By the fourth morning after the first monsters fell from the sky, Dawnrise stopped smelling like food.
It smelled like tape.
Adhesive, plastic, dust—and the faint metallic tang of generators that now ran once a day. Rael noticed it the moment he woke, before he even opened his eyes. The air felt thicker, warmer, carrying hints of petrol and exhaust smoke.
Somewhere nearby, Teren snored.
Ren had somehow ended up half on Rael's mattress again, one small foot pressed into his ribs, his blanket twisted into a rope around his waist.
Miko slept on the other side, curled tight, thumb tucked under her chin like she was afraid it might wander off.
Rael lay still for a few seconds, listening.
No sirens.
No shouting.
No distant thunder that wasn't thunder.
Just the hum of the ceiling fan and forty-odd children breathing at different rhythms.
He let himself relax—just a fraction.
Then Lian's voice cracked through the corridor.
"Up. Everyone up. If you're awake enough to breathe, you're awake enough to move."
Groans rippled through the inner common rooms like waves.
Rael carefully disentangled himself, easing Ren's foot away and tucking the blanket back around him. Ren made a small, unhappy sound but didn't wake.
Good.
Outside the sealed windows, the sky was pale and cracked, thin crimson wisps barely visible in the morning light. The portal itself was large enough to be seen even from there.
Breakfast was rationed now.
Not starvation-rationed—Nyla would have fought someone over that—but measured.
Ladles dipped carefully. Bread slices were thinner. Even the older kids noticed, though no one complained out loud.
"Eat slow," Nyla said, tapping the pot. "Food doesn't fill you better if you rush it."
Rael chewed mechanically, listening to the TV murmuring in the background.
"-third minor incursion overnight-"
"-Defence Command reports successful neutralisation-"
"-solvar government's attempt to enter the portal, failed -"
" -even bombarding it with fighter jets couldn't break the invisible blockade-"
"-citizens urged to remain calm-"
Remain calm had become the phrase of the month.
After breakfast came drills.
Not the fire drills everyone had grown up with, where you shuffled outside and waited to be told it was a false alarm. These were new. Tight. Fast. Unpleasant.
"When the siren goes," Lian barked, pacing the corridor, "you move away from windows. Not later. Not after you finish tying your shoe, but immediately."
"What if we're in the washroom?" someone asked.
"Then congratulations," Lian said. "You live there now until I say otherwise."
That earned a few strained laughs.
Rael found himself automatically shepherding the younger ones, steering them away from glass, counting heads without thinking about it. He didn't remember deciding to do that.
It just… happened.
Maybe pretending isn't working anymore.
Days settled into a pattern.
Morning drills.
Supply runs.
News updates.
Evenings packed into inner rooms, mattresses spread like a patchwork across the floor.
The first wave after that initial attack was small.
Creatures dropped in ones and twos—lean things with too many joints, or bulkier brutes that moved like boulders. The soldiers handled them quickly. Gunfire rattled across the fields. The TV showed grainy footage of bodies collapsing—some dissolving into sludge streaked with crimson wisps, others leaving behind lifeless carcasses.
"They seems to be easily defeated," Teren muttered one afternoon, leaning against the wall near the screen.
"Easy," Rael echoed.
"You know what I mean."
He did.
The adults didn't have names for them yet. On the news, they were called entities, hostiles, targets. In the orphanage, the kids just called them small ones.
Small ones that still killed people.
By the end of the first week, blackouts became common.
Not city-wide failures—planned cuts.
Lights dimmed at certain hours. Generators kicked in. Nyla counted fuel like it was gold. Lian made lists on the backs of old notices: who slept where, who helped where, who needed watching because fear made them reckless.
Rael's name appeared on more than one list.
"Hall run," Nyla said one morning, handing him a slip of paper. "Rice and lentils today. And don't linger."
The River of Ten Thousand Currents Hall sat three blocks away, its wide steps crowded with volunteers. The place buzzed like a hive—people moving with purpose, voices low but steady.
Rael helped unload small sacks, stacking them carefully while waiting for his turn.
"Did you hear?" asked the man manning the relief van nearby. "They say the bodies aren't normal. Tissue doesn't match anything we know.
"Nothing matches anything anymore,"
another volunteer replied. "My cousin's in Defence. Says the air near the portal hums."
Rael pretended not to listen.
He was good at that.
The first big one appeared in the second month.
It fell hard.
The impact alone knocked several soldiers off their feet. The creature was massive—bike-sized, doubled, with thick hide, a blunt head, and limbs like tree trunks. Gunfire stitched across its body, sparks and fragments flying, but it barely slowed.
Rael watched from Dawnrise's common room, heart hammering.
"Why isn't it falling?" Ren whispered, clutching his sleeve.
"It will," Rael said, hoping he was right.
The soldiers adjusted. Heavier weapons came online. A burst from a mounted gun finally staggered the creature, punching through its flank. It collapsed with a wet, meaty sound.
Silence followed.
Then cheering—from the soldiers, from the orphanage, from the city itself.
"That one took more," Teren muttered. "They're not all the same."
After that, the big ones started appearing more often. One for every hundred or so small ones, someone on the news estimated. The phrase bullet-resistant began creeping into reports.
Walls thickened around the portal. Concrete blocks stacked higher. Tanks parked farther forward.
And still, the monsters came.
The third month changed everything.
Rael was helping Miko tape a vent when the sirens started.
Not the drill sirens.
The real ones.
Lian didn't shout this time. She didn't have to.
Everyone moved.
Children poured into the inner rooms with practiced efficiency. Nyla shut doors.
Someone killed the lights near the windows.
The TV flickered to a live feed.
The camera shook.
"What's happening?" Miko whispered.
Rael stared.
Something enormous was emerging from the portal.
It wasn't just big. It was dominant. The way it moved—slow, deliberate—made the earlier creatures look like pests.
The thing towered over the perimeter. Plates like armor overlapped its body, faintly glowing at the seams. Crimson wisps leaked continuously, trailing behind it like smoke.
"No," someone breathed.
Gunfire erupted.
It did nothing.
Bullets sparked, shattered, fell uselessly to the ground.
"Heavy units forward!" someone shouted over the feed.
Tanks rolled.
Artillery boomed.
The sound came through the TV distorted and delayed, but the force of it seemed to vibrate through Dawnrise's walls.
The creature roared.
The sound wasn't loud so much as heavy. It pressed into Rael's chest, made his teeth ache.
Ren whimpered.
Rael pulled him close without looking.
For a long minute, the fight dragged on. Vehicles burned. Soldiers fell back in controlled patterns, firing as they moved. The creature smashed barriers like toys, each step a declaration that it did not belong to this world—and did not care.
Then the tanks found their angle.
A shell struck the base of the creature's neck. The blast tore through its plates, exposing darker tissue beneath. It staggered.
Another shell.
Another.
Finally—impossibly—it fell.
The ground shook even through the screen.
No one in the common room spoke.
The camera zoomed in on the body—massive, broken, still leaking crimson wisps that curled upward and faded into nothing.
"They killed it," Teren said softly.
Rael didn't feel like celebrating. They'd needed tanks to bring it down. And there was no guarantee there wouldn't be worse.
The autopsy changed the language.
For days afterward, the news was filled with scientists and officials.
"Anomalous tissue density—"
"Energy readings inconsistent with known physics—"
"Crimson wisps appear to be a by-product, not a weapon—"
Footage showed the massive corpse under floodlights, researchers in protective gear cutting into flesh that resisted blades like reinforced rubber.
"This one was different," Nyla murmured that evening, arms folded.
"Different how?" Lian asked.
"Big enough that pretending doesn't work anymore."
There was no remain calm announcement this time.
A new briefing came two nights later.
Rael sat on his mattress, Ren asleep against his side, when the Defence Command seal filled the screen.
The spokesperson's voice was steady.
"Based on accumulated field data, Defence Command is issuing a formal threat classification system."
The room went quiet.
"Tier-1 entities," the man said. "Creatures ranging from dog to lion size. No supernatural abilities. High physical capability. Neutralised by standard firearms with sufficient hits or precise targeting."
Rael nodded slowly.
That fit.
"Tier-2 entities," the man continued.
"Creatures ranging from horse to rhinoceros size. Increased durability. Partial resistance to conventional firearms. Neutralisation requires high-caliber or concentrated firepower.
Inconsistencies in speed, durability, and wound recovery confirmed through live observation."
Murmurs rippled through the room.
"Tier-3 entities," the man said, his tone shifting almost imperceptibly. "Creatures exceeding elephant scale. High resistance or immunity to standard firearms. Neutralisation requires heavy artillery, large-scale explosives, or armored units. Often act as wave leaders."
Rael exhaled.
So this was what it had become.
"From this point forward," the spokesperson concluded, "all military and public communications will use Tier classifications. Citizens are advised to familiarise themselves with these terms."
The screen faded in background
No one spoke for a long moment.
"So," Teren said finally, forcing a grin. "We're Tier-what? Zero?"
A few kids laughed weakly.
Rael didn't.
He stared at the darkened screen,
understanding settling heavily in his chest.
They weren't reacting anymore.
They were preparing.
This wasn't an emergency.
It was a war.
That night, as Ren slept, Teren snored, and Miko breathed quietly at his side, Rael lay awake beneath the cracked ceiling.
The sky had opened.
And the world—slowly, deliberately—was learning how to fight back.