After giving my Brother instructions, primarily leaving him a suggestion to remain behind and secure the camp, I checked the flawless readiness of the Reaction Detachment.

Everything was perfect, so the detachment departed amidst a tense and busy atmosphere. The children and prostitutes hid inside the buildings and regular patrols marched along the streets of the Tier Three camp.

Once we had departed from the camp, and headed into the familiar Wild Lands, I expected my familiar focus to return.

But it didn’t.

There was something different about this patrol than previous patrols, but my attentive focus wasn’t appearing. Instead, I felt giddy with excitement. Maybe it was because something different was happening. Or maybe because I had full access to all of my traits. Or maybe because I managed to give the camp commander suggestions, which it looked like my Brother had followed. Or maybe it was because there was a weight of destiny upon me, one which until I thought about it hadn’t even occurred to me.

Of all of those options, I didn’t know what was disrupting me. All I knew was that I had better calm down and focus before we met up with the raiding party.

So I worked through my breathing techniques I had half-remembered from my previous life, and which had helped me keep focused in this life.

Trait 5 Unlocked: Calm Meditation in Chaos

Ironically, the shock of the system message knocked the wind—the giddiness out of me.

I focused on the world around me.

It was late autumn, almost winter. The small patches of trees were now almost fully bare except for the occasional particularly stubborn leaves, or a few evergreen bushes and trees mixed in with the copses.

The air was chilly, but fresh. Something which I had forgotten after spending so long inside Outer Heart—was two months really that long?—and the constant surrounding of wood fires, the smell of unwashed bodies and clothes, and cook fires.

Even the noise was different. Back in Outer Heart there was always a constant hubbub of noise, even during the night. And during the day it was even louder and intrusive. Drill instructors shouting commands for drill. The clack of wooden weapons as the troops practiced fighting. The shouts and joyful screams of the children, newly accepted at Outer Heart. There were so many more noises that I had forgotten them all. But they were a constant barrage of noise.

One which reminded me of the constant noise found in the beloved cities of my previous life.

Yet out here, other than the creak of armour from the Five Tier; the slapping of scabbards against legs; confident, casual breathing; and the sound of rustling grass as we trampled it flat, there was an almost pure silence.

A wonderful silence. One I had forgotten how much I missed. Maybe next time I shouldn’t wait for an emergency before I set out for a patrol. There wasn’t even any wind to rustle the remaining stubborn leaves in the trees or the long grass we trampled underfoot.

We met up with the patrol who had sent a runner about the raiding party. They led us, marching for almost an hour, before they warned us we were near where they saw the raid party. Nearby was a large late-autumn copse which almost deserved the title of a small forest. In it we came across the first signs of the raiding party. I had sensed that there were a small handful of tribal troops in the copse. From the nervous looks that I saw from my fellow soldiers, I knew that they too had spotted the tribal troops.

That was odd because I knew that our scouts, unaided by Traits, were much better at hiding in even these conditions than them. And our scout unit was only a few tours old, the newest of my initiatives for the Disposal Troops. I sensed one of them had departed through the copse as soon as we were within range, so I guessed the rest of the party was nearby.

I warned the detachment of this.

When we rounded the copse of trees, still under watch by the partially hidden scouts, there was an odd scene. Sitting atop a slight rise was a partially fortified camp. It was both ready to defend against an attack, and showed few signs of aggression that were possible in said situation.

Around their camp they had shaped the earth, making a trench and earthen rampart. In the trench and rampart there was a large, overt, break; almost directly in our line of march. And as a further invitation, they had trampled the grass to form a path directly up the rise.

A campfire must’ve been burning as a single pillar of smoke was rising lazily into the air, and even from this distance I could smell food cooking, masked lightly by the smoke of the fire.

From the angle up the rise I could tell that most of the tribal troops gathered in small groups, armoured yet unarmed; their weapons nearby. Only four of their troops were armed and armoured in full metal armour. These four stood, two on each side, guarding the overt break in the earthen rampart. They carried large curved rectangular shields, reminding me of Roman Legionaries shields, except they were an almost midnight blue rather than crimson. They held long spears, with broad silver leaf heads and black hafts much thicker than the ones the Tier Five’s carried. From the way they glistened in the sun, I had the sense they were more of a decorative weapon than a true weapon of war.

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Though, with the ease they seemed to carry them, I gathered they could be deadly too.

Out from between the four troops a single person wearing a long flowing white robe or dress, with a thick dark grey cloak and a hood which was pulled down over their head hiding much of their face. Even with my Sneaky-Beaky Lookie and Scoutie Trait I couldn’t quite make out if it was a male or female hidden within the clothing.

Once again, I was struck by the childish name of that trait. When it first appeared, I was delighted and found the name fun. Now, though, it was annoying, and I spent many hours wishing I could change it.

One thing I was sure about was that the figure coming out of the camp, down that trampled path, wasn’t armed with anything longer than a short sword or a knife. Even though I knew they were plenty dangerous, and I had used either weapon plenty of times to save either my life or that of my companions.

‘Okay, detachment, wait here. I’ll go on ahead.’

‘Sir, with all due respect, sir. It could be a trap, sir. Sir, one of us should go instead, sir.’ One of the Tier Five, Strong Axe, said.

He was one of those whom I had saved a few tours ago in a particularly nasty Fissure invasion and remained at Outer Heart of his own free will since then. As an homage to his name, he forwent the normal spear or shield and used an axe instead. Though he was named Strong Axe his body wasn’t particularly huge and muscular. It was normal looking, for a Tier Five, which meant better build and taller than the norm for Tier Three. His face, too, though slightly darker than most around here, wasn’t overly out of the norm.

Even though he had shaved his hair in homage to me his armour—mail under a good quality, if slightly old tunic—oval shield, and axe, along with his body, spoke for his Tier more than the shaved head spoke for being a Tier Three.

I turned around to look at them all. They were all nervous, their eyes darting not at the copse of trees, where the tribal scouts were almost openly displayed, or the camp atop of the rise, they even kept a watch over the tall grass which could easily hide more scouts sneaking up on us.

Proud that they kept their training even in this unusual situation, I smiled at them. ‘This is an unusual situation. I know that.’ I said to them all. ‘We haven’t seen any tribal raids in the past ten years.’ As I said that, the time between raids suddenly felt suspicious. There had been no raids since I had arrived in this world.

‘Sir, what is it, sir? It looks like something is troubling you.’ Strong Axe said.

‘Yes, and it is to do with this raid. But that troublesome feeling is more proof that I believe we should be fine.’

He looked at me strangely and was about to say something, but stopped when I shook my head.

‘I will discuss things further with my Brother—’ I stopped myself. Maybe I shouldn’t’ve had said anything.

‘So the rumours are true,’ another Tier Five said.

The fact there were rumours about me, which no one had told me, worried me slightly. But it was an issue for later. ‘Yes, they are. We’re twin brothers.’

‘I didn’t believe them because,’ Two-Three, a broad giant of a man even if he was only a Tier Three, said, ‘why would a Tier Nine willingly spend so long living and working and risking their lives as a Tier Three. That is as unheard of as the goddess coming down and wiping my…’ He looked wary of the Tier Five around him. ‘Those snobs never give us any attention if they can help it. Yet you’ve bled with us, wept with us, not gotten drunk with us though, and saved many of our lives.’

Those rumours were oddly specific. Not only was I brothers with the new person in charge of Outer Heart, but they also stated I was a Tier Nine.

‘My name, gifted to me by…’ No, I wasn’t going to say who gifted my name. I wasn’t even sure who gave me my name. Was it Death, God, my parents who thought that Alexander was a noble sounding name and became annoyed when I shortened it to Alex, or had I taken the meaning of the name to heart and held it close when I lost everything else between my death in my last life and my rapid descent into slavery in this world.

All the detachment was looking at me, eager to hear what I was going to say next. Well, they were looking at me eagerly, but they were also keeping a wary watch out for danger, too. I was blessed with people like them surrounding me. My blessings went further than that, though, Death blessed me, Earth’s God blessed me, and the administrator risked himself giving me some tangible blessings.

I smiled at them.

‘My name, my True Name, is People’s Defender. I have focused most everything in this life upon living up to my name.

‘And right now, there are people over there, waiting for us.‘ I pointed to the camp of the tribal raiding party, ’if I can help defend them too, I shall do so.’

This time, none of them complained. I was sure they would’ve cheered me, if we were not in a potentially dangerous situation. With their blessing, I turned around and walked towards the figure in white and grey.

When I got close to the figure, I realised that they were shorter than me.

It had been hard to recognise just how tall they had been when there was nothing to measure them against. They reached up and lowered their hood, displaying a stunningly beautiful face with fiery red hair, through which two long pointed ears protruded.

‘My groom,‘ she said in a soft musical voice, ’long have I awaited for your arrival.’