Chapter 1 : Dawn of Problems

The first light of dawn stretched over the paddy fields of Thenur, painting the sky in bruised orange and deep gray.

Inside the old military outpost, hidden behind a crumbling wall, Vaerin awoke with a start.

He sat up quickly, brushing hay from his shoulder. The soldiers who trained here had already gone. The place was quiet—too quiet.

"Shit," he muttered, rising to his feet. He slipped out through a broken gate and sprinted down the slope toward the village. He had to get home before someone noticed he'd spent the night at the fort again.

As he reached his house, he leapt to the side wall, climbing like he'd done a hundred times before. But halfway up—

Boom.

A sound tore through the horizon. Distant, deep, rolling—like the belly of the world had growled.

A war drum.

No… a war horn. Low, ancient, angry.

A war alarm.

Vaerin froze. His heart raced. That sound hadn't been heard in years—not since the last border raid by Vedharnadu. And this time, it was louder.

He jumped down from the wall and ran.

He reached the military fort within minutes. Captain Velan stood at the gates, armor half-buckled, eyes scanning the sky as a carrier pigeon flew off toward the north.

The moment he saw Vaerin, he sighed.

Vaerin: "Captain! What was that sound?!"

Captain Velan: "War horn. Scouts say around fifty to eighty soldiers crossed into the Greylands just before dawn. Vedharnadu, no doubt. I've sent a message to the capital. If no one responds..."

He looked at the fields in the distance. "We'll have to act ourselves."

Vaerin: "A war?! With eighty soldiers?! We barely have twenty-four men fit to fight!"

Captain Velan (gritting his teeth): "Just f***ing go. Tell your father. We need twenty—thirty men. Anyone who can hold a damn spear."

Vaerin didn't argue. He turned and ran.

By the time he reached the village square, people had already gathered. The sound had woken everyone. Mothers held their children. Old men looked to the west. Farmers clutched their rusted sickles like they were swords.

At the center of them stood his father—Kali,headman of Thenur.

Vaerin: "Dad... It's war. Captain Velan wants fighters—twenty at least."

Kalin's face remained still for a moment. Then he shook his head slowly.

Kali: "Tell them no. Tell them to prepare their things. We're leaving by nightfall."

Vaerin blinked. "Leaving? But—"

Kali: "This isn't our fight. Let the kings defend their borders. I won't see Thenur burn for politics."

But Vaerin wasn't listening anymore. He was already thinking.

Because for him, the war hadn't begun.

It had just revealed itself.

The war horn had not stopped echoing—and neither had the fear it stirred.

In the heart of Thenur, the village square pulsed with chaos. Men shouted over each other. Some were half-armored, others barefoot, still clutching tools from their morning work. Mothers cried. Children clung to anything that looked solid.

"We need to run!" someone yelled.

"To where? The forest? What if they surround us?"

"They have swords—we have grain knives!"

"The Chola army will come!"

"Chola army won't come for us! We're not even on their maps!"

"Let's burn the village and flee—don't give them anything!"

A man slammed his fist into a post. "And if we stay? You'll fight them with your rice sickle? With your daughter's broomstick?"

Arguments broke out. A few villagers started packing already. Others cursed at them. Fear turned into anger. Anger turned into blame.

Then—

Kali stepped forward.

He didn't shout. He didn't raise a weapon.

He just raised his voice—and the noise fell into silence like a blade cutting wind.

Kali:

"Enough."

He stood tall, his voice rough as gravel, eyes scanning the crowd like a storm.

"I've seen war. Real war. Not stories from your grandfathers.

I've watched good men bleed in mud for causes they never believed in.

I've seen the bravest die because some fool wanted to be remembered as a hero."

The villagers quieted.

He let the silence linger.

Kali (voice steady):

"We are not soldiers.

We are not kings.

We are a village—survivors.

And we've survived because we knew when to stand…

and when to walk away."

He stepped down from the well ledge and walked through the crowd.

"I will not offer this village to Vedharnadu's blade. I will not let our children become banners in someone else's war.

We leave before sundown. Take what you can carry. Leave what you must.

We'll return when the smoke clears."

People nodded. A few let out shaky breaths. Some lowered their makeshift weapons.

But one voice—just one—rose against the current.

And it carried enough steel to break the tide.

That's when Vaerin stepped forward.

Not from the crowd—but from the edge of it. Spear in hand. Dust on his face. Fire in his eyes.

Vaerin (quiet, clear):

"If we run today… we'll run forever."

Heads turned. A few villagers stopped walking.

Vaerin (louder now):

"You think they'll stop at Thenur? At our fields?

They'll chase us through the forests. Hunt us like animals.

And when they find us—tired, hungry, and scattered—they won't just kill us.

They'll make examples of us."

He walked slowly into the center of the square, eyes locked on his father.

Vaerin:

"We're not an army. We're farmers, blacksmiths, hunters.

But we know this land. We know every bend of the canal, every tree with thorns, every rock that can trip a warhorse."

His voice sharpened. Each word struck like a hammer.

Vaerin:

"We can trap them. Delay them. Hurt them enough to make them think twice.

We don't need to win.

We just need to make sure they never forget what happened at Thenur."

Kali's face was unreadable. Not proud. Not angry. Just still.

Vaerin turned from his father to the crowd.

Vaerin (raising his spear):

"I won't beg. I won't promise you glory.

But if you believe this village is worth more than a pile of ashes—come with me.

To the fort. Bring your sickles, your blades, your fists."

The silence cracked.

Sinna Perumal, the old retired guard, limped forward.

"One last fight won't kill me. But watching this place burn might."

A boy—barely seventeen—stepped out, holding a sharpened stick.

"My sister's not running. Neither am I."

Two hunters followed. Then a pair of brothers. Then five more.

They didn't come all at once. They came like embers catching wind.

By the time Vaerin turned back toward the fort, nearly half the village stood behind him.

Kali watched them go.

And for the first time, he didn't see a boy walking away from him.

He saw a leader—walking toward something that couldn't be undone.

The group marched in silence. Roughly thirty-two villagers followed Vaerin. Men and boys. Two women. A hunter with a mangled arm. A boy too young to shave but too proud to turn away.

Some walked tall.

Most didn't.

The further they got from the village, the more heads lowered. The more doubts crept in like fog.

"Thirty of us against eighty of them?" one man whispered.

"We have farm tools and hope. They have steel and experience," another muttered.

A teenage boy wiped sweat from his brow. "I should've stayed with my mother…"

They neared the old fort, its crumbling towers barely holding together. Smoke still drifted from the small campfires of the morning shift. Crows circled above.

And on the ridge, arms crossed, stood Captain Velan.

He watched them approach. His expression unreadable.

Vaerin broke from the group, walked straight up the path.

Vaerin (calm, but loud enough):

"Thirty-two came. All we could gather."

Velan raised an eyebrow.

"No armor. No discipline. You brought me a parade."

Vaerin (unfazed):

"Not a parade. A wall. If you help me build it right."

Velan looked past him, eyes scanning the crowd. "Some of them can barely hold their tools. That one's limping. That one's twelve."

Vaerin:

"Four under fifteen. Five over sixty. I know. They'll be in the back."

He turned. "Form them up. Now."

They assembled in the fort yard. The dirt was dry and cracked. It stank of sweat, ash, and fear.

Vaerin took a stick and began scratching a rough formation into the ground.

Vaerin (commanding):

"Listen up!

Anyone under fifteen or over sixty—you'll be backline. Support only.

Anyone with hunting or military experience—front row.

If you know how to shoot an arrow, you're in the ridge team.

If you've carried sacks of rice your whole life, you're lifting traps."

People began to move.

Vaerin (pointing):

"Maari, you and your sons—spears. Guard the canal flank.

Sinna Perumal, you'll lead the chokepoint near the bund wall. You've fought before. They'll listen to you.

Arasan, you and the woodcutters—cut trap stakes. Sharpen them by sundown."

Someone asked, "What if the letter to the capital gets answered? Won't help be coming?"

Velan grunted. "We haven't seen a hawk or a pigeon. If the capital was coming, they'd be here already."

Vaerin looked at the old watchtower, its pigeon perch empty. The cage door swung open in the wind.

Vaerin (quietly):

"No help is coming. We are the help."

Vaerin and Velan huddled over the rough dirt map.

Vaerin drew a crescent moon shape around the village wall.

Vaerin:

"They'll come through the east bend. Too narrow for full force.

Here—" he tapped a spot between a ditch and a dead tree

"—we'll fake a gap in the barricade. Funnel them in. That's where we hit."

Velan (nodding):

"You want to choke them in a kill zone. Good."

Vaerin:

"We place spike traps here and here. Mud pits behind.

Archers on the ridge, two teams. Rotate every volley.

Front line: spears in first row, shielded men behind.

We don't charge. We hold."

Velan looked at him long and hard.

Velan:

"You've never commanded in a real battle."

Vaerin:

"No. But I've watched every one that's come through these lands.

And I remember every mistake they made."

Velan chuckled, then slapped his shoulder.

"Fine. Your wall of farmers just became a warband. Let's make damn sure they don't die as one."

They worked through the evening.

Axes bit into wood. Mud was scooped from canals and packed into pits. Bamboo spikes were sharpened to deadly tips and buried beneath woven mats. Ropes were tied, pulleys rigged. Hunters laid tripwires between rocks and tree roots, just as they did for wild boars in the hills.

No one rested.

Even the old men worked—tying, lifting, muttering blessings. The younger ones moved with shaking hands. But they moved.

By the time the stars crept overhead, Thenur had become a war machine. Not beautiful. Not perfect. But real.

Vaerin stood on the watchtower just before midnight. Captain Velan joined him.

Velan (quietly):

"This plan of yours… if it works, you'll go down in history."

Vaerin (without looking):

"If it doesn't, we won't be here to argue about it."

The Next Morning – Just Before Dawn

A strange silence hung in the air.

Birds didn't sing. The wind didn't blow.

Then—

BOOM.

Not a horn this time. A deep thundering roar.

Villagers flinched, ducked, some cried out.

But Vaerin stayed calm.

Vaerin (to Velan):

"That wasn't them attacking. That was a mistake. Their firepit exploded."

A scout ran up the slope, breathing hard.

Scout:

"They set up camp by the dry ridge. Lit a signal fire near a powder stockpile. Something went off.

They're disoriented. And… sir—they're only about fifty to sixty soldiers."

Velan exhaled, shoulders dropping slightly.

"Still too damn many… but not a swarm."

Vaerin nodded.

"Sixty men… means we break their front, we break their morale."

The villagers behind him, however, still looked terrified. Even the old hunter Sinna Perumal tightened his grip on his spear.

Vaerin (to the group):

"We don't need to fight like soldiers.

We fight like the land taught us—quiet, patient, and deadly.

You don't need to win.

You just need to live long enough to make them lose."

He pointed toward the eastern tree line.

Vaerin:

"They'll be here in minutes."

They came like a wave—shields up, swords drawn, confident.

The first line of Vedharnadu soldiers marched into the narrow bend in the terrain.

Exactly where Vaerin wanted them.

Step. Snap. Collapse.

The first man went down—his leg ripped open by a spike. His scream was high and terrible.

Two others moved to help—and the ground beneath them gave way, dropping them into a mud pit filled with thorns.

Confusion.

Then chaos.

Arrows flew from the ridge—precise volleys. Not enough to kill, but enough to slow.

Vaerin's front line held position—spears pointed, braced with ropes from behind so the wielders wouldn't be pushed back.

A Vedharnadu captain screamed something in their language—and charged forward.

CRASH.

The first line hit the spears—metal against wood. Screams. Blood.

A Thenur farmer screamed and twisted as his shoulder was slashed—but Sinna Perumal drove his spear into the attacker's thigh, yanking him down and stabbing him again through the back.

A young boy tripped. A soldier raised his blade to strike—

Vaerin lunged from behind and drove his short sword up through the attacker's ribs, pushing until the hilt struck bone.

The man dropped.

Vaerin didn't stop.

They pressed into the second trap zone—ropes snapped and logs rolled down from above, crushing two men, scattering three more.

The Vedharnadu soldiers broke formation. Some ran. Others fought like cornered beasts.

Velan's unit flanked left, attacking from the side. The hill advantage gave them reach.

The field turned red.

And then, finally—after what felt like an eternity inside a single heartbeat—a horn blew.

Vedharnadu was retreating.

Bodies lay everywhere. Mud was soaked red. Smoke rose from cracked armor and broken arrows.

The field stank of iron, smoke, and silence.

The survivors moved like ghosts through the wreckage—checking for wounded, retrieving the bodies of their own.

Two villagers had died.

A boy and a girl—siblings, maybe fifteen and thirteen. They had no family. No one to weep over them.

So the whole village did.

Vaerin carried the boy's body himself.

Captain Velan walked beside him, carrying the girl in his arms.

They returned to Thenur not with cheers—but with a war horn blown once, long and deep, echoing through the trees.

It was a signal.

To the ones who had run.

By dusk, the rest had returned.

Ashamed. Quiet. Carrying what little they had fled with.

No one spoke. No one needed to.

They saw the wounded being carried. They saw the spears still slick with blood. They saw Vaerin standing at the head of the march—shoulders squared, eyes hollow.

And they knew.

They had been protected.

By the ones they had abandoned.

That night, the entire village gathered in the square.

The fires burned low. Torches flickered in the breeze.

Vaerin stood beside a long sheet of stone placed upright at the center—dragged there by oxen, carved by hand from the old quarry.

He said nothing.

Captain Velan stepped forward and carved the first names:

[Kaviyan & Kani – Died in defense of Thenur]

One by one, the names were etched—every fighter, every wound, every fallen.

The villagers watched in silence.

After the carving, they carried the two siblings to the edge of the village.

A full procession.

Every soldier. Every villager. Even the youngest child. No one stayed behind.

They were buried beneath the flowering tree where the canal split—a place known for butterflies and breeze.

A stone marked their grave. No family name. Just:

"The first defenders of Thenur."

Back in the square, Kali stood beside Velan, arms folded.

Kali (quietly):

"Two dead. That's less than I feared."

Velan (watching Vaerin):

"Still too many."

Kali nodded.

Then paused.

Kali:

"He wasn't supposed to be the one."

Velan:

"No one ever is. But when it's time... the right ones don't wait for permission."

The stone in the village square stayed. Forever.

Not as a monument to war.

But a reminder of what happened when the world came to Thenur…

and the boy who dared to say no.