Pestilence: Rise Of The Pure Undead

As it turns out, the heat was not only capable of burning the world below, but had many more strange capabilities, on top of being capable of bringing energies to a boiling point, it also seemed to interfere with much else, communication items that didn't even create a link of energy between the two ends were also malfunctioning if just one of them was caught in the heat, and would not work at all if directly exposed to sunlight.

'Maybe I should have taken the time to train some astrologers… They might have been able of unveiling the secrets of these suns' thought the minor lord, at a glance, they were naught but very harsh suns, something that wasn't unheard of, Ir'Houwl herself had known that back when she was a living in the empire of Pezerx, but the way more of them appeared and how they disappeared was rather odd.

Indeed, the suns didn't rise over the horizon, or rather, they didn't strictly do so, there were a few that seemed to do so at fixed intervals, but there was one that always remained high up into the sky, it always stayed there without moving at all, and it from behind, or perhaps within that one that more suns would often emerge.

Meaning that whilst they would be able to predict the minimum amount of suns at any given time with the cycle of the more regular suns and by assuming the still one wouldn't bring out more of its friends, but that didn't matter much as the latter didn't seem to follow any logic or pattern, it brought out and took back suns whenever it pleased, sometimes, the additional suns would only come out for a brief instant.

Although it did appear to have the niceness of not being capable of instantly pulling more suns out, its form would seem to bloat a bit whenever it was in the process of doing just that.

It took a little bit of time, but the undeads were gaining an understanding of the rules there, though, it wasn't that much help, whenever signs that the immobile sun was bringing out some company, it means that there wasn't much time left anyways as at most, it would take ten minutes to reveal its new friend whole, and that didn't mean that in the process, the other sun wasn't rising the temperature either.

It was useful for the scouts to know that it was time to rush back to base, but when it came to Ir'Houwl's worry about moving troops from one place to another, or death forbid, actually have to fight out in the open, that knowledge didn't help much, she needed tangible solutions to this problem.

Until then, she just had her troops continue on expanding the first camp they built so as to plant more of the cooling trees, and also create enough space for them to start digging and unearth some of the secrets hidden below ground.

Because they might as well do something of substance whilst stuck in place and waiting for good news from the scouts, though even that wasn't yielding more than sand for the moment, it seemed like the sand was actually present at a far depth.

She herself was paying close attention for any possible life signatures that might appear in the surroundings but so far, there was nothing, or they were good enough at hiding that even a minor lord could not detect them… In any case, that only meant that waiting was all she could do.

"My Lord, the scouts have returned" a warrior with a heavy-looking stone sword on his back informed her.

"Bring them over"

Ir'Houwl had a few different groups of scouts with different capabilities, one of these groups was paired with dried up vultures which sense they could share to perform reconnaissance from above, others were more typical, small sized undeads that were exceptional at moving fast when buried in sand…

All had been working hard since the first camp had been established exploring every direction and always pushing further than last time in an attempt to discover even the slightest of things.

"Lord Ir'Houwl, I have spotted a living creature!" this time however, one of the vulture masters stepped forward with actual news.

"Good, go ahead and explain in greater detail" the scout, whose bones seemed to have been eroded by sand to a dangerous degree, nodded and began telling everything he knew.

"I went south-east of the camp, having found nothing after going to the first dune in that direction the last few times, I decided to push further as the unmoving sun wasn't showing signs of more suns and there was only one moving sun that was soon to go away…" he began "...I first noticed its presence as sand was being flung up, the creature is probably a beast of some sort, it greatly resembles a whale but is only about the size of an elephant, its body was covered in sand that was sticking to its skin"

"It was alone and was simply swimming through the sand, I attempted to follow it as it moved away, but had no other choice but to backtrack as the still sun began to bloat, though, it seemed to be moving in a straight line further east" the scout bowed a bit and then stepped back, another scout stepped forward, having something to report as well.

This time, it was one of the smaller scouts, his head was that of a jackal it seemed, wrapped in thick protective clothing, it looked like he was hopping around as he walked forth, bowing his head, he first start by raising his right arm, or rather, by not raising as it was gone.

"My Lord, I had an encounter north with living creatures adept at remaining concealed, I was unable to sense their presence or life force until the very moment one sprung up to attack me"

"And it managed to take your arm? What did they look like?"

"They were insect-like, standing taller than I, their chitin seemed feeble and inapt to deflecting blows, but where coloured the same shade as the sand and even resemble it greatly, they had four thin legs and two raptorial claws, like those of a praying mantis, it was a swing of one of these that managed to slice my arm off… Their speed wasn't extraordinary be it movement or attack, but merely quick enough that I was unable to evade when it decided to suddenly strike" explained the scout.

"I see… Anyone else? No? Then you are all dismissed for today, as for you, go get yourself patched, today was a good day, focus on the areas mentioned by these two for now, try to learn more about these creatures, avoid engaging them unless necessary, and if you, make sure to bring back a corpse" as she said, this Ir'Houwl lifted her head up to the sky.

"Well, that is new…"