[Current location: Maw city]

"Okay…. Okay…. This is going well." – said Duke Wondan as he was watching through the reports.

(Black market has been finally dealt with and bandit activity has somewhat died down. Probably thanks to the soldiers and adventurers' presence.)

(Monsters also started leaving their homes since a lot of snow has melted down, which does make things bit problematic in one area…. But at the same time, we can now hunt them down since they are no longer hiding.)

(….)

"Huh….Things finally started looking good for a change." – said the nobleman before then hearing somebody knocking on the door.

"Enter." – said the nobleman as in the very next moment a soldier entered his room.

"Sir, I've came here to bring some urgent news." – said the soldier.

"…"

(Oh god.) – thought the nobleman, starting to get nervous after just hearing these words.

"W-what is it?" – asked the nobleman.

"The main army has just returned." – replied the soldier.

"….What...Wait WHAT?!" – shouted the nobleman.

"What are they doing here?!" – said the nobleman as he instantly gotten up and left the room.

"I-I don't know. They suddenly showed right back up a-and when they did, I've came here to inform you…Since…" – said the soldier.

"I understand." – said the nobleman before then leaving the still repaired building and headed straight to the city center, where the nobleman found the remains of the main army arriving.

"…"

"What?" – and as soon as he did arrive, the nobleman spotted a large number of soldiers and adventurers being injured.

"HEY! GUSTAV! GUSTAV CHARIOT! WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU BASTARD!?" – shouted the impatient nobleman, trying to find the general that was supposed to be leading this army.

"Stop. Please." – however, instead of a general, his second in command stepped in.

"You…. I think your name was Arthur, right?" – asked the nobleman.

"Where is the general? I need to speak with him this instance! I want to know what the hell are you bastards doing here so soon and why are you so beaten up!"

"…"

"Sorry, but general is currently…. Unavailable." – replied the tall wolf beastman.

"You will have to deal with me instead."

"…"

"Come." – said the nobleman as he led the man right back to the building that was getting repaired, before then arriving at his private room.

"…I could tell that you wanted to talk privately." – said the nobleman.

"So, what is it? What happened?"

"…"

"General Gustav Chariot…. He has fallen in battle." – said the knight.

"…"

"What?" – said the nobleman with his eyes wide open.

"General Gustav Chariot is no more." – said the knight.

"He was mortally wounded and we couldn't save him."

"As of right now, I'm the one-"

"WHAT THE HELL DO YOU MEAN HE IS DEAD?!" – shouted the nobleman.

"He is currently our kingdom most powerful fighter!"

"And you are telling me he died!?"

"HOW?!"

"Him of all the people doesn't make a lick of sense!"

"Are you sure that the golems were the ones that killed him?!"

"…"

"…"

"Can I explain?" – said the worried knight.

"Yea! You will explain! In details! What the hell happened out there?!" – said the nobleman, demanding the whole story from the knight who then started explaining the whole situation to the nobleman, explaining how they were winning the battle…. Until the entire army was swallowed with explosives.

"…"

"So, wait…. You are telling me, you were winning it completely, but then everything went to shit in moment notice?" – asked the nobleman.

"Yea… This is situation." – replied the knight.

"I've asked the adventurer that tried saving general what had happened."

"Apparently as they were about to finish off the giant, explosions happened."

"Some were knocked out, some died on the spot, while some others were left injured."

"And in that moment of chaos, the general was caught by the giant golem and stuck right in the back… Which ended up leaving a fatal wound on him that bled him to death." – explained the knight to the nobleman who was still in disbelieve.

"…"

"…"

"Sir."

"I'm currently the new leader of this army, since I was the official second in command…. But I don't know what to do."

"Honestly, I don't want to go back to the forest now."

"We can beat the golems and we all saw it."

"We destroyed them and overwhelmed them."

"But the moment these explosives went off, we instantly ended up losing the fight."

"As the matter fact, I'm going to say this straight."

"I'm forbiting any entering to the forest and halting up any operations that involves raiding the golem forest."

"!"

"Do you have any idea what are you speaking of!?" – said shaken up nobleman.

"Do you have any idea what is at the stake right now?!"

"Yea, I'm fully aware." – replied the knight with worried expression.

"I know everything general knew."

"But this is our current situation!"

"If we don't deal with explosives that got us, then we will be just throwing our lives away for no reason at all!"

"I'm scared! Yea! I won't deny it!"

"We were about to win the whole thing, but suddenly we had to run with tail between our legs!"

"…"

"We need to inform the king about this."

"AND TELL HIM WHAT EXACTLY?!" – shouted the nobleman.

"That you have failed!? That the general of the whole kingdom's army is no more?!"

"That you have lost shit tons of soldiers and hired adventurers?!"

"Do you have any idea what could happened once he hears it?!"

"Not only that, these hired bastards will babble shit! They will spread the fucking news everywhere!"

"…"

"But there is literately nothing else we can do." – replied the knight.

"…"

"FUCK!" – shouted the nobleman.

"Then request specialist! Warriors! Anybody! JUST GET IT OVER WITH!"

"…That... That won't be possible." – replied the knight.

"The reason why we even hired adventurers in the first place was because of the fact that we lacked soldiers!"

"As much as it pains me to admit it, only adventurers will be able to head out call for help…. And this time, we will need also to increase the rewards."

"….Then report this to the king… I'm already having some trouble on my own." – said the nobleman.

Mess.

This was the only word that could describe the situation.

The kingdom's forces were completely defeated by the golems, resulting in not only many injured soldiers, but also many casualties, including the non-other than general of the Garmfon kingdom.

And the one that will be soon have to deal with this information will be the king as a messenger was send out as soon as possible to deliver this grave news to the king.

"…"

"?"

(A rider?) – thought the messenger who rode on his horse through the long and isolated road as he spotted a massive man ridding on a lizard creature.

"…"

"Fish Underground." – said the hooded figure as he runs past the messenger, alarming the man as he instantly stopped in tracks and turned around, which was noticed by the second person who in turn did the same thing.

"Red Paw." – replied the messenger as the hooded man dismounted his creature.

"…Who are you?" – asked the messenger as the hooded figure lifted off his hood a bit, revealing his face to the messenger.

"!"

"G-general Oranox Bearmight?!" – said the messenger.

"W-what are you doing here?!"

"Mission that I need to personally deal with." – replied the bear beastman.

"What about you? Why are they suddenly sending a messenger like you out a blue? Should they be doing the monster extermination about now?"

"…"

"There was…. An incident. A massive one at that." – said the messenger.

"The kingdom army has lost to the golems and suffered greatly."

"Many soldiers lost their lives…. And one of most important casualties was non other than general Gustav Chariot."

"!"

"Wait, he is dead?!" – asked the ex-general in disbelieve.

"Yes. I saw his corpse personally before they hid it." – replied the messenger.

"He is truly dead." – said the messenger before then explaining in details what had transpired in the golem forest.

"…"

(Dead... What the actual fuck?!) – thought confused bear beastman.

(I mean, the only reason why I came here in the first place was to assassinate him!)

(The plan was simple.)

(Get to him and quickly eliminate him while the army is distracted with a golems.)

(With the "new general" gone, the traitorous Noble faction would end up losing not only their strongest fighter, but their best leader when it comes down to warfare.)

(This would cause chaos and disorganization amongst their forces as well.)

(And it would give us an opening to exploit, which could allow us more easily take back the kingdom.)

(But he died?! To just fucking golems no less?!)

(I mean, I've been hearing a lot of news from our spies regarding the dungeon, but holy shit!)

(I was not expecting one bit to find out something like this out of blue!)

(Just what is truly going on in that god forsaken forest?!)

"…"

(Honestly, going there right now is a bad idea.)

(He said that the army is in messy state right now…. But they are also on high alert.)

(Killing the new guy who commands the army will be much harder now.)

(….But it doesn't matter.)

(If anything, thanks to this dungeon, we have now gained even bigger opening than before!)

(Just you wait you fat bastard!)

(Soon I will be dragging your corpse through the fucking mud like a pig you are.)

Next chapter will be updated first on this website. Come back and continue reading tomorrow, everyone!

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