Chapter 107 - 106: Territory That Can Defend Itself

Chapter 107: Chapter 106: Territory That Can Defend Itself

There had to be a way.

Iris kept thinking about it as she walked.

The injured survivors had been taken care of. Claire was still with them, making sure nobody decided to ignore their injuries and wander off again. The bodyguard had been ordered to rest, though Iris doubted he would stay still for long.

The others had gone back to whatever they had been doing before the hunting trip.

But Iris couldn’t.

The problem had already been placed in front of her.

People were going outside.

They were going to gather resources.

They were going to hunt monsters.

They were going to level up.

And they were going to get hurt.

She couldn’t stop them from becoming stronger just because the outside world was dangerous. If anything, Velaris would eventually need people who could fight.

What she needed was a way to make sure those people could return alive.

Iris opened her Lord’s Panel.

She went straight to Construction.

The list of available structures appeared in front of her.

She had already used the Construction Directory several times when building Velaris. Roads. Houses. The Warehouse. The Farm. The Weaponry Shop.

Most of the options she had seen before were focused on making the territory more functional.

This time, she looked specifically for defense.

She scrolled.

Storage.

Agriculture.

Housing.

Production.

Transportation.

Defense.

Iris stopped.

She opened the category.

Several structures appeared.

Some were clearly meant for larger territories or more advanced settlements. Others required buildings that Velaris did not have yet.

She continued scrolling.

Then she saw something she hadn’t noticed before.

Sentry.

Iris tapped it.

A description appeared.

Sentry: Automated defensive structure capable of identifying and attacking hostile threats within its designated defensive range.

Her eyes narrowed.

She read the description again.

Automated.

That was the word she cared about.

She continued reading.

Primary targets include monsters and individuals displaying hostile intent toward the territory or its inhabitants.

Iris paused.

"Hostile intent?"

She opened the additional information.

The System provided another explanation.

The sentry did not classify someone as hostile simply because they were unfamiliar.

A person entering Velaris for the first time would not automatically become a target.

A visitor would not be attacked merely because the sentry did not recognize them.

The defensive system evaluated hostility toward the territory and its inhabitants.

Iris slowly relaxed.

That had been one of her first concerns.

The beacon had brought people to Velaris.

More people could arrive in the future.

If she filled the walls with automatic weapons that shot every stranger who approached, the settlement would become a nightmare instead of a safe haven.

She didn’t need defenses that attacked everyone.

She needed defenses that could tell the difference between someone entering Velaris and someone trying to harm it.

The Sentry seemed to do exactly that.

Iris looked at the illustration.

It didn’t look particularly impressive.

The structure was compact, designed to be installed into a defensive position rather than standing openly in the middle of a settlement.

She checked the details.

Installation: Defensive boundary required.

Her eyes moved to the Blackstone Wall.

"So you’re meant to go on the wall."

She scrolled further.

Recommended installation interval: 20 metres.

Iris blinked.

Twenty metres.

That sounded reasonable.

Until she remembered the size of Velaris.

She opened the Territory Status.

The territory’s area appeared.

3,142,000 square metres.

Iris stared at the number for a moment.

"Right."

Velaris wasn’t a tiny compound.

It only felt small because most of the important activity was concentrated around the settlement.

The actual territory stretched much farther.

She pulled up the map.

The Blackstone Wall marked the boundary.

Iris studied it.

If the territory was roughly circular, with a radius of about one kilometre, then the perimeter would be a little over six kilometres.

Six thousand metres.

She did the calculation again in her head.

At twenty metres apart...

Approximately three hundred sentries.

Iris frowned.

She opened the System calculator available through the panel.

The result appeared.

Approximately 315 Sentries.

Iris stared at it.

"Three hundred and fifteen?"

The number looked ridiculous.

She had been expecting a few dozen.

Maybe fifty.

Not three hundred and fifteen.

She zoomed out on the map.

The wall stretched around the entire territory.

Twenty metres suddenly didn’t seem like a very large distance anymore.

Every twenty metres meant another sentry.

And another.

And another.

By the time she followed the entire boundary, she would have a line of them surrounding Velaris.

Iris rubbed her forehead.

"That’s expensive."

She opened the cost section.

The number appeared beneath the construction requirements.

Cost per Sentry:

Stone: 1

Gold: 5

Iris went silent.

One Stone wasn’t terrible.

Five Gold wasn’t terrible either.

One sentry could be considered affordable.

But three hundred and fifteen?

She did the calculation.

315 Stone.

1,575 Gold.

Iris stared at the total.

Her expression slowly changed.

"Okay."

That was much worse.

She checked the Territory Status again.

Basic Resources.

Stone: 5,000/5,000.

Money: 3,000/3,000.

At least the Stone wouldn’t cripple them.

The Gold was another matter.

1,575 Gold was more than half of the territory’s current Money reserve.

And that was only for the sentries.

They still needed buildings.

Resources.

Development.

Future upgrades.

Whatever unexpected problem came next.

Iris closed her eyes briefly.

This was exactly the kind of decision she had been trying to avoid.

The System made everything look simple when it gave her a construction option.

Choose.

Pay.

Build.

But the territory wasn’t an endless resource pool.

Every purchase meant something else had to wait.

She looked at the sentry information again.

There was another detail.

Defensive range: 20 metres.

Iris frowned.

"So that’s why."

If the recommended interval was twenty metres and the defensive range was designed around that distance, placing them farther apart could create gaps.

She checked whether the range overlapped.

It did.

The System recommended placing them close enough to provide continuous defensive coverage along the wall.

Iris imagined the entire boundary.

Three hundred and fifteen sentries.

Each embedded into the Blackstone Wall.

From the outside, they would barely be noticeable.

That part of the design was actually clever.

She opened the installation details.

The sentries could be integrated into existing defensive structures.

The Blackstone Wall would remain the primary visible structure.

The sentries would conform to the material and surface of the wall once installed.

Iris smiled faintly.

"At least you won’t make my wall ugly."

She imagined hundreds of metal weapons sticking out of the stone.

That would have looked terrible.

Instead, the sentries would blend into the Blackstone.

To someone walking past the wall, they would simply look like part of the dark stone.

Only when they activated would their presence become obvious.

That was better.

Iris returned to the cost.

1,575 Gold.

She could afford it.

Technically.

But could she justify it?

She thought about the survivors from earlier.

They had gone outside because they wanted to become stronger.

They hadn’t done it because Iris ordered them to.

They had made the choice themselves.

And they would probably do it again.

The first hunting attempt had already shown her what happened when people went outside without enough preparation.

The next group could be better.

They could stay closer.

They could fight in larger groups.

They could learn from what happened.

But there would always be danger.

A monster could appear from somewhere they weren’t watching.

Someone could fall.

Someone could panic.

Someone could get separated.

And if Iris had a way to reduce that danger, could she really justify leaving the territory without it?

She looked at the Blackstone Wall.

It had been one of the first major things she built.

At the time, it had felt like enough.

A massive wall.

Strong enough to keep monsters out.

Strong enough to make Velaris different from every temporary shelter people had been hiding in.

But now the people inside it were beginning to move beyond it.

The wall could not follow them.

Iris turned her attention back to the sentry.

There was one more thing she wanted to know.

"Can they attack people?"

The System’s response was immediate.

Sentries can engage hostile individuals whose actions or intent meet the territory’s defensive criteria.

Iris’s eyes narrowed.

"And if someone is just approaching?"

Non-hostile individuals are not designated as defensive targets solely due to unfamiliarity or lack of residency.

"Good."

She nodded.

That mattered.

She didn’t want Velaris becoming paranoid.

A safe territory needed to feel safe.

Not like everyone walking toward the wall was one wrong step away from getting shot.

She kept reading.

The sentries could attack monsters approaching the territory.

They could attack hostile individuals.

They could defend the boundary automatically.

They could remain active without requiring someone to operate them manually.

That last part mattered most.

Iris couldn’t station a bodyguard every twenty metres around the entire territory.

She didn’t have three hundred guards.

She didn’t even have close to that many people capable of fighting.

The sentries could fill that gap.

Not completely.

But enough.

She looked at the number again.

The thought of spending 1,575 Gold made her stomach hurt.

Still, she couldn’t ignore what the alternative meant.

Another injured survivor.

Another bodyguard rushing outside.

Another group discovering too late that the monsters were stronger than expected.

Someone could die next time.

Iris’s fingers hovered over the construction option.

She didn’t press it.

Not yet.

She looked at the territory map again.

Velaris had started as a place to survive.

Then it became a place to live.

Now the people inside were trying to become strong enough to face the world outside.

If she wanted them to do that, then Velaris had to grow with them.

A wall was protection.

But protection could not mean locking everyone inside forever.

They needed a territory that could defend itself.

Iris looked back at the sentry’s description.

Three hundred and fifteen of them.

It was expensive.

Painfully expensive.

But for the first time since she had built Velaris, Iris could see a path toward something more than a wall.

She could see a territory that watched its own borders.

A territory that could respond when danger approached.

A territory that did not depend entirely on the people living inside it to notice every threat.

Iris took a slow breath.

"Fine."

Her finger moved toward the construction option.

Then she stopped.

She wasn’t going to spend that much without checking everything one more time.

She needed to know exactly what she was buying.

How the sentries worked.

How far they could reach.

How they determined hostility.

What happened when they fired.

And whether they could actually protect the people who went outside.

Iris closed the construction window.

The decision was already made in her mind.

She just hadn’t pressed the button yet.

"Tomorrow," she murmured.

She looked toward the wall.

"No."

Her expression hardened.

"Before tomorrow."

Because the next group of survivors might not be as lucky as the first.