“You want this piece here, right?” asked Alissa as she casually supported a chunk of stone wider than she was tall on one shoulder in a relaxed way. The piece of stone must have weighed nearly a thousand pounds or so, yet she carried it casually as if it was light. And that was after climbing the ladder to the parapet of the wall with said stone on her shoulder, at that.

“Yes, please, Lady [Hero],” replied an old [Grand Master Sculptor] politely at her inquiry. The man was part of the engineer team that worked on building the wall, which already neared its completion merely a week after their arrival. “A little bit to the left… just a tiny bit backwards… perfect, right there, thank you,” said the old man as he directed Alissa on where to place the slab of stone.

As soon as Alissa laid the slab down, an old woman, whose class showed [Beloved of the Land], stepped in and gently touched the slab with her hands. Before Alissa’s eyes, the massive slab of stone fused with the stone of the battlement beneath it, becoming one whole with no separation between the two.

Then the old [Grand Master Sculptor] went to work and the blank, featureless slate of stone turned into square-shaped crenellations with arrow slits that were wider on the inner side but narrowed down towards the outer side. His skills allowed the old man to shape the stone as if it was putty in his hands, and he moved with practiced grace born from a lifetime of experience.

It was the preponderance of such classes amongst the engineers who came along with the reinforcements that made completing the wall within such a short timespan possible. The engineers stationed at Fort Ixlay were mostly younger ones, second and third tiers looking for more experience. The ones sent as reinforcements however are the veterans and masters, many of which were fourth tiers.

Needless to say, people with classes that even remotely relate to construction work at that tier were capable of doing things that more than made up for the lack of modern conveniences like heavy machinery.

Those like the old woman, typically some sort of class related to the earth and capable of manipulating them, directly removed large stones from the mountainsides to be transported for use in the fort’s construction. Then once the stones were in place, they would fuse it with the structure already built, which resulted in a fort wall that was effectively one massive, continuous piece of stone, without any breaks in it.

That naturally did wonders for the wall’s durability.

On the other hand, those with classes like the sculptor used their various skills to shape the stones as needed, and Alissa noticed that they had apparently learned some tricks from her world, likely brought over by some previous summoned [Hero] and passed down the generations. Other than the fort’s wall being one solid, continuous piece, there were other tricks that made it even more durable.

For example, the fort’s wall was actually thicker than the area where the walkways and parapets were situated by nearly a foot and a half or so. That thicker area jutted out and was actually formed by a thin layer of solid stone that was backed by struts that supported it and connected it to the main wall, though the topside was completely covered so it was unnoticeable once finished.

In the gap between the thin layer and the main wall, they packed fine sand. The sand was packed so well that there was no room for much shifting within the gap itself, but Alissa saw the intention behind the practice. Alissa had seen how the engineers built what were basically self-contained sections out of the outer layer and the support struts and packed each one full of sand.

The wall was built that way so that when a projectile struck that outer layer, its force would be dissipated by first the stone layer and then the sand behind it. Even if they failed to completely dampen the blow, it would result in a much weaker blow against the actual main wall, which was far more solid and durable. The way the sand was contained in individual sections also meant that a blow would only break the mechanism in a very limited section of the wall.

It was like having a thin sheet of metal on top of a sandbag on top of your actual armor.

She was not so arrogant as to believe that the locals wouldn’t be able to come up with the idea themselves, but the specific way they set it up resembled reactive tank armor she had seen in the news before far too much to be a coincidence. Given the way the timeflow between Ephemera and earth seemed to be completely unrelated, it was not impossible for someone from Alissa’s era to have been summoned over hundreds of years ago in Ephemera.

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Sure enough, when she asked one of the engineers during a rest period the man confirmed that it was a technique they learned from a champion that was summoned many generations ago. Originally the technique they learned was crude compared to how it was in the present day, but over the years they had made improvements upon the idea using the skills that some people happen to get.

For example, fusing the stones of the fortification into a single, homogeneous slab made it far more durable, but was something that could only be done with the help of multiple people who had classes that allowed them to manipulate the rocks that way. It was not until a few generations ago that the Kingdom started to purposely groom such people amongst their engineers.

Similarly, the sand that was packed in the gap used to be small pebbles and coarse sand. Over the generations, the locals discovered that using finer sand would improve the effect by quite a bit, so they created ways to make the fine sand needed on the spot. The engineers mostly ground down the bits of stone that formed the excess from the pieces used to build the fort until they reached the consistency of a very fine powder.

Given that it was still only a couple hours past noon, around the time when Alissa’s shift at the wall had just ended a short while ago, the fact that the wall was in the finishing touches meant that it would definitely be finished within the day. Alissa saw Nadine and Maribel team up to carry an even larger and longer piece of stone to be used for the crenellations above the gate. The large slab they carried was too unwieldy for just one person to carry up the stairs.

It was shortly after they placed the slab of stone and while the engineers were working on it that she noticed Glenn walking towards them. He was in the shift before theirs, so she knew it wasn’t his turn to be at the wall, which made her wonder what brought him to them.

“Beg yer pardon for the disturbance, Miladies, yer Highness,” said Glenn, who pretty much referred to everyone in the group as ‘Milord’ or ‘Milady’, probably due to his peasant upbringing. “Sir Marsten bid me to ask for your presence in the command tent, said that he had important news to share.”

“Important news?” asked Nadine from where she sat against the wall to rest for a bit. The Fifth Princess had classes which were not as good as Alissa’s in terms of quality, so her stats were somewhat lower in comparison. “Guess we should head over? I don’t think Old Marsten would call us if it’s not something really important.”

“Guess so, let’s go then,” replied Alissa as she got up and followed Glenn down the stairs.

Since the keep, citadel, and housing weren’t built yet, and there was no cabin of a suitable size out of the ones left behind by the demons, Sir Marsten used a large tent as his command post. The tent was large enough to accommodate Alissa’s whole party as well as another couple dozen people, even if that would mean standing room only and pretty cramped quarters.

“You called, Sir?” asked Alissa once they reached the tent. She noticed that quite a few others were already waiting inside. Joshua and Ethan as well as the rest of the party were present, as were around ten of the other fourth tiers, as well as Sir Inolet and Magus Drummond. The lineup of people present in the tent pretty much meant that it was most likely a serious issue indeed that awaited them.

“Yes, good, now you’re all here,” said Sir Marsten with a nod, his attention riveted to the opened map of the region set before him. Alissa keenly noticed the presence of several tokens that signified the demon army positioned around a few days' march to the east of their current position around where Sir Marsten was looking. “The news that just arrived ain’t good news, I’m afraid.”

“People from Fort Savinal further east had noticed movement behind the enemy lines and sent some of their scouts to ascertain the nature of that movement. What they found out was that a detachment of demons numbering at least twenty thousand are marching west,” continued the old knight. “As you all might have inferred by now, their target is most likely us.”

“They’d be eager to avenge their loss, I’m certain,” noted one of the younger fourth tiers in the tent. “The demons had been dominating the previous three wars, so a loss this early in the war would be like an insult to their pride.”

“That is one reason, another is that we’ve also beaten up one of their [Champions], which most people consider a good omen for our side, including the demons,” added Sir Inolet. “They would want to return the favor to overturn the omen, some just out of superstition, but also to improve morale. They might not know whether the [Heroes] were still here or not, but they were last spotted here so chances are good that their [Champion] might be on their way back for another match.”

“What’s more, the scouts couldn’t confirm it, but we have suspicion that another of the [Champions] are part of this army marching our way,” supplied Sir Marsten as he pointed towards the tokens that represented the marching demons. “The brute had not been spotted for the past few days, which was inconsistent with his usual behavior so far, so it’s probably him that’s on the way here. Meanwhile the Necromancer had yet to be seen again after the fight here, so we might expect her return as well.”

“Ladies and gentlemen, the demons are coming back, and they are expected to reach us within a week at the latest. I want everyone on alert from now on. Protection of the engineers is to be tripled. We will want them to finish their job as soon as possible so we can send them back to safety within the kingdom, is that understood?” asked the old knight to the gathered people. “I want two fourth tiers with every group of engineers that leaves this base as an added security detail. We can’t rule out that the demons might strike preemptively before their [Champions] arrive.”

A chorus of agreements and “yes, Sir!”s answered the old knight as the group dispersed shortly afterwards. As she left the tent, Alissa couldn’t help but feel slightly worried and nervous that the peaceful days were ending so quickly and abruptly. She knew that being part of a war would be difficult, but it was not until she was truly involved that she fathomed the entirety of it.

As she followed behind Nadine and Maribel, she thought about the situation, and the uncertainty she still felt about the Kingdom’s motives with the summoning. The suspicion she had with the temple and the Gods. In the end, however, she realized that at the moment she was in no position to worry about such matters and that it was better to focus on the task at hand.

So she prepared herself to do whatever would be needed to survive the coming ordeal.