BXBX NOVEL Chapter 173: Soldier's fate (part 4)
Another poor fellow ended up unseated from his saddle with a few remaining parts of his body scattering amidst the flames the explosion left in the wake of the man\'s charge.
The shot fell close, far too close to Luan\'s comfort. The flames it left behind stalled Luan\'s platoon, forcing them to slow their mounts down and maneuver around to avoid the flames.
Outside of this distraction, though, things went back to how they should always be.
Luan crested the hill and charged down, using the slope to push his mount even further beyond what should be its limits.
The camp was just a tiny bit away. Nearly within the reach of his hand.
As if desperate to stop them from charging down, the hidden attacker unleashed their spells even faster than before… Only for their attacks to suddenly cease once only about a hundred steps separated the front of the golden cavalry from the loose barricades scattered all over the camp\'s perimeter.
A hundred steps.
Fifty steps.
Twenty steps…
Luan leaned forward and fixed his grasp on the reins while raising his saber up, bracing himself for the impact.
Yet, just as his horse was about to crash through a pile of wooden crates… The enemy finally revealed themselves. And all along the camp\'s line, people started to rise up, all either braced for the charge or on the last leg of preparing some quick spells.
For a single instant, everything calmed down. All the voices and noises disappeared without a trace while the time appeared to cease to exist.
Stuck in the moment, Luan only managed to gulp his saliva down.
And then, all hell broke loose.
Luan\'s horse crashed into the barrels, while Luan himself, only by some miracle, managed to avoid a lance of fire that suddenly appeared in front of him.
Luan jerked his body to the side, as far as he could without risking to fall out of his saddle.
And he did so without a second to spare, with how the lance of fire flashed past his face, leaving a long, burning wound on his cheek.
"DIE!" Luan screamed out, swinging his saber down… Only to have it knocked away by someone\'s arm while two more enemies reached out for the wraps of his saddle, eager to force-dismount him.
But here, in the tight space between himself and the next cavalryman, Luan could finally exploit the greatest advantage that members of his unit had.
Their horse.
"KILL!" Screaming out, Luan didn\'t try to lift his own morale or encourage the people around him.
His shout had a much simpler purpose of alerting his mount and finally letting it act as it desired. And before any wait, this bestial horse, bred with the sole purpose of warfare in mind, started to act.
"DIE!" Luan shouted, his voice once again aiming at nothing but to cheer him up and add strength to the next strike he executed.
This time, though, distracted by his mount, the enemies had no time to push the strike away.
Luan\'s saber fell down and slid right through an enemy\'s arm, nearly reaching the bone. But the resistance offered by the enemy\'s flesh…
It was this resistance that finally allowed Luan to discover who the real enemy was.
\'They are not human,\' he thought, kicking his mount\'s sides to make it stand up on its hind legs. And as it fell down, it added all the momentum that Luan\'s arm lacked.
Swish!
Luan\'s blade fell down. Reinforced by the momentum of the falling horse, it now had just enough strength to cut through his target\'s skull and reach his brain, marking the first kill for the night for the legionary.
\'That\'s how things should be,\' he thought, right as a stray spell struck the plate over his lower stomach.
Thankfully, the attack bounced off and the armor held… but the blunt trauma to Luan\'s soft tissue still remained, instantly cutting down his performance to roughly two-thirds of his usual output.
\'Fucking hell!\' Luan inwardly screamed out, unlodging his saber from the enemy\'s head while already looking for another target.
Soon enough, though, even though only a few people fell on their side, the dynamics of the battle started to appear. Far to the right, Major\'s force started to give ground, unable to hold back the counterattack of the enemy that tried to ambush them.
On the other hand, more to Luan\'s left, his companions stalled the enemy ahead before pinning them down, and forcing the fight deeper and deeper into the camp.
The lines of both sides started to stretch as the initial unit displacement started to inevitably shift as casualties started to mount.
Yet, contrary to their enemies, it was Major\'s force that had a numerical advantage. And regardless of the hell they went through to get to this battle proper, even while keeping the ongoing barrage in mind… They were the ones that had enough men to reinforce whichever flank was faltering!
"Push forward!" Luan screamed out, eager to reach the very front of the center of the battle line so that he could get a shot at gaining some more merits.
Every enemy he fell brought him closer to his dreamed-out rank, after all! And as if fate finally smiled at the young man, the situation at the center turned out… extremely weird.
On the right flank, the enemy gained the advantage. On the left flank, the humans held the upper hand, gaining more and more ground while starting to push the enemy towards their center.
Now, all that was left for them to do was to keep up the pressure, shift some of the troops to the left, and push them past the extreme of the enemy flank before unleashing the riders on their unprotected backs…
For that to happen, though, the center had to hold. Engage the enemy hard enough to prevent them from maneuvering or retreating, but not hard enough to push them back for it would only make it easier for them to reform their formation.
And seeing no other officer anywhere near, Luan took it upon himself to hold the line.
A few moments later, Luan dropped down from his saddle, landing on the ground right as the corpse of his trusty mount collapsed on the corpse of another enemy he managed to cut down.
\'Wait, it\'s not like there are no officers here, at the very center,\' Luan suddenly realized his mistake as he looked around in search of another target. \'It\'s more like, there is no one else left alive here!\'
Pushing his head all around to locate the nearest troop, Luan noticed with relief that a fresh batch of reinforcements was already heading his way. And what was equally as calming, was that the enemy didn\'t seem to care about the gap in their line…
Or maybe the fighting at the center was so intense that both sides managed to annihilate each other at the cost of losing all the strength to exploit this opportunity?
\'As long as I hold this place, we can win easily!\' Luan thought, grinning at his thoughts as he readied himself to engage a long enemy, strangely appearing to be a normal human just like Luan and his companions themselves, strolling at a peaceful pace across the bloody battlefield.
There was no speck of dirt or dust on him that would indicate he was some sort of a fearsome warrior who ended up as the last one standing in the center.
\'I need to cut him down before he rallies the others!\' Luan realized, eager to score some more merit points.
As long as he held his spot for just a few more moments, the units he saw closing in from the sides would help him reinforce the place. And playing such a crucial role in the battle…
Luan\'s face twitched when he imagined all the honors and glory he would receive back home. His eyes then squinted when he saw this strange, enemy human raise a weird, thick, and black stick more or less in Luan\'s direction.
\'Quick!\' Luan hurried himself up, \'before he rallies others to his side...\'
Then, a flash…
And Luan was no more.