Grov: "We follow the instructions the contractor listed, and nothing will go wrong."
Grosh: "That's what people say before something goes wrong."
—Grovmar and Groshlar Grollear, hinting at the events to come.
Help Not Wanted
is a Low Fantasy web novel written by Tyk 5919, and the third entry in the Legatum series.
Desperate for cash and a decent place to live, four goblins within the kingdom of Glordale decide to become good samaritans by taking various contracts and assisting multiple citizens within a small town. But after the goblins decide to help an ogre find his missing daughter, they soon begin to wonder if they're taking on more than they can chew, and whether or not it's worth risking their lives over.
Now has a sequel titled Help Not Wanted: Remixed Phallic Memories in HD that takes place two months after the events of this story.
Help Not Wanted provides examples of:
- Accidental Murder: Played for Laughs. Krumvell gathers up a bunch of mushrooms he didn't know were poisonous so a baker could use them for his cake. Cut to the baker tasting one, followed by a cut to the goblins digging a grave.
- An Arm and a Leg: Ogrell has one of his arms bitten off by a wyvern moments before he's killed.
- And the Adventure Continues: The story ends with the four goblins all taking another contract, and declaring that from now on, they're going to keep helping people both to satisfy their own needs and to make the world a (slightly) better place.
- Big Bad: Ogrell Syn’Gorrsh is the main villain who is secretly a cannibalistic serial killer that tries to murder the four goblins.
- Black Comedy: Early on in the story, some of the goblins are forced into near-death experiences, and in some cases, accidentally get someone killed. None of it is taken seriously, and the goblins are so desensitized that they react to each situation using Gallows Humor.
- Book Ends: The story starts and ends with the goblins all waking up after passing out during an orgy. But by the end of the story, the goblins still have money and aren't struggling to find food, and they wake up inside an inn, not outside in a pile of trash.
- Cast Full of Gay: Of the five main characters, Grovmar, Groshlar, Bunng, and Krumvell are all openly homosexual, and occasionally even have sex with each other.
- Cerebus Syndrome: After chapter 2, it becomes clear that the story is more of a dramedy, and the humor dies down so that the story can flesh out the goblins more and focus on the plot. By chapter 6, the story shifts into survival horror and nearly all of the humor is gone. It isn't until the final chapter where the story shifts back into being a dramedy again.
- Chekhov's Gun:
- The bone Groshlar extracted from Mallwyn's teeth. Bunng later sharpens it and uses it to stab Ogrell in the eye.
- The container of wyvern bait. Bunng drinks it in order to make himself sick so Ogrell will free him from his cell. Later, Grovmar dumps the last of it all over Ogrell's body. Since the bait expired and has a much stronger odor, it attracts two wyverns that both devour Ogrell.
- Chekhov's Skill:
- In chapter 2, a scientist dumps wyvern bait all over the four goblins to see if it'll make a wyvern go berserk. It doesn't, and the scientist later mentions it works on some races (like orcs, ogres, satyrs, and gnolls) but not others. When the goblins escape Ogrell's cave in chapter 8, they aren't attacked by wyverns. However, Ogrell, who's also smothered in wyvern bait, is.
- In chapter 5, Rorrgarl off-handedly mentions to Krumvell that wyverns can't stand the smell of murids, especially their blood. Krumvell later covers Ogrell's prisoners in the blood and organs from a pair of murid corpses, thus allowing them to walk out of the cave without wyverns being attracted to their scent.
- Dead All Along: Sanya Syn’Gorrsh was murdered by Ogrell years before the story began.
- Eaten Alive: Ogrell, who's ripped in half by two wyverns and has both halves of his body consumed.
- Eye Scream: Ogrell is stabbed in the left eye by Bunng. Conveniently, this happens right after Ogrell tried to remove a girl's eyeball using his bare fingers.
- Foreshadowing:
- In chapter 4, Sylesse the wyvern licks Ogrell's face and is about to eat him, but refuses when she finds out that Ogrell soiled himself. Ogrell dies later on after two wyverns tear him in half and devour him.
- Bunng notices that despite Ogrell's You No Take Candle and Third-Person Person speech, he knows how to use words like "pestilence" and "cordiality" properly. It's later revealed that Ogrell was Obfuscating Stupidity so the goblins wouldn't suspect his true intentions.
- After Groshlar tries to advance on Ogrell and offer him a blowjob, he rejects him, but tells him that "Ogrell loves to eat." Ogrell meant this literally, and was hinting that he would treasure the thought of eating Groshlar's actual flesh.
- In chapter 4, Odlar mentions that Ogrell looks familiar, but ultimately decides to drop the subject. He later sends three members of his tribe to try and kill Ogrell, because he eventually figured out that Ogrell showed up around the same time his son went missing and was killed, and presumed that Ogrell was the culprit (which he was).
- At the end of chapter 4, a monster sneaks into the goblins' tent while they're sleeping, but oddly refuses to kill or harm any of them. This is because the monster was Ogrell himself, who was drooling and admiring his soon-to-be prey, and in some cases licking them.
- In chapter 2, Bunng reads a contract stating that a dozen children have gone missing and are feared dead. It's later revealed that Ogrell kidnapped all of them—and killed six of them sometime before the story began.
- I Ate WHAT?!: In chapter 6, the goblins eat a bowl of soup given to them by Ogrell and discover that it's full of human flesh. All of them (minus Krum, who continues to eat it because it tastes good) immediately start retching and deduce very quickly that Ogrell is a cannibal.
- I Love the Dead: Grovmar stumbles upon a contract from an imp saying he needs help collecting dead bodies to fuel his "necrophilia tendencies." He doesn't bother reading the rest of the note.
- Karmic Death: Ogrell Syn’Gorrsh, an Extreme Omnivore and cannibalistic Serial Killer, is devoured by two wyverns.
- Lighter and Softer: Currently the lightest entry in the Legatum series. Except for chapter 6-8, the story focuses solely on a group of goblin Anti-Heroes trying to make money by going through a hilarious series of trials, and exploring and fleshing out the goblin characters. Even after all four of them are nearly killed by Ogrell, the story ends on a somewhat uplifting note with no major character deaths.
- Offing the Offspring: It turns out that Ogrell murdered his own daughter, choking her to death after he got tired of her constant whining.
- Potty Failure: Invoked. Ogrell soils himself on purpose twice, and he later explains that the odor prevents monsters and beasts from trying to eat him. Given how Sylesse the wyvern almost eats Ogrell, only to leave him alone the second she finds out he shat himself, he's not entirely wrong. Ironically, this doesn't save him later when he's covered in the much-more potent wyvern bait.
- Preserve Your Gays: Out of the four main goblin characters, not a single one of them dies. The only major character who does die is Ogrell, who was heterosexual.
- Start of Darkness: Ogrell Syn’Gorrsh was just a normal ogre trying to raise a bratty child. In a fit of frustration, he killed her and ate her corpse. Ogrell developed such a fond taste of flesh for humanoid creatures that he started kidnapping other races and eating their flesh too.
- Vile Villain, Saccharine Show: Help Not Wanted is currently the most comical and lighthearted entry in the Legatum series. As soon as Ogrell Syn’Gorrsh shows up in chapter 3, it turns into a dramedy, and later shifts into full-on survival horror. Conveniently, after he dies, the story turns into a more lighthearted dramedy again.
- Wham Episode: Chapter 6 throws out a slew of revelations that drastically alter the story. Ogrell Syn’Gorrsh drugs the four goblins and locks them in a cell inside of a cave. He later feeds them human flesh and reveals that he's a cannibal, and that he's going to eat Bunng and starve Groshlar, Grovmar, and Krumvell until they resort to cannibalism too. Oh, and it turns out that his daughter, Sanya, was Dead All Along; he killed her in a fit of frustration and devoured her corpse, thus beginning his cannibalism spree.
- Wham Line: This line in chapter 6 changes everything about the story.Krumvell: "Ogrell, if anything, you...heh, you shouldn't trust us. Why wouldn't we trust you?"Ogrell: "Because I'm not a trustworthy person."
