Liam awoke under a large tree in a field. He had run for three hours straight before his body could no longer keep up with his mind's instructions. He had walked off the road to a tree in the distance and promptly passed out beneath it.

Frankly, he figured it was nothing short of a miracle that he wasn't spotted and killed in his sleep. But now wasn't the time to dwell on hypotheticals; he had a long road ahead of him.

Liam recalled the plan he made.

He had heard stories of a city not too far from his home, one where superstitions of the Palisade's fall had been passed down for centuries. The city was apparently called Tabre, referred to as the 'Border Fortress'. It lay almost exactly on the border between Sangrea and Gevilia, hence the name.

Interestingly, it was not actually an official fortress of either state's military to his knowledge; it was called this because the town's superstitious nature and history caused it to be constructed with an unreasonable level of attention given to defense, especially against the palisade. Allegedly, it was nothing short of impenetrable, though its existence was not exactly common knowledge.

It was only really mentioned in passing by noble families who treated the town as a punchline for many jokes. He himself knew this much about it simply because the idea of seizing the fortress as a potential base of operations due to its proximity to the Sangrean border was discussed (and promptly dismissed) during a military meeting at which he happened to be present.

He figured that it was his best bet, and that it likely wouldn't wind up overcrowded considering that it was secluded, not commonly known, and in an area closer to the border from which the attacks were coming.

And so, Liam marched on. The flatlands seemed to stretch into infinity, the horizon only being interrupted by the hills peaking over it off in the distance. To his right, he could faintly spot the snowy peaks of the ever-present mountains that separated them from Ingram. God, how lucky they were to be the furthest from this catastrophe.

They even had the South-ingran mountains serving as a natural barrier of protection against the damned sharp-ears. He didn't necessarily feel jealous, but he certainly hoped Ingram would be willing to offer its support for his people.

Given that they were the furthest from the onslaught, they would have the most time to prepare and get a grasp of the situation. Ingram was effectively humanity's last bastion of hope, should Gevilia and Sangrea fall. He prayed the refugees from his city were about to escape and that Ingram would be kind enough to take them in.

Lost in thought, Liam had already been walking for hours. Even if his body couldn't, it was nice to let his mind slow down and rest after it was overworked so much during the previous day.

But he wasn't so relaxed that he didn't notice the figure in the distance ahead of him.

They were about forty meters away, clad in a hood and light armor, bearing a shortsword at their hip, and most importantly, decorated with a pair of long, pointy ears. Did the sharp-ears somehow send somebody from a splinter unit to intercept him? If so, how was the message received faster than he could arrive?

He recalled from a long-past conversation about a form of magic used in Ingran tactical operations that allowed messages to be transmitted over a great distance, albeit with a degree of inconsistency proportional to the distances involved. He figured it was entirely within the realm of possibility that the sharp-ears were capable of this as well. Even still, why was there only one soldier?

While their soldiers were individually stronger than most of the human infantry, this certainly seemed a little far-fetched.

Could this be a distraction from an incoming ambush? Were they intending to trap him into a pincer attack before he noticed? He hadn't spotted anybody trailing him, so a pincer attack seemed unlikely, but he still had to take the possibility into consideration given he had no way to gauge what his opponents were capable of.

Enough running his mind in circles. The sharp-ear had already closed half the distance between them. Whether it was a trap or not, he had to act before it was too late.

Liam drew his blade and dashed toward the figure as fast as he could. As soon as he started moving, the figure tried to interrupt.

“W-Wait! I–”

Clang.

Their blades collided.

Liam had slashed diagonally over the sharp-ear's shoulder, attempting to cut into the side of their neck and sever their brain stem. Though he didn't know this anatomy personally, he had experienced first-hand what the section would result in.

Liam was completely ignoring their attempts to distract him, having already noticed their hands reaching for their blade.

He saw his opponent was shifting their weight to their opposite leg, anticipating him to pull back his blade, leaving his left side open for them to strike while he recoiled. Instead, Liam abruptly tilted his blade and ran it down the length of his opponent's, cutting deep into their hand.

The sharp-ear wailed from the pain.

Without a moment's hesitation, using his enemy's instant reaction to the pain, he moved back his left foot, twisting his body perpendicular to his opponent. Shifting his weight into his right leg, he used all the strength he could muster to slam his blade into his opponent's.

In doing this, he forced them into a bind. For one, they could relent from the pressure on their wrist, dropping their sword and winding up disarmed; this is the choice that any inexperienced swordsman's body would make for them reflexively in an effort to protect their wrists.

Alternatively, they could make the much more difficult choice to focus their strength on their wrists to maintain their grip on the hilt of their blade. This was problematic because unless you had an extremely large frame which allowed you to maintain your stance and push through the resistance from his blade, you would lose your balance and be forced to the ground before you could shift the tension from your wrists back to your legs.

His opponent took the latter option, and failed miserably at maintaining their stance.

They were thrown to the ground. This effectively confirmed to Liam that he was fighting somebody experienced in combat to a degree, though unfortunately for them, not experienced enough. Given his opponent's frame and build, their best option would've been to anticipate this sequence of events and prevent it from happening in the first place.

Liam stomped on the sharp-ear's fingers and the hilt of their blade, forcing it to the ground and preventing them from raising it against him from the where they lay. Simultaneously, he held the end of his blade over their throat and planted his other foot firmly on the ground beside them so they couldn't shift their body to make him lose his balance.

He could see them visibly sweating.

“What did they send you after me for? Are there others planning to ambush me while I'm distracted questioning you?”

Liam was far too jaded at this point to beat around the bush.

“W-What? I don't know what you're talking about! Do you mean the– Eh!”

Liam poked the tip of his blade into the sharp-ear's neck, drawing a little bit of blood. If there was an ambush, he had to know before it was too late. He couldn't have them fluffing through his questions to stall for time while his comrades approached.

“Answer! Is there an ambush? I refuse to believe they'd send someone as weak as you and nobody else!” Liam barked at the sharp-ear pinned to the ground.

“Waste my time and I'll kill you before they get the chance to catch me off guard!”

“Listen to me! I'm not affiliated with the bastards who attacked you! I'm one of their prisoners who escaped! The situation is not nearly as black and white as you seem to think!” The sharp-ear shouted in response, clearly panicked.

Liam raised an eyebrow in curiosity, still not ready to trust that he was safe, but willing to let them continue.

“Alright, fine. I'll accept that for now, but if you were lying to me, you will regret it.”

Liam raised his sword ever so slightly, listening carefully for the sharp-ear's response.

“Excellent! Thank you! Could you let me up th- Aarrgh!"

Liam pressed his left foot down even harder on their wrist before frowning even again.

“Absolutely not. I still have questions.” Liam replied, deadpan.

“Aargh, fuck, that hurt! What do you need to know, you sadistic asshole?!”

He could clearly see the anguish on their face, but he felt nothing as the faces of the savages who launched the siege of his city echoed through his mind.

“First. What are you people?”

“Wait, seriously? You don't even-”

They trailed off for a moment after Liam narrowed his eyes.

“S-Sorry. I'm an elf. Your assailants were most likely elves as well. Do the humans have no record of us…?”

The ‘elf’, as they claimed, seemed genuinely bewildered by this revelation.

“Not to my knowledge. If such records do exist they are either highly confidential, or both highly confidential and believed to be nothing but myth.” Liam replied in an extremely matter-of-fact tone, not certain the significance of this, but he noticed the blood draining from the elf's face.

“Why have you turned so pale, sharp-ear? Or, ‘elf’, I suppose.”

The elf froze for a moment before responding in a lower tone than before.

“Oh… Oh dear.”

They paused for another moment.

“Before I answer that… Can you tell me something, sir?”

They looked gravely serious.

“That depends on what you need to know.”

“Sir, could you tell me what other races the humans know of? Or, at that rate, how much in general do humans know of the world beyond that ancient barrier?”

Liam hesitated to answer for a few moments, still rather uncertain of the elf's intentions.

“Hardly anything. We know that there used to be many races with which we coexisted, and that nearly all of them were inherently stronger than us. It's theorized that an ancient wizard sacrificed his life to create this barrier to keep us safe, though we have no especially concrete evidence to support this theory.”

The elf froze stiff.

“You're… You're joking right? You must be–…” They cut off their sentence as they saw the deadly serious expression on Liam's face.

“Well. Sir, I turned pale because this human civilization is doomed.”

Liam tuned out the implications for a moment as he stopped them.

“This will require further explanation, so let's focus on the more simple questions first. Second question. Who are the people who attacked my city, why did they do so, and what makes you unaffiliated with them?”

The elf paused briefly, before sighing.

"I suppose it's better I don't have to explain that right now. Alright. The people who attacked you are from the same homeland as I, but they belong to a group that I do not. Are you familiar with… What's an understandable analogue… Ah! Are you familiar with the factions formed by nobles in a kingdom such as your own?” The blood seemed to be returning to the elf's face.

“Yes, what of it?” Liam responded curtly.

“In my homeland, Alphia, we have a similar concept called a 'party'. However, while factions are formed based on the nobles' perception of royalty and each other, our parties are formed by people with a common opinion on how our country should operate.”

Liam listened silently, subtly fascinated by this foreign political concept. “Go on?”

The elf continued. “I am a member of the party that has occupied Alphia's parliament for the past several centuries, the isolationist party. We want Alphia to be completely politically and economically independent from the rest of the world. But several years ago, a previously inactive party called the interference party announced that they'd finally discovered a way to destroy the ancient barrier that enclosed the remaining human population.”

Liam wasn't expecting the increasingly over-complicated explanation. Should he interrupt?

“As the parliament was composed almost exclusively of isolationists like myself, the ‘interfers’ as we called them faced pretty intense political disapproval. But the problems began when an unexpected famine brought about a brief economic depression. Though it wouldn't normally be a problem for us, the newly invigorated interfers seized the opportunity and began to make numerous speeches-”

Honestly, it was rather interesting to hear such detailed description of such a radically different society. He might as well hear it to the end.

“-Throughout rural regions of Alphia promoting their ideology and eventually gathering an enormous amount of support under the government's nose. Essentially, they turned a good portion of the Alphian military to their side and initiated an unpredictably fast violent revolution, completely overthrowing the government that refused to sponsor their proposal.”

Somehow, Liam was still intently paying attention through this information overload. “Then, if you're an isolationist, why are you here in the human lands?” He asked, sincerely curious.

“I already mentioned, it's because I'm a prisoner. While they've already successfully indoctrinated the vast majority of the soldiers in the military– whether or not they've done it through magical means it's still up for debate– there are still quite a few soldiers who still feel a deep-seated allegiance toward the former isolationist government. I'm one of those.”

The elf had a prideful look on their face as they stated their allegiance, only for their expression to sink a bit as they prepared to continue.

“When they catch people like me, they brand us as traitors and usually execute us, but sometimes they'll do what they did to me and lock us up a cage and torture us in front of everyone in order to discourage anybody else from potentially defecting.”

Liam stared in awe and disgust.

“Why, that's absolutely barbaric!”

The elf snickered. “Hey, you said it. Those damn interfers… they're nothing but war-hungry savages.”

Liam recalled the subject he intended to bring back up.

“So remind me; why is mankind doomed?”

The elf's expression sank again.

“Oh. Well, it's quite simple. You humans are far too ignorant of the world around you at this point, and the interference army is undoubtedly already aware of this.”

“And why does that ensure our demise?”

Liam glared skeptically at the sullen elf under his feet.

The elf opened his mouth as if he were going to say something, then closed it.

“I… I'm sorry, I can't bring myself to tell you.”

Liam scowled. “Then you're of no further use to me, sharp-ear.”

Despite what he'd been told, he simply refused to trust the elf. What if he were lying about his true affiliation and had fed him misinformation? What if he were to go back when he left to the interference army and report Liam's location? It simply wasn't worth the risk.

Liam gazed apathetically down at the elf, raising his sword and preparing to sever his throat– but suddenly, something flashed through Liam's mind.

As he looked into the fearful and anguished expression of the elf beneath him, he viscerally recalled the expressions on his fallen comrades' faces. In this elf's face, he saw that same hopeless dread that haunted his mind.

Liam froze.

Then, he sheathed his blade and stepped off of the elf.

“Go. Now.” Liam blurted out, furious with himself.

“W-What… Why are you–” The elf tried to reply only to be interrupted immediately.

“I said go!” Liam shrieked at him, hand on the hilt of his blade.

Without another word, the elf picked up his dropped bag and fled.

Liam vaguely wondered what it was that the elf couldn't tell him. He heard something to his side. The elf was fairly far away, but they somberly spoke the last words Liam would hear from them.

“I'm… I'm certain you'll discover the answer not too long from now. All of you will.”

And with that, the two went their separate ways. Liam was left to ponder why he simply couldn't kill them.

Unsure, he nonetheless made a promise to himself that he would never let that guilt trip him up again. If he let it become a weakness, it would undoubtedly cause his downfall.