Endless toil was the theme of the following days as the building work demanded something from everyone. There was very little hunting done in that time, which, under normal circumstances would have been impossible for the packs. But the dwarves were able to trade in such abundance, there was no need.

I couldn’t help but be uncomfortable with the lopsided trade deal, but every time I approached Fakasta and Stilbraker about it, they just laughed and waved me off.

Over the course of first week back, as Far Reach steadily morphed into a small, fortified town, there was no sign of either Neutrals begging for refuge, or incursions from any of our enemies. Which meant I should have been happy, but once the sense of impending doom settled in, it seemed to grow daily if not hourly.

Where was Natom. Why had Ferro the Paladin of Justice not returned with reinforcements. What was Destruction playing at. I knew I had the hoodie of Darkness, but it wouldn’t take a fucking rocket scientist to check over where they’re seen we’d settled.

The end of that week culminated with the whitan which I’d stopped calling a whitan, because it was undeniably a bloody castle, was completed. Seven floors of imposing towering stone looked over the small town below and gave amazing views down the valley from the top floor.

There was still a lot of work to do internally with the furnishings and finer details, but right now they weren’t so important.

What was important was that the timber dividing walls inside had been erected on each floor to offer individual rooms. For the most part, there were many people crammed into each of those room apart from on the top floor. There were only three rooms up there. One for Sania and me and another for Joel and Lierin. The third room, which took up the rest of the floor was kept as a meeting. We’d probably move it lower down at some point as more houses were built.

In our bedrooms, there were only the narrow slits that acted as windows until glass could be made. But in the meeting hall, wide open spaces had been left for the coming windows offering panoramic views in every direction but east.

On the next floor down, Grastad, Grigor, and Scralex all had their own large rooms with their extensive immediate families.

Grastad had his mate, four children a sister with their mate and three children and an elderly parent. I couldn’t even count how many were in Scralex’s rooms, at least ten adults and around thirty children. Grigor lived with his mate, and three children along with Feen and Kuhn’s families. Making about fifteen people in all. I felt bad they were so cramped, but I needn’t have bothered. Sania promised me they were all very happy and I certainly didn’t pick up resentment from Grigor through our bond.

The five floors below remained open for now and housed the rest of the massive pack. They all had plenty of space to make themselves comfortable and with all things considered it appeared to be harmonious arrangement.

The only person to cause any trouble was Tyl, but Sanyl along with several others from Sania’s original pack seemed to calm him down. I wasn’t clear on the details, but from Tyl’s face the following day, I suspected it involved a bit of physicality.

Despite feeling a little greedy and self-conscious about having a room all to ourselves, I was excited about finally unpacking all of my stuff from Earth. I knew Joel would be doing the same.

Sania was intrigued too, watching with keen interest as I began pulling random things from the first box.

“What does that do?” she asked as I frustratingly pulled out a lamp.

“Absolutely fuck all in Falritas,” I said putting it to one side. “It’s supposed to provide light, but it needs electricity to work.”

“And that is?”

“It’s like a form of power that runs through cables, and we don’t have any in Falritas. It might be something to look at in the future, but that’s a hell of a long way off and I wouldn’t know where to start.”

She nodded satisfied with my crappy explanation as I next pulled out my chef’s whites. I held them up to my body and saw they wouldn’t come anywhere close to fitting me. Still, it was kind of nice to have them. I put them to one side with half a mind to keep them in case I could one day alter my size as Grimstrom had suggested might be possible. Or, alternatively, have more made. Again, that seemed a very long way off.

Under the Chef’s whites, I found something that really excited me. My knives. Some had disappeared, which prompted a little surge of anger, but the one I was most happy, even relieved to see was my Wusthof meat cleaver. It was a beauty to me at least. Perfect for butchering up meat, but I often used it for more mundane tasks, just because I loved it so much. As I hefted it in my hand, it felt so much smaller than it used to, but it brought memories flooding back. Not least of them was, Hakan giving it to me on my eighteenth birthday as I graduated into a proper chef, according to him.

I found it hard to think about him now, since I knew he was a God. On the occasions I did think about him, I tried to recall if he ever did anything strange in a Godly kind of way. Each time, I drew a blank. But now, holding this Cleaver, and the memories associated with it, I recalled the feeling when he handed it over so many years ago. I’d felt a tingling sensation, which I thought odd at the time. I almost dropped the Cleaver. When I mentioned it to Hakan, he’d laughed and told me it was most likely because I was drunk and full of excitement.

Now I wondered. When I’d focused on the lamp, the information that came up said: Lamp. The same was true of the chef’s whites. No stats or attributes, just identification. Sliding the cleaver reverently from its leather sheath to inspect it, my newly formed suspicions were proven:

Cleaver of Clive (Wusthof Classic 8inch). Level eight.

Rarity: Unique

Damage: Hacking +50

Slashing +10

Weight: 3lbs 09oz

Durability: 100

Attribute: +6 to Dexterity +6 to Strength +6 to perception when wielded by Clive.

Attribute: Linked to Clive.

“Ha, that’s so cool!” I shouted out.

Sania watched me with keen interest. “What is so exciting? Can it be used as a weapon?”

“Kinda. I mean It could easily be used as a weapon. But this is my knife. It means a hell of a lot to me. But it actually has some pretty sweet stats. I can’t believe I had a Unique item all that time on Earth. I wonder how Hakan managed it?” I said wistfully.

“I’m happy for you, then. What are its attributes?”

“+6 to Dexterity, Strength and Perception! It’s perfect. I wouldn’t mind a belt for it. But that’s another favor I’d need to ask from the dwarves, and they’ve already done so much.”

Sania gave me a very rare, disapproving look. “Clive. If you want worked leather, then our own people are very accomplished. As for the dwarves, you have to stop feeling bad about our arrangement. We are providing a safe haven for people from their land. People they feel guilty about not protecting when they can and should. This is no small thing.”

I grumbled acceptance, and she smiled patiently at me. I pushed it from my mind and continued to rake through the boxes, pulling out clothes that were too small. There was bedding too, which would be nice once we had a bed, but for now we were still sleeping on the floor.

I found my ps4 too, which was indescribably irritating. I could have done with a couple of hours relaxing and talking shit with Mal, Joel, and Daz as we killed zombies or each other. It was a relic of another life, another world, and I placed it into the box that had the two lamps.

Once everything was unpacked, there was depressingly little of use or value. I stood my one picture against a wall, which seemed stupid here and now. Though it was Ali standing over Liston, and that could only help in the days ahead.

Next to the picture I piled all of my books, mainly culinary texts but a few old Sci-fi and fantasy books I used to read. They might come in again one day.

Beyond that day of ‘moving in’ we had no disruptions to the building work other than eating, drinking, and sleeping.

It was near the end of the following week of our return from Nuinaer that we had our first situation. A band of refugees from Kalabri appeared.

Not that they came to Far reach. Our guard team on the still standing wooden palisade saw them approaching. They noticed the fortification and turn away.

At first, there was satisfaction that the defensive structure was acting as a deterrent. Then realized Destruction’s forces would never have turned away.

The dwarves seem to think it made sense to just pull the palisade down. I disagreed and while it might not have been the most intelligent of ideas, I painted a sign on the wall myself.

Enemies of Destruction

Neutrals of Kalabri

You Are Welcome in the

Town of Far Reach

While I fucked about with the paintbrush, I’d borrowed from a dwarf, Kuhn led a team of Wultr out to find the refugees that had avoided the barrier. They turned out to be whatever a Grawl was. I never found out as Feen, and his band killed them all. Apparently, they were a highly aggressive feral simian race, and they didn’t much want to be herded anywhere.

Feen, in his infinite wisdom decided he didn’t want to leave them roaming the Craster mountains near where we lived where they could cause damage the hunting of the area and to our own people, so he killed them all. I was promised that there had been no other way, and I had little choice but to believe him or cause a shit storm in Far reach. But I was very troubled by the deaths of our first potential neutral guests.

Grigor assured me Feen was honorable and wouldn’t have battled and killed the Grawl if it wasn’t necessary. I knew he believed his words, but I found I still wasn’t convinced.

Ultimately, I was supposed to be in charge here. But I couldn’t let potentially innocent people be killed on their flight to safety. It wasn’t as if Grigor and his pack came here with peaceful intentions, either. Whatever had happened, I felt completely out of my depths to deal with it.

When I explained the issue to Sania, she laughed. “Who here isn’t out of their depths Clive? There is only one difference between you and me, and you and… well everyone else, for that matter.”

“Oh yeah? And what’s that?”

“You admit it,” she chuckled. “Though in your defense, the pressure on you to perform is much greater. None of us here are expected to be the next god of Creation.”

“Literally none of this is helping Sania.”

“I don’t know what to tell you Clive. I am by your side always and I will share your burdens as best I can, but I cannot carry them for you. From what I understand, you could be the most powerful being in the universe, or you could die tomorrow. I will protect you as much as I can, but the choices are yours to make. I already know you will make the best choices you can because you care. It’s why you just spoke to Grigor, and why you are here, talking to me now. All I will say is that you should believe in yourself like we all do. At least then, live or die, you can do it with confidence.”

Sadly, confidence wasn’t so easy to switch on and the self-doubt and anxiety over how my decisions could be responsible for so many lives wouldn’t pass. The only thing I was certain of was that I couldn’t fail through inaction.

That night after I’d spoken to Sania, I took my watch on the wall with a heavy heart.

As I looked down over the town rather than down the valley like I was supposed to be doing, I saw Joel heading up towards us.

“Hey man, you got a minute?” he asked as he approached.

“Sure,” I said patting the wall next to me, to indicate I wouldn’t leave my post to talk. He came scrabbling up the dirt pile to the walkway to sit next to me.

“What’s up, mate? You not busy enough down there?”

“I just came up for a chin wag with my old mate. We haven’t had much of a chance to talk lately.”

“Sania sent you, didn’t she?”

“And Grigor,” he laughed, and thumped me on the arm.

“Come on then, make it quick. Blow some smoke up my arse, then fuck off to bed.”

“You’re an awkward bastard, aren’t you?”

I shook my head. “It takes one to know one. Have you forgotten you’re going home fiasco already?”

“Ha. Focusing on going home was the only way I felt I could survive all the crazy shit going on. Even though it was stupid. I should have been embracing our new life instead of setting myself up on a hill and refusing to move. Even though it was a hill, a younger, dumber, scared Joel decided to camp on.

“What the fuck are you talking about man?” I said with a friendly push to his shoulder.

“That you need to leave old Clive behind. He’s getting in the way of the new Clive. The one all of those people back down there need.”

“Alright, I get your point, Joel. But even so. Me? A leader or a God, it’s insane.”

“No one’s expecting you to be a God, Clive. Least of all me. But you’re actually great as a leader. You’re not stupid… most of the time. You don’t take no shit. And you trust people just as much as you need to.

Except for Sania. You’ve got a total blind spot for her, but I’ll allow it, because she’s awesome and she’s one hundred percent got your back.”

“What about these Grawls that were killed, man. That’s on me and for all I know, they might have been genuinely innocent?”

“Not according to anyone I’ve spoked too, including Bekta who actually wants us to house Neutrals. Not everyone who lives up there are going to be peaceful. We’re gonna have issues like this a lot.”

“I… I hadn’t really thought about that side of things if I’m honest. But it makes sense that there’d be Neutral assholes wanting to fight us too,” I said rubbing at my face with stress. “I thought you’d come up here to make me feel better?”

“Nope. I came up here as a friend to tell you to sort your shit out and stop tying yourself up in knots. For better or worse, you’ve got a job to do here, and I want you to do the best job you can. Sure when things go wrong, acknowledge it and try to fix it, but don’t fucking mope man. It’s not a good look on you.”

“I’m not moping. I’m thinking on what I can do to make sure it doesn’t happen again unless I’m certain there’s no other way,” I snapped.

“You can’t be everywhere at once. You’ll have to learn to trust the people around you.”

I was saved from replying when one of the Krysan guards, Djora, hissed a warning. She’d noticed something and stood sniffing the air.

We all stood turning our focus down the valley path. It took a while for anything to happen, but finally, around fifty people came into view. They were moving closer, tentatively, but with purpose.

“Who are they?” I asked, as I couldn’t make out their identifiers from our current range.

“Smell like Elves, not sure which type,” Djora said.

“Is there more than dark and light?”

She snorted, then turned to look at me with a worried expression. “Sorry Alpha. There are many types of elves, though no Light or High elves live in Kalabri that I know of. They will be either dark, swamp or deranged elves.”

“You fucking what? Deranged elves? That doesn’t sound good.”

“They’re not so bad as they sound,” she smiled. “They can be funny at times, though a bit absent minded. They struggle to maintain focus. Their towns are always a mess.”

“Swamp elves sound a bit off too, if I’m honest.”

“They keep themselves to themselves. Swamp Elf is just a common name for them. They live in forests, but only around the water ways. They’d be useful with our stream and drainage. Oh! They are Swamp elves,” Djora clapped.

It took a few more minutes before I could make them out in any detail. As their identifiers became clear enough to read, I discovered their real race name was Fensalfar.

The figures themselves were well cloaked, with deep hoods. The only other detail I could make out from the odd flashes, was that they had vibrant green skin.