The White Beard Regiment survived the volley of arrows, but Mairek didn't feel like he'd survived. His hands shook from where he crouched beneath linked shields, shields that occasionally shattered under the hail of barbed tipped arrows. Pep, the newest recruit to the Regiment, laughed like a fool while pressing himself to Dhiliaf so as to be under the cover of the large man's wooden shield.

"Someone shut that cunt up!" Goki's command was muffled by the blade of grass he chewed. Pep continued with his laughter and Mairek wondered whether the young man had lost his mind.

"You'll get used to it." Memo said from his left, his shield locked above him with Nohj's shield from the right. Mairek's trembling apparently wasn't confined to his hands alone, a brief flash of shame is all he allowed himself as his game of playing pretend soldier slowly unraveled before everyone's eyes.

"I'm not cut out for this." He said. He could hear the arrow that was to land on top of him whistle through the air. He couldn't move, doing so would be catastrophic. He didn't know how the catastrophe would come about but he couldn't risk going against the will of time. Luckily, the arrow landed on Nohj's shield.

"None of us are cut out for this." Nohj said and Mairek took a grunt from behind as assent from a fellow soldier.

A head rolling away from its body.

Mairek gasped. The hail of arrows came to a slow end. Within the darkness of the raised shields few could tell where the arrows had passed through and met flesh. But Mairek could smell the blood, hear the groans of pain and even see the crimson flow from those with arrows sticking out of them. Still, the thing he could perceive the most broke his heart as he knew it would those around him.

Pep continued his manic laughter forcing Dhiliaf to shove him away but that did little to curb the lad's insanity. Word from the front passed down the line. From Captain to Lieutenant to Sergeant and finally to soldier.

Mairek heard Gans spit out his blade of grass. "Men." He said from somewhere ahead, loud enough for everyone compacted at the Army's tail where the least combat capable Regiments that contained mostly scouts had been placed. "King Gans is dead."

A soldier to the distant left lowered his shield at Goki's words, earning curses from those who'd been cowering beneath it. Silence engulfed the army as each was lost to their thoughts. Even Pep had gone silent. Nohj's breathing beside Mairek sounded labored, the man was clearly fighting a panic attack while shaking his shaggy white hair.

"Nohj, you okay?" Memo asked. Clearly taking note of Nohj's distress.

"No.. I.. No." Nohj answered. Mairek could hear soldiers turn to the direction of his voice. "We're all going to die." Nohj voiced everyone's thoughts. King Gans had been part of the reason the soldiers had stayed back to fight Binoria's reign of tyranny. In their collective minds they had seen themselves fighting to their deaths alongside their King, an act of valiance that would guarantee them a place at Tabrimas and in the minds and hearts of the whole of Talisi. Now the King was dead and the fighting hadn't even started. What symbol would they get behind now? What cause would solidify their stance once the Legions engaged? They needed someone to lead them. They needed someone insane enough to rally behind so as to give strength to their every action in the face of death.

A Telinete's bellow sounded and beneath it a singular war cry too low for anyone other than Mairek to hear. The Talisi young man from Jamou smiled at the sound of his fellow villager. A smile he shared with Pep.

"Of course we are all going to die. But this time. We'll take as many of them as we can down with us." Pep said and Dhiliaf slapped him playfully on the shoulder, almost sending him to the ground.

This time.

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Three horns sounded from ahead.

"You heard the lad!" Goki shouted. "Spears up! The Binorians are charging."

Mairek clutched his spear, the trembling hadn't subsided but he doubted it was still born of fear. No, it was something else.

A shout from the distant right at the same time as from the far left.

"What is it?" Goki asked.

"Horses Sergeant! Gods! A cavalry charge from both directions coming to hit our flanks." A soldier said, panic riddled his voice.

"Light infantry coming in from the front too Serge!" Another soldier said from up ahead. No doubt a messenger from the Lieutenant up front.

A moment passed before Goki spoke. "Alright, let's kill these perfumed assholes."

The Sergeant's words were met with silence, everyone had heard the underlying fear and resignation in them.

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Edda watched as Vayin Vigon stood beside Rehny's kneeling corpse, regarding it with an indifference that spoke of familiarity. The King was after all the harbinger of death, this was a casual night for him.

She did not know why the former Commander's death affected her so. The tears trailing down her cheeks startled her as she remembered his words that spoke of a thirst that could only be quenched by witnessing something new. Something that could take him from the circle he'd walked around one too many times. Seeing Rehny's kneeling lifeless form with a sword plunged in from his front to stick out his back, Edda realized the luxury of something new was nothing but a fleeting thought within the realm. Here she was, bearing witness to something she'd seen once before within a dungeon cell. There was nothing new this life had to offer.

Ishar emerged and approached where Vayin was while standing upon Carrot's snout. The beast raised him high and the young Kolotian, who was clad in a variety of different colored pieces of armor, turned his head from King Gans's headless corpse to Rehny's impaled corpse with its chin resting on its breastplate.

Vayin Vigon raised a hand and traced a circle with two extended fingers. Three horns sounded and a cavalry broke from the eastern and western wings of the Legions, charging straight for the Talisi Green Army with an enfilade in mind. In a couple of moments the cavalry would hit and the Green Army's structure would break. Just like their King.

Vayin raised one finger, curled it into a hook and tugged his arm down twice. The Seventh Legion behind him advanced at a slow march. All the while Vayin Vigon kept his eyes on Ishar, the latter did not meet Vayin's gaze as his violet eyes never stopped shifting from the dead King's head to the dead former Commander.

Edda's grip on her blade tightened but the blade seemed weighted down by despair and incapable of being raised as she watched the Seventh Legion advance on their position, breaking free of the other Legions to encompass their King. She knew all about Binorian military tactics, the seventh always fought while cresting around their King. Vayin meant to charge into their midst with his most elite flanking him and Talisi's only source of hope stood frozen upon a Rhino's snout, transfixed by the sight of the dead.

"Meena is above all, as you will soon come to lea-" Vayin's words were cut short as Ishar's eyes abruptly glowed amber, the Kolotian leaned back and let out an anguished cry that was highlighted by Carrot's bellow. The sound rattled Edda's bones to the core. Anger suddenly coalesced within her, born of the pain of loss. The anger morphed into rage, from rage it carried on to something that could only be deemed as animalistic, chaotic or mad. She raised her blade and to her mild surprise the soldiers around her angled their spears too at the incoming Legion. All despair had vanished. Her thoughts and feelings were a jumble, twisted and malformed into something that could not be defined, only directed. And it was at the Binorians she chose to direct it. The soldier to her right moved forward with a growl, Edda turned to face him, pleased with his enthusiasm and unmindful of his eyes that were glowing amber.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Ishar's Telinete Rhino bellowed once more and this time its rider's voice could be heard by all, mad in its melody, tinged with chaos for its range had no order.

Mairek tried to peer through the bodies at his sides from where he stood, seeking to spot the incoming cavalry whose hooves he could hear. A head turned to face him and Mairek saw an amber glow in the soldier's eyes, causing him to gasp. Nohj from beside him had stopped his labored breathing, Mairek turned to him and saw the manic grin on the soldier's face and a faint amber glow dancing within his eyes.

Pep laughed once more and Mairek could see the same amber gleam from within the scrawny lad's face. "By dawn I shall be dancing within the golden halls of Tabrimas."

From up ahead, Goki looked back and Mairek flinched at the same amber glow within his eyes, framed beneath by his massive white beard. "Right you are Pep, and I shall be there watching you."

This brought laughter from the rest of the White Beard Regiment, laughter that was void of fear. Ignorant of the impending doom if not eager for it.

Mairek's trembling heightened.

Ishar, Gods! What have you done!