Pale had expected that her friends would be confused and worried when they saw Nasir was covered in blood. He may not have been particularly close with any of them, but they'd all come from the same school, and there was enough of a sense of familiarity between them and him to warrant some concern out of them. Pale knew her friends wouldn't have meant anything by it, but that didn't stop her from raising a hand towards them, silencing them all before they could start bombarding Nasir with questions.

  Her friends, thankfully, listened to her, and stayed silent. Once Pale saw that nobody was about to start interrogating him, she turned towards Nasir and gave him a small nod.

  "Go get cleaned up," she said, as gently as she possibly could. The words felt unnatural to her; she still wasn't used to being gentle, especially towards people who weren't her friends. Still, unnatural as they may have felt, Nasir didn't seem to mind, as he returned her nod with one of his own, then ran off deeper into camp. Once he was out of earshot, Pale turned back towards her friends.

  "He's okay," she reported. "Physically, at least. He lost control of his magic. I wouldn't go anywhere close to his tent, though; the results are… not pretty, we'll say."

  Cynthia stepped forwards. "You're sure he's okay? That was a lot of blood… I should probably take a look at him, just in case-"

  "Yeah, I'm sure. I understand you're just trying to do your job properly, but trust me, he's not injured, and putting him through a full examination just in case would only delay him in cleaning all the blood off, which is what he really needed right now."

  Valerie put a hand on her hip. "How did you coax him out, anyway? I mean, I'm just saying… if I had been in his position, just from what you've told us so far, I'd have been a complete wreck."

  Pale shrugged. "I just listened to what he had to say and answered as logically as I could. I suppose what I told him made enough sense that he decided to come with me rather than stay where he was. I wasn't necessarily trying to comfort him, because I don't know how to do that, I was really just trying to keep him alive."

  "I beg to differ," Kayla said softly, taking her by surprise. Pale turned towards her, and Kayla pursed her lips. "...You did a good thing for him, Pale. You might not have fully understood what you were doing at the time, but that doesn't change that you still helped him."

  Pale was taken aback. She blinked, but then gave her friend a nod. "...If you say so," she ventured. "I just… figured having someone else along with us who actually knows what they're doing would be helpful. We're burning through soldiers rapidly out here, and someone like Nasir staying alive might be the difference for the rest of us making it, too."

  At that moment, a flash of movement caught Pale's attention. She turned towards it, and found Allie limping towards their group, wincing with every step. Her armor had been stripped off, leaving her in just her underclothes, though she still had a sword dangling from her hip. As she approached, Pale couldn't help but frown.

  "Heads up," she warned her friends. "I think we're about to have some trouble."

  Her friends all followed her gaze, staring at Allie as she approached. Finally, the Mage Knight stopped in front of them all, then motioned towards Pale.

  "You," she said. "I need you with me."

  Pale's eyes narrowed. "What's this about?"

  "After-action report," Allie grunted.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  "Okay. Why am I in particular being pulled from the rank-and-file to be included in this?"

  "Because you've proven that you know what you're doing-"

  "So have the rest of my friends," Pale insisted. "Or are they still not valuable enough to be considered anything except expendable?'

  Allie grit her teeth. "I am attempting to include you-"

  "Great, then you shouldn't have a problem including the rest of my friends as well, given that they were all as essential to the defense of the camp as I was."

  Allie closed her eyes, then let out an irritated huff. "Fuck me… fine, alright? Just wait here, all of you, I'm bringing the others over…"

  With that, Pale watched as Allie hobbled off once again. Once she was gone, her friends turned back towards her.

  "What was that about?" Cal couldn't help but ask. "Are we getting promoted or something?"

  "I wouldn't count on it," Pale said without looking over to him. "I think this is more a case of the Mage Knights finally realizing that things are spiraling out of control in a way they don't know how to handle. But I guess we'll find out soon enough."

  Sure enough, a few seconds later, Allie reappeared from around a corner, flanked by two other Mage Knights. Pale crossed her arms as they all approached, then stopped a few yards away.

  "So, what's this about?" Pale asked. "Finally realized that things are going poorly here?"

  "I guess that's one way of putting it," Allie grunted. "Really, though, if this attack has proven anything, it's that we're all fucked if we don't do something."

  "I'm not surprised. Getting a double-digit amount of your own troops killed for nothing right out of the gate tends to do that."

  Allie grit her teeth, but didn't argue. "The three of us took a head count while you were speaking with the dark elf," she stated. "We lost just over seventy in this attack."

  Pale's eyes widened. "What?"

  Allie let out a despondent sigh, then nodded. "They took us completely by surprise – eliminated the sentries we had stationed around camp, then went from tent to tent, silently killing anyone they came across. Frankly, we're lucky you woke up and alerted everyone else, because if you hadn't, they probably would have gotten us all without us even realizing it."

  "And how many Assassins did we kill?" Cal questioned.

  "Not many. I think I counted just over twenty of them, lying dead on the ground."

  "Shit…" Cal muttered. "That's not good…"

  Pale was inclined to agree. Combined with their earlier losses over the past few days, and their situation had suddenly gone from bad to absolutely terrible.

  "Allie," Pale said, getting her commanding officer's attention. "You have to realize that we can't stay here at this point. They'll be back, sooner rather than later, and when they return, we won't have the numbers to stop them. They'll overrun us before we even know what's happening."

  "I'm aware," Allie hissed. "But you're asking me to abandon this position."

  "No, I'm asking you not to waste any more lives than have already been wasted, including your own. Surely that's worth something to you?"

  "My orders were to hold this area," Allie retorted. "I can't just disobey an order like that."

  Pale motioned for Allie to look around their ruined camp. "See all of this? It's clear to me that you're not holding onto anything here after what happened here tonight, Allie. We just don't have the numbers for it. If we stay here, we are all going to die."

  Allie hesitated. "...We've already sent a messenger pigeon to the capital, requesting reinforcements-"

  "We don't have time to wait for reinforcements," Pale insisted. "If the Otrudians are even slightly capable tacticians, then they'll have realized just how heavy of a blow they managed to inflict against us tonight, and they'll be making moves to capitalize on it as soon as possible. If anything, they're probably mustering their forces right now, in order to keep the momentum going on their side." Pale let out a sigh. "I'll be blunt, Allie – your options right now are to lose this position by being overrun and killed while defending it, or to lose this position by retreating and leaving it to be taken without a fight. And, frankly, if you choose to stay here and fight and die for what's ultimately a worthless patch of dirt and mud, then I can't guarantee that you'll have anyone besides your Mage Knights at your side when you do it."

  Allie was taken aback at her statement. "What did you just say…? You're thinking of deserting?"

  "Allie, everyone in this camp with any kind of self-preservation instinct is thinking of deserting now," Pale growled. "It doesn't take a genius to realize that we're all dead if we stay here. I don't know how many Mage Knights you have left now, but I can guarantee you that it isn't enough to keep the rank-and-file from running off in the middle of the night. So, before you order us to hold this position at all costs, you should think long and hard about whether you'll have the numbers to last longer than five minutes the next time the Otrudians launch an attack on us."

  Allie grit her teeth again. "...How much time would you say we have, then? Before they attack, I mean."

  "At best, you probably have a few days. At worst, a few hours. They'll want to take advantage of the destruction they just caused and not give us time to reinforce or prepare for what comes next. Really, the timeframe is entirely dependent on how fast they can move their own troops into position. If we're going to retreat, then we need to do it now, because otherwise, if we wait, we risk being caught by surprise and losing our chance to get out entirely."

  Allie let out a small growl of displeasure. "...Fuck me," she muttered, bringing a hand up to her forehead. "The people in charge are going to have my ass if I abandon this post… but you're right – holding onto it does no good if we're all dead anyway." She shook her head, then turned back towards Pale. "Okay… we're moving out. Put the word out there to the rest of camp, all of you – take only what you can carry that won't slow you down. If we're going to do this, then we need to move fast, like you said."

  "We can do that," Pale told her. "Though, I have to ask… where will we be heading, exactly?"

  "To the one place we can actually go right now," Allie answered. "We're heading to the Capital."