(Every character depicted in the story below is a consenting legal adult over the age of 18)

A/N: Where are those pesky Dark Elves?!

-x-X-x-

As expected, they find more of the Living Rot in every town along the border with the Darkwoods, and even in the towns further in as well. Dark Elf troops have clearly been shadowstepping into human lands, finding or creating underground caves beneath human towns, and leaving behind the globules of Living Rot in order to infest the land.

Obviously, Thomas isn’t happy to be correct about that, but it’s not like sticking his head in the sand and ignoring the problem would be any better. No, ultimately… they’re lucky to catch it early in most places, with the blue light lanterns able to destroy the globules that Sevvi, Qyvern, and their people find.

However, in the end it’s just a delaying measure. They can’t win like this. They can’t end it. Thomas has no idea how Synestra is creating this Living Rot in the first place, but she certainly doesn’t seem to have a finite supply so far. You can’t put out fires if someone is running around setting more all the time. You have to end it at its source.

And that required them to figure out where Synestra and her army were. The assumption that they’re somewhere in the Darkwoods doesn’t help that much when that’s still an unbelievably large amount of area to cover. But it’s not like they have any other choice.

While half of Qyvern’s agents focus on using their Gifts of Shadow to hunt down these hidden globules of Living Rot and destroy them before they can wipe out entire towns, the other half, including Sevvi and the Royal Spymaster himself, are sent into the Darkwoods to try and figure out where Thomas needs to go to put a stop to all of this.

The problem? They can’t find anything. It seems like it should be impossible. After all, unless Synestra had only brought along a handful of soldiers, thousands of Dark Elves should be rather obvious, no? Even in a place like the Darkwoods, needing to fill that many bellies would require quite a lot of effort and leave a substantial footprint in the forest’s ecosystem.

Or so Thomas would think. And yet, day after day, he receives reports back from Sevvi and Qyvern that they’ve found nothing. And day after day, he receives reports from elsewhere in his Kingdom that new Living Rot has been uncovered and taken care of.

So far, they haven’t lost too much… but this isn’t sustainable. And even as he throws himself into training both his soldiers and his own skills day after day, Thomas knows that he’s spinning his wheels. They need a breakthrough. They need some sort of sign to follow.

The only silver lining is that Synestra and her forces don’t seem to be looking behind them. They set the Living Rot down in Last Hope and the rest of the border towns before moving deeper into the Kingdom, but there’s been no sign that they’ve actually followed up.

Thomas has people watching and looking for any possible resurgence of Rot in any of the places they’ve already cleansed. Hell, at a certain point he starts to fear that there’s Rot out in the wilderness close to the towns that they’re missing, but sending patrols of soldiers to check uncovers nothing. No Rot. No Dark Elves. Nothing.

Of course, that can’t last forever can it? Eventually, Synestra is going to finish spreading these globs of Living Rot all over the Kingdom and she’ll look back to where she started and wonder why there isn’t a brand new Rotlands where Last Hope stands or something.

That means they’re living on borrowed time. It means they need to do something.

It’s the first time Thomas has truly felt helpless since arriving in this world. Before, while things had been difficult from time to time, he could always fight his way through. But how do you fight an enemy who refuses to show themselves? How is he supposed to leverage his Gift when the struggle is so damn… ephemeral?

In the end, he turns from training to helping produce more lanterns. This was something he could actually use his Gift on, after all. Learning how the blue light lanterns are made, what resources they require, and how to craft them into the life saving devices… it’s a lot like him learning alchemy from Arnold back in the day.

Certainly, it keeps Thomas busy. And within a few days, he’s managed to singlehandedly double their lantern production, ranging into the Darkwoods by himself to collect the major bottleneck, that being the living blue sparks that populate the Darkwood. In the end, he turns the bottleneck around on itself, making it so what they actually don’t have enough of is the glass and metal frames for the lanterns themselves.

And funnily enough… it’s realizing what he’s done, how he’s inverted things… that finally gives Thomas the breakthrough he’s been looking for. Calling on his lieutenants as well as Sevvi and Qyvern, he gets a proper war council together.

Once he has all of them assembled around a massive table upon which a map of the Kingdom sits, Thomas steps forward and clears his throat.

“They’re not in the Darkwoods.”

There’s a ripple of confusion at that, with people around the table frowning and sharing glances. But Thomas just continues on, his confidence shining through in every word.

“Our Spymaster and his people have scoured the Darkwoods for days now. They haven’t seen even a single Dark Elf in all the time… save for the obvious.”

Thomas nods to Sevvi, drawing a few very ragged chuckles from some in the crowded room. Sevvi just frowns, her brow furrowed as she tries to figure out where he’s going with this. He’s presented a puzzle and she’s always been the kind to try and solve those.

“But at the same time, we know that they’re here. We know that they’re trying to plague our lands as we speak. And yet… they haven’t tried to destroy Last Hope yet. Despite us dealing with the Living Rot here over a week ago, despite us managing to do so in every other town nearby as well in the following days… they haven’t retaliated.”

Thomas looks down at the map of the Kingdom… of HIS Kingdom, and scowls.

“They just keep on spreading the Rot. At first I thought it was because they simply weren’t looking back behind them. But that didn’t make much sense to me. Surely if they were positioned in the Darkwoods, they would have come across land that should have been Rotted by now in their returns to their camp. And surely we would have found some sign of said camp by this point.”

Qyvern has his own eyes narrowed as he stares down at the map as well, the Royal Spymaster trying to figure out where Thomas is going with this. Finally though, he simply bites the bait that Thomas has laid out.

“What exactly are you saying, Your Majesty? Where are they then?”

Smiling grimly, Thomas steps up to the table and jabs a finger down into its surface, a specific part of the map. He watches on with a macabre sort of satisfaction as eyes widen, jaws drop open, and understanding dawns on dozens of faces surrounding the huge table.

Thomas himself looks down at where he’s pointed… specifically at the Rotlands, the entire half of the Kingdom that has been unlivable and gone untouched for half a century now.

“They’re here. They’re in the Rotlands.”

“But… how?”

Camilla’s question is clearly something shared by a lot of his other lieutenants. Sevvi though… Sevvi looks like she’s finally starting to understand, putting together all the pieces. When she steps up and starts to speak, Thomas lets her do so, nodding along as she gets everything right.

“They used the Gift of Shadow to transport the entire army from the Darkwoods into the Rotlands. They situated themselves where we would never find them, and then further used the Gift of Shadow to return to the border and start with the Rotting here so that we wouldn’t suspect their true location.”

Sevvi is almost breathless as she stares down at the map.

“That’s why they haven’t realized we’ve been erasing their work just yet. They started as far away from their camp as possible and have been working their way back towards the Rotlands, expecting everything to Rot behind them as they go.”

Thomas nods, still smiling grimly as he crosses his arms over his chest.

“That’s exactly right. Their inherent sense of superiority is keeping them from realizing that they haven’t made a single ounce of progress yet. However… when they do realize it, they’re not going to react particularly well.”

Qyvern growls at that.

“The Capital. I bet they’re within a stone’s throw of it if you’re right about where they’ve decided to set up camp.”

Now Thomas’ smile drops, even as he once again nods. Because yes… the Capital is exactly where they’ll be closest to. The Rotlands might not be right up against the City Walls or anything, but it was close enough that it wouldn’t matter. It was almost certainly going to be Synestra’s final move… after her agents finished Rotting everywhere else, she would send her army into the Capital… which was all but defenseless because the Kingdom’s army was all out here on the border with the Darkwoods, waiting to face an army that had teleported behind them weeks ago.

“But… I don’t understand. How are they even surviving out there? Even if they have some magical protection against contracting Rot Lung, how do they have enough food? Enough water?”

Sir Alonses’ question brings about more frowns from around the table, but the answer, at least to Thomas, seems rather obvious.

“They are using the Gift of Shadow to hunt game from our woods and to find water sources under our lands that they can pilfer. It’s the same rational behind all of the wells we dig, except they don’t need wells.”

Sir Alonses slowly nods, accepting that… but then he looks even more frustrated and perhaps a little defeated as well as he asks his next question.

“But then… how are we supposed to stop them? The Capital is weeks away... and we don’t have enough lanterns to protect the entire army. We can’t take the fight to them and we might not even be able to reach the Capital in time.”

He’s right, of course. The situation is dire… desperate even. Thomas feels right at home if he’s being honest.

“Correct. But that doesn’t mean we give up, do we?”

The mild rebuke sends a jolt through the Knight Bachelor. He straightens up and shakes his head.

“No, Your Majesty!”

Thomas sweeps his gaze around the rest of the room.

“The situation is about as bad as it could get. However, we have one thing going for us… we figured out their plan before they figured out ours. They haven’t learned about the blue lanterns yet. Will they know soon? Undoubtedly. Before we can move the army back to the Capital? Almost certainly. But that just means we adapt. We improvise.”

Everyone is hanging off his every word at this point, waiting with bated breath to see what he’s going to say. They clearly hope he has a plan. Fortunately for them… he does.

“The army will start mobilizing right away. You’ll head for the Capital regardless of the distance, with faster units moving ahead to try and get their quicker. Meanwhile, a small group of us will be heading into the Rotlands using the blue lanterns. We’ll find the Dark Elves… and proceed with the assassination of the First Princess.”

Sevvi straightens up at that and so does Qyvern. Obviously, they both know they’re going to be involved in such a mission. Camilla though… she notices what else Thomas said.

“My King… what do you mean by ‘us’?”

Thomas meets his loyal, dutiful knight’s eyes and smiles softly.

“I meant what I said. I’ll be going with the group. We’ll be traveling light and moving as fast as possible. It will be me, Sevvi, Qyvern, and his three best agents. It should take us less than a day to reach the Capital if we take the Gift of Shadow to its absolute limits. I’ll leave you to decide who else is coming with us.”

That last bit is directed at the Royal Spymaster himself, who nods sharply. Camilla, meanwhile, isn’t happy.

“But… you can’t go! You’re the King! What if you die out there?!”

Returning his gaze to Camilla, Thomas stands tall and resolute.

“Then I’ll die.”

That causes a bit of an uproar in the council, as everyone has something to say about that. Thomas can’t help but be a little surprised at just how much loyalty he’d engendered in such a short amount of time with so many people. He’d done everything he could to better everyone here, to make them the best versions of themselves they could become.

That said…

“SILENCE! That is ENOUGH!”

His voice cracks the very air itself, causing everyone to fall into a stunned silence. Thomas looks around the room and more than one of his lieutenants drops their gazes in shame or embarrassment. Not Camilla though. She glares at him, eyes blazing.

“I do not intend to die. I intend to win. But if I fall in the process, so be it. I did not accept a crown upon my brow in order to sit back and let others give their lives in my stead. I am going to lead the strike on the First Princess. End of story.”

“T-Then let me come with you at least, please!”

Camilla’s plea is predictable, even if it still makes him want to wince. He doesn’t though, resisting the urge even as he shakes his head.

“I can’t, Camilla. You’re fast enough to keep up… but that also means you’re fast enough to be one of the first units back in the Capital. I need you protecting the Queen as soon as humanly possible. After all, if Synestra realizes we’re neutering her ‘pest control’, there’s no telling how she’ll react. Trying to assassinate Anna is the least of what she might attempt in retaliation.”

For a moment as he started talking, Camilla looked like she wanted to fight with him on it. But when Thomas keeps explaining, he sees her begin to realize that he’s right… and more than that, what he’s trusting her with.

Finally, with extreme reluctance, Camilla lowers her gaze and bows her head, stepping back to show her acceptance of his orders.

Thomas looks around the room one more time, hiding his grimace as he slowly nods.

“We all know what we must do. Go… and know that humanity’s future rests on all of our shoulders.”

-x-X-x-

A/N: Finally going to the Rotlands!

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