A hundred miles north of Karen City, hidden within a jagged valley, a thousand fires flickered against the night. The wind carried a constant, discordant clamor: the braying of beasts, the clatter of iron, and the low, guttural growls of non-human tongues. From a distance, the encampment resembled a cluster of festering sores upon the earth.
Hundreds of tents were crammed together, most of them little more than rotting burlap draped over scavenged branches. Demi-humans and Misbegotten lived in cramped, filth-ridden proximity, with the occasional towering silhouette of a Troll looming over the makeshift shelters. They wore rusted scrap-iron and boiled leather, clutching notched cleavers and crooked wooden spears. To a casual observer, they looked like a rabble. But the sheer savagery in their eyes and the corded muscle of their frames spoke of a desperate, lethal hardiness.
Curiously, the camp was divided by a sharp contrast in discipline. While the outskirts were a chaotic mess of brawling and drunken revelry, the central command was eerily orderly. There, the tents were spaced with mathematical precision, protected by firebreaks and a web of sentries that watched the darkness with unblinking eyes.
At the heart of this command stood an elder Misbegotten. His hair and beard were a wispy, ash-grey, and his back was stooped under the weight of decades. Krug, the High Priest, stroked his beard as he watched the disorder of the outer camp, his clouded eyes filled with a heavy, lingering sorrow.
"High Priest, the air is growing cold. You should not stand in the wind," a guard whispered from behind him.
Krug did not answer. He remained motionless for a long time before letting out a breath that sounded like a death rattle.
"Enough, Krug. Stop your useless worrying."
The sound of rushing air preceded a bundle of heavy cloth flying through the darkness. Krug didn't flinch as the cloak landed perfectly across his bony shoulders.
"Did we not expect this the moment we called for a tribal alliance?" the voice continued. A massive figure stepped forward, his boots crunching on the dry earth. He reached out to adjust the cloak for the elder.
He was a Demi-human of roughly forty years, but he stood nearly a head taller than even the Misbegotten priest. Compared to the stunted warriors of his kin, Soreto was a giant of a man, his frame thick with the kind of power that could snap a spear in two.
Soreto turned to the guards and waved them away. "I have business with the High Priest. Go eat and rest. We have a war to fight tomorrow, and I want your bellies full and your arms strong."
"Yes, General!" The guards saluted with visible relief and hurried toward the fires.
Once the footsteps faded, leaving only the two of them on the high ground, Krug turned to the giant. "Soreto, you should be at the vanguard. Why have you returned?"
"The vanguard? What is there to watch?" Soreto rolled his eyes and sat heavily on the ground. "Karen City is sitting right in front of us like a slab of fat dripping with oil. My stomach is growling, and so is everyone else's. Not just the small tribes, even our own Shivering Wind warriors are going mad with anticipation."
He pointed toward the retreating guards. "Those boys are from the Rono clan. Their village was hit by hail this spring. They're counting on this raid to bring back enough pelts to build new tents. If they don't, they won't survive the winter."
"That is enough!" Krug barked, cutting him off. "The proximity of the prey is no excuse to discard discipline. And do not try to sway me, Soreto. We strike Hektov's unit and nothing else. I do not care what you discussed with the other chieftains; we will not set a single foot inside Karen City."
Soreto's face flushed a deep, angry purple. "All for that worthless promise to Clavell? If we kill Hektov, the city is ours for the taking. What could a lone Perfumer do to stop us? He is a healer, not a Crucible Knight!"
"Foolish!" Krug glared at him with a mix of anger and disappointment. "Do you think I agreed to his terms out of fear for his strength? Have you no mind for what comes after?"
"Think, Soreto! Even if we take the city, how long would the Golden Order tolerate our presence? Dectus is only two hundred miles away. They would only need to send fifty Leyndell Knights and a few companies of infantry to hang every one of us from the confession racks. Or worse. The Demi-humans would be fed slow-acting poisons and dragged off as slaves to dig their canals. The Misbegotten would be sent to the colosseums to die for the amusement of their nobles. And the Trolls? They would drive iron anchors through their bellies and drape them in gold silk just to pull their carriages!"
"And what if we take nothing?" Soreto yelled back, his neck veins bulging. "Can you guarantee that Clavell will even become Governor? Can you guarantee he'll keep his word and send the grain and medicine? Can you guarantee we will have any space left to live?"
"I cannot! Of course I cannot!" Krug's eyes were wide with a frantic intensity. "But do we have a better choice?"
"We could sack the city and run! Hide in the mountains! Gelmir is vast; even the knights of Dectus couldn't find us all if we scattered."
"You speak madness!" Krug jumped up and kicked Soreto in the shin, his beard trembling with rage. "Gelmir is vast, but is it vaster than the Altus Plateau? You want to sack Karen? How many would you slaughter? A demigod of the Ancient Dragons just passed through these lands. If we commit such an atrocity now, it would be the same as grinding the faces of the two Eternal Sovereigns into the dirt. How many days do you think we would have left to live after that?"
Soreto was silenced, his arguments shattered by the cold reality of their world. He stood up, his jaw set in a hard line. "I'm going back to the scouts. If Turak returns, I'll bring him to you." He turned and vanished into the dark without looking back.
Watching the giant leave, Krug took a deep, shuddering breath. A wave of exhaustion threatened to pull him to the ground.
Soreto was ten years his junior, and for decades they had been inseparable. It was through their combined wisdom and strength that the Shivering Wind tribe had flourished, eventually uniting the disparate tribes of southern Gelmir. But as their power grew, so did the ambition of his people. Soreto, his second-in-command, was the most ambitious of them all.
Krug knew his own days were numbered. A life of hunger, cold, and constant war had ravaged his body. This was why he placed such weight on the transition of power in Karen. He needed Soreto to learn to see the world from a height—to understand that survival was a game of balance, not just blood.
A sudden, freezing gust of wind tore through the valley. The old Misbegotten pulled his cloak tighter, a fit of painful coughing racking his chest.
"May the heavens watch over my people," Krug whispered, offering a silent prayer to the cold full moon and the dark moon hanging in the firmament.
He did not look toward the Erdtree. He knew the Golden Order had no place for those like him.