MQ: Beyond the Bridge of Souls

[Viola Darkstalker]

She knew it was a suicide run, but it still pained her to see so many good soldiers fall so quickly. The reanimated corpses fell with solitary arrows piercing their heads or torsos, but still Viola smiled. They had to be running low on arrows. It had been frantic, but by sheer force of will the violet-clad general had managed to pull her champion back before he committed himself to the suicide run and wasted his strength. He was the main reason behind her throbbing headache right now. He couldn’t attack her directly, but he could dedicate as much of his rotted will as possible to disobeying her orders. It wouldn’t matter for much longer, though. The division of giant spiders and dur’taigen had started making their bridge.

The docks on the far side of the river exploded in fiery blazes, and the twisted general released a breath she didn’t realize she had been holding. There was more than one reason she had sent her forces far down the bank to ford the river. Even though the spiders did not typically work together, under Viola’s watchful will they coordinated their webbing into a slick, streamlined process. Two dozen spiders leapt most of the way across the river, webbing anchored firmly to the starting bank. Once they reached the far shore, they trimmed their webs, anchored them, and one dozen walked back across the silken strands, weaving another row of silk. The process continued rapidly after that with more and more spiders crossing and weaving back and forth.

A great “pulse” of magic beat in the skies across the bridge, visible like the noonday sun to Viola’s necromantically enchanted eyes. It was all the warning she had to realize something big was about to happen. Her mind flashed back to the circle she had seen in her initial scout; it seemed to match the general origin of the now-spreading ice floes. Hurried mental commands to her fording party got them to stall the bridge for just a moment as the water solidified. A single ship was moving westward now toward her force, but it was traveling much too slow to reach them in time. The bridge of webbing could hold two spiders across at a time, and half of them were already across. The spiders walked with their bodies held high above their legs as a single file of dur’taigen tore across the webbing underneath each spider line. Their orders were to leave the web bridge, not as an escape, but as a hindrance to the ship headed their way. It wouldn’t do too much, but even slightly tiring a bard would be a help.

Her main problem now was waiting for her troops to get fully into position. The reaper of cities was terribly impatient when it came to delays in her conquests. Ten hawks screeched from somewhere behind her, and with the effort akin to blinking, the command to take flight was transferred from her mind to their will. A flurry of feathers later, half a score of black hawks took to the skies at a height where even an elf would have trouble shooting them down. Casually they flew; gliding along the currents until a pair suddenly and unexpectedly arced higher than the rest. A rapid flip at the pinnacle of their climb sent them plummeting to the ground at speeds faster than they could reach in life. Lifeless black eyes were trained on the wizard in the center of the circle.

Make the wizard feel my pain! Show him a life of eternal darkness!

Her orders were clear and concise, and they left no room for deviance. Beaks longed for the whites of the man’s eyes; talons lusted for the tender flesh of his neck and arms. While he may not have been quite as powerful a figurehead as the woman commanding the mass of troops across the bridge, he was still a figurehead. Generals wielded power greater than simple commands; they were the lifeblood of their troops. A direct assault of the mage who could easily have been a general for the power he wielded would be a strike against more than his flesh. She would strike the very heart of her adversaries.

Main force:
250 Spiders
38 Dur’Taigen
260 ants
30 hawks
Derris

Flanking:
300 Spiders
300 Dur’Taigen

[Twisted Infinitum]

The river frothed ever more crimson, and it was only that sight that tore Vipress' gaze from Xem'zund. The elves threw their song fire, lighting the spray beautifully before punching in. She couldn't help but laugh. To think that they fought the legends of the seas with fire. The elves of this era were not stupid, only panicked. Soon, they would all know that feeling.

"Enemy ahead!" Rask shouted gutturally as he led her in the wake of their ancient elf platoon. The warning was only for her. His brethren had already heard his thoughts and were lifting their swords high. Combined fire struck the leftmost of them, punching his grey body as far back as their disembarkment point, where he simply lay and smoldered. The others kept rank and file, and they were afforded a brief break in the fire as the four young serpents and two older ones set themselves upon the next ship that passed over them.

Vipress ignored his command. Instead, she watched the ships attempting a retreat. "You will stay to see this, your kingdom falling!" she shouted at them as she thrust one hand into the air. Ahead of the most easterly ship, the crested head of the mother serpent burst skyward. Her gills billowed, drinking in air for a howl that hadn't been heard in generations; a cry from the world's infancy.

A spattering of fire arrows fell during the cry, and the ancient elves tensed before realizing that they would not even be hit. They stepped into their march once more, and then the dock buildings exploded around them. Two bodies fell into the hungry storm of serpent teeth as the entire formation was compressed from the other side. Instinctively, their swords fell, blasting fire and wreckage away from their position in one burning puff of air.

"More arrows," Rask bit off angrily as he saw the glow of enchantments under the cloud of smoke that hung overhead. His men were disarrayed and drained. He remembered, unwillingly, that he had never been a commander among his kind. So, he turned with unspoken questions to the fallen god who seemed to know everything.

Vipress gave him an ecstatic smile of bloodlust, her eyes radiating as much power as the close of the mother's cry. With a sweeping gesture, she caused one of the larger serpents to lunge from the froth and arc over the land right before the vulnerable elves. It roared, an explosive yet airy sound that soon turned to a death cry as the flaming and enchanted arrows tore into its side. It was motionless and devastated when it hit the ground, its great head smashing into one of the burning buildings with a burst of steam as if it were wet tinder. The elves behind it braced with its forceful landing, and their swords were already perched high and hungry for the air currents.

Unbeknownst to either commander, a marvelous event occurred. The river chilled with arctic intensity and became an ice flow. The frothing came to an abrupt halt as the young serpents found themselves nearly immobile. Their mother, her great bulk still wavering high over the surface, saw the sudden change and threw herself upon it with pure abandon. Fire punched her underside, but was quenched as she lay upon the ice flows and any ships that were unfortunate enough to have retreated that far.

A great wave rose all around her, sluggish and solid with broken ice. It crested high above the decks of the nearest ships, as smooth as desert dunes for that moment. Then, the ancient elves on the southern shore reacted with their standing orders. They let their recharged blades fall, and the air behind the wave became as focused as a hammer blow. While their numbers had been thinned in the elven counterattack, their combined magic was enough to drive the wave's crest over the bows of the closest ships. As if the river were grasping with clawed hands, it crashed down on the ships that had been fleeing across it.

Forces in water:
4 young serpents, immobilized
1 adolescent, immobilized
1 mother, going all tsunami on your ass

Southern bank:
30 ancient elves (uncharged), 5 died

Northern bank:
Two commanders
27 ancient elves (charging), 3 died
(All behind a slowly burning adolescent serpent)

[Sighter Tnailog]

Through the hazy smoke of burning buildings, Tyreles's face had lost all blood. He knew better than anyone what was in the docks closest to the bridge, the docks that buttressed the bridge and were tied to its foundation. The fire had thankfully spared the closest docks, but it was spreading...and if it spread too fare he knew what would happen. In those docks had been set down the powder stores that had been captured when Thoracis Rakarth attacked Valinatal. They had been put there to cripple the bridge in the event of a retreat and slow the enemy advance. But if the fires reached them now....

"GET OFF THE BRIDGE!"

His bellow was filled with all the primal energy of a commander whose sole concern was now for the lives of his troops. He flung down his bow and drew his sword, a hulking montrosity made for swinging with both hands or flailing wildly from the back of a frothing charger, and gestured towards the stairwell.

"All of you, now, retreat procedure! Mount the horses below, have half our remaining archers change their equipment -- they are lancers now. Mount the other half, we'll need cavalry archers to hold off the enemy. Signallers, relay the message to the forward towers -- when they abandon the front of the bridge, have them open the front gate. Bar the northern gate with everything we have, and meet me in the fields!"

He followed his elves out of the tower as they swung into high gear, gathering what Turlin-imbued arrows were left as they went. When out on the plain, they gathered up the arrows into crates and strapped them into carts, which soon were lumbering at a brisk pace towards Eluriand. The remainder were left with about 50 arrows per archer, now mounted on horseback. The forward towers had followed orders, and now the bridge was empty, zombies already starting to flood forward to bang against the now heavily-barricaded northern gate.

From astride his charger, he could see how it needed to work. Caden's makeshift fortress would have to stand as the crucial place to make a stand, while a cavalry charge from area to the northwest of the fortress would have to suffice. But there was still the issue of the ships...

"Send the signals...tell the commanders to concentrate every power at their disposal on those monsters! They appear to be undead...try using Turlin magic, it should easily penetrate their defenses. Make the water around them boil, and rain lightning upon the face of the waters! Cavalry, ride, keep away from the docks!"

He hoisted his sword, and the cavalry wheeled where he rode. He had a small force, but it was not enough...he hoped Findelfin was watching. A sally from the city might turn the tide.

Ground Troops

223 Lancers
150 Cavalry Archers
--7500 arrows left

14 Bards
--5 Turlin Bards
--4 Dagorlin Bards
--3 Aglarlin Bards (Assigned to Caden, both for support and for their own protection)
--2 Lissilin Bards (Assigned to Caden, both for support and for their own protection)

Naval Forces
11 Galleys
--4 West of Bridge
----All Intact, now safely headed for Valinatal
--5 East of Bridge
----3 Intact
(1 has slipped by and is headed for Anebrilith with nearly full complement of reinforcements)
(1 destroyed since last round)
----2 Compromised
approx. 1800+? occupants (does not include sailing staff: captains, first mates, etc.)
--? amount swimming to north shore -- those swimming south will not survive

[Caden Law]

Now ends the balancing act, Caden thought as blood splattered across his chestplate and evaporated away, and feathers burnt an ashen path to the ground around him. The birds tried -- oh, you'd have to give those little bastards credit because they certainly tried to make good on their mistress' orders.

The problem with that is a simple one: They were suicide diving into something like a magical blender. What surrounded Caden now was not a true barrier spell, but it might as well have been one. Pulses of light and energy, will and force all converged around him in a dome-shaped whirlwind, and the birds that hit this psuedobarrier ended up without even having enough dignity to be called fried chicken.

So, for now, he ignored them. He didn't care if he killed one bird or all of them; they were irrelevent.

Focus, he thought again, and did just that. Incidentally, this is the part where Wizard becomes a fanciful, polite way of screaming oh holy shit! Watch closely now...

...because Caden certainly was. He lacked the kind of specific enchantments afforded to the enemy commander, but when you're so far past knee-deep in magic that you're literally breathing the stuff, it does funny things to the senses. He could hear Tyreles shouting, and his own Bards singing, and his men screaming everything from war cries to calls for help. He could see as he had never seen in years, and as he would probably never live to see again. He saw the leylines, he saw the magicks leaving the Bards' mouths, saw the pitch black filth reanimating Xem'Zund's army...

...and he saw it.

Saw the strings of dominion, binding so many of the enemy soldiers to a commander. Saw one particular rope that looked so fat it just screamed, cut me loose. Caden ignored it. Focused on the strings -- harder. Followed them with his eyes, and with the tip of his wand. Ignored how many of them were -- even how they were connected to those damned hawks, and ants, and--

"I see you," Caden said, in a singsong voice that may as well have been Bardic in its own right considering how many of the men closest to him burst into fits of laughter.

His eyes narrowed. He read the Name on the knot at the center of it all, visible only through a heavy haze of the magic that surrounded it. He began to speak...

...and his voice carried. It carried, and it was overpowering; like a battle-axe made of sound-waves and spite, punctuated with ego and the kind of casual contempt you can only give when wearing a Wizard's Hat.

"I SEE YOU, LITTLE REAPER!" Caden Law bellowed with a Voice of authority and determination. It was followed by a kind of awful laughter, and maybe it'd hurt her mentally, maybe it'd just give her pause, or maybe the rage of it would drive her to new heights -- just as Celiniel's violation had done to him.

Caden was past caring about that now. He spoke again, commands given to magic itself in Old Diamonic. His body moved with his words, and his Wand was the conduit...

"Grind your teeth," he told the land, flicking the wand into a circle and then straight up. As if on cue, the Dragon's Teeth barriers sharpened and slit from left to right, back and forth, pulverizing and shredding whatever was caught in them -- including most, if not all, if that pesky adolescent serpent. The wand wobbled.

"Surge to the Ruin," he told the river, and the ice stopped mattering as a pocket tidal wave surged the Elven ships down its length with more speed than they ever could've managed on their own. The wand cracked.

He gave no incantation for the spell to follow; merely gathered magic from the Circle and channeled it. Lightning blue danced into every color of the rainbow along the length of his Wand. He thrust it for the largest target (or mass of targets) he could find. Once it struck, the lightning enveloped and exploded.

Unfortunately, so did Caden's Wand. Light spiderwebbed through the cracks along its length, and then everything from the base to the tip of the wand's business end exploded. All he was left with was a handle, which promptly crumbled to dust in his grasp.

Caden didn't stop to curse his luck. He didn't have the time for that. When you live in Salvar's more desolate regions, as he had, and when you spend your life rushing from one maelstrom to the next, as he had, you learn to improvise. Suddenly and violently and all over the place. He flicked his left wrist--

Out came the scalpel.

Caden would make do. He was starting to bleed from the nose, and his body was beginning to ache all over, but he'd do.

[s]If Viola has any problems with the Namereading bit, gimme a yell and I'll edit it. It'd help if she had some kind of magical alias or something.[/s] Viola had no problems with it, but I edited the Name to reflect an alias she gave via PM. And to ward off any accusations of Powerplay: Caden's going downhill pretty soon. Ish. He just plans on taking a couple o' your arms and legs with him

For the sake of avoiding Insane Post Lengths, I'll refrain from going into great detail about Caden's Crew. D: Suffice to say: Arrows are shot with no specific targets, and swords are drawn and readied. And since everyone else is doing it...

Blueraven Company
50 Archers entrenched in a U-around Caden (~45 Turlin Arrows, with lit jugs of oil and spare quivers totaling 150 normal (soon-to-be-flaming) arrows each.
50 Archers entrenched in rows of 25 to the sides of the U (~40 Turlin Arrows, with lit jugs of oil and spare quivers totaling 150 normal (etc-flaming) arrows each)
1 Man-at-Arms for entrenched with each of the above Archers, totaling 100 (5 Turlin Arrows each).

50 Archers foxholed around the battlefield in teams of 2 (~40 Turlin Arrows, with lit jugs of oil and spare quivers totaling 50 normal (flaming) arrows each)
25 Men-at-Arms foxholed with the 50 Archers (5 Turlin Arrows each)

68 Men-at-Arms scattered about (5 Turlin Arrows each); most with secondary weapons and armor, but nothing stand-out

25 Men-at-Arms previously dedicated to supply running, now redistributing arrows (~100 Turlin Arrows each, heavier armor and shields -- but no bows). Each is accompanied by a fellow Man-at-Arms with a shield and mixed armor.

3 Aglarlin Bards (Kenvas: Flutesword, Spear, full armor, others ordinary Aglarlin) near Caden, accompanied by 3 Human Apprentices (Lesser Healing; otherwise standard Men-at-Arms)

4 Battle Bards* (Leister Covanna: Twin Swords, full armor) scattered about, accompanied by 4 Human Apprentices (Lesser Fire; otherwise standard Men-at-Arms)
* No idea what School the Battle Bards fall under.

Reinforcements from Findelfin
3 Aglarlin Bards coming off the Bridge
2 Lissilin Bards coming off the Bridge

...so much for avoiding insane post lengths! Sorry 'bout that! D:

[Viola Darkstalker]

So all the pretty lights surrounding the wizard were for more than just show. She had seen the two hawks dive, seen them fly headlong into the maelstrom of magic. She watched as they were torn to less than shreds by the swirling forces of the arcane might encompassing him. It had been a good idea, but sometimes ideas just don’t turn out how you like them. That’s what many people called “life”.

Enchanted eyes gazed across the grassy expanse, fixated on the mass of magic across the bridge. Her hawk spies still circling the skies reported a strange and sudden withdrawal of all the bridge’s guards. Now was the perfect time to strike. They had left no curious surprises in their wake, so there was no point in wasting time standing around. Derris was getting more impatient, too. Oh well, that just meant that he was going to be all the more destructive when things turned to hells.

Then there was a voice. It was a strange voice that she hadn’t heard before, but it apparently knew her, and knew of her. The demented smile that she wore without shame split her face as she roared in maniac laughter. Oh how wonderful it was to be known! Finally, someone on this light-blasted rock knew her! It was the perfect culmination to an already exuberant day. The volume as it raced through her skull was nothing short of tremendous, but to a shattered mind it was nothing. She had ravaged cities with more force than his shout had assaulted her mind with.

“Hold nothing back! Rend them all!”

A great buildup of magical energy was all the warning the sinister general had before a great streak tore through the sky toward her flanking force. She didn’t have time to scatter them completely, but it didn’t have a full effect either. Thirty-four spiders and nineteen dur’taigen were fried instantly, and the greater half of the remaining forces were blown away from the epicenter indiscriminately. The flying bodies knocked into those that were unaffected by the bolt, delaying the whole procession by a bit of time as rotted brains worked their hardest to get back up. It was a fairly large setback, but it was also an important one for the defending army.

Frustration tore at Viola’s mind as she rode at the tail end of her pack. She didn’t need a setback now! Derris was, of course, the first one to the gate, brute strength straining against the reinforced and locked metal until the giant ants joined in the war against the barrier. Horrid creaking and the cracking of concrete alike littered the air as precious seconds ticked away. The only part of her army near the gate was the part necessary to tear it down; there was no point in cramming all of her forces around something so immobile just to wait.

Whatever the undead creatures of Viola’s army felt before the lightning strike was unclear, but every fiber of their being screamed murder to the one whom caused the skies to turn against them. Dur’taigen and spiders alike traveled in erratic paths and groups ranging from two to five as they streaked across the fields that lay between their destination. They would stop at nothing to destroy everything in their master’s path, be it Viola or Xem’zund at their head.

Main force:
250 Spiders
38 Dur’Taigen
260 ants
38 hawks
Derris

Flanking:
266 Spiders – 133 injured
281 Dur’Taigen - 141 injured

[Twisted Infinitum]

As she watched the river, Vipress let out a hiss that seemed to awaken all the fire-lit, serpentine fury in her once beautiful face. The mother serpent's wave had crashed a single ship into driftwood, but the others remained tauntingly. Worse, they were now being borne down the river on their own magical wave, a structured, stamina-filled pulse the broke the ice into chunks. The younger serpents writhed about in their renewed freedom, only to have the full might of Turlin magic cast toward their telltale splashes. The unnatural iceflows, as well as two of the serpents, were nearly boiled from existence.

Farther downriver, the mother heaved herself into action again. She tore through the steaming water with mouth gaping and her scaled back bucking against the hulls. River clutter was consumed before her, devoured without a single bite; chunks of ice, frantic swimmers, and even the bodies of her young. The serpents that still lived on in undeath pushed ahead of her and set themselves to ravaging any ships that remained.

"Use the body as a barricade!" Rask growled, speaking audibly only for the fact that his nerves would fray at any moment. "Push it-" The ancient elves tensed to send their magic forward, but froze right as their leader did. The earth below the burning serpent body suddenly became sharp, serrated teeth that ground back and forth. With horrible efficiency, the body was shredded and scattered to the point that it wouldn't be recognizable as organic matter, let alone the necromantic flesh of a mighty beast.

In the emptiness that remained before them, the scattered arrows of their enemy flashed through the air again. The blades finally fell, churning the air and sending the wayward shots even farther astray. "Retreat!" the lizard-man ordered as he spun and grabbed Vipress' shoulder. She turned, snakes snapping and fingers clawing, to face him as if assaulted. "Jade," he snarled warningly.

Her rage, high from the serpents' near defeat, faltered as an old reflex kicked in. Annoyance, born from a title far too personal for her liking. As her mind came back to her, she remembered the situation on the land, and she recognized the lizard-man, her adopted guardian, as the only one allowed to refer to her as such. With wounded dignity, she allowed him to pull her back along the docks.

They found a relatively safe location sligtly downriver. The riverbank lay next to their feet, and the dock buildings burned uncomfortably, but not dangerously, close. Smoke still billowed overhead, blocking out the natural blood red light of the battle as well as the archers' vision.

With a surprisingly calm demeanor and authority to put her guardian's to shame, Vipress looked back toward the sounds of battle. "We still need to feed the serpents," she said to her brood as the north shore undead elves arrived. They retained their righteously straight poses, but some of the glacier-wrought fire was gone from their eyes. In a mental tangent that was quickly cut short, she wondered if Rask had noticed the change.

"They could advance along the bank and help the main army break through," Rask offered, apparently relieved to not be at the helm.

Vipress nodded and made a short gesture for them to do so. The elves nodded, their ears pointing oddly into the air, and marched toward the northern end of the bridge at full stride. "Throw everything that breathes into the river," she said after them as they faded into the smokey haze.

Then, she turned to the opposite bank. Thirty of Rask's elves remained there, almost invisible to the fleeing ships that had been concentrating on the serpents. They had apparently repeated their orders numerous times, for the ground before them was racked bare and their shoulders hunched with strain. She didn't know how many they had managed to push from the decks of the ships. If there were any, they were likely already in the mother's gut. With a thought, she overrode Rask's link to them and sent every single armored, frostbitten body toward the bridge. Even from that distance, their fleetfooted stomping was nearly audible.

"We meet at the bridge," she said confidently, biding Rask to lead her there. Despite her apparant calm, the bloodlust burned. This kingdom would still fall, if only as a stepping stone to her eventual prize, the distant man encased in his own smoldering darkness.

Forces in water:
2 young serpents
1 adolescent
1 mother

Southern bank:
30 ancient elves, heading to the southern gate to cross the bridge

Northern bank:
Two commanders
27 ancient elves, heading to the northern gate to break it down and/or defend those breaking it down

[Sighter Tnailog]

He had given his commands to the fleet captains. Now it was up to them to pilot their ships through the maelstrom of terror that was the surface of the river. They had predicted many strange things in this assault, but sea serpents and strange-looking elves were not among them.

But it was time. Wheeling his cavalry to the strike force, he scanned for where the most important enemy was. Although the strange newcomers with the pointy ears were few in number and a tempting target, it was more important that the charge strike a hefty blow against the spiders and dur'taigen crossing from the makeshift silk bridge. Rallying his troops with a wave of his sword, he cried, "Lances level! Archers pincer and retreat! Forward!"

And suddenly the ground was vibrating beneath him, the sides of his mount flecked with froth as the hooves of a hundred Raiaeran horses thundered in a single charge. He gripped tight to his reins, holding his sword at ready while the forward line lowered their lances. With the terrible sounds of shattering chitin, animal growls and pained whimpers, the front line smashed headlong into the beasts. Dur'taigens snarled and snapped, spiders leaped forward to crush horses and riders alike even as their arachnid brethren fell skewered on the point of the lances. And then he was in the midst of them, sword slashing. He caught one Dur'taigen full in the face, splitting it snout down the middle and slicing cleanly through the forward half of its skull. Ignoring the blood spatters, he called aloud above the din, "Lancers out! Archers, volley when clear!"

He wheeled his horse through the carnage, extricating himself and his troops before they pushed too deeply into the attackers to escape. As the lancers left, horse archers screamed to their positions, shooting at least two volleys of their Turlin-enchanted arrows into the crowd of beasts before wheeling away to the retreat, still firing behind their backs at the pursuing horde. "How many lost?" cried Tyreles over the roar of hooves and the howls of the shape-shifting wolves.

"Not many, sir, but Lieutenant Agarlion fell during the charge...but sir! Look to the docks!"

And indeed he did, for he had to watch what he already heard. A dull thud of explosions was filling the air, and before he even saw the first firespout he knew that the flames had finally reached the powder stores. He watched as first one, then another, then another of the docks shattered. And finally the main stores were breached...and with one awesome, shuddering blast, the docks on both sides of the bridge exploded. The entire metal grate that held the two halves of the bridge together burst from the stone shower, flying in one piece of metal to smash into one of the stone pillars Caden had constructed, shattering the standing stone into three enormous pieces. The two towers on each side of the bridge seemed to hang in air for one imperceptible moment, before crumbling at their base and falling towards the bridge. One after another, they crashed into the slender projection of rock, which broke asunder. The whole northern half of the bridge crumbled at once, casting every undead minion upon it into the chop of the churning river below.

For a moment, Tyreles could scarcely believe what he was seeing. He had expected the explosion; expected the towers to crumble. But he had not expected the bridge to collapse. It was a godsend, a boon -- now the only way across that the undead had was the makeshift bridge of silk, which could be burned away with only a few more charges. Raiaera was saved!

But before Tyreles could turn to rally his troops, he heard something that curdled him to the bones. The voice spoke from across the river, spoke directly to him, spoke directly to the center of who he was. It was the voice of evil...

"Enough."

[The Scourge]

From beyond the bridge of souls he watched the battle. It was amusing, really, this little captain with his arrows, the little mage with his blue standard and his swarthy company of degenerates. And his lieutenants, the one called Darkstalker and the leader of the great serpents, were doing a fine job without him. But their power next to his...they were trifling. And as the bridge went up in flames, he grew tired of the preliminaries. And he said so.

The darkness swirled around his form, then raised itself up as if it was the shroud of mists itself that was speaking.

"Enough."

Beneath his cloak of shadows, he raised one hand and gestured at the river. Immediately it began bubbling as the years of organic dust bubbled up from the bottom, slowly moving to harden into twelve separate bridges of hard-packed dirt and debris. As the bridges formed, he waved his arm and extended his soul deep into the earth, crying out as he enlivened the matter beneath and sucked years of death out of the soil. The ground to the south suddenly churned as if a boiling sea as hands and feet pulled themselves free, the lives of eons of elvish toil ripped from their graves in one foul moment. And the zombies he already had seemed prescient enough to greet them in glee, waving their weapons and their arms in glee -- but even that was the result of his own thought and his own direction.

He continued to speak, broadcasting his words to all souls nearby -- even those as far away as the very inner sanctums of the Grand Palace of Velicë Arta would hear the voice of the Necromancer.

"See? I control what was once life. Even the dirt, the cast-off matter of long-dead fish and seaweed, even it obeys my will. Now, let the power of life-beyond-life sweep over you, burn you, rape you. The Destruction of the Elves will be my doing...see my power and despair."

It may have been much, but it was worth it. The mist seemed to congeal on one point, and for a moment he let his form be seen, his dark armor and his death-mask concealing all else. And then it was back again, and it pushed forward suddenly at the front of the main column of the undead, a column that had previously held back from the assault -- a column now flush with the dead of the southern plains and the ruin of Carnelost.

Now the battle had truly begun.

Xem'zûnd is attacking with a force in excess of 30,000, approximately split in the following fashion:

25,000 zombies, approx. 1/2 newly raised with full battle weaponry and most functions intact, 1/4 skeletal with mixed weaponry, and 1/4 weaponless, long-dead drones
1000 corrupted commanders, each with the ability to raise new undead from the bodies of the fallen
200 Undead Trees
2000 Undead Giant Ants
2000 Undead Giant Spiders
4000 Undead Dur'Taigen

Xem'zûnd is relying on numbers -- huge numbers -- and is capable of counterattacking in a variety of ways. He also has access to wraiths -- terrifying ghost-like spirits of great malice -- but only during the nighttime, so for now he won't use them.

Consider the current time for this thread to be around 3 PM.

[Caden Law]

As one man scattered across 412 bodies, the Blueravens stopped. They all heard the Voice, from first man to last, and every single one of them registered it in the same way: A deep baritone voice, reverberating and echoing, hollow and vile and hatefully magnificent. It spoke out of tune, lacking the rhythm you'd associate with any kind of living voice.

It was thought. It was intent. If it was not evil incarnate, then it was the closest any of them would ever be to facing it.

It fell to the thirteen Bards and their apprentices. As one, they looked to Caden, and Caden looked right over them. With eyes unclouded by fear -- perhaps because of egomania, perhaps because of courage, or maybe out of resolute numbness -- the Wizard Named Blueraven stared across the battlefield. Through the bridges, through the hordes, through all the magic and more.

He gazed at Xem'zund, and made his decision. It was unspoken, but a glance to a bard and then a nod back, and that was all.

"COVERED WITHDRAW!" Kenvas bellowed, whipping his sword high and channeling magic and song through it. It was a mournful instrumental, but it was an orderly one. The other Aglarlin Bards joined him, even the ones tasked with leaving the bridge and joining Blueraven Company. The battlebards were less keen on leaving, but they knew a lost cause when they saw one. This one wasn't quite there yet, but it wouldn't be long.

One by one, the men began to leave their foxholes. Archers provided cover, battlebards and men-at-arms rushed from hole to hole to quicken and protect the retreat. The Teeth kept grinding and anyone standing between the two sets was going to be smashed and shot to bits by the retreating forces of Findelfin on one side and the still mostly entrenched Blueraven Company on the other.

Caden stood his ground. As the men in the foxholes withdrew, he sealed each hole up, denying it from the enemy. It was a minimal effort.

"Think we should burn the forest?" he asked and the only Bard near him, a Dagorlin named Alfrash Olastin, looked at him like he was insane.

Incidentally: "You're completely insane, Blueraven."

He almost smiled. Almost. "He can use trees, can't he?"

"We don't scorch Mother Earth!"

"You don't dig holes in it either. I'm not you." Caden stopped short when a sword was raised beneath his chin. Most of the Company was too busy to even notice it. "Point. Don't come whining at me when they're picking bodies out of branches then."

The sword was drawn away, but the bard did not leave. He stuck close. He didn't trust Caden to not raze the forests anyway.

Which is just as well, because Caden would have razed them the moment Olastin was out of striking distance.

"Alright then. Kenvas," he called, and the banner-bearing Aglarlin looked right at him. "Organize a defense around me. Get a runner to Findelfin and tell him to hurry the Hells up. I'm about to do something very, very stupid. Chances are, we'll all regret it. Either way..."

If he were braver, Caden would've likely said something along the lines of, Put a Turlin Arrow in my corpse if this kills me.

At least one archer who overheard the conversation was ready to do just that anyway.

Caden turned back to the battle. One last time, he started building power. He reached deep, far down the leylines...

And then he pulled. From the air, from the earth, from the sun. Grass shrivelled up and crumbled all across his makeshift domain, and trees shifted seasons so that leaves withered and broke from their branches. Around Caden himself, the individual wisps of magic were no longer visible. It was just one great big mass of light, touching every possible color and few that weren't. It smelled like blue, it sounded like feathers, it tasted like music.

Across the surface, letters and glyphs formed; fast, bloody and precise, as if they were being written with a scalpel. Whatever Caden had planned, it was going to be messy...

The Blueravens are making an orderly withdrawl; front first with the rear providing cover-fire, specifically aiming to knock out anyone blocking Findelfin's retreat from the bridge, then targeting anyone around the dragon's teeth setup or in the runic minefield beyond it.

Blueraven Company
50 Archers entrenched in a U-around Caden (~35 Turlin Arrows, with lit jugs of oil and spare quivers totaling 150 normal (soon-to-be-flaming) arrows each.
50 Archers entrenched in rows of 25 to the sides of the U (~35 Turlin Arrows, with lit jugs of oil and spare quivers totaling 150 normal (etc-flaming) arrows each)
1 Man-at-Arms for entrenched with each of the above Archers, totaling 100 (5 Turlin Arrows each).

50 Archers withdrawing around the battlefield in teams of 2 (~35 Turlin Arrows, with lit jugs of oil and spare quivers totaling 50 normal (flaming) arrows each)
25 Men-at-Arms withdrawing with the 50 Archers (5 Turlin Arrows each)
68 Men-at-Arms aiding the withdrawl (5 Turlin Arrows each); most with secondary weapons and armor, but nothing stand-out
25 Men-at-Arms previously dedicated to supply running, now redistributing arrows and coordinating withdrawl efforts (~100 Turlin Arrows each, heavier armor and shields -- but no bows). Each is accompanied by a fellow Man-at-Arms with a shield and mixed armor.

7 Aglarlin Bards (Kenvas: Flutesword, Spear, full armor, others ordinary Aglarlin) helping withdrawl efforts, accompanied by 3 Human Apprentices (Lesser Healing; otherwise standard Men-at-Arms)
4 Dagorlin Bards (Alfrash Olastin: Standard Dagorlin; Leister: Twin Swords, full armor) helping withdrawl efforts, accompanied by 4 Human Apprentices (Lesser Fire; otherwise standard Men-at-Arms)
2 Lisselin Bards (ordinary Lisselin) helping withdrawl efforts

[Viola Darkstalker]

When something explodes, people give near-universal reactions. Screams of panic wrack some people while others simply shrug the concussive blast off as though it was an everyday occurrence. This day, great fireworks bloomed in the sky as the volatile powder stores did what they did best and the flames licked lustfully at everything. Viola scowled. Sure she had been rather surprised when the bridge blew up like it had been hit with a ballistic missile, she didn’t think civilizations like this were capable of such wanton acts of destruction yet, but after her first small yelp of surprise, she said nothing and did nothing but scowl. No silk bridge would hold under that fire and the only other bridge she could bring her troops to was too far away for her tastes.

As much as the vile thought disgusted her, her conquest was at a standstill. Two years ago she would have laid waste to the entire bridge single-handedly with hardly a second thought to it. The archers in the tower would have known utter terror as volley after volley met nothing but air; the men on the bridge would have trembled in abject horror as the gate folded like putty under the force of her will! Then… they all would have died. The reason she did not flinch at the explosion was a simple one when you took the time to think about it. She had survived assaults from explosions hundreds and thousands of times larger than that one; why should she be scared when she was hardly in range of the shrapnel, let alone the main blast?

She could sense the situation her flanking force was going through dealing with the riders, even if she could do nothing directly to help. They were up against well-trained cavaliers under stringent supervision and command… there wasn’t much they could do but fight like they always had: hamstring the horses and overwhelm the fallen rider. They took their share of casualties, but they still managed to take some down with them. The remnants of the fallen could hardly be recognized as such, and they were only the ones to fall last. Nothing but a few bones here and there marked the majority of the elven dead.

It was nothing but a sensation that caused the dark general to look over her right shoulder, but oh what a sensation it was. All of the most terrible things she could describe wouldn’t have done the sight justice, and that was just her first impression. A planet-hopper herself, Viola had seen many armies of various sizes. Normally she was on the receiving end of their wrath and couldn’t get a full feel of just how large an army was, but when she saw the writhing mass of undead approaching, an orgasmic shiver unlike anything she had experienced recently flowed down her spine strong enough to curl her toes and arch her back. It was like a second wind had come over her with the swarm of reinforcements from the depths of the pit, and oh what sorts of ecstasy it gave her.

That terrible, hells-forsaken voice grinding through her mind… the utter vileness that rolled from the mouth of her master to the souls of all… just listening to him speak was enough to bring her back to her days of glory. Truly this was the man destined to rule this world until she regained the power necessary to bring annihilation to it as well. Serving under someone like this was something she could oh-so-easily get used to. It was only right, after all, that the pathetic elves and their singing would be forced to bow to so great a man as Xem’zund.

Even her enchanted eyes could not fully comprehend the magic that flowed from her master to the riverbeds, but the end result was far more satisfying than understanding necromancy was at the time. A dozen bridges, each larger than the one she had fought to break through, rose from the ground to grant mass access to the waiting “fortress” on the other side. It may have been an act of benevolence or it may have been a simple re-supply, but a division even larger than the one she had been granted originally made its way to Viola’s force. She didn’t bother trying to count the new arrivals; she knew intimately how many puppet she had at her beck and call, and she loved it.

Her shoulders heaved. Her chest moved erratically. Her head whipped back. Whatever semblance of sanity she had been desperately holding onto to take the bridge evaporated as a sound that could only be described as madness incarnate issued forth from the center of the writhing army. It was amazing that she was even able to stay mounted on her great spider, but as the mass of over five-thousand warriors surged forth, the primal roars and deafening cackles of insanity traveled with the heart of the pack.

There was no logical thought. There was no strategy. There was only one command, one that fed the rage and fueled the insanity of the one giving it in an endless cycle of madness.

Kill!


The mass of zombies crossed the bridges and swung around to take the roundabout way of attacking, which incidentally put them tearing their way across the ground to cut through the escaping line and prevent any more flesh from getting away. They had various weapons, various pieces of armor, and one mind… one command. With shrieks that would have made a banshee howl, Viola charged into the fray on her steed looking beyond a wild animal. Her dress was immaculate; she hadn’t been fighting. Her hair was wind-swept; her steed was fast. Her face was wild; eyes lusting for death and mouth voicing her terrible cry. Her muscles ached for the thrill of battle and the agony of pain. A quartet of black spikes with black chains, each darker than pitch as though the light itself refused to touch them, flew from ripples in the air around her body. They flew straight and fast, each honed tip howling for the flesh of the living. The mad reaper was on the rampage, and she loved it!

4500 Newly-risen zombies
487 Spiders
276 Dur’Taigen
260 ants
38 hawks
Enraged Derris
Beyond-insane Viola