I sat in the dimly lit stone chamber we had repurposed as a command post, gripping a cup of "coffee substitute" boiled from some unknown bitter root. It tasted like hot mud, but for an engineer running on four hours of sleep and pure willpower, any liquid that was black, hot, and contained a hint of stimulant was acceptable fuel.
“You said there was movement?” I put down the cup, watching Brad jog over.
“Movement? Bro, it’s the premiere of a disaster movie. Zombie siege vibes.” Brad stuffed the last piece of beef jerky into his mouth—his breakfast. “Come look. The defensive line is about to get a stress test from a very different kind of load.”
Dust rose beneath the walls of the Star Fort. But it wasn't the Wolf-kin army. It was a tsunami of despair. About three hundred ragged demi-humans of various shapes were squeezed into the narrow canyon entrance. Behind them, the white void of the Great Collapse was slowly swallowing the horizon, dissolving reality into nothingness. In front of them was a concrete wall.
“Please...” At the front of the crowd, an Ursine warrior, nearly three meters tall and built like a moving mountain, knelt in the dirt. He was covered in wounds, his thick brown fur matted with black blood scabs. His left arm hung at a sickening angle—clearly a compound fracture. But his good hand carefully protected a cub in his arms that looked seconds away from fainting. “Let us in... even just to sleep at the base of the wall... The earth is gone behind us... no road left...”
His wailing triggered a chain reaction. “Open the gate! Cat-kin!” “Water! Please! My child is dying!” Panic spread like a plague. The sturdy defense line now faced the impact of hundreds of bodies fueled by raw survival instinct.
“Do not open! Archers, ready!” Elder Karl stood on the wall, his bone staff banging against the stone. “Lord Architect! You cannot be soft-hearted! That food is for us! If we let them in, we’ll be eaten out of house and home!”
I remained silent. From a purely rational perspective, the elder was right. We were running on fumes.
“Zayla, what do you think?” I turned to the Queen.
Her hand rested on her hilt.
“The old Zayla would open the door,” she whispered, her golden eyes torn. “But the current Queen must ensure the survival of the Cat-kin first.”
"If we leave them to the wolves, this wall becomes a tomb, not a sanctuary." A soft but unwavering voice cut through the cold wind.
Ela stepped forward, her hands—hands that had spent days mending crushed bones and torn flesh—gripping the rough concrete. She looked at me, her eyes pleading.
"Builder... my light was given to preserve life. If we only protect our own fear, what makes us different from the beasts hunting us?"
Her words hit me like a physical blow. She saw lives that needed saving. Karl saw mouths that needed feeding. But as I looked down again, guided by Ela's compassion, my engineer's brain saw something entirely different.
My gaze passed the begging faces, landing on the massive, bulldozer-like shoulders of the one-armed Ursine, then sweeping over a few Vulpine in the corner who were eyeing the wall’s drainage outlets with technical interest.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
Muscle. And technicians.
“The Elder is right about the food,” I finally spoke. “But Ela is right about the wall. If we just hide, we still die.”
I turned to Zayla and Karl. “We are facing a variable you ignored: Time. The Wolf Main Force arrives in exactly ten days. With just the Cat-kin's current manpower, we cannot finish the Phase Two fortifications, let alone the chemical traps in the mine. We don't have enough heavy lifting.”
I pointed at the massive Ursine warrior below. “But they can help us make the deadline. We don't have food, but we have walls. They don't have walls, but they have strength.”
I turned and waved to Brad. “Give me the megaphone. And tell Ron to put down the bow.”
VMMM—
A harsh metallic feedback screech silenced the commotion below instantly.
“We aren't holding an execution,” I adjusted my glasses. “We are holding a recruitment drive.”
The crowd retreated in terror. I appeared at the edge of the wall, scrutinizing them like a foreman reviewing a pile of unqualified resumes. “I am the Commander here. This is Site Zero of Skyreach.”
I pointed at the kneeling Ursine. “You. The big guy. What’s your name?”
The warrior paused, hugging the cub tighter. “Bj... Bjorn.”
“Good, Bjorn. If I feed you, can you move a five-hundred-kilogram steel I-beam?”
Bjorn’s eyes lit up—the light of survival. “As long as I’m full... I can move a ton! I am the best strongman of the Bear Clan! I’m not afraid of work!”
“Deal.” My finger shifted, pointing toward a Fox-kin girl hovering at the periphery. She had fiery red hair and a collection of tattered tool bags strapped to her waist. Unlike the others, her gaze wasn't fixed on the gate, but on the junction points of the bastion. “You. The one with the red tail. You’ve been performing a visual stress test on my masonry since you arrived. What’s your assessment?”
The girl froze, her ears twitching. She didn't look away, her green eyes remaining sharp.
“I was looking at your mistakes!” she barked, her voice defensive but proud. “Your drainage holes are too wide. A Rat-kin could squeeze through there in grease. And that mortar? It's curing too fast; it'll crack if the temperature drops tonight. Amateur work.”
“Good eye.” I smiled. “Since you can find the holes, you can go into the ruins and scavenge the precision parts I need. Since you can recognize a flaw, you can help me fix it.” I put down the megaphone and turned to the stunned Elder Karl. “See that? They aren't refugees. This is a heavy engineering team and a resource recovery squad waiting to be assembled.”
"But the food..." Lucas reminded me. "We salted the Wolf corpses from last night. Adding 300 mouths, however, means even the wolf jerky won't last two days."
“Food is like project funding; if you don't have enough, you go ‘seek sponsorship’.” I lowered my voice. “If I want to upgrade this fortress to withstand five thousand troops in seven days, the Cat-kin alone won't finish moving the bricks. We will die of exhaustion, and then the wolves will eat us. We need the labor.”
I signaled Brad.
CLACK—CLACK— The heavy gears groaned as the massive concrete outer gate was hauled open. It didn't open to a welcoming plaza, but to a narrow, high-walled transition zone—a sally port. An architectural airlock.
"Ten at a time!" Brad's voice boomed from the walls above, where twenty crossbows were aimed directly downward. "Drop your weapons! Step into the processing zone!"
To enter, they had to willingly walk into a concrete kill box, completely surrendering their lives to the architecture and the archers above.
“Those who want to live, line up. Accept medical checks, surrender weapons.” My voice echoed like a harsh code of law: No Work, No Food. Second Iron Law: Leave your race at the gate. Inside, you are a Worker.”
Bjorn was the first to bend his massive frame, almost crawling to squeeze through. When he smelled the faint aroma of cooking inside, the three-meter-tall iron man shed silent tears.
A notification flickered in my vision: Population Surge: +342. Food Depletion Estimated: 48 Hours.
“Good.” I felt the familiar, sharp gastric pain of high-stakes stress. “Now we have the hands. Next, as long as we figure out how to conjure tons of calories in 48 hours, we won't have to commit mass suicide via bankruptcy.”
Zayla stood beside me, watching the chaos. “You are a madman, Alex. You just let wolves into the sheepfold.”
“No.” I turned around, my eyes cold and focused. “I’m just assembling a machine that eats wolves.”
Lyn’s Character Design
The workforce has tripled. The food supply has tanked.
Question of the Day: If you were starving in a wasteland, what job would you take for a burger?
(Click to sign the contract)
?? A) Moving bricks.
Result: The NPC Grind. Safe, repetitive, and guarantees back pain. You gain +1 STR and -10 Spinal Integrity. At least the wolves won't target you first.
?? B) Scouting ruins.
Result: High Risk, High Reward. You might find loot, or you might find a Level 50 Shadow Stalker. The burger tastes great, but is it worth your limbs? Survival Rate: 20%.
?? C) Cleaning latrines.
Result: Ultimate Job Security. It smells awful, but absolutely no one is fighting you for this position. You are "Essential Personnel." Alex respects you the most (from a distance).
Follow and Rate to see how Alex solves the hunger crisis!