It was slow, and it cost. Each rotation left the scars wider than the healing could shut, but the mound did not get tired and they did.
"It'll take an hour," Nyx judged, watching Calypso wind up again. "Two, if we're taking a more conservative approach."
The work settled into a rhythm, heavy hitters rotating on the mound while the rest held the square.
Asakura's squad spread onto the perimeter the moment the rotation formed.
Shields faced outward down the three chutes the blocked streets had left open. The medic and the onmyoji took the shade of the market awnings, and Oda covered the dead shopfronts along the square's north face.
Alexandra stood with the screening line, exactly where Kaiden had asked her to be. His guardian belonged where the armor was thinnest, and the thinnest armor in the square was on an escort squad a world below the family's weight.
