Returning home, I told 'my' mother and sister not to disturb me as I wanted some time to myself and went to my room. Once inside I closed the door and sat down to do some meditation, wanting to go through the experience of meditation from beginning to end. Ever since I found myself in this new world, I never meditated from start to finish, the only part of the process I went through was the last, pulling the lingering mana in my body to my core.

As I started going through the process as a whole, I couldn't help but notice one thing that escaped my attention till that point, how talented Denethor was. The young elf was known as a genius in the city of Hunbrug so it shouldn't have come as a surprise that his core had an astonishing amount of mana, but as I looked a bit deeper I realized something. Denethor was keeping his real progress from everyone else.

Denethor knew that one of the reasons his father wanted him to take the role as Hunburg's Chief was because of his talent, so ever since he had it in his mind that he didn't want to be the chief and that he rather wanted to go to the outside world and live there freely, he started hiding his real progress from everyone around him, he didn't lie too much so as to not get anyone suspicious of his real rate of improvement, so he was still considered a talented individual by the others. After all, they expected him to be a genius, not a prodigy.

As I was deep in my meditation, pulling mana from the outside world and through my Conduit, hours passed. suddenly, I was startled awake as a knock sounded from outside, not as Denethor though, but as Dorian.

Sitting there a bit disoriented, I looked around me at the luxurious room for a second before the knock sounded again and dragged me from my haziness. With my eyes falling on the door I said: 

"Come on in."

As I expected, it was a maid outside. She entered first and bowed slightly before saying:

"Good morning sir, hope you slept well."

"No need for the sir or being this polite," I said hurriedly, feeling awkward both as Dorian and as Alex, it was a bit weird how I found it quite hard to accept this kind of treatment as Dorian while it wasn't as bad as Zagmuz. As I got up from the bed, I said to not remain in the awkward silence, "what... What time is it?"

"It's 9 in the morning, Master Dunn told me to wake you up at this period before he left," she answered before nodding her head as she saw me stand up, "if you would follow me, the bath is ready."

I didn't have anything else to say, so I followed the maid silently as she led me down the extravagant hallway. As we walked, I couldn't keep my mind from wandering on its own, with my thoughts jumping from one thing to the other, finally, I couldn't hold on any longer and I found myself asking:

"Do... Do you know what's happening?" My voice came out a bit shaky, I didn't know how much the news have spread while I was asleep or if Sir William and the others were going to keep this a secret for now.

Once I asked that, I saw the maid in front of me almost miss a step, as if either I surprised her by speaking to her or what I said wasn't something she expected. As expected from a professional maid though, she soon control herself and said:

"Sir William has already asked for the preparation for the in- invasion to start," her voice broke once she mentioned the unavoidable fate we were going to face, "everyone in town is working towards that, we are already gathering all the supplies in town and putting them in the castle. We will probably start taking in people tomorrow or the day after tomorrow..."

I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding once she was done speaking. I was happy that Sir William was taking this seriously but hearing about the efforts that were being put into the preparation, I couldn't help but have a weird feeling, as if only now with everyone knowing and preparing for it, the invasion has become true.

I was first led to take a bath before heading to a small, but well-kept and decorated room where I had a filling and delicious, if cold, breakfast before I was finally led outside by a male servant. Once I left the castle, I stood in place for a long time, unsure of what to do next and where to go. The truth was that I actually only had two places to head to, either my home or the guardhouse, but it still took me a while before deciding that heading to the guardhouse first was the best course of action. It wasn't only my job, that I still had to turn up to, but the guardhouse was also the place where I could get the most information about what was going to happen.

With that in my mind, I made my way down the streets, not failing to notice how lively the streets were... If only with how many people were walking through them, their expressions and the atmosphere were nothing lively at all, it felt as if most of them were a nudge away from exploding, and some had already exploded seeing how there were already some fights and arguments here and there. The news about an army of demons heading their way must have been quite hard to accept.

I wondered for a second if it would have been better to keep this a secret from the people but I soon threw that idea away, the demons were coming anyway, they were only a few days away from the town and every second mattered for the preparations that had to go into the defences.

Seeing the carts full of grains, smoked meats and even some live animals, along with some vegetables and other such consumables heading to the castle, I turned around and looked at the castle in the distance, the place where we will have our last stand against the demons. Even though the castle was at the centre of the town, it didn't have any buildings around it, it had quite a big clearing between it and the closest building. All that was done so the soldiers would have a good line of sight and also so no invaders would have any place to hide.

I thought that once I made it to the guardhouse I would find the place as busy as a beehive, with guards running around and people filling the rooms, instead what was waiting for me was an almost empty building with almost no one there, which after thinking about for a bit was to be expected, after all with how the situation was outside, the guards were needed out there to keep the order more than any time.

Entering the guardhouse I nodded to the few guards there before making my way to the captain's office, finding captain Dunn sitting on his desk with maps of the surrounding areas spread over it, his hair was messy and his eyes were red, it was clear that he had barely slept the night before. Lifting his head from the maps in front of him, captain Dunn gave me a deep look then brought his head down again as he said:

"How are you feeling today?"

"I'm... I'm good, the sleep helped me," I answered, and I wasn't lying that much, my mind wasn't as hung up on what happened yesterday as I thought it would be, I mean all that I felt and suffered through didn't just disappear, but I had put it aside for the moment by concentrating on what was happening and what was in front of me.

"That's good," captain Dunn said slowly, before continuing in a more severe voice with his eyes boring into mine, "Dorian, you should know that the town is in extreme danger, that the fate of all the people here lies on what we will do and how we will react, you do know that right?"

I nodded as I gulped audibly as his eyes fixed me in place, I knew that captain Dunn had his doubts about me and that he would bring that up soon and I thought I was ready for it, but when it happened I still panicked a bit.

"We both know you lied about how you got the information about the kalla so I hope you come clean right now and tell me how you really got your intel."

Once he was done speaking, I closed my eyes and took a deep breath before letting it out slowly, calming my heart a bit as I did, then I opened my eyes and said seriously:

"I can't say who I got the information from," just this first sentence made captain Dunn frown slightly, but I didn't stop, "but what I can say is that they only want the best for this town and its people, and they, as well as me, will do everything we can to make sure that it would stay safe."