The Blood Moon rose silently, a crimson halo glowing without fanfare. Riku stood atop the obsidian tower, elbow resting on jagged stone, watching molten light pulse through the vents he'd woven into the outer wall. It looked like a heartbeat—a living thing hiding within silence.
Behind him, the camp lay tense but steady. Kael and Sira moved like shadows among the forge fires and sharpened weapons. Tharn paced the perimeter, eyes bright with resolve. It was their first true test.
Then the thunder came.
Not from above, but from below—the ground trembling as if the crater were breathing. From the mist-wracked basin, figures emerged: basalt golems, jagged and towering; lower mist scuttlers—two-legged steamravagers—uncanny beasts of living pressure. The first wave of monsters summoned by the Blood Moon itself.
Riku didn't call an alert. He didn't shout. He just stepped down from the tower and walked to the war table. He opened the local interface scroll—silent, private—and watched the perimeter view.
No help would come. No global intervention. This was theirs. His.
He tapped his fingers on the stone until the first drumbeats sounded—traps released, walls venting heat, fire coursing through hidden walls. The beast wave hit with a clash of stone and steam, roaring into the wall of flame. Golems shattered into sparks; scuttlers hissed and fled.
His people fought with brisk precision—drill-coordinated, unafraid. Even the forge lights flared higher, breathing in tandem with the fight.
Riku remained calm. He smelled threatened steel and sulfur, but also control. It was his design, his strategy, and it held.
As the beasts thrashed, he watched the elite ten—his core fighters—skewer the wounded with calculated strikes, then pull away. He saw Sira on the front, coordinated and silent, oblivious to the fog that tried to swallow her collar.
When the last creature fell, the crater grew still again. Ash drifted. Flames settled. Heat hissed.
They'd lost two men—scattered, not drilled. Not unexpected. But none of the elite. None of the core.
Riku climbed back to the tower while the flames sank low. Beneath him, Kael walked among the fallen, gathering shards of basalt to reinforce walls. Tharn tended the wounded, calm in fatigue.
No sovereigns had appeared. No banners. The global feed blinked with notifications—but none revealed any names. Just facts. "Wave repelled. Casualties: 2/10. Field rated: Alpha defense."
He didn't reply.
In the quiet that followed, he stepped inside, crossed to the supply stores, and checked on his spearman, #7—a young Draganoid who'd pierced a scuttler's core. His wrist was bloodied, but he'd held his line.
Riku knelt and pressed a healing poultice to the wound. The boy's eyes widened—fear and respect blurred together.
"Good work," he said quietly.
No praise. Just acknowledgment.
Later, after dusk blurred into red night, Riku surveyed the battlefield from the tower again. The crater floor was littered with steam and broken stone. His traps had worked. His wall had held.
He felt it then—a whisper of potential power stirring beneath the stone.
In the corner of his vision he saw it:
His spear rack—once four, now five spears.
[Weapon Folded – Combat Spears | Original: 4 | Multiplier: x1.25 | Final: 5]
He slipped a spear down and returned quietly to the tower platform.
By first light, word would reach other camps.
They had survived the first wave.
But he was already planning for the next.