Daylight in Novaterra thinned like silk pulled between careful fingers. It never set so much as it leaned, as if the sky were a tired friend easing into a chair. Hammers slowed. Voices softened. The smell of resin and sawdust made the whole half-born town feel like the inside of a carpenter's pocket.
Aiden walked the western edge with Venn and Ansel at his heels, the mine's first haul of iron stacked in tidy, smug ingots. The numbers in Venn's ledger had names now: bolts, nails, hinges, and—soon—scorpion limbs.
"Leather?" Aiden asked.
"Twenty strips from boots and harness," Venn replied, pained like a man who had donated parts of his soul. "Plus the wolf hides tanned in an indecent hurry. We are… solvent." 😬
"Indecent hurries keep indecent visitors out," Ansel said, grinning as he tapped the cart frame. "Let's build your thorn."
They set the Small Scorpion up on a low wheeled bed so three could crew it—one to wind, one to aim, one to load. The torsion bundles drank leather like a thirsty thing; the arms flexed once and sighed into place. When the bow-spans locked with a thunk, even Venn's tidy soul let out a pleased noise he would deny later.
"Name her," Ansel said. "Weapons don't behave without a name."
Aiden looked at the smooth stock, the oiled winch, the first bolt—iron head, ash shaft—that lay like a promise across the brace. "Thorn," he said. "Short, stubborn, and rude."
Elara strolled up in battered silver, approving with her eyes first, then her mouth. "Thorn," she repeated. "Rinna, Dace—this is your third child. Feed her, oil her, and don't let her wander." ⚔️
Rinna—the soldier from last night, forearm scar peeking from her sleeve—ran a respectful hand above the scorpion's arm, not touching. "Aye, captain. I'll keep her out of trouble." Dace just nodded, the economical move of a woman who saved words for when steel listened.
Aiden assigned a third: a freckled recruit called Tam with a farmer's shoulders and a grin that came out when he forgot to be afraid. He beamed at Thorn like he'd been asked to hold a star. 🙂
"Practice load," Elara said. "No shot. I want the sound in your bones."
They cranked. The torsion bundles creaked like heavy rope under a ship's weight. Tam set a practice bolt—a sand-weighted dummy—Dace sighted along the stock, Rinna breathed out and flipped the trigger. Thwack. The bolt punched a neat black kiss into a stump at the fence, startling the chickens into offended commentary.
"Again," Elara said, which was her favorite word when things looked promising.
By midday, Riversong had sent two runners and a pride-drunk note: First dock-post in; fish large; we named the first boat "Try Not To Fall In." Aiden laughed when he read it. He sent back rope, nails, and five of the calmest hands in camp, as promised. He also sent a little wrapped package of sweetened oats from the ration store labeled For bravery (and boats). Venn harrumphed, then added it to the ledger under Morale (In-Kind) and pretended it was absolutely standard.
The Forester's Hut frame rose at the treeline like a handshake to the woods. The crew sang work songs that sounded like someone had sanded the Blue World's radio into something with sap in it. They replanted as they cut, saplings neat in their rows, hope pretending to be a future forest 🌱.
The mine coughed up its second breath: iron, coal, stone, one magic crystal like a fit of frozen lightning. Calder looked at it with the careful respect you give a sleeping cat that could be a tiger. "Don't lick it," he advised solemnly.
"Nobody was licking it," Venn said, then eyed Tam, who had indeed been thinking about licking it.
By late afternoon, the western watch reported shapes—small, quick, uncommitted—sliding at the forest edge. Charms hung like ugly ornaments where Elara's scouts had marked them: twisted sinew triangles, bone dice on string, feathers that didn't belong to any bird you'd trust. Calder burned two at the perimeter; the air twitched and then felt… quieter. The [System] liked that.
[Totem Cleansing] • Local fear effect reduced. • Random skirmish chance –10% for 24h.
Aiden gathered the dusk team at the fence: Elara, Rinna, Dace, ten newly-minted Militia (proud, terrified, trying not to show the first and the second), Tam at Thorn with hands he couldn't keep still, Mara (who had no business being there but stood anyway like a town pillar), Venn with spare bowstrings and chalk in his pockets, Ansel because he refused to miss the scorpion's debut, Calder because someone had to soothe souls and bandage the foolish.
"Tonight is about edge," Aiden said. "We are not clearing a cave. We are not chasing anything into a hole. We burn totems, break markers, shatter their comfort at our border. If they push, we push back exactly as far. No further." He caught Elara's eye. "No heroics."
Her look said you're learning and I was there when you learned it. "No heroics," she echoed. "Just teamwork." She turned to the line. "Shields. Torches. Spear-hips, not spear-arms. Walk like a wall."
Jory climbed the tower with the horn under his arm and the set jaw of a boy who wanted to be a bell and not a squeak. He threw Aiden a quick glance; Aiden gave him a nod that meant I trust you. Jory's cheeks went pink and brave. 🫡
They moved out.
The west grass hissed like a thousand small secrets. The forest breathed cool and damp. Distant, a drum beat like a heart that refused regulation. Thum. …thum. thum.
"Drums mean organizer," Elara murmured, shield sliding into place. "This won't be a pack of stupid."
"Then let's be a pack of prepared," Aiden said, and if that sounded smug to anyone, he contented himself with the knowledge that he had been terrified long enough for a day.
They came in sight of the first charm-tree: sinew triangles, feathers knotted, a strip of blue bead-light in the center that made the pupil tighten even though the mind wanted to ignore it. Calder stepped forward, set a small circle of sanity, burned the lot.
A hiss rose from the trees. Not wind. Displeasure.
"Push line," Elara said, and they did. The militia moved in the practiced walk—no charges, no lunges, just a steady grind that told the world this is our space. Rinna trundled Thorn along with Dace and Tam, the wheels whispering in the grass. Tam tried not to grin at the machine. He failed. 🙂
They reached the low mouth of the cave as the light turned pewter. Bones hung above the entrance on braided grasses, clacking softly in the moving air. A totem of lashed sticks and a skull sat like a crown in the dirt, blue bead dead center. The skull looked human until you noticed the teeth were wrong. Aiden chose not to notice a little harder.
"Thorn," Elara said, voice low. "Nock. Target: crown."
Tam's hands trembled. He set the bolt, swallowed, set it again with care. Dace sighted. Rinna cranked the winch with a steady cadence. Hnnk-hnnk-hnnk… lock. The torsion bundles hummed like stretched muscle.
"On your mark," Elara said.
A shape scuttled at the edge of the dark—small, crouched, long arms, eyes too bright in the shadow. Two more. Five. A laugh that curled like a cut.
Calder murmured, voice the sound of a steady hand on a fevered brow. The militia's torches didn't shake as much.
"Mark," Elara said, and Rinna squeezed.
THWACK.
The bolt tore the totem's crown off its post. The blue bead cracked without sound and fell like a tear in three parts—the same way the charm pieces had fallen in camp. The drum faltered.
"Line," Elara breathed. "Back a pace. Let them see we aren't greedy."
The laugh came again, higher and angry. From the dark, things slid: goblins, if the Blue World had named them right, but these were less green and more bruise, long-fingered and marked with daubs of chalk that pretended to be armor. They came fast, as if speed could be a shield. It wasn't.
The wall met them like a schoolmaster with a long memory. Bump. Bump. Spears braced and moved, not stabbed at empty air.
"Left gap," Elara called—someone had flinched at a hisss and left a hole—and three shields kissed into place before the first goblin could leverage the mistake. A torch swung low, not at a head but at a hand; the goblin shrieked, let go of its stone knife, and died annoyed rather than proud.
The drum picked up again, faster now, a heartbeat turned into an argument. A silhouette rose deeper in the cave: taller by a head, skull mask chalked in white, staff in both hands, trinkets clattering along its length. The air around it warped faintly, like heat above road dust. The bead-light in the cave mouth liked the staff. Aiden's stomach did a small, impolite flip. 😬
"Thorn," Elara said softly. "New target."
Rinna breathed out, Dace sighted along the stock, and Tam set the next bolt like a prayer. The drum raced. The staff lifted.
"Mark."
THWACK.
The bolt didn't hit the mask. It hit the staff just below the trinkets, where the wood turned from carved to plain. Wood cracked. Trinkets scattered. The skull mask jerked as if someone had yanked a thread. The drum stuttered.
The [System] approved like a tutor surprised to find a good student.
[Leader Disrupted] • Enemy coordination –20% for 2 min. • Panic chance increased.
The front ranks of goblins… noticed. Peering eyes flicked back to the cave. Several hissed at once. A bolder one leapt; the shield there was Rinna's, and goblins do not love meeting Rinna's opinion of them. 🛡️
"Hold," Elara said. "We take the edge. Not the hole."
They burned two more hanging charms. They smashed a fetish that had been brave enough to rattle at them. The staff bearer shrieked in a way no wolf had ever learned to shriek, the sort of sound that curdled milk and ideas. Calder's voice didn't rise; it deepened, and the shriek slid off it like rain off wax.
"Back one," Elara commanded. The wall backed one. The goblins lunged and hit wood. One of them tried to climb a shield and made it three-quarters up before discovering that the person behind the shield could be cruel and elbowy.
The drum stopped.
The cave breathed.
It wasn't air. It was something under air. Aiden felt it in the meat behind his eyes, the way you feel thunder before it talks. The bead-light in the charms flickered like a heartbeat trying to remember a rhythm.
The [System] slid a pane into Aiden's vision as gently as a hand on a shoulder.
[Discovery: Unstable Dungeon — West Hollow (Dormant)] • Status: Dormant (waking attempts detected) • Source: Improvised rituals + ambient ley-stress • Risk: Low → Moderate if unchallenged • Recommendation: Maintain perimeter, destroy catalysts, **do not** enter without prepared party.
Aiden swallowed. He wanted to enter and break the beating thing until it forgot music. He wanted to not enter more. "We have our sign," he said aloud. "We make the edge clear."
Elara's mouth tilted: proud and stern at once. "Rinna, one more shot to clip any charm you can see. Then we peel."
Rinna aimed quick, an archer's instinct translated to torsion. The bolt smashed a line of beads deeper in the mouth. The drum tried one last, petulant thum that even it didn't believe. The wall backed. Goblins tried to follow; Thorn's empty click turned three of them into regret at close range as Tam flipped the bow arms with a speed that would have impressed a cat.
"Tam," Elara said, "you may grin now." He did. 😁
They returned to the fence at a walk, not a skitter. The horn on the tower blew stranger approaching only once, as a courtesy to the line already moving. The goblins followed to the old totem stump, found it very boring, and decided the night had other plans. Jory waited until they were well back inside and then blew all clear in a note so proud it would have saluted itself if it could.
Nobody cheered. They did the work—torches out, gear stowed, scorpion unstrung, shields hung. Then they breathed, and that was worth more than a shout.
"Casualties?" Aiden asked.
"Bruises. Bite," Calder said, already bandaging a forearm with economical hands. "One sprain. Nothing that needs laying down forever." He looked at Aiden over the cloth, a quiet pride tucked between the lines. "You didn't chase."
"Not tonight," Aiden said. His hands wanted to shake. He kept them still by keeping them visible. "We don't go into holes we haven't drawn maps of. We won't earn anyone's song by dying on the first verse."
The [System] tallied what everyone knew and made it concise.
[Engagement: West Hollow Edge] • Charms destroyed: 5 • Enemy disrupted: 1 (Shaman staff broken) • Casualties: 0 (Injuries: 4 minor) • Promotions: 19 → Militia (Lv. 3) • Morale: +7 (We held the edge) • New Site: Unstable Dungeon — West Hollow (Dormant) [Pinned]
Mara slipped up beside him with a dipper of water. "It's a start," she said.
"It's enough," Aiden answered, and let the water turn his dry throat back into a working part.
Ansel thumped the scorpion bed with a lover's fondness. "Thorn throws true," he declared.
"Thorn throws where Rinna tells her," Rinna corrected, smug and modest in equal parts.
Tam patted the stock like it was a dog that had done a clever trick. "Good girl," he whispered. Thorn didn't answer, which was wise.
Elara stood with her helmet tucked against her hip, watching the west line like a captain watches a stubborn horizon. "We'll need caltrops," she said. "Carts of them. Goblin feet are quick and foolish. Make the ground teach them."
"Venn?" Aiden asked.
Venn already had chalk out. "Iron: thirty for caltrops. Coal: keep the forge happy. Stone: sent to wall stakes. We'll run lean on nails two days; Ansel will scowl and build anyway."
"I'd scowl even if we were rich," Ansel said cheerfully.
Aiden nodded, counting days, counting edges. "Morning: finish the blacksmith, set caltrops west, send a five-man escort with Riversong's return runners. Noon: draft wall segment one—a strong corner, like Elara said. Evening: run drills, show the militia the new dance move called 'put metal on the ground where goblins hate it'."
"Catchy," Elara said, deadpan. 😌
The night relaxed by increments. Chickens forgave the world. The cows chewed like philosophers who'd just solved ethics. The mine bell tolled low when the second cart hit the cradle; iron glowed in Venn's eyes brighter than his lantern.
Jory climbed down from the tower with legs that wanted to jelly. Aiden met him halfway, not touching, just present. "Good calls," he said. "Clear. Clean. No panics."
Jory's grin arrived like a dawn he'd earned. "I didn't squeak," he said, and then—because he was still fourteen under all the valor—added, "Much."
"You squeaked at the right things," Elara said, which was a compliment dressed up as a shade. Jory practically levitated. 🫶
Calder drifted past and touched the scorpion's bed with two fingers like a blessing that did not mind iron. "She may carry prayers as well as bolts," he said mildly.
"She carries math," Venn muttered.
"Elara," Aiden said when the bustle thinned and he could hear himself choose words, "that shaman—"
"Staff," she corrected. "A shaman with a staff is a shaman with teeth. We broke the teeth. They'll grow a new set eventually."
"Then we keep breaking them," Aiden said. "At our edge. On our terms."
She looked at him like a commander allowed herself to look at a duke who wasn't stupid. "On our terms," she agreed. "No heroics. Just work."
He turned toward the altar. The silver inlaid lines were quiet and sure. He thought of the bowl drinking vows and returning champions. He thought of the [System]'s cool pane: Dormant, unstable. He thought of portals that were ten years away and smaller mouths that would try to learn to be big. He felt the ache in his shoulders that came from not lifting anything and from carrying a different kind of weight.
"Novaterra," he said softly to the air that tasted faintly of smoke and fresh-cut wood, "tonight you set your boundary."
The wind found the fence and made it hum. It sounded like agreement. Or maybe that was wishful thinking. He'd take it either way. 🙂
The [Evening Summary] pinged, polite as always.
[Evening Summary — Novaterra] • West Hollow: Identified as Unstable Dungeon (Dormant). Perimeter set. • Thorn (Small Scorpion): Operational, crew assigned (Rinna/Dace/Tam). • Promotions: 19 → Militia (Lv.3). Training speed +10% (Heroic Presence). • Blacksmith: 85% (ETA: morning). Barracks: 60% (ETA: two days). • Caltrops: Queued (30 iron). • Riversong: Stable; first dock post set; escort scheduled. • Forester's Hut: Framed; replanting active. • Coins: 800 (unchanged). Resources flowing (Mine cycle). • Morale: Steady → Confident 🙂
Aiden closed it. Numbers were a spine; tonight, bones sang.
Elara started to turn away, then paused. "Permission to tell you something you don't want to hear, my Lord?"
He braced. "Granted."
"This part—edges and night dances and making the forest respect you—this will teach you the wrong lesson if you let it," she said, eyes on the dark. "It teaches that strong lines and louder horns solve everything. They don't. They buy time. Use it to build the things that keep people fed and sane when the drums stop being little and start being armies."
Aiden breathed out. "Barracks and blacksmith. Clinics and granary. Foresters and fish. Walls and—" He looked at the long, long plan that felt too big for a throat. "—and when stone turns to city."
She nodded once. Approval, and a dare to keep deserving it. "Good night, my Lord."
"Good night, Elara."
He stood a while longer with the fence humming and the scorpion's limbs cooling and the sense of goblins sulking just beyond the line like cats denied bacon. He felt tired down where the bones told the truth—good tired, the kind that comes from doing the next right thing even when it isn't exciting.
Far off, very faint, a single thum answered itself and then stopped, embarrassed to be heard.
"Sleep," Aiden told the horizon. "Tomorrow we lay our first stones."
The horizon didn't argue. It just leaned into morning, as if this world had decided to trust them a little—for now.