Part 1 - Moving Forward

 

Urist watched intently as the curious dwarf traveled around the room tracing the stonewalls with his hand. Muttering under his breath, he did a full circle around the room before he noticed the pale Urist.

With a deadpan expression, the dwarf walked up to him. “You, from my current estimations I’m not in hell. I know for a fact I have died so how do I walk among the living? Where are we on the continent? I don’t remember seeing this type of stonework used in the kingdom tell me are we in the barbarians land? Or in the goblin kingdom? Perhaps the savages of northwind?”

The barrage of questions threw Urist for a loop as he currently wasn’t in the best state of mind. Still, it wouldn’t stop him from answering the questions of the dwarf before him. 

Taking a deep breath Urist looked up and studied the dwarf. He stood at the same size as himself, tidy black hair and clean-shaven. Wearing glasses over his brown eyes that carried a hollow expression, thin lips, and a pale skin colorization. 

His clothes although they stuck out, fit the expressionless man. Unlike those that had come before him, he wore a neat and tidy military uniform that carried the colors of black, green and emblem of a green eagle on his left chest.

Clearing his throat Urist replied, “This isn’t your world and you are correct this place isn’t hell. At least, not yet. The land isn’t named for I haven’t named or explored much of it.”

The military dwarf crossed his arms, “So you are the leader I take it. Then tell me all you know.”

Urist shrugged, “I’m the leader until someone better comes along. So it’s like this…

For about half an hour the two men talked with mostly Urist answering all of Ubel’s questions. He also asked a few as well and found out his name while talking. They started from the beginning and worked their way up before the rat tide.

In this time the other three dwarfs were still in a standing daze which the two mostly ignored. It wasn’t until Fatty and Unicy came into the room did the dwarfs walk from their stupor.

“Hey, boss… We are preparing to bury the fallen outside. Will you say something for them?”

Closing his eyes Urist gathered himself to push himself on his feet unsteadily, “How many died.”

Unicy expression didn’t change, “Three died, three are infected. Archer Uto, Commoner turned warrior Usbain and commoner Unior. Of the infected, they are running a high fever which are Wind mage Gale, Yri, and Tänzer. Uroa and Briana say that we should make a medical room for them to recover, thankfully they gathered enough medical ingredients to treat the three. We also have some major injured who won’t be able to fight with their wounds until Light mage Adster heals them. Those being Roche, Stonechild, Gift, Littou, and Urmom.

“The fallen?”

“Where am I?”

“People died?!”

The expressionless Ubel ignored the awakened arrivals turning to Urist for questions. “Some trouble you didn’t tell me about?”

“You wanted me to start from the beginning. I was just about to get into that part.”

“Fair enough.”

“Fatty come over here and help me out. Unicy, get those three acquainted in how we run things. Ubel, you can follow me if you like, since you are a Strategist I’d like your opinion on how everything is run.”

“I’d like that as well. From what you said I got some ideas on how the defenses can be improved.”

Fatty came over and helped Urist in walking. Since close to a day had passed Urist had regained some strength, although not enough to be combat-ready. When Urist entered the tunnel his teeth were grinding as he sniffled a roar he wanted to let out.

They had lost three and seven weren’t fit for combat. Urist knew after doing some quick math that in just one day they had gone from 47 strong to 36 as he was still unable to fight. If they were to lose anymore, then defending the wall would become troublesome. 

Exiting the tunnel, warriors dug graves for the dead under torchlight. The dead lay on the ground with blood-drenched cloth covering their faces. The rest of the dwarfs surrounded them, Urist could feel the bleak atmosphere. People were crying, listless, or devoid of the cheer that they usually embodied.

Urist forced himself to look everyone in the eye, even though he just wanted to crawl into a hole and die for failing them. Biting his lip he drew blood to keep his mind focused that he couldn’t run away when so many people needed him. 

If he ran away who would keep everyone together and make sure they had the best chance of survival. He had to own up to his own mistakes and press forth for the remaining people counting on him to lead the way.

It was his responsibility and he would see it to the end.

As he was about to speak to his people, Ubel whispered to Urist, “Since you’ve talked about how important this Marketplace is. Perhaps it has a way for revival? I say bring back the archer since they are hard to train, but don’t bother bringing back the commoners since it isn’t worth it.”

Urist was calm up until Ubel talked about how commoners lives didn’t matter making him almost erupt into anger. He turned to Ubel with a cold glare, “I will look into the marketplace as your suggestion is good. But don’t you dare say commoners lives are worthless.”

The expressionless Ubel stared for a moment before turning away, “Commoners are only good for farming and quickly gathered military militia to die in the place of real soldiers. Let’s see how long you can keep that naivety of wanting to save everyone. You’re not god.”

Checking the market place intently Urist eyes shone full of blazing fury, “Then I’ll become a god.”

With his dead glazed eyes, Ubel scorned Urist proclamation, “A fool who reaches for the sky. It’ll be intriguing to watch you burn to dust.”

 

Part 2 - Await

 

Everyone could hear the two dwarfs argument clearly with Uria giving Ubel a frosty look.

With a quick search, Urist found what he was looking for was called the revival stone. A locked tier five-item that had a steep cost of eighty million points and ingredients not found in the marketplace to acquire. The price was at an inflated price so with some quick math he estimated that getting such a stone would cost five million points at tier five.

The limited information he acquired on the item made his headache, he needed a dozen items to craft the stone with another requirement that needed 10% of the body to bring someone back to life. It also had other strict requirements that needed to be met before revival could take place and a limit that you can only bring a person back to life once.

Although it had a stupidly high cost and had such things as needing the ‘heart’ of a dragon. He felt confident in being able to bring those that had fallen today to live one day.

“We won’t be burying them. Bring them to the crystal room for storage.”

“Why boss? Let’s bury them. They deserve that much respect.”

Urist shook his head, “I promise that one day I will bring those that died another chance at life.”

“You can bring back the dead?”

“Our boss is a necromancer?!”

Hearing the dwarfs' concerns Urist shook his head, “No I found out information on the item called the revival stone. If we work hard enough we can bring them back in the future. Although I assume that it will be a long time before that can happen. I believe we can make it a reality.”

And just like that, the depressed and lonely expressions of the dwarfs brightened as the sun started rising over the horizon. The three corpses were taken back inside and with a thought, Urist sucked the corpses into storage.

With a goal set for him to achieve, Urist set out to give orders. The expedition team would be led by Uria and have the job to collect seeds and watching for rat activity. The pit would be cleaned out from the rat corpses and the rope that moved half of the pulleys would be redone since the rats chewed into them.

A group of guardsmen and earth mages would also go out and find the holes the rats dug to fill them. With newfound hope, the dwarfs moved forward on their jobs leaving Urist, Fatty, and Ubel standing silently.

It wasn’t long before Unicy’s voice came from behind, “Hey guys, I got some good news. We got another light mage to help out healing and a heavy-hitting frost mage for clean up. The other is a commoner who can help man the pulleys and make more bombs.”

“That’s good news. I guess you sent them over to Adster already. I’ll leave it to you Unicy to oversee the wall and to make sure the Rats don’t pull a fast one on us.”

“I shall do my duty to the best of my ability boss. Though I have a question boss, what are you going to do today, since you are currently in a weakened state.”

Chuckling Urist waved a hand, “I’m going to help in making wooden bombs. I believe I have enough strength to do wood carving. Take Ubel with you to study our defenses and ask his opinions. Although he might have a deadpan expression and vile attitude, he is a Strategist so he should be of some help.”

“Alright, boss I shall take him under my wing.”

“I hope you have more sense than your boss. His naivety will get us all killed.”

“Wha-”

Urist motioned for Fatty to move and waved his hand to clear the air, “He’s a handful, best of luck in handling him Unicy.”

The dwarfs moved fast to get the wall finished before the sun hit noon. Thankfully, no attacked appeared as the dwarfs finished the repairs on the trench, wall, and holes outside the wall. While outside, the exploration team collected bamboo seeds the size of chests. They noted that the bamboo had grown thicker to support seeds and that the bamboo had started affecting other trees by impaling them with their branches.

It was an hour later after the gate was closed and blocked when the first sound of rat screeching could be heard. And with wide eyes, Urist could feel the Earth tremble faintly as he sat. It took some self-control to not mess up the bomb he was carving.

Forcing himself to stand Urist yelled at the top of his lungs, “Everyone to battle positions! Kill the rat bastards!”

Yelling full of fury, most of the dwarfs joined Urist’s war cry as they rushed to the walls. Among the few who didn’t, was Ubel who stared thoughtfully along the wall as the massive army of rats numbering around five thousand strong charged.

He wasn’t that interested in the regular rats' number, more so the rats that were as large as a dwarf standing tall with two elongated arms and legs.

“How interesting. So this is the power of a king that has resources to grow. I wonder what other things he can do.”

Although they looked grotesque, he saw the dwarf-sized rats move naturally. He figured out easily by their body intent that they wanted to jump across the trench. The more interesting thing about them was the fact that only ten of these types of rat ran forward while the rest of their size sat back and waited.

Are they watching and learning? Then it can be assumed to be a probing attack. To see our current strength. Does that mean that this Rat King is planning a full assault depending on how this attack goes?

Ubel uttered out loud, “If so I expected more from a king even if it’s a rat. Hey, bow girl, I suggest smashing them hard. Use a trump card to show them we’re not weak.”

“Who the fuck are you to order me around.”

Giving a shit-eating grin Ubel replied, “I’m the Strategist dear. Now would you be so kind as to do what muscle does best and smash.”

 

Part 3 - The battle meeting

 

Knowing that he was in no position to help, Urist kept making bombs. He stared intently at the process as the dwarfs around him stood up took to the defenses. It was hard to focus over the screaming, screeching, and shouting that filled the air.

The smell of burning hair and flesh filled the air and with every breath, he took it almost kept causing him to gag. But he resisted as Unicy’s orders resounded throughout the air. He could hear her bickering with Ubel on what was the correct course of action until she had enough and order the wind mages to send blades of wind into the crowd of invaders.

After their barrage, it seemed that this caused the rats to call a retreat and the sound of dwarf victory cries filled the air. To hear the sounds joy allowed Urist to relax his weary mind. Tomorrow he would be fit to fight along the wall with his brothers and sisters.

Just the thought of being able to move without help made Urists legs itch wishing for a good walk. It wasn’t long after that Ubel and Unicy descended the wall heading towards his direction with the two bickerings.

Unicy snorted, “I don’t see the reason why we need to send the frost mage out to make sure the bodies are dead. They’re burned pretty well so it shouldn’t be an issue, instead, we should keep his powers a secret.”

Ubel rolled his eyes, “Listen here, bow girl. From what Urist told me, these rats dug their way into the walls. Who is to say the pit doesn’t have rats playing dead waiting to attack the poor sap reaching to get them out? We need an overseer to make sure things go well as we reset the pit. We can’t use Urist since he’s still recovering and Uria is the backup in case the rats decide charge once again.”

“We’ll ask the boss to see who's right.”

“Fine, I wish to see how competent the dreamer is.”

“You take that back!”

“Heh, I rather die.”

“I’m sure I can help with that. How would you like a knife in the gut or an arrow in the windpipe?”

“ENOUGH!” Tired of their bickering Urist yelled at both of them causing them to shut up.

Urist paused, waiting to get their attention, “We’ll do it like this. Unicy makes sure everyone is equipped with spears and have the healers nearby in case there is an ambush. As a last resort have the Frost mage ready to help out if things get too hairy. Now stop bickering and go carry out my orders.”

Although the two didn’t seem happy about the orders the two begrudgingly accepted and got the body removal team ready. Watching this with a smile the Alchemist Empty leaned over towards Urist as the two walked away, “Tough being the boss eh?”

Giving a sigh Urist didn’t respond, choosing to focus on carving up new bombs and ordering rubies when needed.

At the wall as Ubel predicted sleeper rats lay and waited in the pits which were killed by spears as they tried to attack the dwarfs. The dwarfs put on body retrieval only got minor wounds from the fight and were healed easily enough by the light mages.

“See? I told you they set up an ambush.”

“Shut it glasses, we didn’t need the Frost mage like you said so you are still wrong.”

It took the dwarfs a few hours to clear the pile of corpses from the trench. When they were finished storing the usable bodies it was getting late into the day.

Although exhausted from all the exercise, the group ate happily knowing no one became heavily injured from today's fight. Urist gave a test to his legs and found he could move once again with ease so he didn’t have to rely on Fatty.

Belly rumbling, he moved over to the fire to see everyone feasting on the bodies of their enemies. Being handed a bowl Urist noticed that his people had taken it upon themselves to make bracelets and necklaces out of teeth of the rats. They had used the ruined rope from last night to tie them together.

Seeing them all showing off like barbarians he had half a mind to forbid the items being made. But seeing them all smile and gain some semblance of good morale he chose to accept it.

Ubel waited for Urist to finish a bowl of stew before getting up and walking over to Urist, “We need to talk strategy preferably as soon as possible.”

Looking at his bowl, then at the stew, Urist signed and put it in the pile that needed to be washed.

“I can always eat later. Let’s get it done now. Unicy.”

“Yes, boss?”

“Come, you are needed in this discussion as well. Let’s do it in the civilization chamber.”

Eating fast, Unicy threw her bow into the pile as well and headed with Urist and Ubel into the cave. With such an important meeting, Urist bought some wooden chairs for 15 points and a table for ten.

It wasn’t comfortable, but it was much better than sitting on the rocky floor a discussion. Taking out the basic resource map discussions began. Urist bought a feather pen and ink for a few more points and began marking the map.

“We are here currently, our wall is like this and looking at this map the bamboo spreads far down south. I don’t know how far it extends but judging by how we are always attacked by thousands of rats every day it isn’t a small amount. I assume that in three days the bamboo seeding event will end and the food supply will run out for the rats.

That means we need to hold the wall until they starve to death. With that knowledge, we must plan on what to do next. Since you called this meeting Ubel I want your thoughts first then Unicy’s then I’ll say my thoughts on the matter. Does that sound ok with you two?”

““Crystal.””

“Then let’s begin the meeting.”

 

Part 4 - A betting man

 

Ubel sat down and pushed his glasses up, “Thanks Urist. Now I’ll begin with saying that since we used the wind mages I believe we've bought a night of peace. We should keep that in mind as we work on our plan.”

Unicy frowned, “And how could you be sure of this? They are rats.”

“It is because I saw those dwarf size watching us for a sign of weakness. Since we threw out another trump card, I know the Rat King would be hesitant to attack this night after he failed the last one. I believe he will attack tomorrow with double the force or tomorrow night with an advantage.”

“I have faith in this assessment and recommend summoning more warriors for the wall. Hey Urist how many points do you have on hand for summoning.”

Unicy gave Ubel a look but nodded her head, “Although I don’t think his assessment is correct we do need more manpower to face the next wave.

Urist quickly replied, “We have currently 8749 points to use. 50 points can summon a commoner dwarf with no skills, 100 for a random dwarf with a class, and 500 points to focus summon a dwarf of a certain class. This allows us to summon 174 commoner dwarfs, 87 random dwarfs, and 17 chosen class dwarfs. Although I have to pull back at least 2500 points for food, water, and emergency if we need to intomb ourselves as a final choice.

We need to also take about 1000-1500 points to arm the dwarfs that come out with some means of defense if they don’t come with weapons or armor like warriors. And 500 points on berserker potions as a last resort if the rats are too strong. Leaving us with 4249 to 4749 points left to spend on summoning. With that information the two of you please tell me your thoughts.”

Mulling over the information for a bit Unicy went first, “I say we get a majority of commoners and have them under the control of the garrison we spend some points on getting more earth magicians I say two more and we make another pit line.”

With a snort, Ubel gave Unicy a look with his dead fish eyes, “You expect that plan to work? Noted the commoners could make good meat shields but with the rate of growth these rats have, I expect us to be overrun easily. Noted if we had the time to give them a basic training it could work but we lack time. I suggest instead we buy more firepower dwarfs that know magic. We can buy some commoners to be their meat shields and have the mages rotate with each other to cast.”

Gnashing her teeth Unicy hatefully retorted, “You just want to use the commoner's lives as fodder to keep the more valued alive. With such a thought process we won’t survive the incoming fight we need numbers to fight numbers, not elitism.”

“Oh? And do you think exposable commoners that are poorly armed will do better than high tier fighters?”

Feeling a headache coming on Urist put a hand through his hair, “You guys fight like cats and dogs. Hearing your ideas I’ve decided on a plan of action. We will roll the dice and summon 20 random dwarfs before deciding what to do with the remaining points.”

“Boss you can’t be serious to through your fate on such a gamble.”

“For once I agree with the muscle brain. We might only end up with farmers and commoners to which we could have used the points on four powerful members. This isn’t a wise move to make and I caution against such a reckless plan.”

Seeing them for once on the same side Urist chuckled, “Oh you two finally agree on something? I admit you both have good plans but you forget we are dealing with an unreasonable being that is the rat king. Numbers or elites are not going to cut it against that bastard. We need to risk it big and gamble our lives for the future. So let’s see if lady fate is on our side.”

“Wait you mad man, please listen to reason.”

“Boss don’t be rash we can still talk this out.”

“Oh, how ye have little faith. Nothing can be gained without risk.”

Pulling up the summon menu Urist clicked the random button and enter the number 20 instantly using up two thousand points. A bright flash appeared in the room blinding the three of them, forcing them to close their eyes at the sight.

When the light disappeared the three gazed upon the group in front of them. Six wore warrior equipment, 7 wore magic robes and wielded staves, three wore various work occupations, and three were commoners. The last person was a little special in that his armor and weapon gave off light.

Looking at the mages Urist became happy to see that two of the seven were earth mages. Saving him a lot of points he was going to spend if he didn’t get these two. The rest of the mages were 1 fire, 1 water, 1 blood, 1 poison, and one female he couldn’t identify that was ripped wearing a sleeveless shirt and a witch hat.

The warriors were mostly wielding axes with one wielding a bow. The three occupations was a farmer, Rune Smith, and Miner. The commoners had nothing notable to them but the final dwarf caught the three's attention so they awoke him first.

But before that Urist laughed, “See? Sometimes you just gotta roll the dice.”

“What bullshit luck boss. But please don’t do it again unless you consult us before. At least for me, I don’t care what this asshole thinks.”

“Even I have to agree with the muscle-brain that you shouldn’t do that.”

“Blah, you worry too much, let's get to waking these guys and making our next set of plans.”

They couldn’t see the man's features for he wore a suit of armor that was made out of ancient bronze with runic carvings and the symbol of a tiger etched in his center chest piece.

With a poke from Urist, the man shifted slightly before backing away and placing his hand on his sabers handle.

Words full of grit and venom the man's old voice hissed at the three, “Where am I. Speak before I gut you.”

With a drip of sweat flowing down his forehead, Urist wanted to sigh, Why can’t I summon normal dwarfs. This is going to be a long day, isn't it?

Part 5 - Magic Swordsman Voltas

 

A hum could be heard in the air coming from the swordsman. It didn’t take long for Urist to notice the bits of electricity that danced up upon the hostile dwarf. He knew if they carelessly talked, this dwarf would retaliate. And from the pressure coming off him, Urist knew he would lose in a straight-up exchange of blows.

Keeping a neutral expression Urist replied calmly, “Well you see it goes like this…”

In was a tense twenty minutes as Urist and co, explained to the tense old man why he was here. And another ten minutes to search through his memories for him to be relaxed to the point that only his hand was on his sword’s pommel. 

Feeling it was a good time Urist asked the knight, “So Sir Volt will you help us against the horde of rats that will soon be upon us.”

“No.”

Unicy looked at the man in shock at his simple answer, “Wha? Why? If we don’t have everyone fighting we could all die.”

The old dwarf shook his head, “I cannot fight for someone weaker than me it is my soul oath. Unless one of you can defeat me in an all-out one on one fight I can only wield my blade for myself. If I try to fight for someone without serving under a lord I will die.”

Ubel snorted at the old knight, “He’s useless if he gave such a soul oath, might as well have him do chores or teach sabership.”

Raising an eyebrow Urist turned to Ubel, “Can you explain what a soul oath is?”

“It’s layman's terms it an oath that people do to gain power. The more restrictive the oath the stronger the person becomes. But there are limits to this kind of power in such that a body can only handle three oaths at most. And if those oaths contradict each other well… The body explodes and the soul is erased. In my world, it’s a forbidden art only used when someone has reached their full potential. Isn’t that right magic swordsman.”

Nodding his head Volt nodded his head, “You speak the truth. But unlike those you talked about I was forced by my lord to make the oath or be beheaded over my talent. It was me and my family's life or cutting off my path of advancement.”

Ubel gave a small chuckle, “You found such a useless lord. Now that we know he isn’t useful to let’s go look over the others and see what they have to offer.” 

Without a lack of remorse, Ubel turned away from the old man and began walking towards the mages to wake them up next. Unicy looked at Ubel with mouth agape wondering how he could be so heartless to throw someone so powerful away. 

However, the old man didn’t take it to heart as he knew he was useless. It was Urist who broke the awkward air set by Ubel, “So you can’t fight. Can you train people in the art to defend themselves? Unicy is good at it but she specializes in mounted combat using archery.”

“Yes I can do that, give me the peasants for a day and I can at least teach them how to stab with a spear. A week and they will be competent and in a month proficient. I also know saber arts but it’s not something anyone can learn. And finally, I can teach those who both have the talent in the blade and magic how to be a magic swordsman. That is what I can offer you at the moment.”

“That’ll do nicely for our plans, I expect to summon more peasants so this will be fine. I’ll request the smiths and carpenters to finish those spear shafts. Now let's go summon and wake up the rest.”

It took some time to get through all the summoned members but they managed to do it with less of a challenge that Volt came with. Among their ranks was a unique mage named Ayil that said she uses fist magic? 

The three dwarfs never heard of it but Volt had and began chatting up the weird mage at the side. Uria came by to take the still slightly confused dwarfs, to show them around and get them settled.

The two earth mages joined the three other earth mages to expand the dormitory for the new arrivals. Volt and the new Fist mage stuck around to see the Urist summon 20 commoners to which Volt took control of them and headed out of the cave to start training them as spearmen. The Fist Mage tagged along with the old magic swordsman leaving the three alone to do the final summoning.

With the remaining 1000 points, they talked about summoning two more earth mages or just doing another random summoning and gamble some more. In the end, the three agreed it was best to spend it all again in random summoning.

It turned out fine before, so what’s stopping it from giving some more good men and women to fight together on the front lines. With a small grin, Urist spent the points and took a deep breath when pressing the confirm button. And this time even though they were summoning less the light shine even brighter than the last causing Urists heart to excitedly pump with anticipation 

This time he was able to keep his eyes open a bit, allowing him to see two of the ten figures giving off the same intensity of light the old magic swordsman was giving off. Cracking a wider smile Urist hoped that at least one of them wouldn’t have the same kind of restriction that haunted the knight.

With the light clearing Urist turned to his companions, “Well let's see what we have to work with shall we.”

“It better not another person with a stupid restriction”, Ubel replied. 

“I hope they know how to use a bow well.”

Rat Tide timer activated 2 Days 18 Hours 27 Mins

Beast Swarm timer activated 10 Days 18 Hours 27 Mins

Point Amount:  3569