As the sun dipped toward the horizon, the sky bled into shades of crimson and gold, its dying light reflecting off countless green figures gathered beyond the walls of Legion 23’s encampment.

  At first, it was just movement in the distance.

  Then Arin realized what he was seeing.

  “They’re here,” someone whispered.

  The goblins that had ambushed the cavalry last night emerged from the hills like a slow, crawling tide. As they approached the encampment, something unexpected happened—the mass of goblins already surrounding the camp stood up almost in unison. Like a living organism responding to an unseen signal, they parted, forming a wide corridor.

  The newcomers marched through it.

  “Wow…” Arin breathed. “That’s… a lot to take in.”

  His eyes followed the scene unfolding before him. The goblins walking through the opening were different. They carried weapons that gleamed faintly in the fading light—long, straight shapes that could only be described as spears or polearms, though crudely made. Some even carried swords.

  But it was the armor that genuinely stood out.

  Chainmail.

  Actual chainmail hung loosely from their bodies, draped in awkward folds. On their small, hunched frames, it looked almost comical—like a child wearing their father’s oversized shirt. The rings clinked and rattled as they walked, the weight of the armor slowing them considerably.

  Because of that, it took nearly twenty minutes from the moment Arin first spotted them in the distance to when they finally reached a point roughly two hundred meters from the encampment.

  More than enough time.

  The watch crews shouted warnings. Reserve units scrambled into position. Soldiers poured onto the wooden walls and walkways, filling every firing slit and platform.

  Arin spotted familiar figures among them.

  His grandfather stood near the central watchtower, arms crossed, eyes narrowed. And not far from him—

  Commander Eloi.

  The commander had come to see it with his own eyes.

  As the goblins reached the two-hundred-meter mark, something even stranger happened.

  They stopped.

  The armed goblins—clearly leaders or something close to it—moved forward, then sat down in a loose circle. Right there in the open. Their escorts lingered behind them, standing guard, while the seated goblins gestured wildly at the fortifications, pointing, grunting, and arguing.

  “They’re… discussing?” Arin muttered.

  It was so absurd that for a moment, no one spoke.

  The scene twisted the expressions of Arin’s entire family into matching looks of disbelief.

  “Daddy,” Tilly asked, tugging on her father’s hair, “do they know we can still hit them from here?”

  She was perched on Teun’s shoulders, her small hands gripping his head as she craned her neck to see the “special goblins.” Even so, her view was blocked by the wall.

  “Up!” she demanded. “Upsies!”

  Teun sighed and lifted her slightly higher, holding her legs securely.

  “I don’t think they know,” he said thoughtfully. “I don’t remember ever firing beyond a hundred and fifty meters during engagements or battle with them.

  “Oh,” Tilly said seriously. “So they’re just being silly.”

  She tilted her head.

  “Why don’t we shoot them?”

  Karl, who had been standing silently behind Teun for nearly a minute, cleared his throat. “Normally, I’d agree with you,” he said, his lips twitching. “But we’re surrounded, and we don’t have orders.”

  He glanced toward the command walkway. “Not a good time to test the commander’s patience.”

  That patience, Karl had learned over the past few months in Legion 23, was razor-thin under pressure.

  “No need.”

  The voice cut through the conversation like steel.

  Commander Eloi approached along the wide wooden walkway atop the wall, his heavy armor clanking softly with each step. The walkway itself was five meters wide and segmented—engineered so that entire sections could be released, dumping anyone standing on them into concealed spike pits below.

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  Eloi stopped beside them and stared at the goblins.

  “When I saw how arrogantly they set up camp so close to our walls,” he said quietly, “I thought of you.”

  His fists clenched at his sides.

  One of the armored goblins in the entourage suddenly stood, turned toward the camp, slapped its rear loudly, and stuck out its tongue in a crude gesture.

  Eloi’s jaw tightened.

  “I thought of you,” he repeated, then turned his gaze to Karl. “You can kill them all from here, yes?”

  Karl followed his gaze to the seated circle—around two hundred armored goblins, clearly important.

  “Yes, sir,” Karl said after a brief calculation. “That should be doable. Everyone’s here. If you give us space, we can eliminate all of them.”

  He gestured subtly toward the targets.

  “Do we need to prepare for an immediate counterattack?” Karl asked. “They look like they’re holding the rest back. Not surprising—those leaders are classified as Goblin Stage 0.2. Highest we’ve seen so far.”

  Eloi nodded. “Runners have already alerted the captains.”

  He paused.

  “Begin.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The archers moved as one.

  Nearly two hundred bows were raised. Each archer drew four arrows from their quiver and held them between their fingers with practiced ease. Quiet murmurs passed between them as they confirmed targets.

  “No overlaps,” Karl ordered. “One goblin each. Center mass or head.”

  A heartbeat of silence.

  “Targets confirmed?”

  A wave of nods.

  “Fire at will.”

  Karl’s bow sang.

  The first volley launched almost simultaneously, the arrows slicing through the air with a sharp, whispering hiss. Before the first arrows even reached their targets, a second arrow was already nocked.

  Three seconds.

  Draw. Aim. Release.

  The goblins never had time to react.

  The first arrows struck.

  Heads snapped back. Bodies jerked. Chainmail shattered as arrows punched clean through rings, through flesh, through bone. Some goblins fell backward without a sound. Others clutched their chests, mouths open in silent disbelief.

  The second volley followed immediately.

  Then the third.

  By the time the final arrows were still airborne, the seated circle had collapsed into a heap of broken bodies.

  If one looked closely—too closely—at the goblins’ faces in their final moments, there was a single shared expression.

  Shock.

  Confusion.

  Why didn’t the armor protect us?

  How were we hit from so far away?

  If Arin had been asked those questions, he would have rolled off the wall from laughter.

  As realization spread through the surrounding goblin mass, chaos erupted.

  Their leaders—likely the high command for the entire war zone—were dead.

  The goblins screamed.

  They surged forward, abandoning all semblance of coordination as they charged the walls in a blind frenzy.

  But Legion 23’s encampment was no simple camp.

  It was a fortress—within the limits of what could be built under dire conditions.

  The walls were wood, yes, but thick and reinforced. They were soaked daily to prevent fire. The goblins had never been seen using fire as a weapon, and even if they tried, they would have to cross open ground while holding torches—an invitation to be shot.

  As the horde rushed forward, the order rang out.

  “Arrow rain! Maximum density!”

  The sky darkened.

  Thousands of arrows descended in a roaring wave, cutting down the front ranks as the goblins screamed and fell over one another.

  Arin tightened his grip on his bow.

  As the sun finally vanished beyond the horizon, one thing became painfully clear to everyone watching.

  This would be a long week.