Now that you're this far into the novel; the comment attached here has a map!
( * )
"Auferstehen…" Hierd understood little, the concept itself was something only conceivable in fiction. He's already digested many fictious moments in his time in Auferstan; but now fully confronting this monstrous event; his mind couldn't fathom the other amounts of the unreal in Auferstan.
"Excuse me and my questioning," Hierd said. "I want to be more knowledgeable on this Auferstehen you're talking about."
"Sir, that's uhm…" Alrife turned to him his face rather confused. "You've no clue what it is?"
"Not a single clue." They both stopped walking.
Then, with a stern face; "Auferstehen is… Is an event. Much like a festival; but so gravely less festival-like." His eyes were looking before the present, "it's when the monsters of Auferstan rise, it's when; as i've heard, 'when death takes a break.'" He chuckled weakily and awkwardly.
"But, to have someone from around here not knowing what Auferstan is… It's, very… it's makes someone like me ponder." He continued. Pressed, Hierd thought of a response.
"I am from Europe." He stated.
"Europe. What foreign sounding name." His grin was weak. "Guess that solves the fact that you, sir, are not from around here."
He nodded.
"Tell me more about that, Auferstehen," they started to walk, albeit slower. "Are they like us? Humanoid in anyway?"
"Not that I recall. What these monsters are, are practically the… Monstrous versions of our everyday run-of-the-mill farm animals. But they're more bigger, they're more stronger, they're more… Horrific. To say the least."
"I don't… I don't think I'm following." Hierd chuckled a little.
"See," -he pointed at a pair of children playing with a dog- "that's a dog, of course, but monsters of Auferstehen like… That dog, look bigger, a tree's height in difference, and is aggresive. So much more than it's normal counterpart.
"A bulldog the size of a tree." Hierd muttered in his breath. "One of three things I never thought would be fear of mine. Among woman and drivers being the two others."
"Drivers?" Questioned Alrife, "they are courtman are they not?"
"In a way... Yes."
The path winded behind the chief's house. Not really far, just a couple steps and you'd make it there yourself; the backyard was fashioned like an old fashioned barrack. There was this big empty plain devoid of grass, two blocks of target wood at one end, and a hut where (as Alrife said) where they keep the bows, arrows, and swords.
The trees round the barrack was so ridden with cuts and bruises, it's obvious these were the grounds wherein the villager's soldiers train in. The wood-fashioned scabbards, and some plates of leather thrown about secured that resolve.
They had stopped, finally at their destination; "I'll leave you to it, sir. I'm sorry, but I'll need to go back to the chief, please enjoy your stay in the village." He bowed.
Hierd nodded, waving goodbye to the fleeting Alrife.
It was this old shack, the roof having been built with stacks of log rather than wooden shingles are some ilk of roofing. The walls were thankfully a more conventional plank; but the way these were made were so crude and swiftly built that there were still some gaps large enough to be able to see inside.
He opened the door, the two hinges squeaking loudly. It was… Small, but it was a start to a house. The bed was fashioned out of hay then laid with this soft cloth, he couldn't make heads or tails about whether it was wool or cotton made. He sat, noting the cusion, got rid of his two black boots; and laid comfortably and sighing deep reliefs to the air.
( * )
A crowd gathered, hiding amongst the treeline perimeter of the vast field, in the shadows, to shield from the blaring sun. Watching tentatively at the village's footsoldiers, all weary; clad in leather tunic, rough-generational swords in their scabbards.
Everyone was staring at the man upon the wooden stage.
His eyes were ocean blue, hair golden and long. A stern face and strict posture.
He was… Foreboding.
"There are fifty footsoldiers under the chief's command." Hierd thought, "all equally weak, too weak to fight another Auferstehen from what I've heard from Alrife, and my self-gathered opinions."
He stood, unwavered by the amount of people looking at him with curious eyes.
'Who is that guy?'
'From what I've heard, that's the man who'd be saving our village.'
'A single man can't stop the invasion of the animals of hell!'
'What do you know?'
Commotion.
Hierd stopped it by simply taking one step forward the hastily made wooden stage.
That single step alone commanded more than words.
"For the next few days, few weeks… Months?" Hierd started, "I will be the man to instruct. To give guidance. And most importantly, to help protect; the village and all of it's inhabitants under the scourge of Auferstehen."
A bold start. The people commented, the mere mention of Auferstehen was like opening an old wound, an old wound they would rather ignore, be ignorant of and forget. They clutched their arms and suppressed themselves from feeling gloom.
"I, Hierd Die Grace, shall train you to use properly many of the weapons under my seamingly limitless arsenal." The crowd was intrigued, "guns. Rifles. The whole package," -now the crowd was confused- "I will train you to shoot, to fire back, and at upmost importance; kill your enemies."
'What's a gun?'
'I don't know.'
Hierd chortled, seeing the footmen chatter silently with each other about guns. They didn't know anything, and getting their reaction'd be a delight to see.
He parted his luger from the hip holster, brandishing the polished pistol for everyone to see.
'That's a gun?' One chuckled.
'Small and stupid, how'll that… Like… Help?'
The footsoldiers and crowd farther away were growing irate. Did they come here to witness this, did the footmen really just obey the orders of the chief just to witness this man talk with no strength to back up his words?
How would they take the words of a man who they had not seen, brandishing a weapon that could barely help in Auferstehen. A small club would never ever do anything, that'd instead be like handing yourself to God, arms open and happily accepting.
"What is this… Stupidity, sir!?" A footman was bold enough to question. "Your fashioned metal club will do nothing in our fight in Auferstehen! What we want is a militia, steel… No, even good enough leather armor for us all. As well as weapons! We barely have any more spears left! And spears and pikes are more valuable than swords! Get down and enough with the nonsense, sir!"
The crowd and footmen quietly agreed, impatiently waiting for what the next words of that yellow-haird know-it-all.
There was a red-target (same as the one Hierd had seen at Naturvege's backyard) just about seven fathoms away. And with a steady hand, raised his Luger and aimed at the target. "Naturvege."
"Yes, sir?" He nervously approached, a hundred eyes staring at him.
"Please head to that target, tell everyone that on it exists no hole. That no arrow has pierced it, and that I and my Luger will create a hole, deeper than any other arrow."
As soon as Hierd said it, Naturvege ran to the target, telling his citizens the words that Hierd wanted conveyed. And after, the footmen looked at Hierd with anger mixed with curiosity over his unwavering confidence over that metal club of his.
By the next second, a loud; ear-piercing sound shocked the whole field in the rage of this dissonant explosion.
"What was that!?" The people and the footmen were utterly aweshook at the loud noise that they presumed came from the gun that Hierd was holding.
'How can a metal club produce that noise?'
'Did it even do what it did? Maybe it just made noise?'
Hierd fixed his stance, blowing the air away from the barrel before putting it swiftly back into it's holster. "Now check the target."
The footsoldiers ran to the target, not believing, by even a single moment that Hierd's words were in any way correct.
"No way…" The footmen fell to their feet in astonishment. "A hole!"
"A perfect hole," looking at it from the front: "And it was able to pierce all the way to the back!?"
The impossibility, their shock, and their ire now leaving them: was in total disbelief over Hierd, his words, and his gun. That gun… How truly devastating is it's power.
"Everyone!" Hierd shouted, "go back to your formation!" His strict voice whirrled the footmen back to their box formation without a hitch.
A wave of commotion, from the footmen and the crowd that watched and observed the shooting of the Gun.
'A metal bow, so weirdly shaped that it is no bow of any nature, without any drawing time, unleashing a powerful, unnatural power…'
The people were swayed to Hierd after that shot. And they were hooked on to his presence. Now that his words had carried weight. The footman who argued with him felt so disgraceful and disrespectful. Now understanding the power of the man that he argued with, an example of the armaments he carried.
He couldn't even look at him in the eyes.
"You will possess yourselves, each one of you: a gun of your own. This is the Luger. A pistol (we call it in my country), it can shoot faster than any bow, any crossbow, can penetrate bodies like soft bread; you will recieve yourselves the Kar98k."
All curious; the same footman who argued with Hierd rose to question: "may we see what the Kar98k is?"
"Yes."
The gun had already been saddled behind him; as it had been mentioned, he quickly set the strap and laid the butt of the stock on his shoulder. The footmen and surrounding observers admiring the wooden form. The Kar98k, to them, looked like a metal-detailed wooden short spear.
That's because of the attached bayonet at the barrel; "with the simple addition of the bayonet fitted to this; it functions as a spear as well as a 'gun.'" Seeing his audience of onlookers sqiurm in wait for him to shoot it; he swiftly trained the sights onto the previously shot target., putting weight in, and shooting!
A more powerful sounding boom, his audience, even more impressed. Just like the luger had done, the Kar98k had hit the target's center once again. This time, the hole was a bit larger as it had caused the wood to flake and break.
After a long silence, letting his footmen stir in the power of his guns, he finally spoke. "We start training today, and I wish for you all to cooperate."
Weakily, yet with manly prowess a resounding, "Yes, sir!" Powered through the footmen.
—
After twenty or so minutes, and with the help of the footmen; he was able to make a small practice area. The same size as a football field almost, at one end of the rectangle, he set up targets (varying in distance) and at the other was a small post done up by using two trunks from a tree they found lying nearby the grounds.
Quickly, he set the men to a formation of fifty.
"With them being a little malnourished, they should eat up a little. After that, I'll need to get their thirst quenched enough so we could hold a running excersize round the whole field. Then; I should think about the first actual military lessons I should teach them." HIs footmen were waiting, looking at him intently yet not so sharp as to draw attention to themselves.
"Guns are a must need, that'll be first in line. Then their command, they should be split in squads instead, and then maybe things like making sandbags or those foxholes? Or something like that. But that's stupid, right? Foxholes are useless when your enemy uses bows with curved trajectory… Eh! I'll see where this goes."