The Horseman of Calamity

Chapter 16 - A Haunting Past

Several soldiers clad in platted armor marched in a triangular formation and onward toward the daunting jungle edge. The Nordens Republic's Army was formed by men who had eagerly enlisted in hopes of glory, the sweat they shed was yet to be mixed with blood. Only recently, the army had been desperately clawing at any new recruits they could get, yet now, with the prospect of battle, men throughout the nation had lined up in barely-contained excitement.

The air was hollow and filled only with the sound of marching; yet, it buzzed with electricity. Behind the troops stood the fading outline of the city of Illutia, where they had partied hard, ate, and drank to their hearts desires just the previous night. Confident that they would crush the much smaller force belonging to the Horseman of Death, Tannabriss. At their flanks were the cavalrymen, the majority of whom were mounted on horses, however their elite had the privilege of riding rune bears, magically beasts enhanced by the flow of magic to boost their strength and control their temperament. The arquebusiers were scattered in small groups along the main force of infantrymen, with their artillery being lugged in the back. Lastly, there was a small detachment of mages who had moved on ahead, acting as an elite vanguard. The mages had reported the entrance was safe and clear of enemies, clearly the smaller enemy force had retreated inward, likely to regroup and ambush them like the cowards they were. Of course, this formation was kept just in case the enemy forces had managed to evade the mages and launch a surprise attack. But none of the soldiers were worried about that at all, to them, the chance of being attacked was completely zero. "Those cowards probably surrendered already." most of them thought.

Suddenly, a mixture of spells, arrows, bullets, cannon balls and every known projectile began hailing down on the unsuspecting soldiers. As the scene unfolded, the soldiers of the NRPA began dropping like flies, they couldn't see the enemies hiding within the brush and they themselves were completely exposed and carrying heavy equipment. A soldier then takes off his heavy metal helmet to see better, one of his comrades had been struck in the hip by an arrow. He rushed over to aid his brother in arms, a whole platoon of shield-bearing infantrymen were in front of him, covering their rear from the rain of projectiles with magically enhanced shields. From the bushes, a ballista is loaded, its bolt locked and fired at the small platoon, tearing through their shields as if they were nothing and striking the soldier running to aid his friend.

Meo then jumped up from her ragged bed breathing heavily and drenched in a cold sweat. After catching her breath, she got up to prepare the campfire, her brain quickly forgetting about the fleeting nightmare she just experienced. The group had recently just departed from a small local village, the villagers there were wary of their strange group initially but after they helped the village by hunting, fishing, and treating their sick, the village allowed them to stay as guests. The village itself was rather rustic and itself had been isolated for the most part, in fact, the people there did not live off of farming. They were still a hunter-gatherer society, the dense jungle made it impossible to mass farm in their area. It was also there that she found out about Hung's issues and why the group was traveling in the first place, it helped her find more connections but overall she still had some trouble communicating well with the others aside from Nacara.

Meo sat at the edge of the campfire away from the other four, she was daydreaming about play fighting with her father again. Everyone else but her was fast asleep, she had a bad habit of staying up and keeping night watch even when it was safe. The others knew best to leave her alone, she was like that, much less social and solitary than them which was okay. She struggled a lot with open communication and preferred to do things on her own. It took them weeks to convince her to be able to eat with them and just be around their presence in general. Their campfire was slowly turning into just ashes and soot as the sun rose through the treetops, its stuffy smell slowly fading.