“I would never presume to tell you how you should act, Prince Jackson, but what you say makes sense. If you made any mistakes, though, they are outside of my knowledge. I’m pretty good with a spear, but unarmed combat isn’t my forte. I will say that more than one of the men winced when you kicked the brute in the family jewels. Can’t say I blame you though, they were hanging there.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I was thinking earlier. Low-hanging fruit if I ever saw some. Problem is now I’m gonna have to wash my boots.” Jackson laughed at his own words, and the captain grinned. He supposed it was rather juvenile. But some things were just funny, even if they were childish.

  After a moment of silence, Jackson asked, “What now, Captain?”

  “If it were up to me, we’d return now, Your Highness. But our orders are to keep pushing forward. This time, though, we will be sending scouts out ahead of us. Not willing to let all of us get caught running smack dab into their main force.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  “If you want a thing done well, do it yourself.” –Napoleon Bonaparte

  Orc Village- Jackson Nelson

  It took some doing, but in the absence of any of the generals or others, Captain Pritch finally relented and allowed Jackson to go out scouting. The truth was that while he didn’t have the running speed of his sister, he was still able to move faster than any of the others.

  Even better, thanks to his earth rings, he was able to meld into the stone and hide. He had some of the best options of any of them. And if he did get in trouble, it was unlikely that any of the others were better equipped to fight their way free.

  Jackson knew what the pressure was and didn’t mean to cause the man any turmoil, but he couldn’t help it. He wanted to be in the thick of things. This was where he belonged. He must have inherited a healthy portion of his father’s tendency to self-blame. He couldn’t help but feel that if he had been stronger then he might have been able to stop the orc incursion into Baldora.

  Now he meant to make up for it. He hadn’t been gone more than eight hours from the others when he found a clearly marked game trail. Jackson laughed. He never would have been able to identify something like that back on Earth. Mom had always tried to get them away from electronics and out into nature. Apparently, she got her wish, just not in the way she wanted.

  He stopped and crouched down inside a bush to wait. If he was going to encounter any patrols, it would be most likely close to here. Then once he was settled in, he burnt the extra mana and sent out a pulse of Esoteric Sense. He grinned as he did. This skill really was overpowered. It might not help him win a fight, but it surely could help him avoid one.

  In fact, he decided that the skill was so valuable that he bit the bullet and sank an extra 30 character points into it. It was a large expenditure, but if it saved lives he was willing to pay the price. That increased the skill level to 40, which meant that he could do a one-second scan of a 20,000-foot radius around himself.

  The results were initially overwhelming. It had been overwhelming before at level 10, but now at level 40 he simply got so much more detail. He had to do it a few times to make sure he understood what was happening around him, but each time he waited because he didn’t want to burn through all his mana. So he just had to allow his mana to regen.

  With practice, he was able to sort out the small animals and such so they wouldn’t distract him. He could sense one of his fellow spies three miles to the east but was too far from the main group to be able to detect them.

  More interesting was the cluster of orcs he was able to detect just at the very northern edge of his sense. That was promising. If he had been able to pick out any humans in their midst, Jackson would have followed orders and traveled back to the main group to report. But it didn’t mean anything if the hostages weren’t present, so he needed to get closer.

  Completely fascinating was what he detected beneath his feet. There were huge tunnels more than a mile down. And when he thought huge, he meant huge. Massive creatures, larger even than Altracia were plodding along beneath his feet along with a host of much smaller, vaguely humanoid shapes.

  It was difficult to get too much of a picture of what they were doing in the brief bursts of awareness the skill gave him, but he had the impression they were working on some type of project. What it might be was beyond him. He was just going to have to take a page out of Dad’s notebook and set this up as something interesting to explore later. Right now, he needed to creep up to that village.

  Conventional wisdom said that he should move during the day. Orcs were active during the day like humans and tended to hunker down in the villages at night. So one might think that it would be better to spy on them at night. The problem for that with most humans was that the orcs had vastly better night vision than humans.

  Of course, Jackson wasn’t just a human. He was a half-elf, and thanks to the ceremony bonding the races in Eris’ Rise, he enjoyed the full perks of moon elf night vision. So the enemy wouldn’t expect human scouts in the dark, and Jackson reasoned that would make it all the easier.

  A few more hours later, Jackson was crouching outside of an orc village. It was larger than he had first been able to detect. A wooden palisade surrounded it, and there were guards on patrol. He didn’t want to waste mana again on searching, but it was clear that at least five hundred orcs were here.

  One of the things that was interesting was that there seemed to be non-combatants as well. He could make out the scents of skins being tanned. That had its own distinctive reeking odor. There were the sounds of children’s voices as well as the sound of forges working.

  Maybe, this was some type of forward base. The thought entered his head. If there was ever a chance to find someone to discuss a peaceful resolution it might be here.

  With that in mind, he began timing the rotation of the guards. Once he had a sense of where the biggest opening in their routes would be, Jackson activated the earth glide ability from the ring gifted to him by his future father-in-law. For thirty minutes he could glide through the earth without needing to breathe.

  He made a diving motion as his body sank into the ground in front of him just as easily as if it had been water. Then he virtual swam through the ground. He aimed to be about six feet beneath the soil but only had Esoteric Sense to rely upon. The ring might give him the ability to glide through earth or stone, but it didn’t allow him to see underground.

  After a few minutes, he was certain he was past the wall and the general area patrolled by the guards, so he started using the lesser version of Esoteric Sense to see if he could figure out where the most likely place to go would be. Sure enough, he found a building that had two stories.

  It was the only one in the village. He was pretty sure the population here was closer to 1,000, thus making this more of a town than a village, but he would worry about that later. He kept scanning, but there didn’t seem to be any better options for a town hall.

  He kicked himself for not knowing more about orc social structure, but he had to assume that whoever was in that building would be more than likely in charge of this town. He burned a little mana and increased his ability to detect what was inside the building as he glided under its foundation.

  Surprisingly, he came up to a wall. It had a root cellar. That told him two things. This building wasn’t one that had sprung up overnight and also wasn’t one they were planning on abandoning. Jackson stepped through the wall of the cellar.

  It took a minute for his eyes to adjust. There was very little light down here, but he was able to solve that by lighting a torch he found in a sconce. He whistled as he saw foodstuffs but also stacks of armor and weapons. This was a resupply station or had been.

  The fact that all the other buildings were single story indicated that it was likely that this building had existed before and then the rest had built up around it. In fact, perhaps only the cellar had existed as a hidden depot. Jackson was rather proud of his deductions. He felt like he was learning the realities of his new world and picking up the skills he needed.

  Then he felt two guards moving around. The last thing he wanted to do now was be discovered, but a close second to that would be killing any of the people he wanted to talk to about peace. It might be a dream, but he felt like he at least needed to try before tens of thousands died on both sides.

  So he worked out a plan. First, he stowed everything but his gloves—since they were bound to him and couldn’t be removed forcibly—into his spatial bag. He wanted to appear as unthreatening as possible without actually reducing his combat potential too far. This would have to do.

  Then he activated his racial skill Stealth. He’d only put 20 points into it before, but it still had room to grow. He paused before getting on the stairs. Hmm… he’d already burnt 30 of his precious character points, but did he want to burn more for Stealth. He shook his head and bit his lip. Oh well. He didn’t want it to fail because he was greedy about a few points. The levels he had gained and monsters he had killed on this mission already would fund the improvements.

  So Jackson dropped 20 more character points into Stealth to max it out. It still wasn’t a super high skill level, but then the skills he had gotten inflated by the Watcher skewed his perspective. As it was, he began sneaking up the stairs. The door at the top wasn’t locked.

  It was easy for him to cheat because his Esoteric Sense told him where people were around him, even in just its passive mode. He could sense pretty much everyone on the main floor. He didn’t gain a ton of details, but it was clear there were a few people working in a kitchen in back. Two guards were posted outside the front door, and occasionally someone walked across the main floor.

  There was only one person who wasn’t moving. She was upstairs sitting on the ground. That was the most Jackson could determine. He wasn’t sure what she was doing. The other interesting thing was that all the orcs in or around this building were women.

  From what he had heard, there were orc women who fought, but they were rarely in the vanguard, and if they were it was likely because they were unable to birth children. He hadn’t known what to make of that, but then again as he was constantly learning, who was he to judge the customs of another people on an alien world in a different universe?

  He was engaged to be married at fourteen after all. If his friend Jimmy back home ever heard about that he would have been shocked. Worse, if his in-laws got their way, the two of them would be married just a few weeks after they both turned fifteen—which was only a few months away. Jackson had always thought of marriage as a far-off thing, something that adults did. Yet here he was.

  Then he realized he needed to focus. His distraction allowed the stair under his foot to creak. The sound was low, and he doubted anyone who wasn’t purposefully listening for it would have heard it, but Daichi would have made him run laps through the forest for such a breach in control.

  He centered himself and gained control of his breathing. Humans walked, but moon elves knew the way that the impact of their foot would affect every part of Eloria. He needed to do better. Jackson had only trained with Daichi for a short time, but it had left a powerful impression on him.

  Piersung felt it was an appropriate time to mumble, “More balance drills after we get back. A tower with a weak foundation sways in the wind and makes a spectacle of itself.”

  He knew better than to respond back to the spirit of the dead monk in his gloves. It wouldn’t do any good. The monk would never respond—at least not when he was in fortune cookie mode.

  It had served its purpose, though. Jackson’s focus was regained. He stepped forward up the next step, balancing exactly as he wanted so the wood didn’t so much as breathe a whisper of complaint.

  At the top, he tested the door and found it to be open. That wasn’t really surprising since this was deep in territory that the orcs held. He waited for a man to walk by and then up the stairs. Oh well, looked like there were going to be two people up top.

  Then he eased the door open and looked around. He’d already left the torch below with a surprise. Jackson genuinely hoped it wouldn’t come to that, but despite having only been a Boy Scout for a short time, their motto still was useful in this situation.

  There were candles lighting the room. It wasn’t anything like what he would have expected from human buildings. The walls were made of some type of hide, and it was built on a frame of wood and metal that obviously could be taken part. The stairs that led up weren’t really stairs as he looked at them with his actual eyes. It was more of a rope ladder that led to a series of platforms, spiraling around until it reached the top.

  He still sensed only the two of them upstairs, so he started working his way up. He would have to move quickly at the top to get the benefit of surprise. He only hoped they didn’t cry out right away. If they would just listen for a couple of minutes, he might be able to start an actual dialogue.

  As soon as his head was about to pop up. He pushed upward and landed on the floor of the second story. Interestingly, it was made of the same type of hides that the exterior walls were and had been treated to make it rather stiff, even though it had more spring to it than a wooden or stone floor would have.

  Some creaking couldn’t be avoided, but the seated orc didn’t even look in his direction. She must be some sort of bureaucrat rather than anyone with combat experience. Not so the man, though. He had a wicked axed unslung from his back before the floor even stopped trembling from the force of Jackson’s landing.

  Unfortunately for him, Jackson had learned his lesson. Mercy was good but only if you were strong enough to administer it. He pushed off the ground and allowed its wobbling to be a miniature trampoline, sending him rocketing into the orc. The axe was free but not into place as his feet hit the orc like a dropkick.

  The large man rocked back and staggered a step. Jackson had already learned that speed could make up for a multitude of shortcomings, but it was still a disadvantage when you only had half the mass of your target. That was okay though because he had planned for that.

  As he bounced off the orc’s broad chest, he hit the ground with his hands and spun his legs in a circular motion, generating the force necessary to bring himself upright and already halfway into the spinning sweep that took out the orc’s legs.

  It might not have been enough force if the orc hadn’t already been off balance and stumbling backward. At least it might not have been enough to sweep him without breaking his leg. As it was though, the orc went flying over and landed with his head bouncing off the ground.

  The axe in his hands was sharp and bit deeply into the tanned hide floor. He seemed dazed, but Jackson didn’t take any chances. He activated Stunning Fists and then pounced overtop of the orc where he drove a blow downward, drawing power from his hips.

  The force would once again likely have killed an Earth human, but Jackson was counting on the orc being made of sterner stuff. He didn’t want to kill the man if he didn’t have to, but he wasn’t taking half measures. The orc’s limp frame told him that the man was completely out. The stunning effect would have immobilized him temporarily, but if he was fully unconscious then all the better.

  Not forgetting about the woman, Jackson pulled his arms up in a defensive posture. He didn’t want to underestimate the woman. She might not be a warrior, but there were more kinds of power than physical might on Eloria.

  She was still sitting cross-legged on the floor. Next to her was a small wooden desk of sorts, only it was meant for use by someone sitting on the ground. She had turned to watch his altercation with the other orc but hadn’t cried out in alarm.

  The way she looked at Jackson combined with her silence made him nervous. He was on full alert now and thinking about all the tricks he had at his disposal. He couldn’t use any of his auras yet because he hadn’t taken damage. Or rather if he triggered one, it would only last for a single second. That was a definite limitation of his class.

  He felt like he was pretty sturdy, and even if she was some kinda mage, he wasn’t afraid. Tier 3 was still pretty rare amongst the orcs, even if not nearly as uncommon as amongst the humans. He figured he should assume she was at least as strong as he was and act accordingly.

  Finally, a smile split her face. Her tusks were even smaller than Balayria, which was odd given that she appeared to be a full-blooded orc. Her smile was one of amusement, and it gave Jackson a chance to look at her more fully.

  She was much older than him but not as old as his parents. If he had to guess, she was probably in her mid-20s. Her face was pretty even with the green-tinted, gray skin. Her eyes were sharp and had almost an Asian tilt to them. Then he suddenly realized he had seen her features before; they just hadn’t been so delicate.

  This orc administrator looked an awful lot like the orc warrior he had fought during the incursion into Baldora. That immediately put him on guard because that orc had been very strong. Looking closer, he saw the similarities with Karin, which only confirmed his suspicions. This woman must be Karin’s daughter and the sister of that warrior.

  No, not sister. They looked too much alike. Yes, that was it. They were twins. Now he just needed to know what she wanted. Perhaps she was waiting for more warriors to arrive. He reached out with Esoteric Senses but found that he couldn’t feel anything.

  Concern rose within him. In turn, the smile on her face grew wider. Then she opened her mouth to speak. “Hello.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Never assume you know what she wants. It is likely both more than you can afford and less than you are willing to do for her.” —Council from a Sun Elf noble to his sun after the announcement of his engagement.

  Orc Village- Jackson Nelson

  She continued to stare at him, and Jackson wondered what she was looking for. He started to reply but then it dawned on him. She had just said ‘hello.’ Not the Elorian equivalent, which was automatically translated for him. No, she had actually used the English word.