Return to Jorgaldur Volume V: Reunion (2)

Battle (III)

"You think you can invade us? Heh, heh. Do you like the surprise?" Jreneg mocked maliciously, though no one could hear it.

The shadow watched as its army of corrupted beings attacked the living. They had waited deep enough inside, so that their enemies couldn't easily flee. If they tried, many would fall, and join the ranks of its army.

It eagerly awaited the outcome of the battle. While it might lose more than gained, corrupting the living was always a sublime pleasure for the corrupted spirits.

It found somewhat irritating that they held their formation, that they resist instead of panicking. The general was sure it was only a matter of time, though. Sooner or later, they would tire, run out of mana, and be overrun. They were in their territory, which was filled with miasma. Besides, they had gathered the largest army of corrupted beings the living had ever seen.

"I hope they aren't the only ones resisting. I don't want Kroljo to get ahead of me," the shadow wished.

The rivalry between them was fierce, and even more so against those who were on the other faction. Those on the same side would be allies until they destroyed the common enemy. After that, they would surely try to kill each other, unless someone intervened.

The general, continued to observe the battle from afar. It didn't care about the casualties among its troops. There were many, and they were disposable. In fact, most of those in the front were low-level, except for a few elites.

It hoped that the living would become overconfident, and thus catch them by surprise with those elites. Because of this, a certain barbarian had been evacuated with a serious wound in his leg.

"What's that?" Jreneg wondered.

Some projectiles with a glow and an aura that it found repelling were flying towards its troops. As soon as they hit, the glow blinded it for a few moments.

"Shit! Purifying magic! It's so unpleasant... Well, they only killed a few. It's not a big problem, there're many," it persuaded himself again.

It ordered those behind to advance, to fill the large gap caused by the purification magic. A few less losts were hardly a problem. What it didn't want was to give the living time to rest.

The shadow got a little more irritated when it realized that its enemies had taken advantage to clean up the first line of attack. However, it simply moved its army forward a little further, until they were fighting hand to hand again.

It also ordered its ranged losts to attack from time to time. Sometimes a few. Sometimes more. The general wanted to test and weaken its enemies' defenses. Sooner or later, the strength of numbers had to make them fall.

Of course, said numbers couldn't all attack at once. The vast majority had to wait their turn, while the living were regaining their strength and took turns. Unfortunately for the shadow, no one had taught it the art of war. It was too arrogant to believe that it didn't know everything, even if its experience was rather limited.

In fact, contrary to its expectations, they hadn't taken their enemies by surprise. They were prepared for a long battle of attrition, as well as having some unpleasant surprises up their sleeves.

"What's going on?" Kroljo wondered.

Like Jreneg and other shadows, it was in charge of a large army. Like the others, it had seen how the living resisted, or how they attacked with purifying projectiles. What it didn't understand was why some of the losts were acting strange.

"They don't obey me anymore, I've lost control over them. Are they attacking each other!?" it was incredulous at what it was seeing.

Cautiously, the general approached a little. All the shadows were afraid of the mysterious shadow killer, whose nature they didn't know. They suspected that it was one or several fairies, but they couldn't be sure. Therefore, they had positioned themselves quite far back, surrounded by losts.

It moved among its subordinates until it got close enough to the area to perceive the distortion in the miasma.

"Shit! Those explosions have destroyed the miasma!" Kroljo cursed.

Immediately, it began to manipulate the miasma to fill the purified area. Anyway, it was already too late to reconvert those who had awaken. Without miasma to reinforce their prison, some had broken free and regained control of their now corrupted bodies.

Those awakened fought with fury and desperation. They wanted to die, and take as many as they could with them. For a long time, the chaos in that area of ​​the battlefield was enormous, of which the living took advantage to clean the first lines of the enemies again. Now that they had no reinforcements, it wasn't excessively dangerous.

"Damn it! Advance! Destroy those traitors! Trample the living!" the general exclaimed angrily. It wasn't the only one which was experiencing something similar.

"Father, we have the numerical advantage, but they've come prepared. I'm not sure we can repel them," Warkmon explained.

He was the vampire in charge of supervising the shadows, especially to prevent them from killing each other. Now, he was relying on various artifacts to see through the shadows, one by one. It was a somewhat tedious and exhausting process, but it allowed him to have an overview of the battlefield.

"For now, let them continue. Let them believe that we're focused on them. Continue observing. Let me know if there's any change," Kan Golge ordered.

"Yes, father," the vampire obeyed.

In reality, he didn't know very well what his father was planning, and, without a doubt, he was quite curious. However, he was careful not to ask, since his father would have already informed him if he had to know. In addition, being too curious could have dire consequences, as some of his siblings could attest in the past. It was clear that he, the shadows and the army of losts were all pieces in a game whose rules he didn't know. The armies of the living might be pieces too, but they were pieces in the hands of their enemies.

All he could do was obey his father and keep watch. At least his position was far from the battlefield. No matter how bad things were, he would have more than enough time to escape.