The last thing Kaito Tanaka knew was the blinding glare of oncoming headlights and the sickening crunch of metal. There was no pain, just a sudden, violent ending. His final, bitter thought echoed in the void. The strategy was sound. They were just too weak-willed to see it through. Too afraid of "unconventional" methods.He had been one of the Pentagon's most promising strategic analysts, a mind capable of modeling global conflicts with terrifying accuracy. And they had fired him for it. Now, he was nothing.But then, he was something again.Awareness returned in a torrent of unfamiliar sensations. The rough texture of a wool blanket. The pungent smell of woodsmoke and unwashed bodies. A dull, throbbing pain in his cheek."—cowering in your room while real men defend your walls, you useless worm!" a voice roared, thick with contempt.Kaito's eyes snapped open. He was lying on a simple bunk in a stone-walled room. A giant of a man, clad in worn leather and steel, was standing over him

The great hall of Northpass Keep was a monument to faded glory. Tattered banners depicting the Greyrat family crest—a stoic badger on a field of grey and blue—hung from the rafters, gathering dust. The long trestle tables were scarred and barren, and a cold draft whispered through cracks in the stone. It was here that the remaining soul of the fief had gathered: fifty men-at-arms, a handful of servants, and Elara, Kaelan's younger sister, her face pale and streaked with tears.Roderick stood before them, his bulk casting a long shadow in the firelight. "Our father is dead!" he announced, his voice raw. "The Northpass has no Baron!"A murmur of despair rippled through the crowd. They had known the Baron was ill, but the finality of it crashed down upon them. They were leaderless, perched on the edge of the world with a storm gathering in the north."But we are not without direction!" Eldric's voice cut through the gloom, calmer but no less forceful. He stepped forward, gesturing to whe

The silence stretched, thick and heavy, broken only by the pained whinnies of the injured horses and the groans of the fallen knights. Fifty soldiers of Riverweald stood in perfect formation, their discipline warring with the shock of what they had just witnessed. They were ready to storm a gate, to die in glorious combat. They were not prepared for this silent, surgical carnage.Captain Vorlick’s face cycled through emotions like a storm-wracked sky: disbelief, fury, and finally, a cold, calculating hatred. His knuckles were white on his reins. He could order the charge. Fifty men could still take this crumbling keep. But how many would fall to more of those hidden pits? How many would be picked off by crossbowmen he couldn't even see? The cost, both in men and in his own reputation if he failed, was suddenly terrifyingly high.Kaelan didn't move from the railings. He didn't repeat his demand. He simply waited, his Enhanced Calculation feeding him data. Vorlick's posture: 84% probabi

Jasper slipped into the night, a ghost swallowed by the darkness beyond the torchlight. The silence he left behind in Northpass Fortress was a controlled wire, whispering with fear. Kaelan stood over the map for a long time, his Level 3 Enhanced Calculation running endless, fruitless simulations. Without data, every model was just a guess. He felt the weight of every minute Jasper was gone, a tangible pressure on his temples.He finally pushed away from the table, the scrape of wood on stone echoing in the silent hall. He had to focus on what he could control. The grain was secure, but it was a temporary cancellation, not a solution. The fortress was a shell, and its defenders were a ragtag group of individuals, not an army.He found Roderick and Eldric in the barracks, quietly arguing over the watch rotations."We need more men on the wall at all times," Roderick insisted, his voice a low growl. "They could come at any moment.""And exhaust our entire force in a week?" Eldric counter

The air in the courtyard turned to ice. Jasper’s words, delivered in a breathless, terrified whisper, hung in the twilight like a funeral cry. It looked right at me. This was no longer a simple scouting report; it was a confirmation of their deepest, most primal fears. The enemy was not only numerous and brutal—it was aware.“Get him water and have the healer see to that wound,” Kaelan commanded, his voice cutting through the stunned silence. His Enhanced Calculation was already whirring, the new data from Jasper’s report feeding into his Tactical Simulations. The fuzzy map in his mind sharpened, the enemy force now a defined bunch of 200 red markers, with a single, pulsing crimson icon representing the Shaman.Roderick’s face was a mask of grim fury. “Two hundred. We can hold the walls against that.”“Did you not hear him?” Eldric countered, his voice low and urgent. “This isn’t a war party; it’s a… a gathering. It’s harvesting something. We don’t know what that thing is capable of.”