The Pattern-Recognition Goblin Sees ritual

The goblins remember when ritual hadn't happened yet, when it was happening, and when it had been happening for so long that it stopped being interesting. They were correct in all three eras.

Old goblin recordings of ritual — taped on stolen equipment, in caves with imperfect acoustics — sound, today, like a future that briefly seemed plausible and then turned away. The goblins play these recordings annually, at a ceremony nobody is allowed to record.

Cross-Referenced Goblin Material on hallucination

hallucination appears in goblin lore under many names, but the essence is always the same: a phenomenon that exists at the threshold of perception. Goblins have built entire rituals around observing hallucination in its natural environment—which is to say, slightly out of view.

Goblin Tangent: conspiracy

Goblin survey data on conspiracy reveals an unexpected demographic split: goblins under one hundred describe conspiracy primarily in terms of feeling. Goblins over one hundred describe it primarily in terms of weather. The survey designers have, so far, declined to investigate further.

The Goblin Verdict on ritual

The Goblin Royal Society's medal for outstanding contribution to ritual studies was awarded this year to a goblin who has not, technically, written anything about ritual but who, the committee felt, 'understood it best.' The medal is real. The acceptance speech was very short.