That was a disgusting man. Hans was his name. He wasn't the worst man Astrid had ever seen, he wasn't a raper or anything of the sort, but he liked to hurt people. Some kind of salve for the pain and bitterness within him, a cursed individual and one she felt endless pity for, enough to match the revulsion. It wouldn't save him from her, though. Bedecked in enchanted armor the same as all the others, with that long plume and shallow horn, she was a titan to his mouse. But eventually... She grew bored of abusing the corpse. It wasn't as nearly as exciting as she'd thought it would be. Just another disappointment, her first kill, and she felt no more or less than she had been, no epiphanies of purpose. No remorse, either, doing him in had been too easy.
She sighed. The roundshield in her hand felt so light, the blood had made her strong. While she was appreciative of it, she wasn't like Sigi. She didn't want to lord over things, she wanted a struggle that left her broken and bleeding at the end of it. A victory obviously, she didn't want to lose, but there had to be more to life than listening to droning courtiers and wearing fake smiles at galas. She wanted to taste the blood in her mouth, and by the looks of it she'd get her chance. Just not from this one, someone who hadn't trained as she did every single day was not her match.
“ASTRID!” Micah shrieked, running as fast as his frail legs could carry him. He'd taken the blood too, same as them all after a discussion, but he'd not used that part of his body for over a decade, clumsily tripping and hopping to avoid the maul that nearly took him in the crotch. It looked a bit comical, Astrid reckoned, what with the man chasing Micah being so much larger than he was. “Help me!”
“Get back here, you rat!” Klaus huffed, he'd never liked running and chasing someone that he didn't even want to fight was asking too much of him. Why did everyone run!?
Astrid blew Klaus from his feet with a lazy pointing of her spear, followed by a downward glance of disgust at the man she'd just tossed aside. She wanted to taste it, to feel the knives in her, feel something for once, but that wasn't the one either.
“You have armor, yes?” She asked Micah.
He nodded.
“You were given a weapon, yes?”
He nodded.
“Then why do you have neither on your person at this time?” Astrid frowned.
To Micah she was acting very uncharacteristic, but he'd be a fool to argue with Astrid in that moment. He didn't love the armor because it pinched his neck, but he donned it if only to ensure she'd stop glaring down at him, the new and improved version fairly similar to her own. And his legs were still so weak, worth mentioning, ensuring that he really felt the extra weight on him. But a weapon...?
“I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do with this...” He whined. Hoisting a.... A sword? It was about the thickness of a knife, a gentle curving blade the length of his arm with a hilt wrapped of cloth and a round crossguard. Single edged with a wavy taper along the blade where it'd been tempered. It was certainly very sharp, but he'd never trained with a sword before.
Astrid squinted down at him. Down. Down her nose, down because she was taller than him. Imperious. And before she spoke she blew the rising form of Klaus some ways away with her spear again, like a child putting their finger on the back of an ant and pressing down. “You swing it at people that you do not like.”
“...”
“Now you will calm yourself,” Astrid snapped, “Stop your sniveling, your retching and shaking. Open the gate, Micah, your weakness is nobodies fault but your own. Call me if you need further assistance.”
And just like that, she was gone. Tearing off into the distance after another target while the battle raged around them.
Micah watched in morbid interest as one of the orcs leaped free of her formation, her quiver emptied the woman had decided to launch herself upwards and down onto a knight. Ripped him free of his saddle, ripped him right in half, showered by the blood and roaring to the heavens, this was all too terrifying. He should be in an office somewhere, reading a book in his cushy bedroom in the estate, or snuggling with Nala.
War was good for nothing, what an awful thing. The conflict between the big man named Pattoli and that alfen woman Eve was like an earthquake occurring around him, too.
“Fuck, man....” Ignoring the complexities of generating a gate in this atmosphere and through a ward, Astrid was so mean... And 'swing it at people you do not like'!? Well, no shit! Micah had never used a weapon in his entire--
“AHHHH!” Someone roared, and Micah turned, whipping that odd sword around with absolutely no grace. Yet... He, uh...
“Huh...” Micah wondered to himself. A man had separated himself from the mass and charged him with some kind of rusty kitchen implement. Bloodshot eyes and a stain on the arming cap covering his head, wide open. Instinctual. Micah just... Well... Swung it at someone he didn't like. Cut the man clean in half from clavicle to hip, watching the two parts slip grotesquely apart. “I guess that works...”
–
“Hmm...” Rommel had taken the field to observe why nobody seemed to be responding to hails. Why Hans had consumed three haemonculi in the span of a dozen minutes and Yucca had done the same. Pattoli was the only one that was holding out, and the battle with the orcs was still raging on. More fringe elements pouring in to keep them busy. Their losses were irrelevant, but ever since Cortus had shut down the lab, there were no more haemonculi to be made. They had a limited supply, albeit stretching into the several thousands all combined. “Who is that one with the spear, in the armor with the blue tabard?”
“Astrid Stalvarg as before, the wife of your brother,” Her attendant replied. Penny, the one who was only good for her dimensional magic and completely useless otherwise. A small and shy girl with curly brown hair and an upturned nose always pointed at the ground.
“She's very impressive,” Not a lie in the least. The woman was possibly one of the best light mages Rommel had ever seen, and very competent with the spear. She was no archmage just yet, but light was a troublesome element to deal with in a way that others were not. People didn't ward against light commonly, why would they? Any healing spells would slap impotently against their own wards. But when used in the right way...
As if to accentuate the point about to be made, the woman wreathed in white armor splayed the fingers of one hand on Hans' face while her spear threw Yucca from her feet. Klaus was on the ground moaning, Pattoli still engaged with the alf in a wilting storm of fisticuffs. That alfen was terrifying in and of herself, every time Pattoli managed a proper strike, she gave it right back, some unique form of magic completely mangling the big man in a mass eruption that pitted the ground. Of all of them, all told, Rommel considered that one the biggest threat, but Pattoli had many bodies and very nearby, the alfen only had the one.
She watched on with a distinct lack of empathy as Hans bloated up like a balloon, body riddled with an obscene amount of tumors, cancerous growths bursting from him. Skin splitting and sloughing off as he screamed in anguish, something that wouldn't let him die, only suffer on until it reached his brain or the bloating put too much pressure on his heart. Back arched and three times the size as when he'd begun, he finally popped into a spray of crimson mulch. It was disgusting, but effective. No light constructs necessary, those were whirling around in a razor sharp hail that was currently flaying Klaus alive. A few dozen seconds later and he was back and running past Rommel with a grimace on his face, back to the literal grinder.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
None of them liked that feeling of being risen, hands scrabbling about their new body in memory of what it'd felt like to die. None of them had expected Astrid Stalvarg to match three of them by herself...
“I'm engaging, hold the tent,” Rommel sighed.
“Yes ma'am,” Penny replied sheepishly.
Rommel shot off, using light infusion to fill her limbs as the artifacts she wore took her beyond human capabilities. Tearing her muscles and repairing them in an endless loop of sharp pangs that shot through her.
Raj, take Hans and be ready.
Acknowledged.
Fuck off.
Ignoring Han's less than ideal response, she pelted across the ground just behind Klaus. Sweeping in low at his hips, watching how easily he was blasted off his feet by the woman before her. Their list had included three irregulars. Alexis Goldmane for her phenomenal mastery of the wind element, what they'd call storm magic after a discussion. Sigi Stalvarg with her odd hybrid air, earth, and water magic – calamity or disaster magic by another name. And Tyr, for obvious reasons.
They weren't such explicit threats in the grander scheme of things, but they were on that list for many reasons. The fact that their magic was so bizarrely difficult to ward against, and the unlikelihood of them retreating most relevant of all. Astrid Stalvarg had not been on said list, but Rommel now realized she should have been, perhaps at the top of it. A consummate mage in general, but her light projection and constructs were amazing in their intricacy. A talent that didn't come commonly, even to the rare mage with light being their prime element.
As it stood, and if not for her status as a single element mage, Rommel could've been an archmage at the junior level herself. That term was worthless, of course, a joke of a title for academics to preen over. It meant nothing regarding affinity for the martial, half of them were all scrawny bookworms in any case. But even so, Rommel's first bolt of light split and targeting the woman veered off course with a look. Strong. Astrid was insanely able and had a mastery that transcended common sense given their respective ages, cool and unyielding, with a great deal of training in the martial too. Astrid should've been about 23 years old and Rommel was twice that. The youngest daughter of Jartor, in her 40's, scowling at the fact that she sincerely doubted she could beat this younger woman in a duel.
Rommel tried to come up with some kind of solution. The orcs were displaying untold mastery on the battlefield and things were not looking good for the crusade army.
First was the fact that they used tactics akin to the nomadic kijin tribes, but with no need for horses, running and firing in tandem as though they were mounted archers. Second was the magic they were wielding, old magic. That of elemental shamans. Their offhand limbs becoming pliable stone to serve as both shield and weapon alike. They needed to eliminate high priority targets as soon as humanly possible so that their own force multipliers could join the battle. Astrid alone was occupying the attention of four mages now, by herself... If the alfen woman managed to cook off on Pattoli, this would very rapidly become disastrous.
They connected, both women utilizing spears of a different stripe. Astrid favored a rather unique build of polearm. A hasta, a bit shorter than what one would consider a 'spear', only slightly taller than she was, designed to be used with a shield. Light and entirely cast of metal, with an overlong blade designed for cutting and punching alike. Whereas Rommel wielded her own North Varian guisarme in both hands. It was troublesome, not only was the woman competent in magic but she was clearly drilled in the martial, expertly navigating her roundshield wherever it was needed. Every movement was predicated around keeping that shield up, allowing the momentum to carry her around in slick rotations.
Astrid found like she'd a viper in one hand and a castle wall in the other, even Klaus coming in tight and swinging with all his might did not dislodge her block.
The irritating young woman angled that shield when Rommel intended to snake in with a hook around the rim, staring back with cool blue eyes and jabbing with commensurate speed. The Oresundian breaker style that involved keeping one's center of gravity low and loose to their root, squatting down and stabbing upwards to catch the gap between gorget and helm.
Shieldmaiden. Rommel frowned.
Shields weren't abundantly common in the era with magic and artifacts so proliferate, for very obvious reasons, not for mages. But Oresundians favored their shields and tight formations, in a time of human history where common sense might dictate otherwise. And despite their personality profile on Astrid Stalvarg, her brutal efficiency was almost laughable. Not in the sense that it wasn't a skilled opponent Rommel was facing off against, but because the woman fought with great skill and ferocity that belied her 'bubbly' and 'ditsy' persona. Astrid Stalvarg was nothing like she'd been observed to be, she was cold, frigid, with a sublime lack of hesitation and a seeming joy for repeatedly slaughtering those who assaulted her.
The information they'd gathered said each of them had committed themselves to weaponry, but not this woman. Never had it mentioned Astrid fighting or dueling anyone at all, not in the academy, not in private, and yet somehow she managed to be this good...
Rommel was harried from all directions by every single element. Silent cast, no signing, all while still manipulating her enchanted shield to block all attempt at assault. Astrid wasn't an adept, but she fought like one, not keeping to the frail mindset that made true mages such easy targets.
She hopped to accept Klaus' shockwave magic, twirling through the air to disperse the force. Ensuring that even when he was at her back her shield was in the right place, dexterous and agile in an otherwise heavy looking suit of armor. And she rolled her shoulders expertly, ensuring that Rommel's superior reach was made useless by rotating platforms of compacted earth that moved her with no need of stepping herself. Unflagging. Implacable. And she truly seemed to be enjoying this.
In their duel she'd killed Klaus twice, managing to smash Yucca's darkness apart and flay her in the process. A cool, calculating mind. Freeing up the half orc to harass Pattoli and throw an otherwise equal contest into disarray. Rommel relaxed, standing still for a moment. Taking in the beating warmth of the sun and staring back at the younger woman. But Astrid did not do the same, all to be seen was that wicked suit of black armor and the focused eyes, slit, barely visible above the lip of he shield.
Waiting for a recommencement of the duel, a vicious sado-masochist by the looks of it – a personality hidden. Rommel could relate to that herself, courtly politics and intrigues had always unnerved her, the way women were expected to act.
“I have not fought with someone of such ability in some time,” Rommel sighed. “You are very talented.”
“I know,” Astrid replied, still glaring but not pushing her position – ready for the interlopers to come again. They did, Klaus, a blur of movement to the side and not a glance at him before his unarmored head was smashed to pulp with a backhanded blow. And so it seemed to become abundantly clear that Astrid had toying with them all from the start, Rommel shivered just seeing the cold efficiency present in her. “You cannot beat me.”
“That's true,” Rommel nodded. Her skill had never been in a brawl, it had always been recruiting and strategy, finding the right talent for Hastur, ever since it had been just her and Pattoli. The original 'Fingers' of a sort, the beginning of their new order. “I can't win. Klaus and I, even together, are not your opponents. But why are you our opponent? Why do you resist? Is it out of some loyalty for a husband who barely notices you, and a nation that does not even know your name? Yet if you were with us, all would.”
Astrid didn't laugh, didn't snort, didn't squint or react in anger. None of the telltale signs of rising to her bait as so many people had in the past. “I do not need these things. All will know my name, and yet I will feel no interest in hearing them speak it.”
“What do you need?” Rommel asked, genuinely curious, an eyebrow arched in the asking of it.
“This,” Astrid's voice was clear, none of that tinny sound so common of people wearing a helmet. “To stay in this moment forever, until I am bleeding and leaking and ragged, and heaving in the breaths I take when I smash the last of these walking corpses you weakling wretches keep bringing me.”