Chapter 11: The Uninvited
The serene atmosphere of the sanctuary shattered in an instant. Kael's frantic signals from the watchtower sent a jolt of pure adrenaline through the settlement. Thora was already moving, barking sharp, clipped orders. The tribe, so recently relaxed, transformed into a well-drilled unit. Women and children were ushered quickly into the solid safety of the hut. The remaining hunters, including Roric, grabbed their spears and took up positions along the palisade wall, their eyes fixed on the eastern tree line.
Alistair's mind, honed by years of reacting to sudden threats in competitive gaming, clicked into a state of cold, hyper-focused clarity. He didn't feel fear; he felt a problem that needed solving. He scaled the watchtower ladder, emerging beside Kael on the platform.
"Show me," he said, his voice low.
Kael pointed, his hand steady now but his expression tense. Following his gaze, Alistair saw it. Movement. A lot of it. About two hundred meters out, a large group of figures was emerging from the dense foliage. They were humanoid, but they were not Blue-Skins. These creatures were bulkier, with ruddy, leathery skin and brutish features. They carried crude clubs and axes fashioned from dark, volcanic rock. They moved with a swaggering, aggressive confidence, their attention clearly fixed on the settlement.
[SCAN: GRAXIAN WAR-PARTY.]
AFFILIATION: STONETUSK CLAN.
NUMBER: 22.
THREAT LEVEL: MODERATE.
OBSERVATION: TERRITORIAL EXPANSION. RESOURCE ACQUISITION.
A war-party. They weren't here by accident. They were here to take.
Alistair's eyes darted, analyzing the terrain. The group was still filtering out of the jungle, disorganized, not yet in a proper assault formation. They were confident, maybe overconfident. Their leader, a massive Graxian with a necklace of large fangs, was pointing at the walls and laughing, as if the very idea of a fortification was amusing.
They hadn't seen him yet. They didn't know about the Admin.
A plan, ruthless and efficient, formed in his mind. It was a min-maxer's solution: maximum damage for minimum risk.
"Thora!" he called down, his voice cutting through the tense silence. She looked up, her face a mask of grim readiness. He pointed to the gate. "Be ready to open it. On my signal."
Her eyes widened in confusion for a split second, but then they hardened with trust. She nodded and moved to the gate, her hand on the heavy wooden bar.
Alistair turned his attention back to the war-party. They were beginning to spread out, preparing to rush the walls. The fanged leader was hefting his stone axe, roaring a challenge that echoed across the clearing.
Perfect.
Alistair focused. He called up his Terrain Manipulation. But this time, he didn't think about raising land. He thought about removing it. He focused on a single, precise point on the jungle's edge, right where the Graxians were most densely packed.
The cost in Power was significant, but less than the ignition. His pool dropped by 30 points.
He selected the command: **COLLAPSE.**
The ground beneath the lead Graxians didn't just crack. It vanished. A sinkhole ten feet wide and twice as deep erupted into existence, swallowing the roaring leader and four of his warriors whole. The sound was not of battle, but of surprise—a chorus of cut-off shouts and the sickening thud of bodies hitting hard earth and rock.
The charge halted in disarray. The remaining Graxians stared in shock at the gaping hole where their champion had just been.
That was the signal.
"Now!" Alistair yelled.
Thora and Roric shoved the gate open.
Alistair didn't stop. As the stunned Graxians stared at the pit, he focused on the trees directly above and behind them. He spent another 20 Power.
**RAISE LAND.**
This time, he wasn't creating a spike. He was creating a ramp. A sharp, steep wedge of earth and stone shot upwards, slamming into the canopy. The impact shook the trees violently, dislodging several large, dead branches and a shower of smaller debris that rained down on the Graxians, causing them to duck and cover their heads.
They were trapped between a pit, a newly-created cliff, and a hailstorm of wood. Their formation, what little they had, was completely broken.
From the gate, Thora let out a sharp, ululating cry. It was not a cry of fear, but a cry of the hunt. She, Roric, and the other Blue-Skin hunters did not charge out to meet the disoriented Graxians in melee. Instead, they used the opening Alistair had given them. They hurled their spears with deadly accuracy from the relative safety of the gateway.
Two more Graxians fell, chitin-tipped spears finding gaps in their leathery hides.
That was the final blow to their morale. The remaining Graxians, leaderless, confused, and under attack from an unseen force, broke. They turned and fled back into the jungle, scrambling over the new earthen ramp, leaving their fallen and wounded behind.
Silence returned to the clearing, broken only by the faint, pained groans from the sinkhole.
Alistair leaned on the watchtower's railing, his Power Pool sitting at a precarious 50/100. He had spent nearly half his reserves, but he had won without a single one of his people taking a wound.
He looked down at the scene. The sinkhole was a brutal, effective solution. It was clean. It was tactical.
But as he watched Thora cautiously approach the pit, her spear still held ready, he felt a cold knot in his stomach. This wasn't a game. The groans from the pit were real. He had just effectively buried five beings alive.
He had defended his home. He had proven the power of his mind over their brute strength. But as he stood in his watchtower, the taste of victory was ash in his mouth. The Admin of Vance Haven had just issued his first real decree, written not in faith, but in blood and collapsed earth.