“This is madness…,” Lillian uttered as she looked down on countless black dots across a plain from top of a wall. Her face was full of shock and fear. Yes, she had been made aware of the numbers, but to see it in actuality, it shook her to her very core. The monsters were everywhere as far as her eyes could see with siege towers standing here and there.
“Most of them appear to be orcs,” remarked a hooded woman next to her. Her name was Fekete and was a sort of lieutenant to Lillian. Her support team had largely turned into a ranged slash support unit. The majority of her men were either civilians or former soldiers who were crippled. Interestingly, one third of them were women, and she found Fekete the most competent and named her to be a lieutenant. As for the orcs, their armors were rudimentary with simple iron plates attached crudely to their body parts with leather strips. Their weapons, mostly broadswords, were all rusted, making it more of a blunt stick than a proper sword. Interestingly, none of them appeared to be wearing a helmet which was considered rather important for besiegers. After all, not wearing a helmet would leave their heads exposed to arrows and whatnot from above.
“They are not attacking right away. It’s as if they are waiting for an order,” Lillian remarked as she carefully observed the massive waves of black dots down below.
Monsters were generally understood as unintelligent and were believed to act on instinct and impulses. The fact that they seemed to be waiting for an order before the attack meant such a belief was most likely wrong.
“Report!” Karsten’s voice roared as he made his way to the top of the wall, waving his fur cloak. A soldier who was better armored than anyone else ran up to him and leaned forward.
“Milord, the horde is in sight.”
“And they are not attacking?”
“No, it looks as if they are waiting for some sort of order.”
“Are you implying that they are intelligent enough to understand a language?”
The soldier did not answer him.
“Damn it,” Karsten growled. Fighting unintelligent and mindless monsters was going to be easier. With a long sigh, he looked ahead. She approached her father carefully and told him in an almost whispering tone.
“Maybe, they are not attacking so that we can escape?”
“And why would they want to spare us?”
“I … don’t know.”
“Don’t be silly, girl. If they wanted us to live, this whole ordeal would never be upon us to begin with.”
She couldn’t argue with the point. Then a very loud horn was heard from a distance which startled everyone, bar Karsten who remained still with his eyes fixed forward.
“So it begins,” he whispered, then he shouted, “Raise the alarm! Men, grab your spears!”
A soldier nearby dashed to a bell attached to a wooden pole and began to ring it viciously. Those assigned to a spearman role grabbed long spears at once and aimed it at embrasures. They would strike down any monsters that could climb up. Between the spears, there were men with swords who were down on one knee, ready to attack any monsters that got away from the initial spear attacks. This was a typical castle defense formation. Meanwhile, Lillian ordered her men on the wall to fire arrows at will. Thus, the besieging began. Orcs laid down ladders on walls, and siege towers approached the keep at a slow pace.
“Target the siege towers! Use fire arrows!” Lillian barked out an order, pointing her finger at the approaching siege towers. Her unit was trained for archery only briefly, meaning their accuracy was mediocre at best. Still, a siege tower was a large object, and therefore hardly anyone from her unit missed and set an approaching siege tower in flames soon enough. Orcs inside jumped off, some of them falling straight to their death.
“Yes!” She clenched her fist in a victorious mood.
“You fool!” Karsten warned with a roaring voice. “That is just one of many! Don’t get worked up!”
Snapping out of her uplifted mood, she looked around and indeed there were many, many, more siege towers approaching. She could see at least ten within her vision. Blinking her eyes to draw in the reality of the situation, she barked out an order to focus fire on the next siege tower. Meanwhile, the spearmen were systematically either pushing off or piercing orcs that were reaching the top of ladders. Some men were actively pushing ladders off the walls with a stick with a crescent-shape metal on its end. Everyone was working like a well-oiled machine at the moment, and this was expected since these soldiers were former members of the royal army. They were highly trained and well disciplined men, not to mention they were also experienced. Karsten was barking out order after order while he was running around the walls, making sure that everyone was doing their job as instructed. If required, he assisted in stopping monsters as well. Meanwhile, Lillian was doing her part with her archers, setting siege towers ablaze. For the early hours, the defense of the keep was water-tight. In fact, for the first day, not a single orc managed to set foot on the wall. The first sign of trouble occurred when Lillan felt her vision blurring all of a sudden.
“What the?” She mused aloud. Her head was starting to feel light as well. “What’s going on? What’s gotten into me? I feel … dizzy.”
“Milady, you’ve been fighting for a whole day without drinking or eating anything!” Fekete warned. She had apparently been going for an entire day commanding her unit non-stop.
“I shall take command for now. Please go back down and rest.”
“But haven’t you been with me the whole day as well?”
“True, but not all of us can rest. For us to endure this, we must take shifts. Please go get something to eat and rest up.”
She looked around to see visibly tired soldiers on the walls. Her father was nowhere to be seen in addition.
“The lord has gone down to take a rest. He knows the routine, milady,” Fekete said. Her body was sending signals that she must rest and she wasn’t going to ignore such calls.
“M, make sure that the siege engines…”
Fekete interjected, “Yes, we are all fully aware of our job. Now, please go.” Unlike Lillian who had never done any physical labor in her whole life, Fekete was a commoner woman who had gone through many hardships of her own, meaning she was able to hang on far better than the once-princess. In fact, Lillian never made it down. She simply collapsed soon after, tumbling down hopelessly until she was caught by Fekete. She could have hurt herself pretty badly otherwise.
It took her half a day to regain consciousness, and she found every fiber of muscles deeply sore.
“AAAAAARGH!” was the first thing she said, or screamed, when she opened her eyes at last. Her high-pitched scream echoed slightly in the room. “Where … am I? What happened?”
Soon enough she was able to piece together what happened.
“Right…, I must have passed out. How long has it been? Is … anyone out there?!”
There was no response. Instead, she could hear distant clashes of weapons. She checked herself and found that she was wearing a plain gray robe. Fortunately, there was a cloth rack in a corner where her original clothes were along with her sword. She dressed in her attire swiftly, drew out her sword, and carefully opened the door a bit. While she could still hear the distant clash of weapons, it didn’t appear that the monsters had crossed the walls. Gulping and holding onto her blade nervously, she took great care in her steps. She could hear the clashes of weapons closing in as she navigated her way out of a short hallway. A flurry of snow was what welcomed her vision as she exited the main keep structure. She looked up immediately to find the wall still secure; a line of soldiers were thrusting their spears like clockwork.
“Phew.” Letting out a breath of relief, she took a short walk around the main courtyard. Her whole body felt very sore, and she wasn’t sure whether she could be useful on the frontline.
“I guess this is what you get for never working…,” she whispered to herself while trying to loosen up her stiff and sore limbs. She was awkwardly walking with a very much unlady-like posture. Thankfully, due to the chaos above, no one was really paying any attention to her. The courtyard was eerily empty and quiet, and her steps onto snow were heard rather loudly. At one point, a maid found her.
“Milady, you are awake. I was worried to find you not present in the room.”
“I am fine,” she replied back and added in a whispering tone, “Mostly.” Then she raised back her voice. “How is the battle? I take it that we are holding firm.”
“The men know what they are doing,” she responded calmly with her hands in front. She certainly didn't look like she was lying with her calm voice.
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“I will join them shortly. I am just … trying to loosen my stiff body.”
“As you wish.”
There were approximately 4,800 defenders and 300 support personnel. These people were more than enough to fully defend the wall and then some because it required about five hundred men to fully defend the walls in the formation they required. In other words, they were able to successfully shift defenders about every eight hours. Anyone who was remotely wounded was taken off and was treated right away in order to reduce any fatalities. If a wall required immediate assistance due to being overwhelmed, men from reserve were immediately sent out to push back monsters. This was working only because the keep was relatively small. If the 5,000 soldiers had to defend a very long wall like Suvi, the defense would have crumbled already for being spread out too thin. Of course, this didn’t mean they were going to survive. The keep was going to fall eventually at any rate unless reinforcements would arrive and break the siege. Still, for the defenders, supplies weren’t an issue at least. They had a year worth of food along with plenty of scrap metals and basic medical supplies. As long as their morale was maintained, they were going to hold the line for a long time.
When she finally made her way onto the top of a wall, where her unit was present last time, she found the defenders systematically fending off orcs that were climbing up via ladders. Looking further, she saw countless burnt-down siege towers. It looked like none of them made it to the walls.
“Impressive,” she whispered. And her unit was still there although Fekete was nowhere to be seen.
“Where is Fekete?”
“She went down for a break. In fact, half of us are on a break.”
“Half?!”
Looking around, she did notice that the number was clearly less and understood why instantly. Just like she did, they needed to take a break as well.
“Feels anticlimactic, really,” she muttered. She expected a dire tug between life and death, yet the reality was such that she was observing it in peace.
“These monsters don’t have a soul.” Karsten’s voice was heard from behind. Turning around, she found her father standing before her.
“Fa…, Lord Karsten.”
“These monsters are behaving like a hive mind. There are a lot of them, yes, but they don’t act like individuals.”
“Um, I am not quite sure what you are saying…”
He pointed his index finger somewhere. “Look.” An orc was about to climb to the top of a ladder at which point it would attempt to reach the wall via an embrasure. Of course, it would be attacked by a spear at this point and it would fall down. And it did.
“If they were sentient and had any sign of intelligence, they would try to come up with other ways to get around that trap. But they haven’t. They clearly don’t have any attachment to their lives, either. It feels like they are being commanded, probably by the dragon.”
Narrowing her eyes, Lillian studied the orcs’ behaviors for a moment, and her father seemed to be correct in his assessment. They didn’t seem to have any care for their lives and were climbing the ladders mathematically without any deviation. They would climb the ladder, get pierced by a spear, and then fall to their probable death.
“Therefore, I’ve instructed men not to push over the ladders. It’s easier this way; we can thin their numbers down.”
“Are you saying we can survive this?”
He folded his arms with a grim look. “Uncertain. For the time being at least, we are not in any sort of danger. I reckon this will change eventually. When, I am not certain.”
She felt like her whole body had lost its strength. Karsten rushed in to support her by grabbing her upper arm.
“Easy, girl,” he said.
“I … I feel exhausted.”
He grinned as if he was aware of what she was going through. “That’s what happens when determination to fight weakens. You were prepared to fight tooth and nail, and it feels anticlimactic, yes?”
She nodded slowly with amused eyes.
“It’s only natural to feel that way, but the battle is far from over. I can guarantee that this is just a beginning. Hold yourself together.”
“Yes, fa - Lord Karsten.”
“Now go get some rest. You are not needed here, for now.”
As Lillian rested for a few days to recover from sore muscles, she grew an urge to explore the secret route. She wasn’t planning to escape but rather wanted to make sure that it was a functional route to use.
“Interesting, I wasn’t aware of this,” said Fekete, who was always hooded even indoors. A sad fact was that she had a large scar on her cheek, and she wanted to hide it, thus she grew a habit of donning a hooded cloak or robe almost always.
“I am not even sure the route is clear,” Lillian replied. It was just the two of them in the basement which was full of sacks of wheat and other supplies. In fact, they had to relocate several sacks away just to reveal the spot, which wasn’t an easy task for just two women.
“And I want to make sure that this route works.”
“I can’t have you crawl into the hole. I will do it,” Fekete volunteered. Lillian didn’t object; she wasn’t keen on crawling anyway. Getting down on all four, she slowly made it into the tunnel. She would come out after roughly ten minutes. Since it was just big enough for a person to crawl through, she had to come out her bottom first; there was no space to turn around. She coughed a few times after breathing in the dusty hole.
“The route is mostly clear, but I couldn’t reach the end. There were some rocks that needed to be removed.”
This seemingly simple task was easier said than done because of the size of the tunnel. Fekete, a woman, was barely able to traverse the tunnel. Clearing it out was going to be an ordeal itself.
“Do you think you can clear out the rocks?”
“I could. This is going to take some time, tho -”
Both women froze at once because they heard something.
“Do you hear what I am hearing?” Lillian asked.
They were hearing pickaxes faintly from somewhere. While Lillan remained clueless, Fekete’s face became pale as a ghost. She dashed out of the basement, and Karsten soon arrived thereafter.
“What’s going on?” Lillian wondered aloud. As soon as Karsten heard the pickaxes, he dashed out as well and brought in fully armed men. Fekete arrived soon after.
“Relocate the supplies! We have sappers!” He shouted.
“Sappers?” Lillian wondered aloud.
“They are digging underground to reach the keep, Milady!” Fekete explained to her at last.
“I thought it was too easy!” Karsten muttered. “The attack on the walls is an act!” Men poured in and rushed to get all supplies out of the basement. Just when the men were almost done with carrying supplies out, a wall crumbled, and a group of goblins with pickaxes poured inside of the basement. The first thing they did was they threw their torches, expecting to set fire on wheat sacks. Of course, as soon as they realized that the basement was very much empty, they were confused for a moment.
“Csat now!!!” Karsten drew out his sword and pointed at the goblins. They were waiting just outside of the basement, by stairs.
“Elementals of fire, heed my call. Grant me a ball of fire to exterminate them: Fireball!”
A fire mage cast his spell incarnation swiftly to conjure up a ball of fire and threw it into the basement. As soon as the soldiers saw the ball of fire going in, they shut the door firm and leaned against it. The door buckled slightly soon. After a brief moment, they opened the door and men charged in. The fireball caused a fiery explosion within the basement and killed all goblins inside, leaving nothing but black ash. Still, some were left alive within the tunnel in a weakened state. It was the men’s job to finish them off. However, they couldn’t enter the tunnel.
“What shall we do about the tunnel?” A soldier asked Karsten. There was a gaping hole on a wall that was about the size of two goblins standing next to each other. It was obviously not tall enough for an average person to stand up in there. They had the option to block it.
“I assume they will use this tunnel to infiltrate. Leave it be. This is our new front now,” he replied. “Blocking it won’t do anything. They will just barge in again.”
“Lord Karsten, what shall we do about the food and supplies?” Lillian asked.
“It’s good that we are in the North. I reckon leaving them in the courtyard will do just fine.”
Dried and powdered wheat already had a very long shelf life. And, being under the freezing temperature meant that their food supplies weren’t going to go bad, and they didn’t need to worry about rain soaking the food sacks, either. The same applied for other supplies also. He turned to his daughter and asked.
“Why were you in the basement in the first place?”
She didn’t feel the need to lie, thus she told him earnestly.
“I’ve found a hidden tunnel, likely an escape route. Fekete and I were inspecting it.”
“Where is it?”
She pointed at a corner, and he approached it at once.
“Is the route clear?”
“No, there are some rocks blocking the path.”
As he folded his arms, he fired a suspicious glance at his daughter.
“Were you trying to escape through this?”
“What? No!” She denied vehemently.
“Then why were you inspecting it to begin with?”
Bemused by the fact that her own father was doubting her, she looked clearly angry. But then she had a history of doing the unthinkable. He wasn’t entirely wrong to have doubted her. And, to his credit, he knew his daughter fairly well.
“I wanted to make sure that it could be used if absolutely needed to be. That was all, I swear.”
“I see. I will not pursue this matter further than this because your actions had a positive outcome. If it wasn’t for you and your woman, the goblins would have set our food supplies on fire. We would have starved to death with no way out.”
“I didn’t know about sappers at all,” she replied. “It was Fekete who caught on swiftly.”
“The tactic is not used often within the kingdom because our land is often too moist and has underground water sources. Digging a tunnel would likely result in flooding before going anywhere too far.”
Then he furrowed his eyebrows and added, “But then it’s not as if it’s any easier to dig in the North with the ground being frozen most of the time.”
With him going silent as he mulled over, she looked over at the group of men who were guarding the entrance of the tunnel. It was too small for anything other than goblins, so the soldiers didn’t look tense at all. After all, goblins were the weakest monsters. Leaving her father behind who was in deep thoughts, she exited the basement to find Fekete waiting outside.
“We are surviving somehow,” she told her with a shrug.
“Milady, what will you do now since the tunnel has been discovered?”
“Pardon? Nothing. I just want to make sure that the path is clear.”
Fekete had a doubtful look on her face which reminded her that she was also doubting her intentions.
“I wasn’t going to escape the keep!” She raised her voice to defend herself. “For God’s sake… Why does everyone think I am a coward?”
“Nobody thinks you are. It’s just that…”
“That’s enough!” She waved her away. “I am going to my room and get a day off.”
“As you wish, Milady,” said Fekete as she leaned forward.
“Broken reputation, huh…,” She whispered to herself as she made her way to her room.