To be honest, ever since Bane came of age at eighty, he had never brought another male home. It was a little strange; Dwarf gatherings were usually at the pub.

’Zog is a male Dragon, a different species, so it should be fine,’ Bane thought.

But speaking of pubs, he’d heard that some people in the city’s pubs liked to "make friends" with members of the same sex. Objectively, he respected cultural diversity. Subjectively, he was terrified.

After that, he pretty much avoided pubs with too many Humans. It was just too freaky. He’d rather face the subterranean worms in the mines.

Sometimes he would even see those groups holding rallies and parades in the streets, seemingly to promote their ideals—something about how all works of art and literature should include elements showcasing minority groups.

That made him even more scared.

Thankfully, they didn’t have much momentum right now. But if they ever grew in number and power and actually succeeded, and if he were still alive then, he’d have to take a hammer to his own head.

’That’ll never happen.’

’Maybe.’

Bane led Zog through the winding streets of Furnace Castle, eventually arriving in front of a small house.

This was the first time Zog had observed a Dwarf settlement from this perspective.

Previously, it had always been a bird’s-eye view after blasting through the city gates, and he never had time to look closely—mainly because his relationship with the Dwarves back then was a bit... "unpleasant."

Dwarf nobles were a little different from the nobles of other races. Even if they had mountains of wealth, they still insisted on mining personally. Maybe mining was an addiction.

The urban planning of Furnace Castle could only be described as a complete mess. All sorts of small houses were crowded together haphazardly. They all had thick, metal-plated walls. Not pretty, but definitely durable.

If Dwarves sold cell phones, they would definitely be Nokia.

And the Nokia that would best fit the Dwarven aesthetic would be the ones from the brick phone era.

KNOCK KNOCK! Bane pounded on the door so hard, he sounded like a loan shark coming to collect a debt.

"Haven’t you eaten?! Knocking so quietly! Don’t you know your old ma is hard of hearing?" a powerful old woman’s voice boomed from inside.

"It’s not that I’m not a good son," Bane explained to Zog. "Dwarves are a people who value family very much. I bought my mom a big house, but no matter how I tried to persuade her, she wouldn’t move. Says she can’t bear to leave her old neighbors."

Zog was starting to like the Dwarf Race. The sense of familiarity was overwhelming.

The door opened, and a Dwarf who looked even sturdier than Bane appeared. It had to be Mrs. Bane. Zog really couldn’t tell the gender of Dwarves.

"Ha, Mom, you’re looking more beautiful than ever!"

"Oh, son, have you lost weight again?"

Then the two lumps of Dwarf hugged each other.

Forgive Zog for using the somewhat disrespectful classifier "lump," but visually, that’s truly what they looked like. The mother and son’s arms could barely even reach each other’s shoulders!

"Oh! You brought a friend home! It’s been a few hundred years, hasn’t it?"

Mrs. Bane also gave Zog’s big Dragon head a hug. Miraculously, she didn’t seem to mind all his horns and spikes poking her.

"Come on, get inside! You big lug, have you no sense? Pour our guest a drink!"

’Such a classic Dwarven welcome,’ Zog thought. ’Pouring drinks right after meeting.’

"Thank you, uh..." Zog hesitated. ’Although her age was appropriate, he couldn’t bring himself to call her ’big sis.’ "Thank you, Auntie."

"We came back this time because we wanted to take a look at the housekeeping machine your son left here."

After reading Bane’s letter, Zog had set his sights on the housekeeping machine mentioned inside. It would be a colossal waste not to find a way to mass-produce it.

So that auto-chess bet was actually a win-win—as in, Zog won twice.

"Oh, that’s easy. It’s right over there," Mrs. Bane said, pointing to a corner of the living room where a machine was covered with a red silk cloth.

Bane went over and whipped off the cloth. The machine’s casing was sparkling clean; it looked brand new, fresh from the factory.

"Mom, you’ve never used this, have you?"

"It just washes dishes, does laundry, and sweeps the floor. It’s not like I can’t do that myself."

"But I made it specifically to help you with the dishes, laundry, and sweeping."

"What if it breaks? It’ll need repairs, and you’ll have to waste money on parts. Besides, it doesn’t get things as clean as when I wash them by hand."

’This is it. This is exactly it.’

Listening to the conversation between Bane and his mother, Zog felt for a moment as if he had transmigrated back to his old world.

"If I have my goblins disassemble this machine, I guarantee they can put it back together. Would that be okay?"

Zog interrupted their conversation.

"I suppose, but... goblins?"

"Yes, goblins."

Ever since the goblins had created that incredibly bizarre, modular Ghost Camera, Zog had noticed that the goblins who moved into the city seemed to have changed.

Their intelligence seemed to be rapidly increasing. Or perhaps their previous living conditions had been so poor, and they had so little contact with the outside world, that they never had a chance to show their intellect.

It was only after Humans became terrifying upright apes based on physical prowess alone that they had the leisure to put points into their intelligence Skill.

The goblins’ stat panels, on the other hand, were too pathetic to look at. Truly, three goblins together couldn’t even beat a single stray dog.

So the trope of them dragging a Saintess back to their cave didn’t happen here. They just didn’t have the strength for it, you know?

You’d only find stories pairing goblins with Female Knights in the late-night tales of Minstrels, and goblins were chosen mainly because they were sleazy enough to create a strong, stimulating contrast.

Although goblins really weren’t good creatures, Minstrels and indecent Painters were largely to blame for their terrible reputation.

The most common survival strategy for goblins was to find a powerful backer. However, these backers usually treated the weaklings as expendable cannon fodder, until one batch of goblins met the Red Dragon who would change the fate of their race.

Although Zog had also treated the goblins as slaves at first, the goblins had never been treated so well as slaves before. All they had to do was work every day.

An accumulation of quantitative changes led to a qualitative leap.

Bombarded by countless new things in Twin Tower City, the goblins made the leap from Pentium to i9.

At first, Zog bought them many technical books, but they completely ignored them. Instead, they were only interested in taking things apart. The amazing part was that they could put them back together again—and sometimes the reassembled version was even better than the original.

After that, Zog bought a large amount of equipment for the goblins to dismantle, and he regularly had more goblins teleported from Dragon Island to the city for advanced training.

Ren 82 once explained their academic philosophy to Zog. To be honest, Zog, who had spent twenty years in arduous study, couldn’t understand a word of it. The logic was so chaotic it was mind-boggling, but it worked.

Zog personally named it the "Goblin I Reckon School."

Their first development goal was to upgrade the manual assembly line to a mechanized one.

They had a rudimentary version working already. Yo-Yos and spinning tops were no problem. Now they urgently needed to test the waters by designing something specialized for a more complex product.

And just then, he discovered Bane’s housekeeping machine.

Bane could see Zog wasn’t joking. "Well, if they break it, you have to pay for it."

"Don’t worry. If it really breaks, I can definitely afford to compensate you. I’ll drive the price down to a point where your mother is actually willing to use one."

"What?" Mrs. Bane cupped her ear. "You’re a Sub-Dragon, speak up! Aren’t you staying a while longer?"

"No, that’s alright. Goodbye, Auntie."

"Still sitting on the sofa? You’re slouching! Get up and see your guest out!"

Bane walked Zog to the door.

"Aren’t you worried the goblins will steal your craft?" Zog asked.

"Ha! What’s there to worry about? If they can learn it, that’s their skill. The more people who learn it, the better. Am I supposed to take this little bit of knowledge to my grave?"

Bane was remarkably open-minded.

"I’ll send your mother a hearing aid in a few days."

"A hearing aid?" Bane could guess its purpose just from the name.

"It’s pretty easy to make. If you’re in a hurry, you could even make it yourself. Just modify Recording Magic to be real-time, add some Amplification Magic, and seal it all in a small Magical Device that hangs on the ear."

Bane thought about it. It did seem feasible, but he wasn’t familiar with Recording Magic.

"Yeah, it is pretty simple. How did I not think of that after all these years? I’ve just been shouting at my mom this whole time."

"Haha, just having the technology isn’t enough. It’s the ideas," Zog said, patting his own head as he pushed the housekeeping machine. "Ideas change the world."