Ubel’s right eye twitched as thoughts raced through his brain. No plan survives contact with the unknown, exactly as my teacher said. So a curveball right at the beginning? Cut the crap, who’s fucking with me? God? He should stay out of business if he knows what’s good for him. If I don’t handle this right we might lose the event before we even begin.

Standing up from his chair, Ubel coldly spat, “Urist, I strongly advise we meet these new arrivals before things get out of hand like it did miss Snorri.”

Feeling offended, Snorri responded, “Hey I wasn’t that bad. I mean, they didn’t die and merely have a few long-lasting injuries.”

Ubel and Urist just gave her a look before they turned to each other.

“So Ubel, if I’m correct you want to stop this meeting temporarily to meet them and see if they are a threat?”

“Yes.”

Standing up from his seat, Urist motioned for everyone to follow him as he headed out of the doorway. Naturally, everyone with the exception of Snorri, who was fuming at being ignored, followed him.

“Humph, you think you can ignore me? I'm not that bad, how dare you two treat me like this. This is unjust! Unreasonable! I demand to be heard!”

Ubel just turned to her and snorted, “Earn some military achievements and I’ll think about it. Come on, we have an issue to solve, 2nd in command.”

Snorri sent him a frosty glare, “You know I can easily break you, right?”

Ubel turned his head slightly and mouthed, “So? I already died once. Death isn’t scary, it’s the emotional fallout of what said death brings. So lead, follow, or get the fuck out of the way. War is at our doorstep and I don’t have time to deal with your whining.”

Without skipping a beat Ubel turned around and walked out of the doorway.

Snorri cursed as she clenched and unclenched her hands, “You should really fix that shitty personality or you’ll never get married.”

Ubel pushed up his glasses, his voice drifting back into the room, “For your information, I’m married to War and Death. We’re quite suited for one another, thank you very much.”

...

When they entered the civilization room, they found a circle of dwarfs staring at two unknown dwarfs wearing robes. One of them was in white with golden circles stitched on the fabric. The other one wore a green robe decorated with all types of gems.

The white-robed man looked quite plain with the exception of his messy hair and cynical looking eyes. The green-robed man, on the other hand, looked quite whimsical as he had a darker skin tone with locks of thick hair entangled with gems.

Urist parted the crowd, and the commanders stood behind him.

The first to speak was the green-robed man, who had a twinkle in his eye, “So you're the leader of this place? From what the people here say, we’re dead men walking?”

Seeing that the two weren't turning hostile like Snorri, Urist breathed a sigh of relief, “Yes and…”

…

After a back and forth exchange, the two unknown men looked at each other and chuckled.

Confused at the reaction, Urist asked, “Why are you two laughing?”

Clearing the tear from his eye the green-robed man responded, “Ah, it’s a pretty amusing story you told and I wouldn’t have believed it if my friend hadn’t used his truth formation. If you told us any lie I would have turned this room into a bloodbath, but unfortunately you didn’t.”

The man said it with the most sincere smile as he waved his hand, causing little slivers of gems hidden all over the room to move over and settle on his robe. The white-robed man snapped his fingers and small formation disks the size of nails floated off the crowd of dwarfs and settled on his blank right sleeve.

Seeing such preparation made Urist’s blood run cold as he didn’t even know that these two men held his people hostage without his knowledge.

These two make what Snorri did a light joke. Tier 4s are not to be taken lightly. If I wasn’t brutally honest many would’ve died on the spot without me able to do anything. I must take better care so this doesn’t happen again. After this event, I’ll need to talk with Ubel on how to best deal with this new problem.

The cynical looking man finally spoke up, “I’m very sorry about what I and my good brother did. I hope that in good faith you don’t think too poorly on us. Afterall in an unknown place, you can’t blame us for not being cautious with our lives, right?”

Snorri laughed coldly, “Remove the rest of the traps you placed or I’ll kill you two. The five on the ceiling and six on the floor. Plus the one aimed at our King's heart.”

The two men's expressions froze, and Snorri’s tear tattoos began to spread along her body.

Pushing up his glasses from behind Snorri, Ubel added, “If you don’t do as she says, we’ll take that as a declaration of war. So cut the shit, we don’t have time to play around currently.”

Seeing the tier 3s dwarfs readying their weapons and magic, the two men looked at each other. It seemed they were complimenting something before they sighed at each other. With a wave of their hands, the traps were dismantled, including a formation studded with gems that floated out of Urist’s clothes.

Throughout all of this Urist kept a calm expression, which was one of the main factors the two men backed down. But inwardly his mind was in utter chaos at the prospect of how close he was to death without even knowing it.

I almost died without knowing how. Am I truly that weak? And I put my people in danger without realizing it? What kind of leader am I?

Ubel nodded his head, “Since you have disarmed the room fully, would you follow us.”

The green-robed man kept his smiling expression, “And why would we do that?”

“Well, as our king Urist just told you, soon war will come, within a few hours at that, and I wish for you two to comply.”

“And why would we do that? Only one of you has the power to really fight us. What reason must we fight your war?”

“Honestly I’d rather you not be included in this fight since I don’t know you two. If I was in leadership I’d have killed you for threatening my life. But, I am not the king, Urist is and as the general of the army, I’m conscripting you for your services. And in fact, joining benefits you two greatly.

The cynical man chuckled darkly, “Heh, and how does risking our lives benefit us?”

“For starters, your opinion of everyone in the base isn’t that great right now. Number two, this is the only known civilized place in the surrounding area. Number three, as Urist told you, we are going to be facing demons, so an option of you two soloing those things is a pipe dream. And if a Demon Lord descends? You’d be fucked, no two ways about it. Number four, if you kill Urist that means the crystals that summon our people will, in theory, be destroyed. Meaning that surrounding hostile forces will grow stronger as we grow weaker. In the end, if we don’t work together we’ll be killed or enslaved. You not cooperating has more disadvantages than advantages.”

With Ubel having ended his pitch, the smiling man turned to the cynical man and waited. The cynical man mulled over his thoughts for a bit looking Ubel dead in the eye.

Silence hung in the air as the group waited for how the two would react.

Finally after a minute of thinking the cynical man responded, “Fine, my brother and I will at least hear you out.”

Urist nodded, “Good, then follow us. Everyone else, you are dismissed.”

Then he turned to the other six that were transported, “As for you six, the escorts will show you around and get you settled.”

…

After getting them seated in the war room, the meeting afterward went surprisingly well. With the benefits offered by Ubel, the two men agreed to join the war on a few not too demanding conditions. At the same time, the two men introduced themselves as Bishop, a Formation Adept, and Agate, a Gem Mage. The two demanded that they be given large rooms next to each other, a bottle of mid-class wine each week after the war ends, disciples, materials to work on their craft, and lastly, first pick on any materials that suit their needs for this war.

With the accord stuck, the plans explained, and the gear handed out, the dwarfs were ready for war. With the meeting adjourned until the event happens, the leaders went off to do last-minute preparations.

Urist went to his room, sat down in his chair, and stared at the ceiling, hands trembling.

Am I that weak? I feel more like a figurehead than a leader. I was in their grasp, unable to do anything. If it wasn’t for Snorri, Ubel, and all the other leaders backing me up I would be finished. Do I deserve to lead?

As he mulled over his thoughts, he heard a knock at the door before it was pushed open.

“Hey, Urist I wanna talk about something.”

“Snorri? What do you want?”