Cold rain rumbled on the roof above Aegis, as he laid on his tummy, playing with alphabet blocks. God damn, fifty letters. At least it's not a character per word like Chinese or something, that'd be a fucking pain to learn. And what the hell is up with this rain? It's been a month already! Does it always rain in this world? That'd be depressing as fuck. Ren, his elder brother, laid across a chair and stared at his baby brother as Aegis scrunched up his little face and tried to follow the letters with his hands. Melisandra's and Liliana sat across from each other on the opposite side of the room, their eyes saying that they would kill to relieve their boredom at this point. “shaa shaa shaa thump... shaa shaa shaa thump... shaa shaa shaa thump...” A wooden ball slowly rolled across the maroon rug between the two of them and despite the rumbling of the roof, the crackling of the fireplace, the rocking of a chair, and the knocking of wooden blocks, it seemed as if it were the only sound in the room; everything else was background noise, a stage for the ball to sing its tale of boredom with the carpet. “shaa shaa shaa thump... shaa shaa shaa thump...”

“Mama, when's Aegis gonna be big?” Rantal turned his head to the sound of the crackling fireplace that his mother was bent over, cooking a pot of stew. “When he's older darling. You can play with him right now if you're careful, but nothing dangerous.” “But he can't do anything right now. All he does all day is look at blocks.” “Then why don't you teach him the letter on the blocks?” Ariadne knew that Aegis wouldn't understand Ren anyways, but it never hurts to start teaching early and Rantal could get closer with his baby brother. Half an hour later, Ren was on the 23rd letter of the alphabet. “No, no Aegis. “Ta.” “Na!” The baby repeated, sitting up on his butt. “Ta!” “Da!" “Ta!" “Da!"

“No, no, look closely, see? T-a”

“DadadaDaDADA!” The baby rose his tiny arms in exasperation, wrinkles appearing around his large, auburn eyes. You little shit, I don't have teeth! I can't make that sound, just move on!

Ren was surprised at the beginning of the lesson when Aegis had looked attentively at him after he grabbed the first letter and pronounced it and he was thrilled later, that after going through the alphabet once, that his little brother had begun to mimic him. Each letter, Rantal meticulously coached Aegis on for a solid minute until he was sure the miniature person had memorized it. “Ta Aegis.” Fuck you. Aegis stared at his brother in silence, crossing his arms. Ariadne, sat on the rocking chair across from the boys, holding her twin girls, all of their faces contorting, with giggles periodically escaping from their mouths as they watched the scene play out. My gods, he's so expressive! The rest of the the children had just begun to properly smile at us at this stage, but he's practically miming already! “R-r-ren.” Ariadne called out, struggling not to burst out laughing. “Aegis doesn't have teeth yet. He can't make those sounds.” “Don't worry mama, I believe in him!” “Well, that's nice, but believing doesn't really have anything to do with it." “He can do it if he tries!” “Honey, he physically can't do it yet.” “What's physically?” “It's impossible for his body.” “Impossible?” “When, no matter what, you can't do something. Like flying.” “Oh, I get it.” Rantal turned back to his brother with a wide smile on his face and patted Aegis' head. “Aegis is kinda dumb, so it's impossible.” “Well that's...” Aegis squinted up at his brother. Why do I feel like this brat is looking down on me? “Okay then.” Rantal dropped the cube and searched for the next letter in the alphabet. “Here Aegis.” He said showing the next letter. “Ga.” Yes! He's moved on! Scooting his baby bottom, Aegis twisted around to his mom and gave a thumbs up. Whatever you said, it worked, thank you. Oh my gods, my little boy's so smart! He's so cute! Roston, hurry home or you'll miss this! --- *clunk* The log barring the door to the shack outside fell off. Ug'rit, who had been sleeping in the hay, jumped away from it as he awoke and readjusted himself right next to the wooden post as he stared at the door. About two weeks ago, the human who had brought him to the shack found Ug'rit asleep and started shouting and gave him a beating. Ug'rit didn't get any food that day. A massive figure bent under the doorway as Ug'rit recognized the bear-man that he fought in the battle. Entering the dim shack, Roston saw the orc that was giving orders in the battle earlier look up at him. It was the first time Roston had seen one of them since the battle. He had been too busy with his newborn and moving the villagers to the northern half of the settlement. Looking at the emaciated body of the orc now, he finally understood. “So that's why you were so weak when you attacked.” Roston sighed as he saw Ug'rit staring at the basket of bread in his hands. “Well, I'm not one to show any mercy to your kind. You killed a bunch of men. Good men. Friends, brothers, husbands, fathers... I should probably make sure those who lost loved ones don't have to be the ones interacting with you though; it's not right to make them do that. I'm surprised no ones killed any of you. Well, I suppose none of this really matters much anyways; as soon as the rain subsides, the Marquis' men will come over to Thrend and take your lot off us, then we can distribute the bounty among the widows. Probably the only reason any of you are alive at all.” Despite what he said, Roston threw an extra loaf to Ug'rit as he left. Ha! The humans are too soft. As soon as the door closed again Ug'rit tore into the bread. --- Thick slabs of black mud sucked at Im'rit's leathery green legs, clinging to him with every step he took as water sloshed around his knees. The dense canopy above him did nothing to stop the downpour of unending rain. He was followed by En'ki, the youngest, and In'til, their best tracker, through the forest to search for signs of the Tu'lu'min's passing, but as the rain continued to fall and the forest transformed into the behemoth it once was, it became more and more difficult to discover anything. The rain had washed away any tracks and carried away any debris like broken branches that they could have followed. All they could do at this point was continue in the direction that they knew the Tu'lu'min had fled in and hope to catch sight of any landmark or the remains of a camp. Two weeks ago, there were no reeds or sprouts to block their sight, but now the plants were a constant annoyance as the forest recovered. At the momemt, it felt more like a wooded marsh than the forest that they had grown up in. *Splash* a wave enveloped Im'rit's back. “What the hell are you d-” Im'rit glanced back to his companions to see them submerged in a giant blue slime. “Fuck!” After waking up from its hibernation, a transparent blob stalked the first large prey it had spotted since awakening, not daring to let the oppurtunity pass. It followed the two-legs through the trees and when they had split up to search for something, it jumped down on two of them, intent on catching its prey. Unfortunately, the slime was a little out of practice and rather than jumping onto the two orcs, the branch it was hanging from simply snapped. Im'rit pulled out his saber and rushed at the slime, forcing his way through the water until he reached striking distance, but every cut he made slid off the surface of its slipery body as it spread itself out to envelope him. Just as the creature had spread itself to its limits and was about to pounce on the green two-leg, one of the slices managed to open up a wound and Im'rit plunged his arm into it to grab his brothers. Fucking slime! Of course they'd be the first to revive with all this rain! When the drought hit, the slime were among the first to disappear from the forest, but with the rainfall recently they were able to absorb the moisture and became mammoth sized creatures. Damn it, we didn't hear it approach at all! This rain's drowning out all the sounds! “Give me my brothers!” Im'rit managed to pull out one orc, but the slime dove into the water, trying to escape. “Shit!” Im'rit chased after it, knowing that if he didn't hurry, his brother would drown in gooey mucus. He managed to stab into the tail end of the slime, staking it in place and plunged his arm into its wound again to save his brother. Once they were all out, they surrounded the thing as it tried to squirm away. “Skin it, I have plans for its flesh.” Seeing the orcs slowly approach it, the slime became more frantic and started to absorb the water surrounding it, becoming twice, three times, four times larger than its previous size, reaching up to the great trees around them in an attempt to intimidate the orcs. Im'rit gave a greedy smile as he stared at the creature. Taking his spear he said. “Yes, this will be perfect.” He looked at his burnt brothers, eying the creature with hate and then at his own arm. The mucus in the slime was corrosive, he was lucky to save his brothers as quickly as he did. If the slime had been more agile and not made such a large splash when hunting them, his party would most likely be dead right now. It must have just recently awoken, I remember seeing one before the drought drop into a flock of birds without a single one noticing. It was a funny thought, a being made almost entirely out of water being rusty. Im'rit once again stabbed his spear into the base of the slime, driving it into the muddy ground as En'ki did the same and In'til speared it to a tree. They then took their sabers out and began to widen the cut as it desperately tried to squirm away. Fifteen minutes later, they had managed to remove the mucus covered membrane and the creature plunged into the water in order to escape, it would regrow the membrane during the next few days as long as none of its natural predators found it. Those things are impossible to kill. Even if you manage to cut them open and take a stab at its core, it'll just move the core around within its body. Even during the drought, I thought they would die, but it looks like they were just dormant. The orcs headed back to their tribe, dragging the slime membrane through the water behind them, letting it get washed of it's mucus and acid. Back at the tribe, several orcs called out. “Did you find any traces?” “No.” Im'rit shook his head. “We were ambushed by a slime. In'til, En'ki, go dress your wounds, make sure to wash away any acid.” The two orcs with Im'rit left. “I need help with the crops! Bring some pointed logs! Long ones!” “What for?” “You'll see, I'm quite proud of this idea.” Eight orcs came to the clearing with a stack of logs. “What do we do with these?” “We'll make a shelter for the plants using the slime membrane so that they don't drown. The skin will be used as a roof and it'll allow light to pass through, but keep the excess water out.” Soon the orcs hammered the logs into the ground and stretched the slime membrane over, making a see-through tent that ran the water off on either side. They then dug a shallow trench between the plants for the water to run through the plants. “Ha! With a few more of these, we won't have to worry about any of the plants drowning!” --- Hector leaned over the castle ramparts letting his black hair direct the water past his green eyes and across his scarred and chiseled features; rain glistened off his brown leather chest-piece, as he stared past the sprawling grey city below him, past the flooded plains and drowned fields beyond the walls, and into the dark horizon where he knew the Megolas forest resided. They had received word a week ago that a village called Thrend had been attacked by an orc horde. There had been no word since. It was too wet; they couldn't move the troops to help. It had been so flooded in fact that the messenger had almost drowned and would probably be dead if it weren't for some huffed up merchant who tried to leave, but ended up having no choice but to turn back to the city on account of the rain. Apparently the attack occurred three weeks before they even heard about it. Normally it took only three days to get urgent messages to from the edge of the forest. He sighed as he walked back into the cover of the tower nearby, if Thrend hadn't been able to repel the orcs, he would be spending his time burying the dead when he arrived. Walking through the main hall to his quarters, Hector saw magister Patroclus. “Magister, any word from your colleagues on how long this rain will continue?” A deep voice resounded from the knight's chest. The word 'old' wouldn't even begin to describe Patroclus. At the age of 400, the man could be considered ancient; dark, layered robes, kept his decrepit body warm as it slowly turned towards the knight and slow, gravely words came from the blind man. “No word unfortunately, communication has been quite... troublesome. Those that I have managed to contact are as clueless as I am as to where this rain came from. The hydromancers would normally see the signs several days, if not weeks, in advance, but everyone was completely caught by surprise, which shouldn't be possible for a system this large.” “Then where did this rain come from?” “We don't... know. It disturbs me, even a pyromancer would see a continent-wide storm approach. Hell, even a toddler could.” “So it's artificial? A mage made it?” Hector frowned. As a military man, he didn't like unknowns. “Perhaps, it's hard to say until I can get word from the guild in the capital; I don't have the necessary tools to test the clouds and determine if they were conjured, but it's strange that not a single one of us saw the signs. Even if it were the grand magisters of the guild, I doubt they could conjure a storm this large and they would certainly send out a notice of sorts if they attempted... I don't like this Hector, I know of no individual or group capable of doing such a thing and I have met and even... personally tutored many... talented individuals.” “...” “...” “Was that an innuendo?” “I'm sorry boy, could you repeat that? My hearing isn't quite what it used to be.” “I said-” “Oh, I apologize. I must go now; I have an appointment with our lord.” And the old man turned and walked away, sweeping his walking stick in front of him. “tap... tap... tap... tap... tap... tap... tap...” He had barely moved a few feet. Even a toddler could outpace him.

“Right...”