Blackpine Five-Ring

Inside the command tent, old master craftsman Mack stood before a simple sand table of Blackpine Fief with a dozen or so calloused foremen. Victor, the one-armed old man, lingered in the shadows as usual.

Shien had taken care to protect the craftsmen during the march and the battle against the Bloodthirsty Rot Rats, so they had suffered few losses.

He wore a dark coat and leaned back in the chair at the head of the table. The bloodshot look had yet to fade from his eyes as his gaze swept over the sand table.

"We've surveyed the surrounding terrain." Fatigue left Shien's voice slightly hoarse. "Tell me how you plan to build this wall."

Mack carefully pulled a roll of yellowed parchment from inside his coat and slowly spread it across the table.

It was no sketch they had dreamed up on a whim. It was a standard Church fortress plan, born of centuries of experience paid for in blood by the Most Holy Church.

"My lord, look here." Mack tapped the plan with a rough finger. "This design has held the front line through more Blood Moon Seasons than anyone can count. It's dependable."

His finger moved inward. "We fit whole blocks of rough-hewn stone together and build the wall six meters high. Then we put fully enclosed arrow towers at all four corners. Not a single blind spot."

The tent fell quiet.

Shien lowered his eyes to the ancient, intricate plan, rapidly comparing it with the knowledge from [Lv. 2 Large-Scale Defensive Construction] in his mind.

From a purely military standpoint, it was an excellent model for an age that fought supernatural Demon Beasts with cold steel and flesh.

He nodded slightly. "A classic design. It's certainly stood the test of blood and fire."

Hearing the lord's approval, Mack and several of the construction foremen visibly relaxed.

"But." Shien's next word shattered that brief relief. "It still won't be enough here."

Without softening his words, Shien set his charcoal pencil against the outermost moat on the plan.

"We have to account for our actual circumstances. Take this dry trench. A few days into the fighting, Demon Beast corpses will fill it, and it'll become a ramp for their charge."

The craftsmen's faces changed at once. They had never considered how the terrain would change as casualties mounted.

Shien gave them no time to absorb it. His charcoal pencil swept across the thick, six-meter stone wall.

"This would take a tremendous amount of time and labor. We have only six months before Blood Moon Season begins. Even if we put every person and all the supplies promised by the Church—

"along with everyone still on their way here—toward construction, we couldn't build half this wall in time."

Silence filled the tent. No one answered.

Shien continued, "If we cut corners to finish faster and build a wall that collapses on impact, how will you stop Demon Beasts above the Third Tier? And we're likely to face Werewolves this Blood Moon Season."

Charcoal cracked in the brazier, the sound jarringly sharp inside the tent.

"No matter how perfect this plan is, if it ignores reality, all we're building is a prettier tombstone for ourselves."

Before the stunned eyes of the old craftsmen, Shien drew a huge black X across the plan without hesitation.

Mack sucked in a sharp breath. "My lord! Our forebears paid for this with their blood—"

Shien paid him no attention. His gaze swept over the sand table. "We have to make the harshest trade-offs based on what we actually have."

With the Sacred Flame Altar at the center of the sand table, Shien scooped up a handful of sand and tossed it.

The grains scattered across the table, forming a broad fan-shaped shadow.

Mack froze. "My lord, what does that mean?"

"We'll use that defensive plan to build an inner fortress around the Sacred Flame Altar, then establish a deep killing zone outside it." Shien tapped the edge of the fan-shaped area hard.

"When Blood Moon Season arrives, it will suppress the Sacred Flame. But I'll push the Sacred Flame Altar beyond its limits, forcing its light to expand across this entire sector.

"Even during Blood Moon Season, any Dark Creatures that enter the Sacred Flame's light will have their regeneration suppressed and their berserk state disrupted. That's the foundation of our defense."

Shien paused and looked up. "But how we kill them inside that light matters. First, what's a Werewolf's greatest advantage?"

Before anyone could answer, he answered himself. "Speed, and the ability to leap farther than seems possible. Build our defenses on flat ground, and they'll climb a six-meter wall over their comrades' corpses.

"So we won't meet them head-on. We'll use the ground to break up the rhythm of their charge."

He lowered a wooden stick and drew five staggered, jagged trenches across the fan-shaped area, working from the outside in.

"The First Ring: Rending Fang Trench." Shien touched the outermost line with his stick.

"Its floor will be packed with iron-tipped stakes, and Flow Channels will feed Alchemical Fire Oil into it. Once the Demon Beasts fall in, they'll land on our first open-air grill."

Old Mack frowned and raised the most pressing objection.

"My lord, a berserk Werewolf can leap seven or eight meters easily. They'll jump straight over this trench."

"On flat ground, they could." A faint smile touched Shien's lips.

"But what if we build them a slope on the approach?" He quickly drew a rising incline outside the trench.

"Pile all the excavated earth on the outer side and tamp it into a slope. Then pour boiled fat mixed with lime over it, letting it set into a smooth, hard crust."

Shien looked at Victor. The old man gave a twitch but said nothing, so Shien continued.

"The berserk pack charges uphill at full speed, but their claws can't bite into the smooth surface. Forget seven or eight meters—they won't manage one. Their own momentum will send them headfirst into the fire."

Mack stared, mouth open. He could already picture it: a charging wolf pack slipping at the crest and tumbling into the flames in droves.

"The Second Ring: Ground-Spike Trap Trench." Shien kept drawing.

Young craftsman Jack could not help speaking up. "My lord, traps that complicated won't last. A battlefield is full of mud, sand, blood, and flesh. One jammed gear, and the whole defensive line is useless."

"Who said anything about gears?" Shien grabbed a discarded sheet of parchment and swiftly sketched with his charcoal pencil.

They leaned in. The drawing showed only a simple lever and a spring-loaded base.

"The more precise a machine is, the easier it breaks. We'll use the crudest kind of stored energy." Shien slapped the sketch onto the table.

"The Werewolf's weight triggers a spring when it lands. The heavier it is, the harder it jumps, the more force the rebounding Refined-Steel Ground Spikes drive into its belly."

Jack stared at the drawing, his breathing growing heavy. He had never seen a trap built this way.

Brutally simple, yet perfectly sound. The design overturned almost everything he thought he knew about traps.

"The Third Ring: Poison-Mist Trench." Shien moved on. "We bury brittle ceramic jars in the trench. Pressure breaks them and releases a large cloud of irritant gas."

"My lord... a single drop of Abyssal Venom strong enough to kill a High-Tier Magic Beast costs a hundred gold. We can't afford it."

"Who said we need to poison them to death? Making trouble for them is enough. A Werewolf's sense of smell and hearing are dozens of times sharper than a human's, but to me, that's its deadliest weakness.

"Mix discarded Lesser Holy Water with acid from Rot Rat glands. The reaction between the holy and the foul will produce extremely acrid Boiling-Blood Smoke.

"In high concentrations, it'll burn their nasal passages and eyes. Blind, unable to smell, the berserk pack will do nothing but tear into one another inside the trench."

Victor pictured it. It did seem possible.

Using Holy Water to make poison gas—this chemical-warfare scheme, heretical to the extreme, stirred a strange fervor in him.

"The Fourth Ring: Alchemical Blast Trench." Shien fixed his gaze on the route attackers would have to take toward the heart of their position.

"We'll prepare a powerful explosive for High-Rank Werewolf leaders and siege beasts. When their strongest fighters gather, we light the Flint Fuse and detonate it."

Finally, his stick came down on the innermost trench.

"The Fifth Ring: Holy-Silver Bone-Eater Trench. We'll line it with scrap-iron barbed wire coated in acid and Holy Silver Powder.

"A Werewolf might survive this far through regeneration, but the barbs will tear open its flesh, and the acid will carry the Holy Silver Powder into its blood.

"Its berserk state will break. Its regeneration will fail completely. Then it'll hang there like a stray dog on a butcher's hook, waiting for the crossbow bolts from the wall."

A deathly silence filled the tent. Only Shien's voice lingered.