It was several hours of labor, working hard and with very little rest throughout the night to remove the hundreds of slave collars from these people. Honestly, I was exhausted, but I kept going, projecting strength and confidence to those who were starting to feel the anxiety that comes before a battle. Most of them were probably just farmers, craftsmen, hell, even children before being dragged here and growing up in this pit. I’m fairly certain that a few people had even gotten sick from it.
The jitters were in full force, and unlike me, they only had one life to give, so their willingness to fight demonstrated a level of resolve and bravery that I could never emulate. The most I could do for them was a few words of encouragement and maintain the confidence that we could win this fight.
I think what kept me going was the look on their faces once the collars were off. There was this moment of disbelief, their hands would almost always come up to their necks as if they needed to physically confirm that the metal band that had tortured them for so long was actually gone. Many of them looked elated, some of them even cried, and a few dropped to their knees and heaped blessings and praise upon us. Whenever they invoked a god in those praises, I felt a twinge of annoyance, but I kept my feelings under wraps as I knew they only wanted to thank us in their own way.
Still, it was wholesome, if grueling, work. We had a small mountain of broken and discarded metal forming. I caught a few people venting their anger on the inanimate objects, spitting on them, throwing them, and even pissing on them. It did serve to elevate morale by keeping them focused on righteous anger, so I could see no reason to dissuade the behavior. More than once though, I had to stop a group of them from attempting to either beat or murder the guards we had tied up. While it didn’t win me any points with them, it was still unacceptable behavior, and I would not compromise on it.
Eventually we managed to free the last of them from the hold of the collars. They were left to idle for the time being, we still had a few hours until dawn. Everyone sought out their own form of comfort to pass the time, but I still needed to plan out some things.
I looked around for Silia, which also meant that I was looking for Kala because I was ninety-nine percent sure that she would be with her. I found the two of them cuddling in a somewhat private part of the underground, evidently trying to make up for lost time while they could. My presence probably wouldn’t be welcome in their familial setting, but there were questions that needed answering for when things went crazy.
“Sorry to interrupt, I just need to ask you a few questions, Silia.”
The look on her face said it all, I was a nuisance interrupting her time with her daughter. “What do you want?” The tone coupled with the leer was the epitome of hostile. I really needed to reconcile with her at some point, though I got the feeling that as soon as she found out I was in a relationship with Kala, she would turn downright murderous.
“I just needed some more information about the area and wanted to plan things out with you. I’ll try not to take up too much of your time.”
She relented the glare a little when the discussion became about the mission, but it was clear she wanted to prioritize her daughter. “Fine, what do you want to know?”
“First, where they keep all the farming tools, second, if you could lead everyone there. While I'm sure that there is plenty that we could do without everyone being armed, it would still be better if they at least had something that they could fight back with.”
“They always make us put the tools in a storage building not far from here once we are done working for the day. I’m sure anyone could point you in the right direction.”
I shrugged. “Maybe, but you’ve already proven your ability to navigate efficiently, and I want to make sure that everything goes as smoothly as possible. Lives are on the line, there is no room for chance.”
Silia appeared to contemplate my words for a moment before she sighed. “Well, if we’re going there anyway, I guess I can lead the way.”
I dipped my head to her. “Thank you. I’ll leave you two to get some rest, we don’t have long before dawn arrives.”
They were quick to take me up on the advice and got back to cuddling. I decided to also heed my own advice and went upstairs to sit down and maybe close my eyes for a little while. There were only a handful of people up there to watch the door, so I wasn’t likely to be disturbed. Not to mention I was experiencing a little bit of the problem I had when I first arrived at the coalition’s volcano camp in the form of distrust. They were all aware that I was part of the rescue operation, but my appearance was still a major factor for most of them in their attitude towards me.
It may also seem counterintuitive, but I would actually sleep easier being in a place where I could react immediately to any problems that came through the front door. My presence in the entry room was glanced over by the six or so individuals who were on guard duty. Jorn was amongst them as well, which was just a little bit of extra comfort to have a familiar face nearby. I told him to wake me before dawn or if anything happened and sat down in a corner to try and get a quick nap in.
I nodded on and off for a little while, finding it a little difficult to get in the proper rhythm required to fall asleep. Exhaustion eventually won over my body's misgivings about entering a vulnerable state with an impending battle so close at hand. My awareness of the surroundings slipped away to only the bare minimum required, and I was allowed a few moments of respite to combat my growing exhaustion.
When I next woke it was because a hand was tapping me on the shoulder. I flinched a little at being torn from my brief rest, but my mind quickly caught up to the situation as I looked to see Jorn crouched down next to me.
Once he had confirmed that I was awake, he gave me the reason for the disturbance. “It’s almost dawn.”
A terse statement, but one that almost immediately brought me to full alertness. I quickly rubbed the sleep out of my eyes and stood up. “I’ll get everyone else ready.” My body was already starting to switch gears into overdrive in preparation for what was to come. Not enough that I could call it an adrenaline spike, but my heart rate was slightly elevated, and I was breathing a little quicker. Both of these things created a cocktail of anxiousness that put me on edge.
Not knowing what else to do once I got down into the cell blocks again, I just started telling everyone who was nearby to get ready as it was almost time to strike. The news spread out like a wave, and I was the stone dropped into the still pool, disturbing the peace. Eventually everyone came to an alert state and was standing around, waiting for orders on what to do next.
I wanted Silia and Kala up front with me to lead the way, so I called out and waited for them to emerge from the crowd. Once they were standing beside me, I informed everyone else how we were going to go about this. They would all form an orderly line up the stairs and when it started, move concisely and without hesitation. It would be a fairly lengthy process to move hundreds of bodies out of the building, essentially one at a time. I just hoped that there wouldn’t be a whole lot of fighting before we got everyone armed with some basic tools.
After we accomplished that objective, we would divide our forces into those who were staying and those who were leaving. All the people who didn’t volunteer would be making a straight shot towards an exit on the opposite side of the castle from where the siege was taking place. Accompanying them would be a small number of the volunteers who would make sure that they could make it out safely before rejoining the fight.
The tension was mounting as everyone got into position. You could feel the weight in the air. Whether that was because everyone was feeling nervous and it just had a compounding effect on our empathy, or if it was because this was that moment before things snapped and we were all bracing for impact. Whatever the case, it would be an anxiety filled wait for things to really pop off.
We sat around, fidgeting and just trying to find ways to occupy our time and keep ourselves distracted. I took to inspecting my sword, making sure that it hadn’t acquired any defects of any kind. As I stared into the metallic surface of the blade, I began to contemplate the truth of this morning. I would most likely have to use this, and I couldn’t afford to hold back. My thoughts and morals meant nothing anymore. This would be a fight of life and death, and I would have to protect those I cared about.
At some point I had stopped checking the sword for flaws and just stared aimlessly into it, lost in thought. A hand being placed on my shoulder snapped me out of it, and I quickly figured out it was Kala who had put it there. She wore that soft reassuring smile that I had grown immensely fond of.
“You look like you’re overthinking things again.”
I let out a little huff of amusement. “Maybe. It's just... I’ve never done anything close to this before. This is insanely dangerous. So much is at risk and I'm just trying to figure out the best way to get through it without losing any of you.”
She nodded slightly in an understanding manner. “Fighting is never a clean affair, but I think that there could be no better plan than what you have created here. If you won't stop until you reach perfection, then you will never be satisfied with the outcome.”
“I know, but I can’t help it. I just want to keep you safe and prevent excessive loss of life. There’s already been enough of that.”
“Yes, you have a good heart, James, and it pains me to see you agonizing over everything. I know you didn’t want to do this, but you did it because you thought it was the right thing to do.”
“Thank you, Kala. I can only hope that the plan works and that this whole nightmare will end sooner rather than later.”
“We all hope for that, and we will all help you fight to achieve it. You’re not alone”
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
“And I'm thankful for that every moment.” I smiled at her and her at me. She just had a way of making all the stress seem unimportant. At the very least I wasn’t lost in the maze of my own mind.
The sun was beginning to rise not long after our little talk. I was starting to wonder when we would hear something about an army at the gates. Not even five minutes after I first had that thought did a harsh and loud sound split the air.
Somewhere in the castle there was a bell being rung. After the first one had started, several others had joined the cacophony in what was obviously an alarm. Following this alarm, there was a flurry of activity outside the building as the soldiers started to wake up or run to their designated positions. This was as good a sign as any that the coalition army had finally arrived.
I got up and moved over to the front door where Jorn was waiting expectantly. “Does this mean what I think it does?” He had almost an eager grin on his face while he asked me the question.
“If what you’re thinking is that the coalition has finally shown up, then yes, it probably does.”
“So how are we going to do this?”
“First, we’re going to wait for most of the soldiers to clear out of this area. Once the majority of them are distracted by the army, we will move out and arm up. Probably wouldn’t be a good idea to just run into the enemy without weapons. After that we follow the plan and cause as much chaos as we...” That was when the world exploded around me.
The earth shook, the air was rent, and it felt like someone just punched me in the chest. I had covered my ears as a reaction, but they were still ringing. Everyone else was also in a similar state, wincing in pain, shocked, and covering their ears. What the fuck just happened?
I got up and opened the door to see what the hell was going on. Once I made sure that there were no soldiers in the immediate area, I stepped out and looked around. It was then my gaze fell upon a dust cloud stretching up into the sky from the western wall. My jaw dropped open as I stared at it. Tendrils of energy reminiscent of lightning arced through the dust, giving it the appearance of a barely contained storm as it climbed higher.
After my initial moment of confused awe had passed, I saw trails of dust leading outward from the cloud at an accelerated rate. My eyes widened as I realized what was going to happen next and I dived back inside with a shout. “Get down!”
Not even two seconds later did a loud crash sound out from across the street. A gigantic hole had opened in the roof of the barn-like structure across from us followed by the collapse of part of the wall. Smaller impacts and a hail of fist sized stones landed all over the place outside. I was glad that this building was constructed mostly of stone and shielded us from the aftermath of that detonation.
I had not expected this much of a reaction from what was most likely the crystal I had sabotaged. Rocks from the tower had been thrown in all directions and were now falling like rain across the landscape. It was a full minute of ducking in cover before the last audible crash of rocks upon the ground was heard.
Everyone stopped ducking down and looked around cautiously. Jorn looked at me from where he lay. “What the fuck did you do?” His voice still sounded a little muted as my ears were recovering from the shockwave.
I threw up my hands. “Okay, in my defense, I didn’t know what those runes would do exactly and did not expect this.” I might have been speaking a little loudly, but that was needed for any of them to hear me clearly.
Jorn just shook his head. “I hope that the army wasn’t caught up in that explosion or were hit by any falling rocks.”
“Yeah.” And I hope that the civilians here weren’t hit by anything either. I pushed my own private concerns out of my head and started to refocus on the task ahead of us. “Well, while this was unexpected, we wanted chaos, and this is as good a start as any. Let’s use the distraction that this had undoubtedly cause and move out.”
They could agree with that at the very least and got everyone back on their feet and ready to go. After I checked outside to make sure the coast was clear I ushered Silia out to lead the way. She was followed by a line of individuals all moving quickly to keep up. Holdrem and Colvin remained behind to make sure that everyone made it out alright while the rest of us followed Silia to clear the way of any ‘obstacles’ that would present themselves.
As we moved down the street, I surveyed the damage that was caused in the aftermath of the explosion. This far away from the epicenter it wasn’t too bad, there was a sparse scattering of rocks here and there, some buildings had holes in them where they were struck by fast moving bits of stone, but it didn’t appear to be widespread destruction at the very least.
The explosion seemed to have drawn almost every able-bodied soldier to the location as well. The streets around here were now empty when before they had quite a few patrols. That made our job a little easier, at least for now.
After a few minutes of travelling down the street we came to the storage building that Silia had mentioned earlier. They had stopped in front of the double doors that marked the entrance though, and I pushed my way to the front to see what the holdup was. I didn’t even have to ask because when I got close, I saw Silia fighting with the doors that were obviously locked.
Silia noticed my approach and turned to talk. “You wouldn’t happen to have any keys for this would you?”
“Uhm, maybe.” I started reaching for the collection of keys that I had acquired since coming here but was stopped part way through when someone from the crowd spoke out.
“Just move out of the way.”
I looked towards the one who had spoken up and saw a pair of droln pushing people aside and clearing a straight shot towards the door. Figuring out their plan, I elected to take their advice and step aside. Once they had a good twenty-foot lane cleared in front of the door they took up a ready stance. One of them did a deep huff through the nose as a signal, and both of them took off at full speed towards the door.
They collided synchronously with a massive bang and the sound of splintering wood, but the door did not give on the first attempt. Not disheartened in the least, the two walked back down the path rolling their shoulders and getting ready for another charge. This time when they made contact the doors burst open in a shower of splinters as they skidded to a stop a few feet inside.
With the way cleared, we went inside and prompted everyone to follow us. Inside was the single largest collection of farming tools I had seen outside of a particular brand name store from my world. Pitchforks, shovels, axes, scythes, sickles, and pickaxes. Everything that you might need to run a plantation or arm a rebellion.
Now began the process of trying to hand out these makeshift weapons in as organized a way as possible. Just having a mad scramble to arm yourself would probably create more problems, and thus be slower, than having a system for it. So, I began to order people into lines and placed those who already had weapons in charge of handing out more.
It was going smoothly. People entered empty handed and left holding a tool in just a few seconds. Despite having streamlined the process as much as possible, there was still the underlying sense of urgency that I tried my best to ignore in favor of doing things correctly.
After we had just reached the halfway point of distribution, there was a commotion outside. It sounded like yelling, though I couldn’t make out what was said exactly from inside. People near the door were starting to panic a little bit, and that raised many red flags that sent me flying outside to figure out what was happening.
As soon as I stepped out, I saw what had caused the disruption. There were a little over a dozen fully armed and armored soldiers staring down the crowd. They were well covered in metal with most of their body hidden behind the layered bits of steel, a problem if this was standard for all of the garrison. A few in the back had bows knocked and ready to shoot at the first sign of someone doing something they weren’t supposed to. It seemed our escape had finally been noticed by the garrison, but if they only sent these few to challenge hundreds, then they must be spread thin dealing with the situation at the wall.
The one at the head of the small group of soldiers started to shout again, pointing his sword at everyone for added emphasis. “I said, drop the tools and disperse back to your cells! Fail to comply and we will execute you all!”
Despite the clear number advantage that we had on our side, many people in the front shrank back a bit at his words. The fear that had been instilled in them during their time here was not an easy thing to overcome evidently. Still, I was at least thankful that none of them actually dropped their weapons, as that might have created a cascading effect of morale loss.
The situation was far from optimal however, and I needed to step in before things deteriorate. I marched up to the front line, trying to exude as much confidence as I could muster. “Hold the line! Don’t falter now!”
My entrance created some rather flabbergasted faces from the soldiers. “What in the pits are you doing?”
“Freeing these people.” I said plainly as I drew my sword.
That changed his expression to a scowl. “Never imagined there would be a traitor here.”
“Traitor implies that I was once on your side. I’d never be complacent with this insane dogmatic bullshit.”
“Then you can die with the rest of these animals! Shoot him!”
One of the archers drew his bow and loosed an arrow at me. In a split-second reaction, I swung my sword in a sweeping motion in front of me and there was an audible clink as I had managed to bat aside the incoming projectile, causing it to clatter across the ground. There was a moment of stunned surprise from everyone who witnessed that display.
While on the outside I played it cool and stood up straight in defiance, on the inside was a different set of emotions. Holy fuck I can’t believe I did that! Please don’t shoot at me again, I doubt I'd be able to recreate that.
Accident or not, I decided to play off my moment of badassery for the most effect. Leveling my sword at them, I shouted out to the crowd so my voice could reach most of the people. “Do not be afraid of them, for you can see in their eyes that they are the ones who are afraid. They speak forceful words, but they stand there shivering in their boots because they know that they are weak, they are outnumbered, and they will lose if you but find the courage to say, ‘no more’! No more shall you be beaten, no more shall you be forced to work the fields and reap no rewards, no more shall you be slaves! Take back your lives, take back your future, and fight for a better tomorrow!”
I hoisted my sword into the air and was met with a cacophony of roars and shouts from the crowd at my back. With their fear dispelled, they boldly charged forth at the soldiers. Some of them broke at the sight of insurmountable odds intent at stomping them into the dirt and ran, a few tried to hold their ground but were quickly swallowed up in the sea of bodies.
The small contingent of soldiers was wiped out in but a handful of seconds, having been brutally beaten, stomped, stabbed, and crushed into nonexistence. I was just glad I didn’t have to witness it directly as the wall of bodies obscured my view. While I pitied them in their last few moments, I had other things on my mind, such as keeping up this momentum.
Despite not being able to bring our full force to bear there was no better time to move out than now. I jumped atop a crate to better attract the crowd's attention. “Everyone! We must aid the coalition forces who are assaulting the walls as we speak. Stay in groups and go forth to distract and harass the soldiers. Ignore the civilians, they are unimportant, make sure that our allies can get inside, for once they achieve that, victory will be ours!”
Another round of enthusiastic cheers came from the crowd as they marched forth into the battlefield. I hopped off the box and caught someone coming at me in my peripheral vision. It was Kala, and she came out of her jog to stand beside me.
“What do we do now?”
I gave her a reassuring smile. “You and the others keep handing out tools to the rest of them and then send them out. I’m going to follow the crowd and try to direct the damage to the right areas. Make sure that those who aren’t fighting get out safely. Stay with the rest of our group and protect each other, prioritize safety above all else.”
She nodded at me. “I’ll do my best. You stay safe out there too. I love you.”
“I love you too.” With those final words now spoken, we both got back to the matter at hand. The siege was in full swing, the uprising was a success, and things were about to get crazy. Looking out at the chaos ahead of me, I took a bracing breath before striding forth. It was time for me to join the war in full.