Daniel marveled at the crude rifle he held in his hands. “Nice.” He said, a foolish looking grin on his face. It looked somewhat like a musket, but with a Winchester-like lever at the grip. The barrel was rifled, and the sights were nowhere near as accurate as he would have hoped, but it would serve. They could make improvements, and it had the potential to help the war effort exponentially.

“Are you sure this is going to work?” Avria asked, her lack of confidence blatantly obvious. “You have never augmented materials before. This could literally blow up in your face.”

Daniel examined the hand-full of ammunition that he had made. “Well… if something happens, then it happens.”

The ammunition was the trickiest part. Like one of Daniel’s first experiences in Pelemont, materials didn’t ignite normally here. It had to be flame with a great deal of spiritual energy infused in it to stay alight or ignite other materials. So they created a crude casing for the rounds, and a metal bullet that was placed as the tip. Within though, he had to get creative. As a Dae-Rah, or fire user. Daniel was able to augment materials to explode with his spiritual energy. The process was tedious and consumed a great deal of his reserves. With Avria’s guidance however, and his substantial supply of spiritual essence, they created augmented pellets of earth that could explode when triggered with a spiritual spark. The mechanisms inside were similar to that of his own rifles. But instead of a firing pin hitting a primer, and igniting gunpowder within. The pin was more of a needle that injected ones spiritual energy into the bullet. Causing the fire infused pellets to explode, shooting the bullet out of the barrel, and at the enemy down range.

“Ready?” Daniel asked, shouldering the weapon.

Avria just folded her arms, and took a tedious step backwards. “Go right ahead.”

“Here goes nothin’.” Daniel squeezed the trigger and heard the audible click of the pin stabbing into the bullet. “Hmmm.” He pondered, and then remembered he needed to infuse it with his energy. With a bit of control, his energy bled into the weapon. This was something he was used to. While training with Oros and Delmos, the Dunamis infused practice weapons he used had a similar mechanic. Suddenly the rifle bucked, and a loud bang broke the tense silence. Flame vomited from the barrel, and the stone target grown from the ground cracked with the impact of a metal bullet.

“Hah!” Daniel yelled in triumph. He cocked the lever, loading another round into the chamber and fired it again. Then again, and again. The stone target was cracked and broken, but had eight holes on its face.

“I’m a little rusty.” Daniel grinned, “But my grouping isn’t too bad.”

Avria’s eyes were wide with surprise, and probably had the largest smile he had ever seen on the stern woman’s face.

“So?” He asked her, handing the weapon over. “Want to give it a try?”

She looked at the weapon, then to him, uncertain.

“Don’t worry, I’ll show you how it works.” He said, loading eight more augmented rounds into the chamber under the barrel and handing it over to her.

She took it and mimicked his stance, aiming the rifle at the stone target.

“Good, now close your left eye and line the rear sight up with the front sight. Her elbows stretched out awkwardly and he could see she was anticipating the recoil.

“Wait.” He said, stepping in and pulling her elbows close to her body. “Lean forward a bit and breathe slowly. If you anticipate the shot, you’ll aim low, might even shoot the ground in front of you. As you inhale, take your aim, then as you release your breath, fire before you inhale again.

Avria breathed in slowly and released through her nose.

“Good, now slowly pull the trigger.” Daniel said.

The rifle cracked with an explosion, but a chunk of one of the trees far to the left of the target indicated her aim was a bit off.

“Wow…” She looked down at the rifle. “That is amazing. It seems so…”

“Mechanical?” Daniel smiled with a nod.

“Yes.” She shouldered the weapon again.

Daniel did his best to coach her through the rest of her loaded rounds, and to his surprise she managed to hit the target a few times.

“Don’t worry, you’ll get the hang of it.” He said, taking it from her.

“A very impressive weapon, Captain.” Avria brushed her cloak, then opened her hand toward the target. A screech of electricity blasted the stone into a cloud of dust, and she looked at him smugly. “However, I think I prefer my own Dunamis. It will be quite effective for the civilians though.” She put her hand on his shoulder. “Good work.”

Daniel raised his eyebrow skeptically, then took in a breath. “Sure, no problem.”

Avria began to walk away, but stopped by Daniel clearing his throat. “Something else?” She asked, turning to face him.

“As a matter of fact.” He took a breath, then put the rifle on a worktable to his left. “We need to go over a few important things here. I know it’s soon, and we are all trying to cope with what happened, but I want to talk to you about Oros, there were some important things that we were working on together… now since, you know. I was hoping we could continue that.” Avria’s jaw tightened at the reference to her dead fiancé.

Her eyes hardened and she opened her mouth to speak, but he held up his hand.

“I know that look.” He shook his head. “You don’t have to get defensive every time we have a discussion that is sensitive, or goes beyond a hi or hello. It is possible for the two of us to become friends, you know? Oros and I were friends… he wasn’t just my teacher here. We talked about a lot of different things. One thing being that he felt like he never really knew you. That was something I could sort of relate to, seeing as how I’m pretty introverted myself. And I wanted to keep it that way.” He pointed his finger at her. “But you went snooping in my head, and saw some very personal things.”

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He waited for Avria to speak, but she didn’t. She only stared at him, her eyes cold.

“You owe me.” He finished.

“I owe you nothing.” Avria hissed. “Captain.”

“Oh that’s how it is?” Daniel folded his arms across his chest. “I dragged your ass out of the fire, literally. After I followed you into certain death. And now I’m just one of your lackeys? Bullshit. I showed you where my loyalties lie, and I think I deserve a bit more than that.”

“What do you expect me to do?” Avria pointed her own finger at him. “I don’t know what you and Oros were working on.” Her voice broke at his name. “But that doesn’t mean much now. He’s dead, and even if he weren’t we don’t have the time to deal with it. Human problems are miniscule in comparison to the big issue here. Our clan is on the verge of collapse!”

“I’m not saying that we should just leave all this and do something else.” Daniel brushed his hands through his hair in frustration. “But dammit, Avria.”

“What?” She asked impatiently.

Daniel sighed and shook his head again. “Never mind.” He picked up the rifle and a box of ammunition. “I’m going to tend to these lazy pieces of shit, so excuse me.” He walked past Avria, and started yelling for the other Dae officers to line up.

~

Avria fumed as she watched the frustrating human walk away. Her eyes darted to the dozens of Dae who had witnessed their little argument.

“Is the human that important to our mission?” Lord Atun said, approaching from the rear. “The Torre’ have again urged that all association with the demons be ceased. Because of the role the Rexunii human played in the destruction of our city.”

Avria turned her fiery gaze to him. “He is not a demon, and the Torre’ are fools. You will do well to know that he fought with me against Alektor himself and did not cower. He also is helping to preserve what remains of our divided clan. You should show some respect.”

“I apologize, my lady.” Atun bowed. “I only thought to bring forth information you might need to better make decisions. We will be hard pressed to defend our land against the Rexunii, and even the possibility that the human is not on our side is something to keep in mind.”

“He is on our side.” Avria turned to walk, then paused as she heard Daniel yelling at one of the Lokkadonian warriors. She turned, intrigued at the vulgarity of his words.

“You useless sack of shit!” He yelled. “All of you! Every single one of you should have been clawing for the chance to prove yourselves to Lokkadonia! Instead you’re all sitting here with your fucking thumbs up your asses, hoping this all blows over! Did you complete the Egeiro!?”

“Yes.” The assembled warriors said, enthusiastically.

Daniel’s hand raised toward the formation, and crimson flame burned around his arm. He held it there, and flames began to drip from his arm like lava. Avria’s eyes widened at the alien Dunamis. What the? She thought, stepping closer to observe.

The warriors all backed up from him, terror etched on their faces.

He continued his tirade, but his words were drowned out by Avria’s study of the strange behavior of his Dunamis. It did not behave like normal flame, but more like liquid.

“Those are the flames of hell.” Atun’s face was etched with fear. “I have never seen anything like that before.”

Avria nodded in agreeance. “Be glad it is on our side.” She said, then turned to leave.

~

The next day Daniel selected a group of five warriors to move swiftly over the terrain and gain intelligence on the location of where the Rexunii were focusing their strength. They returned after four days with news that the raiding parties were capturing or killing hundreds of fleeing Lokkadonians, and all the main roads leading to Vul De Toh were heavily guarded.

While the scouts were away, Daniel had been working non-stop on the firearms he promised, as well as using them to drill with the existing warriors and bolstering their ranks with volunteers. Of the five hundred villagers, almost half accepted the responsibility to their clan and joined. Daniel threw out the tactics he learned from Oros and Delmos, and used the military small unit structure of the US Marine Corps from back home. It was all he knew when fighting this kind of war. He broke the Lokkadonian warriors and villager volunteers into four platoons. Each platoon was made up of three squads, and each squad was made up of three fireteams. Each fireteam was led by a team leader. Each squad, a squad leader, each platoon, a platoon sergeant and a platoon commander. Out of the roughly three hundred bodies he had to work with, he only needed about one hundred and sixty. The rest were used as reserves, and for supportive roles.

After another several days of preparation, Daniel found himself the commanding officer of a full company of Lokkadonian warriors. Granted, they were untrained and undisciplined warriors, three quarters of which were villagers who had never fought before. Regardless, He was optimistic about it. Daniel sat at a large table, going over designs of various improvements to his rifle. Around him were three Dae officers, Captain Merith sat to his right, lieutenant Carrasi beside him, and to Daniel’s left was a lieutenant Rorick beside an empty chair.

The officers sat in silence, watching Daniel examine the designs while sipping a bowl of wine. After several awkward minutes, footsteps could be heard approaching the door to their room. It swung open to reveal the same civilian man who had been so vocal during their first meeting. The group stood to greet him, all but Daniel, who only leaned back and folded his hands.

“Welcome, Jori.” Daniel gestured to the open seat.

“Good day to you.” Jori bowed his head before walking around the table and sitting.

“Well then.” Daniel leaned forward and eyed the officers. “I want you all to welcome Jori as our fourth platoon commander. I know he’s a civilian, but I have extended to him the rank of lieutenant.”

There were grumbles from the other officers, but Daniel continued. “This promotion is temporary, as he has not completed the proistem academy. However it may become permanent if he proves himself a capable leader of warriors. We already know he is a well-respected Dae in Vul Dema, let’s just hope that extends here.”

Merith raised his hand respectfully, and Daniel nodded toward him. “Yes?”

“Sorry, uh… sir. I wanted to ask about the training regiment. You seem to be focused on the importance of familiarity of these new weapons, as well as accuracy. All very important I grant you, but the fundamentals of combat in Pelemont revolve around ones mastery of the Dunamis.” Merith shrugged. “The difference in abilities between our warriors and civilians is vast. We must also take the time to bridge that gap.”

Daniel nodded. “True, but we don’t have time for a full regiment dedicated to the Dunamis, Merith. The enemy could be at our walls at any moment, and we need to focus on how they could be most effective in a fight. One thing I can say though, is that we need a command element of Dae-Voh to train as much as possible. Creating barricades and cover in the midst of battle will be a huge advantage. I want them to train every day for that. How many do we have in the company?” Daniel looked to Jori, who pulled out a scroll and opened it.

“We have twenty two, my Lord.” Jori said

“Sir, is fine.” Daniel looked back to Merith. Defensive Dunamis will be much more effective in this kind of fight. So they will be more geared toward the use of their power. Everyone else though? I want them as accurate as we can get them.”

“Sir?” Lieutenant Rorick said. “What about uniforms? My platoon looks like a group of mercenaries. A minor issue I know, but it is very symbolic to my warriors.”

Daniel sighed. “That really isn’t a priority Rorick.” He thought for a moment. “What if we dyed the cloaks the troops already have? Do we have red?”

Jori shook his head. “No, sir. We don’t have any dye here in Vul Dema, the crimson of the Lokkadonian warriors isn’t found in our areas. There are several plants around however that could be used to Dye the cloaks green.”

“Green?” Carrasi asked. “We can’t shed the crimson of Lokkon.” Rorick and Merith nodded in agreement.

“Green will work.” Daniel interrupted. “As long as it’s dark enough, concealment is paramount for us right now. If we can’t defend the village, then we have to fight in the forest. Camouflage will be helpful for us.”

Jori nodded, and jotted down a note in his scroll.

“Alright then.” Daniel stood. “Let’s go inspect the troops.”