After half an hour, I decided to approach the origin of the sound and found the entrance of one of the dwarven towns. They sure liked to make them inside mountains, for some reason. They had a lot of confidence in their work, because I wouldn’t be able to live in those pces.

  “It is awfully quiet there… even from a distance, I should have been able to hear the sound of hammers against the anvils.”

  “Awoo!”

  “What now?”

  I looked at the entrance of the pce and I couldn’t see the signs of barriers or the golems that defend the pce. It looked like the entire pce had been abandoned… I decided to go check it while using camoufge and soon saw that the interior was pretty dark as well.

  ‘This pce is too close to the border for them to abandon… something must have happened.’

  I couldn’t help but question if my luck was really that terrible, or if fate itself had it out for me. I had gone out of my way to avoid the war, a very clear choice, driven by a desire to steer clear of the chaos, and the annoying decisions that came with it. I thought that by taking a different path, I could escape the storm brewing around me. Yet, no matter how far I tried to stray from conflict, it seemed like problems had a knack for finding me.

  It was as if the universe wasn’t content with letting me sit this one out. My decision to avoid one catastrophe didn’t grant me the peace I wanted; it only steered me toward a different kind of turmoil. I wondered if this was destiny’s way of mocking me.

  ‘Maybe I should borrow some of the stuff that they left behind. I am sure that they won’t miss it… no! Bad Regulus, bad!’

  It was better if I didn’t become a criminal. That way, I would be able to sleep soundly at night knowing that my enemies were chasing me unfairly. They could say that I killed some of their people, but it was in self defense.

  Putting that aside, I decided to hurry up a bit in order to catch up with the dwarves that had left the area. Gcien and I moved while using the Camoufge amulets, in order to avoid detection, but I was still pretty sure that they never saw us coming.

  Soon night came, and we still kept going because I was able to tell that they weren’t that far ahead. Despite the darkness of the night, they kept moving in a steady jog. Considering that they were slow, it looked like they were in a hurry.

  ‘This group is retively small… while they don’t look like civilians, they also don’t look like proper battle ready dwarves.’

  I began to connect the dots, piecing together the clues that had seemed disjointed at first. A problem had suddenly arisen in their territory, and the timing couldn’t have been worse. It coincided with the brink of war. At first gnce, it felt like a cruel twist of fate, as if the universe had decided to heap chaos upon chaos.

  The timing was too precise to be a coincidence. A crisis of this magnitude, coming just as tensions reached their peak, couldn’t simply be random. The thought gnawed at me, and a single possibility came to mind, one that sent a chill down my spine: a dungeon break.

  It made sense, in a terrible, foreboding way. Dungeon breaks weren’t just localized disasters, they were eruptions of monsters and chaos that could destabilize entire regions. If one had occurred here, it expined the sudden influx of trouble, the urgency in their actions, and the growing unrest. Worse still, it wasn’t just a problem for their territory. A dungeon break in the midst of war could tip the scales unpredictably, threatening to engulf everyone in a tidal wave of destruction.

  ‘They should have known that they needed to manage their dungeons well in a situation like this when a war is ready to break out, so maybe the problem wasn’t that it was a misstep… did someone cause this?’

  I knew that some beastkin knew how to cause a dungeon break, but we were pretty far away from their territory. It was hard to imagine that they heard about the possibility of the war and came here to take advantage of it. Then again, I didn’t know much about the kingdom of Felyndor factions aside from what Vincent told me. There is also a chance that things have changed in the st few years.

  The circle of the wild was a council formed by representatives from each species, promoting unity, peace, and cooperation among all beastkin. They emphasize harmony with nature and the importance of maintaining bance in their realm. Their goal is to mediate disputes, foster alliances with other realms, and preserve the natural world.

  There was the wild hunt. A warrior faction made up of elite hunters and guardians of Felyndor. They believe in strength through nature and often defend the realm from external threats. Their goal is to protect their homend from invaders, maintain the bance of nature, and hunt for sustenance.

  Finally, the shadow cn. A secretive faction of rogue beastkin who thrives in the darker aspects of Felyndor. They engage in espionage, theft, and covert operations. To gather knowledge, disrupt the status quo, and amass power within the realm. This seemed like the most obvious culprit.

  ‘I still can’t see why they would do this… they are shielding the refugees of the Skarnash Tribends, so helping the dwarves fall faster would only cause more trouble for them. While they can be troublesome, the dwarves work as a wall to protect them from the empire…

  While I was thinking about that, the group of dwarves ahead stopped moving and soon they began to set their camp close to the base of a mountain. Night had arrived, so I couldn’t see things that well from a distance. Still, with Hawk's vision, I was able to check the entrance of the pce… it was an incomplete image on a rge rock.

  ‘Is that… the lower half of a dragon?’

  The entrance to the byrinth was massive, a towering archway framed by jagged stone that seemed to ripple with an unnatural aura. It was impossible to miss, and so was the creature engraved around the entrance. I could see enormous, muscur legs. They were thick and scaly, with cws..

  The sight of those legs alone was enough to make my breath catch. They reminded me of a wyvern, its predatory power and imposing stature unmistakable. Yet, I couldn’t confirm it; the rest of the image remained incomplete in the entrance of the byrinth. The proportions didn’t quite match what I knew of wyverns either, as these legs seemed stockier, more grounded, like they belonged to something fatter and perhaps even more dangerous.

  ‘I guess this is a new byrinth and only recently the image began to shake… Before things get out of hand, they decided to control the mana levels inside and avoid trouble.’

  Leaving a dungeon or byrinth alone for a couple of months wasn’t enough to let a dungeon break happen. However, things are different with new byrinths. Things are always unstable when it comes to them…

  I could only guess that this timing for them is terrible… is this a bad omen? Sometimes, empires don’t fall because of internal strife or thanks to external threats. Sometimes they fall for just pin ck of luck.

  This situation made me recall a memory of something I had read about one of the earliest empires of Earth. It was a tale of ambition and downfall, of how even the mightiest can fall prey to forces beyond their control. Centuries ago, during the era of warring states, countless factions cshed endlessly, vying for dominance. One of those states rose above the rest, a powerful kingdom with unshakable defenses and unmatched might. It seemed destined to unify the nds under its banner.

  But history had other pns. An earthquake, sudden and devastating, struck their heartnd. It wasn’t just the ground that shook, it was the foundation of their power. Fortresses that had stood for generations crumbled like sandcastles, leaving their armies vulnerable and their enemies emboldened. In the span of days, the state went from a dominant force to a fractured remnant, overrun by opportunistic rivals who saw their chance.

  The parallels between that story and this moment weren’t lost on me. Here, on the brink of a war that could decide the fate of this region, a disaster loomed that could tip the scales in this approaching conflict.

  ‘It is hard to say if the same thing is happening here. Still, what now?’

  I have been asking this question a lot tely. Regardless… This could be a chance or could be a problem in front of me. I couldn’t think of a way while showing uninvited here without raising some suspicion.

  “Don’t move!”

  While I was lost in thoughts, I heard a cold voice coming from behind and then I heard the sound of a mechanism triggering behind me… I could tell that it was a crossbow. It seemed that we messed up big this time.

  Gcien didn’t move an inch, so I could tell that she was as surprised as me… I couldn’t imagine anyone sneaking out behind us, but then I realized that we speed up a bit to catch up with this group and we were also moving against the wind, so we were unable to hear or feel the smell of anyone coming from behind..

  “Who are you, and what are you doing here?”

  “My name is Regulus and I am just traveling around… My goal here is to get a bcksmithing css. While I was looking for a byrinth with that kind of css, I found this group moving.”

  “If you aren’t a Dwarf, what makes you think that you can use our properties like this?”

  “Good point. I was trying to convince you guys to let me. Anyway, whatever you do, don’t pull that trigger. That won’t end well for either of us.”

  WritingMachineGun