He was leaning heavily, almost entirely, on the thick, groaning oaken shaft of his Dane axe. His knuckles were white where he gripped the wood, his massive arms trembling with a deep, violent fatigue that his sheer willpower could no longer hide.

Every breath Bramm took was a ragged, visible plume of white vapor, accompanied by a sharp, wet catch deep in his chest.

A thin, dark trickle of blood was leaking from the corner of his mouth, staining his grey, flecked beard.

"Chief!" Telarin’s voice cut through the dark, but it lacked its usual boisterous, booming resonance.

The veteran brawler was stumbling toward him through the mire, his left hand pressed tightly against his own torso. A massive, jagged tear split his leather lamellar vest wide open from hip to collarbone, exposing the blood-soaked, white-rimmed edges of a savage laceration.

He was pale, his skin slick with cold sweat, his breath coming in short, shallow gasps as he tried to keep his organs from shifting behind his makeshift bandages.

"Don’t worry about me, Telarin," Bramm rumbled, his voice dropping an octave, thick and gravelly from the internal bruising. He didn’t look at his own wounds.

His dark blue eyes were scanning the immediate wreckage of the gatehouse and the surrounding areas. "What of the men? Are there any casualties?"

His heart clenched as he prepared himself for the worst. He had seen men beside him die, and it had gotten the better of him. His emotions had been in turmoil ever since.

But there was no preparing him for what came next...

"It’s grim, Mormaer," a strained, hollow voice rasped from the shadows of the shattered timber platform.

Resven leaned against a cracked support beam, his hands clutching his head as if trying to keep his skull from splitting open. His steps were uneven and unsteady as he walked towards them.

Bramm observed him carefully.

Dark, drying tracks of blood ran from Resven’s nose, his ears, and the corners of his eyes. His battle had been quite brutal to say the least. He couldn’t even look at the light of the remaining torches without his pupils violently contracting in agony.

’He must have overexerted his Vitre,’ Bramm thought solemnly.

Overexerting your Vitre energy can be a dangerous thing; it could lead to a person burning away their life force. Whilst this granted a greater strength, the sheer consequences of doing so made it something most people would not dare to do.

Worry flickered in Bramm’s eyes as he surveyed him. Telarin looked far better compared to the man before him.

"The northern wall platforms gave out during the second hour," Resven continued, his words slow and meticulously spaced to fight off the paralyzing phantom pains rippling across his limbs. "The primal beasts... they climbed over their own dead. Many of the men who stood guard were overwhelmed... they didn’t make it, My Lord." 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝚠𝕖𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝕖𝚕.𝚌𝗼𝗺

"Eight men on the northern walls fought valiantly before death," he saluted slowly.

Bramm’s jaw tightened, the muscles locking so hard the bone audibly clicked. Eight men at the northern wall, four at the gate...

That was almost half of the current manpower the House had... All gone.

"And Keren?" Bramm asked softly.

"Alive," Telarin grunted, spitting a mouthful of blood into the mud. "But his squad took it raw on the ridge. Lost two rangers to a pack of Cù na Droighneach. Keren’s back is a ribbon of claw marks, and his right ankle is snapped clean through. His men took him to Lady Espeth."

"She is taking care of the wounded..."

"Not that there are many remaining to be cared for..." Bramm mumbled in dismay and sadness.

Bramm looked away, his gaze drifting over the staggering, almost surreal landscape of the aftermath. The floor was completely unrecognizable. A literal mountain of flesh lay piled so high against the palisade that the corpses formed a grotesque, sloping rampart.

Most of these beasts were Light Red and True Red tier beasts; there were Dark Red and Orange tier mixed in there as well.

"Survey the field, get a tally on the numbers of beasts and the damage dealt to the encampment!" Bramm ordered.

His gaze remained on the Orange tier beasts mixed in the pile...

’If it were not for Mestin, Adara and... Torin. We would never have survived this ordeal.’ he thought silently.

The sheer number of beasts that had assaulted them was horrifying, and in all rights, none should have survived this battle if not for the brave actions of the Orange tier combatants. All three of them had taken part in the battle and defeated the remaining red-tier beasts, killing a significant number of them.

There were more than one Orange-tier beast that assaulted their encampment. Three in total. Mestin and Adara were able to take care of the Light Orange stage beasts.

All was going well until that monstrosity appeared. On the apex of the pile lay a beast, eclipsing both other Orange-tier beasts killed by his men. Its power still radiates off it even after death.

This beast had almost thrown the whole camp into despair... Mestin and Adara may be Orange-tier warriors, but they were still in the Light stages. The massive beast was the true apex beast of the horde, a Dark Orange-tier beast.

The whole encampment had thought all was done for, and they were fighting their last fight, when Torin unexpectedly jumped into the fray...

He had pulled out his twin swords, and in a brutal clash, he fought the beast, pushing it further and further into the forest. The sheer Vitre energy that pulsed as they fought had killed many of the weaker beasts in its vicinity.

And although Bramm and the others could not see the battle as it raged on, they both disappeared beyond the treeline. The energy pulsed, and the earth trembled as they fought.

It wasn’t until a long time after that Torin returned, dragging the giant body behind him. He was the ultimate victor and without too many injuries to boot. After that, with his help, the group had been able to kill the last few beasts in the area.