Chapter 2 - The Battle of Ulmiah

Though they still haven't regrouped, the legions of Pyrrskegard are forced to engage the armies of the Sand's Caliphates at Ulmiah.

"Men and women of Pyrrskegard!" General Barón held his cross spear, the Kingdom Come, up high in the sky. "Brave soldiers, heed my words! The eyes of Pyrronikos read the omens true! These 'Golden Beasts' have been performing forbidden concept manipulation, and their armies before us prove it so evermore! Their intentions would see the world brought to ruin. We are the chosen ones who can stop them, and this is where we shall do so! Give your heart and soul to the cause!"

The legions roared and cheered. Most of them, anyway, as the Duelist standing beside her never spoke. However, at the sight of the large, closing enemy army, the Royal Guards began organising their men. "Spearmen, up front!" Azalea shouted. "Spears at the front!" Her sub-commanders repeated the orders for each of their groups. Captain Azalea checked her flanks. Lady Sança Desllor, a tall woman in her forties, almost as tall as Azalea, and one of the two Royal Guards under her, had taken up her right flank, sunlight flaring up against her plate. The bangs of her short, dark brown hair and her brown eyes were still somewhat visible through her helmet's visor. Standing behind her men, bill in one hand and the other pointing forward, she shouted the orders "Pikes at the first row! The rest, shields up and shoulder to shoulder!" The legionnaires obeyed without any hesitation, and the Royal Guard quickly placed herself with the rest of spears at the front. On the left, the other Royal Guard, Ivar, was finishing relaying the orders. He wore a helmet typical from his homeland of Eilíft Hvítt, a rounded cap of steel with mail aventail and a spectacle guard around the eyes and nose, like a mask. "Well? You heard the lady!"

The Caliphates' host stopped on its tracks and silence suddenly fell on Ulmiah. The two armies stared at each other, assessing the situation. It was then that the Sandmen's horse archers streamed out of their right flank and began maneuvering around the legions of Pyrrskegard. "Shield wall, circle formation!" Azalea ordered, clanging the visor of her lion head-shaped helm shut. The legionaries surrounded the hilltop at its foot, preventing the possibility of being surrounded, at the cost of spreading thin. She left the thralls at the front. Arrows flew by and some lodged along the wall of shields. General Barón stood watch, his arms crossed, and replied to this with his own ranged fire, ordering his crossbows and longbows to shoot back and target the mounts. Any unhorsed warrior was quickly dispatched by bolts and arrows. The superior equipment of the legions proved hard to pierce, and they withstood the barrage. As the volleys took a toll on the mounted archers, they were eventually called back in reserve, with a couple being shot in the back as they ran.

The infantry quickly moved back into a line formation but left a small contingent in reserve with the General's bowmen. Once again, pikemen held the first line. The enemy cavalry began to gallop towards Azalea's battle. Behind her, Barón pointed his arm up, and seconds later, he lunged it forward. "Fire!", he commanded. The cannons began their barrage, felling many horsemen. Others tripped over their dead and the dying. Limbs were blown off and screams sometimes followed. Regardless, many more managed to reach the legions. "Now!" Azalea cried, and the pikes pointed at the incoming cavalry. Numerous horsemen impaled themselves, the tips of the spears coming out of their backs, while some of them went through the horses instead. Those that fell off or were stopped in their tracks were easily pulled down and hacked to death. Azalea's gaze fixed on a rider targeting his lance on her. She gripped her mace tightly around the hilt with her right hand and quickly deflected his thrust with her shield, as the head of her weapon found the man's stomach. Now on the ground, Azalea immobilised him with the weight of her shield and bashed his head in with her heel. Another horseman slipped through, but was quickly surrounded and dealt with, the Duelist thrusting his rapier through the gaps of the man’s helmet.

The battlefield grew chaotic, and the heat was becoming increasingly unbearable. Men crawled, staggered, cried and died at her feet. She turned her head to the hilltop once more, and noticed the General defending his archers from stragglers that dared target them. Meanwhile, her men-at-arms received the brunt of charge after charge. The Captain slung her bludgeon across her waist, picking up a fallen banner of Pyrrskegard and driving it right through the chest of a mounted warrior with a war cry. She bashed another man in front of her with her shield, kicked another one running at her and swung her mace right as they tried to retaliate. Her signature move then kicked in. "Afterimage: Repeat!" little did they know that they were already dead. Likely thinking she had missed, the two men began their counterattack, but Azalea's concept skill then, in the matter of a second, materialised, copying her previous strike on the oblivious warriors that were now within her range. The apparition swiftly cracked both of their heads, an eye coming out of one of them.

The Caliphates' infantry was now moving in as well, fully committing to the battle. Metal clanged against metal, and the cries and screams became more intense. Azalea's line was slowly being pushed against the hill in a claustrophobic struggle. Ivar punched a man and pulled him into his side, where he held the poor man's head back and slit his throat with his axe. Lady Sança shouted, "Pyrrskegard!" and brazenly thrust her conceptually enhanced, invisible bill into an attacker's heart. Next to Azalea, the Duelist deftly pierced the back of the head of a man in lamellar armour, dropping him instantly.

But it didn't look good. Even General Barón was engaged in constant hand-to-hand fighting now, and the bows had run out of arrows. They were slowly becoming encircled. Still, those that reached him froze in doubt, and they either fled, or stood and died. He danced through his enemies, and he had no match. Her own skill wasn't that far off, either. A man lunged at her with a curved sword, but was quickly brushed off by her shield, and finished off by a legionnaire. Another man threw his javelin at this previous legionnaire, "Concept: Shield!" she cried. A luminous, flat apparition in the shape of a golden circle formed between the javelin and its target, deflecting it and consuming the conceptual skill. But losses were mounting. Men laid dying, blood spurting out of their wounds into the hot sands or filling their throats. Even if slowly, the line was receding.

Then, the trembling of warhorns became louder than the screams of the wounded and the clashing of iron and steel. More? She thought. Then the rising sound of horses followed. From each flank streamed a unit of knights and mounted men-at-arms in heavy horse in a wedge formation. In them flew the black and white tree of Hargrave, the pink cinquefoil of Laverne, the white swan of Swayne and the fiery phoenix of Fortis, among others. At the tip of the left's spearhead rode a man in an emerald variation of the Royal Guard plate with details of gold and a flower-shaped shield, Sir Rowan Laverne, riding his brown stallion. The other was led by the Commander himself, a knight ahorse a dark destrier, and fully clad in a black version of the Guard's armour and a winged helmet whose eye-slid resembled a furious stare, with its lower half's mouth-slid drawing a sinister grin. His sable cloak flew briskly, leading the right side's charge. The two detachments met at the enemy's rear, washing over the committed forces in disarray. Men were flown off their feet and into the air, and others simply trampled over, crushed repeatedly under the weight of the horses. “For the Lady Leoncoeur!” The green knight shouted as he downed yet another foe with his greatlance. When the lances broke against their targets, the riders switched to swords, maces and axes, striking down at every adversary they went by.

Those on the opposing side that still rode a horse began to flee, and those that couldn't were cut down or yielded. The knights gave chase but were crucially stopped by the Commander after breaking the enemy cavalry. Soon enough, they were trotting back to friendly lines, with the dark knight at the front sheathing his longsword. General Barón, back on his white horse, slowly rode past Azalea to meet with him. The rest were finishing off the fatally wounded foes or giving aid to their men. Ivar seemed to be looting a dead man. Bloodied, Azalea lifted her visor and stormed towards the two men, her Shadow following close. These performed the salute to each other, covering their left eye with the opposite side's hand through their helmets. "The Eye sees", they said to each other. The General turned his head towards Azalea, "See, Captain, he came." The Commander slowly removed his helmet and grimaced at her sight, earning a scornful gaze from her. “You look like s**t.” That man...