Soon after the reports were done, both the right and left hands returned to their posts with renewed determination, receiving some wisdom from Loimos had breathed new death into their putrefied lungs, even if this sort of insight was not exactly revolutionary in of itself, such things always felt as such to the ears of those that needed to hear it, not to mention, anything Loimos said was probably written down, probably by that meek little skeleton that no one noticed, or by an adept of the church, which were never far, especially their priestesses.
On Horhir's end, he secretly had some undead mages, sorcerers and scholars led to the north, where they could begin studying and helping Combuscrus develop pyromancy to the next level.
The warking's very own form of attaining power was not rudimentary in the least however, he had already progressed far and wide, but with the knowledge of those undeads and the ressources granted by the empire, advance should definitely be made, the north was but a mere question of managing and checking every so often, which was accomplished thanks to a nightbird remaining stationed there at all times, any problem would be quickly reported.
In the west, the right hand had dispatched Tilmiel and the greater majority of the nightbirds to scour and investigate, trusting in their ability to take notice of even the slightest of clues, although, Ourlst had told him about the fact that specialties of the feasters were most certainly circulating in all territories, it was a finite resources for those that did not know the way of feasting, but it could also be problematic, who was to say that some unknown objects could have been passed around as well?
Belliste's regions were the ruins of an old nation, they could have access to old artefacts, in fact, they most definitely did.
Another advantage of striking that deal with the north was that Horhir had learned a fair bit about his enemies, Combuscrus had inherited the most out of the old records for example, meaning that he had the monopoly on all sorts of knowledge.
But even he had not been able of telling Horhir how the westerners were evading detection so thoroughly, supposing that it may have something to do with their transplantations, which were not as simple as replacing one eye to see better with it.
Of course, the secrets of each region were too well-kept to be known in detail by anyone but the practitioners.
So, with Western Cliffs remaining as they are, and with the Northern Swamp no longer a threat, Horhir turned his focus to the Eastern Peaks, water had been tainted, and all wildlife was infested as well, orchestrating a famine through pestilence, he waited a while and then sent a message to their leader, by starving them out, the undead could more easily force their hand in negotiations.
Horhir was not planning on actually letting them all hunger to death, having kept a few nightbirds in this region, they had placed explosives throughout the mountains, which would be detonated to block their way if they attempted to migrate to another area, and if push came to shove, Horhir also had a handful of soldiers to threaten them with, especially the cavalryman, Arathaksa was no pushover, carving through weakened, enfeebled livings would be a walk in the park for him.
Still, Horhir would rather not go to this length, it would go against the limits set upon him, the possibility of using troops was there as a failsafe, but also as a temptation, he was aware of this fact.
As such, it would either be through an agreement, or through starvation that victory would be reached, Horhir awaited a response, which never came.
"Lieutenant, the message definitely reached its destination" assured a nightbird, the handful in the east kept a close eye on the dwellings of the feasters, they had seen Derdlim Maulerd pick the message up.
But there was something more concerning that they had noticed from observing, in the early days of the infestation, after the livings had noticed that something was off, they had first attempted to find a solution to their problem, clearly, there had been some sort of panic caused by the situation, quickly enough however, they seemed to grow calmer, not even attempting to go out and hunt, and when the message was sent, right after the warqueen took it, the feasters stopped coming out of their caves.
And just a little while after that, they lost track of their life force as well, as though they all popped out of existence.
Of course, they reported this to Horhir, who was naturally confused, the knight suspected that his strategy had not paid off in the least, and that the feasters may have had access to hidden hunting grounds, but the most experienced nightbirds had infiltrated the caves and found no such passages, Tilmiel herself had searched Maulerd's, and all feasters had disappeared inside their own respective caverns, meaning that if that was the case, that all nightbirds had missed hidden passageways.
Which was implausible.
'Could they have consumed something to perfectly mask their presences and energy signatures? Similar to what they gave to the south?' this was a possibility as well, but then, the point would be to lure the undeads in, which would not accomplish much, they may defeat a few but the cat would quickly be out of the bag, their strategy would be revealed and Horhir would just continue to starve them.
No, either they were circumventing his strategy, or they would have taken the chance to at least converse with him, even if unwilling to negotiate, Derdlim would have surely chosen to come face to face with Horhir.
Whatever it was, it could not be discovered by waiting around and thinking hard about it, he should at least check if any of those caves were truly empty.
Apart from a select few, most of them were small and compact, so the nightbirds he sent to check it out did not take much time to visit each and every one of them, by the time they came back, Horhir had already guessed that they had found no livings, and indeed, his belief was confirmed.
Not only were the caverns free of their inhabitants, but all personal belongings and such were also completely gone, once again, no hidden trapdoors, doors or any contraptions were discovered.
'The west and now this… Good thing I managed to get into agreement with the north, otherwise I would have accomplished basically nothing!' running one hand over his visor, his disappointment was obvious to all the nightbirds.
"We should call back the others, let's not disperse our efforts"