“How old are you, anyway?” A gruff old man asked Ren, who was sitting across the camp fire.

  “I’m sixteen years old- Sergeant.” He answered. The man stared at him for a good couple of minutes, unsurprised, before letting out a sigh. “Just call me Lee from now on.”

  “I’ve seen an awful lot of kids like you these days… It just makes me wonder what exactly they’re trying to do.” He sipped on a canteen full of coffee. “Nothing major has happened yet this past week, but that’s exactly what’s making me worried…”

  Another man began to talk. “They’re sending this many people, and even drafting some kids to the field. What could they possibly be afraid of? Those phony magicians can’t possibly be much of a threat compared to a gun.”

  “That’s right. We’ll finish this conflict and send you young blood right back where you belong! Right Mack?” Lee cackled, as he patted my back. They had some kick to them, Ren yelped inwardly.

  “I don’t know, Lee… I just can’t shake this feeling that-” Abruptly, a man came yelling in our direction along with some other men, carrying a person. The person wore differently colored fatigues than us, completely bloodied up.

  “Sergeant! We found a scout sneaking around our camp! We searched for him, but we only found this map on him!” a man yelled.

  Ren’s eyes darted towards the map, but he dismissed it. Nothing seemed abnormal, after all. The map had some geographical data, notes, and text in a language we could not understand. It had an odd luster.

  “This doesn’t feel right. They sent a scout with nothing but a map? They couldn’t have possibly thrown away their comms just because we were jamming the area…” Lee muttered under his breath.

  “Maybe they’re using magic?” Ren pointed towards the text on the map. “They could be using it to communicate and avoid the jamming.” He explained. The entire group nodded in agreement.

  Lee took the map before going into deep thought. “Maybe we should let the Lieutenant know about this tomorrow. Better safe than sorry… For now, while we wait for the higher ups analysis, let's set up for the night and have some people on night watch.” He dismissed everyone in the area, and they all went into their tents for the night.

  Ren’s eyes shot open as if he was awoken by the sound of an explosion, despite the endless silence that filled his cold tent. His comrades were dead asleep, to the point of snoring, but he couldn’t shake off that eerie feeling. Stepping out of the tent, he was greeted by the glistening stars in the sky, and the pale white moon up above.

  At a distance, he saw a brilliant blue star in the sky. Several more followed, and they quickly grew in number. Are stars supposed to look like that? He lampooned.

  “It’s a warlock! Everyone, get up now!” A man screeched at the top of his lungs. The silence of the night quickly flipped into a sea of chaos. Craters sank deep into the area where his company had set up camp, and the smoke had blotched out the stars.

  A man had grabbed Ren by the collar, dragging him out of the tent. “Get moving! Are you trying to die!?” he hollered at him.

  Ren snapped out of the daze, and began moving his legs as fast as he could. He was taught about warlocks and the different types of them, but he had never seen one first-hand. It was unimaginable how much destruction a single person could cause without any weapons beside a mere staff.

  After running through hundreds of meters of fallen trees, craters, and objects hidden by the dark, he saw a familiar face belonging to a person from his squadron. A sense of relief washed over him as he sped up towards the man.

  “Lee!” he yelled. The man turned around, with a pale look on his face. “We need to get the hell out of here, now. Our company is completely disorganized, and we can’t possibly turn this fight around now due to all of this chaos.” Lee gathered whoever we could find from our squadron as we sped towards an armored truck.

  Ulysses, a burly man the size of a brick wall tapped Lee on the shoulder. “Boss, the closest camp is a hundred klicks southeast.” Without a trace of hesitation. Lee whipped the vehicle around and zoomed towards the southeast. Explosion after explosion sounded out around the group, until it panned into a deep silence. They had finally escaped.

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  By the time they arrived at the camp, the sun was already rising. Several other trucks were gathered around the entrance, some ridden with broken parts, missing entire doors and such. The soldiers from the camp gathered around, astonished.

  After a brief talk with the camp's lieutenant, Lee came back with a dark expression.

  “What’s wrong? Sergeant?” Ren worriedly asked. Lee looked him in the eye, with all the confidence left from yesterday shattered. He swallowed before he spoke.

  “Half of our troop is dead. Mack is nowhere to be found.”

  “...”

  Hearing that news, the entire squadron fell into a stupor. In no more than one hour, a single warlock caused the deaths of nearly a hundred people. They were the first troop to witness the destructive might of a true warlock…

  The tension was high that night. There was hardly enough space for all these newcomers, and everyone was deathly afraid of what was to come. They feared that a warlock could appear at any moment, and that they would not stand a single chance. The men who were already at the camp did not understand.

  Lee, along with some other squad leaders went into the lieutenant’s tent to have a discussion.

  “Before we were attacked, we found this odd map…” He began to explain the situation yesterday. Having the same thoughts as we did, they left the map at Ren’s tent to avoid leaking any information in case the map truly was for communication.

  Ren examined the map closer. It gave him an odd feeling when he looked at it, despite its ordinary looks. After some contemplation, he realized that it was not just an odd feeling. The map began to glow in a faint blue color that faded in and out. Ren’s face warped.

  Ulysses looked at him strangely. “What? What's wrong?”

  “T- the map!” Ren stammered

  “What about the map?”

  “It’s not for communication… It’s to track our location!” Hearing this, Ulysses fell silent.

  Both Ren and Ulysses ran out of the room, towards the Lieutenants tent. With the map in hand, they explained the situation and they all bolted out of the room. Within thirty minutes, every single person in that camp gathered outside. The silence loomed throughout the area, and the dread piled on.

  Just as Ren began to relax, a figure showed up in the air, a faint light coming from it. Without a single moment to spare, the entire camp began firing at the figure, turning the sky into a mess of orange and red. Without a scratch, the figure emerged from the smoke and waved its hand.

  “Reinforcements from the main camp should be coming soon! We just need to hold him down!” The lieutenant yelled.

  As bullets tore through the sky, an audible yelp came from above. The figure had a bullet wound on its shoulder, dripping blood onto the people below. In a single breath, It slammed down onto the ground, flinging dirt into the air and sending soldiers flying. Beneath the hood that it had pulled down was an angry, menacing face.

  In a split second, flames spewed from the ground, a vivid reminder of the slaughter that happened just before. The order we had was once again destroyed, and everyone began to run away.

  Lee grabbed my shoulder and began to run into the woods, Ulysses followed behind. Without looking back, they ran past the awful screaming. Tripping on sticks and rocks, like helpless children, as the fire caught up behind us. Suddenly, gunshots, followed by a wild screech sounded out from behind

  Ulysses began firing at the warlock. “Just keep running! At least get the kid out here alive!”

  The crazed warlock simply walked towards him, swiping each bullet away with his hand. Firing his last magazine, Ulysses charged forward, attempting to bash the enemy's head in with the butt of his rifle.

  “Don’t look back!” He yelled.

  Ulysse’s agonizing scream reverberated through the entire forest. Ren swallowed.

  A swath of fire split Lee from him, as the warlock pushed him into a corner. He fired madly, hoping that a miracle would happen and that a bullet would go through, to no avail. The warlock simply stepped closer and closer, until he could do nothing but freeze into place. Ren's heart sank as the man raised his hand, expecting to go up in ashes.

  In a breath, a figure jumped through the fire, taking his place. Sergeant Lee had shoved him out of the way. Gritting through the pain, he threw a punch at the man, hoping it would land as his body slowly went into flames. He took one good look at the kid behind him, before turning into dust.

  Ren, who was down behind him, fell into tears. Blood was pumping through his entire body, and he grit his teeth before clenching his fist.

  Before he could do anything, a white mist enveloped him, as he fell unconscious. A figure approached from above, stabbing the enemy warlock in the chest with an icicle the size of a streetlamp.

  “The first exposure is complete.”