Book 1: The Mob Invasion
Chapter 6: Errands

Days Since the Mob Invasion: 747

Calamari Lake, the second largest lake in Minecraftia and the largest lake in Southern Minecraftia, is one of the only places in the Empire where one could naturally fish for squids. Because of this, the lake was heavily fished by many fishermen wishing to make a profit off of the ever valuable squid ink. After years of constant fishing with no reprieve, the squid population dwindled to almost nothing in the lake, and fishermen were forced to take their business elsewhere. Left behind in their wake were small fishing villages, abandoned by the fishermen and left to be reclaimed by nature. Hunter's Watch was one of those towns.

Sitting atop one of the towers along the wall around the town, Daren stared into the treeline as an ever watchful sentry. Ever since Hunter and the new guy, Alan, returned the other day with news of a griefer attack at the Testificate village, Daren had volunteered for longer shifts as the gatekeeper. He looked up and noticed that the sun was just starting to poke out over the horizon. Shuddering in the late-autumn morning breeze, he pulled his fur blanket close to him. He had watched the sun go down and the sun come back up. He was tired, and his eyes felt like they were burning, but still he stayed watching.

Daren sighed and remembered all the military training and drills that he had gone through when he first joined Notch's imperial spear legion about 6 years earlier. He knew those long nights of training would prepare him for his life as a spearman, but he had no idea it would be like this. He felt his eyelids start to get heavy, and for a split second they closed just a little longer than they should have.

"Impaler..." the memories of a word he had heard too often in his life rang in his head as he felt his head involuntarily nod to sleep for a split second.

He jumped, slightly startled by himself, before groaning and rubbing his tired eyes. "Damn sleep deprivation... starting to hallucinate..." he cursed to himself for drifting off, even if it was for just a second. Just then he heard loud, bulky footsteps making their way up the stairs. He didn't need to look to see who it was.

"Good morning, Daren!" Zeke's voice boomed in the quiet of morning, causing a nearby group of birds to fly away frightened. Zeke's balding, dark-skinned scalp was reflecting the morning sun almost like a mirror. Like most days, he was wearing a thin, sleeveless shirt and some drab looking pants that barely came down to his calves. No shoes, per usual. No armour, per usual. Just one giant, bulky sword dangling from his hip, per usual. Daren looked over to Zeke and took note of him before turning back towards the treeline,

"Shouldn't you be wearing shoes or something? I thought you Southerners hated the cold," Daren quipped. Zeke held his belly and bellowed with laughter, which scared even more birds in the treeline, before pointing at Daren's blanket.

"And I thought that the strong, hardy Northerners didn't need wimpy luxuries such as blankets!"

"Touché." Daren smirked. He had walked right into that one. "You here to relieve my shift?"

"That's right! Now, get out of here and go get some rest, little Northern man," Zeke poked fun at Daren. "You look like you're about to keel over! Hahaha!"

Normally Zeke's loud behavior would annoy him, but Daren was too tired to feel anything more than relief as Zeke took his spot as the watch for the day. Walking down the stairs, he made his way down the dirt road in the middle of town to get to his house. On both sides of the road there were small, wooden buildings. Some were houses, others were storerooms or the community center, which he saw Lana walking to while carrying a basket fulls of vegetables from the greenhouse. She saw him and smiled.

"Daren, good morning! Are you gonna stay up for breakfast? I was gonna try and make some sort of vegetable medley today." Lana and Hunter were the designated cooks of the town. Lana knew how to cook things and make them last, and Hunter could clean, strip, gut, and butcher just about anything that moved. In terms of post-apocalyptic eating, it really wasn't all that bad.

Daren stabbed his spear into the ground and slightly leaned on it. "No, not this morning. I'm going to go to sleep soon as I get home." He was hungry, but he was even more tired. Lana frowned, but she understood.

"Well, how about I save you a bowl and bring it to you later?" she asked. Daren nodded at this, trying his hardest to keep his eyes open. Lana could tell he was about to pass out. "Alright, well, you get some rest now, okay? I'll see you later." And with that, she was off to the community center to start cooking, and Daren was off back to his house.

As he walked past Hunter's home, he heard two people having a conversation. Looking through the window as he passed, he could see Alan and Hunter sitting at Hunter's dining room table having a discussion.

It's nice that he's getting along well with Hunter, Daren thought to himself. Alan's introduction into Hunter's Watch had been a little more aggressive than they wanted, mostly due to Lana's uncharacteristic decision to stab him, but Daren was still glad he decided to stick around. The kid's potions were good. Just as good as Sofie's was, if not better. Suddenly, he frowned.

"Sofie..." he whispered to himself. He shook his head before he could think about that topic anymore than need be. Better to just forget it and move on. What's done is done.

Walking through the front door of his house, he quickly stripped the chainmail armour off himself before walking over to his bed in the corner. He rested the spear along the wall right next to the head of his bed and, without even taking the proper time to pull the sheets back, he plopped on the mattress face-first. He needed all the rest he could get before he had to do it all over again that night.

He was fast asleep within minutes.

In the northern side of town, near the gate, there sat a small house almost separated from the others. Much like all the other houses, it was a simple, one-story, wooden house with a few windows in the front of the house. Inside, a man could be seen at his desk writing very frantically. He was a middle-aged man with dark, unkempt hair. Sitting on his nose was a pair of thick reading glasses, and behind them were a pair of small, green eyes. His shirt was a button-up long sleeved white shirt with the sleeves rolled up. Everything about the man seemed jittery, and it was apparent by the stacks of books and papers strewn across his desk that the man was a scholar of some sorts, or at least he was before the mob invasion.

Suddenly, there was a knock at the door, causing the man to jump briefly.

"Come in! Come in please!" he called out. The door was unlocked, and shortly thereafter Alan walked in with a small crate full of potions.

"Uh, yes, you're George, right?" Alan asked, eyeing the man on the other side of the room. The man quickly walked over to Alan, practically jogging, to greet him.

"Yes, yes, yes I am. Thank you very much, pleasure to finally meet you, very sorry, very sorry for not doing it sooner by the way do you have it? I've been trying to be patient but I really need it please, thank you."

"Uh, what?" Alan asked, mentally lagging behind the man. The man was speaking faster than Alan could even keep up. George glared, seemingly offended by the man's ignorance.

"The potions. The potions. Do you have the potions? I need the potions. Can I please have the potions? I gotta have the potions." George talked rather disjointedly, like he was constantly trying to speak two sentences at the same time. It was exhausting just to listen to.

"Oh, the potions!" Alan exclaimed, finally caught up with George's train of thought. "Yeah, Hunter was telling me you needed a crate full of potions of speed, but he wouldn't tell me why..." Alan handed the crate to George. George took the crate and nodded in appreciation before quickly walking over to his desk and dropping the crate in the middle of it. The glass bottles rattled against each other as the glass rubbed against glass. Quickly lifting a potion up, George popped the cap off of it, and chugged.

"What?" Alan asked, bewildered. "Hey, listen, if you're some sort of druggie-"

George held up his hand to stop Alan. He was looking down at the ground with his eyes closed, as if he was concentrating very hard on something. Eventually, he looked back up and smiled at Alan.

"Sorry about that, Alan," he said, a lot calmer and slower this time. In fact, Alan could see that George's entire demeanor had changed. His muscles were relaxed, and he seemed a lot less tense, which is the exact opposite of what is supposed to happen when you drink a potion of speed. Alan raised an eyebrow.

"What the hell was that? You just drank a potion of speed, are you okay?" Alan asked, walking over to George. George smiled and nodded.

"Well, it depends on what you mean by 'okay,'" he said, rather mellow. Alan scoffed.

"So you're a druggie, then? So what was that, your withdrawals?" After the Baron Wars, Notch strictly regulated all production of potions of speed by the alchemists due to their addictive nature and intoxicating side-effects. Alan was beginning to suspect that George had become addicted.

"No, no, no, not at all," George laughed, waving his hand dismissively. "You see, about 15 years ago I was working in Ravenscroft with some redstone from the Red Mountains. The sample we were studying was some of the purest redstone that had ever been mined. We were testing to see what gave redstone it's reactionary properties and how we could best use it when all of a sudden...well..." George didn't finish, but lifted up his right arm and showed off a rather large scar on his forearm to Alan. It was a wide, thick, nasty looking scar that seemed like it had cut all the way to the bone. Alan gasped, finally understanding now as the connection formed in his mind.

"Redstone poisoning," he whispered. George nodded solemnly.

"Our pulley system broke and crushed my arm under a redstone ore. Some of it broke off and got into my bloodstream. When it got to the brain, I was out like a light. For 2 days I was in that coma. When I finally woke up, it had damaged my brain pretty badly. They say it was a miracle I even woke up at all. Ever since then, though, I've been like what you saw earlier. Tense, always on edge, unable to sleep, the list goes on and on."

"But potions of speed temporarily counteract the damage done to the brain by redstone poisoning, I learned that at the University." Alan said, finally understanding George's situation and the reason for his behavior the past few days. George smiled, brushing his hair out of his face.

"After Sofie died, my speed stash dwindled pretty quickly. Since then I've sort of had to... well, make due. Nobody here knows how to make even the simplest speed potion... but then you came along. I'm just glad you were able to complete an order of this size in such a small amount of time." The crate of speed potions had about 26 potions in there. George took the empty potion flask that he had just finished and handed it back to Alan. "For recycling," he said, giving a small smile and a wink.

Alan was shocked at just how different George seemed now. He had seen him several times throughout the past 4 days that he had been there, and he always seemed like he had someplace that he needed to urgently be. Whenever he would eat in the community center, he'd always eat his meal as fast as possible before returning back to his home to do who knows what without so much as saying a word. Alan just assumed the man was jittery from the mob invasion, he never would have suspected redstone poisoning.

"Well, well, well, you seem to be doing better," a voice from the door rang out. Alan turned around to see Hunter leaned up against doorway with a bottle of rum in his hand. A startled laugh came out from George.

"Well thank you, Hunter. I feel better!" he exclaimed, rubbing the back of his head. Alan walked over to Hunter, clearly displeased.

"Why didn't you tell me he had redstone poisoning?" Alan hissed, staring daggers into Hunter. "I accused him of being a damn druggie." Hunter could tell Alan was clearly embarrassed by his misdiagnosis as he shrugged.

"Hey, aren't you supposed to be able to identify that stuff? I mean, you are the designated healer after all," Hunter teased, taking a swig of rum. His breath already reeked of alcohol. Alan wasn't even sure if it was noon yet.

"You're not drinking already, are you?" George asked, shaking his head but smiling. He didn't know why he even asked since it seemed like Hunter made it his personal goal in life to get absolutely hammered before lunch time. "You haven't changed a bit since we first met, Hunter."

Hunter just laughed at this before taking a seat in one of George's chairs. George's single-room house was very cramped, which was made even worse by how messy he kept it. Papers and books were strewn about everywhere, including the floor. It was all Hunter could do to avoid tripping over something as he made his way to the chair.

"That reminds me," Alan started. "How did you guys meet? I mean, I assume Hunter's Watch is named after you, right Hunter?" Alan walked over and sat next to Hunter as George leaned his back against his desk and crossed his arms. Hunter grinned, before taking yet another sip of his rum. Alan had never seen someone drink so much alcohol, but Hunter was drinking it almost as if it were water.

"Alright," Hunter spoke, his voice slightly straining from the strength of the rum. He put the cork back into the bottle and laid it on the table. He explained to Alan how he had came to Lake Calamari about 2 months after the mob invasion in search of freshwater. That's when he found what was now known as Hunter's Watch. A few days later, George joined up, and offered to build a wall around the town in exchange for living there, which Hunter complied.

"We've been friends ever since," George chuckled after Hunter finished.

"For the most part," Hunter smirked, raising the bottle of rum to George in the gesture of a toast before swallowing another mouthful. "I also thought he was a druggie when I first met him, Alan, don't worry!" he laughed. Alan, however, was still confused.

"Okay wait," Alan stopped them. "If you two founded Hunter's Watch, and if it's named after you, then why is Frederick the one in charge?" Alan thought it was a pretty good question, seeing as Frederick seemed to be the one that called the shots around here. Hunter's expression seemed to drop.

"Frederick..." he groaned, rubbing his brow. "That son of an ass."

"You mean like a donkey?" Alan snickered. Hunter shook his head.

"No, I mean like an ass."

"Oh c'mon now, Hunter," George interjected. "He's not that bad."

"No, he's not... he's even worse." Hunter retorted. Alan looked at him clearly confused.

"So... what did he do?" Alan asked again. By this point, Hunter had finished off the bottle and tossed it aside on the floor, much to George's annoyance. Hunter just considered it an addition to George's collection.

"Okay... so, after me and George built the wall, Daren shows up. Now, Daren used to be in Notch's spear legion, so we'd be crazy not to let him in, right? That, and he's The Impaler from the Edgeland's Rebellion, so he's a fuckin' war hero," Hunter stated.

"Wait, 'the Impaler'?" Alan repeated, now even more confused than he was previously. "What's that?" he asked. He couldn't help but have a trace amount of fear in his voice. Daren was intimidating enough as is, but with a nickname like 'the Impaler,' it surrounded him an even more frightening aura.

"You... should probably just ask him yourself." Hunter just looked at Alan as if he were stupid for even asking such a question. "You must have not kept up with the war in the Edgelands that much..." Hunter stated, slightly in disbelief that Alan didn't know the story of the Impaler of the Edgelands. But that was a story for another day. "Anyway," he continued. "A few weeks after Daren shows up, Frederick and Zeke show up as well. Frederick, if you don't already know, used to be a a statesman for Old King's Grove up north near the Red Mountains, and Zeke was his personal bodyguard. Apparently, they used to live in the Capitol before that."

"Really?" Alan asked, astonished. "That's incredible."

Hunter rolled his eyes. "Yeah, well, it was so 'incredible', that my dumb ass thought it would be a good idea to have him lead the town rather than me, seeing as he had some experience with that sort of thing before," Hunter looked down, mentally cursing himself for his decision.

"It was a good decision!" George remarked optimistically. Hunter looked over at his friend and scowled.

"Yeah, and not a day goes by where I don't regret it," Hunter said in a deadpan tone. "He's way to stuffy and uptight. The guy has a huge stick up his ass."

They all laughed at this, including Alan. He liked Frederick, he was kind enough, but he did notice that Frederick seemed to be a stickler for order. The man still dressed and groomed himself as if he were still living a comfy life as a lawmaker. They all sat around the room, telling stories and jokes for a few hours. Between the bursts of laughter, Alan smiled to himself. He felt like, for the first time in a long time, he had finally found someplace where he belonged. Before he left that night, George handed him a letter that he had written containing a list of how many speed potions he needed in a typical month's time to combat his redstone poisoning. It averaged out to about 2 a day: one at night and one in the morning. It was an order that Alan was more than capable of filling. After a little more talking, and more than a few dirty jokes by drunken Hunter, Alan and Hunter left George's home to go back to each of their own houses for the night.

As night fell, the half-moon shone over Lake Calamari casting a beautiful reflection on the surface of the water. Frogs could be hear croaking in the distance, and a symphony of crickets were chirping their nightly orchestra. Every now and then, you could here a plop! in the water from a fish jumping into the air to catch a dragonfly for a late night snack. It was Lana's favorite place to be.

Sitting on the edge of the fishing dock by the lake, Lana dangled her feet off the edge of the platform. She came here every night to stare into the lake and take in the sounds of nature. Sometimes she'd only take a few minutes. Other times she'd stay for hours and hours on end. This night was one of the latter nights. Lana looked up into the moon and hummed a simple melody quietly to herself. A gentle breeze blew her long red hair into her face, which she promptly fixed by brushing back behind her ear.

Looking at the moon, Lana couldn't help but wonder where Rinoa was right now. Was she looking at the same moon as her? Was she thinking about her? Was she even still alive? The thoughts plagued Lana's mind constantly, it was the major thing that prevented her from sleeping most nights. She brought her legs up to her chest and curled into a ball.

"Wherever you are, I hope you're okay," she whispered to herself. Or maybe that was a prayer? She didn't even know anymore. She could feel the tears start to well up in her eyes as thoughts of her younger sister filled her mind, as well as the soul-crushing realization that she would most likely never see her sister again. This, of course, only made her remember Sofie as well, whose gravestone was just a few yards away from her near the lakefront right next to her house. "I miss you," she choked back on her tears. "I miss you both so much..." It was all she could do to stop herself from full-blown weeping at the knowledge that her two baby sisters were gone. Not only had she failed them, she had failed her parents as well. She was the oldest, she was supposed to protect Rinoa and Sofie with her life. But now? There was almost nothing left of either of them. Just one gravestone, and a mentally-unstable shell of her former sister who had to be exiled across the continent for murdering one of their own. That's all that remained.

Suddenly, Lana heard footsteps behind her walking across the dock. She quickly wiped away her tears the best she could and looked behind her to see who her unwelcome guest was. He expression immediately turned sour.

"Hey there, Lana," Alan greeted her a little awkwardly. He had stayed up to do some extra potion brewing that night, and decided a stroll through the town would help clear his mind. When he saw Lana sitting alone on the docks, something inside him compelled him to go over and talk with her. Looking at her reaction now, though, he was starting to have second thoughts.

"What do you want?" Lana replied coldly as she turned away from him to look back at the lake. Alan assumed she would react like that going by their recent encounters, but he was still determined to extend an olive branch of friendship to her, or at least hold some sort of conversation. He remembered what Hunter told him the other day on their way to the Testificate village about what Lana and her sisters had gone though. It was a depressing story, and he could really start to understand Lana's behavior the past few days.

"I just wanted to say that I'm sorry," he started. "Hunter told me the other day about Sofie and Rinoa and... well, I know how you feel."

"Do you?" Lana asked, almost mockingly. Alan nodded, even though she couldn't see it.

"I lost my younger brother the first night at the Capitol. Well, I lost my whole family that night, really. Everyone here has lost nearly everything. I... I just wanted you to know that if you ever needed to talk about anything..." his voiced trailed off. He already wasn't the best at social interaction, so this was way out of his comfort zone. Lana just sat there, motionless, not saying anything. Alan winced at the cold treatment.

This was probably a mistake, he thought to himself. His intentions were good, but Lana just seemed like she was determined to hate him. He lowered his head, slightly disappointed, and turned to walk away. He was about half-way across the dock when a voice came out behind him.

"Wait," Lana asked. He turned around to see her finally looking at him. It was dark, but her expression didn't seem malicious. She let out a heavy sigh of defeat and turned back to the lake. "Come sit down," she said, scooting over to the side to allow Alan to sit next to her, which he gladly did.

For a few long seconds, neither one of them said anything, and Alan was starting to feel even more uncomfortable than he had been when she just refused to acknowledge him. Finally, however, she spoke up.

"I'm sorry for stabbing you in the arm, and voting against you in the community meeting, and treating you bad and... yeah. Everything." For the first time since they met, Alan got to hear Lana's voice without any venom in her words. He almost didn't know what to say. For the past few days now his only interaction with her had been coated in very aggressive hostility, but now she seemed genuinely apologetic, even nice. Alan didn't even know she had this side to her.

"Why did you stab me in the first place?" he asked. Alan began to wonder that if Lana was actually a nice person like everyone else in Hunter's Watch claimed she was, why was she so cold towards him at first. Lana covered her face with her hands and groaned. She actually seemed embarrassed.

"Because," her voice was muffled by her hands. "I didn't trust you, and I thought it's what Rinoa would have done in that situation," she admitted. She looked up at Alan. "I really did think you could have been trying to poison Hunter, you know. And Rinoa... Between me, her, and Sofie, she was the fighter. After the mobs invaded, we made our way to Spawn Pointe. Rinoa joined up with this... 'mercenary' gang to help pay for our housing there as well as our way into the city." Lana used her fingers to make air-quotes around the word "mercenary." Alan immediately understood what she really meant to say was "griefer," but he didn't feel the need to comment on it. "Without her," Lana continued, "we would have been out in the streets like most people were, or cramped in the refugee camp." Lana hated thinking about those months in Spawn Pointe. Disease, starvation, and crime were rampant in the last days of the Empire, and Spawn Pointe was the center for it all after the Capitol fell. She looked back up at Alan. "In a lot of ways, she was the older sister during that time. All I could do was volunteer at the refugee camps and it just... It made me feel... useless." She looked down, feeling the years of regret piled high onto her shoulders.

Alan shook his head.

"I'm sure that's not true, I doubt you could be 'useless.' Besides, you can't think of it like that. I mean, who knows what would have happened to Rinoa and Sofie had you not been there to look after them? You can't take the blame for what happened. It's not you fault." He smiled at her. "Besides, I was a big brother too, so I know how those sorts of things work out."

Lana couldn't help but let out a slight laugh at this. She couldn't believe that this guy, who just a few minutes earlier she had nothing but disdain for, was starting to actually make her feel better, even if it was just a little bit.

"You know," she said, smiling as she remembered her story. "Rinoa dyed her hair pink," she laughed.

"Pink?" Alan laughed along with her. "Unusual colour for a hair dye, even at the Capitol."

Lana nodded.

"When we were kids, Rinoa was so jealous of my red hair. Our mom had red hair, like mine, and our dad had darker, brown hair, like yours. Rinoa and Sofie got our father's brown hair, and I got our mom's red hair, and she hated having brown hair. So, she goes to an dye stand in the Capitol one day and steals a bottle of what she thought looked like red dye," Lana smirked as she leaned in closer for the next part: "Except it wasn't red."

Alan raised his eyebrows, clearly amused by the story. "I think I can see where this is going. So, what happened then?"

"Well, mom and dad came home that day to find Rinoa bawling her eyes out with pink hair, Sofie with an unchanged diaper, and me in the corner laughing hysterically at it all," Lana beamed as she imagined the scene in her head again. "Believe it or not, though, but eventually Rin decided that she actually kind of liked it. Said it made her look unique. 'It's better than brown hair,' she'd use to say. She's been dying her hair pink ever since." Her smile faded as she looked down into the black surface of the water. "That was... That was a long time ago, though." Lana felt like the tears were about to start coming again.

"You know, we shouldn't be enemies. We're on the same side here, after all," Alan pointed out, distracting Lana from the memories of her childhood. She looked over at him.

"I know." Lana nodded.

"So, let's be friends instead!" Alan said enthusiastically. Lana looked slightly bewildered by the suggestion.

"'Friends?'" She repeated, wondering if he was serious or not. "After how I've treated you the past few days you wanna be friends?"

"Sure, why not?" Alan asked. "I mean, just look at your name! Lana is-"

"If you're gonna make a joke about what my name is backwards, save your breath," Lana angrily cut Alan off mid-sentence. "I've heard that joke all my life..." She huffed, clearly annoyed.

"What...?" Alan was confused. "No, that's not what I was going to say at all. I was going to say that our names are the same letters just in different order," he pointed out. "A-L-A-N and L-A-N-A. So, like, that's pretty much destiny right there," he extended his hand toward Lana for a handshake. "Besides, you've talked more these past few minutes than you have all week to me, so that's gotta be progress, right?" Lana looked at his hand, dumbfounded. She wasn't really sure how to react. One conversation and suddenly they're friends? It was... funny. Finally, she just giggled and abruptly stood up without shaking.

"Whatever you say, Mr. 'Destiny,'" she teased. "You're a funny guy, Alan."

Alan gave a small, comedic bow. "I try my best." He wasn't sure if she meant 'funny' as in weird, or 'funny' as in humorous, but he took it as a compliment either way.

"Well," Lana shuffled her feet, not exactly sure what to say. "Guess I'll see you tomorrow then... friend." A genuine, real smile creeped across her lips, and Alan felt a rush of relief wash over him.

"Sure thing, friend," he responded as he returned her smile with his own.

And with that, Lana turned to walk down the dock back to her house. Alan turned back to stare into the lake. He felt good. Real good. Part of him had been tempted to just avoid Lana after the whole stabbing incident, but he felt like he had made the right choice. He felt... content. He was putting his alchemy knowledge to good use while helping people, he had his own house to sleep in without having to worry about the mobs, he was friends with Hunter, George, and now Lana; and for the first time since before he could even remember, the future seemed... hopeful. He took in a deep breath of the cool, night air as he laid down on his back, gazing into the night sky, counting the numerous stars in the sky above him.

He was looking forward to his new life.

In the treeline in front of Hunter's Watch, just outside of the field of view for the guard tower, three shadowy figures took cover behind a tree, taking great care not to cause any sort of noise or disturbance with their presence. The cover of night cloaked them with a canopy of darkness as they surveyed the area. Their scouts had just discovered this community only a few days prior, and they had decided to come see for themselves if the town looked to be worth it. The walls seemed to be the biggest problem, but only a minor hindrance. No way to tell how many people were behind the walls, but it mattered very little. They had their god on their side.

One of the figures stepped forward to whisper to his leader. "Monsieur," his voice was barely audible. "I suggest we return to camp and come back before sunrise. A night attack would be advantageous to us in this situation." His accent was heavy, even in a whisper. His leader looked toward the gate of the town and thought for a second.

"Non," he finally replied as he placed his hand on his comrade's shoulder. "We give them a chance. We give everyone a chance. That's what separates us from the filth of this world. It's what he would want," he grinned as he tightened the grip on his subordinate's shoulder as his subordinate hung his head in shame.

"Forgive me, monsieur. You are right."

"All is forgiven, child," the leader spoke as he eased his grip. Their third comrade stepped forward from the shadows.

"Monsieur Jericho," she addressed her leader. "If we aren't attacking tonight, we should held back to camp. The mobs get lively at night," She was curt, but not disrespectful.

Her leader, Jericho, nodded. "You're right, Amelia. We will return tomorrow and give them the same options as we did the unholy Testificates..."

Jericho smiled as he remembered the glory of their conquest. A conquest that was only made possible through the benevolence of their lord. He took one last look at the town that laid before them. The next target for the La Sainte Armee des Calamars on their holy crusade.

"Convert... or die..." Jericho whispered.

Next Chapter: Blue Fire