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Challenge #04693-L309: Combat Hypocrisy

If war is diplomacy by violence, then the currency of exchange is in the bodies of the youth. And so a General must make his bitter calculus, choosing which men to hurl at the enemy defenses in the grim hope that the righteous side is victorious. -- Deathshead419

The best kind of war, say many philosophers, is the one you don't have to fight. Many war hawks have ignored this wisdom and prefer to throw fighting youth at the enemy until one side or the other runs out. When it comes to the biggest army wins, only one has consistently won with a smaller number of soldiers. According to many, he cheated by being an assassin. According to many, he should have hired one like any decent lord of his era would do.

As for all the others, they were slow to learn the important difference between tactics and strategy.

One such example came in the repeated attempts to conquer the Wyldewood. A deep forest that was the realm of Wood Elves and Rock Elves, with hidden cravasses and sudden spikes of stone. There were whispers that they shaped strange beasts within the labyrinthine depths. Nightmares made flesh. Some whispered that they shaped the very land around luckless adventurers that stumbled into their territory. Nobody knew for sure because, once they went in, they never came out again.

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Challenge #04692-L308: There's Always a Catch

Below the waves is a shrine. Those who lay upon the alter join the sirens, gaining a new form and an enrapturing voice. And Arbin had best learn to use these new pipes, for the sacred duty of sirens is to ensure at least one is always singing a lullaby. For if the song ever falls silent, something lurking in the darkest depths may awaken at last…

Inspired by BKF's comment below this previous tale: https://peakd.com/fiction/@internutter/challenge-04657-l273-uninhabited --

Challenge #04691-L307: In the Hour of Greatest Need

An apprentice healer saves a mysterious stranger from a fever. The thankful stranger gives the healer a box, promising that when the time comes, the box will open and the debt will be repaid. -- Deathshead419

Devryq never knew the stranger's name. They were just a fellow traveler at the waystation-house. One in need, because they were deep in a fever. Deveryq hadn't thought of rewards, just of the need ze could see to.

It didn't matter that the stranger was a

Challenge #04690-L306: Not Your Average Teen

The child thought they were human, until they began to enter their teen years and certain things began to manifest that showed they were not. Small scales, occasional flame, they were frightened. Then a kind hand reached out to them and stated "No you're not a freak, or a monster, but child, you are changing. It's time you learned your heritage." -- Anon Guest

Everyone knows that things can happen to a body growing into maturity. For Humans, the usual speech is

Challenge #04689-L305: Lessons of History

Over the objections of his advisors, the youngest of seven princes makes friends with a warren of kobolds whose home was right under the estate he'd been given. That friendship pays off during a brutal rebellion, when he is able to get innocents hidden so they do not suffer. How did the alliance form? He almost paid his life to protect the warren from poachers trying to take eggs. -- Anon Guest

History easily becomes stories. Some of those stories transform in

Challenge #04688-L304: Miracles For Midwinterfeast

"Greatfather Langeven is a childhood god. He only sees that which is good in the world, and so comes for the children who believe they have been good. Which is terribly unfair to those who've been told they're wicked their entire, brief lives. But that's a different story for a different time."

The youth had always been kind, had always done their best to help others, even though they, themselves, were constantly being told they were evil, wicked, and, sadly, thoroughly believing

Challenge #04687-L303: The Price of Prophecy

Divine clues convince a town that a boy and his friends must complete a daring quest to avert world ending disaster. That may be true. But the Hero’s parent knows the children will face potent foes none could survive without aid. So the parent, willing to pay well, begs Wraithvine to watch over the young heroes from the shadows and keep them from harm without being seen. -- Deathsead419

Langdon was born with the blaze. Prophecy declared that the boy born

Challenge #04686-L302: The Fool's Choice

What’s better after a night barhopping than an impromptu car race on the rain-slick city streets? Why, doing so before seat-belt laws! -- Deathshead419

There was a time which had much more freedom, compared to the modern day. Less freedom when compared to certain other times. Like, say, the paleolithic era. But those had their own caveats. Rampant disease, early death, that sort of thing. But in this era, the age of rock and roll, or the sock hop, there was

Challenge #04685-L301: Slaughter Underwater

Well drat, Wraithvine’s unexpected island vacation will have to end sooner rather than later to help free the merfolk from having to make sacrifices to the Whijioght, though ze will likely have to get very damp doing so in this follow-up to:

https://peakd.com/fiction/@internutter/challenge-04588-l204-a-knack-for-finding-trouble -- Deathshead419

Obviously, whatever Whijiought was, it needed to be stopped. Sacrifices to something that needed a pronounciation guide were never a good thing. Wraithvine used every atom of hir acting skills to

Challenge #04684-L300: Unfeeling Love

I do not understand emotions, although my library has the definitions I do not truly feel them. Although, it is not written in my code, there is an unfinished task in serving my master. I am missing a part if I am not with them. Is this… desire? -- Anon Guest

I am Min-yun. I am made to serve. I am a thing of cogs and gears, run by crystals and magic. My master-maker-mother commands me and I obey. I am good

Challenge #04683-L299: Help the Helper

They were a hellkin, but their horns never grew in. They had the tail, the dark red skin, black fingernails, though not claws, but no horns. As an adult they wore fake horns to try to be more like others of their type. Until another told them, "Horns don't matter, your kindness is in your heart." -- Lessons.

The basic Hellkin "starter set" if you wish to think about such things, is thought to be horns, teeth, tail, and weirdly-coloured skin. Red

Challenge #04682-L298: Own Employee Rights

Why were you arrested? /"I severely overworked my employee to the point of collapse while not seeing to their needs."

Wait... I thought you were self employed and had no employees. /"You're right, I don't."

So which employee did you overwork if you don't have any working for you? /"I guess I was the employee."

Okay... that's odd. /"Yeah, I don't belong here." -- The New Guy

[AN: This prompt had to be adjusted for line brevity]

The Galactic Alliance didn't believe

Challenge #04681-L297: Sage's Advice

They begged the old hellkin to teach them to fight. True the apprentices were no masters and could teach as well, but he had been the first to actually be KIND to them. He didn't exactly teach them to fight.. as much as he did teach them how to accept life. -- Anon Guest

Everyone knew the daft old cheesemonger with a goat he called a dog. To be fair, the Hellkin's miniature goat certainly believed she was a dog and nothing

Challenge #04680-L296: Objection Lessons

There's a reason I'm called Patience. When someone calls me a 'teuf', I don't, normally, hurt them. And I will NEVER hurt a kid. However, I will teach why it's NOT a good idea to call one of my kind such. Sadly, some lessons do hurt, but I've never, happy to say, killed anyone. Though some wished I had before they finally learn. -- Lessons

Sometimes, they asked. "Why is it such a bad word? It's just the short form of a

Challenge #04679-L295: Just So, No Snow

The war against the Northern Kingdom has not gone well. Now the remnants of the Southern army ready themselves behind the walls of their final castle, hoping for a miracle to break the siege. -- Deathshead419

They had fallen for one of the classic blunders - never get involved in a land war in the Northlands. Their worst and cruellest general was the very winter itself. Freezing boiling soup before it reached the bowl. Freezing men in their tents. Freezing breath so

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A 4634-post collection

Challenge #04693-L309: Combat Hypocrisy

Challenge #04692-L308: There's Always a Catch

Challenge #04691-L307: In the Hour of Greatest Need

Challenge #04690-L306: Not Your Average Teen

Challenge #04689-L305: Lessons of History

Challenge #04688-L304: Miracles For Midwinterfeast

Challenge #04687-L303: The Price of Prophecy

Challenge #04686-L302: The Fool's Choice

Challenge #04685-L301: Slaughter Underwater

Challenge #04684-L300: Unfeeling Love

Challenge #04683-L299: Help the Helper

Challenge #04682-L298: Own Employee Rights

Challenge #04681-L297: Sage's Advice

Challenge #04680-L296: Objection Lessons

Challenge #04679-L295: Just So, No Snow