They placed the woman they had brought back in a hut outside the village.
This hut lay several hundred meters from the Amazonian settlement itself, serving as a resting place and sentry post for those returning late. Inside were stored clean water, gauze, and some food—though the woman they had brought back was far from being able to eat solid rations.
Dora laid the dying woman on the bed, wiping her down and examining her. Her mouth held no tongue, no teeth. Rescue had brought no change to her expression; prolonged suffering seemed to have shattered her spirit. Her body was equally precarious. Dora was merely a warrior; her bandaging skills suited only emergency treatment of external wounds. The casualty before them required more attentive care and medication, but they couldn't bring her back yet.
Even the more emotionally driven Dora wouldn't rashly take such a risk.
The woman they'd brought back needed further examination. She might be carrying something inside her, or even harboring some unknown disease that could threaten them. Catherine went to report the reconnaissance findings to her tribe. Instead of going straight to the Queen, she first sought out the tribal physician. She intended for him to relay the message via note and also requested he examine the wounded woman.
"I truly cannot fathom it," Victor sneered. "This band of united fools—must they all die together? Ah, warriors. Muscles in their brains."
"What's your opinion?" Tasha asked.
"Kill them on the spot! At least don't bring them back!" Victor declared matter-of-factly. "Who in their right mind would bring back potential bait during combat?"
Tasha remained noncommittal. While she disapproved of taking prisoners, she understood their choice. In just a few days of contact, she had glimpsed the Amazons' unity, stubbornness, and acute sense of crisis for their dwindling clans. If they truly abandoned suffering kin for safety, they wouldn't have stayed here this long, facing overwhelming enemies to uphold some warrior code.
Some things simply cannot be compromised for certain people.
In a way, it was almost a transparent strategy. They had implemented every conceivable precaution. Given the information available, there seemed no better solution—that is, one that could rescue the captive while ensuring their own safety. The approach Victor suggested was clearly beyond the Amazons' consideration. Tasha directed the Ghost Touch to penetrate the wounded man's body, slowly permeating his flesh and bones. She found no foreign objects.
Her findings matched the Amazons': the man carried no devices, mechanisms, or runes. His health was as dire as it appeared—barely able to move, incapable of any trickery.
One phantom watched the wounded man, while the other gazed distantly at the human encampment. The verdict that "the prisoner is clean" did little to ease Tasha's unease. A persistent, nagging feeling lingered—as if her subconscious sensed something amiss, yet she couldn't pinpoint it. Had she overlooked something? Information was scarce; the watchtower hadn't yet reached the vicinity. For the first time, the ghost had hit a wall in reconnaissance. Tasha was unaccustomed to this sense of not being in complete control. She silently warned herself: had the dungeon's omniscient perspective and meticulous surveillance spoiled her? Her need for control grew stronger, and the imperfections of losing command threatened her composure—a classic downfall of great demons.
Tasha struggled to shift her thoughts away from the unsearchable carriage, like ignoring a shadow looming just beyond reach.
The night passed without incident, likely because the two Amazons had set fires upon their departure, leaving the exhausted human army too drained to stir trouble. By the next day, soldiers began dismantling the tents facing the forest. They cleared a space and slowly rolled something out.
The Red Hound emerged from the crowd, its head glowing crimson.
In a flash, Tasha remembered what she had overlooked. The captive brought back needed no devices attached to her body, nor could humans expect her to do anything. She wasn't a spy, not a detonator, and not an Amazon—she was a mixed-blooded foreigner bearing the Amazonian hunting markings. With her as a tracking device, the Red Hound could locate the Amazon camp.
Wait...
The moment of realization was followed by a flood of new questions. Did the humans truly intend to use this to locate the camp? Setting aside that the captive wasn't even within the camp itself, and ignoring the Amazon warriors monitoring the forest's edge—who would have ample time to relocate the prisoner once they discovered the humans' purpose—the objective itself was implausible. Discovering the camp's location was essentially useless. The question circled back to the beginning: even if this powerful yet unwieldy human army knew the exact location of the Amazon camp, how would they traverse the forest? How could they defeat these forest hunters, masters of their own domain, who could flee at any moment?
Tasha's temples throbbed violently, as if she were staring at a massive warning sign written in an incomprehensible language. Truth and danger now lay just a step away. Tashan moved closer to the camp with irritation, straining against the immense repulsive force to peer through.
The red hound moved swiftly. It wasn't a true hound needing to sniff around; this bizarre machine walked in a straight line, pointing directly toward the Amazon camp. Soon, untouched trees loomed ahead. The hound drove toward a giant tree, soldiers moved to fell it, and at that moment, an Amazon in the forest drew her bow.
The humans tried to protect the red hound, but their efforts were short-lived. An arrow pierced through the soldiers' gap, driving itself precisely into the red hound's skull. The small red lamp was pierced by the arrow, black smoke billowing from the wound. The red hound let out a mournful cry and fell still.
The commander frowned, though the expression seemed uncharacteristically relaxed for someone whose grand plan had failed.
They carried away the motionless red hound and planted a wooden pole where it had fallen. Something was being pushed out. Dozens of soldiers manhandled the rolling log, hauling the colossal object away.
The surprise attack had successfully neutralized the Red Hound and forced the exposed Amazon warriors to retreat, preventing them from approaching the newly revealed massive object. Tashu floated mid-air, straining to observe the silver-gray behemoth encircled by stars. At this distance, only a distant outline was visible.
The human army certainly hadn't brought this thing when they arrived, nor had the supply convoys that followed. Larger than several carts combined, Tasha surmised it was assembled from parts of multiple vehicles. Its appearance was bizarre: a stocky body with a long pole thrust straight ahead, resembling a giant mosquito from afar. Under command, soldiers carefully adjusted its angle, pointing the pole toward where the red hound had paused moments before.
With nearby figures for comparison, Tasha realized the pole wasn't thin at all—it was merely an illusion created by its contrast with the machine's bulky frame. Thicker than a human torso, its slow rotation suddenly reminded Tasha of a tank.
"Do you recognize it?" Tasha asked.
"Never seen one. Looks a bit like dwarf work—they love making these odd contraptions," Victor replied.
"Among dwarf creations, are there any... exceptionally powerful area-of-effect weapons?" Tasha asked quickly. Under her gaze, the crowd gathered around the iron monster now positioned in place.
"Some pretty interesting gadgets—like self-propelled vehicles or giant mechanical clouds—but just curiosities. They've made artificial compressed fireballs, nearly as powerful as a minor fireball spell, but each attack consumes enough resources to hire a full-fledged mage." Victor said casually. "Didn't you ask those artisan dwarves? The orthodox dwarves and their creations vanished long ago. It seems the Red Hounds are the only ones still bearing their traces..."
Tasha cut him off. She didn't intend to delve deeper. An ominous foreboding was too strong to ignore. She commanded the ghost in the Amazon village to manifest before the queen and order her to evacuate everyone immediately.
The army began retreating, falling back dozens of meters, covering their ears as they lay flat on the ground. Nearby Amazon warriors sensed something amiss. Archers ventured forward, drawing their bows and aiming at the strange thing.
Too late.
Tasha saw the blinding light erupt from the long barrel—from the cannon's muzzle.
Not even the first dawn light in the night could match its brilliance. That white light was too blinding; compared to it, the sky was merely a dim curtain. Silver lightning ripped through the curtain, tearing apart the sky, the earth, and everything that stood in its path. Only after the dazzling beast roared past did the earth-shaking boom reach the ears of the onlookers.
Light pushed to its extreme became terrifying indeed.
Tasha's eyes ignited the instant the light struck her. Her face and torso swelled as the radiance hit, then exploded. Her spectral body seemed fashioned from white phosphorus—the flames didn't even need to pass through it. The heat carried by the wind alone was enough to reduce it to ash. What sunlight could not accomplish, this cannon achieved.
Yes, a cannon.
——[Workers Have Power]: Knowledge is power, they say. Though you know nothing of forging, you possess the eye to recognize basic craftsmanship. For example: when you see a sword so hideously shaped it barely resembles a sword, you instantly recognize it as a sword!
This useless skill activated as the cannon fired. Tashan saw a note appear in his mind: "This is a cannon."
The specters observing from the human army turned to ash, as did the one in the Amazon camp. Neither had been directly hit, yet proximity to the blast proved fatal. The consciousness, deprived of its vessel, did not return to the dungeon. Perhaps the body vanished too swiftly and completely. Tasha's mind, like a leaf in a hurricane, was helplessly swept into the cannon's trajectory.
It was an incredibly, incredibly brief moment, yet that single second stretched on and on. In that gelatinous time, Tasha experienced an agonizingly long final moment. Her vision went blank—was it because the space around her now held only searing white light, or because her eyes had been burned away? Within this pure white void, she sensed the rift in the fabric of the world. The sky was torn apart, the earth ripped open, and everything blocking the path turned to powder. The ashes burned away before they could even fall to the ground. A vast forest was split open by a narrow tunnel, like a brutal chisel cleaving through the protective canopy shielding the Amazonians.
This monstrous, bizarre cannon obliterated half the forest. Through the remaining trees, the Amazonian village lay within sight.
So that was it. The red hounds of humanity needed only a general direction.