"Then the meeting is over. Everyone can leave, except Margrave Felyp. Please stay behind for a private matter."
"Yes, Your Highness."
Upon the orders of the Emperor, the ministers and nobles of the Altus Empire left the meeting room, leaving only Felyp, Emperor Terry and a butler behind. The Emperor gestured the butler with his hands and the butler handed over some papers.
"What is this, Your Highness?"
"These reports came from your territories. Because the driver of the carriage went missing and the carriage was found by the guards, they were sent to the capitol where the postal center is. While most of them were sent to others, this report was sent to you by the guards on the mountains."
"I see... You could have sent these to the mansion or my office here in the capitol, why did you bother with giving them to me here Your Highness?"
"Because the reports were longer than a normal guard report, the young knight that was tasked with finding who the letters were sent to opened and read the reports. He got caught by one of our older knights, but your privacy was still invaded by a knight of the Empire. For that, I want to apologize."
"No need to apologize Your Highness, these reports are from the mountains, they aren't that important anyways."
"I read the report to find out about what happened to the postal service driver, so I wouldn't say these reports are unimportant. I suggest you read the reports first. They are quite concerning."
"Can I read them here?"
"Of course."
Felyp quickly read the reports.
The first thing was another kidnapping case near a village close to the mountains. These strange kidnappings were at first thought to be the work of bandits, but when gurads were sent to the mountains, no human activity was observed.
The next explanation was a number of dangerous caves that the missing person went inside and met an unfortunate end. This theory was later supported by the fact that the guards sent to inspect the caves never returned after reporting finding a cave, and the further exploration of the caves were banned. Guards were assigned to patrol the outskirts of the mountains to stop people from exploring too much, and the missing cases shrunk considerably.
The people were told about bandits in the mountains to stop adventure seekers or supposed treasure hunters from trying to explore the dangerous caves.
Felyp started reading the next report, and just as he started reading the report, his face soured.
The report stated that, a big part of the forest on a part of the Werga Mountains was cut down cleanly on the mountain, revealing a bunch of holes of various sizes on the mountain. The trees were cut from roughly the same height and one oculd guess most of them were cut at the same time by looking at how they fell and how they got stuck on each other. This indicated that someone had cut these trees with magic.
The giant scar the two boy left when they fought with the Plaguehorn came back to Felyp's eyes, and a thought he didn't want to think about crossed his mind.
The next part of the report was about various monster corpses found while they were disintegrating. The reported monsters were all similar in their traits, and bore a striking resemblance to the minions of the Horde Queen, the colossus that still sometimes enters Felyp's nightmares at night.
Felyp clenched his hands holding the report.
"Your Highness... Can I take a portion of the army and inspect the mountains?"
"Sorry, Felyp. I know what you are thinking. I also don't want to find out that the Horde Queen was alive because of the corpses of your son and disciple, but the time for war is getting close. If I were to send a portion of the army to fight with that nightmare again, the invasion would need to be postponed for much longer, and I don't have that much time. I need to be fast while they aren't looking..."
"Who are they, Your Highness? If you have enemies-"
"Don't worry about that. They aren't enemies that can be fought normally."
"I see..."
"Don't look like that, I am sure those kids are thriving right now. And I am not going to let them die before I get to see this new weapon they are working on either."
Felyp smiled after hearing Terry's words.
"As expected, you already know about it."
"Heh, of course. Do you think I wouldn't notice you two escaping from responsibility? Well, to be honest, their minds work better than you two."
"I can't refuse that."
"That said, the only thing to do for a while now is to wait for the preparations to be done in the army, right? I will let you take four people with you to go on a 'holiday'."
"I am thankful, Your Highness."
*****
The next day, the people of the nest started preparations to escape. Kharon and Acherie's armours were repaired by the craftsmen, and Corvin was discussing a second plan with Clair.
The whole plan relied on Corvin saving his mental strenght as much as possible by not using his magic.
His plan was simple. In case the Queen turned out to be stronger than they imagined, they were going to all get away from the Queen's room and explode certain parts of the nest to stall the Queen from following them.
After stopping the Queen, Corvin who is supposed to consume Amy's pills, was going to use his magic to fly the six of them out of the nest from an escape route they selected beforehand.
While they were flying with Corvin's magic, Amy and Clair were tasked with activating the many explosives they planted inside the nest on the way. Kharon and Acherie are supposed to protect them from any monsters while flying and Noah is tasked with helping everyone with his magic.
The young commoner mage who volunteered to help the escapees with the map and coordination was tasked with activating a giant pile of explosives left behind inside the human rooms in case she heard many explosions. This hopefully was going to damage the nest enough to stall the escape of the monsters, especially the Queen, until the Empire could be alerted.
When he first explained this second plan to Clair, all Corvin got was a weird look of horror and pity. Clair commented on what kind of mental illness Corvin had to come up with such a plan. She also added that preparing that many explosives was going to be a hassle even with the help of her magic.
But Clair didn't refuse, and the two decided to work together to find a way to produce that many explosives inside the nest.