Riley woke on the familiar hard stone floor. The rug had imprinted itself on her cheek. Her blanket was half tangled around her legs where she had kicked it sometime in the night. For a few slow seconds she lay still and enjoyed the fact that she didn’t need to hit a dead run in the morning now that she had a troop of soldiers keeping production moving. Instead, she could focus on her first order of business.

  The HUD shimmered into existence the moment the thought settled.

  Routine grounded her. It always had.

  She focused, letting her eyes scan the interface the same way she used to scan her phone screen back home. Status first. Alerts next. Problems before plans.

  The calm shattered almost immediately.

  ? HUD Incident Report:

  ? Soldiers Fallen: 2

  ? Monster Encounter

  Riley froze.

  The words sat there, stark and final, floating in the air. They carried such a weight, she was surprised they didn’t drop out of the HUD onto the floor.

  She immediately walked to the barracks to get more information from Valrik.

  “There was an incident?” she asked him directly.

  “Yes, Commander. At the ore cave. Something attacked the soldiers. They did not survive. They were discovered when they didn’t return with a load.”

  “What was it exactly?”

  “Unknown.”

  Riley closed her eyes and breathed in deeply as she grounded herself. She had assigned those soldiers because ore was a bottleneck and she needed to take a risk to make some progress in that area. But she should have known better. These forests were filled with monsters. She herself had already been attacked twice by bloodstag. Her progress yesterday had given her a false sense of security. She assumed she would go to bed and wake up with a successful report. Without thinking it through, she had sent those soldiers out there with only mining tools and without any kind of reconnaissance of the area. She felt terrible; her mistake had cost two men their lives.

  This was not the first time she had lost soldiers. She had watched troop counts drop a hundred times back when this had been a game on her phone. Numbers disappearing after bad scouting. Red reports after failed rallies. Losses represented on screen as ratios.

  This was different.

  These soldiers had faces. Voices. She remembered the way they had nodded to her when she passed through the yard the day before. They were not icons. They were people who had trusted her decisions.

  They trusted her and she failed them.

  She didn’t even have a hospital. Riley rubbed her temples as the thought crept in. If she had built one sooner, if she had prioritized it over storage and output, maybe they could have been stabilized. Maybe wounded instead of dead. She hated that kind of math. The kind that only made sense after the damage was already done.

  “We need a hospital,” she affirmed to herself out loud.

  She turned to walk back to the tower. She needed to think. She needed to plan.

  Even as she walked away, Valrik stood there without reacting, without moving. She hadn’t given him a direct order yet so he stayed frozen waiting for her instruction. Sensing him watching her, she turned around and said, “you’re dismissed.” Only then did he seem to snap out of his hold and return to his duties.

  In the tower, Riley looked around, almost unsure where to start.

  No, she couldn’t let this setback paralyze her. People depended on her now. Not just the soldiers, but the Hoshin villagers too. They didn’t have the luxury of waiting for her to deal with her guilt. Food still needed gathering. Defenses still needed building. Monsters did not pause because she felt unprepared.

  She heated water over the fire and brewed herself a simple tea from the dried leaves she had traded for days ago.

  The familiar scent helped. Just a little.

  Cup in hand, she moved toward the small table she had claimed as her work surface. She refocused on the HUD and continued scrolling through the remaining messages. Seeing the familiar terms gave her comfort. In her gaming world, players used to refer to their accounts as a ‘build’ because the configurations could change. And now she was looking at her own.

  ? Troop Menu:

  ? Sergeant: 1

  ? Infantry: 9

  ? EXISTING BUILD:

  ? Tower Level 1

  ? Barracks Level 1

  ? Silo Level 1

  Nine infantry.

  It looked smaller than it should have.

  Riley took a careful sip of her tea. Losses hurt. Hesitation killed. She would mourn later. Right now, she needed to keep moving.

  The system did not care how she felt.

  And neither did the world outside the tower walls.

  Riley let the HUD fade slightly as she cradled the warm cup in both hands.

  She pulled the resource ledger back up, eyes narrowing as she scanned the numbers. Ore had increased overnight. Not by much, but enough to tell the story clearly. Those two soldiers had made multiple trips before they were killed. They had worked until they couldn’t.

  Her throat tightened, but she forced the thought into something usable.

  They didn’t die in vain.

  “Hospital,” she murmured into the steam rising from her tea. “That should’ve been earlier.”

  She replayed the timeline in her head. If there had been a place to stabilize wounds, if injured soldiers could have been treated instead of written off…the conclusion was obvious and ugly.

  She would not make that mistake again.

  Riley straightened. Loss acknowledged. Lesson learned. Adjustment made.

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  ? Hospital Construction: Started

  Next, she opened the troop interface again and navigated to training. She needed to build up her defenses. Melee units could hold ground, but range mattered. Especially if monsters were involved.

  She selected four archers without hesitation.

  ? Troop Training

  ? Ranged: Archers 4 x 8 hours

  “By nightfall,” she said quietly. “Be ready.”

  The HUD confirmed the order and slid aside as footsteps approached.

  Valrik appeared in the doorway, helmet tucked under one arm, his expression grave but composed. He waited until she acknowledged him before speaking.

  “Are you displeased with the troops?”

  “No, of course not. You are all working very hard. What happened last night was my fault. I should have planned better. Those soldiers should have been prepared to fight monsters.”

  “The soldiers may still not have survived. Against a monster, soldiers can wound, slow, force retreat, but we cannot kill. Killing a monster can only be done by a hero.” Valrik explained.

  “A hero,” Riley repeated.

  She turned her gaze back to the HUD, to the notification she had dismissed days earlier.

  ? Hero Summon: Y / N

  She exhaled slowly.

  Another tactical error. How could she have passed on a hero? Nobody passed on a hero. Did Gotham ever tell Batman to sit it out? Did New York City ever turn down SpiderMan’s help? Of course not. That would’ve been suicide. She had refused the summon because she didn’t know what would happen, but that was exactly why she should have taken it.

  Her eyes lingered on the still available option. Unused. Waiting.

  “I understand. Thank you, Valrik.” she said.

  Valrik nodded, stepped back, turned on his heels and exited the tower.

  Riley finished her tea and set the cup aside.

  This world had made this rule very clear. And she would adapt.

  ? Hero has been SUMMONED

  Riley sucked in a breath and turned slowly, eyes sweeping the room. She expected light, sound, maybe another impossible blue pulse like the one that had awakened the tower. A figure stepping out of nothing. Armor. A voice. Something dramatic.

  Nothing happened.

  The tower remained exactly the same. Stone walls. Quiet air.

  Her eyes widened in an involuntary well? expression, lips pressed into a thin, expectant line as she swept both hands outward in a small, awkward voilà gesture at the empty air. She held the pose for a beat too long, waiting for the universe to catch up.

  It didn’t.

  The moment sagged. Her hands dropped. Her face flattened into a silent, unimpressed stare, the exact look of someone who had confidently set up a punchline only to realize the joke wasn’t landing.

  “…Seriously?” she muttered.

  She waited another few seconds, heart thumping despite herself. Still nothing. No footsteps. No presence she could feel. No sudden addition to the room.

  Had it failed? Had she misunderstood what summoning meant? She glanced back at the HUD but the message had already faded, as if the system considered the matter settled.

  “I guess I’ll find out,” Riley resigned this would be a mystery for another time. Suddenly, movement outside the tower caught her attention.

  “My hero!” she exclaimed, surprised at how excited that empty, expectant moment had wound her up.

  She stepped to the doorway just in time to see a group of soldiers working the ground near the treeline where she had ordered digging the night before. What she saw made her stop short.

  The hole was enormous.

  It was no longer a shallow pit but a wide, jagged opening carved deep into the earth. Piles of material surrounded it. Not just dirt. Clean stone blocks. Veins of dull red ore. And glittering among them, unmistakable even from a distance, were flecks of gold catching the sunlight.

  Riley’s eyebrows shot up.

  “Well… it’s not a hero,” she said, “but I’m definitely not complaining.”

  She walked closer, boots crunching on loose rock. The scale of it was impressive for one night’s work. This was far beyond what she had expected from a simple digging order. The soldiers had uncovered a layered deposit, rich and dense, like the ground itself had been waiting to be opened.

  Her strategist brain snapped awake.

  “This isn’t a pit,” she said aloud, more to herself than anyone else. “This is a mine.”

  She didn’t hesitate.

  “Reinforce it,” she ordered. “Shore the walls. This becomes a permanent extraction site.”

  The soldiers acknowledged and immediately began adjusting their work, hauling timber supports and widening the entrance more carefully.

  The day pushed on. Construction echoed through the clearing. The hospital rose faster than she expected, functional but rough.

  No sooner than she had been admiring her new hospital did a deep rumble shake the ground without warning.

  Riley spun toward the sound just as dust billowed out of the mine entrance. Shouts followed. Panicked, sharp. Soldiers scrambled back as part of the wall collapsed inward with a violent crash.

  Her heart slammed painfully against her ribs.

  One soldier went down in the chaos, pinned and injured, his scream cutting off abruptly as others dragged him free. Blood streaked the stone. For one horrible second, Riley was certain she was about to see another incident report. Another number reduced.

  The HUD flared urgently.

  She did not hesitate.

  She opened the medical interface immediately.

  ? Hospital Menu

  ? Infantry Level 1

  ? Heal: Y/N

  “Yes,” she said out loud, voice tight as she selected it. “Heal.”

  The order confirmed.

  Riley stood frozen, fists clenched at her sides, watching the soldiers rush the injured man toward the newly built structure.

  The timing felt almost fated. If she had delayed the hospital even one more day, that soldier would be dead.

  The realization hit hard.

  Planning saved lives.

  And mistakes took them.

  She watched through the open doorway as the injured soldier was carried inside the hospital. The wait was short since he was the first patient. Moments later the soldier emerged pale and unsteady but alive, supported by two others.

  Her shoulders sagged with relief.

  She checked the resource readout. The cost was there, a visible dip, but small. Almost negligible compared to the expense of training a new soldier from nothing.

  Healing was cheaper than replacement.

  Now that she knew the hospital was operational, Riley moved on to the next bottleneck. Tools. Everything they were doing relied on improvised labor. Digging, hauling, reinforcing with bare hands and crude implements. It was inefficient and dangerous.

  She opened the build menu and selected the forge.

  The structure rose over the course of the afternoon, smoke finally curling upward as it came online. The sound of hammer on metal echoed across the clearing, steady and grounding in a way Riley did not expect.

  Her attention now turned back to the HUD as she explored the special personnel list.

  ? Engineer

  Her gaze lingered there.

  She exhaled slowly.

  Special personnel occupied all available slots. If she chose to do this now, that meant no troop training while it was in progress. Fewer soldiers, temporarily, for stronger foundations long-term.

  It was a familiar choice. Short-term risk versus long-term efficiency.

  She would definitely need this. An engineer would stabilize the mine. Improved structures would prevent another cave-in.

  She waited until the sun dipped low before reviewing the final reports for the day.

  ? Build Menu

  ? Hospital Level 1 Complete

  ? Forge Level 1 Complete

  ? Troop Training Menu

  ? Archers 4 Level 1 Trained

  Riley looked out to the yard to see her first four archers standing ready. The sight of them steadied her nerves more than she expected. Valrik was already inspecting them, checking their armor, which had markings consistent with her infantry soldiers. A cohesive unit was forming.

  Before turning in, Riley opened the forge menu to queue the first real production run.

  She needed shovels. Enough for every soldier she had now and some for those she would train later. Better tools meant faster work and fewer injuries.

  She made her decision and committed to it.

  ? Forge Menu

  ? Shovels Started x 10 in 2 hours

  ? Troop Training Menu

  ? Engineer Level 1 x 8 Hours

  The timers locked in. Overnight progress. That small comfort never stopped feeling miraculous.

  Riley was rolling out her blanket when she heard it.

  A soft scratch at the door.

  She opened the door slightly, enough that Thorne was able to squeeze in without waiting for permission. He gave her a brief look, then moved past her like the matter was settled, choosing a spot near where she slept and lowering himself with a grunt.

  He had never slept inside the tower before.

  “That’s new,” she said quietly.

  Thorne did not answer. He simply adjusted his position, close enough that she could hear his breathing as she lay next to him.

  As the tower settled into night, Riley let the events of the day replay in her mind. The dead soldiers. The mine. The collapse. The hospital saving a life. The forge lighting for the first time. The hero summoned (wherever he was). The quiet weight of command pressing heavier than it had yesterday.

  She closed her eyes, exhaustion finally claiming its due. Tomorrow would bring new problems and new decisions.

  For tonight, everyone under her roof was alive.

  And that was enough.