When I regained consciousness, my monsters were all standing guard around me.

  Elyndra was the first to notice I was awake, rushing to my side.

  “Are you alright, Lord Herald?” she asked, and I nodded.

  “How long was I out?” I asked. She glanced up at the sky for a moment before answering.

  “No more than an hour,” she said. “We took the time to scout the immediate area.”

  I nodded and began to rise, checking on Elyndra’s condition as well. Her wound had already healed, which was a relief.

  “Right… then we can keep going,” I said, looking past the worried faces of my monsters toward the darkened trees ahead.

  If my sense of time in this world was accurate—with the two hours it took to reach this place, the hour I’d been unconscious, and the fighting in between—it wasn’t even noon yet.

  Elyndra looked like she was about to argue, but after giving me another look, she nodded. We began our march once more, this time keeping a careful eye on the ground.

  The trees were, honestly, beautiful as we moved forward. There was less of the familiar mix of earthy trees and more alien-looking ones, their leaves ranging in color from gold and green to pinks and blues.

  What little light filtered through the canopy cast long shadows, and a strange, colorful glow lit the path ahead.

  We hadn’t gone much farther—maybe another twenty or thirty minutes—when I heard something that made me pause.

  I raised my hand into a fist, signaling for silence, and then I heard it again.

  Voices.

  Shouts in the distance, followed by dull roars.

  “An adventuring party?” Halvard whispered from behind me.

  I shrugged, unsure myself, but I couldn’t think of what else it might be.

  The sounds were coming from the north of us, so we headed that way, cautiously.

  Perhaps they were unaffiliated with the guild we’d fought before… or maybe they were new recruits preparing for another assault on my home.

  Either way, I would find them, assess whether they were a threat, and eliminate them if needed.

  We found them soon after, taking cover behind a cluster of trees.

  Five adventurers in total, locked in combat with a single Dreadpincer.

  They were struggling.

  Two fought in melee—one wielding a halberd, the other a large, heavy-looking sword.

  Three remained at range: a caster hurling bolts of lightning from her fingertips, a healer doing his best to keep the frontline alive, and another caster who appeared to be some sort of support mage.

  Each time he finished a spell, the warriors would glow a different color for a brief moment.

  I felt almost… bad for them. All five looked to be no older than I had been before coming here, and the man holding the halberd especially looked afraid.

  As I contemplated what to do, one of them shouted—and my skill finally hit max level, letting me understand them at last.

  “Fuck! Corinna, you run with Philipp and the others—I’ll… I’ll hold it off!”

  The halberd-wielding man was telling the others to flee. It seemed they really were outmatched here.

  What was I supposed to do?

  How was I supposed to react?

  I had already killed adventurers before—because they invaded my lands, because they tried to kill my people.

  And yet… I had still been human, once. Some part of me still remembered being—

  “No! I won’t leave you, Felix! I won’t let you die!”

  The woman—the lone caster firing lightning—shouted back, tears running down her cheeks.

  “Corinna, run! We can’t beat it!”

  I made my decision.

  “Elyndra, Roderik, Halvard… take the Dreadpincer out. Leave the adventurers alive.”

  My orders were met without hesitation. Elyndra and Roderik loosed arrows at the monster, while Halvard began chanting, his eyes glowing bright yellow as intense heat radiated from his staff.

  The barrage of arrows caused the Dreadpincer to stumble, suddenly looking more like a porcupine than a bug—giving Halvard all the time he needed to line up his spell.

  Slamming his staff into the ground, four darts of flame rained down from above him, each one striking the creature with the force of a grenade.

  It barely had time to scream before collapsing onto its back, nothing more than a smoldering husk.

  The adventurers stood stunned, wide-eyed, looking around for their saviors.

  “Who… who’s there?” the halberd wielder shouted into the trees, staring straight in our direction.

  I hesitated for just a moment before stepping out into the light.

  The sword-wielder muttered a curse, readying his weapon again, while the rest simply looked exhausted and defeated.

  I raised a hand and spoke, shocking them.

  “Today, I mean you no threat, adventurers.” My voice was calm—almost soothing—as I kept it as human as I could. “Don’t think of this as mercy so much as a… gift.”

  Without saying anything more, I turned and began to leave.

  I hadn’t gone more than a few steps when a voice called out behind me.

  “Th-thank you!”

  I paused, glancing over my shoulder at the one who spoke—the woman named Corinna—and gave a short nod before moving on.

  Elyndra offered me a wry smile. The others looked confused, but followed without question.

  I hoped none of them noticed the slight tremble in my hands… or how pale I’d gone when I got a good look at Corinna.

  She reminded me of my sister.

  And that reminder—that she might be somewhere in this world too—frightened me more than anything else ever had.

  We spent another couple of hours hunting monsters and exploring my new territory. We didn’t run into those same adventurers again, but we did encounter other new monsters.

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  One resembled the centaurs of Greek myth, but instead of a horse’s lower body, they had a panther’s, and their upper bodies were like a rhino’s.

  Another was like a cross between a bird and a frog, flying through the air while shooting out an extremely long, prehensile tongue.

  The final one I couldn’t begin to describe. It was big and bulky like a bear, had the maw and face of a wolf, and a three-pronged tail, each ending in a deadly stinger.

  It took some effort, but we soon learned the strengths and weaknesses of each monster, and with that in mind, we managed to take them down with little trouble.

  My Soul Essence stores were starting to build up nicely, which put a smile on my face.

  I was just finishing cleaning my blade on the carcass of one of the frog-birds—called Gloomgliders—when Elyndra called out.

  “Should we head back home now, Lord Herald?”

  I nodded, smiling.

  “Yes, I think we’ve done what we could for today, and I learned some very important—”

  I didn’t get to finish my sentence. Pain exploded through my back, and the force of something slammed into me, sending me stumbling forward.

  “Take out the caster and the big one first! Rolf, engage the goblin. Sofie, you take the strange-looking humanoid!”

  A voice called out from behind me, and I turned, snarling. The thing that had struck me was an arrow, launched by a human now visible between the trees where the Gloomgliders had come from.

  More figures rushed forward, dressed in various armor and wielding different weapons. But they all shared one thing in common—

  The same tabard, emblazoned with an M.

  I reached back, snapping the arrow and tearing it free just as Elyndra and Skreek were already engaged.

  “Filthy cowards!” I snapped, meeting one of the guild members blade-to-blade as he charged me.

  He was taller than the rest of his troop, wearing chain and leather beneath a helmet, but that didn’t stop me from hearing the snarl in his reply.

  “You’re the one the others warned us about — the Herald!” he shouted. “Today I put you down, beast, in the name of Morveth!”

  Morveth.

  A name I didn’t recognize — but one I would come to know well. It was obvious now what the M on their tabards represented.

  We traded blows, steel clashing against steel, before I shoved him back.

  He stumbled on the uneven terrain, and I pressed the advantage — only to retreat as a blast of flame crashed down between us.

  Not Halvard’s work. One of the adventurers.

  So they had more than archers covering their backline.

  I raised my buckler, blocking the next arrow loosed at me, before parrying a wild swing of the man’s sword.

  “You will pay for killing Ser Josef!” the man shouted, swinging at me again.

  I shook my head, sidestepping the next blow and bringing my shield arm around in an arc, slamming the buckler into his helmeted head.

  He hit the ground hard, and before he could recover, I drove my sword into his chest.

  He gasped, choking once, before going still.

  “I only did what was necessary to defend my home and my people,” I said, knowing he could no longer hear me.

  Elyndra was engaged with two fighters—a human woman and a male dwarf—while Skreek fought a pair of elves.

  Halvard was locked in a battle of magic with the enemy mage, while Roderik traded arrows with the opposing archers.

  I couldn’t see Falkar or Dominic for a moment, but then the skeleton came flying around a tree, slamming into the ground hard.

  Following him was a mountain of a man, wielding a massive hammer in both hands.

  He wore no armor, and no sign of that “M”, but his body was thick and muscular, covered in scars. He looked at me and grinned before raising his hammer over his head, aiming to crush Dominic.

  I snarled and channeled magic through my blade, launching a blast of lightning at the man.

  His eyes widened an instant before it struck him, and his entire body lit up like a Christmas tree before he was blasted backward, smoking.

  Falkar came barreling around the treeline a moment later, locked in a dangerous dance with a human wielding a spear, both moving fast enough that their weapons were a blur.

  I rushed in to help Dominic up, the skeleton nodding his thanks, before turning to aid Falkar.

  I took a step forward, but a groan caught my attention. I turned and saw the mountain-man beginning to stand, his knees shaking with residual static.

  It seemed he was resistant to lightning.

  “That blade packs quite the punch, Herald,” he laughed, a grin spreading across his face. He ran a hand across his brow, wiping away sweat. “Reminds me of my late division leader’s weapon.”

  I frowned, a dark look crossing my face, but didn’t rise to the bait.

  He charged toward me, swinging the hammer in a wide arc. I raised my arm to block it — the weapon too fast to dodge — but Dominic got in the way instead, his shield taking the brunt of the blow.

  I could see the undead visibly shaking with the effort, his booted feet digging furrows into the grass.

  I leapt past Dominic and took a wild swing of my own, but the man moved quicker than his size would suggest.

  Standing beside Dominic, I watched the big man for a moment, breathing heavily, sweat dripping from my brow. He looked amused—almost like he was toying with us.

  “Not bad, Herald,” he laughed, shaking his head as he shifted into a defensive stance. “Not bad at all. I see now why you were able to fight Sir Josef.”

  I frowned, but didn’t rise to his taunts.

  Around us, the battle raged on. Falkar was struggling against the spear-wielder, but Elyndra had slain both of her opponents and was already moving to assist him.

  The archers had stopped firing at Roderik and were now taking potshots at Skreek—freeing up my kobold friend, but making things harder for the goblin.

  Halvard and the opposing wizard were locked in a stalemate, every spell Halvard cast countered by one from the adventurer, and vice versa.

  I turned my focus back to the big man, sparing Dominic a brief glance. He nodded, and together we surged forward.

  I slashed. The man leaned back. Dominic jabbed forward. The man brought the haft of his hammer up to block.

  Then his body flashed gold—and he swung.

  Dominic blocked, but he was sent flying once more, while I was left to take the remaining force of the blow.

  There was a loud crack, and for a moment I couldn’t breathe as the hammer slammed into my side.

  I fell to my knees, blood spilling from my lips, before my natural regeneration began to take hold.

  I didn’t get much time to recover, a massive fist catching me in the chin and knocking me onto my back.

  My ears rang, and I didn’t catch all of what the man said next.

  “—itful, really. I thought you’d be stronger than this,” his voice was cutting, mocking.

  I growled, and before I knew it, the berserk rage was taking over.

  I rolled out of the way of the next blow before standing, shouting, yelling, sounding like a beast possessed.

  My blade came up in a vicious sweep before I turned the blow back into a downward slash.

  The first attack he dodged, but the second scored a line across his chest.

  He grunted, falling back and watching me warily now.

  Dominic recovered and joined my side once more, but I paid him no mind, instead charging straight ahead, focusing purely on offense.

  Slash, jab, slash-slash.

  I took hits of my own but barely acknowledged them, focusing solely on trying to kill this man who mocked me, who threatened my monsters.

  The hammer caught me in the side again, blood spilling from my lips, but I thrust forward, driving my blade into the man’s chest.

  It was like trying to cut jello; even without armor, his body was hard, thick, and difficult to punch through.

  Yet I managed.

  He gasped, his body locking up, eyes widening in surprise.

  I pushed deeper, and his eyes rolled back before he slumped to the ground, pulling me with him.

  I didn’t stop there, the rage overwriting any thought. Letting go of my blade, I began to punch, scratch, and claw at him.

  I couldn’t imagine what it looked like to an outsider. I was like a feral beast that had been backed into a corner, I was certain.

  When I managed to get enough sense about me to pull my sword free, I was breathing heavily, my hands and body covered in blood not my own.

  I stood, the sounds of battle still all around me.

  Dominic watched me with that skeletal face, no expression possible to read, but the way he stood told me he was making sure I was safe.

  I nodded, and the two of us rejoined the fight. Exhaustion washed over me… but I wouldn’t leave my monsters alone—not against adventurers.

  [Current Day: 10]

  [Soul Essence: 3691]

  [Kingdom Core: Level 3]

  [Domain Size: 6 Sectors]

  [Active Quest: — None —]