Day 19 Cont. / Children

Hurry up and wait – the much reviled and far too common occurrence in the military had reared its head again. Only a handful of soldiers had arrived by the time Garret showed up, forcing him stand in formation for half an hour while the officer blew the horn again and waited for other troops to filter in from around town. Throughout it, all he could do was think, annoyed, that he could have been spending this time at Annika's side and be just as productive. When they did organize, the sergeants called their respective battlegroups to attention and began to go through roll call, excusing the soldiers whose partners were either dead or missing. Fortunately, Annika was neither dead nor missing, but unfortunately, that meant Garret still had a job to do.

"Good work everyone, you all fought well. Is everyone doing alright? Is there anything I should know before I send you out on another mission?"

The group murmured and a handful of soldiers raised their hands, signaling something was wrong. Sergeant Evans pulled each of them out of the formation individually to talk in private, dismissing most of them, but sending a few back to the formation. Maybe some of them were too shaken up from having to fight their own soldiers or from the horrors of the battle in general. Once done, he returned to the front of the group and launched into his briefing.

"Alright, now let's get down to business. We've cleared the town and swept the streets, but most of the buildings haven't been searched yet. Now we're going to go through the town door by door to make sure no one's left, hiding from us."

He swept his gaze over the soldiers, looking at the gaps in the formation where missing, wounded or dead soldiers used to stand.

"How of you have wounded partners?" A significant portion of the soldiers raised their hands.

"Unfortunate, but at least they're not dead. I don't think we'll encounter many, if any monsters, but I'd still like everyone to work in pairs, for safety. If you don't have a partner for now, find someone else who doesn't and team up."

With the administrative stuff dealt with, he unfolded the crudely sketched map of the town from before and pointed to the east side.

"We'll be responsible for this part of town, where the old courthouse and barracks are. We'll sweep from the plains to the center in two waves, with the second one being there in case the first missed something. People still able to fight will go in the first group, mages and exhausted soldiers will go in the second. I don't want to risk people getting sloppy from fatigue. Any questions?"

No one came forth, so he closed the map and set them at ease.

"You've got ten minutes to get a partner, then we're heading out. If you don't have one, raise your hand. Dismissed!"

Garret raised his hand and looked around. Lots of potential teammates were here, but they were wasting no time pairing up. Who would he be best suited to work with? More importantly, was there anyone here he knew? Though he'd probably made more acquaintances in the last two weeks than he would've in a year back in Northreach, he was still antisocial at heart and would rather work alone than be forced to interact with another unfamiliar soul. He searched desperately through the crowd. … no one. There wasn't a single person here that he was familiar with.

Suddenly a certain green-brown robed and very tired looking sorcerer tapped him on the shoulder.

"Hey. Want to work together?"

It took a moment for Garret to recognize him as the earth mage from before, and his sudden appearance caused him to stumble over his words.

"Ah, uh,… sure?"

He was as close to 'familiar' as he was going to get.

"Excellent! Oh, please, allow me to introduce myself."

He thrust a hand forward, which Garret shook once he regained his composure.

"Nathan White."

"Garret Fax."

The (surprisingly cheerful) man nodded and continued.

"I assume you're just as tired as me and have no objections to being in the second sweep?"

He was and did not.

"Great. Well then, Garret, let's go hunt some monsters."

"Hooooly, that's a lot of bodies."

When they reached the edge of town, Nathan let out an impressed whistle. As the rising sun illuminated the fields and roads around it, a vast scene of carnage was displayed to them. The grounds were covered in broken wagons, scorch marks from spells, embedded arrows, and a sea of mamono corpses. Blood stained the grass red and, having mixed with the mud and rain, flowed into pools wherever it found a low spot. The monsters fighting in the town had managed to buy enough time for the other civilians to start to evacuate with whatever possessions they could carry. Needing every fighter they had to stall The Order, though, forced them to leave the train of refugees unguarded with disastrous result. As they surveyed the field, Garret picked out a few of the different monster types. A kikimora here, a danuki there… a couple lamia, an occasional holstaur… None of these monsters were well suited for combat, so the ease with which the soldiers in the fields had slaughtered them was unsurprising. The men that these monsters gravitated towards didn't tend to be combat effective either and had met the same fate. Garret didn't think he spotted a single fallen soldier of The Order amongst the dead.

"Our soldiers certainly did their job."

"Yup. And good fuckin' riddance." Nathan spit towards the bodies.

"You're from Northreach, aren't you?"

"Yup! How could you tell?"

Garret half-smiled. That display of xenophobia would have looked extremely out of place among the more moderate Natonian soldiers.

"Lucky guess."

They had to wait another half hour for the first group to get organized and head out before the second could even consider starting – something that was good because it allowed Garret and Nathan to recover a bit more of their strength, but irritating because it meant more time away from Annika. As Garret placed back and forth, impatiently, Nathan couldn't help but tease him a bit.

"Garret, you're making me tired just looking at you. Sit down, we've got time."

He kept pacing anyways.

"I just want to get this over with."

"Wounded partner?"

Nathan correctly guessed the source of his anxiety and he nodded.

"I don't like being away when she's that badly injured, even if it isn't life threatening."

"Could you do anything for her if you were there?"

Garret was forced to admit that, no, he couldn't.

"Then relaaaaax. She'll be fine."

"Maybe… but aren't you worried? Your partner's wounded too, right?"

That caused Nathan to laugh.

"No, she's dead. Nearly got cut in half by a minotaur."

Shit, then what was he doing here? The comment took Garret aback and he fumbled with his words, not really sure what to say.

"Oh. uh… I'm sorry?"

Nathan shook his head. "Don't be. We didn't get along."

One of the ways The Order tried to counter the mamono's influence was to assign everyone a battle partner based on compatible personalities. The idea was that by living, eating, sleeping and fighting together, the two would forge close bond, either romantic or platonic. They'd be less likely to be lured away from a close friend or lover by a mamono temptress than from acquaintances. It also had the added benefit of increasing unit cohesion and covering each gender's weaknesses as well, so that decree quickly became widely adopted. Evidently, though, it was not always successful in its match making.

"Uh… well if you're ok, then…"

"I'm more than ok. Let's just focus on our job."

The first house they searched was almost completely empty. Its occupants must have been responsible for one of the carts on the road because aside from furniture, there was almost nothing of value in the house. What little had been left, like tools or heavy clothes, were too bulky to be taken with them, and too heavy for The Order to loot. They did a quick search to see if anyone was hiding under the bed or in a wardrobe, but found no one, and moved on to the next house.

The second one was a mess, it's stone walls and sturdy construction had allowed a dwarf and her husband to barricade themselves in a back room, probably hoping for a mamono victory in battle. Said barricade hadn't stopped the first search team, though, and the remnants it, as well as the blood of the house's inhabitants, were scattered across the floor. Behind the house, a small forge had been set up for the dwarf to ply her trade, but nothing here was valuable loot for a soldier. There were no weapons and the majority of her work seemed to be for domestic use. They dumped the bodies out onto the street for disposal later and, after a brief search, continued on.

The next building, a small candy shop, caused Nathan to laugh when he entered.

"Heh. Hey Garret, take a look at this!"

The shop only consisted of three rooms, the sales room, the storage room, and a kitchen for manufacturing the candy or cooking food. Behind the counter was a massive pot holding the flower where an alraune and her husband lived, though 'lived' was definitely past tense here. Both the alraune and her husband were slumped against each other, neither of them breathing. In each of their hands was a partially eaten deathcap mushroom. They must have decided to die together once they realized the battle was lost, rather than wait for The Order to kill them. An alraune couldn't exactly run after all. Garret checked the pulse of the incubus to make sure he was really dead, before announcing what they both already knew.

"Suicide."

"Some problems just take care of themselves, eh?"

"Nice of them to do that for us."

Now it was Garrett's turn to spit on the corpses. Had it been any other monster, he might have felt a little sympathy for them, but not an alraune. They dumped the husband outside and painstakingly dragged the pot out as well, where Garret cast a spell to set the alraune's corpse on fire.

"That's for what you did to Rin…"

The remaining houses were pretty unremarkable. Most were empty, a couple showed signs of a struggle, and some even had a bit loot, but for the most part, their job of being a second set of eyes was unpleasantly redundant. These houses didn't have many, if any places to hide that wouldn't been found in the first sweep, and all this was doing was keeping him away from his partner. Nathan didn't have any objections to picking up the pace, so their searches of the remaining buildings became a bit less thorough as they rushed through them.

The last building to search was the old barracks, weather worn and with a few cracks in the walls, but still serviceable. Inside, the oil lanterns hanging from the walls illuminated their surroundings, giving them enough light to see around the large, stone building. Juxtaposed to the traditional, utilitarian design of a military building, the walls here had colourful banners decorating them, and the floor had several vibrant rugs. None of these adornments were of particularly high quality, but they gave the building a cheerful feel – a cheerfulness somewhat marred by the presence of a slain dark priest in the corner and a few blackened spots on the walls where spells had impacted.

"Looks like she tried to stand and fight."

"Mhmm."

Unlike the barracks back in Nation, this one only had a few separate rooms. The soldiers would have slept together here in bunk beds rather than having their own space. When they left the common area and searched the sleeping quarters, they found it had also been decorated. Beds had colourful stripes painted on the worn, wooden poles, and the typically plain sheets had been replaced with hand-made quilts. Garret kicked open one of the foot lockers and found a few sets of children's clothes in it, as well as a handful of wooden toys. Some of them were your typical fair like wooden soldiers or horses, but others were far, far too 'adult' for what a small child should be playing with.

"A nursery?"

"Or an orphanage. If we're half as good at killing monsters as I'd think we are, they'd certainly need one."

Nathan picked up one of the more unusual toys, then tossed it away, disgusted.

"I really shouldn't be surprised… but somehow I am."

"I guess they train their daughters early."

"Disgusting monsters…"

The last two rooms were a makeshift kitchen-dining combination room and a storage room. The only thing of interest in the kitchen was that a significant amount of food remained in the cupboards and hadn't been taken with them when they fled. If a priest cleansed it, that might be a boon for the soldiers – having something other than hard tack to eat was always welcome. The storage room was similarly uninteresting, full of crates and barrels, but the first wave had probably already searched them and Garret didn't feel like spending an hour rummaging through the boxes.

With this being their last building, and its resident having already been dealt with, they hustled out the door after a quick sweep. Garret wanted to get back to Annika and Nathan looked similarly enthusiastic about the idea of wrapping up, though he was probably looking forward to a nap more than anything. After a quick check in with the sergeant and one final formation, they were finally released for a bit.

Annika greeted him with a half-hug when he returned. One of the priests had come earlier, she explained, and healed her ribs. Her arm was still splinted and heavily bandaged, as were her legs, but she could at least talk normally now. That made him smile, happy that she was on the mend.

"So what was the big emergency?"

Garret sat on the edge of her cot when she moved over to make some space.

"Nothing too serious. We searched every building for hiding monsters and secured the area. The sergeant put me in a secondary group, so everything was already dead by the time I got there. I should have just stayed with you."

That caused Annika to laugh. "Well, ya did your duty. At least we know we're safe now. … So tell me! What did I miss?"

"Miss?"

"When I crashed into the house. How'd the battle go?"

At Annika's prodding, he recounted the events she was absent for the best that he could. There wasn't really much to tell, just a few times when the line broke where he had to help suppress the monsters surging forward, and their clean up once the monsters had been routed. For lack of anything else to talk about, he also gave a quick overview of what they found on the plains and their uneventful search operation.

"It was strange though, only finding one monster in the barracks. Especially after all the children had left. Why stay?"

Annika shrugged as best as she was able.

"Maybe she didn't? Did you see any priests during the fight? Maybe she hid there for the battle or got separated from her convent."

"Hmmm, maybe…"

The two chatted together for a while before a familiar pair pulled back the medical tent's flap and wandered in. It was Eric and Aisha, uninjured, but clearly searching for someone.

"Ay, Garret! Annika! You made it!"

When Eric spotted them, he shouted a greeting across the room and began making his way over. Annika's cot, long though it may be, was starting to get pretty crowded now that there were three additional people sitting on it.

"Tell me, Annika, do your wounds still hurt? We were so worried when you got dropped to the dirt."

Despite her words, the rhyme betrayed that Aisha had actually been pretty confident she'd survive. Annika played along, though, and waved away the concern.

"I'm fine. Got a few broken bones, but the priests can fix that."

"See, she's a tough girl, I told you she'd be fine."

"I hope they don't leave you with broken limbs, your chances in battle would be quite slim."

"Eh, they'll get to me once they heal the others."

Annika pointed to a soldier on the other side of the tent for emphasis. The woman had been slashed across the gut, straight through her armour. Priests and chirgeons had been kept busy for hours, trying to save her life, though it seemed like they had finally managed to heal enough to stabilize her. Compared to things like that, she was a low priority.

Moving on to a different topic, Garret brought up the search party.

"Did you find anything in your sweep, Evan? Aisha?"

Evan nodded enthusiastically and Aisha looked similarly pleased with herself.

"We found a whole cabinet full of liquor! Beer, sprites, vodka, the works!"

Aisha looked like she was about to drool, thinking about it.

"They looked so good… and they're safe to drink! No prisoner fruit, no demon energy, no nothing!"

"We can crack 'em open tonight. I think we all deserve a reward for a fight well fought."

Garret smiled as the two alcoholics recounted the tale of their spoils, but that wasn't the only thing he wanted to know about.

"That's nice and all, but I meant monsters. It seemed like the town was pretty cleared out."

The pair nodded in agreement.

"Not much. We found a succubus, lesser of course, hiding in a cellar but that was about it."

"Cellar? But there's no keep here."

Annika spoke up, confused. Garret was likewise puzzled, and Eric and Aisha joined the confusion, not understanding why the two from Northreach thought it strange.

"Well more like a pit than anything. It's pretty common for houses to have a hole under them to store meat or milk. The soil keeps it cooler."

"Do you not have these in Northreach?"

Garret shook his head with a half smile.

"Our whole damn country is an icebox, and in the summers, we just do without. Only castles and large fortifications have them. "

"Hmm, strange."

After a call for lunch was made and the soldiers chowed down in their rations, they were again organized into working parties to collect the corpses from the town and drag them out onto the fields to be burned. It was eventually going to be reoccupied after all, and the bodies didn't make it seem too welcoming. The work was grim but unfortunately necessary.

Throughout the job, Garret's mind kept wandering. Why had only one mamono been there?

He slung a body into his shoulder and hauled it over to a wagon.

If she fled battle, shouldn't she have taken her husband with her?

He tossed the monster into the wagon with a sickening thud.

And if she was alone, why was there only one monster in a building of that size?

This body was covered in blood and still wet. He gritted his teeth and he picked it up trying to avoid getting any on him.

It was a nursery and most of the food was still there. Maybe she came back for it?

Another thud, another body dealt with.

Maybe there was something he missed… or maybe he was thinking too hard about this.

If nothing else, the intrusive thoughts distracted him from thinking about exactly what he was carrying, so he didn't mind them too much. It was only after the job was over that he wanted them to disappear. A few hours later, it was time for dinner (at least, for those who kept their appetite after the corpse clearing), but they kept pestering him throughout it. Did they miss something? The whole thing seemed strange. ... But after a couple hours of intensely scrutinizing anything, of course he'd find stuff that seemed strange. Life was strange. Just ignore it, Garret, it's fine…

After dinner, the tents in the old camp were torn down and set up again in the town's main square (recently cleaned of blood and gore by a wizard). Someone had originally suggested that the soldiers sleep in the town houses, but the officers wanted to keep everyone as close together as possible. At least the buildings around the square allowed them to suspend some canvases to shield their tents from any more rain, and the stone meant they wouldn't be sinking into the mud like this morning. Guards got posted around the town's perimeter and also at the immediate edges of the square once it began to get dark, but fortunately neither Eric, Aisha, Annika, or Garret had been given those assignments.

Later in the evening, Annika was healed by a priest, putting her back in fighting shape. Seeing that the whole group was mobile now, Eric took this as a sign to begin their celebration and invited them for drinks.

"I'll met you there in a bit, I need to do something."

"Want me to come with?"

"Nah, it's fine, Annika. It's nothing too important."

As the rest of the gang headed to Eric and Aisha's tent, Garret announced his temporary departure. The mystery of the barracks was still bothering him, and he knew he wouldn't be able to truly relax until he checked it one last time.

The building was quiet. Empty. Just like the way he had left it. Garret eased the door open and slowly crept inside. Even though he knew it would be vacant, his paranoia got the better of him and forced him to sneak around. The barracks was at the exact half-way point between the two guard postings, so if a monster ambushed him, he doubted they'd be able to hear his shouts. Not that there would be a monster, though, they had already searched the buildings and found them clear. This was just him indulging in a bit of paranoia. No harm doing that, right?

The oil lamps had finally burned out, so he produced a flame to see where he was walking as he slowly crept around. He flipped over the carpets of the common area, checked under a table and examined the walls… nothing. Of course there would be nothing, Garret, you're wasting your time fumbling around in the dark.

Despite that thought, he kept going. The sleeping quarters set Garret on edge when he searched it, the long shadows cast by the bunk beds, combined by the fact that he didn't have the energy to illuminate more than a few feet with his 'torch', gave the room a terrifyingly creepy atmosphere. Was that flicker from his fire sputtering, or from something moving? Was there something hiding in that shadow? What was that tiny reflection he saw in the distance? A metal latch? Or the eyes of a monster? Despite the surroundings pushing his paranoia into overdrive, he found nothing unusual in this room. No hidden switches or concealed doors, no monsters under the bed, and nothing hiding in the foot lockers. Taking a deep breath, Garret put the creepy bedroom behind him and headed into the kitchen.

Again, he found nothing of interest. He searched the cupboards and drawers one last time and even took a look up the chimney of the fireplace, but the room was just as empty as it was when he first searched it. That just left the storage room.

Boxes, barrels and more boxes were what awaited him, as did the tedious process of unstacking, searching and restacking them. He doubted the village had any fairies in it, but if it did, they'd probably be drawn to the children… and were small enough to hide in any of these crates. There wasn't much of interest, though, just generic dry goods that were, thankfully, monster free. The barrels were similarly uninteresting. Most were filled with water, though two had lamp oil in them. When he moved the last one, though, from the back corner of the room, he spotted something interesting. Beneath it, barely visible with the barrel on top, was a trapdoor allowing access to (presumably) one of the pit-cellars Eric had spoken about.

"… Son of a bitch."

That was the perfect place to hid monsters, he'd bet a month's wages there were mamono down there. It also explained the presence of a single dark priest in the building. Someone would have to stay behind to arrange the boxes, sacrificing themselves to protect the others. He frowned. Monsters were hedonistic and undisciplined, behaving altruistically seemed strangely out of character for them… but it was the only theory he could think of that fit. It was more satisfying than Annika's, anyway.

Ok, so what was the plan? They'd have heard him walking around and moving the crates above them. If he left, they'd probably emerge and either attack him or run. He could call for guards, but they wouldn't hear him at this distance, and that would force the monster's hands. He could try to hold the door shut with a barrel, but they wouldn't have sealed themselves in with no way out… Monsters were physically stronger than humans, one or two of them could probably lift the trapdoor even if something was on it… If he opened it, they'd attack him immediately or try to run, and he probably only had the energy for a single combat spell… Shit, he was backed into a corner now. Damn it, he should have brought Annika, Eric, someone with him.

He took a deep breath and looked around. At least he had time to think. The lamp oil barrels from before caught his eye. He grabbed the bar he had used to open the boxes and pried the lid off one of the full ones, before carefully walking it towards the trapdoor. Once there, he took a deep breath, steeled himself, and opened the hatch.

Dark energy from a spell flashed and a bolt of magic shot out of the hole the second he opened the door. Expecting an attack, he had remained off to the side, so he wasn't hit, but even so, that spell looked weak. Even if it had struck him, he doubted it would do much damage… but that meant there was someone down there. Immediately he extinguished his flame, then scrambled behind the barrel and heaved, tipping it and pouring its contents down the hole.

There was the telltale splash of the oil hitting the bottom, followed by a surprised shriek from a woman and various cries from… children? Oh no… When the smell started to waft around, whoever had cast the spell at the bottom recognized what they were now drenched in and immediately began to plead for their life. The panic in her voice only caused the children to cry louder, even more scared now that they knew their caretaker was terrified.

"No! No, please! Don't!"

Garret ignited a hand and, careful to keep it from accidentally setting off the oil vapors, used its light to peer down the hole. The 'cellar' was only about ten feet deep and wasn't too wide, but somehow the monsters had managed to squeeze a dark-priest, a kikimora, and a dozen or so terrified children into it – all now thoroughly soaked in oil.

"Please, sir, please! They're just children! Kill us if you must, but I beg of you, have mercy on them!"

The kikimora joined in pleading and the children looked up at him with fearful eyes, falling silent, but still frightened.

There was no mission they would threaten, and they had basically surrendered… He could let them go. No one would ever have to know. He had said before, 'no mercy for monsters', but burning children to death? Monster or not, that was something he balked at. Clean kills with a sword were one thing, but torturing them with a slow death? Was that something the Chief God would want? Their pitiful state didn't help either. In the dark, dripping with oil, they almost looked human, like the dirty, desperate refugees Northreach would sometimes take in when a region fell to monsters. Standing on the edge like this, he felt like an executioner, not a soldier.

"Please, sir! For love of all that is good, choose mercy!"

… In truth, though, the Chief God probably wouldn't care, and he shouldn't either. They were just monsters, right? It was his job to kill them, comfort wasn't a concern. He knew what would be expected of him the minute he signed up with The Order.

"… I made my choice long ago."

Garret was surprised at how simple it was. In the few stories he knew where heroes did something they might personally be conflicted about, there was usually some kind of physical force that they had to fight against, like their own body rebelled against their actions. There was nothing like that for him, though, no titanic test of willpower, he just flicked his hand forward, lazily, and the fire dropped into the hole. Condemning them to death was terrifyingly easy. After that, the fire was no longer his to control, the vapors ignited half-way down, and the oil coating the monsters and pooling on the floor followed soon after. The hard part was listening to the screams.

"Yo, Garret! You're late!"

"Sorry, we started without you."

Eric and Aisha waved to him when they saw him approaching their tent and Annika scooched over on a bedroll to give him a place to sit. On the ground between the three lay a collection of coloured bottles filled with all sorts of alcohol.

"So what's your poison? We got, uh… Thaemian brandy, Lestican wine, Blackwald vodka, uh…"

Eric waved his hand over the bottles and shrugged.

"We've got a lot."

"Got anything strong that doesn't taste strong?"

He laughed and handed him a bottle with a flower and honeybee emblazoned on it.

"Thaemian Brandy it is."

True to his word, the honey brandy barely tasted of alcohol but got his head swimming after only a few gulps.

"Hey, Garret."

He stopped mid-swig as Annika called to him.

"Hmm?"

"Cheers!"

She held her bottle up and clinked it with his. Eric and Aisha did as well, announcing in unison "For the glory of The Order!"

"Heh… Yeah. For the glory of The Order."

Garret cheered along with them, but couldn't help thinking that most of today was anything but glorious.

They were still on campaign so they couldn't get too drunk, but that didn't stop an impromptu duet from breaking out between Annika and Aisha once the group had a bit of a buzz going. Needless to say, the talent of one's singing greatly dwarfed the other's. Eventually, though, everyone needed to get to sleep, so Garret and Annika bid their friends a good night and headed back to their tent. When they arrived, though, instead of bedding down, Annika made herself comfortable and looked at Garret expectantly.

"Alright, let's talk."

Her sudden imperative made him look at her, confused.

"About?"

"Monster children. You said we'd discuss it later."

"Oh, uh… Sure."

That was probably the last thing he wanted to talk about, but he had promised her. He sat down on his roll then gestured for her to proceed.

"Go ahead."

"We could have let that girl go, Garret. We could have gagged her; she wasn't a threat to anyone."

He gave her a strange look. That was certainly something he disagreed with, not to mention something completely against the teachings of the Northreach priests.

"No? She was a monster. She's a threat just by existing."

"Not yet though. Until she matures, she's just a girl. We could have tied her up and let her go later. I don't think its right to kill a child, no matter their race."

He shrugged. It wasn't pleasant, but the age of a monster shouldn't matter. A monster was a monster.

"Maybe? But that doesn't solve anything. That just kicks the problem down the road five, ten years until some other Order soldier has to fight her when she's full grown."

Annika raised a finger.

"She could grow up to be like the centaurs. She might not ever attack humans."

"And maybe she'd go live on the moon! Come on, Annika, you've seen how they live, the chances of her turning out that way are close to none."

"Yeah, but is it right to judge her before she's even made that choice?"

"Is it right to endanger humans to give her that choice?"

Annika looked thoughtful for a moment, formulating an argument before carefully replying.

"I think the choice she makes is her sin, not ours. We're not at fault if she decides to attack humans, that's her decision. Her choosing to do something evil later doesn't make mercy now wrong."

"I don't think that's…"

The faces of the children in the cellar flashed before his eyes. All this talk was bringing back recent, unpleasant memories. Monsters in the hole… Killing them was the right thing to do, Garret was sure of that, but it wasn't easy… and someone arguing that he shouldn't have done that just made it even harder to swallow. Come on, Garret, don't think about that. This is war, you knew it had to be done. There was nothing wrong with a soldier doing his duty... right? He stared at the ground in front of him, rapidly losing his motivation to debate.

"Sorry, Annika, can we talk about something else."

She arched an eyebrow.

"I think it would be better to solve this now before we go any further. We just got started, is something bothering you?"

"I just…"

His pause and the topic at hand was more than enough for her to guess what the problem was.

"You found more children, didn't you?"

Garret hesitantly nodded.

"Yeah…"

"… And what did you do?"

The screams echoed in the back of Garret's mind. Horrible, tortured screams from voices far too young came as the fire engulfed the children. It intensified for a time, then slowly faded as one by one they either succumbed to the flames or screamed themselves hoarse before burning to death in silence. That memory, those sounds… Something told him they were going to stay with him for the rest of his life.

"I think, Annika, you already know what I did."

Author's Notes: That's the end of Act 1! Thank you everyone for sticking around so far, we've reached the 1/3rd mark of the story. Of course, I don't actually know that only 66% of the story remains to be written, things might get shortened or extended depending on how things go, but I think, milestone-wise, this is a pretty good spot to mark an act transition. I've introduced most of the important characters at least once, and, I think, have given a decent overview of the key ideas that I'm going to cover in later chapters. Now, on to my commentary.

One thing that you commonly see is a dehumanization of enemies in stories. Since they're not the focus, you rarely see how the war/conflict/whatever affects them or get to know anything about them. I wanted to at least do a bit of that, though, which is why I went into detail about their search operation. You got to see one family that had packed everything and fled, only to be killed when The Order attacked the refugees. Another family, who didn't flee decided to kill themselves and die together painlessly rather than being hacked apart by swords. Then there was the dwarf who, despite being in a town full of fighter-monsters, didn't make any weapons or armour. Swords and shields would probably have fetched a decent price in a town with that population, so why not make them? Was she a pacifist? Garret certainly didn't care, but hmmmmm, the hints are there.

The other thing that I wanted to show was a scene that demonstrated the ruthlessness expected of a typical order soldier and how that affects them. I'm not entirely sure the way I did it here was the best, but I was in a bit of a rush to get this chapter out before my classes started (more on that later), and I think it's at least serviceable. Again, they're 'just monsters', and he was only doing what the Chief God would want him to do. As he said in his chat with Annika, they'd probably have to fight them in a few years anyways, so killing them now is fine… right? But is it really that easy to justify killing a bunch of children? Especially if they don't pose a threat to you, and your only way to do it is torturous for them? You probably already know the answer, but I'll write about that anyways in later chapters.

Speaking of Annika, I've tried to set up a bit of a consequential vs deontological dynamic with the pair. It's boring if everyone nods their head at the main character and agrees with them all the time, so I wanted some arguments to happen. Garret is entirely an 'ends justify the means' person, while Annika is on the other side of the coin. I don't really want this story to get bogged down in lengthy philosophical debates, but a page of dialogue here or there can be fit in, I think, and makes the characters a bit more fleshed out in their motivations.

Now, I mentioned that this chapter was a bit rushed, that's because I'm starting a massive project and won't have any time at all to write in the next month (maybe two). I wanted to get this chapter out before then, though, so please forgive some of the awkward writing here. Now, I know the reputation hiatuses get, with most authors just abandoning the story, but as I've said before, that's not going to happen. So uh… When you don't see a chapter for a month or two, let it be known that the delay is planned and not because I decided to stop writing.

Ok, that's all I've got, so once again, thank you everyone for reading. The favourites and follows stats keep ticking up so I must be doing something right.

Until next time, Sayonara!