The valley below stretched for miles, a vast basin of stone and scrub and scattered monster territories where most of the rookie-track guilds operated. From this elevation they could see the terrain like a map, the clusters of activity where teams hunted, the empty zones between territories, the natural corridors that monsters used to move between feeding grounds.
Those corridors were full.
Monsters poured through them in a flood, dozens of creatures that had no business traveling together, predators that would normally kill each other on sight running side by side in the blind, panicked stampede of animals fleeing something worse. They crashed into the hunting zones like a wave breaking against rock, and the tiny figures of rookie fighters scattered before them.
Some didn't scatter fast enough.
Brittany grabbed her artifact and dialed.
…
