Display of Strength

After quietly closing the door behind her, sighed softly and pushed away from Nix's workshop. She hadn't made it three steps before she was confronted by Drevids tired smile.

"Hello child, is Nix available?" He asked in a weary voice. His shirt and pants were covered in dirt with signs of some being recently smeared away from his face.

"Hello Chief, Mother is currently trying to sleep. Can we get some people to guard her?" Sheeva asked as she gestured for him to bend down to her, her hand disappearing in her pocket.

"I'm not the Chief anymore little one, just Drevid is alright. And I'll get Luvid and Raine on it." Drevid spoke as he got down on one knee for the Fox-Kin to wipe the dirt from his face. "I see you're making your rounds again?"

"Yes, I need to give Veronica's team their glasses so they can start their training. As well as let those that signed up to work us where they will be stationed." Sheeva nodded proudly as she finished cleaning the man's face. Happy with her work, she tucked the small cloth away before bringing her tablet up. "The Stone-Folk called Ludin is to go to the guard unit. The rest will work with us starting tomorrow."

"So she felt it as well." The Vyrin sighed as he stood up and looked behind him.

Where the street had once been wide enough for two carriages through, now held multiple tents and fires with barely enough room to walk between them. Though most remained unoccupied, there were still plenty of new faces in the village. They had just barely gotten the refugees settled in mere hours ago when the sun was still low in the sky. Now that it hung at its highest point, the older members of the village could only hold their breaths and hope there will not be further conflict.

Just as the group of refugees arrived, someone tried picking a fight to take over a small area of tents. Luckily, they didn't need to send anyone from the Armored Unit to intervene as Drevid stepped in with a few others to calm them down. Now, it was just a matter of time before someone snaps. What made matters worse, the other two groups were to arrive before the next day, only adding onto the anxiety.

"I saw we were almost done with the outer wall, will there be enough room for everyone?" Sheeva asked with a deep concern.

Drevid simply chuckled to soothe the child's worries, reaching down to gently pat her head. "The ramparts have just been built. If there isn't enough room, we will put people in the main hall instead. While the others rest, we have some people watching those outside the wall with Clark to etch the runes."

After Drevid spoke, he pulled his thin glass lense out and hooked it over his ear before tapping the side. "Raine, I need two to guard Nix while she sleeps. They can take shifts sleeping on the porch."

"Yes Chief."

After the response, Drevid took the lense off and tucked it away once more in his breat pocket. He then gestured for Sheeva to follow as he walked towards the medical hall. "I'll have you make the report for Nix to read later Sheeva. Currently, we have eight people left that are wounded. There are currently complaints about those with their limbs missing being allowed to remain. I don't know what Nix's plan is, but we need an answer before blood starts flying."

Sheeva nodded as she understood what Drevid meant. In desperate times, all of the villages agreed to dispose of the weakest first, be it elderly, severely wounded, or those that were maimed. It was barbaric, but it was how the villages managed to survive for so long in this cursed forest. Even then, it was still a better option than to be sold as lab rats or toys outside of the city. Those that could move would at least he allowed to fight to their death, or they would be killed as quickly as possible to prevent pain.

Sheeva had seen one winter where they had to kill a family who'd all been inflicted with a disease. Though everyone was close to eachother, this was the most efficient way to prevent the village from perishing. A soft sigh left the cubs lips, catching Drevid's attention and making him stop on the porch of the medical hall. "Sorry child, I know it's not what you want to hear, but these are the times we are living in. Hopefully in the future, we will have no need for all of this senseless sacrificing."

Drevid gave Sheeva a soft smile, making her nod sadly before pushing past him to the door. She struggled a bit to get the heavy door open with a tiny grunt, managing to swing it open. She was met with the smell of herbs and blood. Sounds of groans and crying was heard muffled by the hanging cloth walls Nix's system suggested be put up. Though there were fewer beds now, this allowed for patients to have privacy or prevent diseases from being spread. This was made possible by the new mages that had joined them, both recently and a few weeks ago.

The village was lucky that healing magic was easy to pick up, allowing the mages who'd focused primarily on battle spells to get the basics down before they assisted in treating the wounded. Though Nix's syringes were effective, there were only so many that could be made at a time. The medical team decided to only use them for emergencies, or if they needed to preserve their Mana.

Veronica was spotted by Drevid first, who stepped in behind Sheeva and leaned over the child. "Veronica, Sheeva is here for you."

"Oh yes, one moment." A ghostly voice called out before the thudding of quick footsteps were heard. The Ghoul then popped out from behind one of the cotton sheets, briskly walking over to Sheeva and bowing to her. "Welcome Sheeva, are you here with the supplies?"

"Sorry Veronica. We are working on making syringes right now, they should be done by the time the next group gets here. For now, I have your glasses that Nix had mentioned. The system will tell you which belong to who." Sheeva said as she reached behind her and pulled a leather sack off of her belt. Handing it first to the Ghoul, she then pulled out Veronica's pair and offered it to her. "You let these rest on the bridge of your nose. The system will activate just like you've seen before, though these are made for active use. This will eventually be used by everyone else, so let us know if there is anything wrong with them by telling the system to send us a message."

"Ah, I see. Thank you child. How is Nix so far?" Veronica asked with a little reserve. She'd only met Nix a second time to get used to the system, but she was a long ways from being used to that cold gaze she'd been put under.

"She's trying to sleep now, so just call me if you need anything." Sheeva said with a soft smile. Where Nix was an overbearing beast to everyone, Sheeva was like that playful cub everyone wanted to get to know. This made Veronica both happy for someone to speak her words for her, but also fearful at the thought of someone hurting this child.

"Of course, let me know when the syringes are done and I'll have someone go retrieve them. For now, I suggest getting to the ramparts. There have been signs of Dark Beasts spying on us from the edges of the forest recently."

"The system has already warned us. Though it will stall the production of the protective runes, we will be more than happy for those Beasts to attack us." Drevid huffed a chuckle. It was obvious the Vyrin had something planned for when the Beasts attacked.

As this thought ran through Sheeva's mind, she only then realized that there were no Armored people among the security in town. Looking quickly at her tablet, she realized they were all standing on the ramparts of the outer wall where the system predicted the Beasts would attack from.

"Sheeva, could you tell the guards to gather the people at the gate of the outer wall? I believe the exhibition will start by the time they all get there." Drevid asked as she stepped out of the building.

Sheeva could tell he was making his way to the rampart ahead of time for something. A sudden realization made her sigh and tuck the tablet under her arm. Everyone in the village knew that Drevid was a meek and shy man, so the only way the Vyrin would act like this would be if his wife made a plan for him to follow. He was enjoying himself, that was for certain, though Sheeva could only imagine the two ways it could go.

Shaking her head, she bid Veronica farewell and left the hall to go find the current leader of the inner guards to give the order. "Mother, I hope you approved of this..."

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It had been several hours since the people had gathered at the outer wall. Thankfully, there was plenty of room for people to relax and grumble in. Drevid's plan had long been ruined when the second group of refugees caught their attention and made them run towards them. They were originally going to send people after them to assist, but reports came in saying that they were going to use their emergency supplies and book it to the village.

With a new plan in mind, Drevid had Clark stop working on the runes about and hour ago and join the archers on the ramparts. There were also three Scout type armors all crouched down with their rifles dug into the wood as support. Outside of the gate were the five Defense type Armored soldiers, all wielding shields with other various melee weapons at the ready. On the ramparts next to one of the Scouts, stood a Stone-Folk wielding a crossbow.

Seriously, these people really expect to hold off a hoarde of Dark Beasts with such thin armor and strange weapons?

The man clicked his tongue and rubbed the back of his neck. He mainly did it to see if the Beast-Kin would flinch at the sudden noise, but he was only met with the stone cold silence the stranger kept giving him since he was told to follow them around. With the armor on, he couldn't tell their gender, only able to identify their Tiger like features the helmet sculpted. He'd spent the last three hours observing the armor before realizing that the only amazing things about the armor was how well it fit the Tiger-Kin.

Though it would've been nice to meet the inventor of such a design, it would be best to leave in the middle of the battle.

He sighed softly and sat down once again. It had been since the sun was at the tree-line that the strange looking soldiers took their positions, allowing the man to at least admire the shields and swords those on the ground wielded. He admired how they all held the same color without any flaws, even the axes and spear were all black, like they were made purely from the same materials as the metal blades. What struck him more was how flawlessly they had all gotten in formation without anyone calling our orders. This quickly passed as the sun began to set and darkness had set.

How could they possibly see out of those dark helms. Do they have a mage giving them night sight or something?

The man shook his head and leaned back against the wall. He was just about to call it quits and leave the ramparts before Drevid suddenly stood up from his position and turned around to face the disgruntled people on the ground just a few feet below.

"Everyone, I understand it has been a long while since you were all called over. I apologize for the delay, but it is now time for us to display the protection we promised when you had all arrived. All we ask is that you help us take care of the new batch of refugees that are approaching us currently."

Sounds of confusion was heard as the people began to stand up and turn to each other. Chief Drevid had told them that the other villages were attacked, but how did he even know that the other refugees were here?

Such a confident statement. Only a fool would believe him at this point. There wasn't even a messenger or scout that came from that forest to tell us the others were almost here.

The man clicked his tongue once more as a sudden orange light suddenly lit up behind his head. Swinging around, he noticed the Beast-Kins armor had began to glow a bright orange. Several colored lights began to glow around him as well as more orange flashes appeared from the other Armored people. He found their sources to be from their strange weapons.

How? There was barely any sound. How could they launch fire projectiles so effortlessly. Are these things artifacts?

His eyes then followed where the bolts landed, seeing small orange circles forming in the darkness. He noticed one of the circles lifting in air and swaying quickly before disappearing.

Vsh!

The Beast-Kin fired another bolt and hit where the circle disappeared, creating a new one before it dropped onto the dirt. It was only then that the Stone-Folk realized they had fired on Dark Beasts that had gotten a little to close, even if he couldn't see them. Before he could even begin to question how this could be happening, he noticed the familiar green lights of a suit jogging out of the edge of the forest towards the gate.

"Everyone, please welcome home our fellow people." Drevid called out as the area around the gate was suddenly lit up by a bright red flame that was shot into the air.

There, everyone that was gathered could see several rank two and three Dark Beasts laid out in the grass in various places with small lines of smoke leaving their corpses. Behind them, a large group of people were jogging towards them, carrying others that were either wounded, or the children that couldn't keep up.

The red flame that lit them up from the sky also showed people surrounding them fending off other Dark Beasts as well. Their ranks varied between rank two and three, though they seemed to be easily dealt with by the sudden barrage of bolts fired from the ramparts. It was then that the five soldiers outside of the gate started to run towards the group, just in time for those at the village to hear shouting and high pitched whimpers from the battle outside.

This is insane. How is no one giving orders?

The man thought as he dropped his crossbow and stomped towards Drevid, who's attention as solely focused on the red covered battle in the distance. As the man's lips moved silently, the Stone-Folk slowed his pace and raised his brow.

"...ignore the smaller Beasts. Those up here can pick them off while you guys take care of the rank fives leading them." Drevid spoke before he sighed and shook his head. "Though this will make for a good show of strength, don't you think it's a little to much for them?"

Silence followed as the Vyrin fell silent and winced like he was being yelled at. Though this was missed as the Stone-Folk took a fearful step back. "R-rank fives? This village...we're all doomed..."

As the man stuttered, Drevid raised his brow and looked down at the shorter Stone-Folk. Seeing who it was, he simply chuckled softly and shook his head. "Fine fine, I understand. Just give us a good show Ju'Shal, and I'll keep my word."

After Drevid spoke these words, a sudden collection of roars were heard from the forest behind the approaching group. Causing a collection of fear to rise from the villagers behind Drevid. Everyone, save for the Armored Soldiers were shaken and began to look around for some kind of order.

"Everyone, please watch the fight. What you see must be etched deep into your hearts. This is the future Mother Moon promised us over a century ago." Drevid shouted without turning around, causing the crowd to fall silent.

They hadn't heard such words before, but the mention of Mother Moon caused some to suddenly start praying while others fearfully watched the battle unfold.