"Still nothing…" Cleavster read the messages sent back by his fellow lords, even though their situations were a bit different to his, as they were opting to remain concealed in the wide territory of their respective legions, a hardly manoeuvrable swamp, a desertic landscape ran through by countless ravines, jagged mountains filled with caves and steep falls, the undeads should be searching for the livings, but they also remained passive there.
The knight king had moved directly to the ramparts facing the undead camps, as per the agreement made with Loimos, only the few camps he could see existed, they had done through a strong oath, so he was certain of himself, when the undead would become decided to attack, they would strike from here, when no fishing convoy was passing through, they moved around a lot, especially the regular soldiers, pushing and assembling about machinery of war, putting up protections from archers and other ranged weaponry users, they even had what looked like chariots and other moving constructs that seemed to be made solely to transport and shield said marksmen.
He did not understand how this all worked, but they were working awfully fast, not to mention that he suspected this was all a smokescreen for whatever was going on hidden from sight inside their tents and all.
With so many specialised tools, to prevent undeads from getting upon the walls, fighting them outside of it, blocking their way was inevitable.
What was going inside the barrier was one thing, but whatever they were up to outside of it was also a cause for concern, the miasma would require some time to properly encompass the barrier, but they had built impressive buildings there, the amount of soldiers simply waiting to move in was too much for the warking's imagination's, he already struggled to think about how one could defeat something that had already died, the three-headed dragon had brought information concerning certain types of undeads for them to learn about, but it really did not tell much, apart that fire, holy could be effective, but only life was sure to work in all cases.
Looking down upon his sheathed blade, Alisart Cleavster still wasn't certain if Combuscrus's bright discovery would work as intended, the pyromancer king seemed to be overflowing with ideas and creativity recently, no one but the pyromancers themselves knew how their fire abilities worked but it seemed like getting access to new information allowed him to innovate.
A special flame was imbued with the blades of his knights, Irlke called it 'a lively flame' that should supposedly allow for greater efficiency against the enemy, it was still to be put to the test.
Unsheathing a portion of his greatsword, gazing at his own reflection for a moment, spotting movement past the blade, amidst the ant-like work of the undead soldiers, one of the black knights made an unusually fast movement, climbing upon the back of skeletal horse, greatbow slung over the back, holding a long-shafted axe in one hand, the other grasping the reins as they galloped close to the wall.
Lifting the visor of their helm, the undead spoke in a surprisingly sweet tone of voice, the inside only filled by a skull that was most definitely falling apart, held together by thick cobwebs, unfurling a piece of paper, reading directly from it.
"As per the authority of the general, Ourlst, Left Hand Of Loimos, declares for a battle to start in three days, and three nights, at the first light of morning, to go on unto its end, or unto eternity, any demand for a temporary truce will have to be made to the left hand himself" the piece of parchment crumbled to dust, the visor was shut, and without expecting, nor awaiting any answer, the knight rode back to the camp, Cleavster narrowing his eyes, running an armoured hand over his scared visage.
Three days and three nights was the minimum amount of time agreed upon that did not require any further, had they asked for less time, Alisart could have discussed it and moved it back, but of course, Loimos had made sure to get some room to move in without giving them that chance, three days and nights was already pretty generous, that gave enough time to prepare.
One thing that Alisart, or rather, that Loimos had made sure to not bring attention to, was the fact that certain terms of the battles could just be decided without giving a chance to the other party to make any remarks, that knightess had put into clear terms that this battle would not have any end, meaning that it was a battle of attrition, which was something the dead had no chances of losing.
Though, the knight king did not bother to imagine his defeat, he would fight them until either side crumbled, and as she had just said, truces were negotiable, now, he just needed to know whether this Ourlst fellow was any easier to deal with than Loimos in a negotiation, the thought that this undead was literally the general's left hand went through his mind for a moment, making himself chuckle at this absurdity.
'So he is also pushing such things onto the shoulders of his subordinates? That bastard pushed us around in negotiations, but he won't do it again? Or is it that he is not around at all?' he wondered, watching as the undeads started moving with even greater velocity, already going into formation.
"Knights!" the soldiers and knights that had been around and heard the declaration had remained silent, waiting for their lord to speak up, putting on the royal great helm, Alisart spun his finger in the air, shouting for knights to go fetch all surrounding soldiers, it was time to get to tactical planning, although one might believe that knowing the enemy's formations ahead of time was great, the warking was more so thinking that it was a bait.
In case it was not, he would think something to counter it, but he seriously doubted that what was being put in place before his walls would be exactly what befell his troops when the time came.
Whistling for a messenger bird to come over, he wrote to inform the other lords that a battle would soon take place in the south, the answers he would get should tell him if the undeads were preparing to fight on all fronts or not, he needed to know every single thing to have a chance of getting inside of the enemy's head.
'Mmmh, the time of truth is soon… How do my soldiers compare to his? How do my knights compare to his?
That Loimos is a beast, even with the full support of the barrier to back me up, I doubt I could defeat him… His vanguard is bound to be up to par…' even without having the first clue about what Loimos was all about, simply assuming that he might be some sort of knight-like warrior due to his choice of apparel, Alisart felt certain that a duel between him and Loimos would end poorly.
But when it came to their followers, Alisart felt more confident that the land of his people, even if it is naught but superstition, defending it from invaders should empower their strikes.