Cent. Calendar 26/02/1640, outside Fort Sheraya, ~30km south of Le Brias, Altaras, 8:29
It was now the 26th of Febrond, Year 1640 on the Central Calendar. The war had been going on for about two months and a little over a week since the Altaran city of Kagis fell to the hands of the Parpaldian Imperial Army. While the Army’s Group West led by Entoupercheur (Colonel) Marius consolidated their holding on Kagis, Group East, led by Entoupercheur Gilles, who was considerably bitter over losing out on the fame of taking a major Altaran city, went ahead and marched north toward the capital Le Brias around ~80km to the northeast. With the Sa’arak River to their left flank, Group East marched at a steady pace as its vanguards clashed with disparate Royal Altaran Army counterattacks and retreating actions. After three days of tireless march, on the 21st, the first elements of Group East reached the first series of defenses of Le Brias, which was encircled by a deep, multi-layered network of fortresses. The two major formations under Group East, the 86th Infantry Regiment and the 121st Infantry Regiment—both of which are from the Duro region—respectively began their attacks on two of the outer defense line’s major fortresses, Fort Sheraya and the fortified town of Nizur.
Nizur was situated on a hill surrounded by thick forests and was supported by a minor fort to the south on a tall outcropping jutting from the ground. The 121st, supported by the Wyvern Corps, managed to take the outcrop fort. There, a siege artillery battery could reliably support a siege of the town. By the 26th, after a 4-day long siege (the siege only began after they took the outcrop fort on the 21st), commanders of the 121st had commenced negotiations with the garrison commanders in Nizur for surrender.
Fort Sheraya, located 5km west of Nizur, was a different story. A lonely fort situated on a hill, it was surrounded by prairie and some farmland, but what truly set it apart from Nizur was that it had its northern flank secured by the Sheraya River, which ran east to west and was a tributary of the larger Sa’arak. The river was by no means uncrossable since at times it was shallow enough for a person to wade through, but its large width, tall banks, and uneven sloping meant that it would be difficult for an army to cross without assistance. Upon arriving at Fort Sheraya, the 86th Infantry Regiment immediately had its infantry and artillery attack the fort to try and draw attention from elements crossing the river north to encircle the fort completely. The attack cost them a hundred troops, but they successfully got four companies across the river and established a consistent supply line to them. However, unlike the 121st at Nizur, the 86th’s siege of Fort Sheraya wasn’t as fruitful. Sorties from the fort, harassment attacks from probing Altaran units, the sudden withdrawal of the Wyvern Corps from providing air support, and an ammunition mishandling incident that resulted in an explosion that took out three of their cannons, had all cost them 400 troops in just five days of siege.
Unfortunately, things were about to take a turn for the worse.
It was 8:29 in the morning and while the sun’s warmth provided ample optimism, the sound of muffled popping sounds in the distance was more than enough to get the blood pumping for Avileuxpercheur (lieutenant colonel) Michel, commander of the 86th. Even from the command tent at the center of the regiment camp, he could tell that the popping sounds were none other than gunfire. He already knew what they were and why, which irritated him more.
Michel was outside his command tent, already dressed in his uniform, issuing orders to signal officers, who would then communicate them to the different battalion commanders who were already away mobilizing their troops.
“Orders to the 95th and 96th: battle formations along the river, facing north! 95th will provide a company to respond to a potential flanking sortie from Fort Sheraya! The 97th will remain in position along the innermost siegeworks! The artillery companies are to take firing positions on elevated positions Droz and Etienne! Lastly, tell the 98th to expedite withdrawing its companies from the north of the river!”
“Yes, sir!”
The signals officers got to work operating their bulky manacomm sets to send the orders out. As Michel bit his lip and watched the signal officers get to work, one of his officers, mounted on a horse, approached him with another horse in tow.
“Your mount, sir!”
Without uttering a word, Michel swiftly took the reins from the officer, climbed onto the saddle of his mount, and then raced out of the camp with his officers, personal guards, and a signals officer with a personal manacomm set. They were headed to a hill some distance to the east which had a commanding view of the surroundings and was occupied by one of their light infantry company skirmishers. It was consistently under threat from Altaran probing attacks, was closer to the river, and was considerably small in area so they didn’t set camp there, but it was nonetheless a defensible observation post.
As his group rode out, he ran the situation in his mind one more time. At around 10 minutes past 7, reports started to come in from the 98th Infantry Battalion that scouts of their four companies deployed to contain Fort Sheraya’s northern flank were engaging Altaran light cavalry; minutes later, they received reports that the scouts retreated and the enemy cavalry was harassing the entrenched infantry. 30 minutes into the engagement, the enemy cavalry was still engaging them, giving him the impression that a larger formation loomed behind. Without the Wyvern Corps’ reconnaissance flights, which decreased from twice a day to once every two days due to orders from up top to concentrate on naval operations, he was forced to rely on scouts. However, given that they were now essentially a stone’s throw from Le Brias, the density of urban terrain and enemy forces meant they had little room to maneuver. If it was really a larger formation coming to engage them and relieve Fort Sheraya, they were not in the best position to fight them.
Sensing his hunch grow ever stronger, Michel decided to ask for help. He turned to his signals officer, who was riding alongside him.
“Contact the 121st and Group East HQ! Tell them we are under attack from a massive enemy formation—perhaps a regiment or more—and we urgently need reinforcements!”
The signals officer let go of his horse’s reins, letting the animal gallop by itself while he transmitted his commander’s orders to their recipients.
Some minutes later, they reached the hill where their skirmishers were. Michel descended from his horse, handed the reins over to one of his officers, and ascended toward the hill’s summit. Two skirmishers guarding the southern approach to the hill emerged from their positions and saluted their commander.
“Where’s your commanding officer?” Asked Michel as he motioned them to relax.
One of the skirmishers turned toward the summit and whistled. Moments later, an officer holding his pistol in his hand emerged from the crest and descended to meet them.
“Avileuxpercheur, sir!” The officer saluted Michel and his officers after hurryingly shoving his pistol back in its holster.
Michel beckoned him to walk with him as the officer dismissed his men to return to their positions.
“Can the developments north of the river be seen from here?” Michel asked the officer, pointing to the rough direction from which the echoes of gunfire were coming.
“Yes, sir. We’ve already sent reports back...”
Hearing this, Michel glanced at his officers. His small eyes betrayed his awesome glare, which his officers immediately felt. They shied away and turned their lines of sight elsewhere, as if to feign ignorance.
Michel let off a silent sigh under his scarf. There was a better time for discipline.
Surmounting the crest, they arrived at the summit. The hill sat at the edge of a forest so the treeline extended up to the summit, denying them a view to the south and southeast but allowing them a commanding view of Fort Sheraya and beyond. Standing at the top, he motioned his hand to his officers, who promptly handed him his telescope. He pointed it toward the northwest, roughly where the popping sounds were coming from just to the side of the silhouette of Fort Sheraya.
Despite it being a quarter before 9 and the weather being immaculate, a slight fog hung above the ground north of the river. Complicating matters were treelines on hedgerows which blocked some of their line of sight. Nevertheless, he was able to make out small yet dense clouds of spent powder—be it gunpowder or crushed magic stones—wafting amongst the trees. Still, neither he nor his officers could make out the sight of their soldiers or the enemy, but it was clear that there was fighting going on.
Meanwhile, visible from the hill without the use of telescopes were the mass marches of the 95th and 96th battalions. Formed up in lines in the tradition of line infantry, the men rocked the earth with their concerted footsteps to the tune of their respective battalions’ drums. Behind them, the regiment’s artillery companies towed their field guns and lance-pois types (‘Modèle 1620 mitrailleuse’ rapid-fire volley guns) using their horses. As per his order, the two battalions will form battle formations on the southern side of the river, which has a treeline about a stone’s toss from the banks, while the artillery companies will take their firing positions on two positions slightly elevated above the plain behind the infantry.
Michel took a pained gulp as he watched his battalions march toward the tree line on the river’s southern banks. The sunlight was strong yet a cold wind blew from the north, but what really chilled the drops of sweat running down his back was not the elements. A faint yet choking sense of dread started to come over him.
He remembers the time he helped out in the stable with their family’s stable hands back home. It was already Martsid and the air was beginning to warm, so they started to bring the horses out of their winter stables. It was something they’d always do, just as predictable as the seasons or the constellations that appeared above them every spring. But then disaster struck: a sudden cold snap came over the eastern Parpaldian seaboard, setting back that year’s planting season. The empire’s internal ministry, which handled agriculture via a dedicated agency, and the climate institute at the Imperial University of Esthirant were yet to issue that year’s planting recommendations so many farmers were yet to plant, but ranchers who were rearing animals—cattle, sheep, domesticated beasts—were affected by the snap. Thinking that spring was upon them, they started to let their animals back into the pastures and dismantle winter dwellings, but then the snap occurred and lasted for a week. Many animals died from the cold, and ranchers fell into ruin; most of Michel’s family horses also didn’t make it, forcing their military house to marry into a rival house to get them to forgive the debts that compounded from the lost horses that year.
Michel learned then that things will always go wrong when you least expect it, and his experience in this war with Altaras has so far confirmed it. The other group’s takeover of Kagis under the noses, the ammunition blast that rocked his siegeworks, and now a possible counterattack from a larger enemy formation. He heard about how the press back home was touting the war as a landslide victory against the Altarans. Oh, how little did those pesky pretend sleuths capture the actual circumstances their fellow countrymen were suffering in this war...
- - -
It was now 11:30. Almost time for lunch. But the panging in their stomachs wasn’t remotely strong enough for Michel and his officers to detract from observing the situation.
By now, their battle lines had formed all along the southern banks with their artillery firmly entrenched behind them. But what was different now was that on the treeline on the opposite bank, almost a dozen or so enemy battalion banners flew just beneath the canopy, shaded yet clearly visible. The number of battalion banners was more than twice the number with his regiment, hinting to Michel and his officers that there were at least two enemy regiments present—perhaps even an entire infantry division. That means they were outnumbered almost three to one.
Fighting had already commenced. The retreating companies of the 98th had crossed the river southward an hour ago, prompting the 95th and 96th to provide covering fire against the pursuing enemy light cavalry and skirmishers. Their intense barrages whittled the loose formations of the enemy vanguard, but the crossing more than took its share of Parpaldian lives. It wasn’t impossible to imagine that the bleeding, dying bodies of his men were still somewhere in the river.
But they were in no position to rescue them, for the ruffled enemy vanguard retreated behind the looming masses of the main enemy formations. With the enemy taking positions on the northern banks of the Sheraya, Michel didn’t wait for them to form ranks and promptly issued the orders to the 95th and 96th to fire.
Three and a half hours since they heard the first popping sounds, the incessant noise of thousands of rifles firing resounded across the battlefield. Thick clouds of spent powder wafted amongst the armies’ respective treelines, obstructing the view of the river from any perspective. While they nevertheless maintained visual overwatch of the situation, Michel and his officers continued to receive updates via manacomm through their signals officers, who had relocated to the hill.
“Enemy ranks advancing past the northern treeline! They’re about to ford!” The signals officers reported.
Michel and his officers turned their attention to the river. Beyond the veil of smoke, they spotted the bright battalion banners advancing to the river, and beneath them were masses of enemy soldiers in drab overalls marching in formation. Consequently, their battalions intensified their fire, showering the advancing soldiers in a hail of bullets; their artillery companies, ordered to open fire once they saw the enemy fording, commenced bombardment of the river. Even from the hill, they could see dozens of enemy soldiers falling onto the ground and river water every second as bullets and cannonballs descended upon them. But it was not enough to stop the enemy battalions from fording the Sheraya.
“Enemy soldiers cresting the banks!” The signals officers screamed.
As if in reflex, Michel screamed back new orders.
“Tell the 97th to divert two companies to shore up our right flank!”
Signal officers immediately relayed his orders. Sometime later, two companies from the 97th, which held their positions on the siege trenches before Fort Sheraya, started to emerge from the eastern end of their trenches and out into the field. They marched toward the eastern end of the battle lines to help shore up against a flanking maneuver, but new reports started coming in.
“Enemy formations on the left flank have engaged the 95th! They’re reporting casualties!”
Despite the ferocity and volume of their fire, the all too numerous enemy battalions managed to take the southern bank on their left flank, returning fire against their battalions as they did so. Already they could witness some companies of the 95th back away from the treeline. They continued to fire volleys into the pressing enemy formations, but their lines too were starting to be whittled at.
Sweat started to pour from even Michel’s palms. There was so much sweat he had trouble gripping his telescope. What do they even do at this point? The 98th, which retreated from the north earlier, was in no shape to serve as reserves, and they couldn’t draw any more from the 97th, which held their siege lines against Fort Sheraya. His officers, too, couldn’t come to an idea about what to do.
Slowly, one by one the companies of the 95th and 96th backed from the treeline. Some daring officers ordered pointless bayonet charges against the advancing enemy, pitting their sections of the battle line into an intense melee. Their actions temporarily stabilized the line, but more and more Parpaldian lives were being spent as a consequence. Still, they did not reverse the trend, and despite continuing artillery fire from their companies, the 95th and 96th battalions continued to give ground.
Michel was gasping for air. He did not want to order a retreat, but the situation was deteriorating. At this moment, he should be choosing between whether to accept military defeat or organizational punishment for retreating, but his pride and coping had him insisting there was still a way to reverse their fortunes. It was as if he was back there at his family stable back in Duro, knowing of the coming snap yet unable to find it in himself to convince his stable hands not to let the horses out.
Horses...? Speaking of horses, he had been hearing the sound of hooves hitting the dirt prevailing amidst the loud noise of gunfire for a while now. As it got louder, he returned to his senses and turned to look behind him where the sounds were coming from. There, cresting the hill summit was a man in officer’s clothing galloping towards him on horseback together with a couple of others. He instinctively put his hand on his holstered pistol, but he recognized the banner flown by the other horseman, letting him put his guard down. No, rather, seeing the banner in fact relieved him, for it was a banner that didn’t belong to his regiment but to that of the 121st Infantry Regiment.
Stopping his horse short of a skirmisher motioning him to stop, the officer dismounted from his horse and asked the skirmisher.
“I’m from the 121st! Where is your avileuxpercheur? I need to speak to him!”
Before the skirmisher could reply, Michel called out to them.
“I’m right here!”
Descending the hill, he approached the officer from the 121st.
“Avileuxpercheur!” The officer saluted Michel as he approached him.
“You’re from the 121st? Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?” Michel asked, his voice rough from thirst and exasperation.
“W-We did, sir. But we didn’t hear back from you.”
Michel turned to his officers, his cheeks red with annoyance. They were flustered and appeared to have an excuse, but they once again shied away from his glare and spoke not a single word. He turned his attention back to the officer from the 121st.
“Well? Where are my reinforcements?”
“We have a company of land dragons and a battalion at the bottom of the hill near the river! They’re all we could spare at the moment!” The officer said, pointing to the bottom of the hill behind him.
Michel’s eyes glittered. He felt his knees almost buckle at the immense sense of relief that came over him. A company of land dragons and an infantry battalion hardly made the numbers equal, but if deployed in the right place they could save their precarious situation. With this renewed vigor to continue the fight, he had already configured in his head where the 121st’s reinforcements would go.
“Alright! Go tell your men that this is where they’ll go!”
- - -
The fight for the treeline on the southern side of the Sheraya was reaching a tipping point. Parpaldian infantry in their crimson and gold overcoats continued to hold their ground as if having dug their heels into the bedrock, refusing to yield to the relentless Altaran onslaught. In many cases, this was how Parpaldian soldiers perished: with their boots still planted onto the ground and their bodies merely bending over or back. The Altaran infantry, some still wearing the old standard white uniforms with most wearing the new standard drab colors, steadily pressed on with each volley. Like the Parpaldians, many perished without stepping back, but the sheer number of two regiments’ worth of men was enough to muscle their way forward.
The air was thick, not only with fervor and fighting spirit but with spent powder that made it hard to breathe. Under the tree canopy, the residue and smoke had nowhere to go but linger. The sun’s rays shone through the breaks in the canopy, filtering like rays from heaven through the carnage. Despite the hostility of the situation to the psyche and senses of the men, both sides knew where the enemy was coming from and thus they knew where to point the muzzles of their rifles.
But things didn’t remain that way.
“Kaymakam! (lieutenant colonel)”
The piercing scream of an officer shouting his rank caught the attention of an Altaran battalion commanding officer.
His battalion was the battle line’s leftmost, which was on the line’s eastern end. As planned by the miralay (colonel), the thinned-out Parpaldian line would be shored up with reinforcements to their line’s right flank, which faced their (Altaran) left flank. Even then, in no short time, they will force the Parpaldians into a rout, hopefully securing a victory against the invaders.
But something was about to throw a wrench into such hopes.
“The Parpaldians brought beasts!!!” Screamed the officer as he pointed toward the east.
“Beasts?! What beasts?!” He screamed back.
Then, as if in reply to him, the thunderous roar of wild beasts echoed throughout the battlefield. The roar of the beasts was more than enough to silence the fierce fighting in the treeline, forcing many of the soldiers to look to the east where the roar emanated from. There, some distance from the kaymakam’s leftmost formation, were four gigantic beasts, some as massive as the trees they were felling with every thundering stomp. Then, as if to hammer to the ants that were the Altaran soldiers who it is they should be fearing, the beasts opened their beaks, larger than any field gun they know, and let out another thunderous roar.
Grooooooooooohhhh!!!
Whether or not they realized that they were Parpaldian due to the crimson and gold banners flung on the sides of the beasts’ humongous shells, the Altaran soldiers, having never seen such tremendous monsters before, turned their rifles toward the beasts.
“Monsters!!!”
“Fire fire fire!!!”
“Eek!!!”
Without forming a new line to face their new opponents, the Altaran soldiers fired disparately at the four beasts. To their horror, their rifle bullets disintegrated into crystal-like mist upon hitting the beast’s rugged and thick scales, producing little damage, if at all. All that their disparate attacks did was agitate the beasts, who produced another thundering roar in anger.
GROOOOOOOHHHHH!!!
The beasts’ stomps got stronger, their pace got faster, and their eyes got madder. But now that they know that their puny rifles did fuck all against the gargantuan monsters, the plummeting Altaran morale crumbled altogether.
“Our guns are no use!!!”
“Run!!!”
“It’ll eat us all!!!”
The companies of the leftmost battalion were the first to crumble. The kaymakam grew desperate to maintain order.
“No!!! Hold your line, you scoundrels!!! You dare turn your back on the invaders—”
GROOOOOHHHH!!!!!
Interrupting his speech was one of the beasts, whose enraged eyes stared daggers into his. The gigantic monster advanced like a tortoise, but every stomp crushed a tree in its path, pulverizing its thick, well-aged bark into cinders. It felt as if it was making a beeline for him, what with him and his officers flying the conspicuous battalion flags. The sight of such a frightening beast making his way toward him turned him pale. He could even feel the pants in his crotch area turn hot from... he’d rather not imagine an esteemed officer like him doing something so unsightly.
Still, if he were to choose between the beast or his life, there would be no debate.
“Run!!! Retreat!!! Back across the river!!!”
The kaymakam, his officers, and the battalion flag officers made a beeline for the river. The sight of their battalion officers running with the flags crushed the battalion’s morale, turning a disparate breakup of the line into a rout of the left flank.
“The kaymakam is making a run for it! He’s leaving us! Run, you shmucks!”
“Fuck! We’re not dying here!!!”
“Wait for—Ack!”
One unlucky Altaran soldier, who had turned his back to try and run, is hit squarely in the back of the neck, killing him instantly.
Without turning back, the soldiers of the disintegrating left flank could feel a hailstorm of bullets descend upon them. Parpaldian soldiers from the main line, seeing their land dragons come into the fight, are reinvigorated and restart pouring volleys back into the treeline. Meanwhile, joining them were Parpaldian soldiers from the 121st Regiment, taking cover behind their land dragons and taking potshots at the fleeing Altaran soldiers. In essence, the Altaran left flank was exposed to a crossfire from two sides, with one side involving four gargantuan beasts.
As the Altaran left flank crumbled, their regiment commanders only now started catching wind of the situation.
“What?! The Parpaldians brought beasts into the left flank?!”
The Altaran miralay (colonel) couldn’t hide his horror at the report. But from where he was, he could clearly see his men fleeing in a rout across the river. There were also the terrified screams and the unfamiliar roar of beasts echoing in the distance, past the cacophony of gunfire closer to where he was.
He ordered the second leftmost battalion to reform battle lines facing the beasts. However, consequent reports further turned his complexion pale.
“The beasts are impervious to rifle fire?!”
Reports of the Parpaldian conquests against the Philadean Northern Alliance raced across his mind. There were descriptions of entire battles being won because the Parpaldians brought gigantic “tortoise-like” beasts to the battle, which the Parpaldians used to terrifying effect; in some cases, the mere sight of the beasts rampaging their way toward the enemy line was more than enough to trigger a general rout. Little illustrations exist of the beasts, likely because the Northern Alliance doesn’t have access to advanced magic or non-magic photography, but whatever witness accounts they have do support the “tortoise-like” descriptions. From the Parpaldian side, all they know is that they have more or less 200 of these beasts across the empire and that they affectionately refer to them by a rather impressive name: the land dragon.
Due to the scarcity of details on the land dragon and their military uses, the Royal Altaran Army has no strategy to counter them. After all, Parpaldia is the only power that employs them; they were apparently selectively bred from species of gigantic yet docile beasts from an undetermined island within Parpaldian territory.
The miralay thought: if the Parpaldians did bring with them land dragons, it was inevitable that his men, having never seen them before, would be frightened. With the land dragons, the still-intact Parpaldian guns, and the reinvigorated Parpaldian battle line pushing back on them in a crossfire, he prudently concluded that there was little time to think of a counter strategy if he didn’t already have one. Unable to count on any reserves and with the risk of his battle line being destroyed, he made the tough decision to withdraw back to the northern side of the river.
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“Commence retreat back to the northern side!”
Orders were quickly disseminated and the battalions that would cross first and the battalions that would fight to keep the enemy at bay were designated. Fortunately for them, at this time of the day—roughly noon—the river current was its weakest and the depth shallow enough to cross on foot. For roughly two more hours, the fighting continued as the Altarans crossed back onto the northern side, sustaining moderately heavy losses as the last battalions struggled to cross back under persistent Parpaldian fire. By three in the afternoon, as the sun was starting to hang low in the west, both sides ceased firing at one another and the battle settled into an exhausted stalemate.
86th Infantry Rgt HQ, 18:40
The sun had now set and darkness reigned over the area, save for the torches and campfires lit in Fort Sheraya and the camp of the 86th Infantry Regiment. Now, though, they were joined by numerous torches and campfires lit in the camp of the larger Altaran formation on the northern side of the river. The stalemate earlier produced an uneasy peace, but the fierce fighting had caused an untold number of deaths on both sides, and the three regiment commanders and the fort garrison commander all came to the agreement to stay off one day of fighting to gather their war dead and give them their funeral rites. Parpaldian and Altaran patrols frequently crossed paths with one another on the river banks and on the southern side, giving each other deathly stares as they gathered the bodies of their fallen comrades. Nevertheless, officers from both sides managed to enforce the agreement, whether by word or by bayonet, and everyone was able to get right into recovering their respective fallen without incident.
The 86th Infantry Regiment commander, Avileuxpercheur Michel, himself tired from a full day of watching the battle, stood watch over rows upon rows of coffins gathered at the camp’s makeshift marching ground. More and more coffins were being brought in by the cartload as his HQ personnel went around tallying the number of dead and confirming their names, families, and hometowns. Those who weren’t helping with the recovery or eating dinner were by the coffins of their fallen friends, comrades, and brothers, their sobbing echoing into the night sky. Some of them were airing their regrets, their dashed hopes, or repeating the promises they had made with the fallen before they were killed today. It was a heartbreaking sight, one that gripped even the avileuxpercheur’s heart.
As it stands, they were expecting 800 to 1,000 dead, a big chunk of the regiment’s fighting force. With that many dead, it wasn’t anything but a miracle that they were able to force a stalemate with an army twice their size. The reinforcements from the 121st also sustained casualties, but they were hardly more than a dozen—and that was already counting their wounded. The agreement for a one-day ceasefire was a godsend, but with the Altaran side proposing that, he could only surmise that they were bringing in additional reinforcements by tomorrow. If he wants to continue their offensive—nay, if he wants his force to survive, they must be reinforced ASAP.
“Your dinner is ready, sir.” One of his personal servants called out to him with a bow.
Despite being tired, weary, and starving, Michel didn’t have an appetite. The fact that he had just lost around a thousand men was weighing on him, more so the daunting task of keeping the other 2,000 or so men in the fight. Still, he’d be worse for the wear if he ignored his body’s needs.
As he followed his servant back to his tent, a signals officer ran to him.
“Avileuxpercheur! Avileuxpercheur! It’s Entoupercheur Gilles! He’s currently waiting for you on the manacomm!”
Michel’s eyes widened at the mention of Entoupercheur Gilles. During the battle, he had asked for reinforcements from him, but only the 121st responded. While the silence did irk him, it was already within expectations that the entoupercheur wouldn’t respond, at least not immediately. Though now if he had something to say to him, it must’ve been very important.
Temporarily setting aside his dinner, Michel followed the signals officer back to the manacomm.
- - -
An hour later, Michel and his officers ventured to the outskirts of their camp perimeter. There, they stood in the cold winter night with thick coats, looking toward the south. During the day, they would be looking at a forest, but at night they couldn’t see a damn thing. Only the gods knew what lurked in the forest, but whatever may come their way, they’d first have to deal with his personal retinue of guards, who stood at guard in front of him and his officers.
Michel took his pocket watch out of his coat. He held it up in the air so that it would catch light from the torches of the camp behind him. He could barely make out the clock’s hands: it was ten minutes to seven in the evening. Just as he put the watch back in his coat, one of his guards cried out.
“I see a torchlight in the forest! Dead south!”
The guards readied themselves and gripped their rifles as they fixated their gazes on a faint orange glow emanating from the forest. It was moving amongst the trees, disappearing and reappearing behind the silhouettes of their thick trunks. Not long after, the glow became numerous, with around a dozen or so embers hovering in the dark. Then, they started to hear the sound of numerous hooves hitting the cold dirt.
“Cavalry...” One of his officers muttered.
Before long, the torches got close enough for them to see the illuminated figures of their holders: cavalrymen with thick coats wearing caps meant for dragoons. Their colors and design were Parpaldian, but just to be safe...
“Le moineau!” Cried out Michel’s guards.
“...et l'écureuil!” Replied the cavalrymen.
Hearing the designated phrase, the guards and the officers relaxed their grips on their guns and collectively breathed a sigh of relief. The cavalrymen that had appeared before them were the ones they were expecting.
Michel went forth toward the cavalrymen, followed by his officers and guards. As he approached, some of the cavalrymen dismounted from their horses and met them halfway. Now that they stand face to face, Michel and his officers saluted one of the cavalrymen.
“We’ve been expecting you, entoupercheur!”
Hearing this, Michel’s guards turned to him in shock. Like a punchline in a bad joke, the cavalrymen they saluted took off their scarf and their dragoon cap, revealing the face of Group East’s commander, Entoupercheur Gilles. Michel’s guards, taken aback by this revelation, hurriedly set aside their rifles and saluted him. Following their commander’s lead, some of the other cavalrymen behind Gilles also revealed themselves to be part of his officer corps.
“Forgive me for imposing,” Gilles said as he motioned them to be at ease.
“If I may, entoupercheur... Why risk your life to come all the way here?”
Michel asked him as he beckoned Gilles and his officers toward the camp. While walking side by side, they conversed.
“When I received word of your request and then the subsequent reports about your regiment’s... precarious situation...”
Gilles looked down on the ground. It was almost as if he felt the gravity of their situation.
“I just had to rush here myself.”
Michel’s heart skipped a beat. It sounded like he had botched the situation and his superior had personally come to try and fix his mess. He hung his head and tensed his fists, and his face was red all around. He felt as if all the shame in the world had concentrated on him.
“...I see.”
Gilles sensed the guilt and shame in Michel’s weak reply. Whether it was out of respect or he just didn’t have it in him to chide him, he simply stayed silent. Then, he changed the topic.
“I did not rush here myself; reinforcements are on the way.”
Michel did not budge. He continued.
“We expected that the Altarans would counterattack, but we underestimated their speed. We’re actually preparing a massed offensive beginning with Fort Sheraya and punching all the way to Le Brias’s inner defenses, but now that the Altarans attacked and they have seen how precarious our frontline is, I decided to move the timetable on that offensive forward.”
Gilles reached out to Michel to stop him. Looking him in the eyes, he gave him a light tap on the shoulder.
“You managing to hold your ground against an enemy division saved our asses.”
Even though he didn’t say how grateful he was for Michel’s actions, Gilles still managed to impart a sense of gratitude. For Michel, that was more than enough to get some weight off his shoulders. The price his men paid for their campaign’s success was by no means light, but now he could confidently start to say that their sacrifice wasn’t in vain.
As a frigid wind blew through the Parpaldian camp, hope for a victorious end to the war continued to burn bright in their hearts.
Cent. Calendar 01/03/1640, 4th Infantry Div Camp, north of the Sheraya River, 23:10
The situation couldn’t be any different north of the Sheraya River. Being ferried by train from the capital to this fortress on the outskirts, the men of the Altaran 4th Infantry Division have seen better days. Originally garrisoned in the city of Madibur on the island’s western side, the King, via his commanders, ordered their entire formation to be ferried to the capital where they could fight against the awaited invasion on the capital’s harbor. But that never came, instead, they fought three battalions’ worth of enemy marines while a division’s worth of enemy troops invaded from the south, cutting off the peninsula from the rest of the island. The sheer number of troops the King had ordered to be concentrated in the capital strained their supplies, which were now effectively cut off by the Parpaldian ‘siege’ of the peninsula. Only by the time the critical city of Kagis fell to the enemy did the King and his commanders send them south. It was by no means too late, but it certainly felt as if the King and his commanders were always multiple steps behind the enemy.
Their commanders brought them to the outskirts of the capital’s defenses, a lone fortress named Fort Sheraya, where a Parpaldian regiment was currently laying siege to it. At first, things went well. Their vanguard light cavalry chased out some cornered Parpaldian siege forces on the north side of the Sheraya River, after which their main battle lines were drawn along the northern bank. At their miralay’s command, they crossed the river. While they sustained some casualties, they managed to successfully reach the south side and start pressuring the smaller Parpaldian line. They had cannons at the back, but they weren’t nearly enough to prevent them from wrestling the treeline from the Parpaldians. Weird enough, the Parpaldians didn’t have their wyverns out, which were a constant sight back at the capital.
For once, they may actually win. They may actually break the invaders’ attempt to swallow their kingdom—their home. But then, as if the gods themselves brought them down to the mortal realm, the beasts of war emerged. They were cruel, heartless, and monstrous. They roared to life thunderclaps and willed earthquakes from beneath their feet. As if that wasn’t enough, they bore the enemy’s banners and shielded the enemy’s soldiers from their fire. No rifle, whether en masse or alone, could break through their immortal scales. Fearing for their lives, they ran for the northern banks of the river where there were no enemy soldiers, no enemy banners, and no monstrous beasts. They had a day to rest and recover their fallen brothers, but it didn’t feel enough.
For days now, they stood at the treeline north of the river. They dug trenches, traps, and redoubts from where they could fire on the enemy trenches, traps, and redoubts on the southern side. There was no sign of the beasts to be found, but the sheer volume of fire from the enemy positions was enough to counter any of their attempts to attack; in turn, their machine guns could mow down any attempt by the enemy to cross. It was a stalemate, but one that felt could be broken any day.
It was now nighttime. The calendar had just moved, and it was now the third month of this year, meaning that the war had been going on for three months. As short as that sounded, it felt as if they’ve lived multiple lifetimes. While the rest of the division caught sleep back at the camp, some of the battalions had to sleep in the trenches to guard against a potential night attack by the enemy. In one of the trenches, a squad of soldiers, including their officer, were wide awake. They were supposed to take shifts, but none of the soldiers could be bothered to get some shuteye. Perhaps they had bad dreams, or perhaps they were feeling a bit rebellious.
Huddled together in the cold dirt and mud with the rustling of tree canopy above them blocking the night sky, the faces of the soldiers were all despondent. For as much as they thought dire of not only their situation but the kingdom’s, they too held ‘dangerous’ thoughts.
“I’m tired of this shit. I wanna go home. His Majesty can go fuck himself and fight the Parps.” One of the soldiers muttered as he buried his face in his blanket.
The other soldiers looked at their officer, who didn’t bat an eye at what he had just said. Confirming that they wouldn’t get any reprisals for it, they too openly aired their thoughts.
“Fucking right. I missed the New Year celebrations with my family because of this... I haven’t seen them in months.”
“I could only hope that my wife and kid managed to escape to my parents in the mountains. If the Parps haven’t already burned Madibur down, that is...”
“Look, there are rumors that Kagis is still intact! They surrendered, too, so there’s probably a chance they spared Madibur if they surrendered...”
“Personally, though, I don’t give a shit if the banner’s ours or theirs. I just want to go home to my love.”
After airing their pent-up frustrations, the soldiers turned to their officer, fearing a reprisal. The officer, however, simply stared into the darkness of the canopy above them as he shared their sentiments.
“I miss... food.”
They heard an audible growl ring out from the officer’s stomach.
While the soldiers may have varying degrees of attachment to their homes, one common thing they shared was a disdain for their rations, which had been reduced to two pieces of hard crackers and a small piece of frozen meat per soldier per day. Water was also a problem; unable to rely on the Sheraya, they were forced to procure barrels of water from the next town, which was only enough to give each soldier half a pint of water per day. Of course, there wasn’t enough around to clean themselves, either, so a terrible smell lingered in the trenches and the camps.
Their situation here in the middle of nowhere was no better than the shanty towns they were forced into while they awaited the King’s orders in the capital.
The soldiers continued to grumble, unable to think of anything positive to talk about. But then, out of nowhere, their eyes were showered with light.
“What the—?!”
“Who—?!”
It took a while for their eyes to adjust, but once they did they saw each other, the black and brown soil of the trenches around them, and the colors of the leaves of the trees above them. However, beyond that lay a very bright sky that was almost to the point of white. It was almost as if the sun had been opened up just above them, its bright rays shining through the gaps in the canopy.
“Something ain’t right!!!” The officer remarked, still shielding his eyes from the brightness.
Grabbing their guns, he and his men climbed up to the top of the trench. Up there, they could see the entire landscape around them—the river, the trees, Fort Sheraya, and the camp—as if it were the middle of the day. Make no mistake, however, it was supposed to be the dead of night. The next sign that something wasn’t right was that other than the sky above them, the sky was completely pitch black.
“Over there!” One of the soldiers shouted as he pointed to the sky.
It was still too bright to look up at the sky directly, so they had to squint and cover some of the sky with their hands. Still, they could make out whatever their comrade was pointing to: a shining star slowly falling out of the sky. Soon, they spotted more of them, all falling to the ground at a leisurely pace and shining brighter than the sun at midday.
“What the hell are those...?”
As they looked on from behind their hands in confusion, they heard a symphony of roars echo throughout the area.
Kyuuun!!!
“Wait...!!!”
Unlike the roar of the beasts they heard earlier, it was higher pitched and softer. But more telling than that, however, was the fact that they knew the roar all too well.
“Wyverns?!” The officer cried out.
Instinctively, they held their guns to the sky, but it was still too bright to look at the sky directly. Just then, the silhouette of a wyvern emerged from behind the blinding glow of one of the falling stars then dipped below it. Not long after, several more wyverns emerged from behind the falling stars, diving straight toward the division camp.
“Fuck fuck fuck!!!”
The officer panicked as he watched the wyverns dove toward their camp. An overwhelming sense of dread came upon him as he jumped back into the trench to sound the alarm.
- - -
Minutes earlier, with only the stars to light up the night sky, 10 of Parpaldia’s wyvern lords flew in complete darkness.
Under normal circumstances, this would have been unthinkable; while wyverns can fly in darkness, it was difficult for their riders to navigate in the dark. Even with precise instruments, they could never spot another wyvern, let alone an enemy wyvern, in the dark, so it was commonplace for wyvern operations to be limited to daytime. However, Parpaldia had an ace up their sleeve: another wyvern, which led the formation, was a different breed.
Absent for much of the week due to developments elsewhere, the wyvern corps, after enough pestering from Entoupercheur Gilles and wrapping up their mission at Hajjisler, are finally back to supporting the Army in Altaras. With enough rest, they were able to spare enough wyverns for Gilles’s planned offensive, which had them mount a surprise night raid on an encamped Altaran infantry division near Fort Sheraya.
“This is Ardean. We’re right above the target.”
The rider of the lead wyvern communicated to the formation through his manacomm.
“Roger, Ardean. Dropping flare bombs...”
The 10 riders of the wyverns following the lead wyvern each dropped a pumpkin-sized box into the air by pushing it out of their stowage just behind their saddle.
Moments after the boxes were dropped, parachutes unfurled from their tops, slowing their descent. The deploying parachutes pulled on a mechanical switch near the top of the box, activating a mana circuit that started a chant. Then, almost simultaneously, all of the stones inside the boxes flashed into life, shining brighter than the sun. The stones, which were what the Parpaldian riders called flare bombs, illuminated the immediate area as if it were midday. The big parachutes had reflective film on the inner side, acting as a reflector that focused the intense light from the mana stones toward the ground below. It must’ve been blinding for the poor enemy soldiers still awake below them, but for them and their wyverns, they could finally see their target illuminated in full detail.
“Flare bombs active! You have two minutes!” The rider of the lead wyvern cried out through the manacomm.
The 10 riders looked down on the camp below. They had already been briefed beforehand about which targets to strike with their wyverns’ flame attack, but since they didn’t have a map of the camp, all they were given was what to strike—ammunition dump, barracks, the stables, and so on. It was up to the discretion of the riders to discern what these targets actually looked like, so they took a good while to try and pick out what their target was before committing to the strike.
25 seconds after the flare bombs lit up, the first wyvern lord banked into a downward course straight for the camp; the other wyvern lords quickly followed. Each assigned their targets, they pointed their wyvern lords toward what they believed were their targets and communicated with them to ready their flame attack. As they got closer, the enemy soldiers started to run amok, and the sound of bells rang all across the camp. They finally realized it was an attack, but it was too little too late.
The first wyvern lord to dive spread their wings out as a form of air brake. Then, riding on the inertia, they opened their once-closed mouth, spitting out a lot of mucus-like liquid. Once the liquid was out of their mouth, it caught fire, turning into a fireball. As the wyvern lord started to fly back into the sky, the fireball hit the huddled tents of the camp’s barracks, spreading the burning viscous liquid all around. The fire from the liquid quickly caught onto the tent fabric, spreading the fire across the barracks in no time.
“Fire!!! Put it out!!!”
Chaos reigned over the Altaran camp as soldiers, some half-awake, were either running for their lives, running for the armory to get their guns, or trying to fight the blazes with dirt or water.
But they weren’t done: more of the Parpaldian wyvern lords descended, pitting their fireballs all around the camp. As fires continued to rage, the camp’s defenses, initially stunned by the flare bombs, finally went to work. However, they had difficulty zeroing in on the fleeing enemy wyverns due to the overwhelming brightness of the flare bombs.
“Dammit! I can’t look at ‘em directly!”
Before they knew it, the enemy wyverns were too far away to attack with small arms. Still, for some reason, the sound of gunfire filled the night. Soldiers who were awake and on their feet quickly rushed to the armory and ammunition stores to fight the blaze but found the fires yet to reach them. Miraculously, the enemy wyverns didn’t land a direct flame attack on either, but the sound of intense gunfire continued. Attention quickly turned to the south where their trenches facing the river were.
- - -
Back at the trenches, the officer and his squad were back inside, only poking their heads out to watch the carnage at the camp unfold. Bells and sirens rang into the night, masking the wails of their burning comrades and the desperate cries of their other comrades trying to fight the blaze. It was a terrifying scene, but it was something they expected from a wyvern attack. Still, to think the Parpaldians were so adept with their wyverns to dare to pilot them in the dead of night... If this was their first time, it was a total game-changer. If they had mastered it, then they were totally and truly fucked.
“Wyverns at night... They must be mad enough to fly them in the dark!”
“Without their little falling stars, they shouldn’t be able to find their way back! It was probably a suicide mission!”
“It won’t be the first time they’ve surprised us, though, so I wouldn’t hold my breath...”
Slowly, the bright falling stars waned before completely going out. In no time, darkness reclaimed its rightful place and night returned to the battlefield. It was dark again, but it was by no means pitch black: the raging flames from the enemy attack continued to burn, turning an increasing portion of the camp into cinders. They were like a massive bonfire, lighting up the surroundings.
“Shit... I wonder what’ll happen from here on—”
Just then, interrupting the officer’s statements were several loud thuds on the trench’s mud walls.
“Wha—?!”
The officer and the other soldiers quickly took notice and turned to the source of the thuds. They cast their gazes down onto the floor as what had caused the thuds rolled down from the walls. Their eyes were yet to readjust to the dark, but as soon as they saw the fruit-sized and fruit-shaped objects, they instantly recognized what they were.
“GRENADES!!!” The officer screamed out.
Their knee-jerk reactions kicked into gear and every man ran deeper into the trench. However, before they could get far, explosions rocked the trench.
Kaboom!!!
The powerful blast sent the men tumbling, but some were less fortunate: the shrapnel and the blast wave tore through their backs, killing them instantly. Their bodies served to dampen and shield the others, leaving them with concussions, ruptured eardrums, and other painful effects.
“Ughh...”
“Dear Astarte...”
The men gasped for air as they groaned, fighting the pain that had beset them from all corners of their bodies. The officer, who survived but was struggling with a ruptured eardrum in his left ear, was screaming in pain. As he writhed on the floor of the trench, he crawled up to the trench wall and pinned his back onto it. Turning around, he caught sight of the silhouettes of several men surmounting the trench and dropping in. It was too dark to make out what they looked like, but he knew then and there they were the ones who dropped the grenades.
“Blasted... Parp swines!” He cried out in defiance.
He reached for the pistol on his right hip, but before he could pull it out of its holster, one of the silhouettes ran up to him. At such a close distance, he could now take a look at his would-be killer: a man with calculating, unyielding eyes, wearing a drab uniform devoid of the crimson and gold the enemy regulars wore and pointing the muzzle of an unfamiliar gun on his chest.
BAM! Click click
With a quick pull of the trigger and a double flick of the arm, the Parpaldian soldier dispatched the surviving enemy officer. Behind him, his fellow soldiers did the same with the surviving enemy soldiers, dispatching them with one shot to the center mass each.
“There!” An enemy soldier cried out from deeper into the trench, away from view.
It appears that the reinforcements have finally come. The Parpaldian soldiers turned their guns back in front of them as they swarmed forward in file. Earlier, when the flare bombs were deployed and they were in their holding positions, they had covered their eyes with blinds so that they would still be accustomed to the dark, unlike their enemies.
Coming toward the corner where the voices were coming from, the foremost Parpaldian soldier primed a grenade and threw it around the corner. The reacting screams came, then the detonation.
Kaboom!
Without delay, the Parpaldian soldiers rounded the corner one by one, swiveling their guns into the killzone and emptying them without stopping—without a hint of mercy.
BAM! Click click. BAM! Click click. BAM! Click click.
The confused enemy soldiers, their eyes still unaccustomed to the dark and their ears ringing from the blast, couldn’t lift a muscle to resist. In less than 10 seconds, another enemy squad lay dead, bleeding, and motionless in the trench.
Elsewhere, Parpaldian soldiers in unusual getups—drab gray uniforms, boots built for surmounting the hardiest mud, bandoliers brimming with grenades, some with eerie-looking body armor with sharp edges and hexagonal plates protecting the neck, chest, abdomen, and groin area—surmounted the trenches with lighting speed and terrifying violence. Every turn and engagement is opened with grenades before seamlessly switching to the back-to-back discharges from their guns. Their small formations followed extremely coordinated approaches and movements, always allowing for as many guns from their comrades into the firing arc. By now, the dry and flat sound their guns made had become signature, but most especially was the double click heard in between each shot: BAM! Click click.
These Parpaldian soldiers, part of an elite Mirishial-trained and Great War surplus-armed unit called the stormtroopers, effectively cleaned house. Fulfilling their novel role as shock troops meant to break through fortified impasses by way of violently swarming the cracks, they opened the path for the more numerous Parpaldian infantrymen to push through.
As the last stormtroopers made their way to the end of the trenches, the battalions of the 86th Infantry Regiment and other formations flooded into the still-burning camp of the Altaran 4th Infantry Division.
“NO QUARTER!!!”
A battalion commanding officer screamed as his men marched past the trenches. His order, supposedly issued only to his battalion, resounded throughout the formations, and soon every Parpaldian infantryman took the order into their minds.
A bloodbath ensued.
The Altarans still outnumbered the Parpaldians, but the surprise of the combined wyvern-trench assault meant that only a fraction of them were actually armed and ready to oppose them. Gunfire rang throughout the night as clouds of spent powder joined the billowing black smoke of the burning camp. Guns weren’t the only weapon deployed en masse; swords, axes, bayonets, cutting knives, butchers’ cleaves—all sorts of blades clashed and slashed as men descended into madness and barbarism. Feelings of anger, regret, rage, and revenge swirled in the heads of Parpaldian and Altaran soldiers. The weeks of rations, endless cold nights, seeing their brothers and friends die and burying them—it all came to a head in this battle. But some weren’t willing to give themselves into such barbary; some Altaran soldiers dropped their weapons, spread their arms into the air, and got down on their knees in surrender. However, only one thing echoed in the minds of the Parpaldian soldiers: no quarter.
- - -
“Fuck fuck fuck fuck! What the fuck is happening?!”
The garrison commander of Fort Sheraya fell to his knees as he watched a massive Parpaldian army on the northern side of the river fall upon the burning camp of the 4th Division—their supposed relief force and hope for a victory.
He was at an utter loss for words on how to describe tonight. First, the sky turned brighter than day, blinding their watchmen for a good minute. Then, the Parpaldians swooped in with their wyverns, setting fire to the division camp. After that, as the sky returned to normal, gunshots and screams rang out from the river; there were flashes erupting all across their trenches on the northern side. Before they could get a fix on what was happening in the trenches, the flashes stopped, and then soon after they saw masses of troops crossing the trenches, marching for the burning camp.
With a horrified look on his face, he turned to an officer standing next to him.
“Contact command back at the royal castle! Tell them what’s happening!”
The officer affirmed his orders, turned around, and ran back to the signals room, leaving the garrison commander to struggle against his quivering legs to stand back up. With his meager force of 200 men, there was little they could do against such a massive enemy army. At this point, the thought of surrender lingered in his mind. There was little hope that another relief force would come to their aid, much less so within the hour. If the enemy wants to take the fort now, they will get it in no time.
Still, while the commander contemplated options, the best thing they could do at this moment was inform their top commanders back in Le Brias of what was going on.
Cent. Calendar 02/03/1640, Royal Castle, Le Brias, 4:26
Beneath the Royal Castle, the top military commanders of the Altaran military gathered to discuss the ongoing crisis that had developed from the outer perimeter of the capital’s defenses. Commanders, officers, and staff personnel alike had all rushed to the complex beneath the castle to take over from the skeleton crew as word reached them of the developing crisis. Over the course of the four to five hours since the first reports came in, there was already a report summarizing most of what had happened.
After the night battle—although the garrison at Fort Sheraya described it a “massacre,” instead—at the Sheraya River, the Parpaldian Imperial Army’s east army group continued their march northward, penetrating as far as 10km with enemy cavalry supported by enemy wyverns overrunning towns and minor forts 20km away from Le Brias proper. Here, the enemy continued their use of “falling stars,” which lit up the sky brighter than midday and stunned any onlooker, to enable wyvern operations. As of 0400 hours, the enemy has widened this penetration to about 6km, catching some of their smaller elements off guard in their camps.
“Five hours in and they’re still pushing?! It’s almost morning; they’ll run out of steam! Rush in some of the regiments we have in reserve and push them back!”
The deputy chief of staff of the Army roared. Having only managed a handful of hours of sleep last night, he had bulging eyes and dark circles around them.
Quickly his commanders gathered around the massive map of the peninsula at the center of the room and pointed axes of advance for their reserves using poles. As the details were ironed and finalized, staff personnel on the side took notes to swiftly hand over to the signals officers to disseminate to the reserve commanders.
“I think it’s about time, sir...” One of the commanders remarked to the deputy chief of staff.
Despite the lack of sleep, the deputy chief of staff had a clear mind and an ironclad resolve. His eyes were weary, but the nod he gave in reply was sharp and clear.
“Right! The pieces are in place, after all, so all that’s left now to get the counteroffensive going is to get His Majesty’s clearance!”
The situation may have been grave, but the expressions on all the commanders’ faces around the map were brimming with confidence and conviction. They gripped hard on the map edges, bit their lips, and wrinkled their bows. The Parpaldians may have been setting the momentum all throughout the war, but they were not going to let them dictate the dance for long.
- - -
Meanwhile, somewhere in the main palace complex of the castle, three girls in sparkling white nightgowns rushed through the decorated stone halls. Their bare feet made soft, hardly audible thumps as they ran, gripping the hems of their gowns so that they wouldn't accidentally trip on them. Behind them followed their ladies in waiting and maids, who called out to the girls in hushes but maintained their pace.
“Your Highnesses! You mustn’t run in the halls barefoot!”
“Dear goodness, that’s not the crux of the problem: they mustn’t run in the halls in their sleepwear!”
“Truly! Oh, how Her Majesty would’ve fainted at the sight of her beloved daughters behaving so slovenly!”
They shared a collective muffled sigh as the three princesses of Altaras—Semira, Alira, and Lumies—all ignored their hushed warnings and continued their sprints.
They then reach a massive doorway with huge, bulging wooden doors. On both sides stood guard two Royal Guardsmen, unflinching in their gaze and unyielding in their statue-like posture. The three princesses stood in front of the doors but hesitated to go further.
“Are you sure about this, Lumy?” Asked Semira, the eldest of the princesses and the closest to the door.
“I am! My contacts in the Army warned me about a Parpaldian breakthrough!” Lumies, the youngest, replied, pointing to the door and telling her sister to hurry.
As Semira turned to the guardsmen and ordered them to open the doors for them, Alira, the middle sister, broke her silence and spoke up.
“...Wait!” She said in her soft voice, but that was more than enough to freeze even the guardsmen in their animation.
Before the other sisters could ask her why, a loud crash thundered from behind the thick doors. Then, the sound of breaking glass. Finally, the deep screams of what sounded like a madman.
“Ngghhh! Grrraaaaahhh!!!”
The violence of the screams was unfamiliar to the sisters, but they all recognized the voice: it was none other than their father, King Taara XIV.
“Why... WHY?!?! These imbeciles can’t be assed to do anything... RIGHT!!!!!”
They heard more crashes, more furniture being upturned and destroyed. The guardsmen, the ladies in waiting, the princesses—they were all frozen in a mixture of shock, sorrow, and a panging sense of denial. How could their king, a symbol of the people, the land, and centuries of Altaran dignity and might, be reduced to such a sorry state?
Finally, as the crashes died down, they heard pained cries.
“Yasmin!!! My love!!! Our kingdom is being forsaken by its own ungrateful children!!! Why did you leave me to rule this kingdom alone?! Why did you leave me?! Why?!?!”
As their father wailed and whimpered, Semira turned to Lumies and Alira.
“It appears the news has reached him.”
Lumies sighed in exasperation as she buried her face in her palms.
“Curses! He’s gotten more mad! Now he won’t hear me out on my plan to escape Le Brias...”
Lumies spat out her thoughts candidly. This touched a nerve with Semira, whose eyes turned white like a cat’s and cheeks flushed red with vexation.
“Is... Is that what this is about?! You were hoping to change his mind again?!”
Semira raised her voice with her frustration oozing from every word. Lumies, in kind, raised her voice too.
“And is that a bad thing to bring up?! We’ve had so many chances to escape—to continue to fight this war on our terms! What good does it do to us—our kingdom—by staying cooped up in this place?! Our father is supposed to be smart, he should’ve known that! That is if he hadn’t gone coo-coo in th-”
SLAP!
A dry, resounding clap echoed throughout the halls. The ladies in waiting and Alira looked on in surprise at Semira’s extended hand and Lumies’s fallen figure, her white nightgown spread out on the floor. She had her hand on her left cheek, which was swollen red.
Before any of them could process what had happened, Semira opened her mouth and out came an outburst of fury—the ugly climax of countless agitating back-and-forth arguments and fruitless mediation between her sisters and her father.
“All you do is antagonize our dear father and go against his wishes!!! Why don’t you try to be more understanding of him?! Why don’t you love him more?! You’re always thinking about you, you, you—ONLY YOU!!! This is why he always locks you up; he knows you don’t love him back, so of course he doesn’t love YOU!!!”
At the tail end of her outburst, she swallowed and instantly she felt the bitter whiplash of the cruelty of her own words. There on the floor lay her youngest sister, Lumy, with Ali kneeling next to her. Ali’s upward gaze met hers and she could see the anger in her usually silent, unfeeling little sister. It was as if she was saying with her gaze, “You went too far.” Meanwhile, Lumy, whose face won’t turn her way, had tears running down her reddened cheek.
Before long, she could feel the warm yet bitterly frigid touch of her own tears rolling down her cheeks. Feelings of annoyance and frustration had overcome her, and now it was regret and a desire for forgiveness. Unfortunately, they did not translate down to her lips all that well.
“L-L-Lumy, I-I... No... I didn’t...”
Her lips overlapped with her tongue and the words couldn’t come out right. Before she could untangle them from one another, Lumies stood up from the floor, her left hand still on her swollen left cheek, and walked away. She uttered not a single word, her gaze never meeting hers. Alira followed her, and so did their ladies in waiting.
As she watched the backs of her two sisters get more distant and the wails of their father beyond the doors got louder, tears flowed out of her eyes like a dam bursting at the seams. She covered her face in shame as she cried, her ladies in waiting trying to console and wipe the tears from her jaw and neck.