Life had fallen into a steady state, of sorts. People rebuilding, guard defending. Routine was hard-fought for, and worth it to be maintained. Routine was what gave me time to practice with my third tier attribute, the moments withdrawn from in-between the rigid stricture.

As the tail noted, I now had the capacity to burrow with it. That semi-cryptic phrase was made clear when I put it to the test. I let my tail touch the ground, and instinct kicked in, albeit not in the manner I expected. My tail slapped at the ground like a wooden plank, and in turn, the earth beneath me turned to putty, swept aside by another flick of my tail. It was malleable up until it left my reach, hardening just the moment after, until my tail graced the same surface once again.

It was only the ground that shifted underneath me. Not any other objects, but that wasn’t a problem. This was something I could easily work with. Truly becoming stronger had its perks.

But today wasn’t the day for my practicing. Today was a day where we departed from routine once again. We had received a summons to the road to prepare to receive a party the scouts had noticed. It was against Titan City’s agenda to be caught unaware any further.

The steady sound of feet trudging forward traveled ahead of the group, a steady staccato of inevitability. You didn’t need enhanced hearing to notice the overwhelming sensation walking down the road. It was a slow march, for those carrying forward lacked the strength to hasten faster. They carried their life’s possessions on their shoulders, cloths fashioned to sticks to hold all that remained. It was a horde of the weary and downtrodden, Titan City destined to meet them.

If it was an army, then they were the sorriest army one had ever seen. A suite of caravans, desperate parents and lonely survivors unable to stop, progression the required outcome of their march. Their clothes were ragged and many a body laid on a wagon, arms grasping a body that could do no more than rest, a form that would have been abandoned if there was no more room.

Amalarys stood at the head of our forces, studying the travelers intently. She signaled for my presence and I hustled over, unwilling to let anything else go awry due to my inaction.

“Does this seem like an accurate measure of their population?” she said, gesturing to the travelers. I closed my eyes, studying the signatures they gave off. It was far more than I could count at a moments glance, but not too far that I couldn’t see the end of it.

“Unless there are those further away, this is all there is. You’d have to ask others to check for stragglers. Or perhaps ask them themselves.”

She glared at me before making a curt wave of her wrists. Behind me Marie and Ed pulled ahead, running along the sides of the path, the travelers only giving them a weary gaze as they continued ahead. They lacked the energy to spare, let alone care.

Our brave leader cocked her head, noting even the slightest of movements from the people, wondering how best to deal with the crowd. Where was she to find a representative to best speak with out of this exhausted populace?

The opportunity to decide was stolen from her as a familiar face broke out of the crowd. She had strained dark hair and a sharp closed-off face. She wore practical attire meant to endure a long trek, her tailored grey leather shirt sitting above the form fitting black pants. She jumped off of her wagon to meet our presence, her steely grey eyes meeting mine before her body could close the distance.

“Amalarys, may I introduce you to the Mistress?” I said, the information broker bowing as she stepped in front of us.

Her face was weary, stress stealing away the restful nature she had emitted when we had last met. Amalarys’s eyes perked up upon hearing the moniker, her study of our reports evidently lingering on her mind.

“I’ve heard a lot about you. What brings you and all of your people to the doorstep of Titan City?”

“We’re fleeing, Amalarys. Do we have to do this game or can my tired people continue onto your city and take refuge already?” That cutting edge she had once spoken with in her hidden bar was gone. Only a vast fatigue dripped upon those lips, each word as though it had taken an exuberant effort to be produced.

One eyebrow perched up upon Amalarys’s face. “I wasn’t intended for any sort of game, Mistress. Just to understand what was going on here. You’re saying that everyone gathered here is fleeing Malagost?”

“You’ve got it in one. Congrats. You’ve proven yourself wise beyond measure. May we enter your city?”

“Mistress, someone of your stature must understand the problem already, but I’ll say it for everyone’s benefit. Titan City had just experienced the invasion of a city-tier spike feeder and is still recovering. I don’t know if we can reasonably host your people at this time. There’s not enough room.”

“Come now. You’re saying you don’t have room even with all of the people you’ve lost? Are you trying to just be callous to the living, or are you trying to forget the dead you failed too?” The Mistress spat. She glared at Amalarys, face growing red. Evidently she was lacking practice at negotiating from a place of weakness.

“I’ll pretend that was a reflection of your concern for your people rather than an attack on our city, Mistress, but see you don’t make that mistake again. Even if we’ve lost people, that didn’t immediately fix the housing. Nor did that reinforce the bodies working to produce food, to continue restoring the city to the former glory it once had.”

“This is what I’m talking about, Amalarys. We both know the outcome. Yes, the people with me are willing to fight for their future, even if it means taking up arms against Malagost. I’ve brought about every meaningfully trained person and am willing to discuss more about the impending threat to Titan City, but I’d prefer if we can continue this behind the city walls. Malagost wasn’t going to willing suffer our departure without some insurance. We have some stragglers a way back.”

Ed and Marie came back over the horizon, their returned presence speaking the same to Amalarys. “Very well then. We’ll negotiate the exact terms of this militia with the leaders of the expedition. I presume you have someone more military inclined present?”

The Mistress nodded, motioning to a man in the crowd, her bodyguard peeling away from her body to deliver him a note. Even when he had stood in plain sight he had been nearly unnoticeable, his presence diminished in the cover of the Mistresses’s fierce will.

The military man walked ahead, his presence looking familiar but I couldn’t put my finger on it. It must have been someone that I had seen in my time in Malagost, but I didn’t have the mentality to linger on it. There were other elements to be concerned with.

“Great, is that everything?” the Mistress remarked. “Can we finally have the refugees enter your city? If we linger any longer the scouts might catch up with us.”

“The scouts?” Amalarys inquired. She looked to me and I expanded my senses once again, looking for activity off in the distance.

“How far behind were they?” I asked, scanning the distance.

“Uncertain. We’ve been traveling with minimal rest. Don’t know if the same can be said for them.”

I nodded to Amalarys and started advancing to the back of the horde, weaving on the outskirts of the weary bodies. The faces were filled with detachment, consciousness allocated solely to continuing forward. It was the tired faces I had grown to recognize in the days following the attack on Titan City. Existing was all together too much for them. They had to persist through the moment so that they could get to place where reality could crash through again.

The people couldn’t even acknowledge my presence, the brief pause not enough for them to let their guards down. Some had their heads leaning against one another, trying to measure out a brief respite where they could find it. Others had tense bodies ready to leap at a moments notice, the last vestiges of strength they had allocated to further escape, if need be. They would burn the candles at both ends to ensure their survival.

As I approached the back of the population, I noticed Marie and Ed’s following of my person, seemingly discontent to leave the situation alone in my hands. I couldn’t say I was displeased with their initiative. If things escalated poorly, then we would need all the people we could get to deescalate the situation.

I opened my mind off to the distance, scanning to the utmost of my range, ignoring the proficiency increase from straining my capacities once again. At the very edge signatures increased, coming along at an increasing rate.

“Something’s coming,” I muttered, Ed and Marie calling upon their second tier attributes. Lanky legs and mischievous grins, the pair were prepared to harry and harass anything that needed to be encountered.

Shortly thereafter the people came into sight, a handful of bodies on the horizon. It was still hard to make out the fine features at this distance, even if the gap was quickly closing, but two stood out from the rest, their winged forms gliding above the ground.

The last time I had seen them was in a more shadowed environment, trying to make out like kings from our passage. It seemed like they’d been given a second chance, perhaps as disposable chaff if they were being reintegrated into Malagost’s forces.

“Assume they’re hostile. Prepare for combat,” I said, summoning my own second tier attributes to my being. I could almost hear Javier in my ear advising me not to try anything new in the middle of a fight, but my tail had already sprouted, the earth malleable beneath me. I already had some prior experience with them. They didn’t deserve an opportunity to be denied the results of my growth.

Another few seconds and they were hundreds of feet away, still hastening towards our position. “Stand down,” I shouted. “This is your sole warning before your act of aggression is noted and force will be used. You’re going into Titan City’s Sovereign territory.”

Amalarys would likely read me the riot act later for my improper message, but we had all but officially accepted the refugees. I wasn’t going to let these bandits continue to harass them.

The civilians behind me startled out of their fugue state, starting to push forward, all but confirming that these visitors were likely hostile. I drew a charge out of the air, my fingers guiding the growing current like a channel, the accumulated potential resting at the tip of my nails.

“This is your final warning,” I said, narrowing down my fingers on the arriving bodies, their forms seemingly only getting faster in response to my words. I couldn’t say that I was surprised, but I had hoped that they would have made a prudent decision, given their prior defeat by my team’s hands.

“Violence it is then. Get ready, Marie, Ed.” I released my stored Direct Current, the crackling electricity cleaving through the air and piercing the unprotected flesh of what looked like a person with a wolf beast soul. He collapsed to the ground, body writhing from the accumulated charge. To my side Marie and Ed cackled, the sound waves bouncing off of one another, growing in volume with each laughter. For a pair that was traditionally silent, this moment of cacophony was absurd. My own impulse to laugh had to be stifled as to ensure I didn’t interfere with what was presumably a technique.

The round of sound build up even larger before the last volley shot forward, my body tingling at the sensation as it continued past us, like a wall shimmering in the air. The winged fighters dived on through, bodies falling out of the sky as though their wings were clipped.

The remaining forces decided to err on the side of caution, one that looked like a snake launching some strange liquid through the air, the other one seemingly following suit but with their own blood. The liquids passed through the sound distortion, pooling in sizzling puddles on the ground, the wall of laughter seemingly having spent its strength to mitigate the passage of the attacks.

On the ground the birdmen stirred, the owl shakily rising to his feet. “You little shit. We wanted to speak with you but I guess you’ve chosen war,” he shouted, launching a barrage of feathers our way.

I turned around, my tail slapping the earth beneath me and coaxing the malleable ground until a makeshift wall, the feathers heavily thudding against the rock. “You’re the one who wouldn’t stop your movement. I demanded you slow down on our sovereign soil.”

“Words that come from a babe who still suckles on his mother’s teat count for little, whelp. We can pretend that you didn’t maul some of my men and talk about this like adults.”

I could sense that the other intruders were circling about, Marie and Ed already tensed to clash with them.

“Why don’t you give your street market pitch and I’ll confirm whether that’s even worth relaying to the more important people, as you’re currently not even qualified to waste their time,” I shouted back.

“I don’t know why I’m bothering to waste this time with you, but I’ll keep it simple. You’ve got some runners. We’re trying to bring them safely home back to Malagost.”

“I don’t think they want to come along, given they’re trying to move away at the sound of your voice.”

“Fine, have it your way. Let’s bring them back by force.” All pretense was discarded, the birdmen and the rest of the coterie continued their attacks once again. I nodded to Marie and Ed, the pair setting off to tear apart the enemy combatants while I cast up another wall behind me and started burrowing underneath. It would perhaps evoke one of the pair’s loss not too long ago, with Alain’s emergence from the shadows.

Tracking them from underneath was effortless with my electroreception. While I couldn’t tell what they were looking at, I could continue on underneath, the earth effortlessly shifting under my hands. When I was underneath, I let a Direct Current filter across my knuckles, and parted the earth above.

While I wasn’t so foolish to think that they would be right up on the ground, I flung an Electromute, the body freezing and falling down before me, just in time to meet the impact of my charged brass knuckles.

The owl’s body shook violently as my heavy voltage stormed through his body, my arms unrelenting in the pressure of continued punches before he flew off to the side, body still shaking from the impact.

The only one in a suitably intact form was the other winged man, Marie and Ed having taken out the other interlopers in my time underneath the ground. Given the numbers had turned around, he flew off, unwilling to be caught by any of the violence suffered upon his allies.

It would have been easy to launch an attack on his fleeing figure, but perhaps it was best for Malagost to understand that an attack on Titan City would not be without consequences. His words would bear witness to our might. We still stood tall even if the city was in shambles.