To see two veterans at work was something that inspired awe in Aren. Of course, he expected such methodology from the cold and calculated Fang, but to even see Nissa take something so seriously, and work the problem with such efficiency, just proved to Aren that she more than deserved her high rank in both the Adventurer’s Guild and the Coalition Army.

Contrary to Aren’s assumption, they did not so much even get close to the main city of Rakab, much less charge in there with weapons ready while the goblinoids were asleep. For most of the day, the group stuck to the outskirts, deploying in two-man groups, save for the stealthy Damien who was on his own, and scouted the locations and entrances to the underground tunnels, where the orcs dwelled.

Every hour, on the hour, the group met up in a ruined church on the outskirts of the new city ruins, reported their findings, and filled in the newly scouted locations on a piece of parchment that had the magical ability to not only copy itself, but also update the original and all the copies.

Nissa laid arcane traps in certain locations and Cassandra did the same. Damien also managed to collapse several tunnels on Fang’s orders, and by the time twilight came it became clear why.

There were some twenty four discovered tunnel entrances, with up to ten still undiscovered. Of those twenty four, eight were collapsed, isolating several backyard alleys and routes and removing them from the equation.

Now, that the moon had risen over the horizon, Aren could remember Fang’s bloodlust-gleaming eyes, and devilish smirk.

“This is where we will kill them all,” Fang said back then, stabbing his finger in the spot on the map that showed the location of the King’s Plaza in Rakab — a wide open space with very little cover and plenty of elevation for enemy archers and mages to get into position.

Back then, Aren did not understand why Fang chose that suicidal spot, but now, Aren could understand. It was diabolical.

The Square had four large streets leading to it, and several smaller ones. All the tunnels close to the smaller streets were collapsed or trapped, leaving only the main street open. Some seven or eight tunnel entrances fed into these four streets, with the others too far away to be of any strategic importance — not initially at least.

The three groups moved independently, converging on the King’s Plaza, with Damien in the vanguard. Corpses of goblins and orcs littered the ground intermittently — scouts and guards put down silently by the assassin. Nissa, without a doubt, had her own ways to silently eliminate anyone who could raise an alarm, and her lack of arcane stealth — which Damien possessed — was more than made up for by her incredible perception. Even in this darkness, Nissa could most likely see clearly, not to speak of her other senses, which she had proven when they avoided the first ambush, virtual days ago.

Aren’s teammate was Cassandra, the White Priestess, and the first clue to this strategy was the leather case of scrolls hanging from the belt of her white dress. Back in the bazaar, Aren had not noticed it when the group restocked, but Fang bought scrolls and stuffed them into a scroll case. Aren, back then, was too distracted with the Appraisers explanation to pay attention to the various deals and haggling happening around him, from the group and others. But, during their final briefing, Fang handed the scroll case to Cassandra. Cassandra glimpsed at the scrolls within, and nodded, instantly understanding what they were for.

Aren only caught a glimpse of the scroll’s title. Light Barrier.

It took him until now to understand — thirty minutes later, and minutes until their operation began in earnest — and the thought of Caesar’s siege of Alesia came to mind, when Caesar ordered his troops to build walls around the besieged city, to keep defenders inside, and reinforcements outside. From there, Caesar’s weaker army could defeat the enemy in detail — one by one.

Aren would have cackled with glee at the intricate detail and clever strategy were it for not the fact that the term defeat in detail came to mind. Aren was predisposed towards academic studies, with a high Index for learning, but he was never interested in military theory before. The term defeat in detail was a word he certainly heard of before, but not one he would’ve used.

Maybe it was a foolish thing, but Aren truly believed these were his last days; whether the end for him came about in the form of execution or mind-destruction was not so much a question of if but when. That is why Aren only had a singular wish: to see Priscilla again. He didn’t know why, and he didn’t really care. Perhaps he pinned all his hopes on her. Perhaps he just wanted to do one thing right before the end. Or perhaps he just wanted to feel good and happy one last time. The reason did not matter.

AGMI were not only a banned technology, but they were entities equivalent to the Gods the ancestors of Humanity believed in. Except, these Gods were living creatures, with a presence in the world. It was natural to fear them, and to love them, and to obey their will.

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The group of two broke into the plaza, and as discussed before, they approached the dry fountain in the center. They were the bait. Cassandra sat down on the edge of the fountain, and expectantly stared down the dark, moonlit western street, awaiting the enemy.

Morale was an incredible thing, and a hidden stat in Singularity. When one felt good about their chances, they would perform better. Some, it was believed, took it to the next level. Some called it Reality Negation, others Luck, but those who were extremely confident could overturn battles that they had no business winning — strikes would find purchase through even the heaviest armor, swords could cut through granite and even deadly, organ-crushing blows would become just welts and bruises. Aurora, the Goddess of War, was often associated with Luck because of this — her blessed warriors believed in their destined victory to the point that a single individual could defeat an entire army, in theory at least.

And although Aren wasn’t one of Aurora’s Chosen — at least, he didn’t think he was — he did feel the effects of high morale. He felt as if no matter how many orcs come, and no matter how many archers and mages took the roofs, their victory was undisputable.

And that was the problem with morale. If it didn’t become the devil’s luck or powerful enough to shape reality to the perception of the observer — whichever philosophy one subscribed to — it was just wishful thinking.

And Aren, in his opinion of certain victory, was dead wrong.

A burning sensation in his brain drew Aren’s attention to the 7-o’clock position in his vision, where an urgent message awaited him.

[Urgent][Group] Nissavi: Fang is dead. I am next. Run.

“Cassandra!” Aren exclaimed, turning towards the white priestess and grabbing her arm — he would apologize later for his rudeness.

The moment Aren shook the white priestess, she became limp, and fell off the edge of the fountain onto her side. Two bolts emerged from her bosom, and two rivers of blood poured down the corners of her mouth. Her expression was frozen in confusion and wonder.

Aren jumped away from the corpse as if it was a vector of plague and, reflexively, his hand fell on the hilt of his new shadowblade, which was sheathed on his back and attached to his belt.

It was silent.

There was a good reason Rakab had not been reclaimed from goblinoids for years. Aren cursed himself for not realizing this sooner, but he should’ve raised the question back when Fang first mentioned clearing out the goblinoids from Rakab. Why had no one done it before? Now, it seemed like an obvious question, and the answer, although not detailed, was just as obvious. Within moments, Aren was alone. His teammates were likely dead. Maybe Damien made it out?

Straining himself to see in the darkness, he could not make out the form of anyone or anything — not Damien nor Cassandra’s slayer.

He got the idea to use his buffer and obtain the bird’s eye perspective of his area, and when he did so, it also revealed nothing. Empty streets and a ruined city with a population of just one — Aren. There was no death line either, and try as he might, Aren could not open a path. It was a spontaneous thing anyway; he couldn’t just will one into existence, could he?

Moving quietly, and close to the ground, Aren snuck over to Cassandra’s corpse and carefully unlatched the scroll case from her belt. He twisted the cover open and withdrew a scroll from within.

Scrolls were special items. The same way that arcane items had sub buffers to store macros, aliases and perform limited calculations, scrolls possessed something similar and far more potent. The size of an item’s buffer depended on material and skill of the enchanter and crafter, and it has long been known that special types of parchment and ink had an extremely high buffer capacity. Scrolls, therefore, could contain entire spell sequences, and with each use, a part of the ink would disappear. Some were one-use, others could have multiple uses, but the most important part was that one did not have to be familiar with the magics, they simply had to open the scroll and, for the lack of a better word, will it.

The scroll Aren got from the case was not the Light Barrier he was expecting, but the Create Light spell. Luckily for Aren, it served the same purpose. He rolled the scroll open and allowed the item’s sequence to activate.

A burst of light erupted over his head, bathing the area in cold light as bright as daylight. In the shadows where previously was nothing, in the doorways and windows of ruined buildings, on the tiled, ruined rooftops and among the broken clutter and garbage littering the sides of once proud buildings, was a swarm of orcs and goblins.

In the brief moment he could see them, Aren noticed they wore black, matte leathers and cloth, wielded crossbows and spears and shields. Almost none of them had close-range weapons, like the short swords and daggers the group collected earlier. This wasn’t a ragged band of scavengers where everyone was for himself; this was a fighting unit — a trained army — with shieldwall tactics and ranged capabilities. They used their night vision to their advantage, and during daylight hid in the underground tunnels. They concealed their hand until the moment it was too late for their victims.

That is why no one took Rakab from them in years.

Perhaps even now, some adventurer in some distant tavern, was telling a story of how they and their group once attempted to take Rakab from those filthy goblinoids, and ended up being slaughtered without any warning, from unseen attackers waiting in ambush. The number of people who possessed intelligence on this particular group’s tactics could probably be counted on the fingers of one’s two hands.

They were brutally effective.

In the distance, Aren heard Damien’s scream. Then the light from the scroll’s magic faded and everything returned to darkness.

In the resulting silence, Aren could only hear Leviathan’s genderless, toneless voice.

< Mission parameters achieved. New objective: Survive, evade, resist, escape. If you want to reach your goal, follow my instructions. >

Aren swallowed. He understood what the Machine Agent meant. He did not give it a second thought and drew his shadowblade.

< Mind-Machine Interface synchronization: 14% >