Regroup

A sudden inhumane screech blew through the forest, Nobody could tell where it came from or what it came from. It seemed to echo and get louder as it passed through the forest. The glowing-eyed creatures all suddenly froze for a second as the screech met their grotesque ears. While some of the wolves and people fighting took advantage of the mass freeze and stuck down their opponents the majority of the altered goblins stopped at the sound, doing nothing.

The monsters seemed to digest the commands in the screech and they all simultaneously turned around and ran like a flood receding from a beach. The altered goblins didn't even care if they were in the middle of a battle or if their fellow goblin was getting turned into shish kebab by some wolves. No, none of that mattered and the goblins all hurried away ignoring the group of wolves and humans that they had just fiercely fought against. Soon all of the spotlight eyes of the monsters seemed to disappear and silence and darkness took over the forest again.

Jason looked at Lyle. He looked just as confused and was looking at Charlie who also shrugged his shoulders. Jason along with Lyle headed towards Charlie where the rest of the group was meeting up.

Lyle turned to Jason and asked

"you have any idea what that was?"

Jason looked around vigilantly as they walked. He was still very cautious (and scared) that the altered Goblins would flood in once again.

"no clue, but if I had to guess, I think it was a command by a higher-ranked species?"

Lyle and Jason had already joined Charlie, who nodded

"yes, I thought it was something like that too possible a commander ranked species judging from the sheer amount of monsters"

Jason quickly went to ask Boops what that meant, he had just suggested that it was a command using logic and the evidence of all of the creatures following its will. Boops seemed to pull up a book in his mind space and start summarizing a part of it.

'*ahem* okay, species in the world of WOW are generally divided into ranks. They reflect the power and strength of the following creature. The ranks are (leader), (commander), (general), and (king/queen).

Each rank usually means different things, a leader just leads a group of monsters usually its kin and is generally more powerful than the creatures it leads by a margin. Besides that nothing special. Around level 50 is where most leader rank monsters are at.

The commander rank is between 50-100, commander ranks usually have leader ranks as subordinates and they can command a substantial force. Commander rank monsters and above are able to make more logical decisions and can command the monsters in more tactical ways

The general rank is more dangerous. Like the commander rank, it has numerous commander and leader ranks to help lead its force. The monsters the general rank leaders can be more intelligent depending on the monster. General rank monsters were usually at the 100-200 level.

The last rank was the king or queen level. These were one of the most dangerous threats. If a king or queen rank monster got close enough to a major city, let along with their armies or minions and commander ranks and leader ranks under its tow. Just the monster alone could deal substantial damage to the city and possibly even destroy it. These monsters were around level 200 and above.'

Boops paused and checked it Jason was remembering everything. Thankfully he was and Boops was able to add in a few notes from the information Perseus had gathered.

'so the scary thing about the king/queen rank is that they have the potential to make a kingdom of their own. Yeah, they're intelligent enough to do something like that. Once it's established there are new ranks added. Depending on the monster kingdom the ranks are different, like for instance if vampires made a kingdom, a new rank that could be added would be a vampire baron or something. Long story short, if you aren't planning to ally with monsters or anything, don't let them create kingdoms.'

Jason nodded and asked

"where did you get this stuff?"

'from Perseus, apparently, the library of Herdita is stock full of useful information'

"has there been any monster kingdoms?'

"currently none exist, but a few have been made before"

Jason thanked Boops for the lesson who replied by saying that Jason should buy him a subsystem.

When Jason finished his conversation with Boops and looked around his surroundings. He saw Charlie and the rest of the Blue 2 team talking about the current situation in Earl Grey's territory.

Apparently, an Orc king had risen near the capital city of the territory and the Earl was franticly attempting to subjugate the Orc king before further damage could be caused. Most of the rose knights it seemed were sent to help defeat the Orc king, even Colby's brother.

Lyle asked Charlie crossly if what they were doing had any difference.

and Charlie answered calmly, that they were making sure nothing could take out and key lands on the border of the territory. Which it seems they really wanted to take.

Jason still couldn't believe that those "elite" bandits were really bandits. From the way they moved to the discipline and strength, it was just absolute bullcrap. And those two hooded figures Jason had seen. He didn't think a bandit would have a disappearing artifact or something on him.

A sudden sound behind the group, made them all jump up with their weapons out. The wolves too jumped up out of surprise and barred their teeth.

Boops swore and seemed to spit something out as he grabbed the floating screen of the map and stared at it. There were no red dots on there and the creature that made the noise had gotten through the wolves' sense of smell.

Boops looked at the map closely one more time and then sighed in annoyance and then let the floating screen go away. Since they were in a forest, the entire map had a green covering it to signify it, it was a personal touch he applied to give it a bit of atmosphere. Well, apparently the green masked green dots so well he couldn't see them until further inspection.

A group of green barrack members stepped out of the trees cautiously with their hand on their bowstrings ready to fight. They approached the place where Charlie was lighting up the area with his spell. Seeing Charlie they lowered their bows in relief and walked up to him with their torches in hand.

The team leader walked up to Charlie and saluted

"green barrack team leader Brem reporting for duty"

Charlie nodded and asked

"good, what's the situation?"

The green barrack member let out a small smile as he answered

"sir, we and the rest of the blue and green barrack members have been in contact thanks to barrack leader Ardem's familiar we have hunted down and defeated a number of leader rank monsters, we are now combing through the woods looking for more of those glowy eyed creatures."

Charlie nodded in satisfaction. It seems the rest of the teams were doing better than them. He asked another question

"what were the enemies you were facing and how many?"

"those glowy eyed creatures sir, at first we were a bit scared of them, but we later learned that they were just a bit stronger than a goblin the leader rank creatures were a bit harder but we managed to do it as for numbers they came in packs of 30s or 40s so we could easily handle it with enough space."

Jason listened to the entire conversation and mentally facepalmed. It felt really embarrassing to be so freaked out over this forest while the rest of the rose knights were apparently slaughtering the leader rank monsters.

Charlie talked with the green barrack team leader for a bit more, getting more information and giving orders.

Finally, after some time, the green barrack team leader left along with the rest of his team. They seemed to head in the direction of where the exit was.

The entire team turned to Charlie who answered with a smile

"that swarm of creatures that we just fought was actually the commander's personal minions which means that screech we just heard was the commander's command. I just send commands for all of the teams in the forest to move out of this maze-like forest. The message should get passed around soon thanks to Ardem's familiar"

Lyle understood what Charlie meant and grinned. He pulled out his sword and let the red runes glint in the darkness. He let out a somewhat crazed smile

"we going hunting boys"

Jason witnessed everything that was going on and started to swear in frustration. Boops started to laugh, Mark and Ethan were still busy going through the altered goblin's bodies looking for anything useful and Colby stood there silently like usual.