43. Save The Sixth

The army of the Seventh and the army of the Sixth carried their banners proudly in the air. Nathanial marched forward, observing the battle unfold. Horns blew from both of the Everheart armies. The figures from afar became clearer.

Men with their broken iron armor stood tall. Soldiers with their wounds wrapped shut by bloody linen cloth joined the line of the Sixth. Nathanial watched in silence as he witnessed a one-armed standard bearer push with the rest of his comrades.

They were all fighting to get to them.

Dying to get to them.

And in the face of that courage, Nathanial realized that what he was witnessing wasn’t just the sight of an army on the verge of collapse. Those who were fighting to make their way toward them had every right to have surrendered. To have given up on the uncertainty that their comrades would rescue them. Yet they continued to fight, holding onto a hope that somewhere out in the vast wilderness of the forest—rescue was on its way.

Nathanial couldn’t believe it.

Many of the others couldn’t either, as the army of the Sixth continued to march from the other side, trapping the Empire’s forces between the two.

“Is… is that the Sixth?” Fredrick asked in disbelief. “Those bastards must be insane to sally out in their condition!”

“They’re on the far side, cutting off this section of the Empire’s army from retreating,” Nathanial muttered. “We’ll need to group up with them somehow.”

Richard stepped forward. “It’ll only be a matter of time until the rest of the Empire’s forces on the southern side break through. We’ll need to route the northern side before it’s too late.”

“But how?” Fredrick asked. “Right now, this is nothing more than a meat grinder, and even if we could, there’s not much we could do to change the tides of the battle when it’s on this scale.”

Nathanial’s gaze deepened. He scanned the lines, noticing their perfectly even ranks. Their line seemed immaculate at first glance, yet one section caught his attention. Shields overlapped less cleanly there, tiny gaps forming where exhausted soldiers struggled to keep formation.

“We’re going to punch a hole straight through,” he said. His gaze swept across the men surrounding him who had yet to join the Everheart ranks. “All free aura users gather on me!”

Several of the officers who heard the order turned their heads. Others looked at one another.

Soldiers who had never seen Nathanial before wore expressions of doubt.

Yet one after another they moved with the standard in Nathanial’s hand becoming a rally point.

His voice echoed through the ranks. Men who couldn’t join the line because of their difference in weapons formed columns behind Nathanial with the Everheart banner clearly in sight. He focused on one section of the Empire’s line that seemed the weakest and immediately marched to that section with everyone he could gather, following closely behind.

The officer commanding the section that Nathanial approached met his gaze. An exchange without words occurred, and the man nodded at the valor shown. His booming voice tore through the air with a single command.

“PUSH!” he roared at the top of his lungs.

“PUSH!” the men responded.

Nathanial immediately joined behind the line with the other soldiers as they formed a wedge and dug into the Empire’s final line. The pale expressions of their foes clearly revealed themselves before Nathanial as he and many others reinforced that one section of the Everheart front.

Shoulders pressed against the shields and backs of their comrades as Nathanial and the others threw their weight forward. The enemy formation cracked. Mud churned beneath hundreds of boots as men strained against one another in a contest of pure strength.

The heat from Nathanial’s breath seeped through the gaps in his visor. His muscles tensed as he pushed with his shoulder, continuing to hold a blade in one hand and the standard in the other. The clash of steel was drowned out by grunts of anger mixed with fear and officers screaming orders one after another.

The Empire’s forces desperately held the line.

Spears darted through narrow gaps in the wall from both sides. One Everheart soldier cried out as a spearhead pierced through his thigh, while another stumbled after taking a shield’s edge to the face. Yet before either one of them could fall back, the men behind stepped forward and continued to fill the gaps.

“MAINTAIN THE FORMATION AND ADVANCE!”

The rest of the men forming the wedge continued to advance.

Taking ground inch by inch. Foot by foot.

He could feel the enemy line beginning to break beneath the pressure, and he released a fierce command, pulled out from the depths of his soul.

“BREAK THROUGH THIS POINT!”

The soldiers roared in unison, moving forward as one.

Shields slammed together with a deafening crash, and men from the second line joined the first as the wedge buried deeper into the Empire’s ranks.

Soldiers from both sides screamed with all their might, roaring with the ferocity of a wounded beast in its last days. The first push was met with equal resistance. Nathanial gritted his teeth as his entire line was forced a step back, then another.

“HOLD THIS LINE!” he roared at the top of his lungs.

Men around him were collapsing. Fredrick made it to his right, and Richard to his left. All three of them formed the center with new lines of Everheart soldiers reinforcing their point.

A second push erupted from their side, and Nathanial pushed forward again.

It was a desperate brawl of death with men from both sides falling like flies. Screams of pain and the scent of iron permeated the air. Yet the men around Nathanial continued to march as if grasping onto the last rope of salvation before them.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

“Kill the bannerman!” the Empire’s officer screamed.

The Empire’s men surged toward Nathanial, converging toward the center of the wedge. But before a single blade could reach him, three Everheart soldiers threw themselves into its path, with one dying instantly and another rushing to replace him.

And soon, that very area gave way like a dam that failed to hold back its reserve.

An Empire soldier lost his footing, and another was shoved aside. Nathanial saw the fear spreading through them. They no longer looked like disciplined veterans. Instead, they looked like men trying to survive, and with one final push, the Empire’s last line of defense fell.

“Cut them down!” Nathanial ordered, bringing his aura-clad sword down as the vapors of azure drifted into the sky.

“Follow the standard!” A Everheart soldier shouted.

The men’s spirits ignited with a new resolve as those who were on the sidelines immediately tore into the broken Empire lines. Nathanial rushed forth with his blade in hand to cut down anyone who dared to block his path. Yet out of hundreds of enemy soldiers, none dared to challenge him as his aura flared from his body.

The battlefield was changing.

What had been a brutal struggle for every inch of ground turned into a rout.

One soldier stepped back. Soon, another followed with an enemy officer screaming at them to maintain formation. But none of the Empire’s men listened. Nobody obeyed. What started as one man, turned into ten, then fifty, then hundreds.

They’re… running…

Nathanial’s eyes widened at the sudden realization. He focused on the backs of the fleeing men. The same men who moments ago had been willing to die while holding the line. Now they shoved each other aside in desperation.

Some discarded shields, while others threw away their weapons entirely.

The discipline that held them together was gone.

“They’re breaking…” Nathanial whispered.

“I can’t believe it…” Fredrick added. “Did… did we actually do it?”