72 The Grand Pyre

"Why are we even following this guy?" some of them asked each other.

"This fellow really thinks he can just go and order us around without explanation? I say this is all bullshit!" another one of them cried.

Quickly the thoughts of dissent spread through the crowd, their passion lit as the mass of people vented their frustrations towards Eidiri.

However, when the cries of abandoning ship began to reach a fervor, the woman from before stepped in, "Why don't we just give this a chance first?" she proposed.

"If this guy really is so shameless to just use us as free labor then we'll make him pay, but for now, let's play along."

Apparently, this lady had some authority established within the group already, with the ability to calm down the crowd to reasonable levels.

Still a bit disgruntled, the crowd grumbled as they went to meander around, collecting pieces of wood that were left lying around and piling them on the inner rim of the gate as Eidiri had specified.

As they piled the wood, Eidiri dumped yet another pile of wood from his arms into the growing heap, stopping for a bit to wipe the sweat off of his face.

Then, finally acknowledging the discontent of the crowd after his initial rush to prepare for the defense of Kugo, he turned to address the crowd as they busied themselves around.

"Now I know many, if not all of you have your doubts in regards to me. But there truly is a monster horde approaching this village."

"As you can quite clearly see, the occupants that used to live here have already gone and evacuated."

"To be truthful, they've completely lost all hope of still being able to live here. And while normally, we won't be able to tackle a monster horde like this, with the home field advantage I think we can succeed," Eidiri elaborated on the situation.

From the crowd, someone yelled, "That still doesn't tell us anything. Give us something substantial or I'm bouncing!"

Realizing the flaws he had previously made, Eidiri scrambled to recover from the vagueness he had just said.

"Okay, okay, uhh..." Eidiri stuttered in front of all the people, "Okay, the monster horde is largely composed of forest monsters like trolls. We should uhh... be careful of the Boruta especially, I think that from what I've observed this is a monster that manipulates Earth and Nature as a whole."

"I've seen it interact with trees as well as Earthen elements I guess you could say. But that's not the main point."

As he continued explaining, his tone got steadier, the belief that the crowd had in him marginally rising.

"The plan is that we lure them into the village, and using the mass amount of firewood we have piled in here, we trap them inside and let them burn."

"I myself think it's not the best plan, but we have a limited amount of time. At any moment, they could come bearing down upon on us," Eidiri said.

Almost as this were the cue for the monsters to arrive on the scene, orcs, goblins, beasts of all kinds poured out of the forest, rushing towards the first sign of human civilization, Kugo Village.

The people scrambled, clearly not expecting to get attacked just as Eidiri was giving his explanation to them.

Quickly they rushed around like headless chickens, not knowing what to do.

Some of the more intelligent among the flock, deserted the village, having already acknowledged Eidiri's plan.

The woman from before began to shepherd the people through the other entrances, Eidiri hurriedly preparing a fire to set off the limited amount of wood they had placed.

Hopefully, the fire wouldn't just immediately die out and they could get an actually decent blaze going that would eat the village.

Twisting and turning a small stick of wood, sparks began to shoot out as the monsters started to close in on the village.

With several bangs, Eidiri could hear the horde hitting on the gate.

Anxiously, he began to twist the stick of wood even faster.

Without this fire, the entire plan would go to waste, the monsters being able to continue their rampage.

Cracks were already starting to form in the gate when Eidiri finally started to catch the first wisps of smoke.

Seeing this, he eagerly began to blow on the tinder coaxing the flame out.

When the flame had grown to cover all of the tinder, he bent over and grabbed the tinder, rushing over and dumping it onto the wood-pile.

The gate was nearly shattered by now, the monsters only needing a couple more hits to finally burst through.

Covering the fire to prevent it from dying, he gently blew on it, trying to provoke it even further.

With that, the wood started to emit a fiery red glow, the flames licking away at the wood.

As the monsters burst in through the gate, all Eidiri could do was flee the village, leaving the wood to burn for itself in hopes that it'll catch them off guard.

He left through one of the back entrances, meeting up with some of the other players that had helped him.

In order to ensure victory, he suggested for them back to the front of the village to make sure that the monsters didn't escape the burning village.

From the distance they were at, they saw the flames slowly start to overcome the walls, growing to a fiery inferno, consuming everything around it.

The shrieks of monsters rang out from inside crying out as the fire devoured them.

Despite the scene being highly morbid, the lack of actually witnessing the burning flesh cooking in there helped quite a bit with Eidiri's consciousness.

The players began to listen to Eidiri, recognizing his authenticity after witnessing the events that had just occurred.

Making their way to the entrance, many monsters were fleeing the village, burnt pieces of hide and fur leaving ashes in the wind.

The players then lined up, ready to push back the monsters, the flames licking at the backs of the horde.