Two hundred kilometers away, deeper into the Silverhound territory was a clearing in the middle of a dense forest. The clearing was obviously freshly made, and had several dozen greenish-brown tents set up. At the center of these tents was a somewhat larger command tent.

Four soldiers stood guard in front of this tent, while several dozen others were busy with their own things. Some were on patrol, while others were busy cooking, eating or gambling. The camp couldn’t exactly be described as quiet, but nobody made too much noise.

Nobody, except for the thousand-man-commander. The man had suddenly exploded with curses a few moments ago.

The four guards did their best to appear stoic, but they knew trouble was up. Thousand-man-commander Andersen was generally a calm, even sneaky man. For someone to make him curse so much meant trouble was coming their way.

Inside the tent a stern looking man in his late forties was talking into a dark-brown clay disc. His face was flushed red and he was breathing deeply, obviously trying to calm down.

“Pardon me Hundred-man-commander Downy. Could you please repeat everything from the beginning. I think I missed the later bit.” The man’s voice was now cold and fairly emotionless.

The scout leader listening to the clay disk’s counterpart was unable to tell that the commander was still frowning and gritting his teeth while talking. In spite of that it was a no-brainer to know that the commander was in a bad mood.

“Yes Sir! About an hour ago Hundred-man-commander Andersen and his men were annihilated in battle. Following your order, a ten man scouting party was watching the entire operation,” Hundred-man-commander Downy said nervously. He waited for a moment for the thousand-man-commander to explode in rage once more, but after the other party remained silent he continued his report.

“At first the operation seemed like it was going to be easy. The mark had twenty wagons, with just as many drivers, ten mounted guards and twenty-one men that walked on foot.”

“Hundred-man-commander Andersen offered the guards and drivers a chance to flee. After their refusal things escalated into a frontal clash. At this point both guards and drivers joined the fray.

“The guards and drivers formed seventeen squads of three, while shielding their carts and animals. It was obvious that all of them were well trained and well equipped. Far too well for regular caravan guards, especially considering their use of Silverhound basic squad. They were either soldiers or had military backgrounds.

“The same goes for the wagon drivers. Those men were fully armed and equipped with chainmail armor which they wore under their baggy travel clothes.

“The scouts report that all of those men were trained to the standard of elites assigned with guarding you, Thousand-man-commander. Maybe even a Five-thousand-man commander. If it wasn’t reported by my men I would’ve doubted the claim, but they managed to hold off an enemy that had a clear numbers advantage.”

Hearing this the commander scratched his beard with a frustrated expression. “Continue. Be objective. We need to know our enemy.”

“Yes sir! Sorry sir!” the scout commander shouted before continuing. “The battle was fairly evenly matched with our twenty squads against their seventeen. Probably in part because Hundred-man-commander Andersen wished to minimize casualties. However at this point the situation suddenly took a turn for the worse.

“After the initial stalemate that lasted roughly half a minute an unknown person of small stature appeared, and started slaughtering our troops. The person in question is most likely a halfling Sword-Sage or maybe an assassin. There is also an off chance that the person in question could have been a goblin, but it should be fairly unlikely. This person–”

“Stop.” Thousand-man-commander Andersen cut him off. “Describe the battle. I know you weren’t there, but you should have some basic intelligence regarding the flow of the battle.”

“Yes sir! As I have previously mentioned, at first it was a regular battle. Our teams were using the classic five man formation we always use. The enemy used three man teams which is a popular basic squad formation in the Silverhound army, as you already know. The battle went as one would expect from disciplined men fighting conservatively, meaning there were no obvious injuries on either side in the opening exchange of blows.

“This stalemate lasted roughly half a minute. After half a minute passed a small manling of unknown race joined the fray. This person immediately attacked a five man team. Unfortunately their movements were too quick to be noticed in the chaotic melee. This unknown person dispatched three men in a brief moment before moving onto another squad.

“The attacker kept moving, using hit and run tactics. Before the troops on the field became aware of the danger multiple teams were already crippled or destroyed. The uncanny speed suggests the use of Internal Energy, but was not confirmed.

“The scouting party believes that the person in question dispatched all their targets with a single blow. The person was reported to move with inhuman speed and agility. One of the scouts said he was reminded of an assassin using shadow melding to disappear from view. Only assassins use such techniques, but an assassin wouldn’t risk an open confrontation like that. So we’re not sure–”

“Just tell me how the battle went.” Thousand-man-commander Andersen interrupted as soon as the scout veered off from objective truth and started making guesses. “I need a report, not your opinions.”

“Yes sir! Sorry sir! This person moved with extraordinary speed and in less than a minute crippled or destroyed several teams, each time taking out three to four of our men without stopping their dash. Whoever was left in a three on one situation was quickly slain. Then their three former enemies would go and help others. Causing the situation to spiral out of control, just as you might imagine.”

“And the assassin?” Andersen asked, by now he expected that his cousin should’ve given an order for retreat and asked for backup.

“The assassin kept on killing,” the scout replied hurriedly. “From what my subordinates reported, this person appears to be a psychopath. After the hundred-man-commander Andersen issued a retreat order the assassin gave chase. He knocked Hundred-man-commander Andersen prone in two moves before stabbing him in the back of the head. All of this was done in cold blood, without the slightest trace of hesitation.”

“Anything else?”

“No Sir, that would be all.”

“Why would a twenty wagon caravan have such a person standing guard?” The thousand-man-commander had a thoughtful look in his eyes while roughly scratching his beard.

“Sir, about that… It should be obvious that they have something extremely valuable with them,” Downy carefully offered his opinion before continuing with facts. “I’ve already dispatched a team with equipment designed for detecting extra dimensional spaces. I should have an update for you tomorrow. In any case these people still have more than two hundred kilometers before they reach your position, Sir. Even after you get our report, you should have several days to make a plan of action.”

“Let me know when you have any news on these people. Over.” The faintly glowing clay disc in Thousand-man-commander’s hand dimmed while voicing one final “Yes Sir”. The words sounded a bit distorted as the disc was powering down when transmitting them.

The communication disc disappeared from the thousand-man-commander’s hand.

The man stood upright for a moment as he stared blankly into space in front of him.

*Crash!*

“Fucker!”

The thousand-man-commander kicked the table, and started destroying things in his tent before eventually calming down.

It had taken a full minute before silence returned to the tent. The commander breathed in and out deeply for a while before muttering.

“So long cousin. I hope that Judges treat you kindly,” the man said solemnly.

“Attend me!” he suddenly bellowed after spending a couple of minutes in silence.

Immediately one of the guards standing beside the tent flap ran inside and saluted.

“Have my adjutant assemble the men. Call in even the auxiliary troops. Tell them they have either three days to get their asses here, or four days to reach the old bridge on the Great Yellow River, whichever suits them better.”

Heeding the order the guard saluted, and left without saying a word. Just as he had expected they were up shit creek.

***

For Northshield troops that day went by extremely quickly. Ever since the sun had risen the soldiers were busy getting ready for march. In their commander and chief’s tent the clay communication disk started vibrating yet again.

The thousand-man-commander picked it up. The voice that informed him of his cousin’s passing once more echoed in the command tent.

“I have a report Sir!” Hundred-man-commander Downy on the other side was mindful of his tone.

Yesterday he’d been forced to be the bearer of ill news. Fortunately the news was much better today.

“At ease. Tell me, have you learned anything?” Commander Andersen could almost hear the man on the other end of the communication device standing on attention while speaking. He could also tell that the commander of his company’s scouts was eager to make his report.

“Yes Sir! We’ve detected several spatial fluctuations coming from that caravan. One even belongs to a Portable Mansion! The mansion either has an outer form of a wagon, or something that can fit inside a wagon. We don’t know who’s inside, but generally only big-wigs own such gear. So, whoever it is, they have some status. We can’t tell what the insides look like, but it’s safe to assume we’ve found ourselves an important person that’s worth quite a bit of money.

“Other than the Portable Mansion we’ve also detected a number of Rings of Holding. Several of which have an extremely high grade. This kind of item is luxury even for high ranking nobles, but this caravan has multiple such items. All in all, just the spatial items are worth hundreds of thousands of gold pieces, but we can’t tell the exact value.”

“That’s major news,” Thousand-man-commander Andersen exclaimed when he heard this. He was greatly surprised by their luck.

Apparently they’d run into high nobles, maybe even conspirators looking to overthrow the Duke. After a moment he realized this made sense. That was the only way to explain such a high grade warrior watching over an unremarkable little caravan.

“Did you find anything else?” Andersen asked, sensing that this wasn’t the end of the report.

“Yes sir.” Hundred-man-commander Downy said proudly. “We’ve confirmed the exact number of hostiles outside the Portable Mansion. They have fifty guards plus the guard captain. Twenty of the guards are posing as common drivers, but based on their performance last time, and how they act when they are resting, it’s obvious that they are skilled warriors.

“Then there’s the assassin. He goes around, posing as a child, wearing a Mage’s robes. Apparently he also brought a personal chef with him, so it’s highly likely that he’s very paranoid as well. That kind of person is difficult to trap or catch by surprise.

“To eliminate such a threat we need to drown him in numbers, and then a lucky survivor should eventually be able to stab him dead. Either that or use a sharpshooter, or a large volley where he can’t dodge arrows. It doesn’t matter how skillful he is if we can kill him from a distance.” Speaking up to here the scout shut up. He’d just realized that he was once again giving advice and his opinion instead of just reporting their findings. Suddenly, there was silence that lasted a couple of seconds.

“Ahem! At least that’s what I think. I naturally have no intention of telling you what to do or how you should plan our course of action, Sir.” After several moments of awkward silence Hundred-man-commander Downy spoke once more, trying to dig himself out of this situation.

“At ease Eric, I calmed down.” Thousand-man-commander Andersen said slowly. “Thank you for the information. Is there anything else?”

“No Sir. Because of the assassin I didn’t allow my men to approach close enough to eavesdrop, or I would’ve had more information for you. With a potential assassin around, the odds of them getting captured were quite high–” Eric tried to explain why his report was lacking, but the commander didn’t wait for him to finish.

“It was a good call Eric,” Andersen said. “We’ll be seeing each other in person soon. Right?”

“Yes Sir! Everyone has received your summons, and they will either meet up with us, or at the Great Yellow River bridge a day later.”

Archibald’s lessons:

In retrospect the Empire of Human attacking the Empire of Orc was a very foolish decision. While other manlings might have taken human brashness stoically, orcs fought back. Not just that, orcs started invading and pillaging human lands. Eye for an eye and all that…