It began slowly. To prevent the enemy archers from pelting them with arrows before they were ready, 5th division had set up several hundred meters away, and running the entire distance would’ve tired the soldiers out before they even got to the fight. Still, it felt strange to walk across the field toward the shield wall bristling with spears, as if the thousands of warriors were out on a Sunday stroll and had recognized an acquaintance from afar. The Marradi drums were increasing their cadence, and the soldiers answered their beats with a shouted chant, though Edwin couldn’t make out the words.

Edwin could feel his heart beat quickly, and fought back against the adrenaline trying to narrow his vision and whip him into breaking into a run and leaving his comrades behind when a glowing orb rose from inside the Marradi formation, closely followed by several more.

“Fireballs!” Bordan shouted, his warning echoed a hundredfold throughout the Harvand army. “Huddle up!”

They stopped, and beside Edwin Salissa raised her hands and closed her eyes. There was no indication of anything happening, but Edwin put his head back to watch the fireballs’ lumbering flight as they arced down towards their formation. They seemed to grow larger as they fell, and despite knowing that he was safe, Edwin couldn’t help but flinch at the last second.

The shield shimmered into visibility as the first spell crashed into it and exploded, flammable liquid mana spraying in every direction. The spells’ explosions made the air thrum as the sky turned into a flaming inferno for a few seconds, but the display of raw power and destructive force didn’t faze the warriors much. They’d weathered plenty of these attacks by now, and they trusted in their mages to keep them safe.

Once the last of the liquid mana had burned up, the Harvand forces continued their silent march across the now smoldering field. Soon they were in range of the remaining Marradi archers, and a volley of arrows rose into the air like a cloud of flies from a rotting cadaver.

“Raise shields!” Bordan shouted. “Double time!”

The adventurers around Edwin raised their shields to cover their heads, and the entire formation fell into a jog. To Edwin, it didn’t feel much faster than walking, but he reminded himself that the others had neither his long legs nor his limitless stamina. As the arrows fell around him, the sounds of the steel heads impacting wooden shields playing a harsh staccato, Edwin raised his left arm to cover his face, looking at the feet of the men to his left and right to keep his position.

“Fireballs! Formation halt!” Bordan screamed suddenly, and Edwin looked up. They were maybe a hundred meters from the shield wall now, and the Marradi mages were trying to smuggle in one last magical strike while the attackers were distracted by the arrows and their impending charge. It didn’t work. By the time the spells finished their high arc, the Harvand forces were safe under their magical shields again, and the fireballs burned up into nothing. Again, the horn sounded, and again, they set off across the burning grass.

Arrows still rained down on them, but they were getting closer. Eighty meters. Seventy. Sixty.

“I need a runup, Bordan!” Edwin reminded him loudly.

“Wait for the signal,” his friend simply shot back, voice strained.

Fifty.

Forty.

The Marradi were so close he could make out their faces and feel the beating of their war drums in the ground under his feet.

Thirty.

The horn’s clear note cut through the noise, and Edwin’s boots dug into the soft ground and shot him forwards, his comrades flashing by as if they were standing still, even as they broke into a run themselves. Edwin ducked his head and held his glaive like a lance, concentrating on his rapidly pumping legs as he gained more and more speed. The narrow corridor between the adventurers ahead of him undulated, contracting in places and expanding in others as the charge made the warriors forget about their formation, and Edwin only hoped that none would step into his path. He was way past stopping.

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Finally, he reached the front of the wedge, walls of adventurers replaced by wide-open field in an instant as he shot out from the formation like a bolt from a ballista.

He looked up to aim his final approach, meeting the gaze of a Marradi soldier even as the man’s eyes widened almost comically and he opened his mouth to shout.

“It’s the—”

He never got to finish his sentence as Edwin slammed into the shield wall exactly between the soldier and his neighbor, throwing them aside as if they weighed nothing. There was another line behind them, but he went through them just the same. The third line actually slowed him down noticeably, so when he barreled into the fourth, toppling the braced soldiers brought his mad dash to a halt.

There was a moment of breathless quiet, surprise warring with disbelief on the faces of the men around him as he caught his footing. Then, someone screamed.

“It’s the demon!”

Standing all alone in the middle of hundreds of enemy soldiers, Edwin watched with surprise as the men actually stepped back from him, the bravest among them stopping just long enough to pull their downed comrades out of his reach. A strange feeling overcame him, one he couldn’t place, as he had never felt it before. He took a deep breath, filling his lungs to the brim as he felt the familiar heat of mana flooding his body.

Then he roared, the deep, guttural bellow drowning out every other sound on the battlefield for a few moments as it pushed back the men in front of him another half step. Absolute silence followed – only to be broken again when two thousand Harvand throats answered with a wordless battlecry as the tip of their wedge crashed into the Marradi shield wall. Finally, the men around him woke from their shock.

“Form up!” a soldier to his right shouted. “Hold the line! He’s just one man! Surround him and he—”

His voice was cut off along with his head as Borm’s two-handed sword found the gap between his helmet and his gorget. Swords and axes rose and fell, and moments later a heavily armored adventurer stood at each of Edwin’s shoulders.

“You keep starting the fun without us!” Borm yelled, coaxing his long weapon from one sweeping strike into the next to keep its momentum.

Edwin didn’t bother responding, instead hefting his glaive as he fixed his glare at the enemy ahead of him, the blood draining from the poor soldier’s face even as he set his feet and bravely raised his shield.

The next minute was bloody chaos. The Marradi were strongest when lined up in their shield wall, and they could keep their foes at a distance with quick stabs of their spears. Had the line been intact, the adventurers would’ve been at a severe disadvantage. On the other hand, most of the adventurers had shorter weapons that were more useful in the tight press of bodies that Edwin’s charge had created, and the Marradi had to fight mightily to prevent the deep wound in their shield wall from tearing open even further.

But fight mightily, they did.

Edwin’s glaive fell, turning yet another shield into so much firewood, only for the screaming soldier to be replaced by another.

“Hold the line!” an officer shouted. “Just a little longer!”

They’re not breaking, Edwin thought grimly. They’re fighting as if retreat wasn’t an option. No – they’re fighting as if… ‘a little longer’?

“Bordan!” Edwin shouted, turning around to look for his friend among the fighting. He spotted his banner’s pennant and pushed through the adventurers behind him, trying to reach it. “Bordan!”

“What?!” the former soldier looked over, meeting his gaze with a confused look. “What’s going on?!”

“They’re not going to break, Bordan!” Edwin shouted over the din of battle as he arrived next to his friend. “They’re waiting for something! We need to leave!”

“What?” Bordan asked, alarmed. “How do you know?”

“No time to explain, we need to retreat!”

“Look, I can’t just order a full retreat because you have a hunch!” Bordan shouted, though he looked around with worry. “I’ll send a warning to the general—”

“Bordan!” Edwin growled, grabbing the shorter man’s arm and leaning down until their faces were a hand’s width apart. Even if he had all the time in the world, he wasn’t sure that he could explain how he knew. But he knew, as surely as he’d ever known anything: The Marradi weren’t going to break. They weren’t going to run, or surrender. They would keep holding the line for as long as they had to, because they knew that something was coming, and when it did, 5th division needed to be gone.

“Trust me!” Edwin growled. “We need to leave now!”

For a few seconds, Bordan held his gaze, a shocked expression on his face. Then he whirled around, grabbing the horn from the belt of their flag bearer and raised it to his lips. A drawn-out, mourning sound reverberated across the field, not as smooth as those produced by their usual signalers, but recognizable nonetheless. There was a moment of general confusion as Bordan paused to take a deep breath, then repeated the signal a second time.

“Retreat!” Edwin bellowed, turning to push back to his position at the front. “Retreeeat!”

They had just begun to separate from the enemies ahead of them, struggling to move backwards through the hole he’d opened mere minutes ago, when a horn sounded from behind them, as if to answer Bordan’s signal. At first, Edwin thought that it was division command, giving some kind of order. Then it was joined by another and another, sounding not from directly behind them, but from a valley between two hills at their rear flank.

Edwin cursed. His insight had been correct – it had simply been too late.