Chapter 2: First Meeting

Knight Commander Elsa Dein rode steadily through the forest of Duskveil with a squadron of thirty hardened soldiers at her back, twenty-five bronze-ranked knights and five of silver rank. With such numbers, they could face any threat hiding within the forest. And with her, the only gold-ranked among them, their victory was as certain as the day was sure.

The soldiers knew it too, there was an ease as they marched behind her, which there wouldn’t be on a normal occasion. The forest was ancient, vast, and filled with all kinds of danger. Most of it was still uncharted, and many creatures resided inside, from goblins and trolls to intelligent, man-hunting beasts like orcs, wyverns, and harpies.

The forest often proved too much for a lot of adventurers and lower ranked knights, just returning alive and unscathed would be considered an incredible feat. Only seasoned veterans and higher ranked knights could truly hold their own against the monstrosities and horrors lurking within, and knights like Elsa could do much more than hold their own.

Still, even she did not enjoy assignments inside the forest.

There was just too much unpredictability and risk.

That was why it bothered her still that a company of bronze-ranked knights had been assigned on a mission inside the forest. Granted, it was not combat, but to locate and report back the nest of a goblin horde that had raided a nearby village two nights ago. Still, it was common sense to know it would be too much for them to handle. Anyone would know that.

Was it simply incompetence from the King’s Hand or malice?

Elsa knew of the man’s cruelty, but she couldn’t imagine how it would serve him to send a company of bronze-ranked knights to their deaths ... and they were likely dead.

Their last report was two days ago, before they ventured into the forest.

Elsa had been assigned to find out what happened to the company, but she knew it was a pointless endeavor. The fifteen men in the company were almost certainly dead. She doubted there would even be corpses left to find. That was how brutal the forest was.

A frown twisted her beautiful face. She couldn’t bring back dead men, but she could at least find out why they were given an assignment that could be described as suicide, and help them get justice if necessary. Elsa had no doubt that it would be difficult, perhaps even impossible as the King’s Hand was involved. Still, the matter was worth looking into.

With a deep breath, she shifted her mind away from the thought.

For now though, she would just try to find the corpses—if they had not already been consumed by slimes or any of the other beasts in the forest—and complete the assignment of locating and destroying the goblin’s nest. That was the only priority right now.

“Commander,” a soldier called, steering his horse to ride beside her.

Elsa turned to the soldier, Elliot Reinhard, her second in command. He had been by her side since their training days, witnessed her rise from an unskilled cadet to the youngest commander in their kingdom’s history. She trusted him as much as she could trust anyone, which was admittedly not a lot. She did not trust easily, and this was widely known.

Only her adopted father had earned that full and unwavering trust.

“What is it, Elliot?” she asked sharply. “Trouble?”

He sniffed his nose before looking down the trail. “I smell blood. Lots.”

Elsa’s face grew fierce and she darted her gaze toward where Elliot looked. She did not doubt his nose, it had saved them from ambushes and traps on many occasions.

He was a Demi-human, and his appearance easily gave away his wolf ancestry. He had long, fluffy ears that grew out of his thick brown hair, fangs at the edge of his lips, and a bushy tail below his lower back. Other than that, he looked like any other human.

Their kind was said to have a keen sense of smell, but his abilities were unique, even among his kind. He could see at a greater distance, discern the subtlest poison with a smell, and his reflexes were sharper than the other Demi-human she’d trained. He had even once claimed to be able to taste the mana in the air, but she didn’t know whether to believe it.

“Everyone, be on your guard!” Elsa ordered.

The sound of blades drawing from their sheaths echoed through the forest. Elsa did not bother to draw her own, it was not yet needed. But she dismounted from her horse, and the silver-ranks followed, lest they injured their steeds when the fighting began.

Their power was destructive, yet it paled compared to hers...

Elsa drew her mount by hand as they continued down a beaten trail. The forest held a tense silence, but her armor shattered it, clinking with every step. There was a time it had been too heavy for her, now she barely even felt its weight. Her gauntleted hand rested on the hilt of one of her twin longswords, Myra, ready to be drawn at any moment.

“We’re close,” Elliot said, walking by her side with sword drawn.

They slowly pushed past the surrounding verdure and stumbled onto a clearing, and the moment they did, the smell hit her like a wall. It was a suffocating mix of rot and iron, so thick it clung to the back of her throat. But she had long learned to endure it.

Elliot moved ahead of her, flaring his nostrils before his face twisted in disgust and sudden panic. He slapped one hand over his nose, his tail stiffened, and his ears flattened over his head. “Blood ... and something else. I don’t ... I’ve never smelled anything like it.”