Ten minutes later, in the palace.
King Laing, who had already gone to bed, was having a sweet dream when he was woken up by a hurried knock on the door.
"Your Majesty, it's an emergency."
Even though Laing was half-awake, he could recognize that it was his good friend of decades, Anduin Lothar's voice. "What the hell! Anduin, what time is it now? I hope your emergency is as serious as you say. "
The queen, who was also woken up from her sleep, did not say a word, and quickly dressed her husband.
A few minutes later, when the guards opened the door of the bedroom for Laing, Laing saw a nervous, fully armed Anduin.
"Your Majesty, traces of a foreign invasion have been found in the southeast of the kingdom. But before confirming my news, I strongly suggest that you take a look at the hourglass that Medivh gave you that day. "
Although it was early spring, the air was still cold. Laing only took a breath of the night air, and he felt that his lungs were about to freeze.
"Thump thump thump!" Hurried footsteps sounded in the Storm Fortress. Under the escort of two teams of royal guards, Laing and Anduin came to a storage room that was strictly guarded by four guards.
"Open it!" Laing's voice was trembling.
The guards opened it, and quickly opened the empty storage room, and lit up the oil lamps around it.
Under the illumination of dozens of torches and oil lamps, Laing and Anduin's gaze suddenly froze — all the sand in the black hourglass had fallen down.
"When did this happen?!" Laing was asking, but his voice had unknowingly become stern. "Didn't I order for it to be checked every day?"
The head of the guards in charge was sweating profusely. "Yes, it was checked. I personally confirmed that there was still a finger-sized amount of sand in the morning. Your Majesty, your order was to check every day, and inform you immediately when the sand in the hourglass is emptied. "
King Laing's face was ashen, and he only said a few words, "Summon the cabinet immediately."
Half an hour later, the Storm Fortress was brightly lit.
On a huge map, Andoine pointed to the southeast of Stormwind. "The first to discover that something was wrong was the outpost at the south of the Red Ridge Mountains. The outpost lost contact with the outpost after three red signal flares, signifying the invasion of a large number of monsters. Two months ago, the Gryphon Reconnaissance Team that I had stationed at Lakeside Town in Redridge Mountain immediately took off and saw a large number of green-skinned giant humanoid monsters surging out of the Swamp of Sorrows. "
"Gigantic? How big is it? "King Laing frowned.
"According to the magic message, they are about seven feet tall, and they are generally more muscular than our people. Moreover, they have all kinds of armors and heavy weapons such as axes and hammers. "
Duke Bolvar asked, "Are you sure it's not a Troll?"
Andoine shook his head. "No, in order to confirm, two of the Gryphon Knights even swooped down to observe at close range. One of the Gryphon Knights was even killed by long-range weapons."
The corner of King Laing's eye twitched.
The Gryphon, a giant bird of prey with the limbs of a lion and the head and wings of an eagle, was not easy to raise. Despite the Gryphon's large size, it could easily overturn a large group of human soldiers in battle. If a Gryphon were to eat to its heart's content, it could eat a cow every day.
It would be a lie to say that Laing did not feel the pinch after losing a Gryphon just for reconnaissance.
At this time, a messenger came in. "Your Majesty, Commander, Sirs, there's new news."
Seeing the latest news, the whole room was dead silent.
A small garrison stationed at the triangular junction of the Redridge Mountain had been annihilated. The garrison stationed at the Stormwind Mountain had fewer people, about 500 or so. Even so, the report said that there were no survivors.
This was not a surprise attack when they were unprepared. This was a complete annihilation after they had received the warning from the outpost ahead and were prepared for battle.
The weight behind this was definitely heavy.
The faces of Laing and Andoine had slight spasms of pain — because this meant that their good friend of many years, Medivh, had really betrayed them. At least he had given up his duty as a guardian.
Laing twisted his neck that was like a rusty machine and looked at Andoine. "Have you informed the Tirisfal Council?"
"Yes, but there was no response," an old court mage answered.
Laing suddenly had an ominous premonition.
However, the imminent large-scale invasion made Laing have no time to care about other things. Among the seven human kingdoms, Stormwind was considered a strong country, but no matter what, Stormwind could not afford to raise a standing army of more than 100,000 people. For Stormwind, which had a total force of less than 30,000 people, the annihilation of a garrison was not a trivial matter.
Most importantly, this seemed to be just the beginning.
King Laing pressed his hands on the table and said in a low voice, "Information, I need more information. What the hell is our enemy? What is the evaluation of combat power? Level of armed strength? Number? What is their goal? We can't easily fight a group of enemies that we know nothing about. "
Lothar raised a finger. "I suggest that Duke Marcus come to the meeting. He seems to have made more preparations for this. "
Lothar's suggestion was firmly opposed by several other upper-class nobles.
"Sir Lothar! This is a war! This is not a war game that a 15-year-old child should be allowed to participate in! "
Several high-ranking upper-class nobles objected, and Laing had no choice but to shake his head slightly at Lothar. The king changed the topic. "Andoine, I need your people to organize a hunt and try to catch the other party's captives. If that doesn't work, corpses will do too."
"As you command, Your Majesty. However, I suggest that you declare the kingdom to be in a state of war before that. "
"State of war? No! We don't even know who the enemy is, and we're declaring the entire kingdom to be in a state of war because of an armed conflict that occurred at the farthest border of the kingdom? What a joke! "Marquis Camron exclaimed.
Entering a state of war so easily would definitely be a great damage to the interests of the nobles. It was because a state of war meant that the king could easily order the nobles to pay war taxes, transfer the nobles' private troops, and even temporarily govern the nobles' territories.
That was even worse than killing them.
The attitude of Marquis Camron and the others almost made Anduin Lothar choke to death. Unfortunately, before more evidence could be produced to prove the seriousness of the situation, both Anduin and King Laing could only temporarily treat this invasion as a border conflict.
However, the speed at which the situation deteriorated was faster than everyone had expected.
Except for one person — Duque!
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