B2 Ch. 16 Preparations

Ichiro was there in a flash, grasping his Father’s hand and heaving him out of the ground.  Hiro exploded up in a shower of dirt, stumbling forward into the arms of his son. Ichiro held him there for a long second, before Hiro pulled away gently, and looked around at the small audience. As he met our eyes, the dirt suddenly fell away from him all at once, revealing a Hiro that was both similar and completely different from the one they had known.

Guardian Daimyo of the Three-Fold Alliance.

Hiro’s armor and sword remained unchanged as did his characteristic hard stare.  Except now it was augmented by eyes that were formed from the same green gemlike substance that made up the Sovereign Crystal’s structure.  The eyes were intense, glowing with an internal light of their own that was visible even in the light of the sun.  Because of them, it took Tilly a moment to notice the other change. The parts of his lightly furred skin that weren’t covered in armor now displayed an intricate network of markings that depicted dancing flames.

Hiro looked down at his hands, then looked up, his face taking on the “I’m checking my character screen” look. They all watched him, waiting for someone to say the first word.  Tilly, being a sucker for awkward silences couldn’t help but break the tension,

“Looks good on you Hiro!” He said cheerily, gesturing up and down at the lapin’s body and interrupting the lapin’s reading.

The Samurai stared back at him implacably for another long uncomfortable moment,  but Tilly could have sworn he caught a glint in those crystalline eyes at his gratingly awkward joke.

“Father, how are you feeling.” Ichiro blurted, taking Tilly’s interruption as a queue.

The newly christened Gaurdian flicked his eyes down in a dismissal of his screens and turned formally to the Priestess.  His voice finally emerging in all its baritone glory,

“I owe you a debt.  I spent my life willingly to buy time for my people and you have given it back to us along with a great gift.”  He said before bowing deeply,

She surprised Tilly by bowing even deeper in return,

“The Land has chosen you, warrior. May the ground beneath your feet be ever-fruitful and grow rich with the blood of our enemies, Gaurdian” She replied with equal gravity, her response ringing with some small portion of the power of the incomprehensible words she had spoken earlier when casting the ritual.

Hiro nodded finding the words a fitting response, and turned back to Ichiro and Tilly, his crystalline stare making an oddly similar contrast with Ichiro’s all-white gaze.

“Thank you both.”  He said gesturing down at the ground where he had recently laid.

“I was not taken against my will.  The… Land offered me a choice.  My bond for some of its power.  I accepted eagerly, this chance to see my duty to my people through was simply too great to pass up.”

“Are you still… yourself?”  Ichiro asked slowly.

“The bond I have taken is rooted in my desire to protect this place at all costs. I can never again leave the boundary of our people.  In exchange, I will persist as long as they do, growing in power along with the Alliance.”

Then taking special care to look Ichiro in his equally off-putting eyes he continued,

“I am Hiro Masimoto, Fourth Lord in Exile, and now Guardian of the Three-Fold Alliance. She has laid no additional bond on me, I do not think the power she now holds would have allowed it even if she wanted.”

“He is right you know.”  Erash broke in, pulling their eyes over to her.

“I lost access to several of my more suggestive abilities when I took this office.  In their place, much of my remaining build has been empowered and geared toward Purification and Renewal.  While in this role, my own power keeps me from laying a Geas.”

At her words, Ichiro nodded to himself, and Threstus laid a friendly hand on LInus’ shoulder quipping,

“Thank the God’s you are still fit for duty Hiro, I don’t think our Consul here can take any more paperwork.”

Linus’ thoughtful frown turned into a stormy scowl as he struck out like lightning swinging a closed fist at the offending arm like he meant it. Threstus snatched his arm back a mite too slowly, rolling with the blow but not avoiding it altogether.

Then continuing as if nothing had happened, Linus returned to verbally walking them through the plan of attack,

“Hiro, we should have stone start arriving tomorrow, and half our workforce is shifting to the wall project starting this afternoon.  The Commander will hold half the bastions here to continue training our forces.  Can I send the other half with you to hold the pass until we have fortifications in place? We will send regular updates on other progress, but this seems paramount.”

“That is acceptable, I will leave Nyuk and Kuro here to gather up any volunteers for the rangers and begin their training under Threstus. None of our enemy escaped our first encounter, but they know there has been a Shift as well as we, and when none return from their first investigative party, more will come. With the Boon, we have a chance to be ready, but I expect some sort of response in the coming hours, their time.  Once our presence is confirmed, if they mean to come against us in force, then we will undoubtedly be facing a fully mobilized force close to when the Boon expires. ”

“What about me?  Does this change what I should be doing?”  Tilly asked, ready to post up with Hiro and reign down fire on the new foes.

“Jonathan Tillman, your task remains the same.  Increase your survivability and do what you can to find the next Origin Facet.”  Hiro remarked curtly, before turning to Ichiro,

“We need to be sending patrols along the mountains and forests on the rest of our border.  I am sending you to oversee this. We will rotate in others as duty allows to offer our Human a variety of challenges.  I trust you have already laid a sufficient foundation.”

At that Ichiro smiled, “He has done very well and I will see it done.”

“Oh, I have the perfect starting partner for him!”  Threstus broke in, still rubbing his shoulder where Linus had struck a glancing blow.

“He isn’t much use in training anyway.”  He continued, eyeing Tilly with a shit-eating grin.

Tilly winked at him in response, doing his best to cover over the sudden shiver that ran up his spine at the ominous proclamation.

“Sounds like I should start spending the mornings down here?” Erash asked with a quirk of her manicured eyebrow.

“That would be our preference,” Linus answered respectfully,

“We have some interested in testing themselves at the Crystal to see if they qualify for any priest classes. If any are accepted by the system, we would like you to see to their training while you are not here.”

“I look forward to it Consul.” She said, adding only the slightest emphasis on the class name, before turning and walking away.

“Well, if that's all, I have a mess of unruly candidates here that need to know how to at least hold a weapon before another war gets well and truly started. “  Threstus stated crisply before turning in the opposite direction of the High Priestess and moving back toward the drilling soldiers.

At that, as if by some unspoken signal, the others nodded, waved, or simply turned, all moving toward their duties.  Tilly found himself suddenly standing alone looking around the parade ground like he had missed something.

“So no pointers?”  He asked the empty air,

Then not wanting to seem lost, he rested his hands on his weapons casually and wandered over to the water troughs to do some thinking.

Part of him appreciated the freedom that they were entrusting to him.  But if he was being honest, another part of him found being wholly in charge of his time daunting.  In some ways, he had spent his whole life moving from one emergency to another, now he was being invited to prepare in whatever way he thought was best.. He was sure that there would be a follow-up threat to the border, and soon.  But until then, he wanted to put in as much time as possible into strengthening the skills he already had.

He pulled up the Skills list and gave it a hard look, trying to decide what on there would actually increase survivability.

Skills:

-Forestcraft level 12

-Identify level 17

-Cooking level 12

-Beginner Hatchett level 14

-Animal Processing level 9

-Stealth level 7

-Herb Lore Level 2

-Ax Throwing Level 16

-Dual-Wielding (Hatchets) Level 11

-Spirit Walk Level 14

-Meditation Level 7

-First Aid, Level 35

Well, he could throw out the active combat skills, he was already training those.  He could also throw out the quality of life skills.  Those were important over time, but he had the feeling they wouldn’t do much against Corrupted vampires.

That left Stealth, Identify, and Forestcraft as his best bets for increasing his chances of survival outside of combat.  He needed to be able to spot and avoid trouble when possible.  Not to mention his ability to survive if he was ever on his own again.

After sparring tomorrow with whoever they had picked out for him, Tilly decided he would find Ichiro and join up with the patrol force, perhaps even join in some ranger training while he was at it.

That still left him the rest of today…He looked back at the walls, and the camps and fields beyond.  Shit was about to hit the fan all over again, he could feel it, so before he really threw himself into preparations he decided to try and find the few people he hadn’t seen since the fall of the empire. Who knew when he would next get the chance to touch base?

Tilly wandered back through the city, his progress stopped by an absolutely massive group of laborers heading towards the parade grounds, and probably the Gap in the mountains beyond.  They all carried a variety of dirt moving and construction tools.  Their classes varied and Tilly saw everything from Mason to Foreman.

Once through the city, he made his way over to the new bridge and was pleased to find at least one of the objects of his search so soon.  He had decided, if he got the chance, to thank the honu who had done so much to cover his back right before their escape.

Franklin stood on the banks of the river, casting an ice-aspected ability over and over.  Tilly watched as he targeted the bridge’s supports one by one in succession.  As soon as the cloud of frost representing his ability hit the supports, he would move his hands around in concentration, as if shaping clay.  Then the cloud would move on, leaving a slightly reinforced and more ornate structure in its place.

He had also exchanged the more typical honu robes for something thicker and fur-lined, most likely because his new class had not come with any innate elemental resistance.  One thing that had remained was that same brilliant blue scarf fluttering over the collar of his new jacket. With all the changes he had already seen, Tilly was happy, but not surprised to see a new class identifier over his head.

Level 35 Tundra Caller.

“Franklin! How are you doing?”

“Very well! Thank you for asking Mr. Tillman.”

“Please, I don’t think I have a chance at this with the lapins, but call me Tilly.  I’m glad I found you!”

“I can do that...Tilly”  He said, his speech showing some of the honu propensity for slowness for the first time.

“I had heard you had returned in a mysterious manner and the elders briefed us on a coming change, but I did not imagine something like this.” He said, gesturing happily to the ice structure.

It was crude, but obviously sturdy and was allowing for an almost constant stream of traffic to move back and forth from the agricultural lands to the populace centers.

“This is amazing! How often do you have to maintain this thing?”

“Every four hours or so, but along with the ice augment to my water abilities, I gained a skill called Sculpt Element. At higher levels it will allow me to form complex shapes out of ice.  Every time I reinforce the bridge, I can feel my skill advancing.” He said excitedly, then a log bumped against his structure from upstream, and a worker grabbed at if with a hooked pole, shouting for another.  Franklin finished his last support and turned fully toward Tilly.

“They tell me my bridge will be replaced by tomorrow and I'll be moving to the wall project.”  He said pointing over to the pile of logs on the the bank next to the bridge.

“I can only assume this means we are already facing outside pressure.”  He stated, a shadow falling across his face.

“Yeah, we already had a pretty close call at our new border earlier today, Hiro barely stopped it.  We have the bastions moving up that way now to secure it as some sort of fortification is built. But, even with all that happening, I felt like it was important for me to find and thank you.  Without you, I wouldn’t have made it out…”  Tilly said, clapping the Honu on the jacket cover shell. He didn’t know the Honu terribly well but Franklin had fought by his side and covered him during that retreat.  The honu had probably paid the highest price voluntarily for the other to get out, with the loss of Kehie and the other four elders… Tilly sincerely hoped others had acknowledged their sacrifice.

Franklin received the strange physical interaction and offer of thanks with a polite, if confused, smile.  He looked Tilly in the eyes and slowly reached around to his back and gave it a few pats of his own.

“I am glad you made it… Tilly. Too many didn’t.  We have been offered a chance to rebuild and perhaps even fulfill the Dream of my ancestors.”  He said, the heaviness lines around his eyes easing slightly as he displayed a small smile.