by SlyOkami
“C-Commander! Emir…” The messenger exclaimed as he did his best to stand at attention.
“Yes yes, at ease and report man!” Arshad ordered, waving aside the Wyrms who moved to stand in the messenger’s way.
“Y-Yes, the front is falling back.” The messenger said plainly.
“F-Falling back you say? Which platoon?” Katheer asked with a raised brow.
“All of t-them commander! The harassment from the enemy has proven too much and with many injured every platoon was forced to retreat from the blockades and regroup at each barracks!” The messenger explained in haste.
Arshad raised his right palm to cover his face, sighing as he rubbed his closed eyelids in frustration. “How? How have they broken through our defences so quickly?”
“Amongst the enemy are many bandits and pirates, Sidi, they are used to our tactics and know how to avoid, go around and disrupt us. On the defensive we are at a great disadvantage, I urge you, we must push against them with force.” Katheer took this moment to forward his point once again.
Arshad held his free palm open towards the commander to silence him, “How many were spotted assaulting our defences?” he then asked the messenger.
“N-Not many, three or four were distinguished harassing each blockade. But each was a very powerful fighter! Using magic none of the officers has ever seen before!” The messenger answered nervously, paling as he himself remembered that pitch black scythe and those almost demonic red eyes. “O-One in particular wa-”
“Right, right. I get the picture, go.” Arshad then said, cutting the guard off and sending him away. Sighing once more he then turned to Katheer, “Very well, we’re left with no choice but to retaliate with immediate strength. I’ll leave it to you then, commander, make good use of the Sultans…gracious gift.”
Katheer saluted, “The enemy may know how to disrupt us, but in a head-on fight, nobody can match…” he turned to glance at the said gift, “Two thousand Sin Wyrms and their platoon leaders…” smirking as he said the words.
“Of that, I am nothing less than certain.” Arshad mused as he himself glanced over the army of slayer equipped soldiers.
Each fully confident in this belief, as they briefly gazed at the inspiring sight.
…
Katheer turned to fully face the Wyrms, “Officers at attention!” he exclaimed and the high rank from each platoon of Sinbeni Slayers stepped forth to receive their orders. Katheer held in a wider smirk, never had he dreamed of leading any number of Wyrms, less so a third of the royal army.
“We push on the invaders, and your men will be the spearhead to our charge. Remain together and bash right through their defences, after which you shall spread like a forest fire along their backline. Move out!” Katheer ordered, and each platoon leader turned to relay his orders along the many lines before him.
And as Katheer looked on resolved.
As Arshad looked on worried.
Another pair of eyes looked on in wait…
As the army left, long having left, and Arshad walked back into his palace alongside his personal guard.
“Dinner, Now.” The young lord ordered the nearest servant, as multiple rushed to tend to him.
“Lord, with the commander and Wyrms gone, we must take you to the safe room.” One of his guards said.
“Bah, I shall not cower before no one! Let them come.” Arshad exclaimed in annoyance as they walked into the dining hall, then moving to sit down in his personal seat…
“I am the serpent’s bane, the venom that triumphs all others.” A voice suddenly began to whisper in chant.
Causing each of the nineteen guards to unsheathe their swords, and each of the three mages to prepare their own magiks.
“Lord, one who I would call master, lend me your strength…For I am your poison~” The voice hissed out as barriers rose around the now agitated lord.
“R-Reveal yourself!” Arshad exclaimed, as one his guards forced him to sit down as they surrounded him defensively.
“Draconic Summon; Custom Cast; Apep! Izft! First Chain~” Zentha’s voice echoed throughout the room, as golden smoke began to rise from beneath the table, the table which was very much within the summoned barrier of mana.
“Out of the way!” A mage exclaimed, coming to stand before the rising smoke then raising his staff towards it. “Fire School; Heat Wave!” The mage chanted, and a pulse of crimson energy rushed out of his staff’s tip. Passing through the smoke and dispersing it, then through the table and lighting the entire thing afire.
And while the smoke was dispersed…it was only briefly…As it suddenly took the form of several dozen serpents, each assaulting the mage whilst he screamed in panic and agony.
The serpents then spread from him and assaulted others, until each guard and mage had been attacked…
Until each had breathed the smoke in, and each had utterly lost their minds to it.
Blades clashed and magic flew as the supposed personal guard began fighting one another in a sudden rampage induced by the magical toxin.
As they did Arshad scurried beneath the aflame table, hiding himself from the chaos whilst whimpering away whenever the still present serpents of smoke slither by.
But, once he had reached the table…what he was met with was far from safety.
As Zentha’s blade rested itself before his bare throat.
The young lord’s eyes going wide when he met her cold golden eyes, “I-I have n-no worth to you dead!” He then exclaimed, raising his arms up in surrender only to burn himself on the table’s charring bottom.
Zentha smiled coldly, “Oh, you quite do have worth as dead. But I was ordered to bring you back alive, and alive I shall bring you with.” She said in elven, knowing full well the lord understood each word.
Then suddenly steading her blade closer to his skin, “But beware boy, alive does not include all your limbs. Do not test me.” She said with a cold, but almost friendly, smile.
Arshad would have nodded if he could, “Y-Yes of-of course!” he exclaimed as a large iron sword bashed through the table behind him, causing the lord to whimper in fear.
Zentha chuckled quietly, “Shhh~” then raising her free index finger to her thin lips she made a shushing sound.
The amusement shining in her eyes though only made the young lord pale further. (“Fuck my life…”)
-
* * *
-
Lahihr
22:30
City Plaza
Katheer glanced around the building and into the plaza. Seeing it completely empty of any sound or movement though, even at this time of night, pained him. Such was his pride in this city, a city he only saw joy within.
“How goes the push?” He asked the nearest Sin Wyrm to him, a mage in charge of quickly relaying messages amongst others scattered along their army. An army which was stretched out from the north-west wall to the very south-east wall, and slowly pushing through the city and towards the invader’s front.
“No contact yet-” the Wyrm said before quickly raising his left hand to his ear, “Wait no…Contact made, the largest group encountered yet right past the plaza.” He reported whilst meeting the commander’s stare, “A few hundred strong, three to four hundred. Each are wearing Dragon-part armour and wielding weapons of the same make…”
“Slayers as well? Hah, well while they number in the measly hundreds we are over two thousand!” Katheer mused with a chuckle, “We shall overwhelm these fools before they have any chance of retreat! Commence the counter-attack!” He told the Wyrm who looked back at him briefly.
“I would pose the suggestion of waiting further, this seems like a trap.” They said whilst focusing on their message relay magic.
“If it is a trap then we’ll have to spring it at some point, and the longer we wait the more time they have to build it up boy.” Katheer reasoned with a sigh, “I don’t know why they would place their strongest as the bait, maybe to surely lure us in as they did. And they
definitely couldn’t have stronger fighters than those! Else, where are they and why haven’t they crushed us yet?”
“Maybe…they’re minimalizing losses?” The Wyrm offered with a raised brow.
Katheer glanced around the building and into the plaza once more, “Boy, if that was the case…If they are that free to look down upon us…Then we might as well surrender now.” He turned back to glare at the Wyrm, “Will you surrender?” he asked with a deadly serious tone.
The Sin Wyrm suddenly stood at attention, “No.”
Katheer nodded, “Well said soldier, now relay my orders.” He then told them before stepping around the build and walking out into the plaza. Behind him moved the rest of his contingent of slayers, and all around the city the rest of his guards also pushed deeper.
The Sinbeni defenders pushed their retreated lines.
Katheer and his Slayers marching their way through the plaza with weapons ready to face whatever came their way.
And unbeknownst to them, as he watched it all clearly from above…
Every move they made, every countermeasure they prepared in advance.
Erik, had thought of it all, and dealt with it all.
As the Sin Wyrms carefully but with haste, moved towards the other end of the plaza…
Thinking they had the advantage of numbers, and power, while they had no buildings in their way…
Knowing that it was a trap, still they ran right into it, thinking it wasn’t enough to stop them.
As the enemy Slayers stepped out of the streets to meet them head-on, Sin Wyrm charged against Dragon Knight.
The Sinbeni knew it was a trap, but what they did not know was that the measly trap itself was the bait, to a larger more complex ambush that they had just sprung.
As the archers and mages they had left behind them to cover their advance, all suddenly fell to the ground bleeding and dead, Dreadblade Knights had appeared about them in sudden bursts of shadow all too fast for most human, elves and dwarves to react to.
Their blades sinking into the Sinben’s necks and tearing it open before they even noticed the shadow magic, and even if they did notice like many mages had…They stood no chance in close quarters combat against the highly skilled assassins.
Assassins who having cleaned up the enemy’s backline, began making a ruckus as they rushed about picking up weaponry and heavier pieces of armour they had hidden before the Sinbeni’s advance.
“Quickly now! Arm up and line up!” Ascal exclaimed as he managed this contingent of Xilfir Knights, he himself though no longer wearing his white suit of armour and instead donning an azure Slayer set alongside a wicked draconic staff strapped to his back.
Finally noticing the gathering of white armoured combatants behind them, the Sinbeni faltered in their charge as many turned to face the flanking enemy.
But the Dragon Knights faltered not, even when faced with many hundreds more enemies…
“Xilfir, Drakon, Cut them all down!” Pyra exclaimed as she led the Dragon Knight’s charge, donning a new set of black slayer armour herself but having fashioned herself some claws into the gauntlets instead of wielding a weapon.
Pyra needed no weapon, she preferred to bash skulls in with her fists after all.
And that she did, as the four hundred strong bellowing Dragon Knights crashed into the faltering lines of the Sin Wyrms. Truly beginning the battle for Lahihr, as the outnumbered Dragon Knights fought with tooth and nail whilst their comrades set up around the plaza.
Ascal’s platoon having been the first to step out of the shadows since they had to clean up the enemy’s support, also became the first able to push onto the Sin Wyrm’s flanks. Hundreds of lines of white armoured Xilfir at his command, yet he knew they couldn’t take on the Wyrms one on one, the difference in magical strength was just that clear even from their own Dragon Knights.
So instead, Ascal made use of the one kind of magic his people were highly attuned to and most capable of using even while donning heavy armour.
As groups of Xilfir and rebel mages at the back, cast gravity, wind and enhancement magic upon them. Ascal’s platoon began moving about the enemy’s backline with great speed while also managing shadow magic to evade head-on combat.
Like a make-shift unit of shock cavalry, the Dreadblade Knights literally flew about the battlefield hidden by shadow, appearing momentarily to blast the Sin Wyrms with a volley of magic before suddenly disappearing.
Only to move, reappear and assault from elsewhere.
This though was a tactic Ascal himself had come up with, and was enthusiastic to get praised for later as he laughed and chuckled wickedly with every volley of magic fired. As he did not face any enemy, but instead stood back and watched his bloody masterpiece play out.
And while Ascal played his games from the enemy’s back, Makaela and Zentha advanced with their own platoons from the Sin Wyrm’s left and right flanks. Revealing their full strength as over a thousand Dreadblade Knights assaulted the Sinben’s flanks, and four hundred strong Dragon Knights faced them head-on.
The Wyrms still held the advantage in numbers, but as the battle played out Katheer realised it mattered not any longer.
As the Dragons Knights played the role of the anvil up front, as Makaela’s and Zentha’s platoons set up in a formation to be the hammers at long range and blast their flanks to oblivion.
Then there was Ascal, ploughing them from behind whilst evading them entirely at the same time.
Each of these, forced the Sin Wyrm’s formation to break and spread, as they had to deal with several flanks at once. And as this happened, each of the invader’s formations began to slowly fall back, but not quickly enough to give away the final step in their ploy.
As each of Erik’s platoons played defensive even though they had the first strike, as they slow moved closer and closer to the plaza’s edges…
Widening the gap between each other, while also spreading out the enemy further…
Neither the Sin Wyrms, nor Katheer, noticing anything amiss.
As the sound of the battle played out around them, and as the sounds of further combat echoed in from the nearby streets, the city guard having been met with the rest of the rebel forces.
Katheer was the first to notice, but still all too late…
As the ground beneath the plaza’s centre, which had mostly cleared of combat as they pushed the invader’s lines to the edges…
Began to crack, and rise.
Katheer turning to face the rising earth, as he stood at the back and had been commanding the push…
His eyes widened, at first in confusion but then in realisation.
He turned back to shout out in warning, but the sound of the ground exploding out overtook his own voice.
Then followed by a hissing voice that overtook even the sound of debris crashing into their lines…
“Finally…I can’t hold it back any longer!” Kailu exclaimed in exhilaration, as he and his few dozen reapers charged out of the hole they had been hiding in. Seeing them breaking off into groups of only three to four though, Katheer sighed in relief when he saw the measly numbers they had wasted on such a clever move…
But as Kailu appeared before him, the very colour from Katheer’s face drained out.
As he was faced with those hungry, blood-red, eyes full of excitement. Katheer felt his entire body shiver, barely managing to parry the boy’s massive black scythe as it descended upon him.
Feeling the sheer weight beneath it, Katheer couldn’t believe this small boy could even lift it, much less swing it as he had.
And as Kailu pulled back briefly, only to immediately assault the guard commander, Katheer was given little time to think further.
As the massive blade slashed about him in a flurry of attacks, coming in from each and every direction while the young Xilfir twirled it about his small frame as if it weighed nothing at all. As Kailu himself dashed about the man’s position with great speed, his skeletal wings slowly form
ing over his back as the fight went on.
And as the wings formed, Kailu’s speed only increased.
Katheer fought for his dear life, fully grateful now for the years of experience in combat he had over the boy as he managed to deflect, parry and evade each of the untrained Reaper’s attacks. Then finally seeing the pattern in his attacks, Katheer waited for a specific move.
As Kailu’s scythe slashed at him from the side, which he evaded by stepping back, then swing around the boy as he pushed on Katheer, the scythe then coming down from above.
Katheer side-stepped the attack and pushed on Kailu, thrusting forward with his blade and stabbing it deep into the boy’s left shoulder, then faltering as an inhumane screech pulsed out of both Kailu and the black scythe.
Katheer retreated back and away from the terrifying creature as it wailed from the injury, an injury that he saw slowly closing itself whilst tendrils of black-green magic fused into it.
“What a monster…” Katheer mused as he took a further step back, “Are the tales true then? Are you the Dragon reborn into humanoid form I’ve been hearing whispers about!?”
Kailu chuckled coldly at his words, rising and straightening himself to face the terrified man. “Me? A Dragon? Oh no, I’m simply one of my lord’s vassals, and if you think me a monster then your perception of power is as low as that of the rats which scurry beneath your city streets.”
“Dagen shit, then where is your commander? Where is your leader!?” Katheer exclaimed in demand, but his tone betrayed him, unable to hide just how fearful he actually was.
Kailu sighed, as his gaze rose to look upwards.
Katheer hesitantly followed the reaper’s gaze, seeing the small black cloud that had caught his attention.
As it slowly descended towards them.
“When one asks for another’s titles, it is only respectful to announce yourself first.” Thea said as she leapt off the cloud’s surface, landing and coming to stand between the two of them, straightening herself to face Katheer head on.
Donning her set of sky-blue plate armour lined with bright white trimming, her helmet and shoulder pads shaped like a lioness’s open jaws whilst her gauntlets and boots took the shape of the beast’s feet. Over her back also fell a cape, white on the thicker edges whilst gold and blue within the thinner inside where a crest she wore proudly lay.