With the conquest of the Garmfon kingdom, the faction of the rebels led by the Duke Ash had succeed in taking over the control of their nation, the Garmfon kingdom AND appointed a brand-new king.

Duke Ash ascended to the throne, becoming King Ash, alongside several of his highest-ranking loyalist becoming the high-ranking nobles of the kingdom.

The war was over…... But the chaos that it has caused? It was far from over.

If anything, the kingdom could be facing a financial crisis so large that it could end up destroying the whole kingdom.

In panic, king Ash sent out his forces throughout the kingdom in order to restore the balance and deal with any problems that involves, rebels, monsters or bandits.

"And now we have to deal with those fuckers." – said annoyed soldier who was marching alongside several other soldier that were escorting a caravan while a snow was falling everywhere.

"For crying out loud, I've thought we would finally some time to breath or something…. But now they are sending us on the missions nonstop?!"

"Why the hell are we having to deal with bandits, rebels and shitty monsters!? Why there are so many of them in the first place!?"

"And there is snow and I'm cold, just what the fuck!?"

"Well, they said something about Royal faction remnants trying…. Ah, fuck it. I don't even know if they are even telling us the truth." – said soldier B.

"Honestly, I'm already fucking sick and tired of this all…. If it wasn't for the fact that they are paying us, none of us would be here."

"…"

(But we can't pay you right now.) – thought Duke Wondan who was the one ridding the carriage and was overhearing the conversation amongst the soldiers.

{{Info: For his reward, Margrave Wondan was granted a rank of Duke.}}

(If they find out that the kingdom is currently broke, they may end up rebelling, thinking that we won't be able to pay them.)

(D- King! King Ash told us to keep the financial situation of the kingdom a secret, while we focus restoring the balance to the kingdom…. But a lot of soldiers are still exhausted from the war.)

(It just happened!)

(I mean, I know there is no other way around it, but doing this as soon as possible…. Fuck.)

"…"

"Sir." – said the voice outside the carriage, surprising and scaring the nobleman who was deeply lost in his thoughts.

"Y-yes!? What is it?" – replied nobleman.

"We are about to arrive at the Maw city. Please be prepared." – said the knight.

"Thank you for informing me." – replied nobleman, before moments later knight walked away from the carriage.

"…"

(And now I'm stuck in this territory.) – thought the nobleman as he looked outside thought the window, noticing the broken-down carriages right next to the main road

(Mevon territory…. Honestly, this is one of the worst territories right now.)

(It wasn't originally a territory that was "rich" or anything like that.)

(The location sucks and it is peaceful… But there is one thing.)

(The golem dungeon.)

(A dungeon with a quality to become a nation level dungeon.)

(This is the only valuable thing about this place…. And it is also reason why Ash was so focused on targeting this place.)

(Entire peaceful territory was turned into war zones.)

(Villages were burned down while their inhabitants were either killed or ended up being forced to become bandits in order to survive…. For fuck's sake.) – thought the nobleman as his carriage and soldiers entered the ruined city.

[City Of Maw]

(According to the reports, this place is a main control point of the entire territory…. But it is straight up just ruins!)

(There is nothing here!)

(Hell! Nobody is even living here!)

(Honestly, I shouldn't even be here, since the security of this place is straight up not existing…)

(But because of how bad it is, this place needs my direct supervision.) – thought the nobleman as the carriage stopped and the doors opened.

"…"

(Fuck…. It is even worse when I look up close to it.) – thought the nobleman as he looked around the snow-covered city, noticing only rumbles of the buildings and some random bones belonging to the animals or soldiers that were possible devoured by wild monsters.

*Sigh*

"Do we know situation about the bandits? Or any villages that are still 'alive'?" – asked nobleman with a grim expression on his face.

"…. We don't know yet…. So far, we had a lot of wolf monsters running around." – replied soldier.

"By the looks of things, since nobody was taking care of them, they hunted down a good amount of regular farm animals and wild animals in order to survive."

"And since nobody was stopping them, they started reproducing and growing at alarming rate, causing more animals or people to be hunted down."

"There is also good chance that some of the wolve monsters had evolved."

"Which does make situation much more difficult."

"…"

"W-wait! The monsters he shouldn't be strong here according to the reports!" – said confused nobleman.

"Well…. With corpse laying around and everybody being focused on the war, it was no surprise that monster who were left alone would grow in number." – replied soldier.

"They had food and peace."

"But there is good news."

"These monsters are weak and we should be able to hunt them down, if we make sure to sent out big enough patrols…. The bad news is that these bastards are fast, so it may take us a while to hunt them down, if they were to start running away."

"…"

(The entire territory must be covered with snow…...It will make things harder for the soldiers to move around.) – thought the stressed nobleman.

(And the chances of some villages still being "alive" ….)

"Fuck…. This will be really hellish job." – said nobleman.

"…"

"Okay."

"Here is what we will do."

"First thing first we need to focus on stabilizing the main settlement and the main road."

"As long as those are still secured, then anybody traveling via roads could be either attacked by the bandits or by the monsters."

"This is the first objective."

"The second objective will be stabilization of this city…. Well…. Em… At least making it as a checkpoint or some temporarily base of operation."

"And third objective will be a need of securing the golem forest."

"The golem dungeon is a thing that we desperately need to secure and deal with."

"Probably by now the dungeon had created a large horde of monster that need to be dealt with."

"However, considering what I've just found, there is a good chance that the wild monsters may had taken over the forest where the golem dungeon is located."

"There were cases in the past where wild monsters ended up destroying the dungeon."

"So, we will need to quickly go and secure the dungeon."

"We have a good number of soldiers and knights here, AND we will be also getting reinforcement soon, so we should be able to manage all 3 things."

"However, we need to start setting things up and all."

"The next thing we need is some random incident popping up, so take it seriously."

As Duke Wondan instructed, the soldiers instantly splinted up on their individual task.

Restoration, patrol, security.

Those were their goals.

The army split into 3 groups and instantly went to the work, trying to at least start before the reinforcement arrives.

But…... As soon as they started, they encountered an accident.

The group of soldiers that went to secure golem forest... They have never contacted back the forces stationed in the city.

"…What do you mean there is nothing?" – asked the nobleman.

"It is as I've said sir." – replied knight.

"There was no messenger whatsoever every coming."

"….But it is pass deadline." – said the nobleman.

"I mean, I do understand that the weather and snow can be annoying, but I intentionally gave them bit extra time, so they can come back safely."

"So why are they not here?!"

"…"

"What will you have us do, sir?" – asked the knight.

"…"

"…"

"Sent scouts." – said soldier.

"On horses!"

"Make sure to pick people that can ride horses extremely well, even with the current weather."

"tell them to just go camp or outpost…. No. It was camp, right? Never mind! Just look for them near the forest!"

"Yes sir." – replied knight before then walking away.

"…"

(What is going on?) – thought nervous nobleman.

(They told me that these wolve monsters were low danger rank targets….)

(And I didn't send these bastards there to go and deal with all the monsters in the forest, but just to "check things out".)

(They were only supposed to go to the forest for only a moment…. Or did they even arrived at the forest?)

(Fuck! Just what is going on?!)

(I just hope that they just forgotten to make the report.)

The nobleman sent one of his best currently available scouts to go and see the situation near the golem forest, in order to understand why the soldiers that were sent there had yet to conduct the nobleman's forces….

And unfortunately for the nobleman, when the scouts returned back to the city, they reported the worst possible news.

The ruined outpost was not repaired and instead was found not only robbed of anything that was valuable left in it…. But there was claw marks scattered throughout the whole place.

Not only that, but the camp that was set up by the soldiers was not only not finished, but there were also traces of blood on some of the equipment that was left behind.

And the soldiers?

Nowhere to be seen.

No tracks or anything.

There was only possible explanation on what could had happened.

Something or someone had hunted down the soldiers, leaving no survivors behind.

The entire group of soldiers was completely exterminated.

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