The sun rose the next day with a faded start of obscured gold, as a heavy downcast of thunderheads dominated the skies, pelting my packing men with sprinkles of intermittent rain falls, that did very little to cool the fire in their veins.

And before long, all three of my imperial armies were off once again onto the warpath, our heading due south, straight as an arrow towards where we had learned the four great clans were mustering their full force in wait for the arrival of their southern counterparts.

It took us less than a day to cross the Faal Hills, one of the many geographical identifiers that clearly designated the borders between my lands from theirs, and thus would be well protected, or at least that is what we expected, since just as we crested said hills and were at their apex, we saw dozens of smoke signals littering the fields before us, all of whom were too big to be a mere warning fire.

"They’re burning their defences." Said Tessiphina, as her eyes narrowed at the distant smog, as though they had all done her some inexcusable personal wrong.

"But why?" Cyrus chirped up then, his tone full of honest confusion.

"They fear to give us any more advantages, my prince." Leonid answered with a mocking smile.

"Wasted effort." Hamilcar coldly judged, his eyes not amused by their actions, as his gaze then met mine for a moment, immediately telling me that he and I were thinking of the same thing.

"As if we’d ever covet those worthless things of theirs. If anything, we should thank them for the favour, since we were going to tear them down anyway." Hasdrubal then pridefully proclaimed, his lips splitting into an excited grin.

"My emperor," Horus’ voice then warningly came out. "this could be a sign of the worst case scenario."

"Indeed." I nodded, much to the confusion of my brothers, who looked to me for clarification, but I ignored them for the moment, as I called out.

"Hasdrubal."

"Sire?" He answered.

"The Diomedes Knights and vanguard are yours." I meaningfully said.

"Yes, my liege!" He eagerly saluted, as he quickly rode forth to the head of the column.

I’d obviously heard from Horus about our friend’s mild displeasure, and I had no interest repeating the follies of my past, so I decided to finally free him of his leash, allowing him to release some steam at last, as I had come to realize that I had indeed been too insensitive about his predicament for the last few years.

Hasdrubal was a man of action after all, and there was nothing more cruel to such hot blooded men than to shackle them to one place or task, no matter how theoretically important it is, when others are in the midst of risk and danger, wading through muddy waters, while they sit still in their gilded halls, having nothing to scratch that maddening itch in their hands and feet.

And so my armies advanced, but the longer they did, the more wide a plethora of wooden structures we found as smouldering heaps of ash. Makeshift garrisons, outposts and sentry towers set ablaze, mud hutted villages and wooden towns scrapped for all that they are worth and left abandoned by the street sides, like discarded trash; even capitols of minor clans on the cusp of becoming true cities with their primitive fortifications of mostly thick timber and mortar, lay broken and deserted.

The days snailed by with these quickly monotonous scenes repeating themselves with infuriating frequency, until finally on the dusk of the fourth day, when we finally reached a city of some renown that Barrafin told me belonged to a large clan of some esteem, even in the far off northern territories.

The city like everything else in this desolate place, was relinquished off all it’s inhabitants and defenders, yet unlike the rest it was not scrapped and wasted, but merely left like a frozen shadow of it’s former self.

"What in the name of the Gods are they doing?" Cyrus asked no one in particular, only voicing his slightly unnerved thoughts by this whole situation, as he gazed into the unnaturally quiet, and darkening, residences flanking the wide central avenue before us.

"They’re evacuating their people and what they can of their wealth to the south." Avestan said calmly, as he bent low to scoop a handful of charred earth from the ground and inspecting it.

"They’re trying to lure us further south." Leonid nodded, his head staring into the southern horizon.

"Just as we feared." Hasdrubal remarked, his hands resting on his twin sabres. "They want us to keep chasing them south, allowing their allies more time to rendezvous with them, continuously drawing us further into increasingly unfamiliar terrain, while slowly depleting us of our supplies and energy."

"But this strategy is a guaranteed double edged sword." Horus spoke up. "After all, it can’t be easy to plan and coordinate such an enormous operation of population and wealth displacement; while simultaneously keeping at arms length, despite us charging behind them as fast as we could."

"That is correct." Hamilcar affirmed his words, as he came to my side. "But we can not allow them to continue this strategy of theirs, even if it might a bigger headache for them than us in the long run."

"Why?" It was Nizam who then asked, looking to me in curiosity, since as far as his many strategy and history books he’s been fanatically devouring for so long now, have ever told him, it was never interrupt your enemy while they are making a mistake.

"Because," I explain. "allowing our enemies to achieve exactly what they wanted is not wise in war either, especially when we have so little information on what form of support they seem to so wanting to have, at the cost of ruining much of their own land waiting for, despite the fact that their actions will prove a source of greater heartache the longer it lasts. Besides, we’re not even sure how long those fabled reinforcements will take before they arrive, for all we know they have chosen this course of action knowing full well that they needn’t wait too long for it all to be over and done with." I added at the end.

"Then how do we do it?" Cyrus questioned. "How do we force them to fight, when they very obviously have no interest in it?"

"I think the most sure fire way to do so is to strike them at their plan’s hinges. Where they are currently storing all the removed people and provisions." Leonid coldly said.

"All these people and supplies must be converging somewhere, they can’t be just vanishing into thin air after all. I can already imagine the horror of trying to corral so many people into some form of order and obedience." Hasdrubal pointed out in agreement to Leonid’s idea.

"And I doubt it would prove to be that difficult to find them? For how can they easily hide so many hundreds of thousands of people without notice?" Barrafin then spoke up for the first time.

"Yes, but for all we know they could be heading to the southern tip of the Murathicus territories." Horus argued.

"I doubt it." Barrafin quickly corrected. "Despite the ceasing of hostilities between the tribes, they were just embroidered in a devastating war, and even on the best of occasions the clans refused passage, let alone habitation, to those of different clans; even my own clan was denied casual entry into the lands of my own brother in law, and that’s utterly forgoing the point that the patriarchs would vehemently refuse to allow their clansmen to do so anyway, for fear of their more skilled warriors and artisans being lured over to the other side if they remain in too close a proximity to another clan, especially if said clan is more prosperous than your own, something the middle clans would very much especially susceptible for at the moment, as they have literally been forced to abandon their homes. So it would be a near miracle for such a thing to happen." Tessiphina merely nodded in agreement to his claims, adding credibility to his already valid arguments.

"So that must mean that they remain in the Middle lands." Leonid nodded.

"But where?" Asked Hasdrubal in thought.

"Well I doubt they would place them in a place that was too dangerous or sickness prone, as they will eventually need the return of their people as unharmed as possible after the war to rebuild, so that eliminates swamps, bogs and several marshes, as well as quiet a few mountains ranges that have a nasty reputation for avalanches, earth slides and so on." Leonid calmly mused, pinching his chin.

"I also doubt they would keep them too far away from the army, as I seriously don’t believe they would risk such a large mob to be beyond supervision of a competent enough military force that would manage to keep them in check should things ever get too heated; which I suspect would be very easy to do considering they were tearing at each other’s throats not too long ago." Hasdrubal reasoned.

"It’s basically just a giant breathing, talking cache of Black Sand that could explode at any moment." Nizam blurted out before he knew he did. 𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

"Indeed." I nodded to my brother’s apt description, before I then smilingly declared. "But despite the seeming simplicity of the task, as our quarry is not a small one, it would still be a daunting task, as they are hidden within their own backyard, lands that are all but foreign to us, with all it’s subtle secrets hidden from our eyes. Not to mention the fact, that you are all assuming that they would keep their people united, when they could have as easily split them into many, many pieces, which would fix quite a few of the problems you described. Besides, why waste all that effort hunting them down, when we could accomplish our objectives in much simpler way."

"What do you mean, sire?" Leonid and Hasdrubal asked at the same time.

"You plan to have them come to us instead, don’t you, my liege?" Hamilcar knowingly asked before I could answer, taking a step closer to my side.

"Exactly." I nodded with a predatory smile.

"But how?" Asked Cyrus, growing excited.

"Can’t you see?" I asked them, half turning my head back to them, as I slowly gesture towards the empty, pristine city. "The answer is right in front of."