—Royal Trantii Academy of Artillery
—
“Let’s go, people, let’s go!” The section chief shouted over the hiss of hydraulics, his voice muffled by the combat respirator around his face..
The gun breech whistled open, and out dropped a steaming hot 15cm shell casing. It hadn’t even settled on the razed earth by the time a crewman dropped a fresh one in the chamber, another two coming up behind him and shoving it inside with a breech ram.
There was no need for additional propellant charges; their target was a bare two kilometers away, just barely inside the howitzer’s minimum engagement range.
“Ready set!” Each of the howitzer’s crewmen shouted, moving just a few meters away from the gun.
“FIRE!”
BOOM
Before the smoke even settled, a crewman jumped up to the side of the gun and pulled the breech lever, and the breech whistled open once more. Instead of rushing to reload, the crew waited in their positions.
The crew chief’s headset buzzed with static before a familiar neutral voice spoke.
“You heard the man!” The crew chief shouted, wiping the men to action. “Get those rounds up here!”
The howitzer crew burst into action, shouting adjustments and actions out of pure muscle memory as they moved as one deadly tinnitus-addled organism.
Around them, the rest of 1st Battery made the final adjustment on their guns and prepared to fire. The target: a swarm of undead hundreds strong, and the stone bridge they were crossing.
The symphony of war was in full swing once more.
…
A bitter smile escaped Victor’s lips. It wasn’t much, but it was a good start…giving them just a little hope of living to see the next sunset. Outside, this strange planet’s bright yellow sun was beginning to rise, making the wreck-filled sea glimmer like stars themselves.
—
“Come on, Constans!” George beckoned, gesturing inside a nearby apartment.
His sister followed right behind him as they made their way across the street with swift, methodical steps to the tall building. The pair clutched rickety crossbows and well-worn daggers, the best weapons their meager gains could afford them.
As they entered through the front door, their eyes darted around for threats. The ground floor had once been some kind of shop, though time and looters had done away with any discernible markings or products, much like with most buildings in Iridia’s southern quarter.
George spared a moment to listen for movement in the streets behind them, but heard nothing. That was good, though the undead were not in the habit of making loud noises. The group that had nearly trapped them inside that old warehouse was but two blocks over, and by now they should be closer.
Spotting a dusty brick staircase, they rushed towards the upper floors.
A pair of mice skittered into one of the old apartments beside the forgotten corridor as they passed the first floor. Had they not been in a rush, they would’ve skewered them with their crossbows. Any kind of food was rare in the Witch’s City, and they had grown tired of their ration blocks. George couldn’t wait for them to cross back out of the containment zone and dig into a bowl of stew back in civilization.
Unfortunately, that day seemed further and further away with each passing moment. As they passed through a window on the second story, he caught the glimpse of a full swarm crawling their way out of a cellar two streets down.
‘Curse that damn war-mage!’ He thought, his eyes flashing back to that moment when they saw a giant meteor descending upon the Duke’s Garden.
Who they were and what they were doing, he knew not. War-mages were a rare sight, more often spoken of between drunken pub patrons than witnessed in real life. Especially in wintertime, when the passages to the north froze solid and the Imperial Army marched down south for wintering.
By the time they made it to the thankfully empty third floor of the apartment building, both siblings were huffing and puffing. They needed to eat and sleep, or at least lie down and rest. The pair should’ve been sleeping right now, after a full day of working the area, but the warspell had also awoken the city’s denizens.
“What about this? Against the door?” Constans’ voice brought him back to the present.
He turned to find her pointing at the wooden desk placed in one corner, which was taking up a good chunk of the space inside the small upper-floor apartment. It was rather light for standard furniture, like any piece slated to be used on the upper floors.
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“Y-Yeah, okay, let’s do that.” He approached on one side as she went to the other. “One…two…three!”
They lifted the desk a half-palm above the floor, so that it wouldn’t make noise as they dragged it across the musty wooden floor, then carefully moved it next to the door connecting the apartment the staircase. Both items of furniture were relatively intact, though the door’s hinges looked very rusty. Courtesy of iridian craftsmanship, back when the living occupied Iridia.
Even now, so many years after its fall to the Witch’s Curse, the city was still famous for its fine goods. Their fence had given them an extra silver coin just because a ring they found was etched with the seal of one of the city’s Artisan Guilds.
“Slowly…slowly…” He muttered as they lowered it back down to the floor, most aware that a loud noise would—
BOOM
“Ah!” Constans exclaimed, the desk slipping out of her grip and dropping on the floor with a bang.
George would’ve cursed, had he not ducked down to the floor on instinct.
“What in the Witch was that?!” He cursed, turning towards the nearest window.
BOOM
This time neither of the siblings made a loud noise, though Constans let out a whisper-quite wine. The noise sounded much like the warspell they’d heard some time ago, only slightly less loud. Out of curiosity, bravery or stupidity, George approached the window to look outside.
BOOM
The noise was coming from the Duke’s Garden, no doubt about it. Other apartments obscured the view, yet he could see smoke rising to the sky. What could that be about? More spells? It made no sense, just like the first time they’d heard the boom. Why would anybody be casting spells into the city?
Any caster with the power to fire spells from leagues away was a precious resource, more than entire villages or towns. A single war mage was more powerful than three knights, as the popular saying went, and George had seen the power of knights up close the last time he got out of the containment zone.
Maybe they were…practicing? It made some sense, considering the city was less than useless for everybody except scavengers. Knights and men-at-arms were charged with guarding the perimeter, so that no monster would go within.
—
“Milord, please wake up!” A servant pleaded. “The magus is requesting your presence.”
Arnus woke up with a jolt, finding himself in naked under the covers. Looking to his left, he found the young blonde that had entered his quarters last night in deep sleep, not a hint of cloth on her body.
He spent a moment looking at the woman, comparing her to the service girls that worked around the barracks down south. She wasn’t as young, or even as beautiful, but there was a certain roguish charm to the girls of Centra. They were cheaper, too, which was mighty helpful when trying to entertain a cohort of men-at-arms through the autumn on a budget.
As the voices grew stronger, he ripped off the covers and put on his clothes. An arming doublet of heavy cotton went over everything, more for its warmth than protection. There was no risk of attack inside the camp, so late into the year, yet through the years he found its weight felt…right.
Strapping his sheathed knightly sword on the leather belt, he exited the bedchambers of the former farmhouse to an awaiting servant. The sky outside was still dark, though he could see the barest hint of a sun rising from the hills beyond.
“Why have I been awoken so early?” He asked, wincing inside at his acid tone. ‘No need to kill the messenger, Arnus. Just…hear him out.’
“I-I bid you good morning, milord. My deepest apologies for disturbing your sleep, but a matter requires your urgent attention.”
“What is it, then?”
“Magos Telestis is awaiting your presence, milord. He speaks of combat inside Iridia…magical combat.”
“Magical?” Arnus muttered under his breath, looking at the servant straight in the eyes. “Where is the Magos now?”
“O-Outside, milord.” The servant said, his gaze falling to the ground. “H-He has taken a seat on the balcony, of his own accord.”
‘Of course he did. Old Man Arche and his fresh air…’ Arnus thought, replying in understanding as he made his way outside, pausing two steps later. “Bring us something to eat, hot if it’s available or cold if the cooks have yet to prepare watered wine to drink. We will eat on the balcony.”
As the servant rushed to prepare food and drink, he walked outside and found the singular war-mage present in the southern perimeter in a chair, drinking from an engraved steel flask.
“Hard liquor so early in the day, Magos? Aren’t you worried for your health?” He quipped, taking a seat next to him.
Most of the cohort was still fast asleep inside repurposed farmhouses and sheds. The three villages just south of Iridia had been abandoned along with the city, as they were just barely within the danger zone. Some villagers had even fallen to the Witch’s Curse, but most had managed to escape without harm.
Now the villages were home to the southern zone’s troops, as well as peddlers, blacksmiths, menders, servants and pleasure workers that made a living off the soldiers’ coin. At its peak during the summer months, the population swelled to well over fifteen hundred souls. Right now, however, barely eight hundred lived here, including just three Knights…and a single war-mage.
Magos Telestis was older than most war-mages of his rank, and that made him older yet than most mortals in the known world. Yet Arche knew that under that grandfatherly gaze and skin full of wrinkles hid a veritable beast of war.
“I sense a great disturbance beyond the walls.” The magus said.
His simple world elicited a jolt from Arche.
“…truly?” The knight asked. “Then…why is it so calm out here?”
Telestis chuckled, taking a sip from his flask. The scent of brandy filled the air.
“You are a great warrior, Arche, yet your greatness blinds you to the world of magic. It is a common side-effect of your rank, one that I do not blame you; few war-mages can stand in the way of a knight in close combat.”
The magus took a deep breath, exhaling it slowly as his gaze focused on the barest hint of the accursed walls of Iridia. Arche followed, but a familiar haze clouded his vision. The Witch’s curse was potent, even from so far away; nothing inside the city could be observed from outside, no magic enhancements could pierce it.
Even without the necromantic and chimeric components, the curse would’ve doomed Iridia to ruin. Maybe not in a day, but in a week, a month or a year the city would’ve been abandoned. No modern city of Iridia’s former size could survive without the benefits of alchemy and magic, yet both had been excised in their entirety, barred not just from entry beyond the obsidian walls.
“The Haze blocks sight so completely that we can scarcely understand the size and shape of the walls we are looking at without consulting the texts smuggled out of the city during the exodus. Smell is equally nullified, though I doubt we could glean much even if we had wolf beast-men among our ranks. Yet touch…that’s quite harder to shield against.”
“What are you saying?”
Telestis looked back at him. “Had you or any other enhanced person been awake, you would’ve felt it too. There was a great tremor from within Iridia’s walls. When the containment patrol had just been set up I was younger and more adventurous, and once I shot a fireball into the city. Few cared, and none reprimanded me; the city was as good as lost whether I bombed it or not.”
He chuckled, the smile not reaching his cold eyes. “The tremor I felt was barely perceptible, and most other enhanced didn’t even sense it. So if you’re feeling such a tremble from the city, something truly great, either powerful or extremely heavy, has fallen into the city.”
“I have spent the time between there and now, considering the possibilities. It couldn’t have been a spell, for the caster would need to be outside and, therefore, his signature detectible. It can’t have been a necromorph or monster, because there exists nothing of that size and nature that could manifest so close to civilization, let alone inside an area so hostile of magic as to strip the mana from a mage’s core.”
The magus turned to look at him, his voice cracking. “I don’t know what could’ve caused this, and that scares me.”
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