That opportunity came when Gorvak charged out of the grove. He had used the skill that enlarged his size allowing him to tower over and overpower them. He slammed his axe into one only stopping when it was halfway through its chest.
Whistling Chronos couldn't help but admire the massive strength boost that skill granted him.
When the other one tried to bite him Chronos removed its legs and cut into its spine disabling it in the process. Unable to move any longer it roared at them from the ground while the other breathed its last.
"Should we keep it alive for studying?" Chronos asked.
"No, we can't learn anything worthwhile from its body and keeping it alive will just be torturing the poor souls used to create it." The matron blasted the abominations head with lightning breathe as she approached. "There, that will give them some rest."
"Will they really?" Chronos couldn't help but be curious how blasting them with lightning would give them peace.
"My breath is divine lightning and while it isn't the blue dragon's job she can still pass the souls to the black dragon." She said.
That made sense. Each dragon god had their own responsibilities and unlike many pantheons they never really crossed into each other's divine responsibilities. It was one of the advantages of having an entire pantheon formed of natural gods that instinctively knew what they could and could not do.
Nodding Chronos decided to ask some questions while he could, "By the way, why does a god whose power is growth have lightning as their main element?"
"Lightning is the spark of life, life cannot exist without lightning to start it off. Nearly all creatures that exist have lightning as a part of their body in some way." The matron kindly explained.
Chronos wasn't sure if he agreed with that but had no way to deny it either. Besides if a god was claiming this it was probably correct.
"How are Lyla and Sariah doing? I didn't see them in the battle." Chronos asked.
"They're with the children right now. We couldn't leave them alone with enemies around." The swamp hag said.
Nodding they went back to the grove after burning the corpses.
They didn't find anything that could lead them to their base, but the spare swords and armor would come in handy. Unfortunately, nobody recognized the holy symbols worn by the priests, they gave them a bad feeling, so they burned them too.
The armor was well made and had enchantments for light weight and speed on them. They weren't very strong enchantments, just strong enough to boost their fighting style and assist in escaping when they needed to.
"You think they are lacking in materials or expertise? Knights' equipment would normally have more enchantments than this." Chronos casually asked Gorvak.
"No, if they were lacking, they wouldn't be able to set up so many rituals or create so many abominations. Most likely they just don't care about the lives of the regular knights." Gorvak said.
"Makes sense, the priests seem to treat the abominations and devil beasts as their main combat force. If these knights are from an opposing faction or an outside group working with them, they wouldn't care about their life or death." Chronos said.
They sighed as the possibility of multiple organizations working together settled in their minds.
They already knew about the trolls but now that the castles were being built, they didn't think the troll king would be much of a threat. It was the hidden groups they had to watch out for.
They stacked all of the armor and weapons in a spare room then went to check on the kids.
"...the dragon princess picked up her groom and walked towards the altar. 'Hey put me down, crazy woman. I'm bigger than you, I should be the one carrying you!' he shouted through his laughter..." Lyla was reading them a famous book from the dragon church.
It was a favorite of children who admired the courage and talent of an abandoned dragon princess who worked her way up the nobility and helped calm the kids down.
"Looks like everything is fine here." Gorvak commented.
Chronos looked around the room once then twice, "Where's Sariah?" He muttered.
Extending his senses he found her walking with Gregory as he examined their surroundings.
The rain was beginning to pick up again making it hard to do anything outside right now, he would have to find something to fill his time.
"I'm going to get some blankets and towels. This storm is going to get a lot worse before it gets better." Chronos said.
After Gregory and Sariah came back from patrol Lyla passed the kids off to the matron and everyone gathered to dictate a report for Commander Stan. They were joined by the swamp hag just before the meeting started.
Gregory started by asking, "How did they get so close to the grove without us finding them?"
"They used illusion magic to hide the entrance to a bunker built into a hill. I know where it's at now, so I'll go check it out later. I think they have more of them hidden deeper in the wasteland but finding them with my current abilities is going to be difficult if not impossible." Chronos responded.
"They also have a way to counter divine and holy power. It wasn't a targeted spell meant to counter this grove but a counter to all divine and holy power. I can tell." The swamp hag added.
"I saw the abominations from a distance; they were more complete than the last one we fought and seem to be standardized now." Sariah said.
"But that made them weaker than the one in the fortress or the smaller one in the village. My thrown weapons were able to injure them, with a bit more precision I could kill them as long as I can keep some distance between us. I'm more concerned with where they are getting the live sacrifices for their creation from." Gregory said.
"Most likely they are using the people of the wasteland for it right now but once they run out of victims here, they'll probably get them from the Vhalic Empire. There are enough people there that if a few of them go missing nobody will notice, especially with Duke Darrius's support." Chronos sighed as he thought about how many people would be harmed by the priests.
"So, in summary they use illusion magic to hide in the wasteland, have standardized the abominations allowing them to begin mass production but have weakened them as a result, can use the people of the empire as materials giving them a near limitless resource, and can counter divine and holy power. Am I missing anything?" Lyla summarized for the whisper bird figurine.
"There's a small possibility that the knights and the priests are not from the same group. If they are a part of the same group, then they are from different possibly opposing factions." Chronos said.
"Right, I'll put that down." Lyla recited it.
Looking at the information Lyla realized they had found out a lot but were still missing the most important information. They didn't know where the priests were or if they had stronger creatures yet to be released.
Now that they thought about it, they didn't even know the name of this group. Just that they seemed to work for the devils and had made a deal with the trolls.
"Let me write a letter for you. I'll note down the combat style of the knights and some possibilities about where they learned it." Gorvak commented.
"Sure thing." Lyla passed him a paper and quill.
Ogres liked to travel to various martial schools and nations to watch and learn new combat styles before they took up a position in their tribe. This gave older tribes some of the most comprehensive libraries for martial techniques and methods in the world and made them the foremost expert on identifying where various combat styles came from.
They were different from the Beklaedning clan that travelled around to challenge strong opponents or from wanderlust. Ogres actually gathered the knowledge and brought it home instead of just beating up the martial artists.
That didn't mean they didn't bring back techniques or methods they thought were worthy, but they had refined their own methods to such an extreme that anything less than the personal methods of the royal knights would have a hard time impressing one of them.
"Here. That's everything I know about their combat style." Gorvak handed Lyla a letter.
He had written nearly a full page about how they fought, where such methods had come from, and what weaknesses this style had.
"That's impressive," Chronos remarked. "I have to admit, I'm a bit envious of the ogre tribe's knowledge."
With the meeting coming to an end they decided to hold off on sending the figurine out as it wouldn't make it to Commander Stan in this storm.