“Sometimes, your greatest foe is far closer to you than you could ever imagine.” - Old military saying.

Neither Lili and Rózsa understood the foreign tongue used by the invaders, as it was unlike any of the languages the two of them were familiar with. Even so, there were other ways to gain information that did not require an understanding of speech at all. As unofficial mascots of their unit, the two of them were left in the camp, put under the care of whichever unit happened to be in charge of guarding the camp that day, but the two also had quite a bit of freedom to roam around.

Where they roamed, they also watched with their keen eyes. While the lack of language understanding hurt somewhat, between what close observation they managed, as well as what they picked up from the body language and gestures of those around them, Lili and Rózsa learned quite a bit about their enemies, more than what most would expect.

The two of them were heavily attuned to their wilder instincts, which was a common thing amongst shapeshifting druids, and those very same instincts helped them notice some things that most would have otherwise missed. It also helped them pick up on subtle things like internal hierarchy and people’s predisposition where no external signs presented themselves.

Over the next five days – the plan was for the others to cause a distraction for them to exfiltrate themselves at the end of the week – Lili and Rózsa learned various things about their enemies. Most of what they learned were minor tidbits of minimal to no military value, but some others were far more valuable.

For example, the two learned of the enemy’s organization, which at a glance resembled the Republic of Caroma’s setup with hundred-men units, but turned out to be quite different. The foreign invaders instead divided their soldiers into teams of five men at the smallest, with twenty such units forming a single hundred-man unit. To such a unit, an extra set of twenty-five men consisting of the hundred-man commander and four lieutenants as well as twenty bodyguards would be attached, and eight such units formed a thousand-man unit.

The thousand-man commander would have his own personal unit of no less than four lieutenants, fifteen subcommanders, and over two hundred soldiers as guards. The cycle repeated itself with eight such units combined into a ten thousand man unit, and so on. The foreign enemy seemed to utilize a doctrine that allowed for more flexibility amongst the various parts of a unit, though not to the level that the Free Lances did.

Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

Other than that, they also realized that the invaders actually used their flags – each thousand-man commander had several flagbearers stationed near them – to convey commands over long distances, with the motion of the flag signifying different commands. While the two were unable to decipher the details beyond the most basic commands, just that confirmation alone would give the allied forces a leg up when they engaged the invaders later.

While they were at it, they also made themselves familiar with the central region of the camp. The twins played it off as if they were attracted by the bright colors of the tents around the central region – another oddity of the invaders, as their tents were quite colorful and decorated, luxurious for military equipment – and even took naps on the silken folds of the tents.

Some of the patrolling soldiers wanted to shoo them off, but they happened to run across another officer who thought of them as symbols and omen of good luck and told the soldier to leave them be. That gave Lili and Rózsa relatively free access to even the well-guarded central region, and sometimes they even walked around and looked curiously while the invader commanders held meetings.

Since the two acted as quiet and obedient little pets, their presence was tolerated even during such meetings, with a couple of the invader generals even habitually stroking their fur absent-mindedly. It was during such meetings that they also realized that the invader who seemed to be the high commander had a habit of keeping maps, scrolls, and other paper on his desk rather than within his storage ring.

Such a predilection wasn’t a rare one, as some people found it hard to quickly find certain items in storage rings, especially larger ones. While storage artifacts were commonplace in the invader army, some people still kept to old habits like that from time to time, which was probably as good as it would get for Lili and Rózsa and their mission.

All they were waiting for was for the appointed time of their extraction to arrive. It was planned to happen on the last day of the week, during the hour when most people slept the deepest. The platoons under Erycea’s leadership would conduct a harassment attack with burning jars of oil from above and various unpleasant concoctions from the goblins, while the rest of the group would also attack the enemy camp with arrows.

For safety reasons, Hannah and her fliers had scouted to make sure they knew which section of the enemy camp Lili and Rózsa were in, so they could avoid attacking that region. The plan was for Lili and Rózsa to escape during the commotion caused by the attack while at the same time, grabbing anything of military value that they could get their hands on.

Rózsa hid a tiny storage artifact – a conical ring that one of the goblins amongst Egil’s people designed to wrap around the top of one of his fangs – at the back of her mouth, keeping it perched on one of her rearmost molars. It was a bit uncomfortable to have the artifact there, as it was still a bit large for the size she assumed, but it was at least well-hidden.

Naturally, the two of them planned to cut across the central region of the enemy camp in their escape, where they would go through the command tent and store as many maps and other documents from the enemy commander’s table into the storage ring as they passed.