Hey, I'm just going to be writing down thoughts as I come across them so some of my comments might be invalidated later on. If that's the case, then ignore them. :)
Lets start with this phrase, "But here in this place of hopelessness, of fear, and even torment,..." Up till now, your opening paragraph has been really solid with a good opening hook while also setting the world we will be exploring. This sentence is more of the same and the only quibble I have is for the word "even." Even is a moderator word, its purpose in this sentence is to diminish the impact of what you're saying, but in diminishing it you also weaken it. The sentence would be strong (IMO) if you just removed the even, you don't need it and to have it in there diminishes the direness of this world.
Next is the phrase, "That is exactly why I wandered through the dark world,..." Here, I would remove the "exactly." Having it in here does nothing to change the sentence while also slowing the momentum. It is also an "LY" word, which are generally considered weak.
The second this is about the phrase, "...through the dark world..." Up till now, you've referred to the dark world with the more personal "this" and I liked that because it crafted a subtly more intimate relationship between the reader and the world. That's just my opinion, though.
This phrase is passive, "I was thinking only of getting to my mission," and I think you can easily switch it to, "I thought only of..." and thus make it active.
I also have a comment about the prologue in general. You make of several descriptive phrases, like where you explain what/who Ardon is. The information you convey is mostly fine (apart from the Ardon which felt a little irrelevant) but the thing about the phrase is that they're intrusive. They interrupt the natural flow of events to explain something. One or two every so often is fine, but when you have numerous in a small area they cause the story read somewhat jaggedly because you're constantly pulling the reader out of the story. Does that make sense? That happens here.
You don't need the "however" here, "By choice, and by calling however," because you said former in the previous sentence. I would remove it because "however" is an interrupter and will naturally interupt the flow of the prose.
I think this sentence can be written a little more active, "My focus was on one thing, and one thing only..." Something like, "I focused on one thing, and one thing alone." Or maybe something like, "My focused rested on a single objective." These are just ideas I'm throwing out, you can probably come up with something better.
"Just" is another of the "moderating" words, "until the sun had just started sinking into the landscape behind me." which are general considered weak. you want to speak confidently without moderating your words because that dilutes their power and impact. I would remove it here and just write, "until the sun started sinking..."
I have two things for this sentence, "Then, slowly, I started to inch my way closer to the enemy camp." the first is that "inch" is already a slow movement so you don't need the "slowly" at all. (In my experience, most LY words are generally unnecessary because they can either be replaced by a strong verb like inched or are simply unnecessary because the context of the sentence conveys the detail naturally.)
Second, words like "started" and "began" are delaying words. They delay the action unnecessarily most of the time. That's the case here. The phrase, "I inched my way..." is simply stronger and more immediate than "I started to inch."
I know this is a fantasy world, but it still strikes me as kind of strange that dogs would bury their dead, " I always wished I could bury every victim...." You don't have to change it, I only really mentioned it because burying the dead is a human custom.
I don't know if you have a dog, but their paws don't really crash, " I heard the sound of heavy paws crashing through the forest" Moreover, if they were going out to hunt, they would do so quietly so as not to disturb any potential prey.
(I see you mention their volume a little bit below. I'm going to leave my comment in because it does bear thinking about.)
So there were two general things that I noticed, and they tend to go hand in hand, and those were that you wrote this almost entirely with passive sentences and a lot of telling. Both of these are considered "weak" and the first of them is fairly easily fixed. Just have something or someone in the sentence do something instead of telling us they did it. Take the bit where you said the dogs were alive. You would get the same result by having them do something or anything. Have them jump or bark at their captives. Have them scratch at the walls or try to reach the reeds overhead. All of these things will show the reader that they're alive without you having to tell them.
Telling's a little bit harder to fix because it tends to require a new sentence. You have to show the readers through your descriptions and the actions that take place. Something things need to be told, but that generally only because the knowledge needs to be immediately evident.
These are the two main reasons I'm not particularly interested in continuing to read this story, but some of it is undoubtedly that this isn't my preferred reading. That being said, this was far from bad, it just needs alot of polishing to reach its full potential.
I hope you find my review useful and wish you nothing but the very best of luck! :)
Happy Holidays! :D
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