-Callen-

  Burying Dad hadn’t been easy. I left the flower that nightshade had begun to symbolize peace for Dad. Even though I have memories from my previous life and impressions of what happened in between. I don’t know what arriving in the proper afterlife entails, but I know that the soul is real and that Dad was an honest and good man. I’ll simply have to have faith that there is a place for him to rest happily.

  With the attack at an end, the town hastily erected makeshift barriers, and everyone with any perception skills was called up to guard the breach points. Meanwhile, Mayor Hew had decided to leave, leading the repairs to me. He was busy acting as host and negotiator with a team of knights who had arrived without warning. Normally such a force would be met with extreme suspicion because knights don’t visit without a reason, but during the battle the knights had proven vital in securing the northwestern walls.

  Previously I had gotten a great deal of experience designing houses, but now I was charged with repairing a wall layered with countless fractures and large chunks fallen into rubble. Luckily the workers I was working with were enthusiastic to work with me again. The quarry was soon in full force while the carpentry team focused on clearing rubble and building scaffolding. I did some quick research through the town's records on how the walls were originally built and discovered that the founding duke of House Harlanou had been a powerful earth mage and constructed a number of sanctuaries within his domain. These sanctuaries eventually grew into towns.

  While an interesting tidbit of history about the duke of the north, it didn’t help us fix the walls. The records of other incidents that damaged the walls showed that they had been mended in a more conventional formation of stacking stones and supporting structures. Those walls were inherently weaker than the solid stone left from the original. I definitely didn’t have the means to accomplish the same, but as long as I had the material, fusing the stone with projecting runes seemed entirely reasonable.

  Soon I got back into the groove of construction management. I didn’t even notice the knights the mayor had used as an excuse to avoid work and leave the town without causing a fuss. Instead I was taken in by several projects. A magic crane that pulls stone from the quarry, weight reduction carts to move the stone, and runic stone condensation to fix the fractures in standing walls. Reesia and Callia had taken Dad’s passing hard, but that didn’t mean they were moping; no, instead it lit a fire back in them.

  Callia had taken up Dad’s spear and was training with it to develop the necessary resistance to wither energy that afflicted everything it touched. Dad always carried it with him, which was becoming more impressive to me and Sis because she struggled to wield it for barely a few minutes. Grandpa also took this time to tell us how Dad had claimed his branch and raced off to save Mom. Telling these stories seemed to help Grandpa come to terms with the passing of his son, and my sisters and I loved hearing the details of Dad's life.

  Reesia’s stand at the central gap had boosted her position among the town guards, and now she was in limbo as the acting captain. The previous captain had jumped from the walls to kill beasts damaging its foundation before the wall collapsed, crushing him. The older guards filled in the authority and experience gap while Reesia took the lead with their support. Reesia had felt responsible for a great deal of the damage since she had participated in killing the cub, but even after we shared our story with the people, most seemed to accept it as a natural choice. A few were resentful but not vengeful, and our personal apology to everyone who lost someone seemed to appease them.

  With the helicopter successfully functioning, a big step was achieved. It had been designed to be my first battery-style flying device. The battery didn’t last long, but using runes to replenish it in flight had made it sufficiently functional as a proof of concept. Master Yoren was ecstatic about the invention and passed the message to his master with great enthusiasm. The response was something beyond my expectations. The Earthkin had assembled a massive hover platform/ship and flown an entire colony of their people to settle into the town. Apparently the grandmaster council had chosen to send Clan Stone-Foot to our town.

  The recent loss had left the town struggling to fill the gap in labor. Looking back to both the worm incident and the invasion, our adult numbers were almost cut in half. Mayor Hew had tried to leave organizing the Earthkin residents to me, but the Earthkin clan head dragged the mayor off. He was like a petulant child pouting at me as he was forced to work. With the surge of eager new workers, the repairs finished with ease, and I also got to learn directly from the Earthkin how their cities are protected by massive defensive installations. The idea was interesting, and a lot of the Earthkin were eager to try making new ballistas for our town, so I got to experiment with designing heavy weapons.

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  The townsfolk were hesitant to accept the new residents of the town at first. Their eager nature in craftsmanship and willingness to share knowledge helped people adjust, but the brash and stubborn attitude led to a number of drunken fights. The biggest changes brought by the Earthkin were the technology. Previously I had devised a number of new features like running water plumbing for public restrooms and the hospital, but the Earthkin wasted no time digging in and adding extensive expansions to my project. Running water through the farms, smooth stone roads on major paths, and they changed the quarry into a massive gate leading into their new district.

  About 4 months later the wall had been fully restored, and the new underground district was cleared out enough to provide shelter for the Earthkin. A new knight had been dispatched to our town, and it was someone familiar. Sir Fullart, who had been the leader among the knights dispatched to our town. I had been thoroughly surprised that we didn’t just get a knight but the knight captain of the previous baron. Though the man's grim demeanor made me suspect his presence in our town was more a work of politics than a voluntary choice. Despite that, Grandpa somehow ended up as a drinking buddy with the man. For some reason Grandpa gets along best with grumpy but honest people.

  Grandpa’s Story time

  Renack raised his flask to his mouth, forcing down the bitter drink. Growing old was truly a curse. His friends had long fallen in the line of duty, and his family had passed. His wife was slain in a bird raid, and his youngest was ambushed by a squirrel that had climbed the walls. Now his pride and joy, a fully fledged knight, gave his life fighting an apex monster.

  It was a good death; Renack couldn’t deny the pride he felt when little Reesia had shared her story. How he stepped up and drove the beast back. Nobody saw his end, but they saw what he had achieved. Reesia had escaped, The Great Bear had been severely wounded, and he had passed as all great warriors wished. Renack lamented his aching joints; when the captain had him retired, he had fallen into a long depression. It was his grandkids that opened him back up to the world. So curious and blessed in ways most would envy.

  Since then he has reached out to his old and new friends and taken up teaching young ones what it takes to survive. His life had meaning again, but then Marek had passed. His son would never get to spend time with his kids again or tell them all the stories he had never gotten to share. Renack had decided if Marek couldn’t, he would for him.

  “Your dad knew he couldn’t just run up and fight the Wither Tree; he had to win if he wanted to be with your mother, and he was only given two months to claim a trophy. He had usually focused on attacking with speed, but in those two months he trained the most important skills for fighting monsters stronger than you. Power Strike, Instant Strike, and a whole series of weakness-exploitative skills. However, the most important part was claiming this.” Renack holds up a blackened splinter.

  “This was a splinter recovered by accident from a ship that drifted too close and was smashed by the tree. It had chipped off when it struck the tooth of a great shark that the crew had recovered from a battle between sea beasts. Using this, your father built a tolerance to the wither. It likely cost him years from his lifespan, but that didn’t matter if he could spend what remained with Ela.”

  Renack flourished the piece dramatically to his grandkids, who, despite being nearly grown, listened eagerly.

  “Nothing he had could challenge the tree except this splinter. He mounted it to the tip of his spear and set out. His goal was only a single branch, enough to prove himself. The Wither Tree is very hostile, but it is also proportional, and your father, even though he was the level of a knight, did not provoke more than a single branch to swing at him. He timed it just right to strike the joint of the branch reaching towards him.

  The chip acted as a blade and pressed right into the weak point and broke through while your father's spear shattered. Marek was flung backward right into his boat, but the branch had lodged itself in him, coming with him into the boat. He would have died then and there, but he had the foresight to have a healer waiting on the boat. With news of his success or failure and to treat him should there be any hope.

  He lived, but he spent a week in a coma. However, when he woke and saw the branch, his prize, he didn’t even wait for the healer to finish his treatment. The fool grabbed his trophy and hopped the walls in a mad dash to try running all the way to the Baron.” Renack chuckled a bit, remembering the big fuss the former healer had stirred up about Marek running off with a stick that was draining his vitality.

  “He told me later that he almost didn’t make it and had collapsed at the gate of the city, but his mentor had pulled him in, and the Baron had a good laugh at the story. The Baron had been so amused and moved by Marek’s persistence he agreed to let him stand as the third option for Ela.”