We did some talking during our evening meal. More than just a little in fact. We sat up guard rotations and training schedules for the units that, for now, would remain here in Caer'zoth. Some, like the trolls and giants of the Wall Breakers, would help with the reconstruction as well. Their knowledge was not limited to tearing things down after all. Essentially only the cloaked rangers and scouts of Tortho would move on to find and secure the route the enemy army had taken. Only some of the harpies and a few hunters and rangers from the village and the surrounding hamlets would support them in this task. If the enemy had left guards behind I didn't want to give away our intentions right away. If our mission to get behind enemy lines was to be a success we had to remain unnoticed for as long as possible after all.

I would come along as well to get a good look at what we would find. Kaele on the other hand would stay behind. She would focus her attention on the hill I had dubbed Kor'za's pyre. She would use some of the magical seeds she had bought to start regrowing the forest on the hill, at least to a degree, and do some landscaping. She couldn't just regrow the forest on the whole hill. That would take years and thousands or even tens of thousands of saplings. With a few magical groves and hedge fences she could prevent excessive erosion for the time being though. In the end we had agreed upon her allowing for a few new farms on the hillsides. Our troll engineers even volunteered to lay the foundations for a path connecting them to the village as well as setting up a few dry stone walls for future fields and pastures.

With more time they probably could have outright built new farmhouses as well, but I simply didn't know how much time they would have, thus I decided on less ambitious goals. We could always hire them for a proper construction job later if and when we returned in victory. Instead of my sister, Eld'tide would come along for this particular job. She was our best ranger after all and the other hunters and rangers knew here pretty well by now. Kaele didn't simply let me go on my own though. As we were getting ready to set out next morning she pulled me aside to hand me a spell scroll she had gotten in the capital. She gave me a quick shakedown on how to cast the spell, Chameleon Skin, noted down on it as well. It was a little simpler than an outright invisibility spell. At the same time it would hide me better than the Blur spell I already knew. At least at a distance. Close up it was more likely to make me an obvious target.

I gave the spell a try right away. I gathered the Mana and built the spell matrix, taking great care to do it just as the scroll told me to. Then I triggered it. It was weird. I could still see myself but both my skin and my armor were trying to mimic my surroundings. It worked pretty well as long as I moved slowly. I made a practice swing with my weapon and the fast movement turned part of me in a blurred mess of colors. Tortho watched from a few steps away. “A neat spell. I make sure any of my scouts, who have even the slightest aptitude for spell casting, learn it.” He spat the straw he had been chewing to the roadside. “It has its limitations though. It is most useful for ambushes when you don't move much at all or only very slowly. Don't rely on it alone and you should be fine though.”

He wasn't wrong. In most matters it was better not to rely on spells alone. Stealth was no exception in that regard. Move quietly and with great care and the spell would take care of the rest. If one wasn't stealthy to begin with, the spell wouldn't save their hide either. I hugged Kaele and turned to leave with the captain of the scouts at my side. A few people gathered along the road to see me off once again with waves and cheers. I returned the cheerful waves until we reached the gate. Beyond a number of the other scouts and Eld'tide were waiting. She was back in an outfit similar to the one she had worn for our ill fated camping trip. It was all browns and greens. As we approached she handed me a bundle she had been carrying across her arm. “A little something for you. Your armor doesn't stand out like others but you probably should still wear a cloak similar to the others.”

I raised an eyebrow as I unfurled the garment. She was right of course. My scale mail didn't contain any metal worth mentioning and blended in with trees and shrubs to a degree, but a proper camouflage cloak would be better. I fastened it around my shoulders before we continued, now surrounded by men and women. This wasn't the whole detachment of scouts, rangers and hunters. In fact it barely accounted for a third of them. The others were already out there, ranging ahead of us. We wouldn't march like this for long either. A large group like this just kicked up too much dust and made too much noise, even if everyone tried their best to move quietly. Even as I looked on, the group split into six smaller ones who spread out to use different paths to reach our first destination.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Our first goal would be the small farming hamlet where we had ambushed the enemy foragers. We would set up camp there or nearby for the night. First though our way led us past what looked like freshly dug up fields. They weren't fields though. Not exactly. Not yet anyway. These were the long pits that had been dug up in the aftermath of the siege to bury the remains of our enemies. We didn't have the wood and time to build funeral pyres for them. They didn't really deserve that much effort anyway as far as I was concerned. Simple earth graves, one pit for each dozen, would be good enough for them. They should have stayed home if they wanted better burials. No body had been buried as a whole though. The heads had pits of their own.

Once it became known that the enemy had been led by a ghoul, while I was still out cold and recovering from my very near brush with death, someone, probably Eld'tide's mother, had decided that beheading the dead was a prudent safety measure that should be taken. Hopefully we were only being overcautious. I really didn't want to return home to find the place crawling with the living dead though, thus I didn't mind. If worse came to worst it hopefully would be enough to keep the dead from crawling out of their graves. Once we were past this morbid reminders of the recent past our group followed a path up the burnt hill, that would lead us past our cave hideout, through the gorge where we had led that group of elven head hunters into the ambush with the angry dire boars.

I used the time we spent marching in silence to practice my new spell. I found that it worked especially well on the burnt hill. We were moving slow enough that I blended in pretty well with the burnt ground and the charred trees, weapon, armor, cloak and all. I tried to take some pointers from the way Tortho and his men and women moved as well but that was a lot trickier. Well, if everyone could do it we wouldn't need any specialized scouts. I still tried my best, knowing all too well, that I was the weakest link regarding stealth in this group. We stopped for a quick break of bread and water at the cave hideout. It wasn't the hard bread we had bought en mass but fresh bread from the village. We would keep the stuff that would keep for weeks for later. I perked up a little as I noticed that there were some sweet raisins baked into the bread, making it a little less bland.

Eating in silence like that was weird. But it probably was something Tortho and his scouts did by habit. They talked as little as possible in general and used simple hand and finger signs instead whenever possible. It made sense in a way. If they talked as little as possible they probably could avoid talking at the wrong time. We only relaxed a little when we finally arrived at the little hamlet we had used as a base, even if just for a little while. There were signs of reconstruction here as well, but things were going slower than at the village. I winced as I remembered the charnel pit the enemy left at the heart of this little settlement. The people here had lost more loved ones than anyone else.

We didn't interact with the people much, staying by ourselves instead. We set up our sleeping spots along the walls of some of the troll built farmhouses. There were no fires either. In essence we would just sleep next to each other, wrapped in our cloaks. The only luxury was some light but sour wine provided by the people living here once more. As I sipped on my share I could finally see messengers from the other groups coming in. A few were sleeping here as well, among the walled pastures, most were much further out though. Tortho and Eld'tide listened to their quiet reports before approaching me. The elf provided the shortest of summaries. “No signs of enemies so far. Your people drove any stragglers off for good I'd say. We have the army's trail as well. Can't really miss it.”

My gorgon friend nodded in agreement. “We ran down all that we could find. Thankfully there were no more headhunters. You must have really gotten the last ones atop the pyre.”

I handed the wineskin off to the next man and grunted. “Just as well. If I never see one of those again it will be too soon.” That earned me a grim smile from Tortho as well as Eld'tide. “We move with sunrise?” They both nodded. “Good.” There was nothing else to say thus we curled ourselves up close to each other, to share some warmth, with the exception of the ones who would take first watch. It wasn't exactly a comfortable night, I didn't even take my armor off after all, but I slept like a log anyway.