When we got to the gates, something felt wrong.

The two guards, Ret and Bico, shouted, “Chief! Where have you been?”

“Sorry, our trip to Fuoril’s city took longer than expected. Something wrong?” Elfindor answered.

“Uhh…” Ret replied, scratching the back of his head nervously. Biting his lower lip, he sighed and said, “Maybe Mr. Trent should be the one to tell you.”

“Tell me what?”

Ret and Bico stayed silent as Elfindor got the horses moving again. We had to go to the stables and return the horses and cart, but there was another problem.

What happened here?

It looked like a tornado had come through this place. All the horses and carts were missing, and the stables were in shambles. Walls were broken-through and only half-standing, windows were smashed, and the stablemaster lay on a pile of hay, crying through his palms. The roof had collapsed and dust and splintered wood was everywhere.

Elfindor ran to comfort the man. “Max! What happened here?”

“Chief…. While you were gone, we were overrun by bandits.”

The stablemaster was in the stables when they attacked, so he only had second-hand information, but he said they’d come in after smashing part of the wall, several feet away from the gate, demanding all the animals we owned in return for protection. Oswald, acting on behalf of the missing chief since Trent wasn't around, refused and gathered as many able men as he could to fight off the fifty or so invaders, but—

“They had a powerful spellcard!” Max cried. “I heard they turned… invisible!”

We left Max to get the full story from Trent. What we saw along the way made me furious. The attack must’ve been recent, as light trails of smoke still rose from certain barns that were destroyed. A lot of Big Tree villagers were left homeless. Some people in Little Rock were also left homeless, and the only thing remaining was ash and soot. Glass and other things that hadn’t melted in a raging fire littered the rubbish pile of floorboard remains.

We found Trent doing damage control. People under his command were running left and right, to and from, gathering info of what remained.

“Trent! We heard from Max. Who attacked us?!” Elfindor shouted.

“Callum! Where the hell were you?”

Given what had happened, I felt ashamed I’d made us late. I almost threw up thinking that, while we were screwing girls in a brothel, Trent and the others had had to fight off bandits.

Elfindor clenched his fist. “I’m sorry. We stayed longer because the guildmaster made us take the adventurer exam and… before we knew it, it was evening.”

He didn’t rat me out….

Trent was wearing a large straw hat to shield his face from the sun. He took it off and exhaled deeply. “They took almost everything, Callum. We have less than 20% of our chickens left. And only because they lacked any more room in the carts they stole from us. All our cows, horses. Gone. It would cost at least a few thousand copper to replace even half of them.”

Guilt washed over me.

“Father, what about the Holy Knights? You saw the crooks’ faces, didn’t you? You could—”

Trent shook his head. “Most of their faces were covered. And then they turned invisible. By the time I’d gotten to the scene, our men were getting overwhelmed. After they turned, we couldn’t see or even hear the wheels of the carts turn. The horses, the chickens—everything went silent!”

Tears rolled down his face. “They even took—Matilda!”

The man I’d taken for brave and strong fell to his knees right in front of me. It seemed he’d tried his best to distract himself from that fact by doing his job, but all the feelings he’d repressed gushed outward in full force.

They took our hot maid?!

I ground my teeth so hard I could have torn through flesh. I found myself shouting, “Damn it, Trent! Why didn’t you stop them? You should’ve protected her!”

He stood up and slapped me across the face. “You don’t think I tried?! There was nothing I could do!” he shouted, the veins of his neck popping. “They had real weapons! They were coordinated! And we couldn’t see a thing! Damn it! Damn it all!”

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

He punched the ground. I’d never seen him so angry. Even when I’d gotten in serious trouble the first couple of days, he looked more disappointed than anything else. But now, I bet he wouldn’t hesitate to take blood.

“What were the Holy Knights doing?” Elfindor asked.

“Who knows,” Trent said. “They patrol the forests but never find a damn thing. They won’t even station any men in the villages. We must be so beneath them, our stink would soil their armor.”

My mind went blank with rage. They’d stolen not only my hot maid but all the meat I was going to eat for every meal. All my hard work to improve this damn village had been pulled out from under me. We were worse off than ever.

And they had the audacity to do it when I was away.

They were going to pay.

I wouldn’t rest until I’d slaughtered them all.

* * *

Trent stayed on the ground for a long time. Until some of his errand boys came back. He wiped his face and stood up. He couldn’t mope forever, knowing he had to put on a brave face for those who were counting on him.

“Callum. Alster. We need to move forward,” he said calmly. “The bandits broke a lot of things. And burned down homes and barns. How much payment did you receive for the horned wolves?”

Elfindor scratched his head. “Oh, uh. About that. The guild retained 90% of the reward from our first quest. Guess that paid for our registration fees. We only got about twenty-something copper.”

That was a solid lie with solid delivery on his part. Even I would’ve been convinced if I didn’t know it was outright bullshit.

“Oh,” Trent replied, deflated. “Better than nothing, I suppose. No matter. We need to figure out how much copper we’ll need to replace what was lost. Help me.”

We nodded and got to work.

After clearing my fifth house in record time, Trent asked if I could do the rest and gave me the chief’s magic tablet so I could record my findings myself. He’d said it was a big responsibility but that he trusted me. The magic tablet, which was an empty card repurposed for note-taking, operated almost like a computer. There were notes organized in folders and notes labeled with dates. There was no graphical user interface, only displayed text on whatever I was working on. But it was like I could see the folders in my mind and read through various notes contained within. Writing on it worked the same way, too.

A few hours passed. I ran myself ragged back and forth between houses, barns, talking to villagers and gathering data for Trent so much I gained a new skill.

New Skill Acquired: Running

Not seconds after, I felt reinvigorated, like I could run forever. I found it far easier to pace myself and it took longer for me to get out of breath. Trent commented on how quickly I was taking care of my tasks when I found him helping a family move their stuff into crates in the workers’ district.

“What are they doing?”

“Moving,” he said solemnly. “They want to get as far away from here as possible. And I don’t blame them.”

Figures. The bandits could come back.

“Well, I’m done with inspections,” I said, handing Trent the tablet. “In total, on top of the ones you guys had already counted, two additional barns, and thirteen homes were either burned down or partially destroyed. The ones I marked in blue are the ones that can be saved with some repairs. The ones in red will have to be rebuilt from scratch. I made a full report on another page. I measured each home like you asked and got approximate heights from the residents for the estimation.”

He was speechless a moment before returning to his senses. “Alster, I’m sorry about… what I did earlier. I let my anger control me.”

“It’s fine, Father.”

He ruffled my hair. “I’m proud of you, son. Get this report to Craig so he can do the math. Then we’ll need to rack our heads together and figure out how to earn whatever amount he comes up with.”

The accountant Craig was a numbers wiz. He could do fast and accurate mental math, an extremely useful skill in a world with no concept of calculators. I’d asked him what 732 x 482 was once and he answered in five seconds. Of course, I had no way of knowing if he was right.

I asked Trent where Elfindor was and he said the chief had gone out of the village in search of nearby Holy Knights. We’d make a report of the attackers’ faces. Someone who happened to be there when the bandits were demanding our valuables was an expert at drawing people, and, of course, the bandits hadn’t yet turned invisible. He could recognize at least half their members. Most notable was the leader, who had a large linear scar across his right cheek and a deformed upper lip. Elfindor had suggested bringing that person along so we could have wanted posters made and place a bounty on their heads. That would further limit their movement. He said they’d be back before sunset.

Not a bad plan.

But I would be damned if I let the law take care of those thugs. It was obvious what they were planning to do with Matilda. I wanted to smash their faces with my own two hands.

I have to calm down. First things first.

I went to deliver my report to Craig. I found him drowning in cheap ale in his tiny office in the banquet hall.

“Thanks, Alster. I’ll g-get—to… work.”

He took the tablet from me with an unsteady hand. I grabbed him by the wrist. “Listen to me, Craig. Don’t let these bastards win. We’re going to come back from this. So stop drinking and crunch those numbers. We owe it to the villagers to be strong.”

He gulped. For a second, there was a flicker in his eyes, though I could tell the urge to give in to despair was still there. I put a firm hand on his shoulder and left.

There was still a lot of work to do. I needed to work with Trent to assign Big Tree villagers to the few barns that were left. I braced myself for a lot of complaining. If things were hot and cramped before, just imagine now.

There was a lot of rubble in the streets, mostly from the houses near the gate and only in the workers’ district. But not every home was affected. The unimpacted villagers formed groups to help out their neighbors, picking up huge slabs, splintered wood, shards of broken glass, and broken things. It wasn’t just Craig. There was a lot of despair in the air. People only lifted things half-heartedly, as if they were just killing time instead of taking part in an active recovery effort.

I wanted them to snap out of it.

If only I knew where those bastards were hiding. Then we could hit them with a surprise attack.

But even the Holy Knights hadn’t found their lair. So how could I?