FREE USE in Primitive World

The heavy wooden gates of the Veynar closed with a final, echoing thud, sealing the one hundred and eighty returning warriors inside the relative safety of the central rings.

The initial burst of wild celebration... the weeping mothers, the shouting scouts, unrefined shock of a bloodless double raid... gradually settled into a tense, heavy quiet.

The sun was climbing toward the center sky, burning away the last of the blue morning mist, , casting bright, harsh light through the ironwood canopy, but the shadows on the ground felt longer, heavier.

In the southern corner of the primary clearing, a massive pre-war feast had been thrown together with frantic desperation. In the Orrath, a feast before a grand clash wasn’t a celebration of victory... it was a final acknowledgment of life.

There was no grand ceremony or traditional dancing; it was a gritty, urgent gathering meant to fuel the bodies that would be holding the lines by nightfall.

Large wooden platters piled with roasted thunder-boar meat, thick slabs of salted river-lizard, and bowls of bitter iron-root paste were thrown onto the dirt tables.

Jars of fermented rot-juice and sweet palm-berry sap were cracked open freely.

Men who usually rationed their essence-heavy food tore into the hot fat with their teeth, grease dripping down their scarred chins.

Women drank the harsh, burning liquor until their eyes turned red, laughing too loudly to drown out the low, rhythmic death-chants the elders were still singing near.

Nobody knew how many of them would be breathing by the time the moon rose. In the face of absolute slaughter, the primitive instinct was to fill the belly and warm the blood.

Sol sat apart from the noise, his back pressed against a broad petrified root.

His black Rockhorn carapace was still caked in the greenish-yellow fluid of the stalkers he had harvested in the swamp, the alien stink mixing with the sour smell of roasted fat in the air.

His eyes were closed, his mind fully focused inward on the molten golden-silver pool crawling lazily beneath his ribs. The newly evolved energy was perfectly stable now, its golden-silver current flowing through his body like liquid starlight, giving his natural perception a sharp, heavy edge.

Through the fringe of the crowd, Sol opened one eye and spotted Elder Thorne sitting way across the dirt square in the deep shadow of an old granary hut. Beside him was his son.

Right now, both of them were keeping an incredibly low profile. Thorne’s fingers were loosely wrapped around a wooden bowl of mash, his old, wrinkled face deeply buried in the shadow of his fiber cloak.

His son sat perfectly still, his eyes fixed on the dirt, deliberately avoiding looking anywhere near Sol’s direction.

Ever since Sol had systematically dismantled the elite guards and stripped the elders of their authority over the defense maps, Thorne had realized that his political games were entirely useless against an outsider who ruled by absolute physical execution.

Sol watched them for a brief second before tearing another piece of meat off the bone. He didn’t care about their silence or their hidden resentment. In his mind, Thorne and his line were just small, fragile insects scurrying in the dirt.

In a world where raw strength and survival were the only laws that mattered, their political complaints had been thoroughly crushed by the sheer weight of his execution.

If they stayed out of the way during the pivot, they would live; if they stumbled or tried to compromise the lines to save their own skins, his blade would part their necks before the enemy could even reach the walls. It was simple logic.

Right as Sol finished his meal, a sudden shift occurred along the high watchtowers, as suddenly a sharp, piercing shriek came from above.

A large, spectral spirit hawk dropped from the high canopy like a falling stone, its translucent blue feathers trailing a faint line of essence as it swept across the clearing. The bird landed hard on the leather-wrapped forearm of a high watchtower scout who had just sprinted down the wooden ladder into the center ring.

The blue spirit bird instantly dissolved into a thin vapor, its internal message transforming into raw sensory vibrations that flooded the scout’s mind.

The scout stumbled into the dirt before Warchief Veylara, his breath coming out in a frantic, terrifying gasp. "Warchief! The lookouts at the lower basin... the spirit hawk has returned!"

"The messages have converged!" the scout panted, his breath shallow. "The Zerith stalkers from the northern swamp and the Gray Marauders from the southern ridges have met up at the central river crossing.

The Grand Chieftain of the Marauders has taken absolute command of the combined force. They are gathering their spears, foaming at the mouth, and moving out together in a single, massive group."

The announcement hit the clearing like a sudden frost. The loud laughing died instantly. An old warrior froze mid-bite, a piece of hot boar meat slipping out of his fingers and falling back into the ash. The reality of the four-thousand-man mass was finally on their doorsteps.

Sol rose from his place, the black Rockhorn carapace shifting smoothly over his shoulders. The newly evolved molten golden-silver liquid inside his chest gave a slow, hot thrum, expanding his internal perception until he could feel the sudden spike of adrenaline rippling through the surrounding warriors.

He turned his head toward Kira and Zeyra, who were standing right behind his flanks.

"The curtain is completely broken now," Sol said, his voice flat and casual. "Kira, Zeyra... go join the elite speed squads under Veylara and Hargon. Get your weapons prepped for the final round of war. You know your sectors."

Kira looked at him, her eyes narrowing with a brief flash of hesitation, but she nodded sharply, tightening the fiber binding on her short-bow. Zeyra didn’t argue either; she simply leaned her head against his shoulder armor for a single, grounding second, her unblinking eyes full of that obsessive, quiet heat, before she drifted into the shadows toward the western wall.