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When he was finally finished, Athos delivered all the corrupted swords into his hands, causing him to fall into deep despair. Athos had not stood still in the meantime and successfully corrupted all weapons.

After another day of pure torture – I mean, runesmith – they were finally ready to go.

All the undead gathered in front of the gates, all the carriages and wagons lined up. The skeletons were armed with all the best items the city had to offer, the magic weapons that Treevor enchanted distributed among the army’s mana users, but the best was left with the leaders of course.

Athos was sitting on top of one of the carriages in the middle of the army, just waiting for something. The entire army was waiting for his cue to march, but he was patiently waiting for something. As if he couldn’t wait any longer, Sevenus approached him on horseback and asked respectfully.

“My lord, is there something preventing us from leaving? Is there something we still need to do?” Sevenus asked.

“The dawn.” Athos replied as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

“Dawn? But why?” Sevenus remained confused.

“Well, since it’s an army leaving, I thought having the right weather was important. An hour or two won’t make a big difference since we’re marching without a break. So why not wait a while and leave with the sun rising. Doesn’t it create an epic mood?” Athos was serious.

.....

Sevenus and all the leaders started laughing in exasperation, realizing it was just a whim of Athos. As soon as the sun began to appear on the horizon, Athos got up and ordered the march to begin.

The skeleton horses and cattle neighed and pulled the carts, at the same time the skeletons began to walk neatly. The leaders were scattered throughout the army, with Treevor in the rear, as he would be seen from a distance because of his size.

The hive hawks, like the other skeleton birds, were flying ahead of the army, looking for monsters or other humans. The Platinum Fist Fortress was close to a mountain range and there were metal mines close to the fortress.

There were numerous traders who visited the fortress and the caravans carrying metals moved regardless of the seasons. It would be a big problem if they ran into a caravan returning from the fortress and they were discovered.

Before the gang blockade the city of Faltra served as a resting point between the fortress and the big city of Shiima, but it had been 5 years since that changed and it is unlikely that a caravan would move towards the city, but better be prepared.

The army marched day and night without stopping, killing the monsters and animals that the skeleton birds encountered. It was mostly gray wolves and wild boar, but there was a single aurora frog. The animals were just common deer.

Treevor still took short breaks every few minutes to use the world pillage, but with his movement speed it was easy for him to catch up to the army.

Athos stopped the army after 5 days of march, 12 hours’ journey from the fortress, to make sure that they would not be seen by lookouts or merchant caravans. He decided to do an investigation with a small group of elites to form a plan of attack.

Athos, Treevor, Emilia and Caio advanced as soon as it got dark, taking care not to be discovered. Treevor was in his real body instead of the corrupted willow, as a 5 meter titan would not be very stealthy. A small group of hive hawks followed them on the orders of Athos.

They approached the fortress before Treevor stopped them.

“There’s a large-scale spell ahead. If we go any further than that, it’s possible we’ll be discovered.” Treevor spoke. Large cities or strongholds had large-scale spells that could be activated in emergencies, such as protective barriers, or others that were always active, such as surveillance spells.

These spells were enchanted on objects in the same way as runesmith, only on a much larger scale. Tens or even hundreds of mages would enchant one or several items at the same time, creating effects that would be impossible to recreate alone, no matter how strong a mage is.

It required a lot of energy, so hundreds of magic stones were needed to maintain them. Stronghold mages also used items that naturally drew world energy like magic tree branches to power large-scale spells, but they were simply insufficient.

It was nearly impossible to detect a large-scale spell while they were deactivated, and even those that were active permanently active would be impossible to detect with common abilities like mana vision or sensory field.

Treevor was only able to detect it because of his plant side’s mystical senses.

“Let’s stop here and use the hive hawks to investigate.” Athos spoke, ceding command of one of the hive hawks to each of them, before ordering them to fly as high as they could. His black bones would be nearly invisible in the darkness of the night and mana vision wouldn’t go that far.

“Isn’t that bigger than Faltra already?” Athos asked shocked. The fortress in front of her was such an incredible sight. The fortress was surrounded by two walls, one internal and one external, made of stone over 15 meters high. ballistae and catapults were just behind the walls, soldiers watching and ready to use them in case of threat.

There was a camp of tents and stone buildings being built between the inner and outer walls.

Night had fallen, but the fortress was still active. Athos could see what appeared to be an open-air market, warehouses, training areas and garrisons where soldiers could rest. The inner wall was directly connected with the fortress wall, which occupied the center of the “city”.

“Does anyone have any ideas on how to break into this place?” Athos asked after watching for some time, trying to find gaps in the defense that he could exploit, but finding none.

“Invading from the front is impossible. The catapults and ballistae would kill thousands of skeletons before we reached the wall and the barrier would block us long enough for archers and mages to kill a few thousand more. Even if the boss and I fired our spells early on until we ran out of mana, it would still give them more than enough time to get organized.” Treevor spoke as he crossed his arms, considering the attack to be madness.

“I have to agree. I think it’s best to just ignore them and move on.” Emilia suggested again.

“Hey Treevor, I have a question. Do you know how high the detection spell works?” Athos asked, ignoring Emilia’s suggestion. He got an idea when he saw through the hive hawks, a sparrow flying up to the keep and nothing happening. It was likely that the spell would ignore small animals or an alarm would sound whenever a bird flew over the keep.

“I can only feel it approximately, but the spell seems to expand around the wall in a spherical shape.” Treevor explained without understanding Athos’ idea.

“Can this surveillance spell detect teleportation?” Athos asked, placing his hand on his chest and feeling the lower teleportation crystal, the one that belonged to Emilia. He had brought it with him in case he needed to flee in an emergency.

“That’s unlikely, master. The teleportation crystals cannot be detected by anything except items purposely made to detect the energy coming from the crystals. It’s a huge and unnecessary investment in a fortress designed to resist demihumans, a race underdeveloped.” Emilia spoke.

“In that case, i don’t have to wait any longer. We’re going to invade today.” Athos said before calling all the hive hawks back. “Treevor, I want you to go back to where the army is and lead the attack. I will use teleportation crystals to invade with the team that is already here. We will hide and cause chaos at the moment of the attack.”

“This is crazy. It’s going to take at least a day to get there and back, how are you going to hide for so long?” Treevor asked worriedly. If Athos were discovered and killed, he had no way of knowing whether he would be freed or whether he would die for good.

“It will be difficult, but in a fortress this size it’s not impossible. We can hide in warehouses and move between buildings to avoid being seen.” Athos shrugged.

“Haah... do what you want. But if I start the attack and you don’t show up, I’ll order the retreat and run away without looking back, understand?” Treevor spoke and waited for Athos to nod his head before starting to run.

“Well, shall we invade then?” Athos spoke and one of the hive hawks immediately began to fly. He flew high, beyond what the patrol on the walls could see and entered the detection radius without any problems, before flying towards the training area which was empty in the middle of the night.

The hive hawk flew low until it found an empty building and entered. He informed Athos that he was alone and the latter immediately looked through his eyes.

“You two, approach me.” Athos ordered. He transferred mana to the teleport crystal until it was full, before a black sphere surrounded its surroundings.

With a strong wind, the black sphere appeared inside the building.