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Chapter 46

  Once the spider queen was dead the battle was basically over. The spider army quickly tore itself apart. The Snatcher spiders are naturally solitary hunters. Because of that once the queen was dead they no longer had anything forcing them together anymore, and so they turned on each other. With their close proximity to one another the spiders all turned on one another and the humanoids got to watch as the army of thousands of remaining spiders quickly ripped itself apart.

  After the army destroyed itself the remaining humanoids split up into teams of 4 and quickly went through the cavern and killed the remaining spiders. They executed their plans with extreme prejudice, no spider was left alive once they finished their work. Once all of the spiders were killed those left alive collapsed in exhaustion.

  As soon as the army started to rip itself apart a few of Gram’s unit went to go and try and remove him from the spider queen. From the way he hung limply from the impaled corpse they didn’t have much hope for his survival. It was hard to believe that he would be left alive, especially with the kinds of wounds that covered his body. They began trying to extract him.

  First thing they did was remove the spider queen's fangs for its body allowing his body to fall to the floor in a heap. They weren’t entirely sure what would happen if the fangs were still in him when he reverted back to his normal size, but they didn’t want to find out. They began to try and cut the fangs out but to little success. The muscle inside wouldn’t let go. So they resorted to the next best thing, they began to try and cut the muscle out from inside the fang itself. It was possible, as the diameter of the fang was roughly fist sized. Just to make sure they could easily pull the meat out though they gathered one of the gnomes who managed to stay alive during the fight and had them cut out the meat. Their small stature played a pivotal role in their extraction process. As with the smaller size their fist was smaller as well, and had more room to maneuver inside the hollow carapace and cut out the meat easier.

  The main downside to the situation was that the monster was still a level 50 creature. It had an unnatural toughness to it, that included its body and ergo the flesh underneath the carapace. But the gnome was able to make progress, it did take a while but he was able to remove enough muscle to where they could pull the hinged fang out of Gram’s body.

  As they gingerly removed the first fang from Gram’s body he woke up with a jolt. The pain must have stirred him to wakefulness. He looked over at the wound, chest heaving, with a manic look in his eye. With his good hand he grasped the second fang that was still in his body and with a mighty yank tore it free of his body. The issue with his actions was that when the fang left his body, so did his left arm. He dropped both his left arm and fang and collapsed once again unconscious. Blood slowly seeped from the stump where his arm had been. A testament to how much blood he had lost during the flight.

  After he collapsed he began to shrink once again, slowly returning to his normal 8 and a half feet tall instead of his current 13 feet. Frantic to try and save his life, one of his warriors searched Gram’s belt and found a healing potion. Not caring if he would affect Gram for life he pulled the cork from the bottle and poured its contents into Gram’s mouth. He then held the mouth closed and started to massage his neck forcing him to swallow the liquid. After a few seconds of this his wounds started to slowly close on their own. It was amazing and at the same time unsettling to watch as new skin started to creep across the stump where Gram’s arm and shoulder used to be.

  With Gram taken care of, four of the warriors picked him up gingerly. Two more picked up Duke Dornan, and two others got Meira, and the 8 began to move them away from the battlefield and back to camp.

  As that was going on Bjorn, Rickie, Tayla, and Alaric watched the professed warriors start to pick up Meira and take her back to camp. Bjorn stepped forward to try and make his way to her, but he was stopped by Alaric, who stepped between him and Meira. “Easy, she is in good hands. There is more work for us to do here, let us finish before we seek her out.”

  Bjorn was fraught with worry. “But what if something happens to her. I want to be there to help.”

  Alaric put on a reassuring smile. “Relax, the fight is over. We have won, she will be fine. Let us finish killing the last of them while we let those with the skills take care of Meira. The sooner we finish with the spiders the sooner we can go after her.”

  Nodding in agreement the four of them began to slowly and wearily make their way through the cavern, killing spiders wherever they were found alive. Every time they came across one of their fellow soldiers they would stop and check, making sure that they were well and truly dead. Sadly every single one was dead.

  It was several hours later before they made it back to camp. Slowly but surely the army began to trickle back to camp. After the battle all semblance of military cohesion was lost, and no one cared. No one stopped those covered in blood and grim from the spider's insides as they slowly tramped their way back to the camp. Almost everyone who had been a part of the battle had a hollow look to their eyes. Even the weathered veterans, who had seen countless battles. Even if it was common for people to die on the field of battle, not to the same scale that this battle had seen. They didn’t have the official numbers yet, but by Bjorn’s best guess of the initially 2000 some odd people who went to battle, less than 400 had survived the fight.

  Once they made it back to camp the first place Bjorn and his friends went was to the central command center. They didn’t know for sure, but they were pretty sure that was where Meira had been taken. As they approached the doors the two who stood guard outside noticed, and recognized them. The two guards had been two of the professed warriors who carried Gram, Dornan, and Meira back to camp.

  They stopped them as they drew closer. “Stop right there.” One of them said in a gentle tone. “We know you are concerned for your friend, but we can’t let you in there. The healers are currently working trying to stop Captain Gram from dying. It is quite hectic in there and we don’t need you complicating the situation. You look exhausted, go to your tent and rest. I promise you that when you return, if they are done saving Gram’s life then we will let you pass.”

  Bjorn just stood there stubbornly.

  “I promise you, after what you and your friends have done today, there will be no one willing to bar your way. But take a look at yourself in a mirror, you are in no state to help. Come back when you are clean and rested and we will let you pass.”

  After a few seconds Bjorn nodded, and turned to go. Before he did so both of the guards made a fist with their right hands, they then placed them above their hearts and then bowed. Not a full bow, but a slight tilt at the waist and a fully bowed head. They held that position for a moment before they almost in unison raised their heads and returned to their normal position by the door.

  The four friends slowly made their way to their tents and uncaring fell into their beds, still caked in blood, dirt, and unknown dried liquids. From there they all collectively fell asleep.

  Roughly 18 hours later Bjorn woke up from a deep sleep. He opened his eyes and looked around to see if there had been any movement from his fellow friends. Upon seeing the other 3 forms still in their beds, the normal sounds of deep sleep emanated from each bed. Bjorn laid back down and closed his eyes.

  When he closed them scenes from the last battle played out over and over in his head. His back to the ground, large Doberman sized spider on top of him trying to bite down on him, its fangs making a clicking sound as they snapped together trying to get closer.

  The slimy feeling as the venom dripped out of the end of the fang and onto his face.

  The sickening crunch sound as his dagger finally punctured through the hard exo-skeleton and into the soft flesh underneath.

  The twang of his bow as the deadly projectile shot forward and slammed into the body of a spider.

  The Sight of a humanoid getting her leg ripped after two separate spiders sank their fangs into her body. One in her torso, the other in her leg. After a few seconds they began to pull in opposite directions. After the bone was no longer there to provide structure to the body the leg came off surprisingly easily.

  Countless other visions clouded his mind while he tried to relax. This isn’t what is talked about with the glory of battle. In real life and in his fantasy writings he read while he was a kid. They always talked about battle as if it was something to be celebrated. Rarely do they talk about the horrors of battle. It is not a glorious thing, it is not something that is worth honoring. It is dirty, disgusting, and bloody.

  So much blood. There is roughly 1.5 gallons of blood in the average human body. Multiply it out by over 1500 people who lost their lives. At times there were small rivers of blood running across the ground. They were lucky that the battlefield was mostly dirt, making it so that most of the blood soaked into the dirt. There were places where the ground had been made of just pure stone, and in those places the casualties were the highest. The blood coated the rocks and it made their footing slippery and treacherous.

  As they lay there trying to get his mind off of the horrors he saw over the last few weeks Bjorn decided it was time to try and see what he gained over the last two weeks for personal growth.

  Level up!

  Level up!

  Level up!

  Level up!

  You are now level 22, you have 12 (base 16) attribute points to distribute.

  (We finally caught back up and he is able to gain skill points again. Of the 12 he will actually only get 9, again because I gave him too many stats before.)

  You have advanced your skill level in archery, reaching skill level 24. Damage from arrows you shoot is increased by 36% over base damage.

  You have advanced your skill level in hand to hand combat. reaching skill level 12. Blows you land with bare fists and legs now deal 24% extra damage.

  Congratulations you have advanced your skill level in heavy armor, reaching skill level 11. The effectiveness of your heavy armor will be increased by 33%. Your 5% movement speed decrease per piece of heavy armor is still maintained.

  You have gone from a beginner to a novice in your skill: Heavy armor. Your movement speed decrease per piece has been reduced to 4%.

  You have advanced your skill level in small blades, reaching skill level 7. Your attacks with daggers and knives now deal 14% more damage over base value. Additionally critical strikes done with your small blades will deal 7% more damage.

  You have advanced your skill level in swordsmanship, reaching skill level 11. Your attacks with swords now deal 33% more damage over base value.

  You have gone from a beginner to a novice in your skill: swordsmanship. Your attacks with your sword have been further increased by you learning how to effectively wield your sword. Your increase per level has gone from 3% per level to 4% per level.

  You have advanced your skill level in light magic. reaching skill level 10. You have unlocked the ability to learn higher level spells.

  By passing a minor threshold in your skill advancement you are given 5% resistance to light magic.

  You have gone from a beginner to a novice in your magic: Light magic. You have gained the perk: Increased duration of your light based spells. The duration of all of your light based spells are increased by 20%

  You have advanced your skill level in Earth magic. reaching skill level 13. You have unlocked the ability to learn higher level spells.

  By passing a minor threshold in your skill advancement you are given 5% resistance to Earth magic.

  You have gone from a beginner to a novice in your magic: Earth magic. You have gained the perk: Decreased requirements. The requirements to learn earth based spells are reduced by 25% for you.

  You have advanced your skill level in Dark magic. reaching skill level 7. You have unlocked the ability to learn higher level spells.

  Congratulations you have proven yourself capable and knowledgeable in the ways of battle. Your actions of rallying your troops while they were unorganized and leading them to success has given you the skill: War leader.

  War is an evil that some say is a necessary one, others think it is a worthless waste of life and effort. Who is to say who is right. You however prepare for the eventuality of war, and as such are better suited to help those around you survive the meat grinder.

  Due to your actions on the field of battle you have been given progress in the war leader skill in spite of you not forming a war party. In the future you will not be given any progress in this skill nor war points to be spent unless you have an active war party formed.

  Congratulations you have advanced your skill: War leader, reaching skill level 4. The bonus offered by this skill is not a static thing. Spend your war points to gain your bonuses.

  Your war band has killed 11,357 snatcher spiders netting 56,785 war points. Your skill level has capped your war points gained to 250 per engagement. You have gained 250 war points.

  Your war band has killed 219 snatcher spider infiltrators netting 1095 war points. Your skill level has capped your war points gained to 250 per engagement. You have gained 0 war points.

  Your war band has killed 37 snatcher spider warriors netting 370 war points. Your skill level has capped your war points to 250 per engagement. You have gained 0 war points.

  Your war band has killed 1 snatcher spider queen netting 1000 war points. Your skill level has capped your war points to 250 per engagement. You have gained 0 war points.

  Mentally Bjorn was wailing against the injustice of the universe. He played a decent role in that last battle. So why was he only able to get 250 out of the almost 60,000 war points. He got less than half of a percent of the war points. This is utter bullshit. Mentally he held out both middle fingers to the universe.

  You know what, you are right. You did play a big party in that last battle and it is totally unfair for you to get less than half of a percent of the total war points.

  Thank you.

  Adjusting your war points to better reflect your contribution to the war effort. Your new war point total is 251.

  “What?” Bjorn mentally asked in anger. When no response was forthcoming he let loose a string of insults that would actually make Alaric impressed. The litany of insults continued unabated until Bjorn ran out of steam, which took a surprising amount of time.

  Once he was finally calmed down enough to where he could think rationally Bjorn began to go over his skill growth once again. It was impressive to see his gains laid out before him in a simple, clear, and easy to understand way. He kind of lamented how much he would have enjoyed something like that back on earth. Regardless it was quite nice to see how he has grown in his capabilities over the last two years.

  Which, speaking about growth, he had stats to allocate. So he pulled up his character sheet.

  Over the course of this fight, war, whatever you want to call it, with the snatcher spiders Bjorn had learned one thing. No matter how good he had gotten so far, he was still no match for anyone who had some skill with a blade. So leaning into that would be folly. Especially with how rounded out their party had become.

  Everyone has kind of filled out a role. Alaric had become the tank, as he stood there absorbing the most punishment, while being able to dish it out as good as he took it. Rickie was more of a brawler with his combat ability. It made him tough to deal with, especially with Alaric around to help mitigate any damage that was dealt to him. Tayla was fast, elusive, and was handy sneaking around being unseen. She became their scout while in urban areas, and guard for Bjorn and Meira as that was where her skills leaned into the most. Meira became their party healer and heavy ranged damage with her spellcasting. The confluence of her Talents, lucky encounters, and now Professed mage made her their most important damage dealer. The trade off was she wasn’t that good at avoiding attacks, making her kind of a glass cannon.

  The only role that wasn’t being filled by their party was a scout in nature, and sustained ranged damage. Which so far was exactly what Bjorn’s skills and stat points leaned into. He was the only one who had some sort of tracking skill. He spent a lot of his time in nature during the first year of his life in the Eld. He had stealth, his highest combat skill was archery. It would just make plain sense for him to lean further into that role.

  It also became apparent that he was lacking when it came to his ability to sling spells. Although everything he knew was different than Meira, and in its own right powerful. He would never be able to match her for pure damage capabilities, but his magic seemed to serve more of a supportive role anyways. Regardless though, his spell casting had played a pivotal role in his survival, and with his reliance on keeping distance lately during a fight he found himself low on mana in almost every single fight they had been in.

  With all of that in mind Bjorn started to allocate his points. He put 2 into dexterity, 2 into agility, 2 into wisdom, and finally 3 into intelligence. Bringing each stat except for wisdom up to 20, with wisdom at 17. For his mental stats he didn’t feel really any difference, but with the 4 points he had put into agility and dexterity it made his entire body feel more balanced, looser, and made him feel like he could move all around much easier.

  With all of his stats finally allocated he stopped and looked at his total stats. It was quite respectable. No one stat was over inflated over another. They were all pretty close to balanced, at least as close as you could get to a balanced build, based on his skills. For the almost millionth time he took a look at his level and lamented how much more he could be right now with an additional 22 stats if he didn’t have that damn weak disadvantage.

  After he finished with his stat allocation and skill advancement Bjorn wanted to see how the war leader skill worked. For about 15 minutes he tried to find where a ‘form war party.’ button was in all of the menus of his HUD, but with no luck. Eventually in frustration he gave up on searching instead he sat there thinking about the skill. By almost pure happenstance Bjorn’s gaze fell onto Alaric’s sleeping form and thought “Maybe Alaric knows how to form a war party.”

  After that errant thought a screen popped up in the middle of his vision.

  Would you like to form a war party? Yes/No?

  Obviously Bjorn mentally clicked yes, and a new screen appeared in front of his vision.

  This is a one time message, so don’t skip any part of it. You have formed your first war party. Your war party your war party will last a total of 32 hours before disbanding. You are only able to make a single war party per 32 hour stint. The 32 hours starts as soon as you form the party. Once made, anyone who becomes a part of your war party will be included in the war party for the full 32 hours. Each person can only be a part of 1 war party. As a beginner war leader you are able to have at max 10 people in your war party, as you go up in ranks in this skill you will be able to have more. Until the war party is disbanded everyone in the war party will stay in it, this is true for the 32 hours, once that time frame has elapsed the war party will naturally be disbanded. As the war leader you will get war points for everything that your war party kills. As a beginner war leader the maximum number of war points you are able to obtain per day is limited to 250. Increase your rank in this skill to increase that limit.

  Bjorn spent a few minutes reading over that confusing line of text until he finally started to understand what exactly it was trying to say. After he grasped the meaning he closed the message and looked where he had seen the information the war leader skill gave him while he was a part of Tommin’s war party. And sure enough the list was there once again, this time the only name on the list was himself. Next to his name was a little star. The star was the exact same one that Tommin had next to his name when Bjorn was added to his war party.

  Right next to his list of members of the war party was a small button that wasn’t there when Bjorn was just a member of a war party and so mentally he clicked on it. A new menu appeared in front of his face. Immediately the first thing he noticed was the fact that each item in the list had a number next to it. It didn’t take a genius to guess that the number was the warpoint cost. He quickly scrolled through the list, and it was a long list. Nearly anything and everything Bjorn could think of appeared in the list as he scrolled.

  Increased range on your sphere of influence. 50

  Movement speed. 25

  Attack damage. 10

  Defenses 10.

  Roles 100.

  Magics 100.

  Telepathy. 50.

  Were a few of the items on the list that jumped out at him as he scrolled through the list. Just when Bjorn was wondering if he could get more information on an upgrade path a prompt appeared in the middle of his vision.

  Natural healing 20.

  When you purchase this upgrade for your war leader skill your entire war party's natural healing will increase by 100% throughout the duration of the war party. This upgrade has multiple levels to it.

  Well that was good to know. As it turned out the prompt that he got further explaining how the upgrade worked matched up with the one he was looking at as he had that thought. With his new found knowledge he began pulling up upgrade after upgrade getting a more detailed explanation on what each upgrade did.

  Increased range on your sphere of influence. 50.

  Your sphere of influence is how far out your aura reaches. By default the area that you are able to affect is 25 yards. Once outside of your sphere your war party members lose the benefits of your sphere of influence until they come back inside the range of your sphere. They will still be considered a member of your war party and will not be removed from your war party. Any role that they obtained from you will be maintained. This upgrade has multiple levels to it.

  Movement speed. 25.

  Purchasing this upgrade will give your war party an increased movement speed of 5% in whatever terrain you pick. You may purchase this upgrade multiple times, choosing different types of terrain each time you buy it. Each type of terrain that you pick has multiple levels to it.

  Attack damage. 10.

  When you purchase this upgrade you will have to pick what type of damage you wish to amplify. You may purchase this upgrade multiple times, choosing different types of damage you wish to amply each time. Each type of damage you purchase will have multiple levels to it.

  Defenses. 10.

  When you purchase this upgrade you will have to pick what type of defenses you wish to amplify. You may purchase this upgrade multiple times, choosing different types of defenses you wish to amply each time. Each type of defense you purchase will have multiple levels to it.

  Roles. 100.

  Roles are a single upgrade that you purchase and are able to be assigned to a single member of your war party. When a role is allocated that member will gain buffs associated of the assigned role. Each role will have multiple upgrades that can be purchased for it.

  Magics. 100.

  This upgrade will unlock a certain school of magic that you will be able to buy upgrades for. Each school of magic is a one time purchase. Each purchase of a school of magic will have the exact same cost to unlock.

  Telepathy. 50.

  Telepathy is a one time purchase and will give your war party the ability to communicate with you exclusively by telepathy, as long as they are part of your sphere of influence. There is only a single upgrade to this skill. Once purchased you may spend an additional 25 war points to upgrade your telepathy to allow your war party members to telepathically communicate amongst themselves as well as with you.

  Bjorn spent some time going over what he would want to purchase as he read through the descriptions of what all of the upgrades to his war leader skill would do. In his mind there were two upgrades that were no-brainers to pick up. So for 150 war points he purchased the two upgrades. The first being, increased sphere of influence and the second being telepathy.

  With the first purchase the price updated as well as the description of the upgrade. The cost jumped from 50 to 100, but the range on his sphere of influence also jumped from 25 yards to 50 yards.

  After he purchased the telepathy upgrade it also changed. Its cost dropped from 50 to 25. With a mental sigh Bjorn spent the last 25 to max out the upgrade. After he spent the war points the upgrade disappeared from the list of his available upgrades.

  With 76 war points left Bjorn was debating on what to spend them on, it wasn’t enough to purchase any of the major upgrades so Bjorn started to devise how to spend his remaining points.

  The first thing he spent the remaining 76 points on was a movement speed upgrade. When he spent the points a huge list of different terrains appeared. Scrolling through it Bjorn ended up settling on one, and that was forests. The way he figured up until this point Alaric, Meira, Tayla and himself had mainly traveled through forests to get here. During his life in the Eld he had spent the majority of his time so far in only three terrains. The first one being mountains. The second being forest. And lastly underground. With the battle against the spiders being finished he decided that underground wasn’t a good purchase. Once they were done here they were planning on going to Vanta to tell Rickie’s friend's sister about his death. So they would have to travel through the forest to get there.

  After he purchased the upgrade for movement speed it changed once again. The initial option to buy movement speed was still there for the initial cost. Instead another option appeared, this one labeled.

  Movement speed(forest). 5%. 25.

  With his amazing powers of deduction Bjorn surmised that the 5% was the increase to movement speed while in forests. What was curious was the fact that the price didn’t increase. Bjorn’s curiosity ended up getting the better of him and he purchased the second level of movement speed (forest).

  This caused it to change once again, this time its speed increase jumped to 10% and the price also jumped to 50. Its name also changed from Movement speed to Movement speed II. Bjorn ultimately decided that his curiosity was actually not worth the 25 points that he had to spend to figure out that the movement speed price wasn’t a static thing.

  With his remaining 26 points Bjorn was undecided as to what he wanted to spend them on. There wasn’t anything that really jumped out at him as something he should spend the points on. So he decided to spend 20 of the remaining war points on attack and defense.

  When he purchased attack for 10, a menu appeared much as it had for the movement speed. Through there there were a number of choices to pick from. Stabbing, slashing, crushing, force, concussion. Bjorn thought about it for a moment and decided to purchase slashing. Although it wouldn’t help Tayla really, it would help Alaric and Rickie. Rickie’s two handed sword was basically a slashing weapon, if not a partial crushing weapon. And as for Alaric although he used a hammer during the fight with the snatcher spiders his preferred weapon was an axe so he would benefit from it as well. Once again after Bjorn purchased the upgrade a new item appeared under the attack option being.

  Attack(slashing). 5%. 15.

  With that purchased he next went to defense. What surprised him was when he purchased the defense he had choices there as well. Instead of types of damages that came up, such as piercing slashing or crushing, what appeared was: Physical, Water, Earth, Air, Fire, Light, Dark, Life, Death. He wasn’t expecting defenses to encompass the schools of magic as well.

  So with his ten points he decided to go with the safe route and purchased physical defenses. Right on que there was a new option for purchase, that being, upgrade the physical defenses. His purchase of the first level gave his war party 5% resistance to any physical attack.

  Which ultimately left him with 6 war points left to spend. Not knowing what exactly he wanted to spend them on he began to scroll through the list once again, this time just filtering for what he could spend the 6 points on. What caught his eye was an upgrade that cost 1 point to purchase. Out of curiosity Bjorn took a closer look at that upgrade.

  Better insults. 1.

  Purchasing this upgrade will make any insult your war party hurls at your opponent sting just a little bit more. This upgrade will have multiple levels to purchase.

  Mentally laughing at the absurdity of the upgrade Bjorn decided to purchase it.

  Better insults I. 5%. 2.

  The thought that Alaric’s insults will have more of an impact on their enemies just made Bjorn giggle internally. So he immediately decided to purchase the second one. Which increased the effectiveness of Alaric’s insults by 10%. Leaving him with 3 war points, Which coincidentally was the exact cost for Better insults III. So he spent the last 3 war points to purchase Better insults III. This brought the cost for IV up to 5 war points, and the total increased effect of insults to 15%.

  After all of his war points were finally spent he looked around the room and he saw a few Rickie had moved himself into a seated position in the tent. He and Bjorn made eye contact and then nodded to each other. There was an unspoken agreement between the two and they both started to get up. After all they were both still covered in the grime from the day before. As Bjorn got to his feet he mentally disbanded the war party just by thinking about it, almost the same as how he had formed it.

  At the commotion in the tent the other two woke up, and they too quickly started to gather up clean clothes and their bars of soap. Together the four of them made their way towards the communal showers/baths area. Once there they stripped out of their soiled armor and their soiled clothes and cleaned themselves.

  Once everyone was clean Tayla got dressed in her clean clothes as she picked up everyone’s soiled clothes and took off for the launders. The three men picked up all of the various weapons and armor that they had used and sat down and started to clean their gear, still naked, as they would likely have gotten any new clothes dirty once again. They were not the only ones doing that. There were around a dozen other people in various states of cleaning themselves and their armor and gear. It was a stark reminder of what they had lost, before the battle there would be roughly 25 to 50 people there cleaning themselves.

  After they finished cleaning the grim from both themselves and their gear they collectively got dressed and picked up their gear. Making their way over to the forges they dropped off all of their gear to let them repair anything that needed to be repaired.

  They then made their way back to their tent to collect Tayla, she had told them before she left that she was going to go back to the tent and take care of their dirty sheets after dropping off their clothes. When they got there they found that she had finished changing out the sheets and the dirty ones were nowhere to be seen.

  Next they went and got a quick bite to eat before they made their way to the command center. Upon arrival there were two new guards standing outside of the doors. Some form of military discipline apparently had reasserted itself as they were standing more at attention than the two the night before were.

  As the group approached they expected to be stopped by the guards. To their surprise the two men instead clasped their fists to their chests and bowed their heads, must as how the two the night before had done. They didn’t slow and instead just walked right past the two guards. After the group had passed they returned to their previous position, standing at attention.

  The inside of the command center was once a military headquarters, not anymore. Although a small area was still dedicated to running the camp, the vast majority of the large spacious room had been changed into sleeping accommodations. Where the building use to be a flurry of activity, now it was just a soft slow bustle.

  As soon as they entered the building someone made their way over to where they were standing and after a quick bow salute she spoke. “We were told you would likely want to see your friend Meira. If you would like to follow me I can show you to her.”

  Following her through the rows of cots they passed plenty of people who were sleeping. There were also a number who were not. Everyone that they passed who was not sleeping gave them the same type of treatment they had gotten from the guards and the woman. Not everyone saluted and bowed though. It was impossible not to see the gratitude and respect on their faces though.

  They followed the woman to the far side of the room and down a small corridor that they hadn’t seen the last time they were in this building. Around half way down they went through a small door. Inside was a room roughly 7 by 8 feet. It was furnished with a bed, small desk and chair. Standing next to the bed was a man in an outfit that labeled him as a healer. Laying on the bed unconscious was Meira.

  The woman gave a small smile and left. The healer saw the quartet and spoke before any questions could be asked. “Don’t worry, she is fine. She is just sleeping. She had pushed herself too far in that last battle and fell unconscious because of the depleted mana. She is making a full recovery.”

  Bjorn nodded. “Is there anything we can do to help?”

  The healer shook his head. “No, she just needs sleep that is all.”

  “Thank you.” Tayla said.

  He nodded and made his way from the room, having to push past the group to do so as the room didn’t have much in the way for space. They sat there, talking in low voices trying not to wake Meira.

  After roughly 15 minutes a young boy came to the room. “Duke Dornan would like to speak with you. If you would like to follow me I can show you to him.”

  Everyone made to follow except for Bjorn. Looking back at Bjorn Alaric asked. “You okay? Are you coming?”

  “I’ll be fine, I think I will stay here.” He said simply.

  Rickie gave the boy a curious look.

  “He didn’t say that you had to come, just that he wished to speak with you, and to come at your own time.” the boy shrugged.

  “Sounds good, we will see you in a bit.” Rickie said to Bjorn as they filled out the door.

  Bjorn sat there by Meira’s side for a good long while before anything changed. He had eventually taken a seat in the one chair and laid his head on the bed and fell asleep while waiting. He was awoken by the feeling of a hand running through his hair. Sitting up he saw Meira laying there with a smile on her pretty face.

  “I can think of worse ways to wake up.” Meira said teasingly as Bjorn sat up. “A cute boy laying on my bed, obviously sick with worry over me.”

  Meira’s words struck a little too close to home for Bjorn and his heart began to ache. “You had me worried, I thought that I lost you when I saw your limp body being carried away from the battlefield.” Bjorn’s voice was thick with emotion, it sounded like he was on the verge of tears.

  “You aren’t going to get away from me that easily.” Meira replied, her smile growing wider. “You were the one who saved me, I owe you my life, wherever you go, I will go to.”

  “Meira, you don’t owe me anything. You have saved my life time and time again, if anyone owes the other their life it is me.”

  “Now that is a nice thought. You owe me, looks like I am the one stuck with you.” A playful note in her voice.

  Even though Meira’s mood was light and playful Bjorn wasn’t quite finished with his emotions. For the thousandth time Bjorn was overcome with the desire to kiss her. Something in him snapped today. And instead of pulling away and stopping himself, he leaned in heading straight for her lips.

  Instead of pulling away, or looking stunned she came forward and their lips locked. They were soft, and sweet as if she had just eaten a candy. They sat there kissing each other for who knows how long before they broke away. But they didn’t fully retreat, they stayed faces almost pressed together.

  “Well that was unexpected.” She said breathlessly.

  “But not unwanted it seemed.” Bjorn said teasingly.

  “Not at all.” She replied before placing her hand on the back of Bjorn’s neck and lacing her fingers into his hair. She pulled him in for another kiss. He didn’t resist.

  They kissed once again. As their lips were locked together they heard a voice over by the door. “Its about damn time you two fucking got over yourselves and kissed.” Alaric’s voice cut through the silence.

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