While I was advancing through the paved road, I could see from the top of Direshadow, the allied army marching all around me, it was a good feeling.

We were now near the border, Hoss's army was waiting south of us, ready to advance. Zaven had three big cities other than the capital, one on the eastern coast of the continent, south of Zaven, one between Hoss and Zaven, west of zaven, and one northwest of Zaven. The plan was for the Hoss's army to advance towards the second city, while we would advance towards the third. If we left those cities to the enemy, they could attack us from behind and retreat to the city multiple times once we would siege Zaven, so it was important for us to take those two cities.

The city we were advancing towards was called Cail and it was the nearest city to the Lost's Forest, a big forest ranging from the centre to the north-east of the continent.

The western part of the forest belonged to the Hollows and the tribes of demi-humans allied to them, the tribes were composed of powerful demi-humans like high orcs, werebeasts, dark elves, and vampires; those were the strongest races of demi-humans and were once the officials of the Dark Lord's army, many of them remained loyal until the end and after the triumph established their home in the forest and in the underground.

The western area was off-limits, but the eastern part was the house of both weak and powerful monsters, for this reason, Cail was the house of many adventurers, it wouldn't be easy to take.

The day was about to end and soon we would set up a camp to rest for the night, but the soldiers around us didn't show any sign of tiredness. They were wearing low-rank soldiers' uniforms, but the soldiers around us were probably stronger than the others, we were slightly ahead of the supplies' carriages, so it was natural this zone was heavily guarded.

We heroes all traveled near each other, occasionally exchanging words, I and Mark also took advantage of this by training in mana control by creating lumps of attribute mana and trying to dissipate the other's lump, we never trained too hard in case we had to fight though.

Oliver stayed near us and sometimes talked to us, Lae and Roxanne followed behind us, talking often to each other.

Erian was the only one that walked at a distance from us, she passed the time by staring in the distance with a blank face, sometimes she showed bits of emotions, but it wasn't her usual expression, she furrowed her forehead, her eyes became half-closed, and she seemed to be trembling a little, then, soon after, she always shook her head and rapidly regained her calm.

The calm and gentle expression I liked was nowhere to be seen, but her scared expression made her seem much less threatening to me, I guess whatever was haunting her was getting closer to her. During those moments she seemed like a scared puppy, it was cute, in a way.

How did I know what expressions she made? It's not like I was looking at her often, but sometimes my eye fell on her and I couldn't help but notice her expression. She also made me curious, she was strong enough to oppose me, but she didn't seem to be doing anything about her mysterious problem. She was a fool that refused to see the truth, but at least she was a strong-willed fool, if things went differently she would have been a great ally, after all it was a pity not having her by my side.

Suddenly, from my right, I saw an arrow fly into the sky from behind a hill and shine in red light in the sky for an instant, it was the signal for a raid unit approaching us.

The army stopped and the clerics started giving orders around, Alua approached us and said:

“For now stay back, heroes, if things go well you will join the battle at the end, we will show it on the army with illusion magic so you David avoid demonic magic at every cost.”

We then got off our horses and waited with our weapons in our hands.

I enhanced my ears and heard heavy steps coming from our right flank, it seems the raid unit stopped trying to conceal their presence and just charged at us.

The warriors and their clerics, led by the paladins and a high-paladin, positioned themselves in the front, with their lances pointed outwards to stop the enemy's charge, behind them magic swordsmen were ready to fire when the enemy got closer. In the rear, the archers were ready to shoot at the enemy and intercept whoever tried to jump or fly towards the rear, behind them the magicians were ready to rain destruction on the enemy, behind them all, there were the priests, a high priest, the supply carriages, and us. Some warriors were also scattered here and there in the rear, in case someone managed to bypass the front lines.

I saw the enemies appearing at the top of the nearby hill, running down the hill at full speed while keeping their formation, there were a few hundreds of them.

The archers were the first ones to start firing, their bodies were enveloped by the blessings of the clerics and they released the first volley towards the enemy, no arrows were returned to us but some spells were thrown at us. The magicians managed to block them and then started to counterattack, mostly using Fireballs and raising Earth Spikes in front of the charging enemies. The arrows and spells didn't seem to have done much though, the enemies were few but they seemed pretty tough.

We were marching on a hill so we would have the terrain advantage, the hill wasn't too steep but it was better than nothing.

The magic swordsmen were the last ones to start firing, and soon after I heard a huge clash from nearby, it was slightly behind us, the enemy was probably going for the supplies.

I wondered what their objective was. They were found out before they could attempt a proper surprise attack, and they were all warriors and magic swordsmen, not the right composition for guerrilla technique. This seemed more like a suicide attack than a surprise attack.