Three weeks sounded like a long time, but it really wasn’t. There was a lot to learn about how the competition would work. There was also new equipment that everyone had to get used to.
“Each of you will receive a medallion like this,” Hiawatha announced the next morning, holding up a large, densely engraved copper disc. “You are all competent channelers by now, so there should be no problems with their use, no matter how much you come to despise them.”
“These medallions will be your protection during the contest. It is capable of detecting threats, and will automatically generate a mage shield to prevent any serious injuries. Not even the 6th years will be able to get through this shield. The generated shield will be just above your skin - it will prevent injuries, but not damage. Armor will still be pierced, and shields can still be shattered.”
“You will all fight as if you were in a real war. That includes striking to maim or kill. All weapons issued will be real, from spears to arrows. I expect you all to trust in the medallions. They will keep you safe, and they will protect your opponent as well. Every year we get students who are ‘killed’ because they hesitated when they had the opportunity to land a killing blow. DO. NOT. BE. THAT. PERSON! Or I will make you run for days!”
People started looking amongst each other, smirking. No one seemed to have any issues with Hiawatha’s instructions.
“Of course, we also need to be able to eliminate students who are ‘killed’. That is the medallion’s other job. This fun little device will not only block any threat that would have caused you injury, but it will also simulate that injury for you! Get cut on your arm, and your arm will become lame. Get stabbed in your stomach, and you will feel some of the pain. Those that take lethal blows blocked will find themselves completely paralyzed.”
“It will even detect mortal injuries, so treat everything as you would in real life! A bad neck injury may leave you on your feet, but you will likely become more and more weakened over time, until you too are ‘killed’. We will be going over how medical treatment is simulated later, but do not forget, that will sometimes be the only way to keep from becoming a fatality later.”
“I have three very important rules for you to follow when using these medallions. Breaking these rules will have severe consequences!”
“First, look after your medallion! Each of you will sign for your own, and each has its own identifier. The cost of each medallion is far beyond what any of you could possibly afford. It’s only due to the Academy having its own crafting district that we are even able to provide these.”
“Second, do not strike at a ‘dead’ classmate! Once someone is out, they are out! Anyone who thinks it’s funny to attack someone who had been paralyzed will face serious punishment! The shields will color code themselves. Normal strikes are clear, just like a regular mage shield. If the injury would have been severe, or a mortal wound, the shield will flash amber. A killing blow will activate a red shield. Red shields stay active for as long as the student is paralyzed, and will continue to flicker for as long as they remain ‘dead’. So, to be clear, never attack anyone with an active red shield! There is only so much charge, and you risk causing actual injury. It’s happened before!”
“Which leads me to the third rule. Always keep your medallion charged! It’s there to quite literally save your life! These medallions create a closed circuit, whereby any arcana channeled into it will continue to flow in an unbroken loop. Injury causing blows will break that circuit, releasing some of the arcana and causing a shield to be generated over your skin. This uses some arcana each time, and it can run out! Always keep your medallion fully charged!”
“Now, form a line, and come and sign for your own medallion. Once you each have one, and once they are all fully charged, the real fun will begin… You will all get to try and knock out your friends!”
Most of Yaric’s classmates seemed to be almost as excited as Hiawatha, causing a lot of pushing and shoving when forming a line. It took twenty minutes for everyone to be issued with their own medallion, and five full minutes of channeling before they stopped accepting any more arcana.
“Take off your armor. We don’t want unnecessary damage. Your shields will protect you, and you need to get used to this.”
Everyone removed their armor and stood facing their opponents. Sven was nowhere to be seen, but Lauren and Li Na were facing each other. Delmar stood ready in front of Yaric.
“Now… KILL!”
Students exploded into action up and down the field. Every single person jumped into attack, leaving many pairs with both fighters knocked back, their amber shields flashing angrily. A few even dropped like ragdolls, covered in a red shield.
Delmar and Yaric were both using swords and shields. They each managed to block the others’ strike, but neither let up with their own attack.
Delmar twisted his shield too far to his outside in an attempt to block a slash, exposing both his torso and the edge of his shield near his fist. Yaric was quick to capitalize.
Stepping forward, Yaric punched out with his own shield, rim to rim, knocking Delmar’s shield arm out wide and leaving him completely exposed to the upward thrust from the sword he held at waist height.
A sharp pain flared in Yaric’s left leg, just as he drove his sword point home.
Yaric fell as his leg collapsed under him. His leg wouldn’t respond at all, but Delmar was lying still on his back, covered in a shimmering red shield.
Battle Mage Hiawatha ran up and down amongst the students, turning off the medallions and chuckling to himself all the while.
“Good! You are all trusting in your shields right from the start! But maybe a little too much, eh?” Hiawatha laughed. “Don’t forget to treat this like a real fight. Prospect Jarrod tried to impale himself on a sword, so he could cleave Prospect Sarah’s head with his axe. That didn’t work so well, did it? Prospect Lina thought she could take a blow to her head to land a blow of her own. You’re not using your head the way you’re supposed to, are you?”
“Your shields will protect you… but they will also cripple you to simulate real injuries. Who amongst you would allow their own arm to be cut off, just so they could cut off their opponent's head? Does it make any sense to have a limb crippled so you can get your own strike in? And what happens after, when a second opponent replaces the first? Winning is important, but so is winning in one piece!”
“Now, face your opponent again. Good. Begin!”
The rest of the morning was spent testing the limits of their new shields. They also started trying to get into the habit of recharging the medallion whenever they had the chance.
Hiawatha was not happy with the number of injuries that were being prevented, and he soon started refusing to reset the medallions for anything less than death. That quickly started a competition to see who could go the longest without help, and pointless injuries dropped drastically.
A sudden paralysis was not exactly the same as a wound, but Yaric was still forced to compensate whenever he had a bad injury blocked. Weirder still was the impact itself. A solid blow still pushed you back if it struck with enough force, as was made clear when Li Na managed to catch Lauren off guard; Lauren smashed the record for both distance flown and time in the air!
The biggest complication was the resetting of the medallions. Paralysis caused by injuries did not simply go away, and no student had any means for removing the paralysis caused by lethal blows.
“These bandages have been specially inscribed to interact with your medallions. To use them, place them over the area that was injured. It will immediately reduce the paralysis affect by 25%, and the rest will gradually fade over the next 3 days. The area will remain paralyzed if it was a mortal wound, but the timer will stop and you will prevent the shield from changing to red. Mortal wounds will gradually ‘heal’ over 5 days. The first day will have no change, followed by a gradual 25% reduction over each consecutive day.”
“This is obviously nothing like a real injury. You need to learn to prevent injuries as much as possible. Medical training begins in your 7th year, so for now this will suffice.”
“Nothing can be done for those of you who are killed. The paralysis will last for 15 minutes, after which the shield will remain, but the paralysis will end. At this point you will need to make your way out of the exercise area. You will sit outside until the next resupply, at which point you will return as ‘reinforcements’. The waiting areas have basic shelters and simple meals. You will also need to find something to do to keep yourselves occupied. Preferably something that will help you keep from being killed the next time!”
Yaric noted how most people looked around at everyone else, assuming that they would not be amongst the casualties.
“The expedition will start with the forming of groups. Each year will form their own groups - but take note. The 5th and 6th years are the only years where the worst performers will be considered to have failed.”
A lot of concerned questions were thrown around after that statement, some students even panicked. Yaric was surprised to find that he wasn’t all that concerned.
“Each year will have around 50 students held back; students who will be repeating the year with the next class that moves up. For all of you, that means that you will leave for this expedition with additional classmates. 50 6th years will be held back from the current 6th year class. They will now be a part of your class. Permanently.”
“Fifty!” Yaric exclaimed. “That’s a third of our year!” Now he was concerned as well.
“Relax,” Lauren said gently, “it’s only the bottom third. It won’t be you. If you look at it objectively, it isn’t likely to be any of us,” Lauren added, waving her hand at Li Na and Sven. “Well, maybe Lina.”
That earned her a kick to the shin that activated her shield.
“Calm down. Quiet! This happens every year! Your class will get bigger at the start of the expedition, and will stay that way permanently.”
“Sir,” one of the students asked, “won’t the class shrink again next year? When we also lose 50 students?”
“No, it won’t. You are gaining 50 students from last year’s 5th year class. Next year you will lose 50 students, but you will also gain 50 students from the current 6th year class. Sometimes you even lose some of the students that joined the year before. Don’t be one of those!”
“I think I understand what you are getting at though. You will go back down to your current numbers when you move to your 7th year, the students you lose then are not replaced. What I mean when I say that your class will stay the same permanently, is that no students will move back up. If you shift into a different year, that is your new class.”
“I expect you all to welcome your new classmates with open arms. There is no shame in repeating this year. Your 5th and 6th years are very combat orientated. Don’t forget that there are many non-combat paths available to you. Many of you will end up working construction, or crafting. Some of you will be healers, or assist farmers in boosting their crops. It should not be surprising that some of those arcanists will have a lower aptitude for combat.”
“I will stress this though. All arcanists are required to defend the Kingdom. No matter what goals you have in life, do not underestimate the importance of being able to defend yourself. I expect all of you to live very long lives. Long enough that you can be sure that war will find you. If you cannot fight, then that is exactly how long your lives will be.”
“Instructor, how do you keep learning magic if you’re held back?”
“You don’t need to worry about that. You will still be with your current class for the 1st half of the year. It’s only in the next year that you will repeat your classes. Which just means that you would end up being very good, wouldn’t you?”
“I will answer questions later,” Hiawatha said, waving away the continuing inquiries from the worried 5th years. “We are discussing your next expedition. To start, you will be joined by 50 new classmates. Then, you will pick 4 captains, and each will select teammates. You may request that your teachers pick the captains if you wish.”
“You will then receive a map. Your maps will only show parts of your exercise area, but all borders will be displayed. Beware! Your medallions will also signal if you cross the border. If not already dead, you will immediately be considered so.”
“The map will also show the location of your base camp. Only YOUR base camp. You are required to find the other camps yourselves. There will also be supply points indicated. Those are for your own logistics and resupply during the exercise.”
“Almost any reasonable items can be supplied, but each will be assigned a weight. You can only receive so much in resources with each supply drop. It’s up to each team to decide on exactly what they want to have brought with each drop.”
“Students who have been killed will come back to their teams with the supply drops. They will be considered as reinforcements to replace themselves. In case you haven’t realized it yet, this means that any deaths will reduce your team’s strength until the next supply drop.”
“Supplies are dropped off every 3 days for the first 3 weeks, after which there will only be one per week. How you manage that is part of the test. Once your teams are chosen, you also get one hour to decide what supplies you will take with you. But you will have to carry everything yourselves.
“Now, any questions?”
There were a lot of questions. More questions were asked over the three weeks leading up to the expedition as well. Everyone was worried about dropping out of their year, and no one even knew how to properly prepare.
Lauren shook things up a little when she asked Hiawatha what he thought they should be asking about. He gave her an approving smile before going on to describe the biggest problems most students faced.
Getting set up quickly was a big deal. Some teams might choose to rush an early assault and grab another team’s flag before they were ready.
Reconnaissance was important as well. You had to find the other teams in order to assault them. It was important to not just locate them, but mark them on the map. Otherwise, it would only be scouts or reconnaissance teams that would know the proper locations. And the same went for important terrain features. No one wanted to move into a dead end or get stuck in an undefensible gully.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
Tensions were high when the day came; there were so many unknowns. No one even knew what teams they would be in.
The 5th years gathered themselves together early in the morning, meeting in the entrance square as instructed. The 6th years were there as well, and standing awkwardly in between the classes were a few dozen students who didn’t seem to know what to do.
“Gather around! Come closer! You all chose to have your captains decided for you, so here they are. Prospect Sven McDavids! Prospect Lauren Silver! Prospect Cormac Vantchev! Prospect Christopher Reynolds! These four will select the teams from amongst the 5th years.”
“Before we do so, you have some new students in your year. They will come and introduce themselves one by one, and give you some information on their individual abilities.”
Yaric’s stomach sank when he heard both Sven and Lauren called out as team captains. There was no way they would be able to stay on the same team now.
Each of the 6th years who would be joining them came forward. Well, 5th years, they weren’t moving up with their last 5th year class.
Once they were done, Sven, Lauren, Cormac and Chris stepped forward to start selecting their teams. It was all decided by rank, as usual, so Sven went first.
“Yaric Miller!”
Yaric was surprised that Sven had chosen him first. There were several others that were better fighters, but he still stepped forward and took his place with a big smile. Less than 2 years ago he had been the most useless person in the Academy. Now he was the very first pick!
Li Na immediately started walking forward when it came to Lauren, but she was forced to stop when Lauren made a show of looking around and pretending to think, before smirking. “Li Na Jakobson!”
She had looked shocked at first, and then worried. Li Na glared at Lauren when she finally called her name.
Each team added another half a dozen members, and then Sven switched to calling names from their new classmates. He chose 6 of them before the other captains started looking concerned, eventually picking a few themselves.
No one knew what Sven was up to.
Soon, all the teams had been selected, and each group was led to the side to begin making plans.
“Those who are dropped are usually picked last, so thank you, but we don’t need your pity. We’re still a year ahead of all of you,” Anton, one of the new students, said immediately. He didn’t look angry, but he did seem to be feeling put out.
“Ha!” Sven laughed, “who said anything about pity? Like you said, you have a year on us. I just picked the strongest team! Besides, that’s not even why I picked any of you.”
Sven continued when Anton just raised an eyebrow. “None of us have ever done this before. We have no idea what we’re doing. You guys are doing this for the second time, I want to use your experience to plan better. We are going to go for first place!"
Anton was smiling now, as were the other students who had been held back.
“We will help how we can. Just don’t expect miracles with your first attempt. There are 4 entire teams that are doing this for the 2nd time as well. Many of them have teammates who are going for their third, and I heard that there are at least 2 who are doing their fourth expedition.”
Sven nodded his head in acknowledgement. “I get that, thank you.”
Then Sven turned to face the entire group. “I didn’t just pick people who I thought were the best fighters. If you look at who your teammates are, you should notice that I picked a lot of people who had special roles in our expedition to clear out the kobolds. I got as many of the people who acted as mobile fighters with me as I could. And I got 3 of the 9 scouts as well,” Sven said, nodding toward Yaric, Delmar and Chelsea.
“It’s the same with each of you,” Sven added, looking at his team members from the new students. “I also tried to get anyone who had special skills and abilities from your side. But now we need to figure out what we need to take with us. I don’t even know what we can carry.”
Here the new students practically took over, going through all the mistakes they had made last time. Of particular importance were tools for constructing defenses. None of them had enough to go around the last time; their preparations had been limited by how quickly they could cut down and prepare trees, and how quickly they could dig ditches.
Food was surprisingly less important. They’d ended up with too much the last time. It was only 3 days until the next supply drop, but they depended on their defenses for survival.
Weapons had also been an issue. Everyone took exactly what they had needed. That meant that damaged shields could not be replaced and broken spears left teammates defenseless. The equipment problem had quickly started to snowball when the fiercest clashes started taking place.
Sven’s team ended up leaning very heavily into taking the tools needed for fortifying a camp. Every single one of them would take both an axe and a small hatchet. They would also have digging tools and rope.
A few spare weapons were chosen, but Sven refused to take too many. Anton himself had acknowledged that there weren’t too many problems in the beginning, so Sven chose to prioritize reinforcing their camp first.
Yaric still took a bow, prompting Sven to add 2 dozen quivers.
Every single person had a spear, whether they usually fought with one or not, and they all had shields as well. Sven also made it mandatory for everyone to carry a second weapon, which for most people was a sword. Amazingly, there was still some space left over once five days of food had been added, prompting Sven to make the controversial decision to add some preprepared stakes to their packs.
He clearly planned to get a head start on their defenses.
The students all marched out in their own teams, and instinctively kept a gap between each group. None of the groups mixed or even spoke to each other.
Summer was in full swing by now. The next day would in fact be the dead center of summer, as it would be the longest day of the year. It was already getting hot, the roads were heating up with the midmorning sun beating down overhead. Carrying heavy packs loaded with supplies didn’t make it any easier.
Thankfully, there were many stops along the way. Everyone got frequent chances to rest as they made their way out of Lekton and into the surrounding countryside.
This time the journey took them north. They travelled along the river, heading upstream, before turning away and moving towards the protected Red Forest. It was a long journey, but they made good time, arriving at a proper camp beside the road with 3 hours of daylight still left. The edge of the forest was only a mile away.
This camp was very different to what Yaric and his classmates were used to. The accommodations were all log cabins, and no one was required to do any work or maintenance. Firewood was collected by the staff that maintained the camp, and all the food was supplied and prepared for them as well. Their whole team spent the entire evening eating and sitting in front of roaring bonfires.
“We need to come up with a team name,” Sven eventually told them. “We’re supposed to have a name that the instructors can refer to us as.”
“Anything but the Eagles,” Anton said. "That was our name last year. I don’t want any reminders.”
“No problem. Let’s try to look at suggestions first, and we can veto anything later.”
Suggestions came thick and fast.
“The Bears!”
“How about the Wolverines?”
“Why does it have to an animal? I vote for a weapon, like the Spears!”
Sven made sure to get every single teammate involved in the process, going so far as to solicit opinions from people who were keeping quiet. Soon everyone was invested, and it took almost half an hour to get a name that everyone was happy with.
“So, everyone is happy with The Flagbearers? It might be a bit too on the nose, but it will send a message in a game of capture the flag.”
Everyone was in agreement, so Sven left to go and pass on their new name. The rest of the team just enjoyed themselves. There were enough new faces that people needed to get to know each other as well, but they all got on extremely well. Frequent trips to get more food and drinks, along with large piles of firewood made for a big party.
The noise from the rest of the camp made it obvious that everyone else was doing the same.
Team Flagbearers was up early, ready to go. They had their map ready, and since their camp was located in the opposite side of the exercise area, they would be one of the first to leave. An instructor would lead them most of the way, deliberately taking a route that wouldn’t let them see any major points of interest.
It wouldn’t be fair if they got to see other base camps on the way to their own site.
The instructor led them through the forest until eventually they came across a marked trail.
“This is where I leave you all… The trail you are standing on is the trail that your resupply team will use to bring you your provisions. They are all participants of the contest from the moment they cross the boundary lines, but they will not help you in any way. Outside of bringing your supplies, that is. They will all be equiped with the same medallions that each of you are wearing. There’s no need to worry about attacking a non-participant, as I just mentioned, they are part of the contest as well. Goodluck!”
The instructor left them there in the middle of the trail, quickly disappearing back into the trees.
“Yaric, Delmar and Chelsea!” Sven called. “Quickly see what you can find around us. I don’t want anyone to go further than 5 minutes away though, so stay close. I’m sure this trail will go in the right direction, but I want to find out where we are before we start moving.”
Yaric moved as quickly as he could, trying to cover as much ground as possible. Trees, trees, and more trees. Chelsea had more luck, as she had found a large open area nearly devoid of trees. Delmar had found a river though, and he was able to identify a large s-bend that was shown on their map.
Team Flagbearer heading straight for their base camp the moment they had figured out their location. Sven had been right, the trail did move in roughly the right direction, but turning off to the side and cutting across the open area Chelsea had found shaved a couple of miles off the trip.
The column marched out of the trees and into an area with much thicker brush. The ground sloped up ahead of them, forming a hill that crested just 50 yards up. The sides were curved, causing the hill to bow away from them. According to their map, the base camp should be just on the other side.
Sven lead them up the hill, eager to see the area they had to defend. People started pushing faster and faster while climbing the hill, with the excited students eventually running despite the heavy packs they were carrying. Everyone spread out as they crested the hill, looking down at where their base camp was marked.
It was a large depression, like a crater, surrounded on all sides by the hill they were standing on. The opposite ends of the hill were 60 – 70 yards apart, depending on where you were standing, with the shallow depression 20 yards below them.
Right in the middle of the depression was a square building made of stone. It had a large entrance with no door, but the windows were all narrow arrow slits. A second row of slits in the stone indicated that it had two stories. There was also a clearly visible opening onto the flat roof, which itself was surrounded by low crenellations.
Their base was well hidden, it would be difficult to find.
It was also surrounded by higher ground. At an average of 65 yards across, they would have to defend approximately 200 yards at the crest of the hill. With 50 teammates. And the hill was circular, so the base was much longer than the summit, allowing attackers to spread out better during the approach, and easily concentrate as they made contact. Losing the surrounding hill would give away the high ground and also make it almost impossible to break out.
In short, it was shit.
Yaric’s face fell as he looked around. Their base was terrible, and they could be under attack very soon. Sven didn’t look much happier.
“And I thought our last base was bad,” Gerrick sighed. He was one of the new students, and everyone knew that his team had spent much of the time with less than half their strength. Things weren’t looking good.
They made their way down to the building below, far more subdued than they had been on the way up.
The building was basic. There were small rooms along the ground floor, with much bigger rooms at the far end. A single flight of stairs led to the next floor. Very wide and impossible to defend.
The next floor was almost exactly the same, with the only change being due to the smaller rooms starting at the top of the stairs before shifting to larger rooms at the far end, reversing the layout below. Each of these rooms also had bunks. A short flight of stairs led to a trap door that opened onto the roof.
Sitting in the largest room was a small podium with a large flag. The flag was scarlet and decorated with seven small flags in emerald green and sky blue, being held aloft by armored men in gold stitching.
Along the bottom, writen in large and elaborate letters, lay a single word... Flagbearers.
Sven led them all back outside. Once everyone was gathered, he called everyone to order.
“Alright, we don’t have the best camp. This isn’t what I had imagined. But it’s what we have to deal with, so let’s get on with it. I want an immediate plan of action, something that we can start with right away. I’m talking about identifying and addressing our biggest priorities. We don’t have much time, so right now any plan is better than no plan. We can discuss and work on a more complete plan while we work. Does anyone have any suggestions?”
“We need to get fortification along the top of the hill. We’re done for if anyone pushes us down here,” Trevor suggested.
“We’ll be broadcasting our location if we build defenses along the top,” someone else countered. “Anyone who passes this hill will be able to see where we are.”
“No,” Sven countered, “We can’t afford to risk the hill. We need to get the top fortified as heavily as possible, I want to be sure we can withstand any attack. There’s a lot of area to cover.”
“It’s more than just the length, the shape of the hill makes it difficult to move reinforcements around. We will either need to move all the way around the top, or run down the inside and back up the other side. It won’t be easy to respond to an attack,” Yaric pointed out.
“OK, here’s how we are going to start. I want the 3 scouts to pick 10 people each. You will be fetching the wood we need to build our palisades. The rest of you will be helping me move the bunks downstairs. I want our supplies on the top floor, and our troops near the door. We will work on digging trenches and building a rampart once we’re done.”
“While we work, I want everyone to start thinking about how we can improve our ability to see people coming. Cutting down trees, clearing bushes, building watchtowers. Whatever we can do to give us an early warning. I would rather have lookouts keep watch while the defenders wait down here. We can respond much more quickly if we only ever have to go up one side.”
Everyone got to work. It was midafternoon before there were barricades all the way around the top. The stakes they had brought with them barely made a dent. Worse, the ramparts weren’t even halfway done, and small groups were already being sent out to refill everyone’s canteens.
A late lunch was not enough to cheer them up. They got straight back to work, trying to get a reasonable defensive position before any potential assault force found them. Anton was of the opinion that an early strike was popular with 6th years. He also pointed out that the 8 teams had base camps that alternated by year, meaning that the 2 nearest camps would be held by 6th year students.
The work continued until it got too dark to see. Sven had forbidden any fires, so they were eventually forced to stop just as stars started showing themselves in the dark dome above them.
Guard shifts were created with 10 people to a shift, each of which would stay on guard for 2 hours before rotating. It was a miserable night.
Things did get better in the morning, however, when Delmar figured out how they could dig holes just behind the crest of the hill to sink tree trunks in firmly. That would give them the foundations they needed to put up guard towers.
Several students also figured out ways to layer the barricades, and Chelsea thought of levelling a large area just in front of the crest. Her idea would create an almost vertical wall just below the crest of the hill. They were all more than capable of augmenting themselves enough to jump up, but barricades across the top could make life very uncomfortable for anyone who tried.
The second and third days were spent getting these projects started. Chelsea’s idea would take especially long to complete, but everyone agreed that it needed to be done. More barricades were also put together in preparation for when it was completed.
The resupply arrived on the third day. Everything was carried down to the base camp and stored away, while Sven spoke with the people who had delivered their supplies. He had to give them the list of items he wanted for the next delivery.
It was only on the morning of the fourth day that Yaric had an inspiration. He was helping to dig a trench at the time. Part of their plans included shallow trenches lined with stakes, to be dug behind some palisades. They would be exceptionally difficult to dismantle and would make it almost impossible to jump over the palisades in front of them. He was toying with the idea of covering the trench, to make a hidden pitfall. It didn’t take long to realize that the deterrence factor was a big part of why they were digging the trench in the first place, but who said that it had to be a part of the defenses?
“Sven! I have an idea!” Yaric called, running over to where Sven was helping to finish the watchtowers.
“What is it?” he panted, wiping away the sweat on his head while he caught his breath.
“I want to dig a trench up the inside of the hill, and most of the way down the other side.”
“What?! That will make it easier to bypass our defenses!”
“Not if no one know it’s there.”
“What do you mean?”
“I want to clear an area 3 yards wide, but just a few inches deep. So we can keep the grass intact. After that we dig it a bit deeper, not far, and then we dig a proper trench 1 yard wide right in the middle of the shallow one. We can use 3ft logs to cover the top of the trench, and the logs will still be below ground level because they will be in the wider trench. Then we fill in the top and cover it with the grass we took out. No one will know it’s there.”
“But that’s not a trench then, it’s a tunnel...” Sven paused, his eyes growing wide.
“Exactly!” said Yaric, grinning. “It’s a way out of here if we’re ever under siege!”
“But that will be a crazy amount of work. We might not be able to do it. And if we don't do it properly and the tunnel is found...”
“The only parts that are a lot of work will be getting the logs. We have to cut a lot of short pieces. And digging the trench at the top. We will have to go much deeper there, to go under the part we are levelling. And it should be really easy to block a tunnel if it's somehow discovered. It only works because no one will know it's there, otherwise the other side is easily defended.”
“What if we dig your tunnel all the way to the front of our base camp? We can leave the opening in front of the door. It’s impossible to put a door in the stone building, so I’m already thinking about building a small fence there. We can extend the fence to cover that whole side, and put a cover over the top. No one would be able to see the entrance!”
“So should we go ahead?”
“Definitely! The defenses are mostly done, this will be our escape plan. And I’ve been itching to move on to a proper attack plan. We can’t sit here all day, we need to get flags. If we can…” Sven stopped abruptly, looking over Yaric’s shoulder. Delmar was running along the crest of the hill, waving his arms and shouting. The students behind him were all scrambling.
“Incoming! There’s a full team in the trees! We’re about to be attacked!”