In the heart of South Fort the two leaders, Orok and Rokdo, are studying the information given earlier by the two kobold’s scouts about the humans down the river, a map of the region laid on top of their table to help them in this situation. Both of them wore a serious face as they pondered about how they should tackle this situation, the fort came into being recently, hence, during all this time they never encountered any hindrance to the mine’s operation, the magic creatures that live around the fort are not high level enough to pose a threat to them, until now the biggest problem they had come across was mining a big piece gold-leaf ore deep in one of the tunnels of the mine, a human base near their river is really the first really serious situation the fort will have to handle.

Orok is the general of the ogres and former second-in-command had a good amount of knowledge about how to tackle this situation, before the merge of the tribes he even had led an attack to a human merchant, Rokdo in the other hand is among the strongest warriors of his tribe, he had helped his people fend off many invasion before, leading to him become good in dealing with unexpected enemies. The two discussed about the situation for a few minutes, only stopping when the door opened and the figure of dwarf entered the room, the dwarf in question had brownish-red hair and a very enviable beard, his skin bronzed from his time in the forge, different from the other two that he wore a short-sleeve white shirt with black pants, atop of his clothes an apron made from leather of a cinder beast, on his head a pair of gold forge goggles. This was Dalnur, apprentice of Thalgrim and the one chosen by the brothers to be the third leader of the fort, which includes also been the head blacksmith of the fort.

“So, we have a few humans nearby” said Dalnur entering the room, cracking his fingers greeted Rokdo and Orok before taking a seat beside the other two leaders “I’m will not bother with chit-chat, you two know I’m not good with this type of situation, so tell me the plan and let's get done with this already”

The kobold ogre duo didn’t look surprised at the blunt way of Dalnur, having worked together for a time now they had become already used to the dwarfs honest and direct way, Dalnur had expressed many times that he didn’t want to deal with any matter besides the ones involving the mine, which could be seen by the fact that, since they arrived, he would seldom leave the forge inside the mine. His innately strong dwarf physique was only used to mine and to withstand the strong heat of the forge, a heat that comes for a flame personally lit by the Wolf Lord Will, which makes kinda understandable why he almost never leave the forge, any who consider themselves a blacksmith that come in contact with this flame would not want to leave its side, because it’s that good of a flame.

“The humans, according to the scouts Kalgu and Hokba, had set up their camp down the river around this area near the edges” Orok pointed the area on the map as he explained. Normal ogres can’t really read maps, but Orok is not a normal ogre, while not been born smart like a wizard ogre would be the general ogre inevitably grew smart and wiser as the time passed, so to him, using a map became actually something easy “They number around sixty, their equipment from what the scouts saw it’s good but mostly low-level. I suggest we attack now, using this opportunity their guard will be a good chance of taking all of them out before they could even realize”

“Alright” Dalnur nodded in approval, it’s a known fact the Orok is quite used to night attacks, being something he did with great efficiency many times in the past, so Dalnur knows this tactic has a high success rate with Orok in the team “How exactly will you guys do that?”

“We will close them in a box” said the kobold warrior Rokdo while marking a perimeter around the human camp in the map, pointing at the river he proceeded “I will lead some brothers down the river, this area doesn’t have any strong water creature, meaning they will not expect anything dangerous coming from the river” according to Kalgu and Hokba none of them is watching the river, which confirms, even more, Rokdo’s point.

Dalnur eyes gleamed as he heard Rokdo, his confidence in this plan growing by the second “This plan is solid, with you two in the lead I don’t see this going wrong” he smiled at the rotten luck of those humans, Rokdo and Orok are the strongest fighters under their Lords, there’s a reason why they had been chosen to lead this fort, their leadership was only being part of it “I will go back and get some of the equipment’s I was working before coming here, your hit squad will be ready in less than fifteen minutes”

Nodding at each other Dalnur left the room to do his part of the job, soon word was spread through the fort about the human camp nearby, that the heads of the fort are preparing a night attack at their camp. In an instant the fort exploded with roars full with fervor, the calm period the fort experience actually bored many of them to no end, a battle like this is something none of them wants to miss, this been the first show of strength of the fort to their Lords helped lit the fervor even more.

Choosing their strongest amongst the ogres and kobolds a solid team of about thirty members had been quickly created, twenty kobolds and ten ogres, their numbers had been set like this by both fort leaders during the creation of the plan. The primary idea of this entire operation is to be an ambush, having too many people would make things harder, besides, according to their estimation those humans should be around level ten, while on the other hand, the weakest member of the fort is a level twelve.

As subordinates of the brothers, their lives improved in a way they had never imagined before, the territory of the brothers they live now not only is free of unwanted magic creatures but also rich in mana, the density, and purity of the brothers territory is leagues above anything else in this part of the wilderness, like the difference between heavens and earth. This difference greatly helped the growth of all of them, Valerie for instance, with the increased mana in the air, plus the help of the books got from the fallen tower, actually broke through her previous gap and arrived at level nineteen, if Valerie continues this way she will probably break through the gap again and arrive at level twenty.

Even if they had guessed wrong, the difference in innate body strength will trump this one for them, not talking about the ogres, the kobolds themselves have a really good amount of strength in their bodies.

So, all in all, this operation has really little chance of failure.

Back at the bandits camp, the atmosphere hasn’t changed much.

The moon was still shining at the sky, barely breaking the veil of darkness in the forest below, the night wind still blew through the dark, quiet forest, bringing with him cold feeling to the place. None of the bandits in the camp are awake, with even some of those in watch duty having fallen asleep, to them this area in the edges of the forest only had trash low-level magic creatures, for six hours into the night they had stood watch, and during this six hours they only had seen some small animals that barely qualified to be called magic creatures, this coupled with the group confidence made them lower the guards, with some lowering to the point where they would fall asleep.

Alex, the talkier bandit, was only awake because Elvin would not let him fall asleep, an action which of course was met with the discontentment of the brown-haired bandit “I will go take a leak” In one point he could not take anymore, so using his same old excuse he decided to stretch his muscles a little before he goes mad.

“Again?” Elvin raised his eyebrow at Alex's action.

“What, can’t I go take a leak now?” Without even waiting for an answer the brown-haired bandit strode away into the river direction, leavings his fellow bandit staring at his back with pissed eyes. Walking the same trail he used before he marched at the river direction, the forest was still quiet and dim, small beams of moonlight been the only things to break the complete darkness of the forest, but a difference in the atmosphere could slowly be felt, the mumbling Alex failed to notice the dangerous change of atmosphere.

With his usual confidence the man walked to the nearby river, arriving at the bank he crouched looked at calm waters of the river, where the moon was reflected in all her mystical beauty, this river was actually quite large, going up to the depths of the forest the river would grow even larger, becoming large enough for many ships to sail, like those cruise boats usually used by nobles and rich folk to travel “Ha, one day I will also be able to board of those fancy ferries, I will make those wealthy snobbish women’s crawl around my feet, just they wa-” suddenly a black-headed spear sprung from the water, piercing through Alexa throat, who only reacted to when the spear had already pierced him “ARr-Gurgle” he wanted to scream, but only blood would leave his mouth.

In a question of a second his strength left his body, the spear was taken from his throat making him fall to the ground, all he could, while his body grew cold, was watch the figure of his killer rise from the waters, the figure of a tall red-scaled kobold. The kobold in question was Rokdo, who only gave the dying man an indifferent look before focusing his attention around him, after assuring himself that no one was around, he let it a low growl escape his throat, following the growl seven other kobolds rose from the water, all of them wearing equipment’s recently made by Dalnur. One of the kobolds among them, the scout Kalgu, pointed at one direction with his spear, silently nodding Rokdo mentioned forward with his hand, he then leads the group in the direction pointed by Kalgu, just like that, they silently vanished into the darkness of the night.

The only trace left of their passage was the cold body of Alex left in the ground.

…

“Something Is wrong” Elvin the green-haired bandit, didn’t know his fellow bandit had silently died near the river, but even so he started to feel a little uneasy, he who hadn’t taken their situation as carefree was the others quickly took notice of growing change of atmosphere in the forest. He swiftly took his sword out, looking around the darkness of the forest became a lot more eerie to him, triggering more than a few alarm on his head “Enemies are approaching, I need to get Alex fast”

Making up his mind Elvin dashed forward at the direction Alex had left earlier, he took something that looked somehow like a small flute, he brought the flute to his mouth and was about to use to alert the other in the camp. But the action of taking the flute out broke his attention of the surroundings for a brief moment, and in that brief moment, the trail before him became blocked by a giant “Urgh” he bumped into the giant figure, then suddenly he felt a big hand grab his head, being raise by this hand he left the ground.

Splash

Elvin only heard a deep grunt before he was no more, his head crushed by the hand with the easy someone would crush an egg. Dropping the body, the figure that was Orok didn't even dignify another glance at the now-dead Elvin, from the darkness of the forest behind him seven other well-equipped figures came out, two ogres and five kobolds. Orok took his two maces out, without turning he silently mentioned at one direction with his left mace, marching forward the group passed the remains of the green-haired bandit, one of the ogres, Blorig, while walking spotted the flute dropped by Elvin on his death, picking the flute without stopping his march he casually put it behind his belly armor, just beside a piece of meat that he somehow managed to squeeze in there.

The group walked forward in the bandit’s camp direction, again, only a cold body left was trance of the fort hit-squad passage.

…

The hit-squad started to close the bandit camp into a kill box, dividing themselves they managed to silently take out all the bandits in watch duty, which honestly was really easy considering that most of them had been sleeping. Finally stepping into the human camp the group strode to the circle of tents where all of the bandits are sleeping, all of them could clearly hear the light snore of the sleeping humans, all of them unaware of the breath of death closing upon them. The ogres approached the outer layer of the circle, while the kobolds silently strode forward to the inner layers. One of the kobolds walked behind one of the tents, raising his spear with both his hands he aimed at the human sleeping inside, this feat would be hard for a human to accomplish in a camp that was covered in darkness, but easy for a kobold who was a enhance sense of smell, around him his brothers of tribe did the same with other tents, seconds later all of the members of the hit-squad had already assumed their positions.

Piercing

Piercing

Piercing

With muffled sounds the spears of the kobolds started to pierce their human targets inside the tents, striking the throat of all the bandits sleeping, warmblood would instantly gush from the mouths, stopping any the dying bandits from screaming and alerting the others. The ogres on their part did the job in a more direct way, stretching their arms inside the tents they would grab the head of the bandits and crush them, killing them before they could even awake!

…

Inside the main tent, the Shadow Crew leader Barlow, suddenly opened his eyes, feeling a strong killing intent aimed at him he quickly rolled to the side avoiding the black-headed gold spear aimed at him “WHOS IS THIS?!” in a quick move worth of his status Barlow took his sword the place beside his bed with one hand, swiftly assuming a defensive stance he blocked a spear thrust aimed at him. A shockwave was issued from the clash of the two weapons, Barlow could feel the strength of his opponent pushing him back [Cross Slash] with no hesitation he used one of his strongest skills, mana flowed from inside his muscles to his sword, coating the blade in a white glow, with a burst of speed he made a cross-cut at the direction of his enemy, then with not even looking at the result of his attack he dashed out of his tent

“ARGH!” The moment he stepped out of his tent a strong blow out of nowhere hit him at his legs, they broke in many different places instantly, falling into the ground he started to scream at the agonizing pain coming from his legs, from behind him came a cold snort, something hit his nape knocking the leader of the Crew of Shadow completely out cold.

At the edges of the forest, an eerie scene could be found, the camp recently set by a group of bandits became completely devoid of life, inside the still intact tents no trace of their original owners apart for some blood could be found, the carriages the crew proudly loot also gone, not a trace of the hit-squad could be found in the camp.

Hours later already in the morning, when many residents of the city to the south-east go to the near the river, what would greet them would be the eerie scene of dozens of dead bodies floating away down the river. The vision of the dead bodies, many who had red-eyed ravens on top of them, would haunt many for months to come, a myth would be created around what had happened with those dead men, but for all of them, none will come close to the truth.

A few days later, without the residents knowing, two powerful beings that will create even bigger myths will pay a visit to their city.