"Oh yeah…its all coming together."
An extensive walkthrough of his newly upgraded home revealed a significantly expanded space that was now furnished with some of the nicest stuff he'd ever seen.
Not a high bar considering he'd grown up in the only orphanage that taught you to kill stuff, but he appreciated it nonetheless.
Equally important to his new home acting as…you know, a home, was a kitchen now full of food and a variety of cleaning supplies and even tools for the crafting area he sincerely doubted he'd spend much time in.
A massive cheer so loud it almost shook his bedroom rang out as the Goblins outside were in the beginnings of a celebration so intense it could wake the dead.
Looking through the doorway at his new travel room, equipped with teleporters to nearby major cities and a private World Gate, it was looking mighty useful to avoid rowdy parties.
Rowdy, however, was the understatement of the year.
Over four thousand Goblins had gathered in the equally as improved town; friends and family of the original groundbreakers were now breaking open kegs the size of small buildings and roasting animals equally as big.
When he'd gone on his spending spree, Matt hadn't paid much attention to what he'd bought in the Merit Exchange after he finished the upgrades to his house. All he'd done was sort the list by top priority Town options and bought everything on the list until he was out of extra Merit.
Twenty thousand points poured into the town and within minutes it felt like the entire world shook beneath his feet.
Massive farms grew on the outskirts of town, followed by significantly upgraded roads, Mana driven power stations, dozens of apartment buildings and administration buildings.
Several taverns, shops, travel stations that mimicked the one in his house, and countless other features had appeared over the course of several hours while he hid inside, mildly concerned that so many abrupt improvements might cause problems when it came to actually running the town, but he didn't need to worry.
As soon as the construction ended, Goblins began shuffling out of the travel station, a few at first, then in the tens, then by the hundreds until the population of the town had grown into the thousands.
Before the party had started, Matt got a chance to wander among the other residents and came to a somewhat startling conclusion.
Goblins are just…people?
It wouldn't be incorrect to say that he was suffering under some cultural biases that he would have to make a concerted effort to discard, at least as far as Goblin-kind went. As it had been explained to him before, the more Goblins were gathered under a single banner, the more intelligent they became. It would probably be more accurate to say that they became more civilized as they came together, but that felt like splitting hairs to him and he didn't have any other examples of a large group of Goblins that weren't also corrupted and eating each other.
The memory of Felesterix built up a shudder and he forcibly turned his mind to other things.
He'd mentioned the terrifying Soul Mimic to Sezzikex and got a…concerning response.
Apparently Felesterix was an urban legend to most Goblins, something parents told their children to behave. It stemmed from an ancient, pre-Empire story about a Goblin that had wandered the world when they'd received the System.
He had disappeared, but not before going on a rampage and consuming countless entire villages with a hunger that never seemed sated.
An additional cheer arose as Matt considered what he'd heard, thankfully bringing him back to the present.
Smiling softly, Matt walked to his travel room and set his World Gate for his personal entrance, now exit, point. He wanted to let the town have its moment before the struggle to survive continued anew with increasing dangers to return to.
He had been invited, more than that actually as they had outright claimed him as their own. In a tremendously short period of time, Matt had done more for the town then they'd ever imagined doing over the course of decades. Establishing a town and flourishing under System criteria was an extensive and incredibly difficult prospect, and you needed to earn every single step of that process.
It was difficult to find a perfectly relatable example he could draw from for comparison, but the easiest way he'd come to consider the situation was that he'd taken the town from needing to focus on farming and construction to now being able to train and improve Hunters, the Goblin equivalent of Gate Walkers. It was a sparkling achievement that every Goblin society strove to reach, but few managed to, due to the rather stringent requirements of the System.
Matt knew it would take time for him to fully acclimate to being part of a family, especially one as massive as the Goblin society he'd joined, but he was excited to have somewhere of his own to call home.
Stepping through the World Gate and into Bureau territory was disorienting for a moment, but he got his balance back quickly as Edric stepped forward and said, "We've been waiting for you, Matt. Come with me."
Concern blossomed in Matt's mind as he started following his lead as he asked, "Is everything ok?"
The man's response took him off guard.
"You've been gone for two months. Time distortion isn't uncommon in Gates, but it has caused some concern for the purposes of using this Gate as a training tool. I need you to explain what you've been through and clue us in to how much stronger you've become."
This was out of the ordinary, to say the least, as the Bureau rarely demanded any kind of update as to its Uplifters beyond fairly basic growth reports.
"I'm sure you have questions, but we do have a reason for the debriefing."
Matt tried asking more questions, but was stonewalled by the man as they walked, prompting further concern that something big had happened while he'd been away.
Several minutes later, Matt found himself sitting at a large ovular table in a darkened presentation room.
A man he vaguely recognized stood at the forefront pointing at data on a large screen and presenting various situations to different team leads.
"Matt, please come up here."
He stood up and walked to the front, next to the presenter who said, "Matt, my name is Marcus. I'm here in proxy of the gentleman who created the Uplifter Initiative. I'm sure you already know this, but the Initiative has thus far been a rousing success, but we've run into a strange problem."
Nodding at Marcus to continue, Matt asked for more information.
"When the True Gates to Goblin territories opened, South America was invaded by a Goblin force known as the Empire. They have technology far beyond what we currently do and have been extremely hostile. In my personal experience, Goblins don't usually show this level of aggression or focus on expansion, but it has been quite some time since I've been among them in any meaningful way."
While the expansionist tendencies of the Empire hadn't been shared in any great detail with Matt, what little he did know of them from Sozzikex fawning over the nation didn't surprise him.
"I need to know what you know about them. I only ask because I know you've been in a True Gate for quite some time now. Is there anything you know that could cause them to behave this way?"
Matt considered everything he knew for a moment and explained what he'd been up to while he was away. Fully expecting to be criticized for aligning himself with Goblins, which some of the people present clearly did, Marcus didn't seem to have that reaction.
"Goblins are a good race to make inroads with, to be sure. I haven't heard of this Felesterix, but I do have to wonder if his appearance has something to do with the Empire's new predilection for conquering."
The conversation continued in this way for twenty minutes longer, with Matt answering more questions both about the Goblins he now lived among and the Merit Exchange. It soon became clear that there wasn't much he could offer, and after a quick thank you he was sent out of the office.
Standing next to the doorway was a somewhat shorter person wearing a white mask with green and black lines in a pattern that made his head hurt.
She nodded, which he knew due to her rather impressive endowments, but he pressed past her.
Her large fox ears barely gave him pause, but somewhere in his head he knew that should have stood out more than it did.
Perhaps it was her four bushy tails that distracted him, but either way he needed to get moving. He wanted to check in with Edric and see if there were more missions or tasks for him.
The situation with the Empire was curious to be sure, but there was little for him to do on that front and if he was honest with himself, he wasn't much concerned with it.
All of the data was concerning of course, but Marcus's estimates put Humanity well within the range of competing with the nation, even if they couldn't outright oust them.
There was always something going on, whether it be Gate Crashes, new expeditions, discoveries, special enchantments, or something new in his rapidly changing world, and thus something like an invasion didn't interest him much unless it seemed like it would be some kind of existential threat.
That's not to say that Matt considered himself some kind of genius who could be the tipping point in a war of that scale, far from it. He knew who and what he was, and right now he was more than content making sure that normal people and areas weren't endangered unduly.
However, all of this was taken under the assumption that the world he'd left when he entered the True Gate was the same.
A common problem historians have encountered is the absence of everyday information, things the everyday citizen would simply be expected to know.
Usage of the tools of the day or basic geography were all things that people simply knew and thus had no reason to discuss at any great length.
Humanity is, and always has been, exceptional when it comes to adaptation, even under grand and unusual circumstances. It was how they'd managed to survive the System's introduction alongside Gates and all the changes to society those things had introduced.
This would come into play in a massive way when Matt discovered from Edric that the world had changed again.
It had grown by an exponential factor, with absurd swathes of land coming into existence and stretching distances out by hundreds, if not thousands, of miles in some places.
The Bureau, with one of its entrances in New York City, was perfectly situated to see that the cities and towns of the world hadn't changed overly much in the wake of that transformation, despite everything around them having done so.
Considerably more relaxed, Edric went over the multiple changes to the world with Matt, going into detail on various matters of import.
"The world isn't just bigger, its far more populated than it used to be. That empty space was populated by animals that have been enhanced or mutated, gathering in tribes claiming territories and defending them as fiercely as their predecessors would.
Additionally, several races have appeared despite no new True Gates opening, which also pose significant complications to reclaiming the wild spaces of our world."
Matt looked at his lead with some confusion as he asked, "New races?"
Nodding, Edric pulled out a binder from within the desk in his cubicle as he said, "Yeah. Apparently Earth has always been home to multiple races who lived among us in hiding, and the Bureau has treaties with all of them.
The only thing I've been told is that we're to treat them the same as we do humans, so no mass slaughter for levels or loot."
For the second time, Matt had been warned against not being a monster who killed for personal gain, but all things considered he was once again inclined to stay quiet. If there were any group of people who needed to be warned against this kind of thing, it was Walkers or Uplifters.
Especially Uplifters.
Ok, maybe only Uplifters since Walkers tended to be much more cautious in the face of horrific danger.
"So what are we looking at?"
Holding up a picture, there was the image of a fairly looking man with fox ears and a tail side by side with an impressively large fox with the same ears, Edric said, "First up are the Kitsune. Shape changers with a penchant for fire and nature magic, incredibly powerful and all with the shared trait of being extremely prideful. Its unclear how much stronger they are than the average person, but so long as we don't declare war, they seem to be pretty content to keep to their areas. They haven't tried to claim any specific location, so they're mostly wanderers or part of small communities predominantly near farming towns."
Matt tapped at his System menu and grabbed a picture and recorded all the information he'd been given.
"Next up are the Nekoum. We don't actually know much about them beyond the fact that they have feline features and their population reproduces at a prolific rate. They have taken up residence in a lot of our cities and seem pretty happy to do pretty much any work we need done, with their treaty prioritizing that they be treated like regular citizens."
Edric went through several races in this fashion, throwing out common appearances and various details about the treaties the Bureau had managed to secure with them. Like the Kitsune, some of them had the ability to move between a humanoid appearance and an alternate, or true form more likely. Population estimates showed that there were no consistent quantities among Earth's new races, but they all held shockingly different cultures.
There were few things they all held in common, but one major thing tied them all together and explained how the Bureau had managed to contact and build rapport with them all before they arrived in full force on Earth.
All of the races, thirteen in total, were a confederation, operating individually but working together in large works and efforts.
When Matt asked about the name of this confederation, Edric's answer made True and False shudder, though he was unclear why.
"They call themselves the Hael Consortium."