Ulia made it her priority to get everyone out of the temple, and then forced herself to help with the evacuation. She was a warrior, and she knew that every last warrior was needed... but she had twice in her life been seen people retreating from a city, and she knew it was chaos.
Once had been her home, when she was younger. Her younger sister had been trampled and lost in the crowd, and she had never forgiven herself for letting go of the other girl's hand. The second time had been a city full of enemies, and while she had less pity for them, she had found far too many civilians, too many children left behind, wounded by the crowd... as well as a great number of rich merchants and nobles clearly betrayed and robbed by their own guards and servants.
So she jumped and climbed her way across town with her new best friend, a glowing scimitar that managed to stay put in her belt without a sheath, in a position that didn't inconvenience her at all. The fact that she knew nothing of the man attached to it meant nothing; she had a duty, and the two of them would see it done.
Her time arts helped, as did a blessing from the God of Eyes. Too often, she sensed something amiss but didn't have time to process it; she didn't have the stamina to use her Arts more than sparingly, not considering how much there was to do, but when she felt confusion over a situation, it helped that she could take a moment longer than she would otherwise have to process it. More than once, she jumped down to body-block someone until a person who'd tripped could get up, and her positioning on the roofs helped her notice people who were overcome with fear and cowered along the edges of the road.
Back and forth she weaved, trying to keep ahead of the trailing edge of the panicked citizens, using the God of Eyes' blessing to keep an eye on as many people as she could. She didn't notice or care what happened behind, not as long as it didn't seem to threaten her immediately; that was helped immensely by the fact that a large number of city guard and Temple Blades were keeping up the rear.
It felt... honestly very strange that the evacuation was going so well. It felt strange to be acting in the night, far from where the enemy should have been. But Ulia had seen the enemy army herself, and there was no army in the city to match it. If every Blade could take on a Company by herself, perhaps, but Ulia knew the legend of these weapons... and she knew that they faded over time.
The blades of the Fallen were not meant to rise again. Once they were used, they were gone. The weight hanging from her belt did not seem to mind, did not seem to care about himself. Nor did she, nor would she. Battles were for armies, and there would be a time soon when she would have to put her life on the line. For now, this was a better use for someone with her skills.
For as long as they could, they would hold off the death, the end of all things. In her mind, this was what warriors lived for, trained for--not the act of killing, but the point of killing. She had done her share of killing, even senseless killing, in the past. But today, as long as the enemy wanted to slaughter them, the Blades would would not permit it.
She would not permit it.
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Chibal made a stop by her room to pick up her other set of three linked swords, bringing her total to six. Although she was not terribly good with two sets, and dislike carrying them for their weight if nothing else, this exactly the sort of fight in which she could acknowledge their use: narrow streets, a defensive action, darkness. There were more opportunities for surprise attacks, more places where she could bottleneck foes, more places where she might be forced to leave a blade behind, caught under rubble or stuck in an enemy.
For that reason, when a blade of the Fallen came to her, she ignored it, and it moved on to find another wielder. While she would doubtless have done well with a weapon of the goddess, she would be forced to leave behind a lot of magic swords, or carry their weight and be unable to use them.
She didn't need the blade, anyway. She helped Ulia finish evacuating the temple, and then with a thought, jammed one of her linked blades into the side of the bridge. Using the strong magical connection between them, she lowered herself slowly all the way to the ground. She searched for and found a contingent of guards and Blades eager to fight--about four squads total, two of Guards, one of Blades, and around a squad's worth of mixed. All of the Temple Blades were armed with a Fallen blade, which Chibal knew would help, although she had no idea to what extent.
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Although she had already seen the size of the enemy army, and couldn't put that thought out of her head, she wasn't sure yet what their intentions and tactics were, and they would need to at least skirmish with them to figure that out. While she wasn't the greatest strategist of the temple--Miana was better at that than she was--she had been appointed a Commander after her own fell, and survived two weeks of hard combat on the front lines before a replacement could be found. In that time, she'd learned that she had a knack for out-thinking enemy commanders, although she didn't like leading.
Nor did she want to lead tonight, but the fear and confusion was palpable. As little as Chibal knew about the situation, that knowledge placed her firmly in command, and it seemed to settle everyone's nerves to be led by someone who understood. Chibal could accept that... as long as it didn't go on forever.
The Blades all prayed to the Goddess, as did Chibal, but she could tell that the blessing from Miana was significantly weaker than... than before. The other Blades also seemed to sense it, and Chibal could tell that it was wearing at them. With that, and because she knew it was appropriate, Chibal also led the group in praying to Xethram. This night, they needed his eyes, and each person who received his blessing nodded, impressed with the improvement in their dark vision. The moved as quietly as they could to the enemy's flank, and when they had no cover left to hide behind, charged.
The enemy was ready, of course. Although they had no torches on the periphery, they did have a wall of tower shields, and they were very much on guard. Even so, the weapons of the Goddess were potent, and in the darkness, the city's four squads tore through four times their number with frightening speed.
That speed was, of course, only enough to get them deeper into trouble. Spears and tower shields appeared out of the darkness to surround them, and elemental power surged around them. Flashes of fire and light cut into Chibal's allies, and although she used her swords to jump and escape, and others seemed to find ways out through the powers of the Goddess, too many fell.
Chibal processed what she was seeing as quickly as she could. There was a tension in the air among the enemy, a tension that heightened as soon as her group had struck and didn't lower. They had clearly expected this to be an ambush and a slaughter, followed by a complete rout of the survivors. This, she had to admit, they owed entirely to the God of Eyes: instead of that slaughter, she was here striking back at them before they were even fully set up.
Chibal eyed those in the chain of command that she could reach with her blades, but they were low-rankers, too easily replaced to be worth sacrificing herself to kill. The real targets were surrounded by the rest of the army, out of reach unless she was willing to definitely die, rather than the reasonably likely death that awaited her if she skirmished too long around the edges.
This would be easier once the enemy army spread out through the city... but the Necromancer that had killed the goddess and stolen her power had still not appeared. Chibal had to assume that once he did, any advantage that the elites like her posed would dwindle immediately.
"This way!" Chibal landed in a position to open a spot in the enemy shield wall, and cleaned out a small area, using quick motions of her linked blades to stab into enemies from their blind spots, her blades impossible to track in the night, and led the group out. Her squads--less than three left at this point--cut through a number of enemies along the way but lost a few of their own. The point of this skirmish was not to win, though.
But suddenly, so suddenly that she almost didn't notice, she found she had a sick feeling in her stomach. As soon as they broke through, Chibal gestured and shouted to the others. "Regroup! Into the city. Something's changed. Hurry!"
To their credit, they all seemed to sense it too--at least, the Blades did, as did the guards who picked up or were chosen by one of the Fallen blades. The group scattered into the city, sacrificing their formation to make the getaway easier. Chibal found a narrow gap through the wreckage of the bridge that meant she wouldn't have to climb over it, and, trying to ignore the ruins of her home, did her best to stay on alert and see what was stalking them.
And then, in Chibal's mind, she heard a voice, feminine and slimy.
Ah... I was wondering where these pests came from... and now I sense a presence... the presence of a god, or perhaps two? This will not stand... no, no, I will not allow you to stand in my way. Fie on the gods, and to hell with mankind. ROT!
Out of the shadows, shadows too deep even for the God of Eyes to see into, suddenly shapes appeared. Chibal was not the first one to recognize the shape of it, but when a nearby guard's halberd cut into the shape it erupted into a blast of fire, singeing the attacker and lighting up the night, and she knew immediately.
They were too far from any deep crack or crevice for those goblins to have shown up naturally. The enemy could summon them, as she had summoned their entire army. Chibal took half a moment to wonder if the goblins would attack their "allies" as well, but at this point, it didn't matter, not in the slightest.
Their homes would be destroyed, their fallen allies not merely killed but eaten, desecrated. They had to escape, and hurry.