I canned my other story idea because it was idle for too long.
Also, for no reason really, I’d like you all to know that at the moment I’m 3.8% away from getting my first 4.0 GPA ever. The class I’m getting a B in? Science.
What looked like every casting undead and most of the more melee inclined ones had shown up at the same time, hoping to smash Tou-Tou once and for all. So far, they looked to be succeeding. Several guard’s corpses were on the ground, and the warriors had been driven back into the center of Tou-Tou.
Kou was quickly at Sho’s side, hand on his shoulder. “You think it’s time?” Kou asked, shaking Sho so he would pay attention.
“What? Several of our higher officers know, if we can just get the others together and review the procedure, we should do fine,” Sho said, agreeing. “All right, everyone not already informed of our emergency procedure, come with me into the pub!” Sho said, motioning those he had called to follow him. Several did, leaving only six people, two archers, a mage, and three warriors, to defend.
Inside the pub, Sho quickily went over the emergency procedure. “It’s very simple, all you have to do is run as fast as you can and kick undead ass along the way,” whether as a joke or not, Sho pulled out a large scroll from his pack and unrolled it in full view of everyone.
“Now I’m sure you all know about the east tower,” Sho began, and several in Sho’s audience made jokes about knowing it a little too well. “Well, the plan was that if the fighting ever got hopeless, as it is now, we’d all run like hell to the tower,” Sho explained, pointing to the diagram of the East Tower on the scroll. “For those of you who can’t run like hell, good luck. We’ll stay up on the lighthouse for as long as possible, keeping undead from entering. Who knows, maybe someone will finally make it here and help us out. Is that all clear?”
Everyone ran at top speed out the front door, turned around and started towards the tower. Only one warrior and the mage were left defending Tou-Tou, the rest were scattering across the ground running for the tower.
Sho was just hit with a sudden and tragic thought. Kou had been one of those warriors fighting, and the one he had seen had not been Kou. At least he’s not completely dead, Sho thought, helping people up the tower. He was the last one up, killing several pursuing undead and making his way up further onto the tower.
One and a half days had passed since the “emergency plan” had been set in motion. Ten more people had died, but they still held the tower. The remaining mages were running out of components, and the archers had were having to be used only when necessary, due to the low supply of arrows left.
“We could always raid whats left of the mage’s tower for any components that are left,” Rili suggested from within one of the small rooms carved out from the tower. All the added rooms inside the tower had carefully avoided the center pillar which ran through the entire tower. The excess stones were piled at the base of the tower to prevent easy access. Warriors were having the highest amount of casualties.
“Possibly…” Sho said thoughtfully. Sho had grown increasingly distant, silent and thoughtful for long periods of the day. All the others had given up in despair, thinking the chance of rescue hopeless.
“Right. Well I’m going to go. Up there,” Rili said, pointing upwards with his index finger. It took him about two minutes to leave the room because he kept turning back to look at Sho. As he walked out, he also tried to cheer up the people in the room. They were beyond the point of hope; all Rili could do to help them was say that when they died, they’d just go back to whatever lifestone they were at and start over again. It was that simple.
He slowly walked to the top, stopping now and then to look over the area. The Forgotten hadn’t done anything with Tou-Tou since Sho had lead the group up onto the tower. He couldn’t see any activity down below from his high vantage point on top of the tower.
Rili was suprised when Sho walked up beside him on the edge of the tower. “I’ve got an idea, Rili,” Sho said, reaching into his pack. “In my old days, I used to know someone. A very special person, he was,” Sho smiled fondly, his eyes looking inward, as if remembering that person. “It has been far to long. The Nuegra Tuna must save us all or there is no hope,” After finishing seemingly talking to himself, Sho pulled out a small instrument that looked like a whistle from the pack. It was oddly shapped, with bumps here and there and short thing areas and large, bulging areas in other places.
“It got a little squished from being in my pack all this time…might not even work correctly…may even send the wrong signal…” Sho was muttering to himself, and Rili could only pick out some words. Eventually, though, he put the whistle up to his mouth and inhaled deeply.
What happened next must have been the oddest thing Rili had ever experienced. Sho exhaled into the whistle, but it didn’t really make a whistle-like sound. It sounded like a Shreth bellowing at the top of it’s lungs, a Malus Shreth.
