The next morning, one of the newcomers messed up: bad.

It had rained, lightly, so the field was damp. Mud Tent had earned its name, so I suppose it might have simply been a miracle that no one had been hurt up until this point. But, so it goes.

A boot decided to skid, instead of stop. A spear decided to do what it was always made to do.

There was a lot of blood.

A lot.

Of blood.

Kepler, usually as uncaring as they come, began barking orders. Jones was sent running, while Mars was put in charge of applying pressure to the wound. I was in charge of keeping them from rolling into the mud and biting their own tongue.

Harder to do, when someone's strength is twenty-something, and mine... well, wasn't.

They threw me like a crocodile might, in its death roll.

By the time they exhausted themselves, writhing in agony, I just hoped that their vitality was better than most, because what I was seeing was far from pretty.

Blood, mixed with whatever horrible crap might be on the training field... it didn't take a medical degree to know those two things shouldn't be mixed.

Then, Jones was back. With him, a man in cloth, with a bright red head-piece.

Red Crescent

Medic

Immediately laying hands on the wounded, I saw the newly arrived healer focus intensely. Palm outstretched, just above the bloody gash, the man seemed to be in a trance. There was a look of pure concentration.

[Identify]

I tried to see what he was doing.

Skill: Lesser Heal

Exchange with the God of Mercy. Uses Mana.

Lesser Heal... I was, to put it frankly, surprised to see anything at all. Usually, [Identify] was fickle at best for catching things that weren't objects, but I attributed this to having finally leveled the ability enough to be of some use.

Still, it didn't seem to be working. While the wound stopped bleeding as badly, the gash remained.

The man leaned in, and tried again.

Skill: Mend

Exchange with the God of Flesh. Uses Mana and Stamina.

A different skill... I was fascinated.

This was new.

The King's Palace had shown us all sorts of wondrous things. From the skyline of the city, I'd seen flying boats, glowing gemstones atop watch-towers. What might have even been a flying island... I'd known there was magic, in this world, but until just that moment: I'd never seen it up close. Never so literally, either.

The skin resealed, as if it were pulled together by tiny, invisible, stitches. Pale faced, almost as much as the person in which he'd been healing, the Medic stepped back. Nodding to Kepler, then to Jones, he bowed his red-clothed head, and took his leave.

As he left, Kepler handed him a small purse.

Small, but from the heft of it, probably not all that light.

Turning to the rest of us, intense displeasure written plainly on his face, he didn't say a word, before ripping the remaining spears from whoever still happened to be holding them. Leaning them up against the wooden fence that bordered our training ground, he took a deep breath.

Several, in fact.

Finally, he spoke.

"Tomorrow." Fist clenched until his arm shook, Kepler uttered the word. "Tomorrow."

As he walked away, leaving us all in the mud, for once- for the first time, perhaps: no one was stupid enough to ask him what that meant. As we carried our fellow "Hero" into the tent, placing them upon their bunk, we all went to sleep in total silence.

Clearly, tomorrow, we were all going to die.

...

That night, Kepler left.

For what purpose, exactly, no one knew, but most people were too scared to talk. There was a fear of him coming back and some unlucky soul catching his attention.

Not quite irrational, either.

"I'm scared of him." On the bottom bunk to my own, I heard the new arrival, Jay, whisper. "The squad leader is terrifying."

Laying perfectly still, [Hide Presence] as active as I could will it to be, I waited.

"How long have you all been here?" She whispered again. "Living like this?"

"Long enough." Mars finally took the bait, and replied.

I let out a sigh of relief.

I was saved from conversation, yet again. After all the commotion that day, I'd decided that I'd much rather rest.

Still, I did listen.

"It seemed so amazing, at the Palace. With the King, and the Knights, and the City, just beyond those stone walls. I was really happy to be here." I heard the bunk creak, Jay moving slightly. "I just don't understand, why did it turn out like this?"

"Someone in camp told me that summoning heroes used to be a rare thing." Mars answered. "Bargains with Gods, and fates. Will of divine forces, or things people just didn't understand. Then, there was some war, thousands of years ago, and the King from back then figured out how to repeat a ritual."

"To summon heroes?"

"Yeah, I guess that King used it to conquer half the continent before other countries allied against him."

"Oh." Jay answered. The bunk creaked again.

It didn't seem like Mars' explanation helped much, but I'd heard the same.

We weren't really heroes.

At least, not like the title was probably intended, originally.

We were the product of a loophole, being abused for the benefit of... well, a lot of people, if my understanding of the Empire was even halfway-close to accurate.

"We can get stronger than normal people, here. Much stonger, I guess. The Empire has some people like us who are to the point where they don't even sound human. People who could win a battle all on their own."

"Where are they?"

"Probably fighting somewhere else." Mars continued. "Somewhere more important."

"Oh." Jay whispered. "We're not... are we?"

"You know, when Linda, Cate... when I got my Class, they said..." Mars stopped, for a moment. "Listen, Kepler's not so bad."

Silence greeted that statement.

"He seems pretty bad." Jay finally whispered back.

"Nah." Mars sighed. "He just really hates his job."