The morning wind cut sharp against his face as Aexl leaned into the saddle.
Kentucky, his great cuckoo mount, stretched its wings wide, talons gripping the rocky trail as they left behind the Exit of the Cliff of Echo. The bird's feathers shimmered blue-green beneath the sun, each stride carrying them further into the open field.
Ahead, a lone tower jutted from the earth—a skeletal stone gate, like some tall gate layered and layered by floors. Its shadow fell across their path like a sundial marking telling time. Aexl slowed his mount, as his military mind instantly tried to read the structure.
Thump. He tapped the Ephone, the screen flaring to life with a glowing tactical map. The lines of the landscape unfolded, a digital ghost superimposed over reality. As he suspected, "That… isn't the fortress," he muttered. He tapped his Ephone as he tapped the name on the map Brokenshield, as the screen adjusted the glowing tactical map. The lines of the land unfolded like a GPS, marking ridges, forests, and valleys. The tower wasn't the Orc stronghold — just the Fate that bound the domain of Eldenthyr.
He guided Kentucky onward, plunging into the looming green wall of the forest. As he followed the tactical view like guided GPS tracking the Brokenshield fortress leading him to the shortest route. The world grew dark. Branches clawed at them from overhead as the air thickened with the smell of moss and damp earth. Each step Kentucky took landed with a hollow thrum-thrum, a sound swallowed by the deep, silent valleys.
Then, a sharp buzz resonated not from the phone,
[ Summon Timer Completed. ]
Aexl winced, a wry heat rising in his chest. Time to see the "baby" born from last night's… negotiations with Juvia.
[ Would you like to Summon Now?]
[ Summon ][Later]
[10]...[9…]....[8….]
A cynical laugh almost escaped him, a dark, guttural sound for the absurdity of it all. But before his hand could even brush the summon key, the world broke open.
The forest canopy simply ended, sheared off as if by a giant's blade. The path fell away into nothing, opening onto a high, wind-scoured ridge. Aexl instinctively pulled Kentucky to a hard stop, the cuckoo's talons digging deep into the precipice, sending a shower of loose rock skittering into the void below.
Aexl tapped the phone [2..] [Later] as to stop the summoning
The air here was different—thin and sharp. The trees that remained at the edge of the clearing were scarred, their bark stripped away in wide patches, some snapped in half like twigs. The ground beneath his feet was unnaturally compacted, the earth bearing the ghosts of immense, heavy footsteps that had churned the soil days ago.
He dismounted, his boots sinking into the disturbed earth. A soldier's eyes swept the area, taking in the details. No campfires, no discarded rations. This wasn't a camp. It was a temporary observation post, used by something large and heavy-footed that had come, watched, and left.
He tapped out his Ephone, the tactical overview glowing in the stark light. The GPS trail, a pulsating green line, led him directly to the ragged edge of the cliff, ending in a blinking waypoint that hung over the abyss.
Aexl stared at it, a grim, incredulous smile twisting his lips. "You've got to be kidding me," he muttered, the wind stealing the words from his mouth. The app's cold, inhuman logic was telling him the same thing the scarred earth did: the objective was straight down.
He walked to the very precipice, his boot heels digging into the loose shale. The wind howled in his ears, a lonely, hungry sound. He looked down.
And the world fell away beneath him.
There, sprawled across the valley floor like a festering wound, lay the fortress.
A raw, guttural stench hit him first—a foul brew of unwashed bodies, filth, and the coppery tang of old blood, all carried on the wind that whipped across the valley. It was the smell of a festering wound, a scent he knew from a dozen forgotten battlefields on Earth.
His eyes, cold and analytical, took in the scene. A sprawling Orc fort, a crude masterpiece of blackened logs and jagged stone, squatted in the valley. Foul smoke, thick and greasy, coiled from within its palisades.
But the fortifications were secondary. It was the legion inside that made his grip tighten on the saddle's horn.
Thousands.
His mind, a machine honed by decades of war, began its grim calculus. Ten thousand, give or take. They were a tide of green flesh, but they were not one force. They were fractured.
Half of them were warriors. Hulking brutes whose green skin was a canvas for writhing black tattoos. They moved with a conqueror's arrogance, their roars a constant, rumbling thunder. The sharp crack-crack-snap of their whips cut through the din, each lash a punctuation mark in their brutal symphony.
The other half… were not warriors. They were chattel. Their skin was a paler, sickly tan, their bodies softer, more feminine, and broken. Chained in miserable clusters, they flinched at every sound, their cries swallowed by the roar of their masters.
A soldier's contempt, cold and sharp, twisted in Aexl's gut. This wasn't an army. It was a poorly managed resource pool.
"Ten thousand," he breathed, the words stolen by the wind. "Five thousand fighters… and five thousand reasons for them to lose." He leaned forward, his gaze sweeping the chaotic layout. "This isn't a power shift. It's a collapse." He could almost smell the rot in their command structure. A matriarchy overthrown? A brutish patriarch seizing control? It didn't matter. The result was the same: a force divided, ripe for the slaughter.
A deep, resonant horn blast echoed from below, a sound of raw, undisciplined power. More whips cracked in answer. The fortress seethed, a hornet's nest of brutality, blissfully unaware of the predator watching from the ridge.
Aexl felt the old, familiar fire ignite in his chest. This was not just another battle.
This was a culling.
The wind bit at him, a high, lonely sound that echoed the emptiness of the ridge. From this vantage point, the fortress was a map laid bare. Aexl's hands moved with the practiced economy of a soldier, his Ephone a silent extension of his will. Click. Whir. He took panoramic shots, recorded video, zooming in on the crude watchtowers, the flow of guards, and the twin bridges that served as the fortress's lifeline to the western lands. Each image was a piece of a puzzle he was already solving.
For a fleeting second, the topography snagged on a thread of memory. A deep canyon, a hard-won mountain pass… War Dominion 1. A ghost of his youth, hunched over a glowing screen. He'd built a bridge just like that after taking Echo Mountain. His mind reached for the details of the broken fort at its foot, but the memory was smoke, dissolving as he tried to grasp it.
Clack. He locked the Ephone. "No point," he muttered, the words whipped away by the wind. Nostalgia was a luxury a commander couldn't afford. The pictures he had now were real, tactical data he could use to strategize his next move.
He scrolled through the gallery, a slideshow of filth and brutality. Then he stopped. One image held him captive. A zoomed-in shot of the slaves. He saw them clearly now, not as a faceless mass, but as individuals. The tan-skinned orcs. They were caged, collared, and forced into menial labor under the lash. But what struck him were the horns—single, elegant horns curling from the center of their foreheads, so unlike the brutish, hornless green-skins. Their features were sharp, almost delicate, their bodies lean and powerful despite their chains. Their clothing was little more than rags, scraps of hide that did little to conceal forms that reminded him of the toned, sun-kissed models from his old world.
His mind churned, searching for an answer, a file, any piece of lore that explained this caste system. Nothing. It was a blank. Another question for Lyssa or Roderick, he thought, swiping the image away. The mystery would have to wait.
First things first. He needed a secure location to summon his "baby." And that tower he'd seen earlier… it beckoned. A potential staging ground for a frontal assault. He patted Kentucky's neck, his gaze fixed on the sprawling fortress below, his mind already running tactical simulations.
"This ridge is climbable. That's one thing for sure as a soldier accessing the ridge and a potential perfect staging ground for a flanking maneuver," he mused aloud, his voice low and calculating. "A backdoor attack they'd never see coming... if we had a way to get down." He scanned the sheer drop, the treacherous scree, and the complete lack of cover. "But without a plan this path is a death trap. Far too steep, far too exposed for a proper assault." He gave a final, decisive pat to his mount. "One misstep, and we'd be a feast for scavengers before we ever laid a hand on those walls."
"Let's go, Kentucky." He steered the great bird not back into the forest, but east, trekking along the spine of the ridge. It was a faster, more direct route to the tower.
As they descended a particularly sharp incline, Aexl felt a surge of admiration for his mount. Kentucky wasn't bothered in the slightest by the treacherous footing. There was a technique to its movements, a deliberate precision. Its massive talons would dig deep into the rock and packed earth, finding purchase where there should be none. Aexl found himself clinging to the saddle, a necessary counterweight to the bird's seemingly effortless balance. It was like the damn thing was mocking gravity.
A soldier's instinct, the ingrained need to test every asset to its absolute limit, sparked in his mind. He guided Kentucky toward a higher, even more perilous section of the ridge that dropped off into a sheer cliff face.
"This will be suicide, buddy," Aexl muttered, a grim smile touching his lips.
Kentucky just let out a loud, confident CAW!
It backed up a few paces, muscles coiling like immense springs. "Let's go!" Aexl yelled, the command more of an impulse than a thought.
The bird dashed forward and launched itself off the edge of the ridge.
For a heart-stopping second, they were airborne, free-falling into the abyss. "WHAT THE HELL!" Aexl roared, the wind tearing the words from his mouth as his stomach leaped into his throat.
Then, with a sound like pickaxes striking granite, Kentucky's talons slammed into the cliff face. Aexl was thrown forward, his body jolting as their descent abruptly shifted from a fall to a controlled slide. They were running—running straight down a ninety-degree wall of rock.
He could see it now, the incredible mechanics of it. Kentucky's talons were digging in, releasing, and finding new holds in a blur of motion, kicking up showers of stone and dirt with every impossible stride.
"YOU'RE REALLY A WONDER, KENTUCKY!" Aexl shouted, the terror giving way to a wild, incredulous laugh. They reached a ledge where a small waterfall cascaded into a clear pool, the sound of rushing water a welcome anchor back to reality.
He was still laughing as he slid from the saddle, his legs shaky. "Let's take a rest here, buddy," he said, patting the cuckoo's powerful neck. The bird seemed to understand, dipping its head. "This is a good spot. A damn good spot."
He pulled out some leftover smoked deer from his pack, but Kentucky turned its beak away with a disdainful snort. Aexl chuckled and produced a dozen loaves of hard bread instead. The bird cooed happily and began to chow down with gusto.
Aexl took a long drink from the pool, the cold water clearing his head. The adrenaline faded, replaced by a familiar, focused calm. He looked around the secluded ledge, sheltered and hidden from any onlookers view. It was perfect.
His eyes fell upon his Ephone screen as to resume what was halted before
"Alright," he said to himself, a predator's grin spreading across his face.
"Time to see the baby."