GOATs

The GOATs is a guild led by SoulEater39, and its defining introduction is an offer of collective care: when Bartek asks who looks after the beings under discussion, SoulEater39 answers that the guild does. The emblem he displays—horns locked together and flowing into the lines of an integrated circuit—gives that promise a mechanical as well as communal image. For Bartek, the exchange is also the instant he recognizes that he is being recruited.

Leadership and Reach

SoulEater39 occupies a prominent position in Japan’s alliance politics: he leads the Royal Alliance in Japan and heads the GOATs. That standing gives him first choice of machine. The next day, he invites Bartek to a Royal Alliance waterside warehouse in the Keiyō Industrial Zone. SoulEater39 logs onto his shogun, and the two proceed along a monorail track above empty streets and rooftops. Two districts away, the Flood has begun, placing their encounter against a city already entering crisis.

The Guild’s Emblem and Work

The GOATs’ name is accompanied by a logo in which two sets of horns lock together, their tangle running into an integrated-circuit design. The image connects fellowship with machinery rather than separating the guild’s social identity from its technological world. In the conversation, the emblem follows a direct question about who takes responsibility for the beings being discussed; SoulEater39’s answer assigns that care to the guild. The available account establishes this responsibility but does not specify the full membership or the precise group being cared for.

Bartek’s Recruitment

The encounter shifts from a journey through the disaster-struck city to a personal invitation into the guild. After SoulEater39 identifies the GOATs as the answer to who looks after them, Bartek understands that he is being recruited. His response is to point out that he does not even know SoulEater39’s name, making the recruitment moment an opening negotiation rather than an already settled bond. The GOATs thus enters the story both as an organization with a claim to collective care and as a group seeking Bartek’s participation.