(Soldier POV)
We were told to observe, to watch for cultural differences, not to judge. Just watch, learn, and keep our hands where everyone could see them.
The Moss-Badger burrows didn't feel like tunnels once you spent time in them. They felt like veins, everything moved through them with purpose—food, water, tools, people—nothing was idle or decorative. The stone had been shaped until it no longer resisted, only guided. It held ceilings without beams, curved around corners without sharp edges and carried sound in soft, directional ways.
This wasn't a place built for comfort, it was built for stability and for generations to come.
Our group moved in pairs, loosely spaced and never blocking the flow. That rule had been communicated without words. When we paused too long in one corridor, someone passed behind us and the air shifted, not a shove but a reminder.
Civilians didn't stop to stare, that was the first thing I noticed.
They glanced, catalogued us, and went back to work.
Craft halls opened into wider chambers where light filtered down through narrow shafts cut high above. Bones were stacked neatly by size and density. Not discarded scraps—but sorted resources. Long leg bones were shaved and drilled into frames, smaller ones were ground down, mixed with resin, pressed into moulds.
One man worked a carving bench with a stone blade etched faintly with runes, he didn't chant or gesture. He worked, and the blade stayed sharper than it should have.
Beside him, a woman arranged sinew strips into bundles, checking tension with practiced fingers. She didn't speak unless spoken to. When a male elder passed, she bowed her head slightly and shifted aside without instruction.
Not fear but habit.
Rune use appeared everywhere, but never casually. Women cooking traced heat-runes into stone hearths that flared briefly, then vanished. No lingering glow or wasted energy. When food boiled, the rune was dismissed. When it cooled, it stayed cold.
Magic here was not decoration. It was labour.
Children moved differently depending on sex.
The boys ran.
They chased each other through wider passages, shouted, clattered, were scolded only when they interfered with work. Some carried training spears barely longer than their arms. Others wrestled in open spaces, elders watching with half-lidded eyes, intervening only when someone stopped moving.
The girls stayed close.
They carried baskets, passed tools, learned to read the weight of things too heavy for them yet. When one stumbled, a woman corrected her posture without raising her voice. When a boy tripped, an older male laughed and told him to get up faster.
There was no obvious cruelty, just direction and conformity.
I felt my partner shift beside me.
He didn't look at me, didn't need to, we were seeing the same thing.
Hierarchy wasn't enforced here, it was natural. Lived and breathed.
Lower-class wasn't marked by rags or hunger. It was marked by where people stood, who spoke first, who moved aside. Rune-capable women cooked and healed, but they didn't sit in councils. They didn't oversee trade. They didn't issue commands.
Men laboured too—heavy stonework, hauling, reinforcement—but their work faced inward, clan work.
Whereas the warriors sat at tables or trained on the grounds. The value is visible, the treatment different.
Elders were everywhere and nowhere.
They didn't interrupt. They watched. A glance from one could stop an argument before it began. When they spoke, others leaned in—not out of fear, but because missing the words would cost time later.
This clan didn't waste corrections.
One hall opened into a weaving chamber where bark fibres were twisted with hair and sinew. Three women worked there, hands moving steadily. Their conversation was practical. No laughter. No complaints. When a younger girl asked a question, she was answered fully—but briefly. Learning was expected to be absorbed, not coddled.
A male child darted through the room, nearly knocking over a bundle. One woman caught it without looking, tugged him by the collar, and shoved him back into the corridor.
"Train or be useful," she snapped.
He grinned and ran.
No one reprimanded her tone.
We passed a cooking chamber where steam rolled low along the ceiling. Women worked in clusters, some stirring, some measuring, some tracing runes with fingers stained dark from herbs. The runes responded differently to each hand—some flared brighter, some held longer. Ability varied. Respect did not.
Meals were apportioned with precision. No hoarding. No seconds until elders and children were fed.
I watched a woman give up her portion without comment when a young boy scraped his bowl too clean.
No one praised her, it wasn't a sacrifice, it was an expectation.
A man nearby caught my gaze, not hostile. Assessing.
I inclined my head slightly, copying the way Moss-Badger males acknowledged each other.
He nodded once. That was enough.
The deeper we went, the more stratified things became. Upper levels housed civilians. Lower passages—narrower, reinforced—held weapon stores and training spaces. Women did not go there unless summoned. Boys crossed that threshold early. Girls did not.
We saw a group of young males drilling in silence, wooden spears striking stone targets. An elder corrected stance with a sharp tap of his staff. No praise when they succeeded. Only silence when they failed to disappoint.
Strength here was not celebrated. It was assumed.
My partner murmured under his breath, barely audible. "This would break some of ours."
I nodded. It could also stabilise others.
There was no overt cruelty. No shouting matches. No visible rebellion. But pressure lived in the walls, in the way movement was channelled, in who was allowed to idle and who wasn't.
Freedom here wasn't absent. It was rationed.
We paused at a junction where three corridors met. A group of women passed carrying water skins, backs straight, steps even. Behind them came two boys laughing too loudly. An elder's gaze snapped toward them.
The laughter died instantly. No threat.
Just memory. I realised then what unsettled me most. No one here looked lost.
Everyone knew where they belonged.
Back home, we fought to give people choice. Here, choice had been traded for survival generations ago, and the trade had calcified into culture.
I wondered what winter did to dissent.
What happened when someone refused their place.
My partner shifted.
"We're guests," he reminded quietly.
"I know," I said.
But I also knew why we were being shown this. Not as a warning, as context.
When we finally turned back toward our assigned quarters, the flow adjusted around us seamlessly. Civilians parted without resentment. Guards reappeared only when we neared restricted corridors, not to block, but to guide.
As we walked, I caught sight of a young Moss-Badger girl watching the training hall from behind a stone pillar. She held a basket too large for her frame. Her eyes tracked the boys' movements with quiet intensity.
An older woman touched her shoulder. The girl looked away. I didn't know what future awaited her, but I knew this place would not apologise for it.
When the doors to our communal room closed behind us, the sound dampened instantly. Stone swallowed echoes like breath into lungs.
No one spoke for a moment.
Then one exhaled slowly.
"They're not monsters," he said.
"No," I agreed.
"They're worse," another soldier murmured. "They work."
We stood there, armour dusty, minds heavier than when we'd entered.
Because now we understood something vital.
If Deepway wanted to survive near clans like this, we couldn't just be kind.
We had to change.