Chapter LXXXI: A Gigantic Step Forward

The sudden awed silence was broken by the loud clap of my hands "Alright people, let's get moving. Nightshade you are on fortification duty, Lady Valerica as well if you please. Davos, get your people scouting. Companions..." I pause in thought before shrugging "Go hunt us a nice feast or something."

Before any of the others can answer, Durrak is already tossing his spear up and down and marching away "The one who gets the least gets no drinks!" He challenges and just like that all of them are off.

I look to Shalazar "Please tell me they aren't going to go overboard."

"Fear not, my student!" He squeaks "They shall only barge into five or so camps on their way."

"Oh." I blink and then shrug "Okay then."

There is a slight pause as everyone waits for me to say anything else, and then the small incline above the cave we exited becomes a storm of activity as hundreds of elves and automatons start swarming the place and building a defensible settlement at ridiculous speeds. With the mix of magic and magitech we brought we'd have a military camp with actual walls before the day was out.

It does not take long before a large stone hut is set up for command and planning and I find myself standing before a large if simple stone table with a map Gelebor helpfully made carved right into its surface.

"To summarize." Isran speaks up after Gelebor finishes his presentation of the surrounding area "We are completely surrounded by caves, all of them potentially filled to the brim with feral Falmer and even larger beasts with an actual city's worth of them camped out between us and the Chantry to top it all off."

"At least the Companions won't get bored." Serana huffs, even as I see her frown at the fact we were going to be wading through the little goblinoid shits for days at this rate.

Alor shifts on his feet uncomfortably "Pardon the foolish question, my lord... but would it not be possible to spare some of the fallen?" He asks hopefully "There could be those that can be saved amongst them."

"There definitely will be." I correct him "And killing all of the ferals within the vale would take us a year with how extensive the cave system is so you should not fear them getting exterminated."

The young elf bows and offers his thanks.

"That does beg the question." Isran speaks up again "How are we to advance on a city sized camp if we are under threat of being struck in the back?"

"We would need to clear out the biggest nets on the way, or at least make it painful enough for them to try and attack us." Serana cups her chin, earning a couple surprised looks from us "What? I may have no interest in ruling and commanding people but I was taught how to do it."

The way Valerica straightens up when she hears this almost makes me burst out laughing.

"Right." Isran says neutrally "We need to secure a proper angle of attack" He turns to me "It is mostly your people that will be fighting, how do you want to do this?"

I hum lightly for a while, thinking over the possibilities and ignoring Scorch's helpful advice of simply burning everything to ash, before coming up with a simple yet effective solution "We outright kill those in the most threatening locations while causing cave-ins in the rest. That ought to buy us enough time to conquer the canyon and set up a defensible camp there."

"And turn the natural defenses of our enemies against them." Isran finishes for me "Wouldn't that cut us off from supplies and reinforcements?"

"Not if we set up a proper portal." I say flippantly as if the thirty thousand or so septims worth of materials needed for a portal of sufficient size was a small thing "That way we would only need to hold out and expand step by bloody step. Then again that is something that I will need to concern myself with after we are done with our primary task here, so you don't need to worry about it."

The Redguard huffs but doesn't say anything else.

"So your plans are still to take the vale as your own?" Gelebor frowns, the previous conversation on the topic having been too overwhelming for him to focus on my plans.

"Yes." I answer without hesitation, much to the approval of Nightshade "It is too valuable to simply leave it as it is, and it will serve as a perfect place to protect those of our people who wish for peace and security."

The ancient Falmer remains silent, his thoughts no doubt awhirl.

"There is something I need you to understand, Gelebor." I speak up as he obviously wasn't about to "At this point I am the only hope of your people, the same people you left for dead. If I were a tyrant or had a bigger ego, I'd easily be able to demand you refer to me as the Falmer King and you would have no choice but to accept." I pause as to let my words sink in, and continue before he can reply "But I am no such person, and this is no attempt of conquest or colonization. My snow elven subjects are just as valuable to me as the Dunmer serving under my banner and I will see them safe and prosperous whether you like it or not!"

The room is silent for a long while after my declaration, the ancient Falmer looking stuck somewhere between wanting to test my conviction and wishing to bow before me. Eventually, he simply settles on a wry smile "I see... I suppose I am still stuck living in the past and believing the world would not change with time."

"How about living in the present, now that a future exists?" I quirk an eyebrow.

This time his smile is genuine as he inclines his head "Yes, I believe I will."

Before I can respond in any way, or return to the topic at hand, I notice Shalazar's eyes glinting with amusement, an amusement that is explained but a moment later as Hound, one of my agents, rushes into the room, his breathing heavy.

All of us look at the winded elf as he swiftly calms himself.

"Do we have a problem Hound?" I ask after a moment.

"Giants." He says.

"Already?" I blink.

"Nonono." He waves his hands in denial.

"What then?" I ask, somewhat impatiently and a bit more harshly than intended. The slow squeaky giggle coming out of Shalazar's mouth was outright unsettling me at this point.

"Your orc friend." The poor guildsman takes another deep breath "He-"

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(Davos' POV)

"I know he said 'hunt us a feast' but you'd think they would stop after the sixth deer." Hound comments dumbfoundedly as we focus on tailing the Circle Companions.

"What a rowdy werewolf considers a feast is probably a bit different from us." I deadpan.

He sucks in a breath at that "Yeah, forgot the mad fuckers were Hircinites."

"They don't even worship him." I shake my head at the sheer idiocy of them selling their souls while still preaching about glory and Sovengarde.

"You say that but our own lord is even less pious." He says drily.

Instead of bothering with explaining to this dumbass why commenting on the boss' beliefs is a terrible idea I simply offer him a grin and ask "You want to tell him to do otherwise?"

Hound outright shudders and raises his hands "Hey, I am brave, not suicidal."

"So says the guildsman." I deadpan.

A beat of silence passes before Hound hisses "Shit, what are they doing?"

My eyes land on the Circle members following their massive orc... who was now running toward what looked to be a camp of five white furred and horned giants.

"Shit." I curse and immediately summon my familiar, quickly writing down some orders and sending it to the closest group of guildsmen "We should follow them quickly, if the dumbass dies I am not going to be the one to tell Boss."

"Fuck, might as well kill me then, cos I sure as shit ain't either." Hound curses as well and we both rush after the merry band of warriors.

We reach them before long, both of us armed with enchanted crossbows and ready to make the massive beasts regret being born... only to find the three Nords calling out bets while the orc approached the giant with widespread arms.

"Ho there you big lug!" Durrak yells out cheerfully.

The biggest giant turns to him, the two slightly smaller ones immediately pushing what looked to be their children back behind them.

The chief, or at least what I believed to be the chief, looks down at the orc and grunts out in the giants' simplistic language.

"Yeah, I am talking to you you big bastard!" Durrak grins "You want to fight?"

The giant tilts his head in confusion.

Durrak stabs the but of his spear into the ground and starts walking further towards him "Come on big man, I've been bored for hours now, don't bitch out on me!"

I'd think there was some kind of plan there if not for the Nord twins howling in laughter while the huntress was suppressing her own laughter as well.

Seemingly finally realizing what was going on, the giant swings his massive club at the orc in an attempt to squash him, but only strikes air as Durrak's massive form seemingly blurs and he appears before the furred giant, his hand already mid swing.

The armored fist connects with the giant's knee with a satisfying crack and the beast roars out in pain and looses balance, falling onto its not yet broken knee.

Wasting no time, Durrak jumps and takes another swing, smacking the panting giant right in the face with the force of a thunderbolt. The enraged beast swings its empty hand at the orc but he is already far too close and simply stops the hand from gathering momentum with a rapid kick.

Another fist connects with the giant's face, making its eyes roll back and knocking it out cold.

A grinning Durrak stands up and stares at the rest of the furred giants, the beasts taking an instinctive step back. The gleeful orc points at them and says "I am the chief now."

Hound starts snickering like a madman.

I facepalm.

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(Reyvin's POV)

The whole tent turns deathly silent as Hound finishes his retelling, most of us completely dumbfounded by either Durrak's sheer audacity or his initiative.

All of us save for Shalazar of course, The Lizard Wizard was currently busy rolling around on the ground and giggling like a complete madman, seemingly talking to someone else and bursting into further increasingly disturbing fits of squeaky laughter.

"What even is my life?" I cannot help but groan.

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Apparently the reason why Hound had to rush to the camp so quickly he almost lost his breath was that Durrak had almost killed the poor giant and he needed healing... and booze.

Because of bloody course the fucking frost giants were just as alcoholic as the Nords.

Durrak looked so gleeful and unrepentant when I glared at him I just decided not to bother and accepted everything like it was completely natural. I was at peace with the world, in a state of zen even.

Naturally, the moment I realized that Davos forgot he could use his damned familiar to contact me mere moments after he did so to his agents I spent the next hour gleefully tearing him a new one and then 'gifted' him with a needlessly dry tome on conjuration usage.

I swear, I could almost see the tears of despair in his eyes.

After that... development, we all gathered back in the command hut and spent the rest of the day planning things out and making sure everyone had a place to sleep in relative comfort. We were just about to enter a warzone and no one wanted to spend their nights on the cold ground.

As the sun rose the next day, I found myself standing before my assembled forces, the air around them being both that of excitement and nervousness as this would be our first big military operation as a house.

With one last mental grumble I summoned my sword and rose it high.

It was time to make a speech.

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Doth thou has the stones to proceed?

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