The response team seemed quite annoyed after having run all the way from their post to the wall for nothing all for nothing.

But their relief at being unneeded greatly overshadowed any anger they had.

If they were actually needed after all that would mean that the wall was in serious danger of being breached and that dozens were likely to die.

So after a few shouts and rude gestures, done more in jest than any meaningful amount of hate, they started to jog back to their camp.

While they were returning to their posts the linemen on the wall picked off the last few zombies that were persistently moving forwards.

Bertrand found himself with nothing to do, he couldn't join in on the fighting and there wasn’t really any point in watching the plains given the sheer number of eyes directed there.

Which was a good thing but it did leave him feeling rather bored, so instead of looking over the wall he looked at the wall itself.

It was an ugly thing, originally made up of rough logs from the nearby forests that were stuck into the ground a few inches apart from each other, with dirt and greenery being used to shore up the gaps.

Thinking about it Bertrand figured it would actually have looked rather nice and scenic.

But the attack on the village destroyed parts of it, mostly from the fire though there were signs of brute force having been used to cave in parts of the wall.

The repair work it was given hadn’t made it any prettier. The only real improvement was the walkways, which were made out of scavenged planks and were nailed just below the top of the logs, allowing the linemen to actually be capable of defending the wall.

Presently the wall stood a good few yards tall and if he wanted to scale it Bertrand would need to get a boost, though its height hadn't stopped the adapters in the slightest so maybe it was actually a worthless security measure.

The adapters didn’t even need to breach it, they had just jumped over it, they weren’t content with just ignoring it though.

Massacring the defenders before using some sort of acid to weaken the wood and allow them to tear it apart like paper that way their weaker brethren could enter the town too.

Seer it was terrifying.

They only had to live in fear for a few more days though, just a few more days and they would be reinforced and everything would be okay.

Until then though they had to be on guard.

For the next few hours until day turned to night, Bertrand kept his careful gaze directed towards the plains.

A few more hordes had rushed the wall throughout the day but he had paid them no mind.

His focus was solely on the plains and the zombie corpses.

Last time the hordes had been a distraction for adaptors to sneak forwards, pretending they were dead bodies from the numerous fallen zombies.

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

It would make sense for a similar deception to be occurring again.

The watchers weren’t stupid, they simply couldn't be.

The tales of what they had done were too elaborate for it to be luck or coincidence.

They were intelligent and that was a fact.

Yet despite having human levels of intelligence they were utterly inhumane in the way they thought.

From eating their victims alive to playing cards, to doing nonsensical things like stare at the sun for hours at a time.

And those were just the things he had overheard, if he were to actually start asking around about them there was no doubt in his mind he would learn horrifying facts that put everything else he knew about them to shame.

He wasn’t going to do that though, the reports the task forces that managed to survive had given were more than enough to keep him awake at night.

No need to add more stress on top of the mountain that was already present.

Ignorance was bliss.

Back when knowledge was still withheld from the masses the nobility had used to say that to be ignorant was a blessing granted by the Seer because it meant that your place in life was stable and you knew what had to be done.

It was utter bullshit of course and Bertrand was probably remembering it wrong but he wanted to be blessed.

So for the sake of his psyche, he cast aside the rummers and reports he had heard about the watchers.

Treating them as mere fiction.

It was difficult but pretending that the watchers didn’t exist made him feel unbelievably better about himself and his chances at surviving this campaign.

It was already bad enough that they were getting constantly assailed by zombies without adding in monstrosities like those things.

On that note, Bertrand was feeling spirituality drained by all of the zombie hordes that kept appearing.

Each zombie that charged the walls was an uncomfortable reminder that they had failed in their sacred duty to protect Franica and its people.

Thousands of rotting carcasses from the former humans lie outside of the wooden walls, each one had once been a husband, wife, or bachelor.

There didn’t seem to be any child zombies which Bertrand was very grateful for, he had a hard enough time ignoring the fact that zombies used to be humans without adding kids into the mix.

Perhaps as pay back or maybe because he was just that tired Bertrand wasn’t relieved by his night shift partner until an hour and a half after his shift.

By then all his fellow day shift companions were gone, having been relieved and taking their leave back when the sun set.

So he felt a little anxious and apprehensive about walking back to his tent, but nothing had happened when he had walked here alone in the morning so therefore nothing should happen at night.

But no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t find that spark of courage within himself so as pathetic as it may be Bertrand actually sprinted back to the housing section.

It made him feel like a child but it also made him feel safe.

He stopped once he spotted a patrol, no need to run when there’s a full squad of trained soldiers nearby. In fact running is probably the least smart thing you could do.

They shot him a weird look and asked him to say hello.

But once he replied and they could properly confirm he was human, they let him walk past them.

And after just a few minutes of walking, he was back at his tent.

He had a sheen of sweat covering him thanks to his sprint through the town, but he had arrived.

If anything the run had probably helped him out, he was already mentally exhausted from having to be constantly vigilant throughout the day and now thanks to the run he had gotten a bit of a workout, which helped decrease his physical energy and make him even sleepier.

With a smile on his face, he unbuttoned the tent flaps and strode inside for a well deserved rest.