The raid hit Thornwick at dawn.
Allen was reviewing Tilly's overnight inventory reports when the wall sentry blew three sharp blasts on the horn. He didn't panic. Panic was for people who didn't have project management certifications and a spreadsheet for every emergency scenario.
He grabbed his coat and climbed the watchtower in thirty seconds flat. Lina was already there, bow drawn, pointing toward the eastern treeline. "Six figures," she said. "Moving fast. Better armed than displaced mobs."
Allen squinted. The Road Network project had cleared a half-mile sightline, which now worked against them. Six hulking shapes jogged toward the palisade in formation. Not sprinting like feral beasts. Jogging. Pacing themselves for sustained combat.
They wore scavenged armor. Bits of chain mail mixed with leather plates and something that looked suspiciously like dungeon-looted exoskeleton fragments. At the front ran a woman built like a siege weapon. She stood six feet tall with shoulders that could block a doorway. Green-gray skin marked her as half-orc. The massive greataxe she carried marked her as the primary threat.
The system overlay flickered as Allen focused on her. Isobel Level10 Berserker Half−Orc STR:22 CON:18 ThreatLevel:High .
"Boss mob," Allen muttered. "Level ten. That's five levels higher than anyone we've got."
"She's charging," Lina said.
Isobel wasn't just running. She was leading a tactical advance. The five orcs behind her maintained proper spacing, flanking positions ready. This wasn't a hunger raid. This was a military operation.
"All hands to the wall!" Allen shouted down. "Gray, armor up! Ella, buffs on the gate!"
The orcs hit the killing ground fifty yards out. Allen had designed the approach himself during the Series A infrastructure build. Open sightlines, no cover, gentle slope slowing upward movement. Isobel didn't slow down. She raised her axe and screamed something in Orcish that sounded like a quarterly earnings report translated into murder.
The first arrow took one of the flankers in the thigh. Lina's work. Clean shot, but the orc didn't drop. He snapped the shaft off and kept moving. Toughness stats were definitely higher than standard mob templates.
"Focus fire on the leader!" Allen commanded. "If she drops, the grunts scatter."
Three militiamen fired arrows from the platform. Two missed. One glanced off Isobel's shoulder guard. She didn't flinch. She just calculated the trajectory and adjusted her sprint angle. Smart AI. Terrifying AI.
Allen pulled up his active skills. He had [Tactical Redeployment] ready. [Command Presence] was already humming in the background, giving his team that ten-percent attack speed bonus. He needed something else. Something that wasn't in the standard RPG playbook.
Negotiation.
"Ella!" he shouted. "Hit them with ! Now!"
The elf mage raised her staff. Arcane energy crackled. A pulse of light burst over the charging line. Not damaging magic. Translation magic. The [Universal Tongue] spell, expensive and rarely used, suddenly made Orcish speech intelligible to everyone within fifty yards.
Isobel's war cry shifted from gibberish to crystal clear Common mid-sentence. "...quarterly projections indicate your livestock assets will be liquidated before noon!"
Allen blinked. That was definitely not standard orcish battle poetry.
He leaned over the parapet and shouted down. "Isobel! Your cash flow analysis is wrong!"
The half-orc stumbled. Literally broke stride and nearly face-planted on the gravel. She looked up at the wall, axe hanging loose in one hand, confusion twisting her features. "What?"
"Your ROI calculations!" Allen projected his voice like he was leading a standup meeting in a crowded conference room. "You're running a hostile acquisition on a depreciating asset! Risk-reward ratio is garbage!"
Isobel held up a fist. The five raiders stopped instantly. Discipline like that didn't come from standard mob programming. These were trained contractors.
"Who speaks corporate during a raid?" Isobel called up. Her voice was rough but educated. The kind of voice that read Harvard Business Review between combat drills.
"Someone who can offer you better terms!" Allen said. He kept his hands visible, no weapons. "You're Level 10 running with Level 3 grunts. That's not a war party. That's a temp agency with bad benefits."
One of the orcs growled. Isobel backhanded him without looking. "Quiet. I'm analyzing."
She studied the wall. Allen could see the mental math happening behind her eyes. She noted the Road Network infrastructure. The new Marketplace foundations. The disciplined militia response time. Professional operations. Sustainable growth models.
"You're the Systems Lord," Isobel said. It wasn't a question. "The one running dungeons like supply chains. Word travels in the mercenary channels."
"Then you've heard we pay on time," Allen said. "Sixty percent loot share. Health benefits. Performance bonuses. Actual equipment maintenance."
"I've heard you put orcs in the same barracks as humans," Isobel said. Her grip tightened on the axe. "I've heard you count inventory while people bleed."
"I count inventory so people don't bleed," Allen corrected. "Right now, you're risking your life and your team's lives for what? A few chickens and some copper coins? Let's run the numbers."
Allen pulled up his interface and projected it outward. The holographic display shimmered in the morning air. He brought up the Thornwick quarterly projections. Revenue growth. Infrastructure development. Population expansion charts.
"Hostile raid scenario," Allen said. "Best case: You breach the wall, lose two team members minimum, grab maybe fifty silver worth of supplies. Then you run. You hide. You spend weeks evading patrols because Thornwick has a Road Network now and fast response times. Net gain after medical costs and opportunity cost? Maybe twenty silver per survivor."
Isobel's eyes tracked the numbers. She wasn't looking at the axe anymore.
"Alternative scenario," Allen continued. "Surrender with equity. Join as Head of Security. Base salary of thirty silver per week plus combat hazard pay. Performance bonuses tied to training efficiency metrics. Full medical coverage via our Adept. Promotion path to Captain of the Guard within eighteen months if you hit your KPIs."
"You want me to defect for a spreadsheet?" Isobel asked.
"I want you to stop making bad business decisions," Allen said. "You're Level 10. You should be running dungeons for Epic loot, not stealing chickens. You're under-leveraged. Wrong market vertical."
Behind Isobel, one of the orcs shifted nervously. "Boss? The sun's up. We lose the fog cover in ten minutes."
Isobel ignored him. She walked closer to the wall, until she stood directly below Allen's position. She looked up, and he saw the calculation happening. Risk versus reward. Certain death versus potential gain. The same calculation every startup employee made when jumping from a stable corporate job to a Series A venture.
"Forty percent tax rate is steep," she said.
"Standard for the industry," Allen countered. "We provide the infrastructure. You provide the labor. We both profit."
"I want a signing bonus," Isobel said. "That axe needs sharpening. Rune-work."
"Gray does rune-work," Allen said. "She's our Production Chief. She'll audit your gear personally."
"And I keep command of my team," Isobel pressed. "They're not grunts. They're my direct reports. I manage them. You don't break up the unit."
Allen considered. Five orcish mercenaries plus a Level 10 Berserker. That was 60% of a proper raid party right there. "Agreed. But they follow the Standard Operating Procedures. No honor duels inside the walls. Chain of command is clear. You report to me, they report to you."
Isobel lowered her axe. The blade kissed the dirt. "Deal."
The system chimed in Allen's skull with the force of a church bell. HostileAcquisitionSuccessful NewAsset:Isobel\[Level10 Berserker ] PartyMaximumLevelRaisedto10 MercenaryTeamIntegrated:5Units DiplomaticReputationwithOrcClans:Modified
The militiamen on the wall stared in slack-jawed silence as the six raiders walked through the gate. Allen climbed down to meet them, adjusting his administrator's coat. Isobel stuck out a hand the size of a dinner plate. Her grip crushed bones together, but Allen had shaken hands with venture capitalists. He could handle pressure.
"Welcome to Thornwick Incorporated," Allen said. "Your first assignment starts immediately."
"I thought I was Head of Security," Isobel said.
"You are," Allen said. "Your first security assignment is filling out the onboarding paperwork. Tilly has the forms. Medical history, skill assessment, beneficiary designation in case of permadeath. Then we're discussing your training curriculum."
Isobel blinked. "Paperwork?"
"Every asset needs documentation," Allen said. "Welcome to the team."