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Unferth put a black armored hand to his helmeted chin as he peered down at the pile of goblin corpses before him. His eyes flashed as two green points of light through his helmet, and his breaths rattled as they sucked in through the filtration system of his All-Environment Suit.

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He held down an urge to shiver despite the heating systems inlaid in his body armor and the thick cloak wrapped around it for even more warmth.

Fjall was as cold as everyone said it was.

No, the stories did not do it justice.

This far up north, Unferth felt that if he did not have his suit with its heating function on, he would have turned into an ice block within minutes.

Unferth was no stranger to cold.

Winters in Mercia were dreadful too, and there was once a time when dwarves like him had to hole up underground to watch them pass by.

Though with the Enlightening from the great god Wodin, there was no need to crawl around in the dirt anymore.

Even with the Enlightening, he noted, there were always mysteries in this wide world of many realms.

Such as these goblins.

Unferth looked down at the goblin corpses. They were all laid out neatly across a mat, ready to be rolled up and taken away. The corpses were riddled with bullet holes from both Seeker ship machinegun fire and standard issue infantry tri-arms.

Unferth was no adventurer. Few dwarves ever took to the League.

But as a Captain of the Bluecap Fleet, a fleet meant for expeditionary scouting and reconnaissance across all realms, he had had years of schooling to know the types of creatures and environments he would encounter.

These were all champions. A great many of them. And even a four-armed elite. A force of Frostborn goblins that was far beyond what was normal for the scum that was goblin kind.

The elite was especially troublesome.

It had slaughtered almost all of Unferth's men on the ground, even those equipped with Ironbeast exo-frames, and only constant aerial gunfire led to its demise for it had no means of catching their airships.

"Officer Shield," said Unferth, his voice a mechanical, projected rasp through the filtration system of his All-Environment Suit.

"Yes, sir! "A dwarf standing beside Unferth stiffened up in attention, putting a deferent hand to a blue cap on his head. He was almost indistinguishable from Unferth in terms of appearance.

Both of them were approximately one and a half meters tall. Wide builds. Not much different from the ordinary dwarf.

They both had on the bulky black body armor of the All-Environment Suit that was standard issue for a Bluecap Fleet for they, as one of the expeditionary fleets of the Undead Containment Force, had to be ready for any environment, regardless of how cold or hot or toxic it was.

The only difference between them was that Unferth had a star imprinted on his blue cap, indicating his rank as a captain.

"Signal for the gunship to beam these samples up. This may not be Undeath, but goblin elites are not a force to be taken lightly.

The tendrils on the back of its head may even suggest the presence of a Lord. Though, I suppose that Dark Zones like this would produce sudden mutations like this the most," said Unferth.

He muttered the word 'Dark Zones' with a hint of disgust. He hated taking his fleet through them. Dark Zones were cut off from all surveillance. All communications were shot.

Ordinary Sorcery did not work, and even though dwarven magitech was self-contained in its magical flow, capable of operating even in Dark Zones where particulates such as this 'Grain' severely impaired any external magic expression, it still meant that the fleet had no access to its sensors or remote communications.

Anything the fleet found here, they would have to report back after they had left this storm of Grainfall.

Unferth did not want to waste a single extra second here if he had to.

Cut off from the Terran outpost, the Adventurer's League, the Sorcerer's Order, everything, they were at great risk for any sudden monster to come their way, and Fjall was known for its ferocious beasts.

Especially across the mountain range known as the Rift. That was a place of legend. No dwarven fleet ever dared to make its way there.

And they were uncomfortably close to the Rift.

Unferth watched as Officer Shield nodded and held up a baton in his hand, clicking a button to make it glow a radiant green: a signal for sample retrieval.

Ordinarily, they would have just gone on comms with the main gunship and gotten this all over with. At least they were trained with color signals so that they could navigate through Dark Zones.

Unferth put his hands behind his back and sighed. "When the retrieval team comes down, tell them to take up our losses too. The corpses must be checked for Undeath, and they must be given proper burial rites."

Still, there was something odd that Unferth could not quite place his finger on. His fleet had been given a reputable tip by a Sorcerer's Order that there were potentially daemonic influences in Fjall.

Seemingly unbelievable, and yet, that tip came from Thorian, a known Archmage of the Sorcerer's Order.

Even Unferth knew Thorian's name.

The man was a master golemancer whose works had even influenced dwarven Mechmancers. A known veteran of the Sorcerer's Order who had upheld the order's sworn oath to keep stability across the realms for several decades now. A veteran of the Red Night.

It was odd that Thorian requested that Unferth move in relative secrecy, not informing the rest of the Sorcerer's Order or the Adventurer's League, but then again, politics were complicated.

It was not unusual for representatives in either organization to appeal to Mercia's fleets or forces for things that needed to be dealt with and contained quickly, especially in regards to potential Undeath.

For Mercia was a truly neutral force that sought only the good of all the realms.

This, every dwarf knew, and every dwarf was proud of.

Was it not the great dwarven wall, the Hellegeate, that sealed off Undir from overtaking the realms with its mass undead?

Was it not he dwarven Caliburn-class bomb that had destroyed the shields of the mad daemon king's palace during the Red Night, making it possible for his foul reign to end?

Unferth had taken up Thorian's request for the Archmage truly seemed desperate about daemonic presences, and all those that knew anything of the Red Night knew that daemons were the source of the undeath curse.

And an undeath infestation here was the worst possible scenario for the Common Realms.

In a Dark Zone, it was impossible to tell how far Undeath had spread until it was too late, until a legion of corrupted monsters knocked on the doors of a Common kingdom.