On the eastern outskirts of Thousand Pillar City.
Winding trenches snaked across the positions like twisted centipedes, forcibly splitting the land in two.
Soldiers in steel helmets stood tensely in the trenches, gripping their rifles tight with both hands, leaning forward as their narrowed eyes fixed on the wilderness ahead.
Though it was a rare clear day during the rainy season, an invisible black cloud hung over everyone's heads. Whether they were soldiers in the trenches or fish in the Eternal Flow River, all of them felt crushed to the point of suffocation.
Inside the forward observation post.
General Arayan stared at the distant slope with a deeply furrowed brow.
Deep wrinkles were etched at the corners of his eyes, the dark bags beneath them slightly swollen. His pupils were as murky as the waters of the Eternal Flow River, and a few silver strands hid at his temples. His haggard face looked as though he had aged more than a decade overnight, utterly unlike the spirited figure he had been a week ago.
Gopal, standing beside him, was much the same. He looked as though he had not slept properly in days. Usually the man with the most ideas, he was now unusually quiet.
An entire ten-thousand-man unit had been captured intact...
Nothing like this had ever happened since a dynasty first arose in the Boro Province!
This was not merely the disgrace of a few officers. It was the disgrace of the entire Gray Wolf Army—and even all wolfkin!
What was even more distressing was the fate of those more than ten thousand captured wolfkin warriors.
Their captors were Golden Gallon Port's most vicious thugs, slaves who had been tortured until both their bodies and minds had become warped.
Heaven knew what terrible humiliation those proud wolfkin would