Karl woke up early the next morning, thanks to his early bedtime and yesterday’s activities burning off some excess energy. Dana was a warm ball in his arms, and the blankets on the smooth, slightly stretchy flooring of the fort were warm and comfortable, so he simply lay there a while, enjoying the downtime before he would inevitably be forced to get up and face the day.
His shift on the line was in the afternoon today, so he had morning exercise and a class with Morgana, who he noted still had Remi with her.
Or, at the very least, the Spirit Snake had not returned to her space last night.
He could feel her approaching just as the sun came up, and then the Spirit Snake was back in her space and ready for a long nap.
She had explored many places in the camp that she had never been to before yesterday, and she had met all sorts of people, and tried over a dozen different snacks that Morgana had prepared for her.
It was a good day, but she was still exhausted as she came home at the crack of dawn.
Karl thought about asking her what she had been up to all night, but Remi was already asleep on her altar, curled up in a protective ball around her lucky statue, with her head on the voodoo doll that Morgana had gifted her.
Karl carefully got out of bed, flipping the extra blankets over Dana so she didn’t get cold, and then equipped his armour as he sensed someone approaching the fort on the ground.
[It’s just the Morgana.] Rae informed him.
[Thanks. I’ll go see her.]
Karl climbed down the ladder to find Morgana waiting patiently on the ground. “Alright, let’s get going. I’m glad that Remi understood my message.” She began.
“Wait, Remi likely understood, but she forgot and went to sleep as soon as she was home in her space. I have no idea what you’ve got planned this morning.” Karl informed his Advisor.
“The extra fun stuff that everyone avoids like the plague. The Command Group wants you, Tank and the other pair to fill out a report on the battle yesterday morning. It’s standard procedure for larger attacks, and nobody else could form a fully coherent report on what happened except you four.” She explained.
“And we’re doing this at the break of dawn, why?” Karl asked.
“So that it is done and sent off before the Command Group starts to whine about being kept in the dark. They wanted it yesterday, but everyone was either drunk or missing, and you were having some quality time, so I didn’t want to interrupt you.” Morgana replied with a sly smile.
They walked toward the camp, passing by the empty training grounds and the mess hall, where breakfast was still being prepared. “The report shouldn’t take long to fill out, and then you can get back to your usual morning activities. The Academy says that three days a week of classes a week are enough while we’re on the line. They think that the extra classes will burn out the students when they’re needed for combat, so the actual Academy training will have to wait.” She sighed as they reached one of the lesson tents.
Karl chuckled. “That has to be hard on the teachers. Or are you going to split up the students between classes so you still have duties every day? I mean, you can fill space on the lines, since you’re all Commanders, but it’s probably better to keep you in reserve.”
Morgana shook her head. “That’s about what it’s going to come to. They’re worried that now that we’ve proven we can kill Royal Rank Hill Giants, they will start sending them all the time, and that will leave us short on Commanders to deal with the actual attack.”
“So, we’re too good at our jobs, and they’re worried that being too good at our jobs will get us a promotion in target priority? I suppose that is valid. There must have been other Royal Rank kills along the line, though.” Karl noted.
“Of course. But I seem to recall someone making a spectacle of themselves yesterday.”
Karl shrugged. “As I said before, Rae is an artist.”
“You understand that isn’t going to fly in an official report, right? You can’t just tell them that you let your pet monster go all Vlad the Impaler on the battlefield in the name of art.”
Karl considered that for a moment. “No, actually, I think that I can, and I will. If I inform them that it was a psychological warfare tactic designed to intimidate the Hill Giants and reduce their combat effectiveness, they might even believe that it was a good idea.
I mean, it did work. We scored an overwhelming victory against the Hill Giant attack force, and when the forms are all filled out, that is the only part that is really going to matter to them.”
Morgana sighed, then began to smile. “Fine, do it your way. I want to see what happens when they read that report.”
So did Karl. In fact, he would pay good money to be in the room when that bunch of aging politicians read the report and found out that he was stringing up Hill Giants to terrorize their companions.
The Giants had been known to do the same thing, leaving human heads in trees, or severed limbs and other signs that trespassers were not welcome. It was generally accepted as a barbaric practice, but nobody would say that the Hill Giants might misunderstand the meaning.
They sat at an empty table, and Karl began to work on his report, while mostly ignoring the strange looks that he was getting from the other students in the room. They all looked like mages, but none of them were speaking as they worked, so Karl wrote his report in silence and didn’t disturb them.
Morgana was right, it didn’t take long, and when Karl was satisfied that it was an accurate reflection of what actually happened in the battle, he passed it to her to read.
“Alright, that is fine. That as well. You actually write incident reports quite well. Did you do a lot of these in the mines?” She asked.
“Yeah. I often got nominated to fill out everyone on the day shift’s reports because I was good at using the words that the shift manager wanted to see, and I didn’t know him, so I wasn’t tempted to tell him off in the report.” Karl agreed.
“So, your coworkers just turned in made up safety reports?” Morgana asked, appalled.
“Should we have just told them that the shaft went in the wrong direction, or a hammer was dropped and broke a worker’s foot because half the shift was staggering drunk?
That wouldn’t end well. So, yeah, we made up something nice and came up with a solution that didn’t actually involve changing anything.
I learned how from my dad.” Karl replied.
From behind them, there was a deep chuckle, and Karl turned to see two elderly Generals standing at the door of the tent. “Now I’m even more interested to see what is in that report, Commanders. I am General Stonewall, and this is General Jackson, of the War Department’s Central Operations Group.” The older man introduced himself, before tucking his cover into a pocket.
“To what do we owe the honour, Generals?” Karl asked.
General Stonewall shook his hand with a firm grip and then nodded to Morgana. “We are actually on a regularly scheduled line inspection, we just have good timing, it seems, as your segment is all that anyone can talk about today.”
Karl nodded. “Two Royal Rank kills in one battle with zero permanent casualties, from what I heard. The soldiers who faced the main assault have a good reason to be proud of themselves.”
General Stonewall nodded in agreement, and looked at the report on the table. “And where were you during this incident?”
“I went with the strike team to deal with the Royal Rank threat. Myself, a berserker and two warriors, all at the Commander Rank. The line extended forward at our backs to form a solid breach and isolate the far flank of the Hill Giant assault. All quite textbook, if I do say so myself.” Karl explained.
Morgana handed the report over to General Jackson, who thumbed through it, paused, and then started over, reading it in much more detail.
“It’s a shame that we didn’t have video footage of the whole incident. This one sounds like it was quite the event. Especially this bit about creating a display of corpses to taunt the Hill Giants, and the way that both teams managed to duel their opponents successfully. That is an uncommon skill among the active Elites. The Royal Rank is a significant advantage over a Commander.” General Jackson noted as he read, his face never losing its stern expression.
Karl nodded. “Working in large groups does have its advantages, especially in stacked buff abilities.”