Chapter 60: The Weight of Command (2)
Chapter 60: The Weight of Command (2)
Back at the guild hall, Dillon received a message.
Nathan didn’t see the content as he was across the training yard, reviewing the Tower of Verdant Scales data with Elise. But he saw Dillon’s face when the message arrived, the way his jaw tightened, the way his hand clenched around his interface. Frustration. Resignation. Guilt. All of it flickering across his features before he shut it down and walked away.
Later, Nathan found him in the training yard. The practice dummies were already scarred from his katana. Deep, brutal cuts that lacked the usual precision of [Quick Draw]. Dillon was hacking at them with raw, unfiltered aggression, his form was sloppy, his breathing was harsh.
"Bad news?" Nathan asked.
Dillon didn’t stop swinging. "My father. Again. He’s ’strongly suggesting’ I return home. Apparently my older brother needs help managing the family business, and my ’Tower-climbing hobby’ has gone on long enough." The katana sliced through a dummy’s chest, straw and warding sparks flying. "He doesn’t get it. None of them do. This isn’t a hobby. This is what I am."
Nathan leaned against the training yard’s fence. "What’s the family business?"
Dillon paused mid-swing. "Entertainment. Production companies. Talent management. My grandfather started it. My father expanded it. My brother’s supposed to inherit it, and I’m supposed to be his right hand. The responsible second son." He laughed bitterly. "Except I don’t want to manage talent. I want to climb Towers. I want to fight monsters. I want to be strong enough that no one ever looks at me and sees a backup plan."
"So... What are you going to do?"
Dillon stopped. His katana hung at his side. "I don’t know. Ignore it, for now. He can’t force me to come home. I’m a registered Climber. I have guild protection. But eventually..." He trailed off, staring at the scarred practice dummy.
Nathan didn’t push. He stayed, watching the training yard’s warding lights flicker in the evening air. After a long silence, Dillon sheathed his katana.
"Thanks," he said quietly. "For not giving me some speech."
"Would a speech have helped?"
"No. This was better."
Nathan nodded. Sometimes presence was enough.
---
The return journey from the Tower of Verdant Scales took them through a village that wasn’t on their map.
It wasn’t a village anymore. It was a camp of makeshift tents clustered around a dry well, hastily erected shelters of tarp and salvaged wood. The smell of woodsmoke and grief hung in the air. Children stared with hollow eyes. Adults moved slowly, their faces drawn with the weight of everything they’d lost.
A woman near the central fire told them what happened. Her voice was flat, drained of emotion by the simple need to keep functioning.
"It was a tower collapse. A Mid Class Tower about twenty miles east. Happened a week ago, no warning. One minute we were eating dinner. The next, monsters were pouring out like ants from a broken nest." She stirred the fire. "The TCA came. Contained it. But by then, the village was already gone. We lost thirty people. Thirty. Half of them were children."
The party listened in silence. Nathan thought of Ashwick. Of the Tower of Ash, still standing, still uncleared. This was what happened when Towers weren’t climbed occasionally. When the mana built up. When no one came to release the pressure.
The woman shook her head and continued "Some folks say they saw people near the Tower the night before. Strangers. Climbers maybe? They didn’t climb it though. Not from any guild, had no emblems or sigils. Just... people, moving around the base of the Tower. And then the next day, it collapsed." She shrugged helplessly. "Could just be rumors. Grief makes people see things, you know?."
Nathan filed this away. Strangers near a Tower. A collapse with no warning. It could be coincidence. The outer regions were full of strange stories, and survivors often looked for explanations that made sense of senseless loss.
But something about it felt wrong.
Kuro’s voice echoed through the link, quiet and certain. ’Strangers near a Tower before a collapse. This is not the first time we have heard of unusual activity in the outer regions within the database. The timing is notable.’
Nathan didn’t respond. But he didn’t dismiss it either.
---
That night, Nathan sat alone in the guild hall’s study. Moonlight rested against the table beside him, the Tyrant’s Eye in its riser catching the lamplight and swirling it into silver patterns. The bow was beautiful, and it was his, and it was a reminder of everything he’d fought for and everything he’d lost.
Mirko was in bunny form on his shoulder, finally fully recovered, her warmth a steady reassurance. Kuro was a black shape on the windowsill, her dark eyes fixed on the stars.
’You are thinking again,’ Mirko observed. ’About the refugee camp?’
"About everything. The Tower of Ash. The collapse. The strangers the woman mentioned. The fact that we’re not strong enough yet." He paused. "But we will be."
’Yes,’ Mirko said simply. ’We will.’
Nathan looked at Moonlight. At his summon mark that hummed steadily. At the guild hall around him. His guild, his home, the people who’d taken him in and believed in him even when he’d failed.
They had work to do. Mid Class Towers. Training. Growth. Garrett needed to find his confidence. Dillon needed to choose his path. Elise had her own battles waiting.
And somewhere in the shadows, something worse than an unstable Tower was stirring, watching, waiting.
But that was a problem for another day.
Tonight, they rested. Tomorrow, they climbed, again.
Nathan picked up Moonlight and headed for the door. Mirko’s voice followed him, warm and familiar.
’Also, you promised me carrots. I have not forgotten.’
"I haven’t either. Tomorrow."
’Tomorrow, finally. I will hold you to this, Master.’
"I know you will."
The guild hall was quiet as Nathan walked its corridors. Somewhere, Garrett was probably still staring at his summon mark. Dillon was probably still hacking at practice dummies. Elise was probably still studying Tower data, planning, preparing.
They were all still standing. Still fighting. Still climbing.
Still trying to keep moving forward.
And you know what? That was enough. Truly.