TNL 35 – Recruitment Part One

Halfway through the second day, Raidon and his soldiers come across a number of buildings. It looks like a small abandoned village.

"This is where the pirates gathered, sergeant," Raidon's scout says. "All the tracks come together here before they continue to the mountains. It also seems as if the inhabitants have joined the pirates."

Their path leads them right through the mountains. The mountains run over the narrow part of the island from northeast to southwest. The path that the pirates have followed, and now also Raidon and his soldiers, runs through a mountain pass. Raidon expects an ambush to happen all the way through, but nothing happens. It seems as if the pirates are in a hurry to get to the north side of the island.

The path is easily passable and only after they have started the descent again does the scout find out why.

"I think there used to be a road here. It is completely covered with earth and dust, but we have encountered only a little vegetation that held us up. At first I thought this was a game trail. Later I thought that strange, because no game trail can be this straight. A little further on down the path you can see that there really was a road once. Part of the path has fallen into a ravine and there you can clearly see the old covering stones."

Raidon looks at him in amazement. "A road? And even now we still benefit from it? Amazing!" But then he looks a bit questionable. "Actually, I could have known. We have come across ruins of the ancient legions before on the island. Think of those watchtowers. This road was probably also made by them. I don't think we should be too surprised if we come across more ruins from that time. Especially in the more remote areas."

Their journey lasts several more days and already on the second day through the mountains they encounter even more signs of an overgrown road. This one is already noticeable by a grinding sound. If the soldiers pay close attention, they notice that the sound is coming from under their feet. The studs under their boots rub over the flat stones of the old road. Previously, they did not notice it because a thick layer of sand and dust has blown over it, and even some vegetation has started to grow on it here and there.

Now, however, there is little coverage of the old road and in some places even the old road surface can still be seen. The pirates seem to follow the road all the way to the end.

Another day later they can finally see where the pirates are heading. It seems as if there is a whole city on the northern tip of the island. Complete with a huge stone wall. From afar, Raidon and his men can already see the city quite clearly.

"I hope there aren't too many pirates in that city," squad leader Ice notes.

"Yes, even from here, that city doesn't look as easy as that village we took from the pirates," Raidon replies.

However, the pirates are not on their way to the city, but to a place that is slightly to the east. Another group of pirates has ships here for the return trip to the base and the pirate islands. Before Raidon and the soldiers can catch them, they board the ships and set sail.

"Well, that was that, I think," Raidon notes. "Hopefully they'll go back to their islands and we won't see them again for a long time."

Then he turns his attention to the city.

"Let's see who lives in that city. We haven't come across any sign of people apart from some ruins, but this city is too big to just leave without having a look."

Moments later, Raidon and his men stand in front of the giant gate at the end of the old road.

"Hello!?" shouts Raidon as loud as he can. "Is there anyone there?"

When no one answers, the soldiers also start shouting.

Five minutes later, there is still no response. Then a soldier in ice's squad sees something moving. "There's someone there!?" he shouts. Everyone immediately looks up, at where the soldier is pointing.

When suddenly a shadow appears, everyone recoils a bit.

"Rroee!" it sounds when a huge pigeon rises from the battlements. And everyone spontaneously bursts into laughter.

In the end, Raidon knocks on the gate as hard as he can. There is a hollow sound of metal on strong wood. The sound slowly dies away. The moment it's completely gone, the grating starts.

Slowly, a crack appears in between the two doors that make up the gate and it opens up to Raidon. Inside, it seems like a completely different world. Everything looks like it could stand forever. Everything is pretty dirty from the dust and bird droppings, but all the buildings are still in perfect condition. Raidon and the soldiers have no trouble imagining what it must have looked like in the past.

"What kind of place is this?" one of the soldiers asks softly.

"It looks like a city of the legions," is Raidon's equally soft answer. "Let's see what it is exactly. Does anyone have a problem with us starting exploring at the harbor? At least then we'll know where we are in this maze."

No one answers.

"All right, here we go."

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

Fifteen minutes later they arrive at the harbor.

"Wow, you have to see this!" shouts the same enthusiastic soldier who also made comments earlier. The harbor spreads over a huge area.

"Hmm," Ice hums, "this harbor must be almost the same size as the entire city of Aran."

"Yes, I think so too," Raidon replies. If you include the rest of this city, the whole thing is perhaps three or four times the size of Aran. A huge area to search. So let's get started."

He looks at his squad leaders.

"This is our meeting point, in an hour we will all be back here. We split up and investigate. Seven groups please."

Raidon takes two soldiers into the main street.

"If I remember correctly what the books say, this street should run from the harbor to the center. So if we follow it, we will automatically end up at the most important buildings."

They look their eyes out. There are huge buildings everywhere. When they arrive at the center, the buildings are even bigger. Here are a huge garrison, a temple and a bunch of other giant buildings.

"Let's look at the garrison first, guys," Raidon says, "but be careful. We don't know what we might encounter."

Slowly they open the large doors of the headquarters. Inside they can’t see much at first because there is hardly any light coming through the dirty windows. But once their eyes get used to the light, they see that they are standing in a large hall.

There is a huge layer of dust everywhere and nowhere is it disturbed.

"The dust shows that nothing or no one has been here in all the centuries since the legions have left," notes one of the soldiers.

"All right, then we're going to spread out. Just look around and don't touch anything. I just want to know what's here. In ten minutes we will be back here and we will go back to the harbor," Raidon commands.

The three men disperse. Raidon and a soldier go upstairs, with Raidon viewing the first floor and the soldier viewing the top one. A little later, the soldier comes down again. Raidon is shocked when the soldier suddenly stands next to him.

"Soldier!" he shouts in horror. "Can't you just tell me that you're coming!"

"Sorry, sergeant," the soldier says. "Upstairs is nothing special. Those are just the commander's personal quarters."

"Nice, then you can help here. I think on this floor the offices and such were, but at the end of the hallway is a much larger door. I couldn't open it myself, but it should be possible if we work together."

The soldier obediently walks along. Even together they need all their strength to get one of the large doors open a bit. Raidon sticks his head through the opening to look inside.

"Wow!" he exclaims. "It's a library! Completely filled with books!"

Raidon withdraws his head. This isn’t as easy as it was sticking his head inside. Only with difficulty does he succeed, because he gets stuck with his ears between the doors.

Raidon gently feels his ears to see if he has damaged them very badly. Then he looks at the soldier. "Who knows, maybe there are more handbooks here," he says. "Then we can learn more about the legions."

Once back in the large hall, the other soldier is already waiting. "Down here are only reception areas and such, sir, not that special. Is there more to be found upstairs?"

"Yes, the first floor is where all the real work was done. We can work with this."

Fifteen minutes later Raidon and the soldiers arrive back at the harbor. Only two other groups have arrived, so they have to wait for the rest. A few minutes later, two more groups arrive. There are only two groups still missing.

Ten minutes later, Raidon starts to worry. But then they finally see the two groups coming towards them together.

"They seem rather enthusiastic, Sergeant," someone notes.

Indeed, the soldiers arrive while talking about their findings.

"Sergeant, you must see this!"

"No, ours first!" they shout from afar.

"Calm down, men!" shouts Raidon, then points out one of the groups. "You guys first. What did you find?"

"Ah, nothing special really, sergeant," says the soldier who speaks for the group. "We just found an arsenal full of harnesses, with a real forge."

Raidon looks at him for a moment.

"Nothing special, he says..." he replies shaking his head. Then he looks at the other group. "And what have you found that can match that?"

This soldier manages to keep his face in check even better.

"We found a few small boats in a storage shed, sergeant. Only a few hundred people can be transported with them at the same time, each."

Raidon's mouth almost falls open.

"Boats?"

"No, real ships, sergeant. Of two different types. I think warships and merchant ships."

"Wow," Raidon whispers, "this allows us to build a real army."

Raidon takes the soldiers back to the gate. Here they go up the stair until they are on top of the gatehouse. From this height they can see a large part of the city and also the land around the city. It is clear that the whole city is built around the harbor. There are two clearly recognizable places, namely the temple square with the administration building and the barracks of the garrison.

"When you look around here, what do you see?" asks Raidon. The soldiers look at each other.

"Well, a huge wall that surrounds a city, Sergeant," one person remarks.

"A harbor?" asks another.

But Raidon shakes his head. "I mean outside the city, guys. What we see is a beautiful landscape with really fertile soil. Thousands of people must have lived here in the past. I think there must have been farms and everything outside the walls here. There is not much to see after all these years, but they were probably there."

He looks at the soldiers.

"If we want to stay here, we’ll have to have people who are going to work the land. This can become our place, because it lays outside the borders of both empires. The lost island can become the island of the legion, but we have to keep this a secret."

Raidon makes his decision.

"Ice, you take your squad back to the pirate village. From there you go back to Aran to tell Brandon what we have found. I want the pirate village to be inhabited as soon as possible, and for people to come and work the land not only near the village, but also here. We need everyone he can find, from farmers and fishermen to workmen and other villagers, but he needs to be careful. I don't want the knowledge about the island to be known outside of the province. After the raids, there will be plenty of people who want to start over somewhere else."

Raidon waits for the squad leader to process all this and then he continues:

"Once you've conveyed that, I want you to persuade a few fishermen to come back here. I want a direct connection between this city and Aran and the pirate village. So there are some fishermen who will have to go up and down quite often. Just tell them that we will pay them well for their services. Do you have all that?"

The squad leader looks at Raidon for a moment and then repeats the messages.

"All right, then you leave right now. Try to go as fast as possible, but be careful."

Just as the squad leader goes down the stairs, Raidon calls after him:

"And tell Brandon we need more recruits!"

When Ice and his squad are through the gate, Raidon and the remaining squad get to work. Raidon takes the soldiers to the barracks. Here are rooms on the third floor for the commander of the city and also for a platoon of guards. Here is enough space to stay, once it is cleaned.

As they are used to, there are ten sleeping places per room for the guards. Since they are with eleven, it is going to be tight, but cleaning more than one room is too much work.

"Careful with those mattresses, men, if they fall apart, we’ll have even more dust here!" shouts Raidon to two soldiers who remove a mattress from a bed.

Near sunset, the space is clean enough. There is still some dust here and there, but at least they no longer sneeze as much as before. One of the soldiers even got the windows open, so that fresh air and light can come in.