“Everything’s gone.” Aric surveyed the empty base camp. Not a single tent or barrack remained. The watchtowers stood silent high above, watching them with ghostlike desolation. The only remnants were extinguished fires and dug out latrines. Craters from the ballistae attack pockmarked the ground. Titan checked the remains of one of the fires, smelling the blackened dirt between his fingertips.
He took a deep sniff. “Three days old at least… the bastards have run off.” Titan spat on the empty fire and kicked the unsuspecting soldier next to him out of frustration. “You’re all craven! Come back and fight!”
Arges slid both of his falcatas back into their sheaths. “Maybe they were low on forces and had to retreat. Since they had the higher ground, we wouldn’t have noticed any movement on their part.”
“Or perhaps they were suffering from illness. With a dwindling force like that, they realized there was no chance of surviving another attack. I bet they counted their blessings, tucked tail, and headed straight home.” Steropes’ attitude changed so suddenly. Moments ago he had been speechless, unsure of what to make of the desolate camp, but now he was almost gleeful. His attitude suggested that the victory was already won in his mind, and perhaps he was correct. They were the only remaining army at Lake Raphia, so by default they were, indeed, the victors.
Aric studied his surroundings. To the west stood the cliff’s edge, overlooking the city of Lake Raphia below. To the north were the Midas Caves, and to the east were the Wild Woods. They had come up the southern pass. The Renzai couldn’t have escaped north into the caves; it was too impractical to move such a large army through it. The only sensible escape route would be out east through the Wild Woods. Aric stared deep into the darkened trees. Three days time to empty an entire base camp wasn’t unheard of, even for an army of three thousand soldiers. But something still bothered him. Why would they abandon their position in the first place? What did they know that the Vicedonians did not?
Aric meandered over to the nearest watchtower. He climbed up the ladder to get a better vantage point of the mysterious scene below. From up top he could see the dim lighting of the Vicedonian base camp across the water, and the looming Midas Caves in the north. The Phalanx Mountains had been named so because of their resemblance to the Phalanx military formation utilized by the Vicedonian Kingdom. The mountaintops pressed closely against one another in tight formation, with the next mountain range peaking out intermittently between the first. The progression of mountaintops seemed to stretch out infinitely for miles. The southern pass was littered with dead bodies of the only apparent Renzai soldiers left to fight. He gazed eastward, scanning the tree line of the Wild Woods. The moon was full tonight, bathing everything with muted silvers and greys. The cry of a nighthawk pierced the shadowy sky, alerting everyone to its presence. Aric saw its sharpened silhouette soaring against the backdrop of the full moon. He lost himself for a moment, watching it fly, envious of its freedom. To simply fly away and escape from everything if it so desired. Much like his rescued birds Castor and Pollux. How he envied them at times. He watched the nighthawk flap its wings, gliding slowly back and forth. To and fro it went. Looping around. Back and forth? Something about its flight pattern struck Aric as odd and out of place. It then occurred to him that the nighthawk never flew out of the circular confines of the full moon. It wasn’t flying back and forth; it was circling. What was it circling? Or the better question was; whom was it circling? The severity of the situation dawned on him. Aric’s heart began to palpitate furiously. How could they be so stupid? He shouted down to the army below.
“Retreat now! It’s a trap! They’re hiding in the Wild Woods!”
But nobody moved. A chorus of questions broke out amongst the army, soldiers unsure whether to believe their prince. Aric could not understand their hesitation. Had they all lost complete respect for their prince? Especially now that he was trying to save them? It was unbelievable to him, but it was too late. The trap had been sprung.
To the north and south, giant trees slammed into the earth. They crashed angrily against the muddy ground, triggering a small earthquake, it seemed. Soldiers and horses lost their balance for a moment as the tree trunks piled up high. Before the Vicedonians could react, fiery daggers and arrows shot out of the woods, burying themselves into the fallen trees. Small sparks littered the trunks until an explosion of fire illuminated the night sky. Flames snapped at the cold air, engulfing the northern and southern sections of the camp, cutting off any possible escape routes.
That’s when they heard it, the Wild Woods revealing their true form. The woods screamed out angrily, piercing the ears and hearts of the Vicedonian army. The roaring grew louder and louder. Before they knew it, the Renzai army had crashed into them like a tidal wave. Streaming out of the forest was a river of soldiers. The strength of the Renzai force felt unreal. Aric watched from above as the Vicedonian army tried to brace for the impact, but found themselves being driven back towards the cliffs. He could see General Yagar in the rear of the attack, commanding troops. Even from this distance, General Yagar was an imposing figure; his golden hair covered his head like a mane. Atop his behemoth of a horse, he wielded a giant broadsword with six jagged edges stemming off the central blade. Aric’s resolve to defeat General Yagar in battle seemed to suddenly wane. He quickly shifted his attention. The Renzai soldiers on the outskirts of the deluge pushed the Vicedonians before them into the burning trees, scorching them alive. In agony, they tried to flee, but ended up clashing into their own comrades. The scene was chaos.
Steropes was closest to the scene and watched with hapless dread. He needed to act before it was too late. “Kill those men, now! Stab them and send them off the cliff!”
Soldiers were forced to make the impossible decision between saving their comrades or themselves. Listening to their pleas for help made it all the more gut wrenching as they chose to kill their comrades. Soldiers flew off the edge of the cliff, falling hundreds of feet to the rocky shore below, where their flames were finally extinguished by the lake’s watery embrace.
The prospect of victory worsened as Renzai Oni emerged from the woods. These giants were several times the size of normal soldiers, even dwarfing soldiers of Titan’s stature. They wielded giant clubs studded with metal spikes. They were the ones who cut down the trees for this ambush. It would’ve taken an army of regular men longer than three days to do the same. With a single swing of their cudgels, clumps of soldiers scattered across the battlefield, landing haphazardly in every direction. Some into the fire, some off the cliffs, and some seemed to simply vanish.
Arges counted three Oni, and knew he had to act right away or else. He galloped towards the nearest Oni, who had just moments before smashed a soldier with his bare hands, crumpling his armor into a ball like cheap tinfoil. The Oni caught Arges out of the corner of his eye and hurled the metal clump at him. Arges leapt forward, rolling to safety as the crumpled armored careened into the side of his horse, knocking it to the ground. Arges felt the air shift above him as the Oni raised his massive club. He had to time this next attack perfectly, or he was dead. The Oni brought down the club, shattering the ground beneath him as clumps of dirt and grass flung about. Before the Oni could raise his arm for another blow, Arges jumped onto the club, quickly making his way up the Oni’s arm like an ant crawling up a tree. He was at his shoulders now. The Oni swatted at him angrily. Arms flailing about, he slapped repeatedly at his own shoulders, but Arges was too fast for him. Arges grabbed a hold of the Oni’s hair and vaulted himself up atop his head. He drove both of his falcatas deep into a single point on the Oni’s crown. The Oni let out a great howl of pain, stumbling about blindly. Arges’ body swung violently, too, but he never let go of the falcatas. He finally regained his footing and flipped himself up into the air, releasing his weapons. As he came back down, he grabbed a hold of both of his blades. Whether it was from the momentum, or his pure strength alone, or possibly a combination of both, Arges pulled the blades down the c
enter of the Oni’s body, splitting him in half. Arges landed on the ground and watched as the each half of the Oni collapsed before him.
Aric couldn’t believe how quickly everything had unraveled. From his place atop the watchtower, he could see everything unfolding. Some of the Vicedonian soldiers were standing their ground, the two generals and Titan were decimating everything in their paths, but the majority of the army was slowly being pushed back towards the cliff’s edge. An arrow whizzed by his face, reminding him that he was not impartial to the whims of the battle below. Had he forgotten that this battle was his doing? Was he prepared to be the catalyst of victory the way he had imagined it so many times in his mind? Fate was tired of waiting, and so Aric’s moment of truth had found him.
One of the two remaining Oni grabbed a hold of the watchtower where he was standing and ripped out a leg. The tower snapped apart as it teetered unevenly forward. The Oni, impatient for its next kill, ripped out another leg. The watchtower careened towards the ground. Aric tried to grab a hold of something, but fate offered no favors this time. The watchtower crashed into the ground, disintegrating into bits of rubble. Aric found himself choking on the dust and smoke created from the impact. Before the air cleared, a massive hand yanked him off the ground. Aric found himself face to face with the giant Oni. The Oni snorted on him, covering Aric with foul smelling mucus. It opened its mouth, ready to chomp down on Aric’s head. Before it managed to decapitate him, Aric pulled out a small dagger hidden in his forearm and stabbed the Oni in the mouth. It let out a howl of pain, but still did not let go; instead, it tightened its grip. Aric could no longer breath, losing all his strength from the sudden lack of oxygen; he dropped the small blade to the ground. The Oni tried again to eat Aric, and this time he had no answer. He closed his eyes tightly when the Oni’s grip suddenly loosened, dropping Aric to the floor. Aric looked up to see Titan pulling the sharpened end of his hammer out of the Oni’s foot.
“General Arges thinks he can outdo me, eh? I’ll take down two Oni myself!”
The Oni moved quicker than Titan had anticipated, it grabbed a hold of him with both its hands, squeezing the life out of him. Aric wanted to do something… no, he felt he needed to return the favor. He picked up his blade and drove it deep into the Oni’s leg. It immediately released Titan and collapsed to one knee. Titan picked up his hammer and hurled it at the Oni’s face. It landed with a loud thud, lodging itself right between the Oni’s eyes. The giant rolled over to its side, twitching until the life faded away.
Two Oni had been killed and pockets of soldiers here and there were standing their ground, but as a whole the Vicedonian army was still being pushed further back towards the edge. Steropes knew he needed to switch tactics. He rallied his men around him in the center of the battlefield, ordering them into Phoenix Formation.
He scanned the field for Arges and found him twenty yards away. “Arges! Phoenix Formation! Your division will make up the point! We need to divide their forces in half!”
Arges nodded in agreement. He raced towards Steropes calling out, “Krakens! Phoenix Formation on me!”
Without question, the Krakens fell instantly into place. They organized themselves into a tip of an arrow. Steropes Fourth Unit lined up behind them, making up the body of the formation. From above, the Phoenix Formation appeared as a long narrow triangle. They began pushing forward, wedging themselves between the throngs of Renzai soldiers. The Krakens’ strength was apparent as they cleaved a way through the ranks. The formation had now divided the battlefield into two separate halves.
Steropes continued the next phase of the assault. “I’ll push them north into the fire! Arges, you push your half south! We’ll make them burn in their own ambush!”
The tactical change seemed to work immediately. The Renzai soldiers were being pushed up against the blazing fires now. The Vicedonian lines began to shift slightly towards the cliff. The idea was to push the enemies against the fire and flush them out towards the edge. When all was said and done, the Vicedonians would’ve switched places with the Renzai.
Rather than burning to death, Renzai soldiers began to clump around the edge of the cliff. The Vicedonians, ecstatic at the role reversal pushed hard to send their enemies flying. Renzai soldiers began to lose their footing and could be heard wailing as they crashed into the rocky ground below.
“Push them back! We can end this now! Victory is ours!” Steropes shouted.
Arges’ line was still maneuvering into position. The Third Unit wasn’t so eager to allow a chance for vengeance to escape them so easily. They kicked, prodded, stabbed, and tossed Renzai soldiers into the raging fires. Some seemed to melt away while others tried to run, only to be kicked back into the blazing fire. The flames burned hotter, shooting up higher into the night sky as the Renzai soldiers provided excess fuel. Flames flickered and danced, whipping in and out. The searing heat emanating from the fire was so fierce, it literally cooked everything within its vicinity. The shadows cast from the fire moved in and out, to and fro, mesmerizing the Krakens. The dancing shadows seemed to call out to them, wanting something from them. Gloom began to creep into their minds, and darkness into their hearts.
“Keep moving the formation outwards! Keep moving!” Arges shouted his orders, but they seemed to suddenly fall upon deaf ears. His Krakens remained completely motionless now, Renzai soldiers escaping right past them untouched. They appeared lifeless, staring blankly into the fire. What is going on? Arges grabbed a hold of the nearest soldier and turned him around. The face was all too familiar. It wasn’t the face of one of his soldiers he was staring at, but rather, flashbacks of Captain Izik and the Dark Forest raced through his mind. His beloved Krakens had never truly survived the march. They were one with the darkness now. He watched in horror as the soldier grabbed him by the head and bit deep into his neck.
Chapter 34