Invincible

At the end of June, Frosgard should have been the most vibrant season on the grasslands, yet the main hall of the Sauron Royal Court at the foot of the Holy Mountain was shrouded in suffocating silence and chill.

The enormous stone hall was crude and grim, its pillars supporting the domed roof carved with savage wolf heads and scenes of combat.

The air was thick with the pungent smoke of animal-fat torches, the rank stench of old leather, and a deeper, more oppressive aura belonging to power and bloodshed.

On both sides of the hall stood the core nobles of the Sauron Tribe Alliance, arranged according to strict rank and tribal affiliation.

At the front stood the eight Corps Commanders. Every one of them was broad-backed and powerfully built, radiating a fierce presence. Some had shaved their heads to gleaming stubble, their scalps covered in bizarre tribal totems; others wore countless tiny braids decorated with animal teeth and bone fragments. Their bushy beards covered most of their faces like tangled weeds, and nearly every face bore scars of varying depth, proudly displaying their martial prowess.

Whenever they occasionally lifted their eyelids, what emerged from their gazes was not submission, but the savagery, defiance, and scrutiny of hungry wolves sizing up their alpha.

These men were the pillars of Sauron's military might, as well as the source of its fiercest internal infighting.

Behind them stood dozens of Regiment Commanders and warriors bearing the title of Third-Order Knight or higher. They were just as murderous, but their postures were more deferential. Beneath their lowered eyelids, however, each concealed their own thoughts and calculations.

The entire hall was filled with a primitive, savage, and chilling atmosphere of survival of the fittest.

At that moment, everyone's gaze was focused on the small group