They only had one Sky Fortress with which to face the incoming Beast Wave this time, and George sent it out to evacuate the Deadly Sands mine.

"But what about the Wilds already at the bottom of the Pit?" Aren asked. "We need an airs.h.i.+p to get them out unless you want to open the tunnel that we sealed up from the Pit side…"

"Leave them there. We still haven't had any word from Remian about his negotiations and that Lion Lord's cousin. At this point, we don't even know if the Lion Lord would be coming up with the next wave to rescue the captives."

"And if he does?"

"Then he can join them down there." George straightened. "How many mercenaries have joined the defenses?"

"Including the Iron Legion guys? Twenty-five."

"That's barely two squads." George frowned. "Let's have them reinforce the front gates. We better make sure they have heavy armor comparable to the FDF's."

"We can just lend them armor if need be. The FDF have at least that many sets to spare. But that shouldn't be the case. Most of them are Iron Legion, you know?"

"It doesn't mean theirs is better. I think there's something to be said about having everyone wear matching armor. Let's just send them the FDF sets."

"Speaking about matching armor, are you sure about going out there yourself?" Aren asked.

George grunted. "I have a new exosuit. It's a good chance to test it in real combat."

"Anybody could do that. It doesn't have to be you."

"But I'm going anyway. It makes a big difference to me."

"And what difference is that?"

"It's the difference between saying 'go risk your life while I sit here safely', and 'come with me as we risk our lives together.'"

Aren hesitated. "The burden of command is…"

"It's more than I'm willing to put up with today, all right? Just… not today."

Today was the first time he faced the Beast Wave as the guy in charge. Maybe it was crazy, but he wanted to be there on the front lines, facing it in person with a sword in his hands.

Or maybe a battle-axe. Perhaps an axe would be better. With the exosuit boosting his strength by twice an average person's, swinging around a battle axe should be a lot easier. George himself had more than the strength of an average man. Adding the exosuit's boost, he should have more than three times an average man's strength. That should be on par with grizzled veterans like Max and Markus. If he could wield a good heavy battle-axe… that much strength and that much weight together could do some serious damage.

"The Deutero airs.h.i.+p has arrived, by the way." Aren added. "They brought a lot of expensive weapons. They said the prices are high because of quality, but I think the prices just went up, period."

"I'll go take a look." George nodded. High quality melee weapons had been harder and harder to come by ever since Andros and the Burning Steel left. They were getting by so far on what they'd left behind, mainly because Arnold's crew had been improving ranged weaponry the whole time, but with exosuits in the picture, a good axe might be a lot more useful than a crossbow against a Tier 4 or even a Tier 5 Wild.

But when he actually went to the Deutero airs.h.i.+p and took a look at the weapons in its hold, George realized that he'd made a mistake. He'd been wrong. The weapon he really, really wanted to use tonight wasn't an axe.

No, the weapon he wanted was the one standing in front of him, neatly laid out in a display case.

It was a glaive. Two meters tall, steel-reinforced haft with a heavy blade made of Meteor Iron, an earth-elemental metal similar in value to Misty Steel and Fire Copper, but weightier and harder. It was heavy, goodness was it heavy, George wouldn't dream of dragging it along into a fight if not for the exosuit's strength.

But with the exosuit activated, George felt like he was lifting a common shovel.

"It's rated Tier 5, you know." The Deutero salesman said. George wasn't sure whether to believe him, but then the sales guy pointed out three runes. "This one's for sharpness. This one's for durability. But this one… this one's called a Shockwave Rune."

"What does that mean?" George asked.

"That means whatever it hits will feel the impact a lot harder." The salesman grinned. "I believe the rune has a tendency to cause shockwaves. Even if it's someone wearing armor, the blunt force trauma is going to be that much more serious."

"How much?" George asked.

"Since it's young master George, we'll give you a sweet discount; 50,000 lir."

"Great." George decided to buy it despite the hefty price tag. "Now, how about long-ranged weapons?"

"Uh…" the salesman scratched his head awkwardly. "I'm afraid we don't have any."

"You don't have any?" George stared blankly. "Not even a crossbow? Not a single heavy ballista?"

"All the weapons we have on sale are the ones you see right here."

In other words, the longest-ranged weapon for sale today was a throwing knife. Or a javelin. Or a throwing axe.

George went for the javelins. This was the thrown weapon of choice for the Iron Legion, and George had been trained to use them accordingly. Now he had extra strength to throw with, he wanted heavier versions. The Iron Legion types weighed a little over 3kg each. The javelins in the set of five George bought weighed 8kg each.

Song Chen loved them. "I have a set too, but mine are 5kg in weight. I don't have that much brute strength to throw them with."

George hesitated. In his estimates, Song Chen was actually physically stronger than even Markus or Max. In other words, definitely stronger than George even with the exosuit. Maybe… maybe 8kg javelins was overestimating the suit's capabilities.

"Any chance we could trade?" George asked.

Song Chen considered, then grinned. "Are you willing to take a risk for it?"

George's face hardened. "I don't do gambling."

"I'm not talking about gambling. I'm talking about a challenge. A contest." Song Chen said. "You and me, tonight. If you can beat my kill score with your fancy new suit, I'll lend you my javelin set for a month."

"Deal!"

***

That evening, George stood alone atop the peak of Kara, right next to the airs.h.i.+p dock. Twelve FDF troopers manned four high-powered ballistae there, with stacks of spear-like bolts ready to rain down on the incoming Beast Wave.

This was the most heavily armed weapons platform in KarGoth. There was a similar battle station atop Goth, but that one only had three ballistae; the fourth was still under construction and would not be ready in time.

George scratched his head, surrounded by grumpy and sweaty middle-aged men considering what orders he should give them to keep losses and casualties to a minimum and wondered how a tweenager like him ever got into this situation.

Then again, there were only two tweenagers like him, and neither of them were anywhere near here. Unless one counted Jane? But even she wasn't quite the same. Also, she was in a vastly simpler situation, simply following a guy six years older around and helping him out.

She didn't have to wonder whether it would be a good idea to put up a fake front as the Wave arrived and then evade at the last moment to lure the Wilds into the Pit. It would be a risky maneuver; a lot of things could go wrong too easily.

She didn't need to consider whether the FDF might perform better without armor; early scout reports said the incoming Wilds were fast, too fast to be heavily armored, which meant rapid fire would work better than power shots. Taking off the armor could kill off these lighter Wilds quicker since the defenders could reload, aim, maneuver and shoot faster without enc.u.mbrance… but it would be risky. If the Wilds got through the pikes, facing them without armor was likely a death sentence.

She didn't need to second guess whether an earlier decision to s.h.i.+ft a crossbowman to the pike line would result in his death. Whether ordering the FDF to build up a ramp to hide the edge of the Pit was at all going to increase the Pit's effectiveness or just tire out their troops uselessly before an important battle. Whether the decision to decrease smoke cover to increase crossbow accuracy was a wise choice or a poor one…

All she needed to worry about was what Jim ate for dinner and whether he had enough paper to jot down his endless notes on his experiments.

George paused, wondering. How did she ever get that job in the first place? Even he wasn't sure. But between Jim's absent-minded requests and Jane running around to fulfill them, that's basically what happened.

Also, for tonight, at least, Jane was on comms, speaking as the forward scout stationed aboard Jim's gunboat above Black Depths Lake.

"Scouts, report please." George spoke to a comms crystal.

"Fast running Wilds coming up on Black Depths Lake." Jane reported. "They're moving fast! Jim thinks they'll be there in an hour."

"What types of Wilds?" George asked.

"I'm seeing mainly stag-types, eight Tier 3, three Tier 4 in the vanguard. About thirty more farther back."

"Anything with heavy armor?"

"No, I'm only seeing fur, but there's a lot of them."

George cleared his throat. "Thanks, Jane. We're calling battle stations now."

"You're welcome."

"And Jane?" George hesitated.

"Yes?"

"It's… kinda good to hear your voice again." George said.

There was a sudden silence on the other side.

"Don't get killed, okay?" George tried to stave off the sudden awkward feeling he had. "Mindy will kill me if I let you die under my watch."

Mindy? Now why did he bring her up all of a sudden? George wanted to facepalm, but she'd hear it…

"Don't you worry about me." Jane replied back in a gamely fas.h.i.+on. "Just don't you die either!"

"I'll try my best." George answered modestly, and went down to the front gate.