Siege State

Tom stood in shock as the blood dragon soared over the walltop. Those orcs nearest the wall recoiled in a visible, army-wide shudder, and only the roared commands of their Idealists kept them in line.

He watched it through the eyes of his birds as it banked towards the army. It was clearly injured, great wounds rent in its side, huge holes in its tattered wings. The Lord of Blood himself rode it, and even from such a distance, Tom could see his pale, strained face.

Tom felt no pity for the man. It seemed the rebellion had gotten the upper hand on the pompous, self-assured man.

The dragon swooped down at the army. Its deep red scales shone in the sun, its long, serpentine tail straightening out behind it. Its great wings flared, beating, pulling it level. Its chest sunk, its neck arching, and its predatory yellow eyes locked on to the orcs below it. Then it breathed.

A discordant sound, like wet cloth tearing, but layered upon itself many times, as if echoing through a cave system, ripped and rippled through the air. The dragon, neck fully extended, jaws wide, blasted through rank upon rank of orcs at speed.

And where it passed, they died.

As the dragon breathed in, streams of blood flowed from the orcs, ripped from them, streaking through the air and into its gaping maw. It was rain in reverse, on a massive, bloody scale.

Tom exulted in the destruction. Whatever disagreements he had with the Lord, him pitching in to help destroy the army would go a long way to reconciling them.

The dragon made a single pass, leaving a swathe of slaughtered orcs in its wake. It beat its wings, striving for height, and as it gained it, Tom saw the wounds on its flanks and wings began to knit themselves closed.

Another sound rose above the battlefield. With the screaming of tens of thousands of frightened orcs, it was …not small, no. It could be heard above them, after all. But it was subtle. It took Tom a moment to place it. It was the tinkling of broken glass.

The discrepancy built in his mind. He couldn’t be hearing glass breaking. He was well outside the city, and there was an army of orcs between it and where he stood. Hundreds of skills were being thrown around, raising a cacophony all of their own. The amount of glass that would have to be broken…

A tiny figure rose above the city. Tom could only just make them out, using Sus and Sol’s sharp vision. He stared, and recognition lit in him like a fire, startling him.

It was Instructor Glass! The elderly woman was wearing her usual attire, a perfectly kept dress, and light slippers. Loose strands of her grey hair, usually neat to perfection, whipped about her face. A small trickle of blood wound its way down one cheek. The tiny wound was unsettling beyond all measure. Tom had only ever viewed her as an inexorable force.

Twinkling, glittering, clouds rose around her. Some had formed to her body, carrying her upwards. Some gathered about her, condensing. Even more floated about her, forming an enormous, scintillating shroud.

Tom was taken aback. The wily old woman had lied to him! She had told him she had the Sword, not Glass! Though even as he thought it, the condensing glass nearby her formed itself into a gigantic, deadly sword, composed of innumerable shattered shards.

Tom’s heart bloomed with affection for the woman. She had obfuscated her Ideals simply to give him more impactful advice. Then his heart grew cold. The Lord was not staying to help. He was simply using the army as fodder to continue his own, selfish struggle. His dragon let out another world-rending shriek and banked to meet his old Instructor. Tom wished her luck, but he could not focus on her. The orcs had recovered from the interruption, and the chieftain demanded his attention once more.

The chieftain stepped forward, throwing caution to the wind. It knew it needed to finish him quickly. Hammer blows rained on him, and Tom retreated, never trying to block or parry, always dodging with more room than he needed.

It proved prescient. Several times, the orc’s invisible pushes left the hammer singing through the air not an inch away from him. Each time, Tom managed to score more wounds on the beast, and now, blood ran freely from multiple sources. It was beginning to flag, the retributive damage Tom was dealing it, coupled with layered Agonies, and Whisper tags, were taking their toll.

He took a second to send some mental commands, and then cast Hush. To its credit, the chieftain reacted to the skill immediately, going on the defensive, stepping out from in between Tom and Sesame and retreating back towards the orc line.

Tom was not about to let it reach safety. He charged in, no longer needing to worry about it pushing or pulling him at inopportune times. His spear was a whirlwind, imbued with crackling pink Suffering, and he battered the hammer aside, time and again, falling into the rhythm of the fight, seeking his moment.

Soon enough, he found it. Sesame had angled just slightly off centre, the chief’s own movements helping him. Tom stepped back, and Sesame roared, filling the air with shards of razor sharp obsidian. The orc flinched at the unexpected attack, throwing an arm up to cover its eyes. It was no use. Many shards found soft flesh. Tom stepped forward again, and stabbed the spear through the orc’s broad neck.

A massive hand snapped up and gripped the spear’s shaft. It grinned at him. Tom knew something was wrong. The chief slapped its thigh with its other hand, even as it pulled the spear free from its throat. A flash of light flared from its side, and the remains of a small wooden object tumbled to the ground. Tom glanced at it.

One of Scriber’s miracle mice! How? he thought. They must have taken it from one of the Hunters they killed. Fuck!

The chief yanked Tom forwards by the spear, jabbing the hammer up into him even as a force pushed on his back. Under the combining forces, he felt several of his ribs break. He let go of the spear, reeling, and managed to create distance while the orc got back to its feet.

The chief began to talk. Its growling, rasping language still sounded odd to Tom, but he knew it would be bragging. Its expression said it all. It tossed his spear to the ground.

No, fuck you, Tom thought, not even bothering to pull his wisp over. I’ve had enough of your fucking nonsense.

He pulled his axe out of his spatial storage, and charged.

The chief was surprised, but recovered quickly, fending off Tom’s first few strikes with parries from his hammer and judicious applications of his force pushes. Tom was undaunted. He couldn’t wait to drag out this fight all over again. He would not be able to make it through the closing ranks of the orc army and help his fellow Hunters, if he did.

He became a whirlwind, striking out with unbridled ferocity. His training over the years, his experience in the Deep, Sere circling them, watching, all of it came together to give Tom the information he needed.

Every time the orc tried to push him off balance, he anticipated it. Every time it tried to deny him a retreat or dodge, he knew. The chief began to accumulate wounds at a rapid rate. Unlike the spear, these were gouges, rents in its over-muscled flesh, flickering with pink Suffering mana.

Tom took more wounds than before as well, but that was all to the good as far as he was concerned. Most were from the directed force pushes, but he took a few glancing blows from the hammer too. Though they were only marginal, he still felt more bones fracture. His left leg, his right forearm, both blared with pain. They were not broken, were still functional, though, and he was happy.

Whisper tags grew like silent, oppressive weeds from his opponent, dancing as they fought. Misery link pulsed regularly as it shared some of the damage he was dealt straight back to the orc. Phantom hammers and axes struck at the orc as Echo activated, over and over. The orc became harried.

Tom pressed his advantage, knowing that as soon as Hush came back off cooldown, the fight would be done. The chieftain realised it too, and activated another skill.

Glowing red plates of armour materialised all over its body, protecting its vitals. The armour gave a wicked feeling, and where the blood from the orcs wounds, trickling down its body, met the glowing plates, the red light composing it flared brighter, stronger, as if feeding off it.

Unwilling to let the foul skill charge for any longer than he had to, Tom pressed the attack. His axe was a blur, flickering, questing, always seeking odd and unusual angles he could exploit.

Where it struck, sparks lept in gouts, pink and red, mana from Suffering, and this Forge skill, meeting and clashing, each vying for supremacy. Each strike left gashes in the red plate, but they quickly reformed.

Tom considered while they clashed. The armour was weaker at the joints, but when he attacked them, he still could not penetrate the skill’s defences. Then inspiration struck.

He pushed the orc harder, and harder still. He threw every ounce of training, eked every tiny bit of speed and agility out of his body, and pushed the orc back. One step, two. Then he gave the command.

Several of Sere’s bodies flitted down, into the orc’s eyes, obscuring its vision. It flinched.

Sesame crashed into its back taking advantage of its momentary distraction to topple it forwards.

Tom stepped forward swinging with every iota of strength, straight towards its neck with his axe.

He infused the blade with Silence. It cut through the skill-made armour like a knife through butter. The orc’s head rolled clear of its body.

After the strenuous fight, it almost seemed too simple an ending. Tom didn’t give it a second thought. Mere yards from him, his fellow Hunters were fighting for their lives against droves of Idealist orcs, those who had managed to recover from their paralysis.

Hush came off cooldown, and he cast it at one orc that grabbed his attention, seemingly having gotten the upper hand on its opponent. The startled orc was quickly disembowelled by the embattled woman fighting it. She nodded him her thanks, and leapt into battle against another orc terrorising a Hunter.

Tom ran for the gap. Here, at the back of the orcs line, it was the narrowest, having expanded outward in a cone from where Val had activated it. Even so, the army was denser closer to the centre, and further in, much of the gap had been closed.

He could see the Hunters, strewn down the open pathway, fighting for their lives to keep it open. He swapped his attention to Sere as he ran into the gap, and saw that some of the group had made it through to the very centre.

Fighting for their lives against three times their number of Idealist orcs, were his mother, Val and Rosa. Ten or so others, Errol and Cass included, were fighting with them.

Tom’s heart leapt into his mouth. He had to help! He couldn’t live with himself if they died without him there to help. For that matter, Rosa would give him endless shit if they killed the Smith and he didn’t contribute.

He almost wasn’t sure which was worse. He put his head down, and charged into the middle of the orc army. Even as he ran, he could see hundreds of orcs filling the gap near the centre, closing around the Idealists that had made it through like a fist.

He wasn’t going to make it.