The silent dark sky is suddenly fill with the unusual sounds of wings flapping of hundreds or thousands of flying creatures coming from every direction. The flapping sounds are so weird, sometimes its louder then it suddenly become lower and then the sky become quite and the unusual sounds differing in volume repeats for the whole night.

Whenever someone hears this, their bodies subconsciously stop moving and sometimes stop breathing. The night is cold but they feel that its colder than any nights from their entire life.

Most of the beastmen from Mataliit who are sensitive in sounds are the first ones to experience this unusual phenomenon. They are currently travelling towards the land of riches and gold, Mulier, based on rumors from people.

“What’s this sound?”

“Someone or something is flying"

“Its weird its getting louder and louder and yet I don’t see any birds.”

The sky is so dark and most humans cannot see properly in this starless and moonless sky. But beastmen who inherits the abilities of animals can see from the dark and sensitive to sounds are the ones who will witness this weird and soon to be dreadful experience. Their ears are twitching and their eyes always look up towards the sky. Yet, nothing can be seen nor any birds flying.

“Its getting lower and lower"

“Did it already pass us?”

“Heeeeelppp me…ahhhh"

The group is startle seeing one of their members is easily decapitated by a demon with no lower torso but have large bat wings with a scary face showing its irregular sharp teeth. And at the bottom of its half body, it boldly shows its intestines and other internal organs dangling around. Like it wants to show the world how beautiful its internal organs are. The demon is having a meal on the unlucky beastman.

Chomp

Chomp

Chomp

“ehhhh"

“kyaaaa"

“Monster….die!”

The group easily falls apart. The weak-hearted members just stare and petrified on the spot making them easy prey to the predators. The others are surging with anger that they attack with all their got. They attack it with all their might. But it’s useless against these hungry predators.

Screams of people suffering and shouting of help can be heard in far distance. Other group of beastman heard it and some go towards the location because they are curious. They stop their current task and went there while others just ignore it. They already know that these parts are not friendly to people meaning these parts are so dangerous where different beasts freely roam and breed around. So it is not surprising if one can meet them and worst, the last days of their lives.

Many groups join and meet up either they know one another or a complete stranger, they go towards the source of disturbance. When they reach the source of disturbance, all they can see is the chopped meat of people. Body armors are bent in unusual ways, huge scratches and some have big holes like something tries to rip it forcefully.

Swords and shields are broken and scattered everywhere. Headless corpses and some heads are rip open just to take their brains. Internal organs and intestines are out from the corpses' stomach. It looks like someone or something digs the victim's stomach just to get what’s inside of it.

Just what kind of monster or a horrifying creature attack or worst, eat them. Others are already puking from this scene, closing their eyes and cold sweats starting to drop in their backs and in their foreheads after seeing this hell scene. Their instincts tell them to run but their brains unable to process it. Making them unable to move their feet and just stare on the dreaded scene before them.

“What happen here?”

“Limbs…..missing organs….missing intestines..”

“whats that sound"

They hear the unusual sound with different volume of loudness from time to time. Sometimes its loud and sometimes it’s too low to the point that its quiet. When the sounds of flapping of wings no longer be heard, they thought that some bird creature passed them. But the next moment, they feel the winds, strong winds above them. When they look up, they are too late to realize that they will suffer the same fate from the scattered and mutilated limbs in front of them.

“This is not happening..ahhh"

“Damn those bastards, this is not part of my job…ahh….sh1t…ahhhhhh"

“Why…my dreams…my gold….why…this is not part of my payment…ahhh"

More and more shouts of scream and desperation attracted fresh batch of meats.

“Fresh….Meat"

This is the fate of the group of beastmen and people who are near the Mulier border.

This is one of the unique abilities of manananggal, it makes a silent kill and enjoy its victim when you will no longer hear the flapping of wings.

Later on, when Joel teaches the military about this. He described that when you hear large flapping of wings at night, be prepared as mananaggal is nearby and may be targeting you. Loud flapping of wings means that nasty flying half torso demon is far from your spot but when you hear the sound gets lower and lower, it means it spots you and be ready for your death as it comes closer towards to you. Prepare for the silence. Looks like he speaks nonsense here but that’s the truth.

It is a unique way of manananggal to approach its victim like it silently says ‘I’m coming for you’. When you hear that the loud sound of flapping of wings get lower and lower, the victim will think that a bird is flying away and may drop his guard down. But it’s an opposite if you face this deadly lower demon. When you hear no more sound it means it is right above you or near you. It is best to run if the sound gets weaker and you have a chance to escape.

This creature has long claws and razor sharp teeth to dig the victims body to obtain their favorite meal. Their favorite part is the liver and intestines so its brain nerving and mind breaking for the victim when those razor sharp claws and teeth is use to dig the victim’s stomach to get its favorite food instead of killing its prey. The victim will shout/scream and suffer until he dies from huge blood loss while this nasty lower demon is feasting his internal organs.

The mananaggal is almost immune to magic so magic that is related to holy or light attribute is not effective against it. Melee fighting is not an option unless you know its weaknesses. Remember that it comes from the Devil’s power. It is best to treat them as aliens or non-inhabitants of this world. Thus the long night continues for the travelers.

-----

At the gates of Mulier, the soldiers are tense and heavily armed for the upcoming storm to come. And that storm is.

“Hah…why so many migratory birds around here?”

“Sir, they are refugees, not migratory birds"

The captain just continue reading the encyclopedia while his comrade misunderstands and replies to him. The captain is so engrossed with the release of the very first Encyclopedia featuring birds. The encyclopedia packs with full colored pictures and important info to attract readers and make them interested in this kind of book.

The border guards are busy in entertaining the migratory birds, I mean refugees coming mostly from Mataliit. The storm is the huge influx of migration from other countries and settlements. They check the people thoroughly who wants to pass or visit the Mulier.

First, the guards confiscate any weapons and deadly substances or things and those will be return later on after undergoing complete assessment and evaluation. Then, the doctors will inspect the body and note any diseases found. Then the refugees or travelers are mandatorily take a bath before passing unhindered. Oh, free bath.

The guards and doctors are using modern day scanner to scan people. This scanner is a product of fusing magic and science. It scans for deadly weapons, magic tools, imbedded magic seal, body checkup for diseases and any kind of threats. The scanner is not your typical huge door scanner. The scanner is in the glasses of the guards and the doctor. It helps them easily identify threats and a lot easy to carry out their tasks. The medieval people who just arrive don’t know this. And it’s easy to identify which people who obeys or not during the confiscation of weapons and things.

The process only takes 5 to 10 seconds every person. Quite fast right. But the line of people is a lot longer and a lot quicker to refill than the guard's fast inspection duty. So their job never ends no matter how fast they are.

Since the Queen issues shoot to kill any evildoers or criminals with heavy crimes on site. There's quite a large pile of bodies near the gate and different wild creatures are feasting on fresh corpses. Nearby the corpse, there’s a signboard erected.

[ Evildoers will be killed on site. No questions asked].

The travelers who sees this are frighten at first but when they see and read the sign carefully, they proceed as they are confident that they are not here having ill intention or a criminal. Thus, the result is less and less people who wants to pass. But even then, it’s quite a long ten-man line.

The ones who tries to sneak and try their luck to pass are killed immediately with the death sound of the gun. They are fools who are genuinely identified as criminal or a threat. The criminals have a questionable face as how these guards know their crimes or ill intention. The secret lies on their glasses again. The glasses are equipped with [Profiler] and [Highlight] feature that profiles the target for its crime committed and highlights an individual to identify if he is a threat or not. This is a feature added personally by Joel to prevent future troubles from troublemakers especially the outsiders.

Criminals with light crimes can pass as they only steal to eat and kill for self-defense. As long as they do those things because of the situation and not for fun or any malicious intentions then all is well. Little fairies are the one who will judge this type of criminals because they can read people’s hearts and they are also the final judges. They are cute creatures that holds the mighty hammer of justice.

Criminals or evildoers always underestimate this tiny creature but when the little cuddling cute fairy makes a thumbs down, the suspect in question feels cold sweats at the back and bang. Rest in peace.

The inspection is smoother but takes time before the guards can take a break.

The pile of corpses continues to increase as arrogant and acting self-important idiots are stubborn ignoring the threat coming from the sign post. The corpses have no bloody smell because certain plant creatures absorb the smell or in fact, feeds on foul smell. One example is the fake fragrant flower, a flower with rainbow colors in size of a sunflower. It is one of a kind plant that feeds on foul smell and at the same time a good building decoration.

“Hey..hey why did you kill him. He is my hired bodyguard. You people are too cruel and merciless! You should follow laws and orders. Is this what you show to us? Your strength? I admit that your way of killing is frightening but you should consider yourself from now on or else you will face unavoidable consequences. Killing is not right. Killing without asking is too cruel. Your actions are not justifiable. The gods will be angered.”

The man with an attire of noble shouted from the crowd. The people who hears him listens to this man. He attracts too much attention. Every man and woman listens to his words as if they are captivated by him.

“Yeah..killing is not a solution. At least let us know why they are killed.”

“yeah!!!"

Many people also agree to the man before and within seconds more and more people protests in front of the guards. The guards ignore those troublemakers and continue their duty. This is the most stressful duty they have. Sorting of good and bad people entering their country is a hard task. A heavy task.

The captain who was currently enjoying reading the encyclopedia is annoyed and disturbed by the ruckus outside who goes for almost 39 minutes and still making protests because of their way of handling of things.

“Ahhh….someone really needs a lesson"

On the outside, more and more people who protests joins the fray. Many refugees avoid them and some join them because of inhuman act. The guards’ duty is put to stop because they are really affected by the ruckus cause by that man.

The man smiles like a devil and continues to pour oil into the fire.

“Is this how you people show your prowess especially to the kids?”

“You are worse than any dictators I’ve known. You are barbarians!”

“Barbarians..barbarians..barbarians"

The ruckus and the shouting makes no sense from time to time and the man behind it just smile. Anyone who can see his expression will get pissed and angry but the Mulier guards are calm like they don’t care and not affected by the ruckus made by the man. The man tries to assess the expressions of the guards but he cannot see their faces. They are wearing full face helmet so he cannot see what kind of amusing expressions those guards are wearing.

The fact that those guards are calm or provide no action is because they already completed the seminar of rules of engagement. This is a mandatory seminar for all soldiers on how to deal in different situations. The seminar explains the proper procedure or method on dealing different and difficult situations. Queen Eva is the one who proposed this to prevent and avoid future problems. If those Mulier are still behave like natives, they will not hesitantly kill that man but because of seminar the man is still breathing. Lucky him.

“Silence….silence….SILENCE…BOOM!”

The man who requests the crowd to be quiet but he can’t make them stop for two tries. So he uses his Amayan skill to crumble a nearby ground into pieces. This skill is forbidden to use by the government because it causes huge damage to property that’s why guns are invented. Yes, its restricted due to huge potential of property damage. Property damage are hard to fix.

But with this case, he can reason that this job requires it. He escapes the punishment before but now he is confident to escape again. As long as he is honest, everything is fine.

The noisy crowd before are speechless and having pale faces. This is not a joke right. The skill he uses before easily destroy the ground near them into pieces and crumble in an unusual way. If that skill aims at them before, their bodies will crumble into pieces for sure. Their balls are currently shaking. That man is not joking and not playing around. He is serious.

“So who started this? Speak honestly or else my hand will slip.”

Hearing the cold words from the guard. The people points towards the man who looks like a noble wearing noble clothes. The noble man is also shock but regains his composure as he was confident.

“Me..and how about it..Will I be killed? Is this your way of treating weak people. Is this the way-"

“Shut up. You have no right to complain nor the right to speak here in Mulier. Your objective is clear and we already know it. Mister Lawyir. “

The man in noble clothes is shock and surprise. How did he know his name? How did he know his objective? He is thinking on how to counterattack that man's speech but his mind is currently searching for possible answer why this man knows him.

“Okay. Mister Lawyir is so shameless you see. Making a ruckus here as if he owns this land. As if he lived here. You are just a scum in the nobility of Batia who uses underhanded schemes. Mister Lawyir or I should call you Mister Primonido”

The people hearing this avoid him as far as possible like he is infected by a contagious leprosy. It looks like they know this man in a bad way of course.

Fear and anger envelops the atmosphere. Mr. Lawyir is loss at words. Why this man knows too much. Why this man knows everything about him? This is just impossible. This is weird.

“And you brought some hooligans around huh. 20 that is surrounding you and 10 are scattered around.”

The people who joins him easily are his accomplices. It looks like they plan to cause disturbance. But their plan is easily foiled by the captain, the guard.

“Do you know what happens to the troublemakers here? You who is famed with negative reputation. You who killed and tricked thousands of people. You mercilessly massacre an innocent family. Do you want me to continue to cite your crimes here? In front of the people?”

Mr. Primonido is sweating crazy. What this situation? This is my first time getting cornered in my entire life. How did he get so much info about me? Is someone sell me out. What should I do? What’s this feeling? Why I am shaking? Why I am stared by those eyes. They make me uncomfortable.

His body is shaking and his comrades just look down and nervous. They are currently surrounded by people who are ready to pounce them. As if they want to eat them. What’s this situation? They are not paid for this. This is not part of their plan and objective. Some started to regret and others are thinking for escape.

Mr. Primonido on the other hand is starting to think that he should just confess and apologize. That’s right I should apologize or else I cannot escape from this situation. They have weapons which can end someone’s life in an instant. I don’t want to die yet. I have many things that I want to do. That’s right, if this country can kill those Mataliit super generals, then my choice is to surrender and confess or else I will be feed on those hungry beasts. As he looks towards the pile of corpses which is currenty feasted by wild beasts.

“I am sorry.. please forgive me.. I am just ordered by the Batia emperor. Please spare. I will surrender"

The crowd and his comrades are surprised by his actions. A man known for his schemes and underhanded plans is surrendering and confessing his allegations towards the Batia Emperor in front of them. The crowd is shock and admire the captain of the border guards. Just who is he? How can he make an infamous powerful individual surrender before him? The crowd is speechless.

But their amaze moment is cut off by the sounds of alarm that signals incoming threats. The alarm sound is similar in modern forts that announces that all personnel must prepare for action and brace themselves for the incoming threats.

The crowd who hears the sound is somewhat confuse of the Mulier soldiers. They are running, issuing commands and gives off an atmosphere that a battle is coming. The crowd is somewhat on panic. They thought that these terrifying soldiers will massacre them. Some are running to escape and of course, Mr. Primonido and thugs uses this chance to escape.

“Those who are good hearts go inside now. “

Hearing those words, the people who judge themselves have good heart runs towards the inside of the gate. The people who have doubts about their good nature just walk away. They know and witness already what these soldiers are capable of. They can genuinely pinpoint who is good or bad. It is better to return back rather than instantly dying on the Mulier soldiers. Thus most of the crooks and thugs leave the Mulier gates peacefully.

The people are running on panic but thanks to the assistance of Mulier soldiers no stampede or major accidents happen. The people are thankful to them. The elderly and the sick ones are prioritized. The relatives express their almost endless gratitude to these good soldiers. They now know the good sides of these soldiers, that is being helpful. Unlike medieval soldiers who only knows how to show, fight, pillage and abuse.

“Mister guard may I know your name?”

The relatives of the old beastman are expressing their gratitude towards the man who helps them. It is also the same man who crumbles the ground before and the man who settles down and make the infamous noble surrender. He is the captain of the border guards.

“Its Gates, Vill Gates..”

The family is deeply thankful to him and remember this name for eternity.

The fairies are also busy flying everywhere to check if any hooligans or evil men got inside. After 10 minutes, the fairies conclude that no threats found although some spies successfully infiltrate, all is good. The captain asks the fairies to mark the suspicious spies and do appropriate action if the situation arises. The spies can blend and run but they can’t trick the people of Mulier.

The refugees, the crowd and spies are shock on what’s inside the fort of Mulier. After passing the gate, they thought that they will be place outside of it but they are staying inside the fort. The people are doubting if the Mulier soldiers are naïve, dumb or just they have confidence in defending this fort. Placing thousands of strangers inside the fort is unheard of. It gives high security risks and have a high chance of enemies to capture the fort.

But when they recall the scene before, the crumbling of the ground and the instakill weapon of Mulier, they started to think that these soldiers are capable of defending this place. Whoever tries to disrupt and capture this fort is a greatest fool of all time. They know already that opposing these soldiers is not different from digging your own grave. So it’s better to behave and just watch in the sidelines.

The crowd is so curious about this unusual fort. They never see a fort made mostly of steel. They know about castles and forts and most of them are made by rocks, stones and some metals. But this fort is almost made of metal. They can tell that this fort can withstand strong attacks and shockwaves which is not present in their current view of fortification buildings. When they view the fort walls, one can tell that a ladder cannot be place in their unless you have wings. The gates are not your common castle gate that is made mostly of wood or metals. They can guess that heavy door can withstand an emperor's attack. A blast door. This fort is heavily built and made for defensive use.

The fort is shape in pentagon if one view it from above. This is design to prevent or reduce siege damage and minimize troop movement and communication by placing the headquarters and necessary facilities in the middle. This fort is made of a mix of concrete and high resistance titanium. The walls are slightly leaning outwards to prevent ladders plus it has thorny wires placed on that area, barbed wires.

Barbed wires surrounded the top and bottom of walls to keep enemies from digging and climbing. 5 big towers in each side. These towers have anti-air guns that can kill flying creatures as long as they are not clan dragons. The towers have surface to air missile if more firepower and explosion is needed. Machine guns are also place in strategic points. Mines are already active surrounding the fort. These mines are smart mines that only explodes for enemies only. Mines are classified in non-lethal, explosive and chemical.

The fort has some futuristic special sensors and traps inside. These sensors can sense internal and external threats. Meaning, they can detect enemies within 700km. The sensor is a mix of modern day radar and magic. The result is it uses the air molecules to collect and receive data. It is like the computerized version of Joe's skills [Air sense], [Air medium], [Ultra sonar] and [Highlight]. Like the soldier’s glasses, it has [Profiler] to identify people and threats. So as long as there’s air, no one can escape this sensor either they are flying, hiding, invisibility or digging underground. Just like a game map which map out the area and display foes and allies.

It needs 40 people to operate this fort and the rest is up to the superduper computer. The traps laid are just the annihilator and captor. Annihilator is a laser trap that burns the target for thousands of degrees. Captor is a portal mouth that transports an individual to a Wamahika zone or in a specialize prison for torture, I mean interrogation purposes. These traps are not activated yet even the spies from other countries are busy taking down notes about this fort. The official in charge think that it is not time yet or the time is not ripe yet to display the hidden traps of this fort.

The facilities are barracks, military office, training area, armory, farm, gunsmith shop, fishery (optional), parking area, prison area, storehouse and the command center is half buried and other important facilities like generator is located in the underground.

The fort have no radio towers installed because the soldiers are using high powered radios that have range almost half of the world.

The refugees are currently located in the prison camp. They are not held as prisoners. They are here to isolate them from military and any danger. The prison camp has massive number of bunk beds, tables and chairs. There is kitchen, restroom for males and females and shower rooms. Even this is a prison camp, it looks like a newly built refugee camp for people who have suffered from calamity like floods or storms. The children rush and choose their beds and the adults follow after them. They don’t know what will happen to them and they can only trust these Mulier soldiers.

The prison is a 1 x 1 square meter area. Yeah, it is a small area for many people to settle. How does this small space can hold thousands of people? The secret lies to the combination of science and magic.

This is one of their successful trials, the nano space. Unlike in novels where space magic is common and its function is to open and extend space. This nano space is entirely different because instead of expanding space, it shrinks anyone or anything to nano size. Yes, it shrinks things and creatures in atomic size. The theory or reason behind it is rather complicated to explain so to make things simple: it is a space where things become tiny or small.

This is safe according to their millions of test. No side effects or notable risks and problems found. The time in this space is a little bit faster like 10 minute difference. 1 minute in outside world equivalent to 10 minutes there. The most notable about this nano space is its indestructible and tamper proof so any attacks from outside either magic or physical is useless. Tamper proof means that outsiders or non-authorized personnel cannot modify or tamper this space. The personnel involved are mandatorily make a contract for good use to prevent possible accidents, betrayal, leaking of confidential info and many more safety and security precautions. Joel is really a prudent guy after all.

Aside from his precautionary measures, this is also possible because this is protected by World System which he is an admin level 1 and it follow the law regarding matter: matter cannot be created or destroyed. Well, he didn’t particularly make this space , he just accidentally discover it by tweaking and fusing magic and science. They are still experimenting the nano space. They have many possible potential use in that space like experiments, faster production of goods and many more.

The 1x1 meter may become 10 x 10 megameter . Using his skills, he is able to estimate about 10 mega meter in one meter so its quite a huge boost or huge shrinking process. 1 mega meter = 1,000,000 meter. With many potentials he can think of, he might create a world there. Hahahaha. He will not do that.

He thought. ‘The angel above may come personally to warn me or True God will slap me in my face. And besides, that space is dependent on the outside world because it has no sun, moon, stars, and other galactic objects but living things and objects in this world can exist in that space without any problems. So calling it another world is inappropriate or incorrect.’

“Maam we completed the evacuation of non-military personnel including the refugees"

“Maam, all troops are ready. Defensive and offensive measures are also complete”

Two secretaries or assistants reports to the senior officer who stares in the command monitor. That monitor shows different status, reports and any military related things.

“Good work. Now we will wait”

__________________________

click to view

Joe's Profile

__________________________