FREE USE in Primitive World

His movements were almost mechanical, his boots finding the damp grass sections to avoid leaving deep thuds in the black sludge.

He circled the entire settlement carefully, noting every single tactical important point.

He didn’t go too deep to avoid getting discovered by their Layer 4 leaders, as he knew that, at layer 4, real qualitative changes started to happen, so he didn’t want to take any risk.

After roaming around, he located the places where the Layer 3 Zeriths were sleeping; he mapped out the three large storage structures on the eastern edge where the extra jars of beast-fat, dried pitch, and reserve bone-spears were stacked carefully.

He tracked the narrow, rocky escape routes leading toward the northern ravines... the exact paths the stalkers would naturally run toward once the fires started.

He noted everything, storing the spatial layout in his mind like a modern military chart.

Ten minutes later, the ferns near Jargon’s position rustled softly.

Joran and Kira instantly raised their daggers, only to see Sol’s black-armored body materialize out of the white fog right beside them, his breathing perfectly even, his posture completely relaxed.

”You... you’re back,” Joran stammered, his eyes wide with disbelief. ”You circled the whole tribe?”

”It wasn’t that much difficult and the whole tribe seems to be slacking,” Sol said, his tone relaxed and cool as he looked back at the nine squad leaders who had crowded into the trench to receive their orders. ”The three storage houses on the eastern flank are completely packed with dry fiber and beast-oil jars. There are only two guards posted near the racks, and they are both chewing sour-root with their eyes shut.”

He picked up a dry twig, snapping it into nine distinct pieces and scattering them into the mud to represent the layout he had just scouted.

”We will split the net right now,” Sol commanded, his eyes flashing with a cold, exciting heat that made everyone’s blood run hot. ”Previous Team One and Team Two will slip through the eastern gap beneath the root-wall.

Your only job is the storage.

Don’t fight the sentries; Torin and Bran will drop them from behind.

The moment you enter, you smash every single oil jar against the support timbers, light the pitch-fire, and blow your whistles once.”

He pointed to the next three pieces of wood. ”Team Three, Four, and Five will immediately move around the northern perimeter, taking positions right outside the rocky ravines.

You will not attack the camp. You will set up a tight shield-vault across the escape paths.

When the fire starts in the east, the stalkers inside the tents will panic and run toward the ravines to escape the smoke. You hold the mouth of the pass and butcher them as they run out.”

Sol’s face twisted into a dark, predatory smirk as he looked at Hargon and Mara. ”Team Six through Nine, led by the sub-commanders, will form the heavy anvil at the main bone gates. The exact second you hear the first whistle from the storage fire, you launch a full-scale, violent charge straight through the gates.

Use your axes to chop down the watch platforms and drive your spears through the hide tents while they are still trying to scramble out of their furs. We will not give them a single breath to orient their lines.”

The sub-commanders listened to the breakdown, their expressions hardening into a fierce, absolute focus.

The plan was beautiful in its sheer, dirty efficiency. It wasn’t a glorious tribal challenge; it was a total tactical suffocation that used the enemy’s own camp geometry to trap them inside a burning box.

”Every man knows his position,” Sol growled, his hand falling to the sapphire hilt of his blade. ”Move out in total silence. When the fire hits the sky, the wheel spins.”

The one hundred and eighty elite spirit warriors rose from the fern trenches like an army of ghosts, splitting into their respective squads with a synchronized, terrifying precision.

They glided through the grey mist, their torn leathers and blood-stained cloaks disappearing into the thick brush as they took their positions around the unsuspecting outpost.

Sol stood at the center of the western ridge, Kira and Zeyra flanking his sides, their eyes fixed on the dark hide tents below.

The circle of hornets was tightly closed around the Zerith’s throat, the air was dead silent, and the first crack of dawn was about to light the furnace.

...

The first faint line of grey light cracked through the high ironwood canopy, hitting the thick morning mist.

Sol didn’t move a single muscle. He lay flat on his chest against the wet dirt of the ridge, his silver-crimson eyes staring straight down at the eastern edge of the bone barricade.

Right beside him, Kira had her short-bow resting in the grass, an arrow already notched to the fiber string. Zeyra was on his other side, her hands pressed into the mud, her breath slow and perfectly quiet.

Down below, the shadows of Teams One and Two moved through the white vapor like ghosts.

They reached the eroded gap beneath the root-wall, sliding through the black sludge one by one without making a single splash.

Torin was the first one through.

He dropped onto his knees behind a large pile of stacked logs, his eyes scanning the space between the hide tents.

Thirty paces away, the two Zerith guards outside the primary storage houses were still huddled together, their lanky bodies shivering under a woven fiber blanket.

They were completely checked out, their senses dulled by the long night shift and the morning chill.

Torin gave a quick hand signal to Bran, who was crouching right behind him.

The two leopard-spirit warriors split up, their speed traits firing silently in their legs.

Instead of running straight across the open ground, they slid along the dark shadows of the hides, their bare feet moving across the damp grass patches just like Sol had taught them.

Within five heartbeats, they materialized directly behind the two slacking guards.

Torin’s hand shot out from the dark, his thick fingers clamping over the first guard’s split-mouth, crushing its jaw instantly to block any death rattle.

At the exact same second...