The sky is beginning to lighten, not with warmth, but with a pale, hesitant glow that clings to the edges of Furaberg like frost refusing to melt. Weak rays of sunlight brush the summit, catching on jagged stone and old snow, turning the mountain into a blade held upright against the morning. The light does not banish the cold; it only makes it visible.
Below, the village stirs.
Smoke rises in thin, disciplined columns from chimneys. Doors creak open. Footsteps crunch softly over packed snow. Life resumes not because danger has passed, but because routine is the only shield people have left. Children run through the village hall, their laughter sharp and brief, echoing against wooden beams scarred by age and soot. They chase one another in circles, boots slipping, sleeves too long, unaware—or pretending to be unaware—of the armed men stationed only streets away.
Men shoulder axes and lead their White Hounds toward the forest. The dogs' breath steams, ears alert, muscles coiled. They do not bark. They have been trained better than that. Women gather water, tend to children, wipe soot from windows, tidy rooms disturbed by boots and blood and hurried orders from the night before. Some mutter under their breath as they scrub away messes left by slave-soldiers like Aldo—mud, melted snow, discarded bandages. No one says his name aloud while cleaning. Names have weight.
A few old people linger near doorways, leaning on canes polished smooth by decades of use. Their eyes follow the soldiers as they pass. They ask quietly about wounds, about losses, about whether the forest will answer back today. Their voices are thin but steady. They have lived long enough to know that panic wastes breath.
No villagers are injured. That fact moves through the settlement like a fragile blessing, passed hand to hand. Forty slave-soldiers are wounded, but none seriously. Cuts, bruises, twisted joints, shallow punctures hastily wrapped. Pain that can still stand upright. Pain that can still hold a weapon.
Aldo stands near the edge of the square, boots planted in churned snow, watching the village wake as if from behind glass. His breath fogs the air in slow, controlled bursts. He notes everything—the spacing of patrols, the way people avoid looking directly at armed men, the tension in shoulders that should be relaxed at dawn.
Beside him, Comtois is already working, voice clipped, gestures efficient. They reorganize, recount, reassign. Numbers matter more than intentions now. The 204th company: sixty out of a hundred still able to fight. The 205th: fifty, bloodied more heavily after deploying deeper against a PPF ambush. Aldo folds those figures inward, subtracts the twenty he sent from the 204th to intercept, subtracts the ten the 205th sent yesterday to scout the main PPF route. The math settles like a verdict.
Forty men per company. Available. Mobilizable. Expendable, if the situation demands it.
Aldo lifts his gaze toward the forest. The treeline stands dark and orderly, snow clinging to branches like old ash. Somewhere beyond it, decisions are being made that do not include him. He feels that absence like a pressure behind the eyes.
He is preparing for the next decision, the next attack, the next compromise that will stain someone else's hands and still be written under his authority.
But the forest will wait.
The village will not.
A sharp, angry sound cuts through the morning—wood struck by fist. Then again. Louder. Repetitive. Someone is knocking, not to be let in, but to be heard. Aldo turns as Comtois strides toward a house near the edge of the square, shoulders squared, jaw tight. The door shudders under his knuckles.
Inside, voices rise. Aldo cannot hear the words clearly from where he stands, only the tone—hostile, defensive, sharp with accusation. He recognizes it immediately. Liv. Tarvold. The two men who have been in contact with the PPF. The problem that refuses to stay theoretical.
Insults spill out, curses layered over one another, language fractured by anger. Aldo starts toward them, then stops. Distance becomes a decision. Before he closes half the space, Liv's voice cuts in—higher, fierce, unyielding. The argument swells, drawing attention like blood in water.
Then others interfere. Boys—probably crush Liv—step forward first, emboldened by proximity rather than sense. Then their parents, faces tight with fear and righteousness. Then grandparents, leaning on memory as much as on canes, reminding everyone of older wrongs, older bargains. The crowd thickens, voices overlapping, a living wall forming between Comtois and the house.
The dawn light does nothing to soften it. If anything, it sharpens every movement.
Onaga moves.
He steps between the two sides with practiced speed, palms raised, stance wide enough to block a charge from either direction. Snow scatters under his sandals. His presence is immediate, authoritative, but strained—like a rope pulled too tight.
"Guys, we need to stop fighting.." His voice is firm, but there is urgency beneath it, a plea disguised as command.
No one listens.
Comtois shifts his weight, hand hovering near his weapon. Tarvold maintains his guard, shoulders hunched, eyes never leaving the soldiers. The villagers murmur, anger and fear feeding each other in a closed loop.
Aldo's voice cuts in, precise and cold, slicing through the noise.
"We need to keep our combatants ready, we can eliminate Canine Boy later."
The words land heavily. They are not shouted. They do not need to be.
Onaga snaps his head around, eyes blazing. "Taichou-sama, let me handle this. Minding your own plan, please!" His shout cracks, raw with frustration.
Aldo frowns. The crease between his brows deepens, a familiar ache settling there. He exhales slowly, the sound controlled, almost resigned.
"Ok,...but you need to tell me and Comtois what to do with Canine Boy as the mandatory requirement."
He steps back, deliberately removing himself. At the corner of the square, he crouches and scoops up snow, packing it between his palms. The cold bites. He shapes it carefully, rolling until it forms a perfect sphere. Then another. His movements are methodical, almost meditative.
[ This is how things slip. Not with screams, but with people deciding I am optional. ]
Behind him, the confrontation sharpens.
Tarvold's voice rises, cutting through the crowd. "You want me to negotiate with the monsters !? You are the guillotine of the nobles, bringing destruction and sorrow to the innocents!" His guard never drops, arms tense, ready.
He turns his stare on Comtois. "And you seem shameless about being a monster?"
Comtois chuckles, a sound devoid of humor. He rolls his eyes, wicked amusement flashing briefly across his face. "I am just an armed Earthling, Korean if you care further, armed slave. Why don't you criticize the highers, why me, and others, who have no agency of what we do?"
He continues, voice steady, almost lecturing. "I just do what I am told to do. Legally, citizenship of Mikh includes all human, and you, Canine Boy, are not a human, accord to the law, you must be captured, sold to slave-soldier as a commodity, or be free…in Mikhland-designed Reserve Sites."
As he speaks, Comtois slowly raises his gun. The motion is unhurried, deliberate. Several of his privates mirror him, weapons lifting in unison, forming a line. Metal catches the dawn light. The crowd inhales as one.
Liv steps forward.
Her eyes widen first, shock flashing across her face, then hardening into resolve. She moves in front of Tarvold, arms spread, hand raised.
"That is too cruel…" Her voice trembles, then steadies. "I…won't…let it happen."
Silence crashes down, heavy and unstable.
Aldo presses his thumb into the snowball until it cracks. He does not look up immediately.
Tension coils tighter. Onaga feels it slipping beyond his control. He glances toward Aldo instinctively, then stops himself. He knows Aldo well enough now. He knows the shape of his compromises.
[ He will compromise. A compromise no one is happy with. ]
So Onaga does not call him.
The seconds stretch. Breath fogs. A child begins to cry somewhere at the edge of the crowd, the sound thin and confused.
Onaga's jaw tightens. Desperation flickers across his face, quickly masked. Time does not wait. The forest does not wait. Neither do people when fear has found a voice.
Then he has an idea.
It is imperfect. It is risky. It will anger everyone in a different way.
He gambles it anyway.