Two heads, body as big as a mountain, its body was covered in tentacles. It had an evil voice.
Nope. No idea who it could be.
Didn’t you just implicitly state that you know all of them?
Er, yeah, but I’ve never heard of such a creature, much less seen.
So much for knowing the beings of Cerphet...
Suddenly, they can hear the thundering of the enemy army. The battle has begun. Since they can’t see anything from their position, they can only pray the plan won’t fail.
Tenil waits for the mark. She and everyone else are uneasy. Many will die today, of that they are all certain. Kill or be killed. They aren’t protected by the walls this time, so they can only clash with the enemy head on. Tenil is most worried about her arm, which may or may not have healed enough.
For half an hour, they wait in ambush, hearts racing. And then, the horn is blown for four seconds after the long wait.
“Attack!!!” Tenil stands up immediately after hearing the horn.
“““Oorah!!!””” Knights in Red roar as one.
The fourth regiment of the royal division emerges from the trees. Their sight is greeted by a massive army numbering tens of thousands. Tenil leads her footmen to charge the enemy flank with archers of the fourth regiment firing hails of arrows behind them.
In the midst of the confusion, Tenil swings the massive chunk of hulking iron at the panicking soldiers, the blade clashing with their leather armor, piercing it like butter and halving the men like they were made of soft clay. With that single swipe, she makes fertilizer out of five men.
Her allies are struck with awe. They never thought she’d really swing it like that. On the contrary, her enemies are faltering at the sight of that monstrous weapon. Tenil’s vision is gray as it should be, her inherited warrior’s instinct taking over.
“DEATH TO THE EMPIRE!” Tenil cries in the middle of the battle, inspiring the knights to follow her.
“““DEATH TO THE EMPIRE!”””
Tenil’s comrades are keeping their distance from her in case she might hit them as well. Yet again, she swings the dragon’s fang that has the appearance of a generic, gargantuan sword made of polished iron. The hilt is black, but the blade is like worn silver. The guard is basically the blade, four inches of it left unsharpened so that it can be carried on shoulders, for example.
The length of the blade is 78 inches, and the hilt is approximately 19 inches. The width of the blade is 14 inches. Such is the weapon the dragon has given her. It’s not meant for fighting; it’s meant for massacre. Now that she is swinging it, the dragon is genuinely amazed, and not because she can wield it, but because he has a direct access to her mind. He can hear her thoughts, and what she has going on in her head is anything but normal. The Bladanian trait in effect, there is nothing else in her mind other than calculative thoughts. It’s as if she were a high-functioning machine, and that has amazed the dragon.
She swings it again, the sound of iron tearing flesh resounding in the air loud and clear. The bones of an enemy soldier shatter as the blade cuts through. The man is halved from the height of his lungs, along with three other soldiers. The gore spilling from the bodies paints the monstrous weapon red. A nimble soldier manages to dodge the blade, however, and attempts to strike at Tenil with his axe as she is still recovering from the strike.
Just in time, Tenil catches the shaft with her hand, protected by a light chainmail glove. With her left, wounded arm, she brings the massive chunk of hulking iron at the enemy soldier. The metal hits his hip, pelvis shattered and flesh torn by the iron. The upper half of the body is cut off.
Beautiful...! The dragon blurts in her mind.
Tenil pays it no mind. She keeps calculating the flow of the battle, laying waste over the field. Right now, she is feared by enemies and allies alike. Her weapon may very well swipe one or two knights with it as well. That’s why she is pushing the enemy lines at the forefront.
Before she even knows it, she must’ve slain dozens, and soon it’ll be hundreds if nothing stops her. The fang of the dragon destroys the ranks of the empire.
The horn is blown again. Full-scale retreat is being issued. What’s wrong? Wasn’t the plan successful after all? Whatever the reason, the fourth regiment can’t tell. Tenil is in charge of only the twelfth unit in the regiment. She orders Knights in Red to retreat at once.
“Unit twelve, retreat! Now!”
The enemy soldiers are twice as aggressive now. Although she should retreat, no matter how she looks at it, she’ll be killed if she turns her back at the empire. She can only keep swinging the massive weapon in hopes of finding an opening for a retreat. Her comrades behind her are already retreating, some still fighting beside her.
“Staff Sergeant Tenil...!” Someone shouts.
“I can’t move! They’ll overwhelm me if I turn around!”
Should I help you out? Just say the word, Aoveon reminds.
Tenil doesn’t reply. She is considering it, but for now, she isn’t accepting the dragonic blessing. If even the dragon himself doesn’t know what’ll happen, why should she risk the lives of her comrades? The situation isn’t that desperate just yet.
“Go! That’s an order!” Tenil yells as she swipes the enemies in front of her, the spray of blood reminding her of a monochrome rainbow.
“Yes Sir!”
The soldiers of the empire are bellowing. They know they’re winning. On the contrary, Tenil is clueless as to why the retreat has been issued. Something has gone awry, that is a given, but what could it be?
The footmen making their last stand with her are dying one by one at a rapid pace. She’ll be holding the line all alone very soon. Knights in Red have suffered heavy losses, but most of the archers have survived.
After reading your mind, I’ve come to the conclusion that you want my aid. Trust me, you’ll thank me later, I hope, the dragon says.
Suddenly, a burning sensation wells up within her as if her heart had caught fire. The pain is unbearable, but the Bladanian trait allows her to swing the weapon nonetheless. The earth beneath her feet is corrupting as a faint green fire burns the trampled grass. It keeps spreading around her slowly. Tenil is pressed to her limits, and she is about to be surrounded from all directions as there is no one behind her nor even at her side.
The green fire now covers the earth around her in the radius of a yard. The enemy soldiers are bringing their blades at her from all around. Tenil performs a desperate 360-degree slash around her, and those poor soldiers caught in it are reduced to fertilizer.
And then, the pain welling within her disappears and the green fire bursts around her violently, incinerating the closest soldiers thoroughly, their equipment included. After the burst of dragonic fire, Tenil drops her weapon out of shock as she can feel something crawling on her skin, like some living fire was engulfing her. She falls to her knees, the enemy soldiers keeping their distance, terrified after witnessing their comrades die by the ominous fire. They aren’t looking at a human; they’re looking at something otherworldly.
Suddenly, the fire around Tenil starts to solidify in the same manner magma does when cooled. Her whole figure is covered by the dark, hard matter. It keeps shaping itself, molding to fit her frame. Before the men of Valoria even know it, there is a human-looking thing standing before them, obsidian armor protecting its body. Its organic helmet resembles a dragon’s visage, sharp fangs moving up and down as the thing breathes. The flaming eyes glittering from the sockets speak of its bloodlust.
And then, Tenil in her dragonic armor bellows like a dragon, so loud the ones nearest to her have their hearings damaged. The royal division hears it too.
***
“Did you hear that?”
“Yes! Keep running!”
The retreating knights have their hearts racing as they hear the loud roar in the distance behind them.
“The empire has released a monster after us! Run!”
“What in the name of
the Lords is happening!?”
As the knights are speaking their minds, Lerrot is praying for Tenil’s sake. Commander, do not die on us!
***
The dragonic knight grabs its weapon and lunges at the humans around it. It wields the massive chunk of hulking iron with its right hand, and with its left, it tears the men of Valoria into pieces with the obsidian claws growing from the tips of its fingers.
In the blink of an eye, dozens are gutted. The dragonic knight hurls the weapon at the surrounding soldiers, the men caught in its path annihilated. Following that, the obsidian beast lunges at whoever it can find, using its claws to shred them, its fangs to bite off limbs. They can actually hit it, as it doesn’t care about defense, but no matter how hard they strike it, the obsidian armor repels them all.
The black surface of the dragonic knight is dyed red by the gore it spills. Pieces of flesh here and there garnishing its armor, it fetches its weapon and swings it again while bellowing like a real dragon. The human inside the obsidian armor has lost her reasoning and behaves like the black dragon himself.
In its dimensional prison, Aoveon nods approvingly as humans die en masse. Soon enough, the empire’s men start crying and screaming, fear overwhelming them. In a matter of minutes, it has slain hundreds. Druids high above report to their commander. At first, the report is ignored as nonsense, but when the general commanding the army climbs on top of a ballista, he can see something absurd going on in the midst of his ranks.
The empire’s horn is blown. They’re retreating because of the beast. The dragonic knight keeps butchering the soldiers unhindered. It’s as if it was darting around the battlefield and mangling those in its path.
***
Two hours later, the royal division halts its retreat after hearing a report from scouts. The empire’s army is retreating for some unknown reason. As to why the marshal ordered the retreat, the second regiment was ambushed by an enemy cavalry from an unexpected angle, so in other words, their formation was broken.
It was reported that the advancing army didn’t have any cavalry, and it was true, but somehow a cavalry numbering 500 riders emerged from Northwest. Eighty percent of the second regiment was lost to the ambush. The cavalry suffered heavy losses as well, mainly thanks to the archers and their swift response, and hence they didn’t chase the kingdom’s army. Since the royal division’s pincer formation was broken, their advantage was lost in an instant.
“Sir, may I, Corporal Lerrot of the twelfth unit of fourth regiment, lead the investigation team?”
The marshal answers, “You may. Pick five men and report to me. We will wait here and rest. You have four hours, Corporal.”
“Yes, Sir!”
Lerrot takes Eloy and three other archers with him. Footmen have heavy armors, so they’d only slow them down, hence the choice. Now that they don’t need to stay in formation, they can move faster. Overall, the mission should take only three hours at most.
Lerrot has a secret motive. He wants to see for himself if their commander has died or not. Tenil was the first female knight in the kingdom’s army. Someone like her shouldn’t die in vain, he reasons. If she is dead, he will bury her himself.
Much later when the investigation squad is about to get to the field, the eerie silence and foul smell makes them uneasy. Only three hours ago the loud thundering of the armies clashing out there was the only thing to be heard. Now, not even a bird dares to sing.
“What in the name of the King...!?” Lerrot freezes upon seeing the field.
“Holy...!”
“It can’t be...”
“Oi, what is it?” An archer who’d fallen behind asks.
The opening that was some hours ago a green, beautiful place, is now a graveyard of organic debris. Thousands upon thousands lie dead. It takes the squad a moment to realize that there is something standing in the middle.
“What’s that?” Eloy points out.
“Could it be some flag?” Lerrot wonders. “No, it’s not a flag,” he corrects himself as he realizes that it’s a person, a knight with a massive weapon. “It’s the commander!”
They sprint through the field of organic debris, hearts racing. Is she dead? Why is she there? Questions like that emerge as they get closer. But above all else, just what happened after the retreat? What was the loud roar?
“Staff Sergeant Tenil!” Eloy shouts as he gets closer.
Tenil is bloodied through and through. She has stabbed her weapon into the earth and is now kneeling before it, forehead pressing against the wide, blunt side of the red blade. Is she dead? She isn’t moving at all.
“Sir!” Lerrot shakes her shoulder.
To their relief, she utters something very weakly, a sign of life.
“Sir?”
Tenil repeats. “They were all weak...”
“Uh...?”
She turns to look at them. She is crying, and has been for a long while in fact. “I’m worse than a Demon...”
“Tenil!” Seeing that she has a mental breakdown, Lerrot speaks with a lax tone to calm her. “What happened?”
“I killed them. I killed them all.”
Her answer shakes their reasoning. What she is saying is by no means something they’d expected even in their wildest dreams. She claims to have killed at least a thousand and driven back the enemy army all alone.
“How?” Eloy asks, bewildered.
Tenil wipes her tears before she answers. “I made a last stand.”
“Then what was that roar?” Lerrot asks.
“What roar?” Tenil asks with a weak voice. “I don’t remember such.”
Lerrot concludes she must’ve found a new depth in the Bladanian battle trance. But even if that were the case, she shouldn’t be able to stand a chance against the empire on her own. It’s impossible.
“Sir, do you remember anything?” One of the other archers asks.
“Uhm, everyone retreated and I was forced to fight for my life until I lost it.”
“Is that all?”
“Please,” Tenil begs with a pleading tone, “I want to go home.”
“Understood,” Lerrot replies.
Eloy tries to pull the massive chunk of hulking iron, but he can’t make it flinch no matter how hard he tries. He suggests they leave it there, but Tenil shakes her head, refusing to leave without it. She carries it herself if she must.
Chapter Nine
Winter
The empire is crippled, not in terms of supply, but numbers. According to the scouts, the army of 25,000 that attempted to advance towards Tungon was reduced to 11,000, of which at least 5,000 were slain by Tenil, known as the Red Demon in the enemy ranks. Because of the threat of the ‘Demon,’ the empire is halting its offense. The battlefield in North close to the plains of Ymingor is at a stalemate as well. Because of the battle in the wilderness, Tenil has now earned the title Slayer of Thousand Men. Also, the battle was named as ‘Tenil’s Battle’ and the opening as ‘Tenil’s Glade’.
The following day after the battle is chaotic. No one witnessed Tenil fight, but six scouts confirmed that Tenil was the last person standing on the field, over ten thousand enemy soldiers killed. Not just that, the absurd sword of hers has caught the attention of her superiors. She refuses to hand it over to others, mainly because no one can lift it, but also because it’s not exactly hers.
In the end, Marshal Ramiel promotes her to master sergeant and gives her another badge of honor known as the Silver Bear. Thus far only four have earned the Silver Bear badge in the history of Phyr. The requirement is to make a last stand while outnumbered greatly and live to tell the tale. She is also allowed to keep the massive weapon. After all, it’s thanks to that chunk of iron that the empire is halting its advance.
It doesn’t end there. Once reinforcements arrive from East, seasoned knights from other units of the fourth regiment will be filling the twelfth unit, whereas the arriving knights fill the other undermanned units. In less than a week, Tenil will have 250 k
nights under her command. It’s the largest number a single unit in a regiment can have. To command a bigger force, she needs to be at least a second lieutenant.
As the war is at a stalemate, weeks pass with nothing but guerilla attacks here and there. The defense line at the border close to Ymingor is constantly under the pressure of empire’s offense, but for the most part, those assaults are just small pokes rather than large-scale maneuvers. Also, because of the winter, the empire doesn’t dare to advance too hastily. The soldiers need to be equipped with proper clothes before they can even consider it.
When the first snow of the winter falls, a month later that is, Tenil is already sixteen years old, and her ranks have been filled. She is constantly training her knights to adapt to her methods. She has yet to tell anyone about the dragon, and she’s begun to like Aoveon as a partner. To be able to have a chat with a Leviathan whenever she likes is entertaining. The feeling is mutual, in fact, as the black dragon likes to talk.
***
“Didn’t I tell you? You’re worse than a Demon.”
The malicious entity is invading her dreams again. She is again in a dark place where nothing exists. The voice of the creature echoes loud. The being itself is before her, its tentacles slithering in the empty space around her.
“Why are you haunting me?”
“Because you want peace where weak won’t have to die.”
“I’m abandoning that dream. I no longer fight to protect the weak. No matter what I do, they’ll die anyway.”
“It’s because you live in a dystopia.” The entity uses words Tenil doesn’t understand. “I can make an utopia for you and everyone else.”
“I don’t know the meaning of those words.”
“I will make a world where no one needs to die.”
“Why are you telling me about it?”
“Because...” the entity pauses for a moment, “the Demons need a leader, a queen.”
Languished Life Page 11