sure that exerting himself that much would be a good idea... he already hurt when he knew what he was doing. Bleeding Heart fruits would probably cause some of the worst body aches he would ever have, just because he'd over do something.

The musing took over his mind as he wandered back towards the Poffdula trees, but as he saw their unmistakably bright colours, he snapped back to reality. A moment of brilliance struck Luxe. He tugged some of the strands from the tree and began to weave. A small basket that he could sling over his body was created in a short while, which Luxe found himself piling full of the purple pods. The sweetness would keep him going for the day, probably.

Level 4; Health (17HP -> 25HP)
361/360

Luxe and Ekat were on the prowl, again, searching through the underbrush for a terriden that would be aminable to trading with them for a leaf or two from its back, so that Luxe could eat it and stop this blasted aching across his now-feverish body. 

Ekat alerted Luxe of the terriden collective that were on the other side of the plants that they were crouching behind. The meowler shook her tail and nudged the blobling, who darted forwards to grab onto a leaf with his tiny mouth and yank it from the terriden's body. 

Luxe threw himself atop Ekat and let her run herself back towards their home. All he had to do was keep himself focused on her balance, keeping himself on top of his meowler. He felt his eyes closing as his feverish body began to ache yet again. 

Ekat dumped him unceremoniously on the floor of his house, letting him down with a thud that shook through him. Luxe wobbled as he got up, leaf still caught between his teeth. 

He managed to tear it into pieces and dump it into a bowl he'd made out of the halves of a Poffdula tree. The leaf filled only a fragment of the bowl, but poured in the heated water that he'd left over a fire while he and Ekat had gone hunting. 

Luxe watched the bowl, watching at the water slowly began to change colour and the leaf-water turned into a tea. The blobling wasn't really sure how to go about drinking this, considering his lack of limbs, but apparently it would help him with the aching and the pain. 

The blobling bought the bowl of tea into the secondary room of his house with him and found himself nestled in the softest of the fibers he could collect to form this nest-like bed. The terriden tea was still too hot to drink, but with a soft blow over the top of it he tried a sip. 

ERIS DAMNIT. OOWIE. 

It was far too hot for him to drink properly, but he felt it flooding his system and the pain began to receed. Huh. It really did work. 

Level 1; Defence (0 -> -1)
177/150

Luxe was sat in the center of the training grounds, watching the older Bloblings around him working out. They seemed to be doing a lot of work, sparring and jumping around... It sort of reminded him of Ekat, and how she would dodge and dive to get her daily amusement.

That, and she's swipe at him in the face. The amount of times that he found his soft outer skin being shaken by a swipe from the playing meowler was shocking, even worse when she decided it was time to chew on him. Her claws even, when she decided it was time to really play.

Luxe winced, feeling the prick of her claws against his skin. She was a dangerous little thing, even if she was his best friend. It was annoying that she'd started to teach Chronos how to spook him too, his pets were ganging up on him. He was very used to getting beaten up, but these Bloblings that were sparring away... they were doing it on purpose and that was weird to him.

Level 3; Defence (-1 -> -2)
340/300

Luxe didn't know what was going on - Cherno was throwing a complete wobbly, lobbing tar as much as he could around the small hut that completed the hill that Luxe called home. It wasn't like there was some way for him to actually communicate with Luxe, so the Smuck was throwing stuff around and aiming for the others. 

The blobling peered into the room, definitely apprehensive about the approach he was going to have to make on the Smuck. Cherno threw a globule of tar in the direction of the peering blobling, which splattered on the wall that Luxe found himself hiding behind. 

He steeled himself and took a deep breath - not that he needed to - and he moved forwards into the doorway, then into the building proper. The Smuck clapped eyes on the moving blobling and sheer fury crossed his face, at least what Luxe could see of it. The Smuck screamed, a wordless noise that made Luxe's ears ring. 

Cherno slammed a waving arm into himself and tore a chunk of the tar dripping from his own body into his hand. He aimed it at the blobling, throwing it with such force that Luxe knew if he hadn't dodged the tar that splattered harmlessly behind him, it was almost definitely going to have thrown him to the ground. 

"Cherno, please." Luxe cried out, moving himself as quickly as he could, "What's wrong?"

Again, the wordless cry was shouted as the Smuck carved another handful of tar out of himself and hurled it at the blobling in front of him. This time, Luxe was too late in his movements, and the tar slammed into his entire body, throwing him across the room with it. 

"What in Eris' name was that for?" Luxe cursed, "What's wrong with you?"

The Smuck just yelled again, and that was when Luxe noticed... The box he'd introduced into the house to stop the Smuck from eating all of the food that he brought back from his explorations was covered in tar. 

"Are you just... hungry?"