Mephesto was a day behind and had ordered a forced march of an extra two hours that day but even after reaching the Oasis, his scouts had seen no sign of slayns army.

  "Tell the scouts to stay within five miles of us, this is already enemy territory.” Mephesto knew that the kingdom of monsters was not his only enemy. Even if uncooperative with the god of monsters, Mephesto doubted the monster in the area would allow them to just stroll on by with an army.

  Just as slayn’s army had encountered difficulties during the night attacks, so to did Mephesto.

  “they are trying to keep our soldiers awake” Edrin spoke as he held a cheaply made arrow. “I noticed that there were arrows all around the us, they were probably placed their before we arrived. ”

“intimidation?” Deon asked rhetorically. Even in his situation, he was smiling brightly.

  “they are keeping quite some distance from us but judging by the numbers, it can’t be a small number.” Korin said as she reported what she saw on the northern side.

  Mephesto wore a complicated smile. “That clever bastard.” Although he definitive proof, he was sure that the Kingdom of monsters had something to do with their predicament.

  “that god probably understood that we couldn’t reach him in day and so he asked the monsters of nearby territories to hinder us.”

  “but why would they risk themselves for a god they do not worship.” Kiro asked. Just as Mepehsto was about to answer, Edrin spoke. “Kiro, what happens when a god dies in a war?” Kiro’s smile faded as if coming to some horrible understanding.

“so your telling me, we just declared war against the holy land? That’s war I don’t think even Soen can afford.”

  “No, not everyone is his ally, if that were the case, we would already be dead.”Mephesto interjected. “They are hindering us and making small attacks but never once putting themselves in any real danger.” Mephesto turned to Edrin, “how many times have they attacked tonight?”

  “three sir.”Edrin answered with eerie calm, “I am sorry ask this of you Korin but could you some of your troops patrol the south side.” Korin nodded, “I rotate them every four hours during future nights.”

While at Mephesto’s pace, he still had a little over week left before reaching the kingdom of monsters, Slayn was only four days away.

  Slayn and his army had entered the goblin and kobold territory but ever since their arrival, they had yet to encounter goblin or kobold. It was as if they had all vanished into thin air. There was tarrying silence that filled the territory it truly emulated the feeling of emptiness. Even during night there were no attacks, no unexpected encounters or fiendish traps set out for them. everything was completely safe.

  But even in this supposed safe haven, the less hardy soldiers had found it difficult to sleep despite their squad leaders reassurance them that the vast emptiness was simply a result of the goblins and kobolds fear of them. Goblins and kobolds were the weakest of monsters, so weak that even a common farmer could kill one. that was true back in their country but was it truly the case in the Oasis, was it truly possible for the goblins and kobolds to have survived over thirty years without being gobbled up by the stronger races. Even if outnumbered, could it truly have been the case that no one had dared attack the Goblins and Kobolds? The soldiers contemplated this and wondered if their safety was just a façade.

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  It was these thoughts kept them up a night, they feared the oasis had transformed the pathetic goblin into a formidable foe in numbers.

That night while the the hardy soldiers slept, those that remained awake in the southern camps heard a nasty howl.

  “ahooooo!!!!!” the sound echoed throughout the southern camps. Hundreds perhaps thousands of wolves howled beyond the darkness. those on the southern camps were spared the horror of the previous night, but now it was their turn to experience the terror of war.

“What is it Emen!!!” Emen, a Mage in the squad trembled at the sight.

“dread-wolves sir.” The burly man before Emen was Alzaz the commanding officer overseeing several different squads.

The commanding officer bolted in action and began shouting orders.

“no one is to directly attack, wake the archers.” The commanding officer then shouted to the nearby squad leaders. “you!!!” he pointed to a young soldier, “get albot!!”

“yes sir!!!” the young soideir saluted before running deeper into army lines. Dread wolves were monsters mad with hunger, it consumed their everyone thought, all they desired was to continuously consume. Even the mightiest of monsters feared their hordes for it was not their might that frightened them but their diseases. Diseases so potent and toxic that even monsters normally immune to sickness could become infected. The disease they carried was mostly biological but in rare cases a mutation caused the sickness to even affect a creatures mana, causing a victims mana deplete an eventually kill the infected. This meant that even constructs, artificial creations, could in very rare cases catch dread sickness.

There was once an unspoken agreement among the many territories, “the dread wolf extermination.” But after only a year their numbers had appeared to return to regular numbers and so they territories had decided to simply push the dread wolves into the dead zones of the oasis, often times they would still find their way to other territories but the threat had been heavily contained.

“Commander, their getting closer!!!” one older solider shouted in fear as he shot his arrows but missed every single shot, he was too nervous to shoot properly.

“tham do the world a favor and fall on your sword if your bitten.” Among their army, only a handful of mages had the capacity to cure early onset dread sickness, but the infection would spread to the rest of the army in a matter of hours and those few mages would be incapable of curing everyone.

The numbers were at unprecedent levels. The horde numbered more then three thousand furthermore it was impossible for the army resist in their tired state. the wolves tore through the first line and pushed forward, devouring everything in sight. By the time the mages had created barrier earth walls, most of southern line soldiers had come in contact with the infected.

“albot, there are several soldiers asking for entry.” Albot had had order his army to create a large earth wall all around his base, he had wanted to avoid such a taxing and costly method but now he was sure that the god of monsters attacking them. “kill anyone outside the wall, we can’t risk infection, after that tell the healers to inspect as many as they can.” The older man nodded and headed to spread the order.

“help, I wasn’t bitten!!!” a solider pleaded and screamed for help, pounding against the earth walls and before he could anything else, he was skewered by tens of arrows.

“all who approach will be shot!!!” the man atop the wall shouted as several ex-soldiers scurried back into the wood.

They would lose little two-thousand soldiers that night. In the morning, the exhausted men would begin their journey yet again.