Several rays of afternoon sun poured into the room through high up slanted windows as Edin looked over his older brother’s gagged and swollen face. Desmond was tied with thick hemp rope, wound around from his shoulders down to his just below his belly button, he was unable to do anything to the torture. Edin’s eyes were narrowed as rage began to boil deep in his stomach. His brother’s eyes had not left the motionless servant at his feet.

It was a lowly rabbit-kin servant that had been attending to his princely brother, no doubt his whore when his bitch fox was not around.

Edin had his guards rape her one by one in front of the prince, all while the man struggled to free himself until the twelfth knight and last night had finished with her. The beast girl howled, kicked and scratched at every turn until one of his guards bashed her face repeatedly into the stone floor. He only knew she had not died since her chest was slowly rising and falling, faintly. “Should I go are your favorite whore as well?” Edin cooed softly, each one said deliberately as he watched his brother’s face a subtle reaction.

If he did react, he either missed it or his swollen face didn’t allow it to be shown.

Both of which stoked the fire in him. He didn’t happen that his brother had stopped struggling. One of his knights stepped up and backhanded the bound prince, his gauntlet still on. The slap was complemented with a line of blood that oozed from the fresh wound that only elicited a soft groan. Edin’s nose flared as he fought to keep himself from cutting his unsportsmanlike brother for not howling in pain. Desmond’s bloodshot eyes still fixed on the unmoving body.

The girl was sprawled out on her back, her newly made clothes torn down the back made a pitiful blanket that soaked up each guard’s semen that oozed from his womanhood. Her back was marred with tens of cuts from each punch the guards threw at her when she fought to get away. Her face laid sideways in a pool of blood that faced the prince. He was curious to see the expression the girl had made in her final moments of conciseness, but he didn’t want to give Desmond the satisfaction of not having him in front of him – to which he was beginning to believe was not as imposing as he thought.

The brief impasse only lasted a few minutes before Edin could no longer bare being ignored by Desmond. With a “humph” he got from his chair and pulled the bloodied gag, the rabbit’s balled up underwear. A small string of blood and saliva stretched out before it broke and drizzled over Desmond’s tattered school robes. Edin’s patience was slowly wearing thin as Desmond seemed to defy him by staying quiet. The hand that held the bloodied ball of underwear trembled with rage that was barely contained if only by his urge to watch his brother be charged with treason during the court hearing on the morrow.

Desmond, on the other hand, kept resolute not to react to any of Edin’s vile antics. He kept his gaze fixed on Hera who laid only a few inches from his bloodied boots. He burned every punch and every insult they threw at her. He had known his brother could be a bastard but to this extent… He should have made Avery take her on their journey. It was their mistake. However, he found solace in the fact he knew Avery would avenge them when she came back. It was not something that could be hidden.

He just hoped she razed this palace to rubble.

His heart was ablaze with hatred and vengeance… And the whispers began to slowly seep into his thoughts…

. . . . .

Two rows of ten knights stood before Sir Glen as he walked each line in the training yard. With each soldier, he noted their perfection and determination to take their jobs seriously. It was the most obvious change within the order since they survived that monster stampede.

Today was the day that they were to return to active duty and relieve the city’s Enforcers of their posts within the farmlands within the Capital’s valley, yet only twenty men remained from the original hundred men strong order that had left this valley only a few weeks ago. However, none of these men were those same men. They had the same flesh and armor. But their faces were stony, a few scared physically for life while all of them carried that day in their hearts as well.

While these men stood, Sir Glen’s mind replayed every morning’s line up – the numbers dwindled every day. Yesterday there was twenty-one. The day before, twenty-three. A few men hung themselves from the desolate keep’s walls. A few had fled in the night. A few had completely gone insane and through all of that remained only twenty survivors who had gone through drastic changes.

Each had steeled themselves to fight against the horrors, the monsters in the night. Protect the innocent and defend the weak. No longer the lazy “knights” the nobles had deemed them, their armor dulled and beat like seasoned warriors. These were true men. This was Sir Glen’s thoughts.

Baptized in the blood and flames, even the youngest knight had the hard look of a survivor. Sir Glen had also undergone a drastic change. He was no longer berating the men at every turn. His resentment for being stationed to overwatch the pheasants the Nobles knight just to appease the masses. He now took it seriously with the new lease on life he had been given. Each and every knight coming to the agreement they never wanted to be in that situation again, helpless and powerless like the babbling idiots they had been

A new sigil had been painted onto the backs of each knight, a single yellow cat eye surrounded by a simple flame. A small symbol to pay homage to their savior, Avery. The symbol had also been painted onto the Order flag that flew over the tallest watchtower. “Alright, men. You have your orders. Dismissed.” The men had stood at attention for about ten minutes as Sir Glen went over their equipment before he finally released them. They exited the yard in an orderly fashion as they had practiced before exiting the keep into a throng of freshmen. Nearly two hundred fresh faces, as the Emperor had promised him.

The youngest of the faces looked no more than fifteen, the older no more than twenty. Most of the recruits only wore weather-worn leather armor with the old sigil faintly marked on their chests. A few, however, who iron, steel, and even meteorite armor – adventurers.

He had heard of a few adventurers who had done feats, worthy to be knighted, but nobles did not like commoners; Adventurers as well. Adventurers were seen as greedy commoners. People who would do just about anything for a few coppers and silvers. They were young and haughty, standing at the head of the rows, clearly keeping their distance from the rest of the pack. The rest of them did not seem to have an ouch of experience, so Sir Glen guessed they were just here to be squires. Typical of a noble to send a servant’s child to the Fourth Order.

While the Fourth Order was legally a Knight Order, they were only used to keep the promise of “knighthood” Keeping the clear distinction between the other three orders. It was just a false order in practice. Yet, Sir Glen no longer saw it as a hassle now. These boys would be the first line of defense, regardless if they were paper knights or not. They would still be called to action if an actual attack happened. He nodded at them, at least happy they weren’t half dead from starvation.

“The numbers work out. Men, take nine recruits and form a team then go on your patrol routes.” By the end of the selection, the Adventurers had deemed themselves above the common rabble and refused to join any of the squads, demanding that Glen lead them himself. He didn’t argue with them and allowed it. Of the two-hundred, only twenty recruits were left, fourteen of them adventurers.

These twenty were to be trained in how to run checkpoints under the supervision of Glen himself. As such, he took them down the main path from the keep that skimmed the natural river that acted as the moat for the capital. The entire way, the adventurers complained and bickered with the men they had deemed “below” them. In Glen’s eyes, it was just boys bickering over who had the biggest dick. Useless and not quite useful in a fight. Hell, he would take a woman if she could fight.

After the silent complaint crossed his mind, Narava and Avery came to mind.

“Yeah, I should definitely look into seeing if there were any fighters among them.” He muttered to himself, the words drowned out by the largest voice belonging to a large man who wore meteorite armor. He boasted how he had killed a ruff-boar with only his hands. If true, that would be something. “Hey, S-Sir glen! look!” one of the men called out to him. The entire group came to a stop as Glen turned back to the man who called out to him before he followed his outstretched finger.

Out on the horizon at valley’s opening, smoke columns began to rise.

“That’s strange.” He thought, trying to think if any of the farmers had planned to burn any fields today. Then bursts of blue fire and golden fire flared up on the main road before more columns began to rise. Alarms began to ring from the scattered villages as the distant ringing of steel sounded out. Then the alarms on the city’s ramparts began to ring. “Get to the bridge!” Glen called out to the men and broke into a full sprint.

Along the path, he called out to every pheasant they passed, telling them to run for the city. He didn’t bother to explain and they did not bother to ask. They only looked out on the horizon where fires flared and smoke rose. That was enough to spook them and they joined the pack, leaving their tools and harvest behind. It wasn’t hard for the farmers to overtake the soldiers with only the clothes on their back.

When they reached the bridge, the fighting was almost upon them. The bridge was packed with the commoners who occupied the farmlands and villages as more columns of smoke rose all over the valley. He had yet to see a single one of his men as a giant wolf came to a stop with a memorable face on top. “Lady Navara?!” Sir Glen was surprised to see the young princess here along with Avery’s mount. “Where-” He was cut off by the frantic and pale vixen “She’s fighting the undead! We have to get into the city!

. . . . .

Avery’s screamed with all her might as she channeled more mana into her golden flames, willing them to burn everything in sight as the undead pushed her back mile by mile with an unending wave of Dark Knights. It was far more than the single lich had been able to summon and control on the plains, it was nearly ten times more than the previous fight. She had only been able to slow a small portion of the line before she had to retreat or risk being swallowed whole by the thick black mass with blue dots like a sea of stars washing over the farmlands.

With their short rest, they had managed to reach the entrance of the valley until they were ambushed by a group of dark knights. They were quickly dispatched but more poured out of the forest. Avery had gotten her energy back but Fenrir and Navara still did not have the energy to fight so she had sent them ahead to warn the city.

Waves of death magic poured over the horde and the undead tried to maneuver around her but she still tried to stall them as best she could. It was meaningless as the undead out of her reach were already swarming over the villages ahead of her, extending half a mile past her.

Once she realized this, she kept harassing the front lines up and down until the farmlands began became sparse and narrow, and she was forced back onto the main road to defend the fleeing people. She dared not go in with her sword, aware she was not the unmovable mountain she had been in the game, but she was in her armor now, granting her enough buffs to ward off the negative effects of pouring an unending wave of magic towards her foes.

“Keep going!” She heard a man’s voice call out. She dared a quick turn of her head and saw a man had collapsed, a black arrow lodged in his hip. He was urging his family to go on but his wife and child tried to pull him. “Archers?” she asked herself before she turned to see that black lines traced through the air around small parts here and there, perhaps attacking the fleeing villagers. She had not encountered archers. In the game, they were used to protect walls or guard doors, or when…

Sieging an area…

The revelation came a second too late as black lines raced down towards them and she could only protect herself by throwing the full weight of her fire to burn the arrows away. When she turned back to see if her flames had gotten enough of them to protect the family, she only saw three figures staked to the trampled dirt with black arrows growing from them. Her anger rose, but she could only keep moving back and back as the horde began to fire more arrows at her.

Another wave of arrows burst through the golden flames as it dispersed. Without thinking, she swatted them away without thinking of flames but to instinctively deflex them like she had done in the game. The arrows were flung backward before they turned end over end to the dirt below as a semi-transparent blue wave of mana slapped against them. Avery was stunned and did it again, this time against the undead, but it only sent back two rows of undead before the rest held their comrades in place. It wasn’t useful. With a click of her tongue, she flung out more streams of fire instead. Burning away tens of them instead of just flinging them back into the horde to rejoin the fray a few seconds later.

After nearly an hour over trying to withhold the undead army, Avery finally found herself at the foot of the large stone bridge that extended to the capital’s large gates. The bridge jammed with people who screamed in terror as Avery fought like a cornered dragon to stop every arrow and knight from touching them. It was useless though. While she managed to hold the line at the entrance, the large trench below spanned across the entire wall, bending around the city walls and the river with it.

Arched in a “)” with her at the furthermost point.

Finally appearing on the edge where she could not reach them, the undead archers began to fire towards the front of the cornered commoners who clamored at the closed gates. Arrows and large rocks arched overhead from the ramparts into the black mass, yet the screams of the dying still called out to her back.

Stop… Stop… Stop!

He willed in her heard, trying to extend the telekinetic force to push more arrows away, but what came in out was a golden half circle shield that covered over half the bridge