[At the edge of the Nocturne Forest]
Thousands of imperial troops, standing fully at attention, watched the destruction of the forest. It was honestly the most welcome part of their campaign. The bright yellow streaks of magical fireballs descending and the resounding blasts sent tremors through the ground and thrummed through the chests of everyone present. There were any number of fearsome creatures which called the forest their home, and unless you were one of the more battle hungry shock troops, the thought of meeting one was not an appealing prospect.
After a few more volleys, the order to cease was given. It was only for a few seconds, but there was silence. No man present could describe it, but the silence from the forest felt so damning. It was as though the partially immolated forest was looking at them. Like a wife inviting the person who killed her husband into her home. The officers of each company barked out their orders and the buglers raised their horns to their lips and relayed their tempo. There was a thunderous beat of thousands of boots marching in unison towards the treeline.
Watching all this through the lens of a spyglass, from the command tent, Brigadier General Hammond grinned to himself, his graying mustache pointing upward, "Ah, wonderful. Things are progressing precisely on schedule."
Turning back to the table where a map of the area surrounding the forest, Hammond moved a few green rectangles into the area marked 'Nocturne', "And now with the bombardment finished, if each company remains on their course of keeping at least a mile apart from each other, with enough of a thorough search, we can have this whole woodland entirely explored and cleared out in little more than a month."
Standing by, his Colonel pointed out, "But sir, our last two scouting parties never returned. Wouldn't it be prudent to send in a larger force and then report back?"
Not even looking up from the map, "Those scouts were aware of the four day deadline, Colonel, were they not? Besides, the fact that those specific parties never returned means those areas we bombarded were almost certainly where our quarry is. Or it's the location of a particularly vicious pack of monsters. Either way, it means less risk for our main force."
Stroking his chin, the Colonel wondered aloud, "Perhaps, but sir, doesn't this seem rather excessive to take care of a group of raiders? With this much firepower, you'd think we were marching into a Corrupted Land to smoke out a pack of demons."
"Orders from the top, what can I say", Hammond replied offhandedly.
........................….
Back in the Judges' office, Aeriliya turned through the pages.
"It seems Hammond started off well enough", the same Captain as before pointed out before turning a questioning gaze to Higgins, "So what went wrong?"
"At first, nothing. The going was slow, what with all the splinters and the roots everywhere. It was a few hours in when things started to go wrong", Higgins rubbed a hand over his shaved head, "It all started with that damn fog."
.........................
The company had been marching forward for about four hours, stopping only occasionally to have the unranked soldiers move a tree that had fallen in the bombardment from their path. Every so often, the soldiers would come across a burning pile of flesh that remained of whatever unfortunate monster had been in the area. Poison Tusk Boars, Flail Tails, Wolfmen. Even dead as they were, the sight made every man hug his musket a little more closely.
"These raiders must be a tough bunch to live in a place like this", a Shield Bearer named Franklin noted.
"Betcha your next monthly pay that whoever's in here blackmailed a Bishop", Specialist Higgins joked with his fellow Shield Bearer.
"Nah, these kinds of numbers, someone definitely gave one of the Aequitans a dirty look when they didn't know they could see."
It was hard to tell the time of day through the canopy, but eventually a new problem arose. Though it wasn't the right weather for it, a heavy cloud of mist began pouring in towards the company. It wasn't an uncommon tactic, blunt your enemy's vision and let the confusion do the rest. Plus, it didn't help their beastmen trackers any. Luckily there were Navigators in the troop. Men blessed by the sky god, Halcyonus with the ability to orient straight courses and maintain at least a general idea of location.
"Well, whoever we're hunting must not be all that bright if they're using this old play", Higgins thought out loud.
"Eh, they probably figured living in this great, bloody hellhole would be enough to keep us out", Franklin surmised.
"So, they're probably just buying time until they can escape. Works for me."
After about many hours of letting the Navigators guide them, the Captain told the men to start making camp for the night. Finally setting down their heavy packs came as a great relief to each man present at being able to feel the blood flow return to their shoulders. Tents were set up, fires were started, chores were assigned and sentries were posted. Every few dozen yards a Shield Bearer was stationed. Another subset of the sky god's sect. Specializing in defensive magic, they only had so many uses, but what they did, they did well.
Darkness set on the woods as the men dug in. Higgins was trying to warm himself and bite into the hard tack that was somehow considered food when one of the Navigators approached, "Oi Higgins, it's about time for you to relieve Franklin."
Standing up and stretching out his back, "You know, sometimes I really don't like you Navigators. Your sense of keeping time is so bothersome."
"Funny thing about that, the times when certain things happen occur around the same time they do every other day", the Navigator quipped.
"Ugh, if you were any smugger, you'd make an excellent politician."
Leaving the chuckling man behind, Higgins walked to the edge of the encampment. Seeing the man he was replacing leaning against a tree, he walked up, "Yikes, Franklin, watch must be particularly boring if you're just standing there. You can go now."
The current sentry didn't move. Moving closer to touch the man's shoulder, "Franky, did you hear me you can-", Higgins gasped as his fellow Shield Bearer crashed to the ground. His eyes stared up lifelessly as slightly dried blood smeared from his neatly sliced open throat. Stumbling backwards, Higgins fell on his bottom before scrambling to his feet, blowing the whistle around his neck and yelling, "Alert! Alert! Man down!"
There was a great deal of yelling and running as other guards approached the yelling man. Everyone who came upon the scene gasped as they saw what happened to the sentry. Questions came shouting from every man present. Nobody knew how it could've happened, but one thing was absolutely clear, whoever the enemy was, the earlier bombardment didn't work as well as hoped. While the sentries stood arguing, another commotion could be heard from the camp. Being the only one who technically wasn't on shift, Higgins went to go see what in the blue Baruth was going on. Following the shouting, the increasingly nervous man went and saw that a small group of guards were keeping everyone at bay outside their one Staff Sergeant's tent. Flipping the tent flap up, out walked their Captain looking stony faced as always, but clearly disturbed in his own way. Before he flipped the tent flap back down, Higgins caught a glimpse of the Staff Sergeant, his face covered in a blood stained, white cloth.
"Captain!", Higgins called out and saluted, "Specialist Higgins, sir. We've had enemy contact!"
"I can see that, soldier", the Captain replied evenly.
Shaking his head, "It's not that, sir. Whoever did this, they murdered one of the Shield Bearers before they snuck in here."
The Captain ordered double the number of sentries, but the damage had already been done. Between the fact that someone had killed a soldier who specialized in defensive magic and had gotten the drop on an army officer without making a sound and escaped, the men were rattled. To make things even worse the only things witnesses could claim was seeing a figure walk into the woods but figuring it was someone going to relieve themselves. Even though things eventually settled, sleep was restless at best.