The horde was bustling with activity, their last journey before arriving in the city just about to begin. Everything was being loaded on the carts, rickshaws and wheelbarrows or bundled into packages to carry manually.

“Mama!”

This departure was more significant for one of them as he was about nine months old. Other children close to his age had started talking rather than just babbling, allowing him to do the same. Nobody noticed if he could use a few more words than the others. It was much less startling than if he had started talking while other toddlers his age struggled to say anything intelligible.

At the moment, Nate was sitting atop a pile of skin, leather and fabrics used either for their bedding or as spare clothes. They had been tied up and only waited to be carted away. His mother had put him there while she was carrying other items, while his father was pulling their carts with the ones belonging to the rest of their family.

“Just a second, Nate. You know I’m busy, dear!”

The child in question was in a bind. With all the activity around, he was often disturbed or moved and couldn’t focus on anything. So it seemed an excellent way to occupy himself and try to untie the knot from the package he was sitting on, so he could remake a better knot. Right? Except that, after struggling to undo it, he didn’t have enough strength to redo the knot. So right now, he was sitting on the ropes, struggling to hold both ends and hoping his low weight would be enough until someone could fix his mess.

Talking and walking were good things to happen, which Nate welcomed wholeheartedly. On the other hand, the hyperactivity of being a child wasn’t as much appreciated. This event was just one of them. Ever since he was born, he had been doing his utmost to move as much as possible to promote his body growth. But also to fall asleep quickly, as it was much easier to focus mentally when his body wasn’t awake. Because of that, Nate had a tendency for mischief, taking every occasion he had to explore his surrounding and poke at things and stuff.

It wasn’t his intention to cause trouble. He only wanted to exhaust himself in a useful or at least entertaining way. Sure, he could just keep crawling or walking in a circle, but it would be so—o frustrating. Not to talk about being weird. As such, an incident like this one regularly happened. It was also embarrassing for the reincarnated man. Still, the benefits outweighed the inconveniences. If counting his time spent before his birth, it had been seventeen months since Nate arrived in this world. Eight months were spent in his mother’s womb, as his soul only attached itself to his body after a month. Then nine months as a baby. It was more than a year and a half during which he was trapped in his own body. Until a couple of weeks ago, his only means to express himself freely and escape his limited circumstances was when he was dream-walking. Even now that he could walk and talk, it was in a very restricted way, far from enough to satisfy the adult mind that had Nate.

“What does my favourite nephew need? Tell Aunty Eme, okay?” asked a young woman from Nate’s side, carrying an empty basket.

The aunty in question was his father’s sister. She was a brunette girl about fourteen years old, although compared to someone from Nate’s old world, she could pass for an eighteen years old girl. She was dressed as most women were, with a skirt made out of strips of leather and a top weaved from leaves and ropes. Her arms, neck and ankles were decorated with jewellery: sculpted pieces of ossicles, wood and stones threaded through a string and coloured with pigments.

With names needing to be changed to prevent too many people from a different clan from having the same moniker and families forming with their name, it became much easier to identify who was who. In this case, Aunty Eme’s full name was Emerlia Scott ò Starstrong, for she was the daughter of Emer from the Scott family of the Starstrong Clan.

Most of the warriors in the family were scouts, so the family’s name was deemed appropriate. As for the clan’s name, it came from the name of the two most influential families. Armstrong, the one the chieftain belonged to, whose meaning was evident, and Alistair, meaning Allies of Stars, for being defenders and also the largest family.

Emerlia was the eldest daughter of the family. The two eldest sons, having left their parents upon their adulthood, could choose their names even if both decided to keep the one they had. Whistler for Nate’s father and Pierce for the other son. Both were a lot alike, stubborn as a broark and not wanting to change names when they would already have that of the family and clan to identify themselves.

Thus, the last brother was called Emerson, for he was the eldest son who still lived with his parents. Finally, there was Heatherly and Lianna Scott, the youngest daughters of the family. Heatherly was the daughter of Heather, which was the name of Nate’s grandmother, Emer’s partner. And Lianna was the youngest female child, who spent most of her time weaving things together.

As for Nate’s mother, her name changed from Dew to Diane. In her case, it was more of a want to start a new part of her life. A new dawn. As her own person, as a mother. Her siblings and other relatives had joined the Alistair family. Only her brother, Flint, had joined her in the Scott family since his partner was one of Whistler’s cousins, a blonde girl called Bianca.

Obviously, there would still be many names similar to others. Still, making more efforts to think of a name rather than just using an existing word would help reduce the recurrence. As for a clan having the same name as another, they were told such matters would be dealt with later. Nate was willing to bet it would come to “Might is right”. It wouldn’t be surprising if the families went through the same upheaval.

“Help? The knot is coming loose.” Nate tried not to look guilty as he answered his aunt, but it was a wasted effort from her reaction. He had tried to lower his age but was brighter than the other kids. Any mishap around him had more chance to be something he did than a coincidence.

“Right, and you don’t have anything to do with this, do you?” Emerlia was rolling her eyes, her lips lifting in an amused, if exasperated, smile.

“Maybe?”

“You really should stop poking everything around you, you know?”

Who could blame him for wanting to help? It wasn’t his fault if he kept overestimating what this body could do.

“I try! I wanna move, but Mama said not to.”

No matter how embarrassing it might get in his too-young body, having a family and a loving mother made it easy for Nate to get attached. That, plus his sense of guilt due to the mental manipulation he exerted on his mother, compelled him always to try to do as Diane said. If it meant slightly delaying his spiritual training and progress towards Qi manipulation, then so be it.

“Thanks for the help Emerlia. We should be ready to leave soon, I believe. In any case, I’m not allowed to help any more.” interrupted Diane’s voice a couple of minutes later as Emerlia struggled to redo the knot. Having one of her arms busy holding Nate wasn’t helping her. It thus became a lot easier when Nate was moved into his mother’s arms.

“What did you do this time, love?” She wasn’t surprised in the least. With Nate always moving as much as possible when awake unless dire circumstances prevented it, Diane became used to his hyperactivity. At least he never hurt himself, so she never got overly worried about his shenanigans.

“Knot was ugly…”

“He thought it would be a good idea to […]” Both Nate and Emerlia had spoken simultaneously, the young woman pausing as she heard her nephew’s answer.

“[…] so yeah, he untied the ropes, then couldn’t make a better, I mean, a prettier knot.”

“Of course you did. Did you spend too much time with Lianna lately?”

Lianna was his youngest aunt on his father’s side. She was still a child, not even eleven years old, who liked weaving things together. Most of her time was spent stuck to her mother and other women of the family -or the tribe when families and clans weren’t even a thing- and helping them with their work when it was about making clothes, ropes, or something similar.

Anytime spent on something else was considered wasted time. She had perfect eyes for details, in Nate’s opinion. The tunic he was wearing had a coloured frieze woven by Lianna on it. She was often teased about it because of her very focused interest, sometimes indirectly, as Diane did a moment ago.

Nate didn’t have a good answer for his mother. Sure, he often spent time with the girl, but she wasn’t the reason he decided this knot deserved to be changed, was she? He couldn’t tell. His only answer was to shrug while smiling at his mother.

Barely an hour later, they were all ready to go, the eight clans composing the horde and their about forty families marching together, raising a dust storm in their wake. As a whole, it amounted to almost five thousand people. A vast procession whose sole departure took an hour before the group closing the march started moving.

Due to their enlarged numbers, their journey was expected to take two weeks, double the usual timespan.

From Nate’s perspective, the journey until they got within range of the city was mostly uneventful. The most startling moment was when the horde stopped, yells and roars echoing from a distance, and then people ran everywhere with worried looks. The Scott family was said to be mainly composed of scouts, so they were in the first half of the formation on one of the flanks. The attack, however, had come from the back, far enough from them that they were barely affected, their only losses amounting to the warriors having gone to support the horde’s back. Not that they never had to deal with beasts assaulting their group, only that it never caused the damage dealt to the rear.

It had been a shock for Nate to see his father and the other warriors shaken up as they were. It was a stark reminder that this world was much more dangerous than good old Earth. The rest of the time, most of the family’s worries came from not knowing how well their other acquaintances were doing. They knew the Starstrong clan wasn’t doing badly, but they didn’t have specific about individuals. Then there was the need to ease the journey for pregnant women. Diane was lucky that Nate could help through his Body Manipulation and ensure she would carry her child as long as needed. By then, he already knew it would be a girl, even if he kept that knowledge to himself. Other mothers weren’t so fortunate. The stress from the attacks and the exhaustion from the march made it so that quite a few, in their eighth or even seventh month, had to give birth. Most of those children didn’t survive.

– First POV – Whistler –

I had seen many beasts since I began hunting, so I knew it was a dangerous world out there. How could I not when the one I hunted didn’t even amount to a third of the different kinds of beasts I saw until now? The most important rule was always to avoid getting in range of a beast the clan had yet to hunt. With the number of times we had migrated over the years, we knew how dangerous an unknown foe could be. Most of our losses came from those attacks.

So when I went scouting with my group to uncover the safest path ahead, only to find it was to march between two strips of forest, I knew we would suffer losses. The only question was how much, when and in what manner. The biggest threat I had ever seen around forests was what we called a Winxolf. A large furry predator who could ride the winds and use it to hide itself. At first, when I learned it most often lived in a pack, I thought it would be when it was the most dangerous, but no, it was instead the loner who was the deadliest. Our clan, the Starstrong -and what a mighty name it was!- had never hunted this beast before. But since we’ve met other clans, I’ve heard many stories. A Winxolf pack would retreat after suffering too many wounds or might not even attack if it seemed too risky. A lone Winxolf, on the other hand, was a more cunning and unrelenting foe. It would skirt around, letting you believe you could hunt it, only to disappear in a breeze, its unseen presence weighing down on your mind. Then at some point, the scent of blood would rise, several hunters having fallen without anyone seeing or hearing anything.

I had some doubts about the story, of course. At first, that is. Once I saw a pelt in one of the clans, I knew they weren’t making up stories. That gleaming pale grey fur shining like the new moon was unmistakable.

That’s why I was so worried at this moment, being told to scout the path ahead and warn the horde of any threat lurking at the edge of the woods. Fortunately, I only saw a few nests of red-furred squirrels, which could be annoying as they easily spark flames when rubbing their tails against each other. One or two is nice to watch. Once there’s a nest of twenty or thirty who rush at you? Much less so. Apart from them, I caught glimpses of a few snakes, meaning ten times their number was hidden away. But they weren’t an issue as long as we didn’t get close. The same could be said of Shade Phasmes about their ambushing tendencies. However, the latter looked like large stick-alike or leaf-alike insects and were much harder to see. I didn’t see any, but I would bet a whole hunt’s haul that we already missed more than a hundred. The last notable creature I saw was a kestrockell, a swift bird of prey who could launch its feather as a hail of rocks. Fortunately, those I saw were quite small. We didn’t have to worry since they rarely attacked creatures bigger than them. Otherwise, they were deadly to face. However, it couldn’t be considered a bigger threat than the winxolfs. I only remember seeing a huge one from afar a few years ago, whose wingspan was larger than five men. It was fighting against some beast in the forest. I never learnt what foe it faced, but the impact of its feathers as they landed on the ground could be felt from where we were, at least fifteen throws away. (~4k feet | ~260 feet / throw) It was the first time anyone from our clan saw one so large.

Hence I never was more frightened than when I heard the roars of several winxolfs from behind, then the yelling from other clans’ warriors as they engaged against the threat. I was too far ahead to know if Diane and Nate were in danger, and going back to ensure they were safe wasn’t an option either, as I needed to keep my position. If we suffered another attack because the scouts couldn’t warn the horde ahead of time, it really would be a disaster. We were repeatedly told never to leave our position unless we had a clear line of sight of the enemy and were given permission by the team leader to engage. It had taken some time to get used to this initially, and the restrictions kept piling up as we merged with other clans. But by now, it was our fourth migration and our fifth week since we travelled in those conditions.

So the only thing I did was regroup with the rest of the team, so we could decide who to send to get more info on what was happening. If our runner wasn’t back in a dozen hundred breaths (10min), we would all regroup toward the central group unless there was a more urgent threat close to us.

As it was, our teammate returned and told us the rear was being attacked by two packs of winxolfs who somehow could control the forest to shift its edge and cut the rear away from the rest of the horde.

I didn’t know what to think. Two packs of winxolfs teaming up was never seen. And moving trees? I had heard a few people mention those, but I thought it was stories to scare the children. A way to remind us that forests shouldn’t be entered as they are death traps. I never imagined spirits and possessed trees that could move by themselves were a real thing.

Apparently, I wasn’t the only one being frightened, as the whole horde stopped, half of the warriors tasked to support the rear. I wasn’t among them. And from the retelling of the battle I heard much later, I was glad about this. At the far back, a couple of families were gone, with barely one or two survivors. In the best of cases, for the families who had losses among their non-fighters, three out of five people died, including all warriors.

As a whole, I learned that we had lost around eight hundred people. More than our whole clan reunited. Even the biggest clan in the horde was barely bigger than this.

It had been a disaster.

I could only rest once I met Diane, Nate, and the rest of my family. Even then, it wasn’t all good news. A couple of my cousins and many other Starstrong warriors had died.

— Third POV – Nate –

He had somewhat expected it from knowing how many clans would reunite to form this developing city, but the scale of the place was astonishing. Before they could see it, they heard echoes from the city, so many people were already present. By the time the first structure entered their sight, the brouhaha from thousands of people milling around had already become part of the background. Nate was just as impressed by the scene as it was like looking at an anthill at a human scale. He might have seen just as many people regrouped in the same place before, but not for them to all be actively working to build things everywhere. The best comparison he could make was with the Egyptian constructions and the remaking of scenes when they built the Pyramids or other movies made with such grandiose buildings. Except there weren’t any slaves or just a handful of massive structures.

The horde stopped when they got close enough to the city, and their Exodus finally ended.