Lord Of Puppets-Chapter 162 – Fear of outside.

(Brown colored flag with a symbol of a turtle....) – thought Thauma as it observed a group of soldiers walking on the main road as his scout golems spied on them.

(The symbol of the Miorio kingdom?)

"..."

(But something isn’t right.)

(Miorio kingdom shares the boards with the Garmfon kingdom... However, from what I know, they are not located anywhere near this location.)

(They are located south west of the Garmfon kingdom’s side and do not share the boarders with Mowiorano kingdom.)

(So how are they here?)

(....An alliance, per chance?)

(Maybe one of the two kingdoms formed an alliance?)

"..."

(Or what if they also joined the war?)

(Honestly, I’ve tried asking the prisoners about them, but they had straight up no information to give.)

(....Still... Their presence here is.... Worrying to say the least.)

(Third kingdom....)

(This place started calming down recently, so why a third kingdom made its move?)

(Alliance? Or joining the war by themselves?)

(To neither I have any answers.... Yet, those are the only two reasons I can think of.)

(Things were calm for a long time.... Honestly, I was kind of expecting SOMETHING to happened.)

(Like dungeon raid or the party of B-rank adventurers being sent here to deal with me.)

(But a third kingdom joining the war?)

(This wasn’t in my calculations.....)

"..."

(I need to take action.)

(I’m not talking about sending my manifested monsters into the world to gather sacrifices, since A – It could provoke a counter attack and B – I can’t leave this place unprotected, considering how much I’ve got destroyed during the previous attack.)

(The dungeon defenses aren’t ready yet either, since I still have to produce brand new bosses for each of the dungeon’s hearts.)

(What I need to do is to increase my scout golem active range.)

(I know that I should only focus on my research and military power, but right now?)

(I need to understand what is going on in the outside world!)

"..."

(The question is.... How?)

(The scout golem.... Well, it is perfect for the forest, since not only it can traverse this dense forest around, but it can also climb and hang from them.)

(But the outside? Plains.)

(The scout golem will be right in the open and can be easily spotted.)

(I have a skill called [Familiar Control], which does boost my connection with my familiars and it could increase my range of control... However, it doesn’t matter one bit if they are out in the open.)

(If they spot the golem, they will kill it.)

(But there is no way to hide.)

"..."

(Should I make a flying golem?)

(I’ve never did made one.... But....Hm....)

(Yea, good question. How should I do that?!)

(I mean, which sort of materials I would need to make that kind of creature?)

(Should I maybe try instead dungeon research and have the dungeon research beast type monsters until it gets one that can fly?)

(But the manifested monsters’ loyalty is.... Questionable.)

(Even the beasts I was taking care off were not completely loyal.)

(I’ve killed them for the experiments and once other saw it, they attacked me.)

(I guess they were scared of me? Or they maybe saw me killing them as act of betrayal?)

(I could try "taming" them.)

"..."

(No.)

(It would take too long for the dungeon research to not only obtain necessary results, but the taming process alone.)

(...)

(What about a golem that can dig and then.....No....No.)

(It could leave behind holes whenever it peeks out and it could lead to some people discovering them... Which in turn could result in the golem in question being discovered.)

(Flying isn’t it nor is digging.)

(What the hell can I do that would result in my monsters not getting discovered!?)

"..."

(The answer? Nothing.)

(I don’t have anything that I can make right now or in a near future that can not only see the outside world for me and be completely undetected.)

(Maybe I could somewhat upgrade the scout golems and give them ability to see from afar like with telescope?)

(But there is limit obviously, since pretty much all things I saw even with the basic vision were plains and the ruined remains of the town as well as outpost.)

(There is NOTHING around me.)

(....If I wish to expand my vision range "safely", I would not only need to take over the full control over the forest, but also expand my control outside of the forest as well.... But if I were to do that, it could provoke people to attack me.)

(The dungeon did expanded a bit, giving me more space.)

(I’ve also started dungeon renovation where my own golems are digging inside of the dungeon in order create more space.... But there will be a limit of how many golems the dungeon can hold.)

(Honestly, there are already monsters outside of the dungeon, wondering around.)

(I’m trying to keep as many of them inside of the dungeon, but at the same time I can’t stop the production of new monsters if I want a constat flow of miasma.)

(Should I slow down the production to look less dangerous?)

"..."

(No.)

(They already know I’m dangerous.)

(Slowing production would be a foolish mistake.)

<<I straight up had no ability whatsoever to do anything regarding the current situation.>>

<<I COULD make something, but not now.... And not something in near future.>>

<<The only real thing I could is to just keep up with my experiments.>>

<<But obviously.... Things weren’t.... They were way different compare to before.>>

<<The group of soldiers that went past my forest weren’t the first ones.>>

<<I saw another and another group pass by.>>

<<With the third one being at least being 3 times bigger compare to the other two waves of soldiers.>>

<<Each of them ignored the forest... But even so, I grew worried.>>

<<Since each of them were from the kingdom of Miorio.>> 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

<<I didn’t seen any banners or armors that belonged to any other kingdoms amongst their soldiers....And that only made things more complicated.>>

<<I wasn’t seeing ANY elves.>>

<<Normally they were the ones that started taking over this territory, from my perspective.>>

<<Honestly, my entire territory may had been already completely taken over by them.>>

<<But I guess the territory was now under this Miorio kingdom’s control?>>

<<But if that is the case.... Does that mean that the Garmfon kingdom has fallen?>>

<<If the map is correct, then these people must had traversed through the Garmfon kingdom in order to get here.>>

<<Or maybe they are allies with Garmfon kingdom instead?>>

<<Tch.>>

<<If I could at least capture a single person, I could possible find out the truth about the whole situation!>>

<<But I bloody can’t in the current situation, unless there will be some idiots who would willingly come into the forest in a small group.>>

<<Ah..... This truly "sucks", doesn’t it?>>

<<It was it, right? "SUCKS"?>>

<<Anyway!>>

<<While all of that was happening, I’ve continued my research as well as the development of the new golems.>>

<<I’ve created few golems that were a worthy candidates... So, I’ve decided to have them murder each other to see who would survive.>>

<<And it was a good call, since thanks to that I was able to find the two best candidates amongst the golems.>>

<These two still need some work and improvement, but they will work out based on the performance they shown me.>>

<<...>>

<<But the question is.... Will they truly work against the adventurers? They may had defeated other golems, but the adventurers are completely different story.>>

<<...>>

<<Shit.>>

<<I guess time will tell.>>

<<Still, even though I’ve finally made new golems to serv the dungeon, I still need the new scout golems.>>

<<I know I can’t have them leaving the forest, but I could maybe enchant their vision a bit, allowing me to spot and analyze the targets that are further away from the forest, instead of heavily relying on guessing and what not.>>

<<...>>

<<And that was the plan.... Again.... But I guess something has happened.>>

<<I saw them.>>

<<The soldiers of the Miorio kingdom.>>

<<But they were... Different.>>

<<All of them were heavily wounded.>>

<<Not only that, I saw the man in the carriage with a horned helmet. He was missing his right arm.>>

<<I saw him before.>>

<<He was there with that large army of soldiers.>>

<<He stood out amongst all the other soldiers not only based on his appearance, but also based on the fact that several different looking knights were moving right beside him.>>

<<I’ve thought he was some sort of a leader....But now?>>

<<I don’t know if he was even alive.>>

<<All of them were covered in wounds and blood.>>

<<Not only that, but their armors were visible destroyed in several places.>>

<<These soldiers fought somebody.>>

<<And.... This is.... Extremely worrying.>>

<<This massive group of soldiers just very recently passed by my forest.>>

<<And yet they came back like this?!>>

<<Honestly, when I looked at them, I didn’t saw even a single soldier that was in "good" state.>>

<<If they were forced to retreat because of the wounds they had received, then shouldn’t they had made sure these soldiers returned home safely so they could recover and be used again?>>

<<I saw once a caravan of wounded soldiers going past the forest while being escorted by soldiers.>>

<<So it is not like they don’t know....>>

<<....>>

<<By any chance.... Were they the only ones left?>>

<<Does that mean that massive army was annihilated!?>>

<<But they passed by my forest just few days ago!>>

<<...Ah fuck.>>

<<That means whatever has done that to them maybe close by.>>