Sunlight bathed the earth in yellow as a deep summer heat mercilessly beat down on the woodcutter's village of Thrend. The heat grilled the settlers that hid in the shaded clutter of their tinder houses or under the shriveled oaks dotting the squarish town. The surrounding palisades sagged outwards, as if kneeling to the sun above, the flaky ground beneath them giving way to scorched farmland. Great jagged scars that sunk deep into the crisp brown earth showed the results of the surrounding land's battle with the sun, a complete and total loss. Utter annihilation. The few patches of yellow grass remaining within and around the settlement tried to staunch the flow of the earth's wounds, but it didn't make any difference at this point.

The greatest drought in the Empire's history had left the village desolate. If there was no rain, torrential rain, within the next few months, then Thrend and countless other settlements would have to be abandoned. If not for the imperial family's support, they would have all left years ago.

Roston marched around the house in spite of the heat, preparing everything that his wife, Ariadne, could need or want as she would go into labor any day now. He had already sent his other children to a different house for the time being as he didn't want any distractions while he prepared. A bead of sweat descended from his short black hair, inching along the grooves of his thick neck before meeting its end in the white waves of his linen shirt, which folded loosely across his broad shoulders as it battled relentlessly against more beads attempting to make a breach in its defenses.

“Hmm hm hmmm.” The giant man hummed a tune his father had taught him as the sound amplified in his chest, resonating with the walls as it reverberated throughout the house.

“Roston!” A melodious voice filled the house. “It's time!” Ariadne called from their room.

Wait, what? Roston hands froze, his mind becoming a blank canvas.

“Roston? Roston! What are you doing? Go get the midwives!”

Now? “Are you sure Ariadne? Isn't it a little... early?” A tiny mouse squeak escaped from the bear.

“I don't know... WHY DON'T YOU ASK THE FUCKING BABY!? GO! NOW!” And thus the siren's song was interrupted by the scratchy scream of a witch.

“Yes ma'am!” A deep bellow came from the giant man's cracked lips, quickly followed by a salute as he dashed out of the house.

A woman, with wavy chestnut hair that draped across a fragile looking back sat propped up on a bed. Her soft, doe-like auburn eyes fluttered to look towards the bang of the heavy door slamming shut as her husband ran out of the house. “Honestly, his fourth kid and he still panics like that. What happened to that stern military man who was unfazed by anything? He's like a teenage girl whenever I get pregnant, all blushing and giddy; I half expect him to start wearing a dress!” Her hand suddenly clenched. “I'm the one who's suppose to be emotional!” She yelled, slamming her fist onto the night stand, splintering the solid oak underneath. She stared down at her swollen belly. “And you! You better not bring any trouble. If you're a good child I'll sing you a lullaby okay?” A gentle smile appeared on her face, and like an angel, she proceeded to sing the words to the song Roston had just been humming.

A billowing cloud of dust sped through the village, as the ground quaked under Roston's fearsome sprint to get the three midwives: Agnis, Fiona, Mary to help his wife when a bloodied figure stumbled into the village square.

“Orcs! Orcs!” The man screamed, tripping over himself as a deep gash on his back spewed crimson, the rest of his clothes were glued to his figure by sweat and blood. Clawing his way forward on the dusty ground he desperately cried: “An orc band! They're coming!”

The men of the village, upon hearing orc, emerged from their homes with weapons as they gathered around the broken man. “Clem! Clem, oh gods are you alright!?” his brother, Nept, leapt from the crowd.

“Where are the orcs? How many?” Roston's voice boomed over the encirclement as he approached the gathering.

Clem spat out a sticky paste of mucus and blood. “Logging camp! North! Don't know how many, the-aauurgghh!” A spout of blood escaped his lips. “Th-they ambushed us during lunch. I was taking a piss when they hit the camp. One of them saw me and I ran, but before I knew it, it was already on me. We fought, and I barely escaped with my life.” Clem was by no means a small man; years of chopping and dragging great trees from the Megolas Forest, which was rife with monster attacks, left almost every man in the village with powerful bodies and the scars to prove their brushes with death.

“Stin! Chit! Emri!” Roston called to a few boys. “Get word to nearby villages that an orc band's coming our way! Get help!” The three boys immediately sprinted off towards the stables without a word, each eager to prove their worth.

“Bring your brother to the town lodge, get Mr. Poth to take a look at him.” Roston looked at Nept, before turning to the rest of the men standing around him. “Arms! Now! Tell everyone that orcs are coming!” He barked at them.

---

To the north of Thrend was the legendary Megolas Forest, or the endless forest as it was commonly called. Right now though, it seemed to be less legendary and more like an endless amount of kindling. Its depressed canopy no longer provided enough shelter from the blinding sun for even the sagging shrubbery on the forest floor to survive. At any moment, it seemed that everything would burst into a roaring blaze.

Hundreds of dark green blurs, accented by a metallic shine, brushed through the yellow foliage and hurtled South through the forest. They had just come from a human lumber camp and were now following a trail of scarlet blood.

Ug'rit slowed to a stop as he neared the scene of a fight, his curved tusks protruded from his lower jaw and seemed to glow with the beating sun as his sinewy muscles rippled beneath his dark green leathery hide despite the fact that one could see his rib cage. If not for the great drought, his now stunted frame would have made him one of the largest in the tribe. Ug'rit snorted as he came across a dead orc, its body slump over with its ass jutting out towards the sky as it lay in a pool of bluish blood.

“Pathetic.” He grunted in his tribe's native tongue. “If I were to die like him, I would commit suicide in my next life to repent for the shame I brought upon goddess Selene. To lose to injured prey, especially human, is worthy of being known as hound shit.” He spit a glob of mucus at the body and kicked it over. Many of the orcs who came across the body afterwards did the same. Their party had been sent out by their elders to secure food for the tribe and undergo their right of passage. Each unblooded orc must find and defeat a worthy opponent, the weakest allowed according to the ritual is a human, hence a weakling in their group -now dead- chased after Clem in order to secure an easy route to becoming a full fledged member of the tribe.

Ug'rit recalled the scene of his village before he left. In a dirty gray hut of dried branches, he had stood over elder Lu'kai, who was once the chief of the tribe and its strongest warrior, but now laid on the makeshift bed of broken twigs. His once lustrous skin was cracked from the heat. Before the great drought, there would have been leathers and furs to use as matting, but those had been eaten long ago.

“The crops will fail again.” he wheezed out these words as his breath became a whisper. “The tribe cannot survive another season. You must gather the unblooded and use the ceremony as an opportunity to secure food and hopefully water. Im'rit tells me of a human settlement nearby that receives large wagons of crops every few months.” A spiny arm shot from the bed with sudden ferocity, grabbing Ug'rit by the shoulders. “You must take it !”

“We are not thieves, nor marauders. The ceremony is sacred and using it to take that which is another's would be blasphemous.” He tried to remove himself from the old orc's embrace and found, much to his surprise, that he couldn't. Lu'kai's grip was like the talons of a beast.

“Then we shall not be thieves, nor marauders, but corpses.” Lu'kai hissed. His sunken eyes revealed something feral within them as they bore into Ug'rit. “The dead have no need for sustenance, be it orc or human. You and your brothers must kill them and take their food or we shall perish instead.”

“We can hunt a great beast for the ceremony, if-”

“The beasts are all dead! There are no animals! There are no plants! There is no water! Everything is dying!” Lu'kai's rickety frame convulsed as his skin tightly wrapped around his bones. “But there's food with the humans! They have the means for our survival! I beg of you Ug'rit, do not sentence the tribe to death like this. Selene must have sent us this opportunity. She would not abandon her people! If we do not take this chance, then that would be the greatest blasphemy of all! You must do this. You must...” Lu'kai's body convulsed again with a long spout of coughing, releasing his vice-like grip from Ug'rit and leaving five bloody streaks behind as his eyes rolled back.

Ug'rit knelt by the corpse and offered a quick prayer to the goddess Selene, requesting her to protect his elder on his journey to the stars.

The village was in ruin. Grey huts that once would have been adorned with colorful leathers and ivory now laid barren, with only piles of dried branches to keep those who lived inside them from burning in the sun. The once cold stone beneath their bare feet now glowed like embers, searing those who dared to walk upon it.

No younglings ran around playing kick ball like they used to, or wrestled like they used to, or hunted small game, or built tree forts; there were no younglings. Ug'rit still remembered their cries when the last morsels of food were gone, some of the parents had been merciful and fed them belladonna before putting them to sleep; those who couldn't bear to poison their children could only watch them starve to death. No conversations occurred for fear of moisture escaping one's mouth, some were even afraid to breath. No one hunted as the only prey left were the ancients of the forest, which were capable of wiping the tribe out with a single breath. No one searched for water. The drought spanned the entire continent; there was nothing left. No one did anything for fear of wasting what valuable energy they had left. They only waited for death.

Ug'rit found Lu'shi in her hut beside the cliff, staring blankly into a fire she had kindled. She moved around some poisonous plants in a bowl over the flame, maybe hoping to burn the poison away or maybe hoping for something else, not a care in the world if the fire charred her hands as she continuously crushed the herbs in the heat. Her once soft, green skin was now tough and gray. Her once golden eyes were now only yellow with hunger. Her muscular build had been reduced to that of a skeleton's. Her dark, long hair was now only a few tufts of white. We're walking corpses.

“Lu'shi, your father is dead.” Ug'rit stated plainly as he stood by the entrance of her hut.

“I see.” Lu'shi turned around and stared at Ug'rit, waiting for him to leave, not a hint of sorrow on her face, only hunger. “Anything else?”

“I left his corpse in his hut. Do what you want with it.”

“Okay.”

“... What are you doing with those herbs?”

She looked down in surprise at the bowl her hands, as if she had just realized it was there. “Who knows.”

“I see.” With that he left to gather the unblooded.

Before this famine, she would have taken weeks to grieve for her father. Now, nothing. I have no wish to be a thief or marauder, but the tribe is most important. Family is more important than honor.

Around 200 orcs gathered around the center of the village, standing before the shrine to Selene. The black night was illuminated with a spare few torches and the last sliver of their goddess' will before the new moon tomorrow. They prostrated themselves before her statue, carved from moonstone. It reflected a brilliant white in the moonlight, but turned pitch black under the sun. At this point in their prayers, while they laid on the ground reciting the wisdom of her messages, the village's shaman would normally cast spirit magic to strengthen the unblooded's souls for the ceremony, but he had disappeared long ago when divining for water. No one knew if he had abandoned the tribe or been killed in his search. Despite the fact that they knew the shaman was not present to communicate with the goddess and distribute her blessing, they prayed for her protection, prayed for their tribe's safety, for prosperity, for food, for water... for a quick death...

Lu'shi trudged from the outskirts of the village, a dead look in her eyes, though they no longer seemed hungry. She held a blue stained sack filled with grilled meat in her arms. An animal she found a mile or so from the village she said. No one questioned her, they simply stood and graciously received a morsel each, being sure to add an additional prayer for Lu'kai, wishing for his safe journey to the stars.

---

Around 400 men armed with axes, bows, spears, and whatever else they could find gathered around the village square. Roston stood out imposingly within the mob. “Friends! Brothers!” His voice bellowed outwards, silencing the chatter of the crowd. “Those dumb beasts have killed our kinsmen! We don't know how many orcs there are, nor why they attacked the logging camp. What we do know, is that if those green freaks dare to think they can get away with what they've done, they're in for a hell of a surprise!” The men roared in agreement.

“Everyone with a bow, get on the roofs of the houses on the perimeter of the village, facing the forest. Everyone else, form squads of six, two spears each squad and move to the palisades! Anyone else who doesn't have a squad will form up here in the square and be ready to reinforce the rest! If the fuckers don't raid us tonight, we set out at dawn to liberate the logging camp!” A thunder resounded through the village as the men yelled in affirmation, clashing their weapons against one another in the air.

They swiftly formed up and went to their assigned positions throughout the village. 100 archers on the roofs facing the forest, forty squads around the perimeter of the town, with most shifted towards the forest, and sixty swordsmen and axemen waiting in the town square in reserve. All of the women and children were moved to the town hall, next to the town square, where Ariadne was currently giving birth.

As the sun fell, the orcs approached the edge of the forest to scout out Thrend. “Ug'rit, when shall we attack?” One of the orcs snorted as they hid in the underbrush.

“Because of the hound shit, the humans are probably well aware of our presence. We must attack before they summon more of their kind. We will rest here a while and attack as soon as the sun has gone over the horizon. Im'rit, where do the humans store their food?”

Im'rit clambered onto a thick tree and motioned to follow him. Once they approached the top, they could see into the village. “Down in the big empty space of their settlement, there lies a building much larger than the rest, you see it correct?”

“Yes? Is that it?”

“No, but building directly behind it. That is where they store their food.”

“I see, it looks like they are deploying from the empty space. It will be difficult to acquire the food with the humans guarding it so closely.”

They climb back down and Ug'rit announces the strategy. “I will bring half of our brothers around the village and we shall enter from behind, we must leave soon otherwise it will take too long to circle around without being spotted and make it in time for the attack. The rest will remain here and once the sun falls behind the horizon and Selene, with all her blessings, begins to grow stronger, you will climb into the trees and start loosing arrows upon the settlement. With luck, the humans will be drawn towards the forest or at least their attention will be focused towards it and we can simply take the food without incurring a loss.”

“What of the ceremony?”

“After we return to the tribe with the food, we shall all head deeper into the forest and hunt a great beast. There is no honor to be gained here, fighting with the humans.”

“But the elders-”

“What of the elders? As long as we return with the means for our tribe to continue existing, what right do they have to complain? The ceremony is not a time for banditry, but for our sacrifice to the goddess. I will not besmirch her name by claiming our marauding as a sacrifice to her. If the rest of you choose to do so, then that is your decision.” With that, the sun disappeared over the horizon and the battle was set to begin.

---

Roston spread his gaze upon the town, looking for weak links in the defense. Fucking orcs, attacking when my wife's giving birth. We should be at home! I should be helping with the delivery! Not messing with a bunch of green freaks! He had heard the stories growing up and lived through the nightmares during his time in the army, thousands of monsters, not just orcs, overwhelming everything from tiny hamlets to great cities as they came from the depths of the forest in massive waves, each enough to completely overwhelm the last. Every other decade or so these events, known as the crucibles, would occur. The orcs were some of the worst aggressors. They weren't like the other monsters coming from the forest, wild beasts to be hunted down. They were organized, they could forge weapons and armor, they could use magic, and worst of all, they always tried to stay. He had heard of a kingdom that completely fell to them and was still under their control.

Then, just as the sun disappeared over the horizon, a volley of arrows rained upon the village like a storm, embedding themselves deep into the ground, roofs, and flesh. Countless screams rang out as those who were unlucky enough to be hit fell to the ground like lambs to a slaughter.

“Put the nearby fires out so they can't spot us so easily! Don't be easy targets, get behind a wall! Archers, return the volley!” Roston spouted out the commands as he moved behind a building.

The exchange continued for hours as darkness set, Thrend would be nearly invisible were it not for the minimal amount of torches lighting a road or two, walls of arrows would sink into whatever they could touch, sometimes accompanied by a scream and then a wall of arrows would be shot into the forest.

“Roston! How do we know were even hitting them?” A man yelled from one of the roofs as he knocked an arrow.

“If you listen closely you can hear the pigs squealing every so often! We don't know how many there are, but-”

“ORC!” A woman's scream resounded from the buildings in the back.

---

“Push!”

“Aaaaurggh!”

Ariadne was in a separate room within the town hall, surrounded by women of the village, who were running about, trying to lessen as much of her burden as possible.

“Irene, get another pale of water!” Fiona, a stocky redheaded woman commanded.

“B-but the orcs-”

“Are being dealt with by the men, go get a pale of water from the storehouse!”

The freckled girl, about fifteen years old, glanced towards the doors apprehensively, on the verge of tears as she stood petrified.

“Girl!” Seeing no response from her she turned towards a fourteen year old girl with short black hair. “Isane, you go with her, hurry!”

“Okay!” Isane, grabbed Irene's arm and they madly dashed out the back to where they remembered where the storehouse was. When they thought they were at the right building, they began patting around it, trying to find the doorway, then with an “Aha,” Isane began to blindly fumble with the latch, but Irene, who had been looking around in fear suddenly screamed.

“ORC!”

---

Just as the sun disappeared, screams resounded out from the opposite side of the village, queuing the orcs to begin the raid. Ug'rit and his companions waited in the dried riverbed bordering the south of the village, knowing it would take some time for the humans to focus their attention on the forest alone. Only when a couple hours had passed and the night was properly set in, did they stealthily climb over the palisades, careful of any signs of the town's militia. Without the light of the moon to guide them, or even a torch within sight, Ug'rit relied heavily on his other senses to determine the enemies' locations. Though the villagers on the outskirts of the empire were familiar with hunting in the endless forest and naturally moved quietly. They couldn't compare to those who lived in it, who not only hunted their prey, but had to be truly silent to escape those that would hunt them.

Ug'rit could hear the scuffling of the humans' leather soles. He could feel the reverberations of the palisade with his bare feet as the humans let the hard ground absorb the impact, rather than their own ankles and knees. There was a group of six that had just passed by, none wearing iron, but tough leather comparable to Ug'rit's own skin. He signaled for his brethren, who had wrapped themselves around the thick logs of the palisade, by gently knocking on the wood beneath him. It was inaudible to most creatures' ears, but quickly received through the hands and feet of the orcs nearby. A dozen orcs suddenly jumped from the walls, grabbing the militia, one orc to silence, one orc to kill each person. They quickly dragged the bodies behind a house, not bothering to loot them. The dead don't need anything, but these will only slow us down.

Two more patrols came by, all disposed of in the same manner. All of the orcs had now climbed over the walls and crept towards the storehouse, with Ug'rit and a few other leading the way. But when they were only a house away, they suddenly heard a scream: “ORC!”

In truth, Irene had never seen them, she had been so skittish that when a a gust of wind blew some cloth that had been left out to dry, she had cried out from paranoia. But Ug'rit and the rest had no way of knowing, so they dashed towards the storehouse in a mad sprint to silence the girl and gather as much food and water as possible before leaving. When two girls came into view, running to the town square screaming, Ug'rit could do nothing but curse.

“Get the food! Ignore the humans!”

---

“ORC!”

Roston turned towards the screams, his heart lurching as he noticed it came from the back of the town hall. Ariadne!

“Come on!” He roared, raising his sword and charging to the source of the scream. The men nearby roared behind him and followed, carrying the few remaining torches that hadn't been put out.

Two girls came into his sight, running frantically towards him.

“Mr. Roston!” They cried jumping to the safety of the militia.

“Behind us, near the storehouse!” Isane barked, pointing to where they had come from.

“Y-y-your w-w-ife's giving birth, w-w-we needed a pale of water!” Irene sputtered as her disheveled hair waved about and her wide eyes filled with tears.

Fuck! His feet pounded into the earth, causing the houses nearby to tremble as if there was suddenly a stampede of monsters coming from the forest. A mob of orcs had swarmed around the storehouse, desperately ramming into and hacking away at the doors, unaware of the latch.

“Charge! The fucks are trying to destroy our food!” Roston yelled.

When the smoky light from the torches lit the road they were on, Ug'rit saw what he initially thought was a troll leading a group of humans and his mind went blank for a second before recovering when he heard human speech coming from its mouth.

“We will block them! Im'rit, your group must return to the tribe with food! Go!” He turned towards the giant man and howled as he led a group of eighty orcs to block the humans.

I must kill the troll-man, he seems to be their warlord. Ug'rit stabbed his chipped sword out as he met with the giant. Roston swung his own sword in a overhanded arc to parry and followed the momentum with a jab, the metallic scent of blood filling his nostrils as the two mobs clashed into each other. Seeing the muscles of the giant in front of him ripple, Ug'rit jumped back as clouds of yellow dust, illuminated by fire, kicked up around him, knowing that a single blow from the giant would probably kill him. He swung his own sword down against the troll-man's sword to try and knock him off balance, but Roston took the opportunity to flow his attack further and broke in the kneecap of another orc next to him with a hard kick. Ug'rit again, tried to jab at Roston, trying to outmaneuver the giant, but couldn't get an angle with the compact crowds pushing against each other.

He looked at the battlefield for only a moment, but felt an emptiness well up inside him; his brethren were not battling, but being slaughtered. Blue blood spurt from their wounds. Their weak bones shattered under the pressure of the well fed humans when they tried to block them head on and their weapons cracked with each blow they parried.This can't continue. He glanced back at Im'rit's group which was beginning to leave. “Fight brothers! For the tribe! For our families!” His guttural call resounded through the ears of the orcs and they responded with sudden ferocity, ramming their tusks into the humans when their weapons broke and clawing at their opponents eyes.

Roston saw the orc he was fighting with yell something to its kind and slammed his fist into another orc that tried to jump him, crushing it into a sack of meat as it fell. He swung towards Ug'rit's neck, trying to stop him from giving orders to the other orcs only to see him jump away again. Angrily, he roared: “MY WIFE'S IN LABOR! STOP FUCKING AROUND WITH ME!” sweeping his weapon in a wide arc, turning four of the orcs in front of him into mincemeat as squelches came from the broken mess of orc limbs he had just created. Each swing he took was accompanied by a sickening crunch, or a splatter of blue blood. He proceeded to ignore Ug'rits desperate attempts to stop him and continued slaughtering the orcs around him, giving his men a surge in morale as they slammed their weapons against the green monsters.

“Capture the rest of them! We'll get as much information out of them as we can!” There were only a dozen or so orcs left at this point. He slammed the flat of his sword against Ug'rit a few times, trying to knock him out, as Ug'rit tried desperately to dodge and parry, but was overwhelmed by the giant's strength. Roston raised his sword again when a blinding light stopped everyone in their tracks.

*BOOM,* An explosion rang out from the sky.

Roston felt his bones quaver under the pressure that followed the light and a moment later water started falling. No one had noticed during the battle that thick clouds had begun to gather in the sky. Ug'rit was first to snap out of the trance. “Forget the water and just grab food!” He barked at the other orcs, snapping everyone else back to reality. He sprinted to grab a couple random sacks in the storehouse, ignoring the humans. The other orcs followed suit as the humans cheered, initially believing that the orcs were retreating.

“Hey! They're stealing our food!” Someone yelled as the rest of the militia looked to the storehouse.

“Stop them! Trap them inside!” Someone else yelled as the whole group proceeded to surround the building.

“Ug'rit, what do we do?” An orc asked.

What do we do? Why am I so foolish? They can charge into the building at any time and we'll all be killed. There was no reason for us to try to grab more food, the tribe could have gathered rain water to salvage the crops. Ug'rit looked around at the bleak oak shelves. His mind blocked out the noise of the humans growling outside, the clatter of metal, and the questions of his brethren, only focusing on the pitter patter of the rain hitting the roof. The roof.

“Climb the shelves and get onto the roof! Quickly, before they decide to swarm in!” The other orcs responded with zealous haste as they made their way up, breaking apart the planks that blocked their way to safety, when a wave of humans rushed in.

“They're trying to climb up!” two orcs near the bottom squealed as the militia dragged them down and other men started climbing after the orcs.

Roston looked into the storehouse and yelled “Stop! You're too heavy! It'll break!” Only to see the shelves collapse, bringing down orc and man alike. “Make sure everyone's okay and capture the orcs!”

As Ug'rit felt his footing disappear he could only curse at their misfortune. If the human girls hadn't seen them, they would have been able to carry enough food to feed the tribe for months. They could have prevented future younglings from starving. They wouldn't have to eat 'that.' He could only be thankful that at least some of their brothers were able to escape with food, maybe not enough to last for months, but at least a few weeks, maybe enough time to salvage the crops.

Roston raised his sword and cried “That'll teach the green pigs to attack Thrend! Or any other human settlement!” The men around him cried out and rattled their weapons in the air when lightning shot out dangerously close to the town.

“Lower your iron! I don't want anyone being struck by the gods for hubris or anything like that when they've just delivered rain!” Roston called to the men as they all joyously laughed.

Roston made his way back to the front of the village to see the archers on the roofs were no longer shooting at the enemy. “What's wrong?” He asked.

“Our arrows aren't reaching each other I think. They barely made the distance before the rain started and now it looks like they're being knocked off course.” A man on the roofs called out, the others around him voicing their agreement.

“Then come down, this rains only getting heavier. The battle's over for now. We'll clear out those animals come dawn.” With that Roston ran to his wife.

---

“Aaaaauurrrgghh!”

“Push!”

“Aaaugh!”

“Push!”

Roston ran into the room, soaking wet. “Honey!”

“Rooaaghstaughn!”

“Honey, I'm here, he said grabbing her slender hands. “Don't push yourself too hard.”

“SHUT UP!” She screamed again as she made a large push.

“Uhh.”

“GET OUT!”

Roston stumbled out of the room mumbling something or other about fighting orcs. Out into the main hall, he saw the injured being bandaged and more than a few families weeping over the shrouded bodies that had been lain in the corner of the hall. He made his way to a shriveled old man in the middle of a crowd of injured men, dressed in a bright red and blue cloak. “Mr. Poth, how is it?”

The old man combed back his white hair and frowned as he crushed various plants together in a mortar. “Not well, I'm afraid. There's forty dead and over fifty injured, I expect most of them to be all right, just a few scars, but there's half a dozen in critical condition. We also had to amputate a lad's leg; if we had a priest to cast some spells on him I wouldn't worry too much, but the way he's looking, he might just die from the shock.” Mr. Poth bent down and dressed a deep wound on a man's chest with the pungent poultice he had just made before proceeding to wrap it. “Well that's going to scar.”

“Do your best then.” Roston patted his shoulder and walked back to the room where his wife was giving birth, but not daring to enter this time.

“Right, tell me if your wife needs anything, I'll be right over.”

Roston sat outside the room that his wife was giving labor in, praying to Eileithyia for his wife's labor to be safe and successful when he saw Mary scurry out.

“Mary! How is she? Anything wrong?”

“Oh plenty wrong. And it's all your fault!” The middle age woman grumbled, sidestepping Roston.

“Oh gods! What's wrong? Please tell me! What did I do?” he wailed as he followed the short blonde woman.

“What's wrong is ya fucked her!”

“... What?”

“Oh poor Ariadne, she's such a delicate lady, I don't know how she does it. You're such a giant that all your children are so big when they come out. It's tough even when they're just normal sized you know? I won't pretend to know how hard it is for her. But you! You make her suffer through such intense childbirths all the time! Humph, I can tell you it's definitely a boy this time. When it's a boy of yours they're too big to push out; when it's a girl, they come in pairs! I remember when Rantal was born, Huge! No woman should ever have to give birth to such a large baby, let alone her firstborn! Honestly, I don't know how she does it. Whenever my husband and I had a child, it got easier the more I had, in fact, for my last boy, I just squatted against a wall and plopped him out, barely took an hour! But that's only because they were normal sized! Oh, poor Lilly and Milly, they're definitely going to be taller than all the boys in the village when they're older. How will they ever find a good husband? Men don't like being shorter than their women. At least they're lucky enough to take after their mother and not your brutish build, they'll definitely be beauties when they grow up. You can already see it in the little cuties..."

"But is she alright?"

"...Oh, poor Ariadne, she's such a delicate girl. Why did she have to marry you? She could have had a normal sized husband and normal sized babies and they could have all taken after her, even the boys! Oh that would have been so wonderful. You're lucky to have ever met her you know? Such a beautiful, gentle woman. I couldn't imagine her hurting a fly! She's like a noble lady, especially with how smart she is. I suppose it may have been a good thing she found you in any case. If she were married to any other man, some scoundrels would definitely have thoughts about taking her. But with you? No, no man would dare. Tell me Roston, where did she learn to read? Was her father a merchant or something? She never talks much about it. Did- Oh my gods! Did you two elope? Was she some well to do, primmy, prancy, merchant's girl who fell in love with you one night when you were in the army? Oh, that would be so romantic. The soldier, protecting a caravan..."

"Mary..."

"...No! Escorting royalty! Oh, Roston you fiend! You eloped with the Emperor's daughter!? My goodness, no wonder she's so precious! I'm sure she accidentally got 'lost' when camping one night after seeing you bravely defend the carriage from some nasty bandits that hadn't bathed in months and 'stumbled' upon your tent. And I bet your not a bad size are you? You're such a large man, that I'm sure you were able to conquer her almost immediately. You naughty man! It's too bad that she stumbled into the tent of a brute like you though. Why couldn't it have been a handsome knight? They could have run to his mansion that night and gotten secretly married, only to learn that the Emperor had found out and was sending his armies to execute the brave sir-knight for kidnapping his daughter who was betrothed to another man! But the knight wouldn't let their true love end like that so easily! No! He summoned his armies and fought a desperate battle for the princess and miraculously won! But returned home gravely injured, not willing to accept death's embrace until his saw his lovers face for one last time. Oh so romantic! But no! Instead the princess..."

"So Ariadne's okay?"

"...No - Empress! got you! And instead of a romantic battle for love, you stole the Emperor's wife and spirited away to a little unknown village on the outskirts of the empire! Coward! And instead of receiving the knight's child and raising him in secret by tricking the Emperor into thinking it was his child, for that child to grow up and realize his birth, leading a revolt against the empire to avenge his true father's legacy, she's stuck giving birth to your abnormally large sons! Oh poor Ariadne, to think she could be Empress right now, living a life of luxury, with normal sized children, but instead chose to elope with an army sergeant! It's still pretty romantic now that I think about it. Oooh, what if the Emperor dies and your children find out that they have a claim to the throne! Ooh, that would be so exciting! Keep giving her babies Roston! The more claimants the better!”

The only thing Roston wanted to do right now was to go back to fighting orcs, and if not that then bash his own skull in. “Err... Thank you? … Mary? … For...” With that he walked back to the room and waited, being careful to not ask any more questions to the women coming out.