CHAPTER 701: 701

Town B had fallen, almost certainly the following night Town A had.

An entire settlement wiped out between dusk and dawn.

One of the younger soldiers trembled. "Sir... how many days until the next closest town sends a message like this?"

The commander didn’t answer immediately.

Because he already knew: Too few, far too few.

The soldiers made camp just outside the town walls, refusing to sleep inside the deathly quiet settlement. Torches ringed their camp in a tight defensive circle, their flames flickering uneasily.

The commander stood at the edge of the firelight, looking back toward the empty town.

Two towns, two nights apart. Both gone.

A sign that the enemy wasn’t just spreading, It was accelerating.

And behind it... something far more organized than wild beasts.

The commander’s grip tightened on the plea letter from Town B.

If another raven came tomorrow... it might already be too late for that town as well.

He wasn’t the only one thinking the same.

Far from the dead, silent town, the Countess sat in her chamber, staring at another urgent letter delivered earlier that morning. The handwriting was frantic, the ink uneven, as if written by trembling hands. Its plea was identical to the last, begging for aid, begging for protection, begging for someone to listen before it was too late.

A cold knot formed in her stomach.

"What is happening under my watch...?" she whispered.

Before she could read the letter a second time, the sound of heavy wings cut through her thoughts. A raven, larger than any of her standard messengers, swooped through her window and landed on her desk. Its black feathers shimmered like oil, this one was unmistakable.

Her commander’s bird.

With tense hands she removed the sealed message and unfolded it.

She read.

Then read again.

The commander’s observations, his deductions... the disturbing pattern he outlined, towns falling in perfect sequence, each plea arriving a day too late, each site found stripped of life with no signs of battle, no footprints, no scorch marks, no bodies, only silence.

When she finished, the Countess sat down slowly, her knees weakening beneath the weight of realization. She lifted the newest plea-letter again, the one from the town nearest the commander’s current location.

If his hypothesis was correct...

By tomorrow morning that town would be gone as well.

And there was nothing, nothing she understood about the threat.

No name, no form, no tracks and no survivors.

Just towns erased in the span of hours.

The Countess pressed a hand against her mouth, her breath shallow. Her instincts screamed at her to send her court mage, to deploy arcane eyes, to unleash fire and barrier magic upon whatever horror lurked in those shadows.

But as soon as the thought surfaced, she crushed it.

Knights and soldiers she could afford to lose. Mages? Never.

Not when she didn’t even know what she was sending them to face.

If she lost a mage, her land would be crippled.

If she lost two, the region would be defenseless.

If she lost her court, her entire territory would collapse overnight.

No, she could not gamble with them. Not yet.

Her fingers tightened around the letters.

This no longer felt like the work of mere bandits or rogue beasts. She was a baroness in all but name still beneath the notice of the Empire’s Court, still clawing her way toward true recognition. She had very little influence, very few resources, and even fewer allies.

And now something was moving through her lands like a silent plague.

Something her commander believed was already heading toward the rest of her domain.

Her heart hammered as she stared out her window, the evening sun bleeding red across the sky.

This was no matter for a countess. This was something only a viscount or even an earl should be handling.

She needed to alert them immediately. Before her entire region vanished in the same quiet, awful way.

Thinking of this, the Countess stepped away from her desk and walked toward the open window. The cold evening wind brushed past her, carrying the faint scent of pine and distant rain. Her fingers brushed against the metal ring around her upper arm, a conduit for magic, one she rarely needed to use.

She inhaled slowly, letting her mana flow. Her eyes flickered with a pale green glow, then dimmed.

The moment the glow faded, the air in front of her rippled. A soft spiral of wind twisted upward, giving form, shape, and feathers until a white bird materialized, a creature no larger than a hawk, but with faint currents of air constantly swirling around its wings. Its plumage shimmered like polished bone, every feather edged with the pale blue hue of concentrated wind magic.

She exhaled even calling it out, cost her more mana than she wanted to admit.

If she wished for the message to reach the viscount before another town fell, she would need this bird, her most expensive and rarest messenger.

It had been years since she last used it. Years since she had required a delivery this urgent.

The Countess reached for the storage pouch at her waist, a finely-woven dimensional bag gifted to her by her deceased husband. From it, she withdrew two wind-type mana cores, marble-sized spherical gems pulsing with faint energy. She had stocked up on them long ago, back when she imagined her future would be filled with emergencies, magical communications, and noble responsibilities.

Funny how time wears down ambition.

She held the glowing cores out toward the bird. Its bright, intelligent eyes fixed on them, in a swift, elegant motion, it swallowed both cores whole.

The currents around its wings sharpened into clear spirals. It gazed at her, waiting.

The Countess nodded, her throat suddenly tight.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out the letter she had written only moments earlier. Sealed with wax, marked with her insignia, containing everything she feared her superiors needed to know. Her handwriting had become unsteady by the end of it, but she hoped the viscount would see past that.

She extended the letter.

The bird took it gently between its beak, securing it within the enchanted clasp that formed around it.

For a lingering moment, it looked at her again, its small, wind-touched form framed by the dying light of the sun.

Then it launched itself forward.

A violent whoosh burst from its wings, blowing her hair back and rattling the shutters. The bird soared upward at a speed no ordinary creature could match, cutting through the air as though the sky itself parted to clear its path.

Within seconds, it was a streak of white and soon a tiny dot in the horizon.

The Countess rested her hands on the window frame, her fingers tightening as the last trace of the creature vanished into the approaching night.

Now all she could do was wait. Wait and pray the viscount responded before everything collapsed around her.

Having handled the wind-bird, the Countess turned her attention to the commander’s raven, which had settled on the perch near her desk. The creature tore eagerly into the dried meat she had scattered for it, its black feathers ruffling with each sharp peck. She watched it quietly for a moment, this ordinary creature felt almost fragile compared to the storm-forged messenger she had just sent away.

She envied it, It had no decisions to make. No territory collapsing under its watch, no gnawing dread that every sunrise would bring another disaster.

But she could not allow herself to sit still.

She moved back to her table, spreading out the county map. Pins marked the towns she had already lost, two of them, while others were circled, indicating population size, proximity to forests, and distance from the commander’s current location.

It was clear now. The enemy was targeting small, weak towns.

Why? She had no answer but for now it was enough.

The instinctive response would be to pour soldiers into the threatened areas, wait for the pleas, then rush to help. But she now knew that by the time a plea reached her, the town was already gone. What happened in a single night... would continue to repeat itself.

Instead, she would have to think like the enemy.

Rather than reacting to each town’s desperate cry, she needed to place her men ahead, in towns that had not yet been struck. Like bait on a hook.

Risky bait.

If she could predict where the enemy would hit next, her soldiers might be able to meet the threat directly, observe it, survive it, bring back something she desperately lacked: Information.

She touched a fingertip to three towns on the map, close enough to watch each other, far enough that losing one wouldn’t isolate all.

But the downside... The downside towered over every hope she sketched.

Spreading her men thin meant weakening them. Even if they encountered the enemy, what then? What if the enemy’s numbers dwarfed theirs? What if they were devoured before dawn? What if placing them as bait condemned them all?