Chapter 26: Beasts and Tails

 the grueling sweat, the bruised ribs, or the snapped spear shafts of the first week, had finally paid off. Amutenya had left the drilling to Mukoya, Shalulile, Haufiku, and Weyulu. By the time the massive caravan finally broke camp and began the long trek southward, the forty recruits no longer looked like desperate men. They marched in rhythm, their eyes sharp, their formations tight. 

That discipline was tested exactly one week into the march. 

Drawn by the heavy scent of cured meat and livestock, a pride of twelve lions—four massive males and eight lethal females—tracked the caravan through the tall, dry grass. But Amutenya didn't even have to draw his blade. The moment the lions broke cover, Mukoya’s Vanguard formed a seamless wall of iron and hide, while Haufiku’s Guard flanked with brutal precision. 

It was a slaughter. The men moved as a single, coordinated beast, mauling the apex predators of the scrubland. When the dust settled, two male lions and four lionesses lay dead in the dirt, their remaining pride fleeing into the horizon. In a single afternoon, the Ghost Army firmly established itself not as prey to be hunted, but as the deadliest predator on the plains, putting Amutenya at ease.

The only thing that mildly worried Amutenya was Shiimi. 

After receiving his mandate as the leader of the Shadow Guards, the youth had simply vanished. He was gone for a full week, completely undetectable, missing the drills and the packing entirely. 

He only reappeared the night before the caravan set off. 

Amutenya had been dead asleep in his tent when a blaring, red-alert notification from the System jolted him awake. An unauthorized presence had breached a five-foot radius of his bed. Amutenya sat up, his hand instantly going to his iron dagger, only to find Shiimi standing silently in the pitch black, completely unbothered. 

Behind the youth stood nine figures. 

"I have begun recruiting, my lord," Shiimi had whispered in the dark. He introduced eight males—two of whom were boys no older than twelve with hollow, dead eyes. The final recruit was a thirteen-year-old girl. 

"I found her in a bandit camp east of the hunting grounds," Shiimi reported flatly. "Her family sold her to the raiders to buy their own escape. The bandits killed the men of her family anyway and kept the women as relief toys. The older women bit their own tongues to end their misery, leaving only her. She still has the will to live."

Amutenya had looked at the girl, her face devoid of childish innocence, replaced by a chilling emptiness. 

"How did you get her out?" Amutenya asked.

"I wiped out the bandit lair," Shiimi replied, his tone as casual as if he were discussing the weather. "It served as a good live-fire training exercise for the others."

After that night, Shiimi vanished again. Throughout the journey, the youth would only materialize from the shadows every few days, entirely bypassing the camp's perimeter guards, to quietly update Amutenya on his growing roster of ghosts before disappearing once more.

By the second week of marching, the army had picked up a tail. 

It started as a few dozen, but soon swelled into a massive line of displaced refugees trailing safely behind the caravan's dust cloud. They were villagers from settlements entirely decimated by the drought, people who had been violently turned away from the walled towns and neighboring kingdoms. When they saw Amutenya’s heavily armed, well-fed caravan, they followed like stray dogs hoping for scraps. 

Mukoya had approached Amutenya, spear in hand, asking if he should order the Vanguard to chase them off. 

"Let them be," Amutenya had ordered, calculating the long-term logistics. "Ensure they get water and whatever scraps of food we can spare."

Amutenya wasn't running a charity; he was running an empire. To build a kingdom, he needed population. Allowing these desperate people to tag along safely was an investment in extreme goodwill. When the time came to expand his labor force, these people would worship him. 

He had already scouted a few prime candidates within the refugee tail. There was a fiercely protective couple, though their extreme paranoia meant approaching them now would only cause them to flee. There was also an elderly man fiercely guarding his disabled six-year-old grandchild. Amutenya knew they needed the stability of a permanent settlement before they could be approached. So, for now, he simply provided safety, letting his "likability" rating among the refugees naturally soar.

By the third week, the caravan of wealth crossed through disputed territories. Some petty warlords took one look at the disciplined, iron-clad army and wisely stayed out of their way. Others—arrogant regional chiefs and corrupt royal patrols—tried to extort them, claiming they were trespassing and attempting to seize their carts by force. 

Amutenya did not hesitate. The Vanguard and The Guard fell upon them with ruthless efficiency, leaving a trail of broken authorities in their wake. 

When they finally reached the Ongandjera border, the atmosphere shifted. Amutenya was thrilled to recognize the same border guards they had saved from dehydration months ago. The guards were utterly astounded. The last time they saw this group, they were a pathetic, thirsty hunting party. Now, they were a mechanized warband trailing hundreds of refugees. 

Amutenya and the patrol captain hit it off immediately. The guards happily granted the massive army and its tail permission to camp on their borders for the night. 

The next morning, before setting off, Amutenya approached the captain with a heavy corporate severance package. He handed over twenty kilograms of assorted cured meats, a 150-kilogram sack of premium grains, a 200-kilogram sack of low-grade grains, and ten sets of thick animal-hide armor. 

"If the royal courts ever abandon you, or if you ever fall on hard times," Amutenya told the stunned captain, "my doors are always open. You and your men have a place in my army." After all, such loyal and upright men will make for good soldiers

Days later, they reached the sprawling borders of the Uukwaluudhi kingdom. Months ago, Amutenya and his group had been forced to lie face-flat in a patch of stinging nettles for hours just to hide from fifty Uukwaluudhi royal guards. Now, Amutenya calmly walked up to the kingdom's toll collectors and dropped one hundred premium ostrich beads into their hands, securing legitimate, unharassed passage for his entire caravan. 

The return took six weeks in total. 

The blistering heat of the journey gave way to the familiar, dry acacia trees of their home region. The Ghost Army, now a seasoned, hardened military force of over fifty soldiers, proudly escorted their massive haul of eleven ox-carts, donkey wagons, and Amutenya’s black stallion, Ash. 

Behind them, a sprawling tail of over four hundred and seventy refugees followed the promise of salvation. 

As the massive column finally broke through the tree line and approached the entrance of Amutenya's village, the sheer scale of the arriving force caused immediate panic. The sentries shouted in alarm. Children playing near the outer fences screamed in terror, scrambling back to their houses, screaming that a rival warlord had come to wipe them out. 

Amutenya sat atop his horse, looking down at the panicked village of his birth. He had left as a boy leading a hunting party, now he returned leading an army.