Yet, despite the internal triumph, William saw no reason to pause. In his mind, this was a single step on a thousand-mile march. The obstacles the enemy had placed in his path—the rival guilds, the traitorous masters, the encroaching armies—were still there. They still wanted to burn his home and slaughter his people.
"The stage is clear," William muttered to himself, more than to her. "With enough pressure, the rest will crumble."
He didn't wait for her approval. He turned and began to move, re-summoning his monsters into hunting formations. What followed was a week of unrelenting, systematic slaughter.
William moved through the region like a natural disaster. He didn't hide, didn't use mystery or shadows; he was a beacon of destruction. For days on end, his monsters were a constant presence in the forests and valleys, flushing out remnants of the enemy forces and showing no mercy to those who had come to claim his territory.
