We formed up the column and headed back to Holdfast. My intent was to stop there and gather up any forces that had respawned before continuing out to conquer the zone. The tall grass appeared before too long, and I called a halt before entering it again.
“Sergeant Wrend, any thoughts on how to handle this? Those birds weren’t too tough, but their speed can make them deadly.”
“I was thinking that in this case an advance guard, rear guard, and flankers isn’t the best tactic. If we concentrate the column and have the men on the edges with weapons out and shields up, we can fend off the birds easily. We should of course use your idea of keeping some men in the center of the column and hoisted up on shields to give us an idea if those things are stalking us,” Wrend advised.
“That wasn’t my idea. Some of your Ignominia soldiers figured that one out,” I told Wrend.
“Thank you, sir. The men will be happy to learn it was one of their own to come up with it.”
“Very well, Sergeant. Let’s get moving. I want to make it back to town before nightfall,” I ordered. The column grouped up tighter than before with the men on the outer edges holding weapons out, ready for an attack. Every half hour or so, we rotated fresh soldiers to the outer edge; holding weapons at the ready drained your energy quickly. We were making good time through the tall foliage when my thoughts were interrupted by Sergeant Wrend’s shouting.
“What in the name of the gods do you think you’re doing, Privates!?” Wrend bellowed. I turned to see that two of the privates from Alpha Company had ventured from the column and were making noises at the edge of the column. They both hurried back into formation under the glare of Wrend.
“Sorry, Sergeant. We were . . . well . . . We wanted to see if we could bait some of the birds into attacking us. Roasted terror bird sure beats trail rations,” the soldier offered as a lame excuse.
“So you thought endangering yourself and your entire unit was worth it for a meal? I’ve seen some stupid soldiers in my time, Private, but you’re heading to the top of the list. I’d stop and smoke you with so many push-ups that your grandchildren would feel the pain, but the good Captain Raytak has ordered us to make it back to Holdfast before nightfall,” Wrend growled at the two soldiers. He paused and placed his hand on his chin in an exaggerated motion, pretending to be deep in thought.
“How about this, Privates? For the next ten days, you and your entire squad are on field rations. No hot chow, no sneaking off into town for a bite when you think we’re not looking. If anyone slips you some food, his squad will face the same punishment. You pansies from Alpha don’t know what a treat it is to have even field rations. Tell you what, soldiers, next time you do something stupid, I’ll have some of the boys whip up some prison loaf for you to eat all week,” Wrend said while raising his voice for the whole column to hear.
“Yes, Sergeant,” the soldiers replied. As the column continued, I could hear their squad-mates begin to berate the two stupid soldiers for getting them included in their punishment. It was an old Army tradition that you succeeded or failed as a team. A memory began to reform as I listened to the soldiers threaten the others if they did anything else to get the squad into trouble.
I was back in basic training, a young kid of eighteen standing at ease in the DFAC—dining facility. It was our first week of training and we were all sore, scared, and trying not to draw the attention of our drill sergeants. The line of soldiers waiting for chow was silent. Each time the line moved forward, we followed the same pattern: go to attention, walk to fill the gap, then return to the position of at ease.
Inside the DFAC, the drill sergeants typically left you alone unless you did something especially stupid; the higher-ups made sure that the soldiers at least ate well. It wasn’t because they were being nice; a well-fed soldier was just less susceptible to injuries that might increase the time and expense of training them.
“Private Higby, get your finger out of your nose!” one of the sergeants growled. We couldn’t contain it, and soon the entire line was trying to suppress laughter. The absurdity of a soldier picking his nose in the chow line was too much for us. I even caught a few of the drill sergeants smiling as well.
None of us were smiling when we formed up outside the DFAC after chow. It was time to punish Private Higby, and he needed a battle buddy to join in the punishment—me. The lesson I learned that day was that you needed to keep each other accountable because your buddy could save your life or ruin your day. The funny thing was that Private Higby’s MOS—military occupational specialty—was as a 35F, military intelligence analyst.
I chuckled to myself, caught up in the memory, pleased that the repairs to my mind were continuing despite dying earlier. I couldn’t help but experience a feeling of dread every time I thought about my death, but I had to believe the AI and the nanobots were fixing the problem. As the afternoon drew on, Holdfast and our small garrison fort appeared in the distance. I was met at the entrance to the garrison by a welcome sight. Sergeant Brooks was there, and standing beside him was my friend Mayor Delling.
“Raytak, I come all the way out to Holdfast for a visit, only to find you out on a camping trip,” Delling joked. I shook his hand and returned Brooks’s salute before leading them both into my quarters.
“Sir, I was not advised we were hosting a guest this evening. Shall I bring some refreshments? I fear I will need to go into town to find something suitable for the governor,” Blevins said.
“Yes, see to the refreshments, Blevins,” I ordered, taking the opportunity to rid myself of the annoying private.
“What brings you out to Holdfast, Mayor . . . er . . . I mean Governor Delling?” I asked, pleased that my friend had gained a new title that I assumed unlocked when he hit level 10.
“Had a quest to do some administrative work here and structure the rebuilding of the town. Planning the rebuild correctly will help the town grow at a much faster pace. Great work on defeating those creatures, Raytak. What are your plans now?” Delling asked.
“I have a quest to conquer the entire zone for the Imperium. I just got back from visiting the caves where the remaining Gul Dorg scampered off to. Outside the caves is a respawn point that I took control over. Taking it over spawned a small garrison force, and I assume I have to do that with any other remaining points of interest or villages here in the zone,” I advised.
“Anything I can do to help? I feel like I’m benefiting from your efforts but not contributing a whole lot. My class doesn’t let me adventure or anything, but there may be ways I can help.”
“There is one thing. There is a slew of Gul Dorg that escaped the battle and is hiding in the ruins to the northwest. Between the dwarves and my forces, we have them bottled up, but I don’t have the forces to dig them out of there. I was hoping you could set up some quests to have players clear out the creatures. Is that something you can do? I also wondered if Domax and his tribe had shown up yet. We could use some giants to support us when the war heats up.”
“Not a problem, Raytak. I’ll get the player quests for the Gul Dorg set up right away. I haven’t seen any sign of the giants yet, but I did have the loggers clear some areas near the western base of the plateau, which they can use when and if they arrive. For now, I’m going to head over to the town hall here in Holdfast to set up the player quests. Then I’ll have to log out for a meeting at school. Good to see you again and I’ll catch you later,” Delling said before leaving.
“Sir, I understand our orders are to conquer the zone for the Imperium. What’s our next step?” First Sergeant Brooks asked.
“We, or our allies, control everything to the south and west of Holdfast. Yendys brought word that there is a tribe of ogres and a group of elves to the east. The elves are likely hostile, and the ogres are an unknown. They left Yendys and the others alone, but that may have just been because they helped save a couple of the ogre kids from the elves. They seem like the only real potential obstacles between us and the eastern transition point.
>
“The only wildcard is in what lies to our north. The dwarves tell me there is no transition point in the west, but there may have been one to the north. There are ruins of a bridge up there, but the dwarves haven’t sent anyone that way in a long time. What are your thoughts, Sergeant?” I asked.
“I would feel more comfortable if we knew what was up north before heading into a potential battle to the east where the ogres and elves are,” Brooks advised.
“I agree. The northern border isn’t too far from us and should only take a day or so to reach. Once we clear that section of the zone, we can head back and gather more forces before moving east. We’re still understrength until all our replacements arrive, so I would like to avoid conflict with the potentially larger forces to the east,” I advised.
“Get the men formed up. Best to head out now. The other zone to the east has some designs on Hayden’s Knoll, and I’d like to have the whole place unified before they make their move,” I ordered. Brooks had the men in formation and ready to go quickly.
Our formation for the expedition to the north consisted of 222 regulars, ten scouts, one scorpion team, and one catapult team. The Ignominia platoon was grouped into a separate formation consisting of thirty-two soldiers and 4 scouts. For leadership, I had me, First Sergeant Brooks, Sergeant Wrend, and Corporal Tavers leading the siege engines.
We were still severely understrength from our battles with the Gul Dorg. There was a group of soldiers that had respawned in Hayden’s Knoll before I switched the spawn point to Holdfast, and they should arrive in the next day and a half. “You go to war with the army you have, not with the army you want,” an old secretary of defense was once quoted as saying.
I had the men form up on the road to the east; the town watch had informed me that it would branch to the north just before we entered the lands the ogres controlled. I intended to follow the road itself, assuming it would lead to the ruined bridge the dwarves had mentioned. The road should make it less likely for us to run into random encounters; I was still smarting from the incident with the terror birds, and I wanted to avoid any unneeded casualties.
We reshuffled the men to an equal number among Alpha and Bravo Companies. Wrend formed his Ignominia Platoon at the rear of the column and was responsible for security there. Alpha stood at the front of the column, followed by the engineers and supply wagons. The scouts were sent out to screen us on all sides.
We set a brisk pace from the garrison, making good time on the road that, despite its age, was in decent repair. For the first several miles, we passed by abandoned farms; only a few of the farms nearest to the town had been reoccupied so far. I knew they were just computer-generated npc’s, but I couldn’t help but wonder what their lives were like. Time was short in real life, even shorter in the digital world for the majority of npc’s.
Once past the farmland, we entered plains covered in the tall foliage we had come to associate with the terror birds. Brooks pulled in the scouts, and we once again began to use our strategy of holding men up on shields. The tactic had proven surprisingly effective.
We spotted movement in the tall grass a few times, but there were no attacks, much to the displeasure of the men; word had gotten around about how delicious the birds tasted. The threat from the ambush predators diminished as the crossroads came into view and the terrain changed to rolling hills instead of flat grasslands. I could see a single mountain peak standing out strangely in the distance to the southeast. The lone mountain had to be Goreaxe Peak, the home of the ogres.
The crossroads provided a good stopping point for the night. We set a guard and built up our normal defenses. After finishing off some administrative work, I pitched in to help cover some guard shifts. The nights were proving to be the most boring time for me, and I struggled to fill the time as the men got their rest. I chuckled—then shuddered—as I remembered my times on fire guard in the Army. How many nights of sleep were interrupted for this duty? Since I didn’t need to sleep in the game, the least I could do was let some poor private not have to wake up for an hour.
Just before dawn, the legion began its day. Morning breakfast consisted of a grainy porridge with bits of what appeared to be pork and some dried fruit mixed in. The stuff spawned in the supply room of the garrison. It was light, easy to transport, and nutritious. The soldiers called the mixture “dawn slop” and, despite its unappetizing name and appearance, it was not bad in my opinion.
The soldiers in my legion complained about the chow, but they never had to experience the most diabolical meal ever served to soldiers. From 2005 to 2008, every soldier dreaded pulling from the ration lottery the MRE called Menu 4 Cheese and Veggie Omelet. The much-despised MRE was only made for a few years and was dubbed the “vomlet” by those of us in the field. I shuddered a bit at the memory of its rubbery texture and foul taste.
Why couldn’t that memory have been one of the ones I lost permanently , I thought as we began to march. We followed the road for a few more hours before one of the scouts came running back from the north, making a beeline straight to my position at the head of the column.
“Sir, scouts reporting. We’ve found the ruins of the bridge and can see a transition point on the far side. There is a deep gorge with a river at the bottom and it looks like the ruined bridge was the only safe way across. I have the other scouts looking for a place to ford the river or at least a place to climb down the canyon,” the out-of-breath scout advised.
“Anything else, soldier?” I inquired.
“Yes. Sorry, sir. Needed to catch my breath. There are signs of a battle . . . Several carcasses of Gul Dorg are littered around the edge of the canyon near the bridge, and it looked like several of them fell all the way down to the rocks below. The problem, sir, is that the bodies are on both sides of the river. Somehow, they made it to the other side. There’s no way to tell if they made it to the transition point,” the scout reported.
“Good report, Scout. Lead us to the bridge,” I said. The column continued on, moving quickly over the last stretch of road to our objective. The thought of Gul Dorg escaping to the neighboring zone was not a happy one. A defensive watch along with lots of dwarven runes would be needed to make sure the creatures didn’t come pouring in from the north at some point.
I could soon make out the ruins of the bridge and the canyon that it had once spanned. The bridge ruins seemed ancient, likely dwarven in origin. The seemingly impassable canyon stretched from east to west as far as the eye could see. The far side of the bridge held the swirling blue light that indicated a transition point. The light glowed, tantalizingly out of reach. The ground around the bridge was flat and broken by small rock formations or an occasional copse of trees.
You have discovered the Northern Transition Point. This is a critical location that can be secured for the Imperium. Do you wish to claim the Northern Transition Point: y/n?
I immediately hit yes.
You have claimed this location. As it is a critical location, a defensive garrison force will spawn in the nearest garrison (Holdfast) and make its way here to construct defenses. Defenses will include a strongpoint across the road with a fortified tower. Garrison forces assigned are as follows:
3 squads of Regulars, 4 Scouts, and 1 Scorpion and crew.
Quest Updated: Unite the Zone. You have claimed the critical Northern Transition Point. Continue to claim strategic points in the zone to earn more rewards.
Rewards: 50 gold, 500 experience, 100 resources.
It was nice to be making such steady progress. It seemed like things had slowed to a crawl when I was trapped in the arena. Sure, the final reward was huge, but sometimes little indicators of progress were better than a big bump in xp at the end of a quest chain.
Like the scout had indicated earlier, the torn remains of several Gul Dorg were scattered about the cliff face. The remains were mostly bone and chitin; something had cracked open the bodies and stripped all the edible flesh off them. Was this the work of scavengers after the fact,
or was something out there killing and eating stray Gul Dorg?
“Sir, look at this,” one of the soldiers called from the edge of the canyon. He was kneeling beside the rock and pointing to long gouges that looked like claw marks of some sort. What kind of creature could have made them? The soldier looked over the edge of the canyon, and I was just about to order him away from his precarious perch when he called out again.
“Sir, looks like some kind of cave down there. Hey, what’s that? Arrrghhhh!”
The soldier screamed as a large clawed arm reached up from the canyon and snatched him down. His screams cut off with a wet crunch. I was still in shock when a roaring screech resounded from the canyon and whatever had killed my soldier began to crawl its way up.
“Alpha company, form up! Bravo and Ignominia prepare to flank whatever that thing is!” First Sergeant Brooks ordered. The men snapped into action even as I began to backpedal from the cliff’s edge, my vision fixed on the monster that was climbing up.
Soon, the over twelve-foot-tall creature was revealed, rearing up on its hind legs as it let out another shrill roar. The creature slumped down onto all fours; the ground shook from its weight as the monster began eyeballing me the same way I would eyeball a steak.
Feathers sprouted from its shaggy fur coat, and huge claws extended from its feet. The monster’s oversized eyes were housed in a head resembling that of an owl, complete with an enormous serrated beak. The creature reared up on its hind legs and roared one final time before dropping down to all fours and charging.
Owl Bear, Level 12 Elite.
Several crossbow bolts from the quick-reacting scouts thudded into the beast, and it focused on the closest target—me. I readied my shield and sword as I tried to join up with the now-forming alpha company. In the distance, I could even see Tavers beginning to assemble his siege engines. Seeing I would never make it to alpha in time, I turned and summoned my honor guard.
Limitless Lands Book 4: Opposition (A LitRPG Adventure) Page 5