Chapter 21 - Sounds of war - Part One

Lt. Rooke could not help but be impressed by the young Surgeon’s sheer level of grit and dogged determination. It had honestly been surprising to see her go from a state of complete despair to the maelstrom of activity now flitting about the field hospital. Surprising and more than a little concerning.

Judging by the dark patches under the young woman’s eyes, Lt. Rooke estimated that she had not slept more than a handful of minutes at a time in at least half a week, perhaps longer. The Surgeon hadn’t hesitated at all when Sgt. Gini offered her a canteen of their special scouting stimulant brew. Taking only long enough to sniff at it, she seemed to recognise it for what it was and gulped down at least a quarter of it in one go.

No stranger to the brew herself, Lt. Rooke knew the Surgeon would be bound for a hard crash within the next eighteen hours after taking that much stimulant in one pull. However, she could not fault the Surgeon’s assumed reasoning in doing so. Already on borrowed time and with bodies piling in now that the enemy's forces had been temporarily routed, there would be time to rest later.

Lt. Rooke and all her Rangers were practised in basic forms of first aid, so they had been doing what they could in order to actively implement triage protocols amongst the wounded and dying. While some of the younger Rangers were initially hesitant or reluctant to provide aid to the Goblins, a stimulant fuelled tirade from the Surgeon and a none too subtle reminder from Lt. Rooke’s Sergeants had changed their minds in short order.

This was why they were here after all. Rooke had noticed the important alterations to the quest the moment they encountered the ongoing battle. The primary directive remained the same as before, dictating eight people by name and species, making it clear in no uncertain terms that their required survival for completing the quest was absolute.

The tertiary objective of protecting and rescuing refugees from the adventurer’s Guild Foothold was superseded by another objective upon the discovery of the Forest Goblin refugees. The order changed instead to emphasise protecting and rescuing displaced refugees claimed by the Expeditionary Force first and foremost, and others only if the situation allowed for it.

Even Lt. Rooke had balked a little at the quests phrasing initially. As selfish and troublemaking as adventurers were, they were still human and the overwhelming majority of the third floor Foothold refugees were Asrus kingdom’s citizens. To place a higher priority on protecting monsters of the Labyrinth, even variants, was a bitter draught to swallow.

Temporarily leaving the field hospital, Lt. Rooke headed over towards the adventurer’s Guild’s fortified position a short distance away. Unlike the Forest Goblins, who had been forced to do most of their fighting out in the open, the adventurers had taken shelter behind crude earthworks.

Lt. Rooke had seen enough battles to recognise Mage-made defences when she saw them. So it was clear that the adventurers had a Geomancer or some other rare earth manipulating Class in their midst.

While the adventurers she passed looked pitiful and wretched, Lt. Rooke now understood the intent of the quest, and why it had changed. The adventurers would take care of themselves first, second and third, and their allies last, if at all. The further into the earthworks she went, the more irritated and disappointed Lt. Rooke became. The Geomancer had mana enough to spare to make beds, tables and even crude chairs, but not to provide even small measures of cover for their allies fighting outside?!

The Forest Goblins had made crude palisades from what looked like ships wreckage, but the overwhelming majority of their available materials had been spent creating the field hospital and a smaller structure beside it. Lt. Rooke had enough experience to know that the smaller structure almost certainly housed their young, and at most perhaps one or two carefully selected elders to guide their people in the wake of this disaster.

The estimated Forest Goblin losses were catastrophic. More than a hundred were already dead, their small bodies either bristling with projectiles or hewn apart like sacks of meat. At least another hundred were dying, and many more besides were badly wounded. Lt. Rooke had fought in the last war with the Confederation of City-States, but only the villages that were massacred by the Bloody Baron came close to this level of brutality.

“-will release the Variant Shaman to my custody immediately or face the consequences!” Cpt. Kristof growled from a short distance up ahead.

“Now, let’s not be hasty!” A nasally voice replied somewhat fearfully, “We need the Shaman’s Ward to maintain the safety of the refugees. Without it, we would be beset on all sides. I'm sure we can come to some sort of agreement. Here, take it. Just a small-URK!”

There was the muted sound of a body hitting the floor and a pair of blades being drawn a few moments later.

Lt. Rooke hurried around another set of earthworks and saw Cpt. Kristof standing over the prone and groaning form of an altogether fat and balding man in fine clothes. The swords she had heard being drawn were held by two of Cpt. Kristof’s men. They were currently directed towards a trio of large brutish thugs who seemed to have been slow on the draw and were now backing away with their arms raised.

“You will release the Variant Shaman to my custody immediately or be tried for treason!” Cpt Kristof repeated, the addition of the last words causing the trio of thugs to pale considerably.

“She’s locked up over there with the others!” One of the thugs blurted out fearfully, pointing deeper into the camp.

“The key’s in that pouch on his belt!” Another added.

“We had nothin ta do with it!” The last wailed.

Lt. Rooke reassessed the man on the ground, her eyes narrowing.

Cpt. Kristof knelt down and viciously tore away the pouch from the groaning merchant, along with his belt and no small amount of his silken pants. Taking this opportunity to acknowledge her presence, he threw Lt. Rooke the pouch and its attached textiles. “I’ll hold them for questioning,” Cpt. Kristof grunted, stepping over the incapacitated merchant and determinedly heading towards the trio of terrified thugs.

Leaving in the direction the thugs had indicated, Lt Rooke came upon a section of earthworks almost as sturdy as the ones she had just left, and somewhat surprisingly, it even had a crude door. Given the nature of the imprisonment, she was surprised by the lack of guards.

Approaching the door, Lt. Rooke’s enhanced senses caught the faint sounds of someone choking and what sounded like a scuffle.

Drawing her favourite hunting knife, Lt. Rooke kicked down the door and ducked low in preparation to drive the knife hard into someone's kidney. However, the scene unfolding before her caused Lt. Rooke to momentarily pause.

A young woman with fierce eyes and wild red hair was on her back, holding a man roundabout his neck with her right arm and viciously tightening the hold with her left to add additional pressure. Furthermore, the redhead had her left leg locked around a second man’s throat and was similarly applying additional pressure with her right.

Both men's faces were already beginning to turn dark, their frantic movements becoming sluggish and increasingly desperate.

“They-kid-napped-my-friend!” The redhead grunted, incrementally increasing the pressure against her victims.

Lt. Rooke blinked and took a moment to take in the room at large. As she had already more or less expected, there was a pile of cages stacked against the far wall. Every cage was occupied by monsters, with the exception of what looked like a gagged and bound young man with a large welt and bruise on the side of his head.

As she skirted the ongoing melee on the floor, Lt. Rooke’s blood ran cold as she saw the condition of the monsters kept in the cages. All of them were badly beaten and bruised, and what looked like a young girl barely seemed to be clinging to life, her skin blackened and withered by severed burns. While none of them had slave collars around their necks, Lt. Rooke recognised the near-perfect positioning they held in their cages, staying as close to the centre as they could possibly manage. Even the unconscious form of the young man was curled up in the centre of his cage.

Removing a thick dwarven key from the pouch, Lt. Rooke snapped a booted heel against the temple of the man being strangled between the young woman's legs.

*Crack*

The man jolted backwards slightly and felt limp.

Apparently not even the slightest bit surprised by Lt. Rooke’s summary execution of her victim, the redheaded young woman shifted her grip and viciously rotated the remaining man’s head.

*Crunch*

The man spasmed and gasped as the young woman released him and leapt to her feet. “We need to find the fucker who did this or he will kill them!” She insisted urgently and viciously kicked the paralysed man in the side of the head. The young woman paused and stiffened somewhat, suddenly eyeing her distrustfully, “What are YOU doing here?” She asked suspiciously, her eyes narrowing dangerously, “And why do YOU have that key?”

*****

Sheepishly glancing at my Group Status, I still couldn’t believe Ushu’s apprentices had been right.

[Tim - HP: 50/56 - Normal ]

Lash had of course taken their word at face value, and been very insistent that I do the same. Thoroughly worn out, I still had to admit that I did in fact feel very much alive. Technically, the Shamans in training had said that all life-affirming activities, including eating, would gradually restore my damaged life force. However, the fact that they insisted upon mating being the most effective was all Lash had needed to know. In hindsight, I was relieved by her lack of restraint in waiting until we reached our bedroom.

“Lash?” I gently rocked her shoulder. Getting no reply other than her contented snoring, I jostled her harder, “Lash, wake up, I need to ask you something.”

“Mrm?” Lash stopped snoring and slowly opened her eyes. She flexed her muscles and snuggled in closer as she prepared to go back to sleep.

“Lash...where do baby monsters come from?” My question had the desired effect, immediately sobering Lash up and seizing her attention.

“What?” Lash asked in surprise, pushing herself up so she could look me in the eyes.

Now that I knew I had her attention, I could phrase the question better to find out what I really needed to know. “Monster eggs,” I started to explain somewhat sheepishly, becoming embarrassed under Lash’s intense scrutiny, “I wanted to know...you know...what our chances are...of you becoming pregnant...”

Lash tensed, her thighs pinning my hips as she stared intensely into my eyes, “Is not breeding moon,” Lash replied slyly.

“B-breeding moon?” I stammered slightly, trying to keep my mind focused on getting answers and not her warm skin pressing against mine.

Lash nodded, “Breeding moon brings new life to Clan,” she leaned in closer and stole a kiss, “Still many nights until it returns.”

“H-how many?” I choked out, finding it increasingly difficult to focus on my original reason for waking Lash in the first place.

Lash smiled lustfully, most likely completely misinterpreting my intentions, “Enough for practice!”

We didn’t get much talking done after that. However, once I regained feeling in my legs, I extricated myself from beneath Lash as gently as I was able, got dressed and quietly headed downstairs.

I very nearly tripped and fell over the side when I caught sight of what was transpiring by the fountain below.

Orphiel was sitting on a high branch of the fountain tree and strumming a lilting melody on what looked like a small harp. While Ril stared fixedly up at him from what would pass for a hiding place on the opposite side of the tree, hands cradling her chin and a smitten expression of her face..

On some level, I had expected Toofy and Asra’s relationship to progress, just not this quickly. I also had reservations about whether Asra genuinely shared Toofy’s interest and affection. Their shared affection was awkward to witness, mostly because of the years of social conditioning subconsciously assigning relative ages to them both largely based on height. I had to bite my tongue, and remind myself that the both of them were actually most likely incredibly similar in age, let alone how weird monster psychological development was due to the Labyrinth’s interference.

It had been so long since I last had something to listen to, so I decided to stay and listen for a while.

Unfortunately, unlike Ril, my presence on the stairs was far more noticeable than her hiding place in the water below. Orphiel’s playing came to an abrupt end the moment he noticed me.

“L-lord!” Orphiel stammered, his instrument evaporating into nothingness, “I swear I did not mean to wake you! I can play quieter! I would practice somewhere else, but the acoustics are simply-”

I silenced the distraught Fallen Angel with a wave of my hand and motioned for him to come closer. The last thing I wanted was to wake Lash up again, I was barely ambulatory as it was. “You aren’t in trouble, and you didn’t wake me up.”

Orphiel sighed in relief, his spectral wings fading as he landed long the stairs.

“It’s just been a long time since I had music to listen to,” I shrugged apologetically, “I couldn’t help myself.”

Orphiel blushed heavily, “I am not very good, but I am practising hard!” he insisted.

I had no idea what he was talking about. The farthest I had ever managed to progress as a musician was playing scales on a saxophone when I was twelve. Despite practising for close to two years, I had just never gotten the hang of it. In comparison, for all I knew, Orphiel had only been practising for less than a couple of days and was easily good enough to pass for an amateur musician. The fact that he didn’t have a teacher really made his natural talent obvious.

“I don’t want to hear you lie like that again Orphiel, you're better than most already. If you attempt humility you're just going to piss off anyone less talented,” I insisted.

Orphiel gulped hard and nodded, “Yes, Lord...”

“Have you practised with any other instruments?” I asked curiously, not wanting to curb the aspiring musician's enthusiasm. Not least because I could feel Ril’s attention firmly locked on our conversation. I had seen more than enough high school dramas to know better than to mess with a girl's crush. The fact that Ril was a Daemon that could open interdimensional portals only made my choice all the more prudent.

Orphiel timidly shook his head.

I recalled that he could replicate an instrument he could conceptualize, so I wondered if perhaps that was the reason for his choice. “Was that instrument your favourite? Or-”

Orphiel violently shook his head and his blushing intensified, “I haven't seen any others...” He admitted quietly.

Well, that honestly seemed like a crime given his obvious talent. “Follow me,” I got to my feet and headed downstairs to the storeroom.

I spent the next hour using some charcoal sticks to draw musical scales on the storeroom walls, as well as doing my best to draw different instruments and explain how they worked. Since my musical knowledge and experience was heavily limited, I couldn’t really offer much besides a handful of instruments and very basic music theory. All the same, Orphiel seemed incredibly happy, so I chalked it up as a win. In all likelihood, he would probably be able to take what little I had been able to give him and build on it intuitively with his talent alone, so I didn’t feel too bad about not having much to offer.

Heading down the stairs and walking past the fountain, I was painfully aware of Ril’s intense stare following me as I headed out of the Grove and towards the cooking fires. As disgustingly early as it was, there would almost certainly be something either cooking or left over from yesterday.

However, before I had a chance to do more than salivate over the smell of spiced fish, a commotion over by the eastern gate seized my attention instead.

Releasing a mournful sigh, I petulantly issued a quest for someone working the tending the fires to bring me something to eat while I hurried off towards the gate to investigate.

“Lord! A human repressentative requesstss your pressence!” A Serpent-Kin guard stationed up in the gatehouse tree pointed anxiously beyond the gate, “He claimed it iss urgent!”

Curiosity piqued, I motioned for the Wood Wyrd’s to open a path for me to see who the representative was and what they wanted.

I stopped just outside of the gatehouse, unwilling to stray too close to the edge of the barrier after my run-in with the other Awakened yesterday. Besides, I could see the squad of human soldiers easily enough from here. Bearing torches to see in the early morning darkness, they stood out like a sore thumb in the open terraformed ground that bridged Sanctuary to the soldiers camp farther east.

“Approach!” I called out, more than willing to give them permission to enter the barrier so we could speak properly without making an easy target for our enemies.

Not needing to be told twice, the eleven men and women hurriedly crossed over into the barrier. Despite my expectations, I didn’t recognise the junior officer leading these soldiers. Perhaps in his mid-twenties and only of average height, the junior officer had a difficult to place energy about him that completely rubbed me the wrong way in my state of irritable tiredness.

“Who are you?” I demanded somewhat curtly, immediately regretting my harsh tone as the words left my lips, “I don’t know you,” I amended in a much more civil tone.

If the junior officer was offended, he didn’t show it, and even seemed to smile a little wider now, “We haven't been introduced yet! I’m Lt. Kestrel!” The junior officer volunteered in a persistently irritatingly cheery voice while extending his arm in greeting, “Col. Klive has assigned me as your official Liaison since Cpt. Felix is preoccupied with other duties.”

Taking a moment to formalise the greeting, I clasped forearms with him for a moment and let go. “Is that all you came over to tell me?” I asked, doing my best to remain patient.

“Actually, I have news regarding your Grand Quest to rescue the Expeditionary Force!” Lt. Kestrel opened the messenger's satchel at his side and withdrew a large roll of leather. Unfurling the leather revealed a circular map, and Lt. Kestrel motioned with a nod of his head to draw my attention to two recently added landmarks that I assumed denoted the army’s base and further west, Sanctuary. “Our relief force has made contact with the Expeditionary Force approximately seventeen hours march east by south-east,” he motioned for one of his subordinates to hold the map, and then pointed to the approximate location on the map. Suddenly quite serious, Lt. Kestrel paused for a moment and flinched slightly, “While all members of the Expeditionary Force are accounted for, there have been...complications...”

“Complications?” I tried to brace myself for the worst, but the sheer dampening this prospective news had on the formerly manically cheerful lieutenants mood, did not bode well at all.

“Ah, ahrm, yes...” Lt. Kestrel fidgeted uncomfortably, “The report we received from our ranking Ranger in the field claims that Expeditionary Force member Tobi was abducted and illegally enslaved after witnessing the abduction of a Forest Goblin Shaman during a pitched battle against enemy forces-”

“What?!” I growled, my skin crawling as I recalled my most recent experiences under enslavement to the adventurers Guild.

Lt. Kestrel gulped hard and flinched, his soldiers recoiling and taking a few steps back. “Yes, ah, he has of course been freed along with the other enslaved Variants. They have been remanded to the protective custody of Expeditionary Force member...uh...” he pulled out a small stack of papers from his messenger satchel and nervously rifled through them for a few moments before suddenly sighing in relief as he found the information he was looking for, “Clarice. The freed Variants were remanded to the protective custody of Expeditionary Force member Clarice,” Lt. glanced up at me as if expecting an expression of my opinion on that decision.

I nodded and rubbed at my temples with my thumb and forefinger, “When you say Variants, you mean monsters like me? What the adventurers call named or special monsters?”

“Yes,” Lt. Kestrel nodded emphatically, “It isn’t an insult or a derogatory term or anything!” he insisted nervously, “It just means, well, different...”

I just stared at Lt. Kestrel for a moment before my tired brain dredged up something he had said earlier, “You said there was a Forest Goblin Shaman and that the Slaver abducted them?” I prompted.

Lt. Kestrel nodded emphatically and shuffled through the papers again, “Yes! Our Ranger confirmed that the Forest Goblin refugees under the Expeditionary Force’s protection-” He glanced briefly up at my face as if gauging my reaction to that assessment, “-originate from the Variant trading town of Sunrock. Despite having a longstanding trading relationship with the adventurer's Guild, it seems like they have been all but abandoned...”

“How many survivors?” Having been informed that there was both a battle and that the adventurer’s Guild was giving them the cold shoulder, I braced myself for the worst.

Lt. Kestrel dryly gulped and pulled out the most crinkled page from the stack, “The report states that approximately one-hundred and fifty Forest Goblins were wounded during the battle and can be expected to recover if given enough time, extended medical attention...ah...there is more...Our Ranger reports that there may be as many as three hundred infant to juvenile Forest Goblins in addition to fewer than thirty uninjured adults...” His face turned pale as he reached the bottom of the page, “Ah...also...ah...” Lt. Kestrel gulped hard and anxiously forced himself to look me in the eye, “Expeditionary Force member Emelia is in critical condition and...and may not survive the return journey...”

“What is her injury?” I croaked, my throat and mouth suddenly as dry as a desert, “If Nadine can’t stitch her up then it has to be something bad, or a curse...”

“It was an arrow to the neck...” Lt. Kestrel paled, “Apparently the-” He grimaced and apparently couldn’t muster the effort to repeat the phrase again, “Nadine did all she could, but passed out from extreme exhaustion...”

“How long until the soldiers bring them back?” I pushed back against the mounting dread attempting to establish itself in the periphery of my mind. If I let it go unchecked, then Emelia’s chances would go from slim to none.

“Approximately another eight hours...” Lt. Kestrel gulped hard and gave me a determined look, “Col. Klive just wanted to let you know that he will spare no expense in treatment of her injury! The magical item you traded to him has multiple uses and the Colonel fully intends to use it on Emelia!”

In my raw state, I very nearly corrected him, barely clamping my teeth shut in time to literally bite my tongue. I nodded to show I understood. “I will take in the Forest Goblin refugees, provided they are willing. But besides those I named in the quest, I will accept no humans within Sanctuary. Is that clear?” I stated the last portion far more severely than I needed to, but I was distracted by rifling through my tired brain to find relevant medical procedures to cover as many eventualities as possible.

Lt. Kestrel nodded crisply and thankfully didn’t seem to mind my tone all that much, “Rest assured that the Colonel values this partnership immensely and that we will accommodate your requests and conditions to the best of our abilities.”

I nodded, only half-listening.

Lt. Kestrel removed a small wooden plaque from the satchel and held it out for me to inspect it,

Bearing some sort of writing on the top half and a glass bead embedded below it, the bottom was blank and had a sliding slot with a small leather strap on it.

“This is a Message Board, a sort of low-level magic item. They work in pairs, and I have the one matching this one here. If you want to get in contact with the Colonel or need assistance with anything, just place a manastone in the slot at the bottom and slide it across like this,” Lt. Kestrel withdrew a small manastone from the satchel, popped it into the slot, and then slid it across until it was flush with the other side. The glass bead on the top half of the Message Board suddenly turned pitch black. Lt. Kestrel removed a matching Message board from a rectangular pouch at his waist and held it up alongside the first. The glass bead on the second one had turned black as well. “When one other person wants to arrange for a meeting, they can slide the manastone across and turn the indicator black. When the other person wants to show they are ready to meet, they do the same thing, which will turn both indicators white. Like this,” he slid the manastone across on the second Message Board, which immediately turned both glass beads completely white.

Accepting the Message Board, I realised two things at roughly the same time. First, the small leather strap was to keep the manastone fixed to the slider. Second, there was no way that the soldiers weren’t using this for the equivalent of morse code messages. It was just ‘too perfect’ for the job.

The Lieutenant rolled up the map again and deposited it back in the messenger satchel before offering me the satchel. “The Colonel wanted you to have it,” he explained a little nervously while stowing away his Message Board again.

“I appreciate it,” I replied, making it clear through my tone that we were done here.

Having abruptly ended the meeting, I determinedly headed for the hospital while issuing a quest for Wraithe and any other Daemons who had taken the Surgeon Classes to meet me there for intense training.

The trio of Daemons were already waiting for me by the time I arrived, so I dove right into the theory side of each potential scenario I could think of regarding safely treating Emelia’s life-threatening injury. The overwhelming disadvantage was a near-complete lack of available tools.

Assuming the arrow had damaged an artery, the shaft of the arrow itself would be somewhat plugging the cut. Just removing the arrow would see Emelia bleed out before even having a chance at sealing the cut with sutures, let alone getting a healing spell off afterwards. Assuming the arrow hadn’t penetrated the full way through, the exterior wound would also begin bleeding the moment the arrow was removed, and the sharp edges of the arrowhead would do even more damage on the way out than it did on the way in. And that was assuming the damned arrow wasn’t poisoned...

The first thing drilled into the three Daemons was to demand whoever summoned them to summon the other two to serve as assistants. Without medical clamps, the extra pairs of hands would be vital in stopping the artery from hemorrhaging the moment they started moving the arrow. Second, if the arrow was a through and through, one Surgeon would apply pressure on the exit wound while another pinched either side of the potentially damaged artery to prevent a spontaneous hemorrhage. The final Surgeon would be responsible for breaking either end of the arrow then quickly and carefully removing the shaft from her neck. That same surgeon would then be responsible for suturing the artery if it was damaged, then using their healing ability to repair as much of the damage as quickly as possible before suturing the exit wound.

If the artery was not damaged, or once they are confident it has healed enough to regain its integrity, only then would the second surgeon release their grip on the artery and begin suturing the entry wound.

In all likelihood, they would need to increase the dimension of the entry wound with a careful incision on either side in order to give the second Surgeon enough space to pinch the artery and allow for the third Surgeon to suture any damage.

That was just the first scenario I could think of, but there were hundreds of potential variables to account for. They also needed practice working on veins and arteries.

When I had finished running through the most likely scenarios, I sent them off to gather possible practice materials from the offal pile near the cooking fires. It had been days since the hunters were allowed outside, so I wasn’t optimistic about their chances.

My stressed-out brain ever so briefly toyed with the idea of perhaps having Asra summon a copy of a Daemon volunteer and ‘practising’ on them, but the thought made me physically ill and I rejected it almost immediately.

With the imminent influx of Forest Goblin refugees, and the staggering number of their wounded, I needed to buy out a whole mess of medical supplies and get the other Surgeons ready for the insane number of patients they would need to work through.

It was only after rousing all the Surgeons, prepping all the volunteers that would be serving as porters and redirecting Hana, Qreet and the other Druids toward expanding the hospital and creating more emergency housing, that I realised Emelia almost certainly didn’t have a damaged carotid artery. Or if she did, the cut had to be incredibly small for her not to have bled to death within minutes.

When the Daemons returned empty-handed, I reminded them to try and confirm the condition of the artery first, and if the arrow wound missed it entirely, to act accordingly.

With just about everything arranged, I gladly retired to the Grove and submerged myself in the fountain. Ignoring Ril’s mild protests, I allowed myself to relax, confident that I had done everything I could.

Somewhat remarkably, the stress, anxiety and tiredness that had been building since earlier had now begun slipping away. After soaking for about an hour and long having since allowed my mind to drift, I returned to my senses with a sudden start.

I hadn’t consumed a mana stone in the past two days...

Slowly rising out of the fountain, I began carefully retracing my thoughts since I had first woken up in the fountain. With a clear mind, and now knowing what to look for, I shuddered as I recognised the changes in my usual behaviour. In particular, the shortening of my temper.

It wasn’t much, barely more than the difference of having missed an hour or two of sleep at most. But it had been enough.

Shakily taking a seat on the stairs, I kneaded the crown of my head with my palms in anticipation of an anxiety-induced headache that could strike at any minute.

“Tim scared?” Toofy had wandered over and sat down on the stairs beside me without me noticing.

“I...” My first impulse had been to lie, but the sincere concern in Toofy’s eyes caused me to reconsider, “Yeah,” I admitted, hanging my head and letting out a depressed sigh, “I am...”

Toofy moved in closer and wriggled in under my arm, resting her head against my chest, “Toofy scared too,” she said quietly. “World big, Toofy small, weak,” she shivered and huddled in closer.

I absently ran my fingers through Toofy’s hair. It was the opposite that I found frightening. The more I continued to fight, the more often I experienced violent blackouts.

Being so strong made me nearly invincible...

So what would happen if I turned on my friends? What if I blacked out and didn’t come back to my senses again? The thought of harming the people I cared about both horrified and disgusted me in equal measure.

I needed a contingency to make sure that if the worst were to happen, there would be some way of putting me down. Unfortunately, the only weapon I could think of was the spear used by the Goblin Chieftain from the first floor.

Absently scratching the scar it had left on my leg, I wondered why the magical spear had disappeared the way it had, and what the significance of it was. What was the Key of Awakening? And what arbitrary conditions had I not met? Surely, the magical spear was more useful than whatever this ’key’ was intended to open.

Realising Toofy had fallen asleep, I gently picked her up and then laid her down in her favourite sunbathing spot.

As I turned to leave, I thought I heard her quietly whimper, the sound and implications pulling at my heartstrings. If it weren’t already close to the estimated hour of the refugees' arrival, I would have stayed a while longer. To better satisfy my guilty conscience, I issued a personal quest to Asra to keep Toofy company, with the added condition of also keeping her out of trouble for the next few hours.

To my surprise and no small amount of amusement, this was the first quest I was able to make mandatory. Purely for the sake of science, I followed through and made the companionship and bodyguarding quest mandatory. Unsure of what exactly I had expected, the harshest penalty I could apply for failure was an Exp demerit based on the degree of difficulty. Interestingly, this was my first time testing penalties as well, and it was actually rather cool that the prospective penalty for failure seemed to markedly increase the degree of reward.

Settling on a very minor Exp demerit for failure, I issued the quest and headed towards the Eastern gate.

I tried hard not to smile as I noticed Asra bolting from his barrow towards the Grove. I kept forgetting that I was in a very real position of power and authority, and that abusing it like this was only going to cause problems later down the line.

Waiting for the lookouts to give word, I only now began to seriously consider the possibility that the Forest Goblin refugees may not actually want to seek shelter in the fortress of a bloodthirsty Ogre. My brief chat with Toofy had left me in an awkward state of introspection, and I was seriously starting to doubt a number of things I had been taking for granted.

I had just assumed that Kirk and Rose would want to bring their daughter to Sanctuary in order to become a Surgeon, even after everything that had happened since we left the first floor. But after experiencing two monster raids back to back, I wouldn’t blame her parents for packing it in and living a normal life outside of the Labyrinth.

The same went for Nadine and the others. I had just been assuming that once they returned, things would just return to how they had been before they left. But what was that? Our relationship had been one of near-constant change since the beginning. First, I was their slave, then a sort of pseudo employee, then companion and now...their king? I really hadn’t stopped to consider how things had changed between us.

I was joined at the gate by Lash, Gric and Hana. As leaders of Sanctuary, it would be our responsibility to invite each prospective member to the Settlement. With the refugees numbering in the hundreds. It would take no small amount of effort for the three of us to establish an organised yet brisk pace when processing the refugees. At this point, I just assumed Ushu would be far too worn out to help out, so we would have to make the best of it.

“Lord! The humans have just summoned Wraithe, as you said they would,” Gric announced proudly.

I nodded grimly, “Hopefully the other two will not be far behind. The more of them there are, the better chance they have of just powering through it if something goes wrong.”

A minute passed by with agonising slowness. “Lord! Forst and Xith have been summoned also,” Gric grinned happily, no doubt pleased about being able to charge the Colonel’s Pact Binder for the additional summoning fees.

As Gric was in charge of the Daemons summoning rights, he had established a rather robust set of rules and guidelines for the other Daemons to follow when being Summoned. The most important of which being the payment rate index. Allegedly of his own creation, the payment rate index quantified the value of the desired task and applied an objectively arbitrary required payment to be given to the Summoned Daemon before they would undertake said task. This was, of course, after the Summoner already forked out a commensurate amount of their own MP or manastones just to Summon the Daemon in the first place.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, Gric had also admitted that he was considering having the Daemons establish fictional rivalries with one another to better extort additional payment from potential Summoners if they wanted to attempt summoning multiple Daemons for the same task.

I would have found the nerve to rebuke Gric for his wanton greed, that is, if buying out so many medical supplies from the vendor hadn’t left us desperately poor. So for the time being, I was willing to indulge his avarice in the name of charitable works.

As the minutes dragged on, I was beginning to get worried. The only real consolation I could find, was that the registry still hadn’t marked Emelia as deceased. Knowing the army’s camp was too far away to get a group Status either, and not wanting to risk depriving the Daemon Surgeons of their much-needed information, I was forced to just hurry up and wait.

“Lord! I see movement from the East!” A lookout cried excitedly.

The Wood Wyrds moved aside allowing everyone but Gric a reasonably clear view.

However, my eyesight was not nearly as good as the lookout, so all I could really make out was the human camp in the distance.

Hana suddenly stiffened, her face locked in an expression of extreme shock, “No...it can’t be...” Hana took three slow steps forward, her mantle of emerald mana coalescing around her as she slowly entered the gatehouse.

“Hana are you alright? What’s wrong?” I followed behind her and saw a feverish intensity enter her eyes.

“No...” Hana repeated breathlessly as tears began running down her face.

More than a little freaked out by what was happening, I reached out to take hold of Hana’s left arm, but I was too late.

Breaking into a sprint, Hana raced out into no man's land, leaving the protection afforded by Sanctuary’s barrier behind.

“Damnit! Hana! Come Back!” Without so much as a second thought, I raced out after her.

Expecting an enemy ambush at any moment, my anxiety only continued to climb higher and higher as I slowly closed the distance between us. Now able to see the front of the Refugee column ahead of us, I felt a sudden sinking feeling in my gut.

With the refugee column now having left the army’s camp behind and now headed to Sanctuary, there would be no better time to spring an ambush.

Hearing the cries of alarm from the refugees and escort of human soldiers I was certain that the trap was sprung and wildly looked around for the direction of the enemies attack.

Only, there wasn’t one. They were shouting and pointing at Hana and myself.

While I slowed down in an attempt to rally and counterattack a fictional ambush, Hana continued running deeper in the column of refugees.

By the time I caught up to her, I was greeted with a familiar face.

Looking truly beyond haggard, Clarice had been pulling a sled on her own. Unlike the others drawn by soldiers or the less injured Forest goblins, her sled originally had one sole occupant although it was now shared by Hana.

Hana had lifted the unconscious form of what looked like a badly burned young woman up into her arms and was crying hysterically.

After staring at the two of them for far longer than I should have, my brain finally put the pieces together, “She is one of her sisters...” I hadn’t intended to say it aloud, but it slipped out just the same.

Clarice nodded wanly, her expression a mix of anger contempt, “It takes a real sick fuck to do that to someone...Slavers probably could...but when I got a closer look at her, I remembered what Hana said about...you know.”

I nodded. I didn’t know whether to pity or envy her. There had been a time when I would have given or done anything in order to get my Mum back. Only now, I wasn't so sure. “Clarice you need some rest, and we all need to get into safety as soon as possible. So how about you hop on the sled and make sure Hana and her sister are secure, and I pull it back to Sanctuary?”

Half expecting a fight, I was surprised when Clarice simply closed her eyes, exhaled softly and nodded, “Alright.”

While the refugee column had stalled with Hana and my own sudden appearance, the officers in charge of the soldiers had gotten everyone moving again in short order.

The Forest Goblins being carried on the nearby sleds were giving me curious and somewhat fearful glances whenever they thought I wasn’t looking. Not that I could blame them all that much. After all, I still remembered how Toofy first reacted to me when I caught her on the first floor. Far from a children's fairy tale, the prospect of a little Goblin being eaten alive was a very real possibility in this world.

I was immensely relieved as the front of the column entered the barrier.

A small contingent of Serpent-Kin and Deep Orcs were standing guard outside the gatehouse, while Lash remained curiously absent.

As more sleds from the column reached Sanctuary, some of the soldiers began to level up, prompting some light banter amongst the rank and file as they eagerly brought forward more refugees and sleds packed with salvaged weapons and armour.

When we reached the barrier, I didn’t stop and instead dragged the sled up and through the gatehouse before parking it off to the side and waving forward a nearby Deep Orc to take my place. “Take them to the hospital, and let the Surgeons and porters know that the refugees are here,” I commanded before turning my attention to Lash and Gric.

The former looking incredibly unhappy and the latter sporting the beginning of a black eye.

“Don’t run off like that!” Lash scolded, punching my right arm for emphasis, “Enemies everywhere!” her fury subsided and she now seemed more frustrated than angry.

“I’ll try to be more careful,” I promised, fully intending to keep it, but also knowing deep down that I was almost certainly going to break it sooner rather than later.

Lash pulled me closer and rested her head on my shoulder, her armour uncomfortably pressing into my chest. “Do or I hit harder to make remember,” Lash grumbled quietly, the whisper of a smile returning to her face.

“I will,” I promised, and tactfully made an addendum, “So long as you refrain from beating up Gric!”

Lash looked embarrassed for a few moments and then nodded, confirming my suspicions that Gric must have grabbed Lash’s arm or something to stop her from chasing after me.

I was going to say something else, but stopped as I heard an unexpected sound.

Rhythmic, like a heartbeat, the sound repeated over and over in a set pattern with only minor variances.

My blood ran cold as I recognised the sound, “EVERYONE! HEAD INTO SANCTUARY NOW!” I roared and headed for the gatehouse again, Lash only a half step behind me. As I passed through, I spared a meaningful look back at Gric. I had no intention of leaving the human soldiers outside to die, so Gric would need to make sure both himself and all the other Daemons stayed out of sight.

The soldiers were already forming ranks just within the protective boundary of the Barrier.

Although initially unsure of what to do, the Forest Goblins had begun trickling through the gatehouse and into Sanctuary itself.

The rhythmic pounding grew louder with each passing moment, and with it my sense of unease continued to intensify.

“HESK! PRESENT MY BANNER!” I snarled.

A few moments later, Hesk and his younger brother Hessek came charging out the gatehouse with my banner held high between them.

Almost immediately, I felt the previously mounting sense of unease and dread began to ebb away.

Even though the soldiers hadn’t truly panicked, they seemed much more at ease than they had been a few moments ago. Similarly, the Goblin refugees were still determinedly making their way through the gatehouse without devolving into a rampaging mob, forcing me to reconsider my rather poor opinion of their mental fortitude.

Just about half of the refugees had managed to make it through the gate before the source of the noise revealed themselves.

Three hulking bloated monstrosities, each over twenty feet tall, staggered out of the swamp. Bodies plated with thick sheets of iron, the three corpulent monstrosities indomitably pressed forward towards Sanctuary, their heavy footfalls responsible for the unsettling noise. Worse still, they were not alone, a host of shambling corpses staggering along in their wake.

Staring down the approaching horde of undead, I regretted not having donned my armour earlier when I had the chance. However, my sense of regret quickly passed as I considered the effects my suit of hide and bone armour would have had on Ally morale given the nature of our enemy.

Pulling my mask into place and giving my morningstar a few practice swings, I tried to look on the bright side. At least the giant shambling corpse monsters would be hard to miss...