Chapter 81
Sentenced to Death
A weapon bled red in the streaks of moonlight.
Asher slithered to the side but was unable to fully dodge the spear thrust; it pierced dangerously close to his right kidney, just below it. The wound sprayed blood and the body jolted in shock, but that was just another wound that he had suffered. He’d lost count after about twenty, having made peace with the fact that he’d live through the various aches if he was to survive today.
The pile of bodies behind him was growing, which had crossed fifty moments ago. There were quite a few scattered about elsewhere as well, but it didn’t matter. They did not stop coming out from the dark shadows, bursting through the rain that somehow seemed to have started falling even harder, thirsty for his life.
Even though it rained, and even though there was scarcely any light past the few beams of moonlight that managed to sneak past the ashen clouds, Asher saw perfectly--he saw the dirt mould and meld into dirt, he saw boots slip and give way, he saw unyielding lips part into roars, and he saw jagged rocks fade into the rear behind the sea of plated armors.
He also finally understood what ‘deflections being perfect parries’ meant--as long as he blocked an attack, he never lost his footing while his attacker would stumble, occasionally even fall to the ground. It was a bit of a cheat, but in consideration of his position, it was merely a tip of an iceberg attempting to even out the playing field.
Deflecting a sword strike, he dipped closer and stabbed a man through his jaw and up through his brain. Blood and brain matter sprayed out and he saw the light vanish out of the pair of raging eyes. The body fell limp and toppled to the side but he had no time to pay attention to it. He felt a dagger stab in his left thigh; a crawling man on the ground, alive still somehow. However, only the tip managed to pierce through, as the man was too weak.
Asher stomped on his unhelmed head and killed him, pulling out the dagger and throwing it, hitting someone squarely between the eyes, extinguishing yet another life.
A slash of a sword opened up a gash across his chest, but he ignored the burning nuzzle of pain and thrust forward, killing the assailant. The pain vanished, the wound closing visibly.
Suddenly, a roar burst past all other sounds and, from the ravaging vanguard, he saw a behemoth over seven feet tall emerge, wielding about a massive warhammer. He stomped forth like a maddened beast, but his boots sunk further into the dirt with every step. Some ten yards away from Asher, he was unable to move forward, his legs having completely sunk into the dirt.
Asher flashed forward and appeared in front of the giant, slashing his sword horizontally across the neck. The blade met no resistance, as though it was cutting through a freshly baked loaf of bread. Blood sprayed out violently, gushing out like a raging rapid, as the head slowly grew detached from the neck, toppling to the left as the winds pushed against its side.
He retreated back to the original point, preventing others from breaching through. There were no thoughts occupying his mind--he’d emptied it completely, and sunk them all into the depths of his soul. He only saw stretched lines converging toward him, and thought only of tomorrow he would never live should he fall.
Shadows grew taller and larger and faster, and they began to widen their net, attacking from all ends. There was no pause, there was no breather, there was no stoppage in the battle--his legs were tired, yet at full strength. His lungs burned, yet every breath birthed him anew. The corpses piled up behind and to the sides, and soon were his fortified castle, a throne made up of dead and hateful.
In the darkness, he was no longer a survivor, an aged boulder barely holding out against the tides. No, he was the fortified cliff shielding the inland from the raging sea storms.
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His body bled, over and over, wounds opening and closing repeatedly. Pain... pain was brutalizing. Though he endured, and though all wounds healed, and though there seemed to be no end to his immortality, the wounds burned like fire that would never go out.
A boom of thunder exploded and a flash of lightning temporarily lit up the entire mountain as though it was day--his heart stopped for that brief second for, past the few dozen or so armored knights currently surrounding him, he caught a glimpse of the horde down the mountain. Like black polka dots they decorated the entire side of the mountain, the swarm denser than a forest, all moving in perfect unison toward him.
And, at the rear, there was a figure no larger than him. Regardless, the presence was... suffocating. Just a mere second-long gaze was enough to freeze Asher up long enough for a sword to pierce his lungs and awaken him. That was the figure he would have to survive against should he stem the tide until the very end.
Once again, from the calming sea of his mind, something awoke.
Anger.
Rage.
Hatred.
He did not belong here. He was not supposed to be here. Even if he should have died, it should have been staring down the barrel of a gun to something... human. Understandable. Recognizable. This? This wasn’t that.
This was hell forged by the indistinguishable, and he was merely an experimental pawn.
He slashed out, decapitating four knights in one fell swoop. Heads flew to the side and blood sprayed, ebony-dyed in the darkness. Though he promised himself he’d stay calm, calculated, and in control... he was a human, at the end of the day. Just a human.
And he raged, like a child throwing a tantrum. It wasn’t reasonable, it wasn’t favorable, it wasn’t in his best interest--if anything, it was the opposite of that. It was him giving in to their taunts, it was him telling them that they’d gotten under his skin, that their actions had broken him.
But a boat, even broken and shattered, could still be a life raft in the marauding currents of the ocean.
Gnashing his teeth, he spat to the side and took two sword stabs simultaneously, killing the attackers.
One step forward.
More shadows converged toward him, but he tore them asunder with swift slashes--every swing seemed to carry the depth of his grudge and his hatred, pulsating that much stronger with the resonance.
Two steps forward.
His left arm was nearly cleaved by an axe lodged in his shoulder; Asher spun in a semi-circle and killed seven knights within a second, their bodies disintegrated into a thousand pieces that scattered outward like bloody fireworks.
Three steps forward.
Invisible to him, violent winds seemed to have become corporeal, their tendrils washing across his frame and becoming flickering vapors shaped like fire behind him. Milky-white, they seemed to shunt the darkness behind him, if ever temporarily, and also seemed to block the knights from being able to approach him from the rear.
Four steps forward.
He’d made strides out of the cone of defense--though he knew he should retreat and hold the ground, his body desired other things. The flanks, strangely, grew narrower and narrower--so much so that he could see them all in his peripheral vision.
Five steps forward.
The white vapors, guided by the winds, fluttered like angelic wings, heaving outward behind him, creating a luminescent blockade that seemed to shield his rear from the encroaching shadows.
Six steps forward.
More and more, they converged in his sight--dozens attacked at once, and though a few of the stabs and slashes and thrusts penetrated through, the wounds did not stop him. Rather, it almost seemed like the pain was the urge ushering him forward, the winds in his sails of desperation.
Seven steps forward.
The lightning flashed once more, the sound of thunder so loud that the entire mountain quaked beneath its might--but in the blinding light, he saw the impossible... he saw shadows hesitate. It was merely for a moment, and that hesitation was quickly overcome with thirst once again, but it was there. Surfacing.
Eight steps forward.
He was well past fifteen yards beyond his starting point, where he was supposed to stay. And in his wake, there were nearly a hundred knights sprawled dead on the ground in various states of dissection. Though a morbid sight it was, it was also a rather poignant one--from the fallen, an entity emerged. It was a man, a human, in body and in soul--for blood cruised through his veins, nourishing his muscles and organs, and shielded by layered skin. There was nothing of him that was monstrous, nothing of him that was holy, noble, or blessed; and yet, that tiny creature cast a mighty long shadow across the mountain.
The white vapors have turned almost wholly solid, and though they were white still, there was silver and gray to them, and they exuded no light. They were merely a wall made up of a soul-deep grudge born of unfair life and even more unfair death.
It was an anomaly to an already anomalous circumstance--the sort of change that always ended up dotting the lines of historical tomes, for they chapter the events and they chapter the figures who usurp the world in such a monumental way that it would be remiss to forget them.
Heroic or otherwise, they are the unforgotten.
And now, sentenced to death, there was an unremarkable silhouette standing lonely in the decadent storm, altering the course of time.