The Chosen One's Strange Invitation

Today in Shadow Valley, on the seventeenth day of the Wilderness Mountain campaign, everyone had spent a rather "eventful" morning.

In just a few hours, the gnolls blockading the valley entrance had launched two attacks. The battles had left several hundred more body bags in the Nord encampment. Those brave soldiers had killed an equal number of enemies on the suspension bridge that symbolized hope for the resistance, but gnolls could afford to die. Nord commanders couldn't be so "reckless" with their soldiers' lives.

While the valley defenders held off the gnolls, the kobolds had not stopped digging into the valley.

The earth priests kept casting precise earthquakes to collapse the tunnels the kobolds had dug. But for every tunnel they brought down, the kobolds started digging at least two more. With the battlefield confined once more to a specific area, where the defenders couldn't use their advantage in maneuvering, the Black Calamity's numerical superiority had once again become a decisive factor.

Aboveground or below, the gnolls were slowly but steadily gaining the upper hand. It was like two strongmen arm-wrestling: when their skill was evenly matched, the one with greater strength would always win.

No army in the valley suggested retreating at this point, but as their commanders raised morale, they also prepared for the order that might come at any time. Most of the tunnel network was still in the hands of the players and NPCs—that was their last lifeline. Unless Governor Murphy had truly decided to die alongside the gnolls here, a major retreat like the one at Blackflame Pass would be the best option once the situation became irretrievable.

But this wasn't shirking responsibility!

Unlike the last stand at Blackflame Pass, the strategic objective of the Wilderness Mountain campaign had been to delay and wear down