Lyra stepped through the makeshift camp. In the bright sunlight, the horrid state of the army was plain to see. She frowned as she walked past the horde of wounded and shell-shocked soldiers.
Many of them had empty eyes and full, gaping wounds.
‘This needs to end soon.’ Lyra thought as she saw all the bodies. There were a few healers, but not enough. They scrambled to heal as many people as possible, but the supply of wounded overwhelmed the healer’s capabilities.
‘If only we could end this in one battle,’ she thought as she left the camp and entered the streets of Kroll City. ‘These guerilla tactics are not suitable at all for us. We are just being incrementally weathered down like a rock in a storm until we are finally obliterated.’
Lyra sighed and continued her fast-paced walk through the streets. She needed to help; her heart pressed her to do something, anything. After the initial speech, she had been drained. It was not easy to project a voice with such emotion and volume to thousands. Despite this, Lyra’s heart ached as she walked past the wounded in camp and now the dead on the streets.
After walking deeper into the city, Lyra finally spotted an officer of rank; it was one of the non-human soldiers who had been a part of Moravian and Procka’s squad. Relatively short, the being—clearly a male— was nearly human. The only differentiating attribute was his sandpaper-like skin; it was rough and scattered with minuscule dots. Apart from that and his diminutive stature, he was essentially a human. ‘Well, the people of Kroll City don’t agree I suppose.’
As she approached the short man, he saw her and saluted stiffly. “Greetings, Sir Lyra.”
She looked down at him and nodded; “At ease, soldier. Where is the nearest zone of combat?” she asked, cutting through the formalities that were sure to follow.
The man squinted at her before pointing back into the city's depths; “There are none. They retreated.”
Lyra frowned, “Why exactly have they retreated?”
“I don’t really know.” The man answered, averting his eyes.
“Lyra lasered in on the short man; “Nothing. You know nothing, not even a suspected reason.”
“Well, I might have an idea,” he said, scratching his back, which elicited an abrasive, scraping noise.
“Well?” Lyra prompted, her eyes bulging in annoyance, ‘What celestial cursed his tongue?’
Gulping, the man looked up at her, “Sir Thorne charged alone at the commander of the enemies. Half an hour ago, the strongest surge of energy I’ve ever felt came from where he went.”
Lyra nodded in understanding, “So Thorne killed the commander.”
“Well, I’m not entirely sure. If he did, he should return soon.”
“All right, thank you for letting me know. As we wait for Thorne, you and all the other officers should gather all fighting soldiers into one army.”
The man nodded and hurriedly ran back to the camp.
‘He really did not feel comfortable around me.’ Lyra thought with a chuckle as she watched the sprinting man.
Shaking her head, Lyra leaned against a wall as she prepared for Throne’s arrival…if he arrived at all.
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Moravian jumped forward as he watched the squad of cultivators retreat. ‘Why are they running?’ he questioned as he tossed one of his blades at a cultivator's neck. The brown spectrum cultivators readily cast a rock shield to block the blade and continued running away with his peers.
‘What is happening?’ Moravian shook his head as he stopped his pursuit. When fighting this five-man squad, he had had them on the back foot, but his advantage wasn’t so profound that it would prompt a full-out withdrawal. Most men’s pride wouldn’t allow them to retreat from a five-on-one, let alone a tiny disadvantage in skill.
‘Could it be that energy.’ Moravian thought as he looked toward the area where the horrible surge of yellow energy had erupted from. It was close to him, too close for comfort. The wave was so powerful that it had shaken him off his feet. The squad of enemies had even landed an attack on him due to his shock. The yellow energy had overwhelmed his body and senses. The cultivators of Kroll City had very primitive energy senses and weren’t bothered by it to the same extent as Moravian.
‘I should at least follow them,’ Moravian decided. If I can't kill them, then I at least need to understand why they are retreating.’ A dark smile creased his face as he moved toward where the soldiers had run. ‘Maybe I can pull off an assassination or two.’
The streets were wide and long, so Moravian had to stay far away from the soldiers lest they spot him. To his luck, the endless battles in these streets had caused a mini sandstorm that offered him a decent shroud.
Minutes passed as Moravian stalked his prey. Despite seeing Moravian stop chasing them, they hadn’t slowed their pace. ‘Like hive crawlers returning to the nest.’ He thought with a scowl; something was wrong here.
As Moravian continued, he noticed his shroud of battle-induced dust thinning. ‘So, we have finally reached the enemy's side of the city.’
The soldiers slowed their pace as well; they went from a sprint to a hearty speedwalk. Moravian also stalled his swiftness. As he walked, he scanned the environment for any type of possible danger. ‘Currently nothing, but that’s definitely going to change.’
Eventually, the group of five cultivators reached a surprisingly narrow road. It was quite contradictory to the layout of Kroll city, and the five of them needed to walk single file in order to fit. The road—despite its lack of girth—was incredibly long. It stretched for nearly a mile, and there was no dust to shroud him. ‘So, this is where the journey ends.’ Moravian thought with a small, excited grin. He stood on the corner of the road and peered around again to see if the cultivators were almost at the end of the road.
‘Once they reach the end, I'm going to have to use Draugr’s cloak.’ He planned, but as soon as he thought of that, a scowl split his face. ‘Nightwalkers be damned, then I’ll only be able to scout for a couple of seconds before I have to retreat.
Pacing, Moravian tried to think of a solution, ‘Could I pretend to be one of them? No, it wouldn’t work, I'm not a human.’
Frustrated, Moravian grabbed his head-ridges and looked up to the sun, frustrated. As he peered into the swirling star, something caught his eye; ‘The buildings. I’ll scout from up there.’
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The buildings on each edge of the street had escaped Moravian’s initial planning, and that was for one reason. They were simply too tall. They weren’t the tallest buildings Moravian had scaled, but Moravian needed to be able to escape with haste if necessary, and these buildings didn’t offer a route of escape. ‘Unless…’
Hand moving fast, Moravian retrieved his communication device. It was from the Zupu academy, and only his teammates had them. He dialed Lyra and prayed that she was available.
“Ding!” the device chimed.
“Thank the sable celestial’s you're awake,” Moravian said in a whisper. He held the device to his mouth, not waiting for the Lumanari’s response. “Lyra, I need your help…”
He spoke as fast as he could, outlining the way to reach the narrow road from the camp. “I need you as soon as possible. If you think it's impossible to reach me, then call me immediately.
Lyra—who hadn’t said one word during the call—spoke assuredly, “I’ll start moving now, but I do have one question.”
“What is it?” Moravian bit.
“Why? Why do you want me there, and why do you want me to position myself under the building in such a way?”
A smile streaked across Moravian's face. “You'll see," he said confidently, hanging up the call.
‘Now let us see what the enemies have planned,’ Moravian grinned. He made his way to the tall building and began to climb!
His grey fingers were rounded at the top. Moravian’s years of training with his family had paid dividends. His body was near-perfect for climbing, and he could scale the craggy sandstone building without trouble.
‘I shouldn’t use Draugr’s Cloak yet, ' he decided halfway up the structure. It was such a valuable skill, and he didn’t want to waste it. ‘I’ll just take my chances and hope that no one sees me, ' he said.
Despite his confidence, Moravian increased his pace. He made sure to climb in the most efficient way possible. With each handhold, he would launch himself upward, and make sure to land in silence.
After a few minutes of rapid climbing, Moravian reached the top of the building. Before entering the flat rooftop, Moravian peeked his head over the ledge. ‘Shit,’ he scowled; the rooftop was occupied. There were two cultivators, both with transparent spectrum crystals. ‘This is dangerous,’ Moravian frowned, pulling his head back under the ledge, ‘I need to kill them before they realize I'm here. So high up they can throw me off the building with ease.’
Moravian looked down at the street below. It was hundreds of feet down; there was no chance he would survive that fall without help.
Face crinkling in concentration, Moravian let go of the ledge with his left hand. It was challenging to hold on, but his supernatural strength allowed him to maintain his grip and balance. With his now free left hand, Moravian fumbled around his belt and retrieved two of his finest throwing knives. Unclamping them with one hand was a struggle, but his years of experience won out. Some people back in the academy had criticized him for not leaving his weapons in the spatial storage, but Moravian would never trust a tool he did not explicitly own.
In less than a second, Moravian peeked his head over the ledge, then lowered it back under. ‘So they are in the top left and top right corner.’
Activating all the needed muscles, Moravian pushed himself up to the rooftop. As he did, he released the first knife with masterful skill. The finger-length black blade pirouetted through the air. Before the first blade had even reached its largest, Moravian loosed the second!
Two low thumps sounded on the top of the building. Quickly, Moravian swiveled his head to survey the other buildings. ‘The jade celestial blessed me.’ Moravian grinned. The buildings were devoid of soldiers.
Before looking out onto the clearing below, where the five cultivators had run to, Moravian first dragged the two dead cultivators to the center of the building. It wouldn’t be good if their bodies were spotted.
‘Now let's see what this is all about.’ Moravian thought. His heart pumping due to the anticipation. He had no idea what it was, but he did know that what he was about to see would undoubtedly be significant.
Moravian trotted over to the ledge to get an initial look. What he saw caused him to stumble backward—back to the center of the roof. ‘What in the universe!’
More carefully this time, Moravian looked back over the ledge—this time, he was forced to believe what he saw was real. Beneath him in one of the many city squares was an army many thousands strong!
The army was formatted simply: non-cultivators were at the back—numbers in the thousands. Ordinary cultivators of low-to-medium strength were ahead of the non-cultivators. This group numbered a little bit more than two hundred, which terrified Moravian. ‘We only have about a hundred cultivators, and most of them are weak.’
What scared Moravian the most was the final group. Ahead of the normal cultivators, standing on a raised rectangular platform was a group of powerful cultivators. Energy radiated from them, and Moravian knew they were all more-or-less equal in strength to the sound cultivator he had battled. There were over twenty of them, with many of the spectrums represented.
Moravian sat in silence as he watched. A creeping dread began to fill him, ‘They returned. How did we not notice them?’
Minutes passed without anything happening. There were no conversations between the soldiers, and no commands were made by the officers. ‘It's like they're…waiting. But for what Moravian questioned, scratching his chin.
‘What!’ Moravia ducked down in a scramble. The army had turned around and looked up at him! ‘Do they know?’
Moravian breathed quietly against the sandstone ground. His heart was in a jumble as he lay against the building—hoping to all celestials, hoping to all dreadlords, hoping to the damn universe core that it was a coincidence.
“Get up.”
Moravian shivered. ‘It’s the grade two. I need to escape, now!’
He didn’t know where the man was, but he recognized the terrible, authoritative voice of the grade-two city lord. From his prone position, Moravian pushed himself up to a stand! Energy ran through his pathways like there was no tomorrow—there wouldn't be if he failed.
Moravian didn’t activate any skill, as they were almost all stealth and assassination-based, and instead pushed all his energy into his body. With a heaving push—his heart still racing, goosebumps still formed—Moravian jumped!
“You can't just run like that non-human.”
A cold grip clasped his neck as a voice entered his ear. “Tricking me is impossible.”
Moravian gasped out. The grip on his neck was too powerful; he couldn’t escape unless he acted now. With his free hand, Moravian punched out in a deadly uppercut! Even from such a vulnerable position, he knew that his punches would hurt.
It didn’t work. Due to the oxygen loss, Moravian’s vision was becoming blurry. He couldn’t exactly make out the figure gripping him, but he did see that a lazy palm caught his punch. Then, out of nowhere, Moravian felt a light touch on his forehead.
“You must always be prepared to take what you give. Do you understand little non-human?”
Unable to think, Moravian clawed and struggled against the man. As he tried to escape, full of desperation, his forehead exploded in blunt pain. It was as if he had been brutally assaulted! His eyes began to droop as he began to fall unconscious.
“Bye-bye.” He heard in his ears. Then the vice grip that had been so vehemently grasping him let go. ‘I'm free.’ Moravian thought with a loopy grin. His oxygen-depleted mind was running in circles as he felt the pressure cease. ‘Oh, but I'm falling.’
He looked down, only to be greeted by the blurry array of soldiers. His grin left, and his mind returned to him in a snap. Just as he was about to splat on the ground, Moravian felt a single tear leave him. ‘I've failed father. Just as you said I would.’