Chapter 110: The Old War
The Hollow Watch party returned to Redbrook before midnight.
They carried rusted badges taken from the dead soldiers and a sealed jar containing the energy drained from the tower. The Royal Road Patrol accepted both, recorded the clear, and paid the party without declaring the ancient undead threat defeated forever.
The watchtower would remain quiet for several days. What was interesting was that if the instance wasn’t cleared by at least one party each month, undead would eventually spill out of the tower and make a bigger problem. Right now, there were plenty of adventures running around the area looking for things to do, so it would most likely not be an issue for now.
The party’s success produced the first Level Five instance record, but it did not place their portraits in the Hall of Achievements. Thousands of similar locations existed across Corathen, and Max had no intention of filling the hall with every cellar, ruin, shrine, and cave someone cleared.
The party earned dungeon currency, faction reputation, materials, and local recognition.
The next morning, a military convoy entered Redbrook from the north. Its arrival stopped traffic through the eastern gate.
Orc infantry marched beside human archers. Dwarven engineers rode on wagons reinforced with iron plates. Elven scouts traveled ahead and behind the column on lean horses. Two fey soldiers moved among them beneath green cloaks, visible only when sunlight caught their eyes.
The soldiers wore the same crown emblem. They were part of Corathen’s standing army.
Smaller badges identified where each company originated. The orcs came from a western river city. The dwarven engineers carried the mark of a mountain hold hundreds of miles east. One elven scout wore leaves from a forest that did not appear on the southern district maps.
The ancient alliance had not erased the differences between Corathen’s peoples. It created an army capable of using them together. Orcs formed heavy infantry. Dwarves maintained engines and fortified roads. Elven patrols crossed distances ordinary scouts could not. Human regiments supplied most of the numbers, while fey units handled terrain and magic that did not obey reliable rules.
None of those roles were absolute. An orc wearing a healer’s white sash marched beside the infantry, and the officer commanding the convoy was a dwarf mounted on a horse large enough to carry him.
Most of the wagons carried damaged equipment rather than wounded soldiers. Broken shields were stacked beside cracked armor. Three dismantled throwing engines occupied the rear wagon. Gray dust covered everything returning from the north.
People from the Prime Universe gathered along the road.
Golden Axe watched from outside the caravan yard. They had delayed their departure to help Maren organize the next part of her route. The army’s formation reminded Matthew of the Final Trial, but these soldiers were not copies waiting for a battle to begin.
They were tired people returning from one.
A quartermaster established a temporary desk beside the Merchants’ Association. She posted orders for preserved food, replacement timber, healing supplies, wagon wheels, and two hundred pairs of winter socks.
The first outsiders to approach were adventurers.
"Are you recruiting?" One asked.
The quartermaster looked at his polished armor. "Can you march twenty miles while carrying your own supplies?"
"Yes."
"Can you obey an officer who is weaker than you?"
He hesitated.
"Then you’re not joining my army. If you still want to help, we are paying for supplies."
The craftsmen and merchants moved forward after him.
Within an hour, the supply orders drew more attention than the combat notices. Corathian farmers offered grain. Sanctuary alchemists presented healing mixtures for inspection. Tailors argued over the measurements required for two hundred soldiers who were not all human.
Dellin asked whether the army purchased bread.
The quartermaster told him the army purchased bread that survived rain, cold, wagon travel, and three days in a pack without becoming as hard as a rock.
He considered that a professional challenge.
All contracts were paid in dungeon dollars or dungeon coins. Visitors who had exchanged outside money in the Sanctuary could spend it in Redbrook. Residents who earned it from the army could use it anywhere in Max’s dungeon.
The army did recruit adventurers, but not from a roadside supply desk. Combat contracts required evaluations, references, and acceptance of military command. Notices directed interested groups toward regional garrisons and warned that resurrection did not allow them to ignore orders protecting soldiers who would not return.
Golden Axe’s healer read that line twice.
Matthew approached one of the returning soldiers after recognizing the gray residue on his armor from the Final Trial.
The soldier came from a human farming district near the northern border. His unit spent the previous two months clearing undead from villages abandoned during an outbreak. The dead did not cover the horizon as they had during the ancient tide, but they remained in ruined lands, buried forts, and places where old death magic had soaked too deeply into the ground.
Some years passed with little more than patrols and isolated creatures. Other years brought coordinated movement from regions the army believed empty. Corathen maintained the border because no one knew whether the remaining undead possessed a leader or merely followed commands buried with them.
The Crown reclaimed towns, lost them, and reclaimed them again. Civilian settlements continued behind the fortified line because mines, rivers, and farmland could not simply be moved farther south.
Corathen’s ancestors pushed the horde beyond the old border.
They never destroyed all of it.
"Does the army need help?" Matthew asked.
"The army always needs help. That does not mean it needs everyone who owns a sword."
The soldier pointed toward a notice naming three martial companies approved to test outside adventurers. Golden Axe could apply when ready.
Matthew thanked him.
He did not promise that Golden Axe would march north immediately. The first four levels taught them to recognize a warning disguised as an opportunity.
When Mathew used the portal in Redbrook to return to the Sanctuary, he paid more attention to the area on the grand map that the army had just returned from.
Most visitors focused on the capital and the cities belonging to different peoples. The northern edge of the model received less attention because the roads became sparse before reaching gray hills and an old line of forts.
Now the upper terraces filled around after Matthew had summoned more members of the Guild.
Gnomes answered questions with information that was considered basic knowledge for the people of Corathen. The Crown maintained forts along the old border. Undead remnants occupied several regions beyond it. Army roads connected supply cities, garrisons, and fortified graveyards. Some northern areas were suitable for trained parties. Others were dangerous to anyone not attached to an army.
Nothing on the map suggested the war was Level Five’s main objective.
It was just one part of Corathen.
Max and Anna stood beside the southern section while people examined the distant front.
"You knew the army would draw them." Anna said.
"Eventually."
"Eventually only took eight days." Anna said.
Max had included the undead remnants because a country with that history should not forget the force that shaped it. They also provided campaigns large enough for future war events. He did not intend to send new arrivals into them before they learned how Level Five worked.
The capital remained the most common destination.
Merchants organized larger caravans from Redbrook. Guilds reserved wagons. Craftsmen contacted Corathian associations in towns they had never visited. Most expected the capital to contain better equipment, more profitable contracts, and enough residents to support every service brought from the Sanctuary.
The model gave them reasons to believe it.
The capital contained several cities’ worth of districts inside and beyond its walls. Six major bridges crossed the rivers surrounding it. A royal palace occupied the central rise, but markets, faction offices, schools, temples, workshops, parks, and entire residential districts covered far more ground.
It was the largest human-founded city in Corathen and the one most familiar to human visitors. It was not exclusively human. Dwarven, elven, orc, and fey neighborhoods had grown there during the centuries following the old alliance.
The visitors were probably correct about its opportunities.
They were also concentrating thousands of future travelers on one road.
The Grand Map Room gave Max a view of their route choices without showing private conversations. Nearly every requested path followed the human heartland north. The dwarven, elven, and orc regions attracted interest, but few people wanted their first long journey to end in a city built for another people.
That would change after the capital became crowded and nearby hunting grounds emptied.
Max was willing to let it happen naturally.
***
Kincaid sat alone in the same luxurious room where he had watched his champion fight Hizon’s dungeon months earlier.
This time, the image before him held a country.
Mountains crossed the far edge of the display. Cities shone beneath his hand. Thousands of people moved through a Sanctuary that had been an empty cave when the establishment period began.
Kincaid had expected the little human to surprise everyone.
He had not expected this.
The same colorless message appeared before him.
[Champion Establishment Period Remaining: 22 Days.]
[First Challenge will commence upon conclusion of the Establishment Period.]
The rules did not allow Kincaid to meet his champion unless the first challenge was completed. They offered him no way to explain why a dungeon core had arrived or why a competition Max had never heard of had been measuring his first six months.
For now, he could only watch.
Kincaid lifted his glass toward the image.
"Make me proud, little guy."