- Pronouns
- They/Them
...
Behind the Serpent Throne (CK2)
- Thread starter The Laurent
- Start date
- Original Fantasy
Blazinghand
O cursèd spite
- Location
- California
Something tells me... a roll may be the cause of this
Turn 12: The Battle--Part 14
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Turn 12: The Battle--Part 14
Spirits didn't have genders the way that people thought. Some did, but when they did, it didn't mean the same thing. Spirits didn't have wives, and they didn't have maids. There were spirits that dealt with human affairs, or take human affectations, but that was never one of them. Ayila appreciated it sometimes.
A spirit wouldn't have protested when she got on her horse, for of course she knew how to ride, and she wondered what Csiritan men lived with. She'd heard that their women couldn't even ride, and yet this seemed an absurdity. How did they manage to survive the trials of sex and childbirth if a little horse terrified them. Did Csiritan men prefer women who bruised upon a summer's breeze?
It was all bizarre foreigner nonsense, compared to what her grandfather had called the Spirits of War. There were songs about them, and of course all of them were tragic, because war was the damndest thing.
Women weren't meant for it, or so she was told, and the more she watched it, the more she was sure that they were right: but neither were men.
So out she rode, a young girl, but soon enough it was not time for horses. And as she rode, she sang in the true language, in Southlander, the spirits welling up as she called.
"Naorini, you whose skin is the sheen of beaten copper,
Hicanthe, who sings with flowers a song of poison-death,
Lisine, my old friend, whose arm is an ancient oak that shelters all,
Now is the time for battle. Now killing must be done."
Naoirini formed up, a thousand sheets of copper all around a serpent-form with glistening green-gem eyes, and slithered ahead, his sheen distracting the huge monstrosity, whose each head showed a different facet of the truth, the truth that was devastation and death. Each head had a mask, and was positioned about a humanoid form with no grace or sense, just chaotic whim turned true.
This was what a Great Spirit was: not something trifling. But Naorini could blind with her scales of copper, could reflect the sun and surprise the monster.
Lisine, a brown cloud of sorts, surrounded her, and when the monster at last turned, recognizing her, its glare sent fiery bolts at her, gleaming silver as they impacted against her magical shield, but were broken.
Hicanthe, creeping flowers upon the ground, inched up amid the smoke and dust.
"Great Spirits hear my call. Rise up and serve the world!
Great Spirits hear my pleas," she drew a ritual knife and cut her hand. All around there was chaos, people dying and killing, and yet if this Great Spirit did not fall, then it would be all for naught.
"For I am one of the world's masters.
Yet I am like you, slave to what I am."
The song was barely translatable into Csiritan, did not rhyme as it did in the right tongue, but she sang it anyways, and soldiers turned, shocked to hear a young girl singing on such a battlefield as the dust swirled up around her. Shielding her.
It was the Great Spirits! Her heart soared, and she called more spirits, singing them up, making them feel special. These were their public names, but in the heart she knew she could see, she repeated their private, most secret names, a whisper upon the beat of her heart that sent the dust moving this way and that, making shapes and forms for it to attack.
Several bird-spirits went for eyes, as she called them up, singing of the skies, blue and clear. She stepped forward, as it loomed over her, and then, then at last she outpaced her nervous guards and threw herself from the saddle, whistling to the horse spirits to keep her mare safe as another spirit, this one a glittering dog of glass and steel, bit onto the thing's leg, drawing spirit-blood, clear and white.
No wonder the Csiritans thought that the dead were white.
The enemy great spirit roared, its fury without end, and the world seemed to shake. People fled on all sides around her, and it was a very lonely feeling, standing before such a monster. But she gripped tight her ceremonial knife and strode forward, still singing.
With each word, more and more spirits gathered. Some people struggled to have the force of will to convince a dozen spirits.
Ayila commanded a hundred as if it were nothing, and this was not pride or exaggeration, it was fact.
Yet she was fighting against a spirit so powerful that no one shaman was supposed to be able to defeat them, and with the army panicked or retreating, she had no backup. They'd turn, because they were fighting on, but against a spirit like this?
They needed to learn to fight a different way.;
But her voice was hoarse, and her battle was harsh.
Her knees almost buckled as a spirit screamed and retreated, all the while her flower snuck beneath its feet, prepared to sprout poison blossoms.
She sang and dance and became a conduit for death, and yet…
******
Bai-le was a Mage of some repute, and yet he had wanted to see war more than anything. Now he was forced to desperately hold together men who truly wanted to retreat. He had worked together with the sergeant to get them to stay close to the action, at least. If the cursed spirit was cleared, then they could push.
As it was, he watched.
Bai-Le would live to be a hundred, and he would of course lie about some parts of the story until his dying day. But he'd tell it, and what he said he saw was simple.
A lone barbarian girl, covered in dust and dirt, singing and dancing amid the swirl of a thousand spirits, as a monster fought her. One head roared fire, and another ice, and a third let out a stream of strange green toxins, and all bounced up against the dust and fell away.
She sang, and the dust itself rose up and blotted out the sun.
She danced and flowers seemed to reach up from nowhere and root it in place.
It roared, its main head filled with sharp teeth, its main eyes golden like the Gods, as a serpent choked one head, and bird spirits pecked out the eyes of others, and then from nowhere, for a brief moment, sprang a whole, gnarled, ancient tree, which pierced through its stomach.
The scream was amazing, and she advanced, each spirit cycling in and out as fast as she could sing, which was very fast. It was a wail, and he could not understand the words. But he could understand the meaning.
She wasn't much of a girl, he'd seen far prettier, but there was a look at her face from a distance, as if nothing terrified her. He said that he'd not be much of a Mage if he didn't fight now, and certainly he turned, pulling out scrolls and releasing spirits, bound to his will. Certainly, other Mages saw him do that, and for a time she had support, as the spirit thrashed and flailed.
******
It was a delicate, impossible fight, and she fought mostly alone, almost unaware of anything, lost in the haze of spirits she felt in her mind. She held onto them with her will, with her knowledge that destiny and the Spirits needed her, and yet she felt spirits scream and die, or retreat, no longer able to stand up against this.
The natural instinct of spirits before a Great Spirit was to run, to hide, or to bargain if they were smart enough and it had intellect. Intellect and power were sometimes related, but sometimes not.
She should be falling to her knees, and certainly she felt tired. The help that arrived allowed her to destroy four heads before it retreated, and the battle, which had seemed to turn against all sense, suddenly felt as if it was hers to lose. She growled out more names, no longer singing and dancing, just swaying and stepping forward in time with the screams of the spirits.
She called stranger spirits now, ones that were mere sounds or smells, which tore at its body, revealing more and more flesh.
She knew this Spirit, or rather she knew what it must be. It was a spirit of masks, of forms, of things that hid themselves and multiplied in the dark. Each head blossomed, and destroyed, and then was destroyed.
Only a spirit could slay it, for a mortal blade would but lead to more heads sprouting, endlessly.
In a matter of minutes it had killed hundreds of loyal soldiers, and that was with the protection of other spirits… those that didn't flee.
So forward she went, exhausted, the colors and sights and sounds all seeming to bleach out for her. Some mystics said that you lost yourself in them. But for her, it was always different. Instead, it was more as if they lost themselves in her. As if she had ten thousand arms and legs, all at once. It was hard to control, and yet it was addictive. You lost yourself, because there were so many emotions, but not in the way that they said. Not because you were less than the spirits, but because you were more.
Her limbs shook and her voice babbled with a dozen voices at once as she pressed home the attacks. It was bleeding, it needed to retreat, and yet it was angry. It was angry, and all it needed was one good, true blow to triumph.
Were she a warrior without peer in addition to being a spirit-sage without peer, she could have called on the spirits to strengthen her arms and could have charged the monster and fought with it one on one, her sword flashing with the bright power of a dozen spirits.
Instead, a single hit would leave her down, and two would kill her.
But she was not hit.
She danced between the raindrops, she called up spirits, one after another. They died for her, died as they would not for someone whose very understanding of their natures went beyond names. Beyond, but including.
It fell to its knees, just three heads left, and she stepped towards it. "I know you," she said, quietly, her words echoing through her spirits. "I name you. I feel you in me. A thousand heads, you are that which cannot be stopped. Rumor, and an army, all as one." She panted, her limbs aching, and she felt the awareness start to fall away. "I name you Raelis, and call upon it all of the names you hold. I call upon it." She took a breath. Archers were firing again now, and the army was advancing, and that meant she was safe, for the moment. But she needed to retreat.
Eventually.
Both of its hands rested now, at either side of her. Its arms were black tree trunks, and its two hands were each sprouting more hands, as if it wanted to strange her. Rough, scarred hands. Hands that had wrapped around throats. The one face had hair all over it, and a nose that was more a broken hole, and its mouth now had broken, jagged teeth like a mountain range.
It watched her, not sure what to do. She felt its power. She felt the threat of it. Her heart was racing, and her arms ached. If she let go now, it would eat her. She would sprout dozens of heads, and, screaming, dissolve into nothing. It'd burn her alive from the inside and then push out of her, for she would not be a strong enough vessel for such a spirit.
"No." She growled it. "Mine!"
The weapon, the artifact, it was her family's, it was her brother's. It was her duty, and no woman should hold such a tool, or so she was told.
This, though, she could do it.
Another breath, and now it was breathing in the same rhythm as her. She would pay: for all powerful spirits, there was a cost. A cost to pay for holding them.[1]
But not today.
*******
Legend says that Ayila walked away from the battlefield, returning to her horse to ride back behind the lines, holding a wooden mask, a grotesque thing.
And smiling.
*******
The army surged forward, and the enemy retreated, falling back. A line became a wavering set of lines, and then became two pushed back flanks, like a sort of upside down cup, as seen from above. Which could have been a trap, and might have been used as one, if they pressed on too far. If they let themselves be lured in and the rest collapsed on them.
Still, it was a genuine opportunity. Jinhai had lost his spirit, in circumstances that Ayila had not seen fit to tell Kiralo.
Kiralo who now stood in front of a man who he hadn't expected. "When?" he asked his scout.
"The army's three, three and a half hours out."
Hari-Nat was arriving.
It was a shame that at the rate the fight was going, it'd be over before they arrived, but Kiralo knew that the more thoroughly he won, the better. Jinhai's path was now insanely narrow, if not nonexistent. He had to win within two hours, when at the moment it seemed he might lose within one, or even less. And then he had to gather his strength, and make sure that none of Kiralo's retreating or routing army found the Hari-Nat army and their spine.
Do all of that, and then hope that Hari-Nat was exhausted or disheartened enough, and use the superiority of numbers to overawe them. And then?
Perhaps Jinhai would try to win them over.
It was just possible, tricky monster that Prince Jinhai was, but if so it was barely possible.
"Ah, well, this fight will be over by then, but…"
"Two thousand are coming ahead. They will be here from the west within the hour," the scout said, breathless. "It's their scheme, the Governor's. If Jinhai sees the two-thousand men and enough dust, he'll either think that the full force is here, or know…"
Kiralo nodded. "Know that the war is over. That he's lost. Or at least, his generals will know that."
Kiralo almost itched to take the field himself, but he held back. He had orders to still give, and a battle that might still be lost.
What are those orders?
[] Write-in.
[1] Such as how Kiralo now feels random aches and pains and annoyances every so often for the far less powerful spirit he has bound.
*******
A/N: This is rather unexpected, honestly. Also, if you'd taken the "Spirit Name" thing and won, she would have assumed direct control and then sent it on a rampage against Jinhai's troops.
Spirits didn't have genders the way that people thought. Some did, but when they did, it didn't mean the same thing. Spirits didn't have wives, and they didn't have maids. There were spirits that dealt with human affairs, or take human affectations, but that was never one of them. Ayila appreciated it sometimes.
A spirit wouldn't have protested when she got on her horse, for of course she knew how to ride, and she wondered what Csiritan men lived with. She'd heard that their women couldn't even ride, and yet this seemed an absurdity. How did they manage to survive the trials of sex and childbirth if a little horse terrified them. Did Csiritan men prefer women who bruised upon a summer's breeze?
It was all bizarre foreigner nonsense, compared to what her grandfather had called the Spirits of War. There were songs about them, and of course all of them were tragic, because war was the damndest thing.
Women weren't meant for it, or so she was told, and the more she watched it, the more she was sure that they were right: but neither were men.
So out she rode, a young girl, but soon enough it was not time for horses. And as she rode, she sang in the true language, in Southlander, the spirits welling up as she called.
"Naorini, you whose skin is the sheen of beaten copper,
Hicanthe, who sings with flowers a song of poison-death,
Lisine, my old friend, whose arm is an ancient oak that shelters all,
Now is the time for battle. Now killing must be done."
Naoirini formed up, a thousand sheets of copper all around a serpent-form with glistening green-gem eyes, and slithered ahead, his sheen distracting the huge monstrosity, whose each head showed a different facet of the truth, the truth that was devastation and death. Each head had a mask, and was positioned about a humanoid form with no grace or sense, just chaotic whim turned true.
This was what a Great Spirit was: not something trifling. But Naorini could blind with her scales of copper, could reflect the sun and surprise the monster.
Lisine, a brown cloud of sorts, surrounded her, and when the monster at last turned, recognizing her, its glare sent fiery bolts at her, gleaming silver as they impacted against her magical shield, but were broken.
Hicanthe, creeping flowers upon the ground, inched up amid the smoke and dust.
"Great Spirits hear my call. Rise up and serve the world!
Great Spirits hear my pleas," she drew a ritual knife and cut her hand. All around there was chaos, people dying and killing, and yet if this Great Spirit did not fall, then it would be all for naught.
"For I am one of the world's masters.
Yet I am like you, slave to what I am."
The song was barely translatable into Csiritan, did not rhyme as it did in the right tongue, but she sang it anyways, and soldiers turned, shocked to hear a young girl singing on such a battlefield as the dust swirled up around her. Shielding her.
It was the Great Spirits! Her heart soared, and she called more spirits, singing them up, making them feel special. These were their public names, but in the heart she knew she could see, she repeated their private, most secret names, a whisper upon the beat of her heart that sent the dust moving this way and that, making shapes and forms for it to attack.
Several bird-spirits went for eyes, as she called them up, singing of the skies, blue and clear. She stepped forward, as it loomed over her, and then, then at last she outpaced her nervous guards and threw herself from the saddle, whistling to the horse spirits to keep her mare safe as another spirit, this one a glittering dog of glass and steel, bit onto the thing's leg, drawing spirit-blood, clear and white.
No wonder the Csiritans thought that the dead were white.
The enemy great spirit roared, its fury without end, and the world seemed to shake. People fled on all sides around her, and it was a very lonely feeling, standing before such a monster. But she gripped tight her ceremonial knife and strode forward, still singing.
With each word, more and more spirits gathered. Some people struggled to have the force of will to convince a dozen spirits.
Ayila commanded a hundred as if it were nothing, and this was not pride or exaggeration, it was fact.
Yet she was fighting against a spirit so powerful that no one shaman was supposed to be able to defeat them, and with the army panicked or retreating, she had no backup. They'd turn, because they were fighting on, but against a spirit like this?
They needed to learn to fight a different way.;
But her voice was hoarse, and her battle was harsh.
Her knees almost buckled as a spirit screamed and retreated, all the while her flower snuck beneath its feet, prepared to sprout poison blossoms.
She sang and dance and became a conduit for death, and yet…
******
Bai-le was a Mage of some repute, and yet he had wanted to see war more than anything. Now he was forced to desperately hold together men who truly wanted to retreat. He had worked together with the sergeant to get them to stay close to the action, at least. If the cursed spirit was cleared, then they could push.
As it was, he watched.
Bai-Le would live to be a hundred, and he would of course lie about some parts of the story until his dying day. But he'd tell it, and what he said he saw was simple.
A lone barbarian girl, covered in dust and dirt, singing and dancing amid the swirl of a thousand spirits, as a monster fought her. One head roared fire, and another ice, and a third let out a stream of strange green toxins, and all bounced up against the dust and fell away.
She sang, and the dust itself rose up and blotted out the sun.
She danced and flowers seemed to reach up from nowhere and root it in place.
It roared, its main head filled with sharp teeth, its main eyes golden like the Gods, as a serpent choked one head, and bird spirits pecked out the eyes of others, and then from nowhere, for a brief moment, sprang a whole, gnarled, ancient tree, which pierced through its stomach.
The scream was amazing, and she advanced, each spirit cycling in and out as fast as she could sing, which was very fast. It was a wail, and he could not understand the words. But he could understand the meaning.
She wasn't much of a girl, he'd seen far prettier, but there was a look at her face from a distance, as if nothing terrified her. He said that he'd not be much of a Mage if he didn't fight now, and certainly he turned, pulling out scrolls and releasing spirits, bound to his will. Certainly, other Mages saw him do that, and for a time she had support, as the spirit thrashed and flailed.
******
It was a delicate, impossible fight, and she fought mostly alone, almost unaware of anything, lost in the haze of spirits she felt in her mind. She held onto them with her will, with her knowledge that destiny and the Spirits needed her, and yet she felt spirits scream and die, or retreat, no longer able to stand up against this.
The natural instinct of spirits before a Great Spirit was to run, to hide, or to bargain if they were smart enough and it had intellect. Intellect and power were sometimes related, but sometimes not.
She should be falling to her knees, and certainly she felt tired. The help that arrived allowed her to destroy four heads before it retreated, and the battle, which had seemed to turn against all sense, suddenly felt as if it was hers to lose. She growled out more names, no longer singing and dancing, just swaying and stepping forward in time with the screams of the spirits.
She called stranger spirits now, ones that were mere sounds or smells, which tore at its body, revealing more and more flesh.
She knew this Spirit, or rather she knew what it must be. It was a spirit of masks, of forms, of things that hid themselves and multiplied in the dark. Each head blossomed, and destroyed, and then was destroyed.
Only a spirit could slay it, for a mortal blade would but lead to more heads sprouting, endlessly.
In a matter of minutes it had killed hundreds of loyal soldiers, and that was with the protection of other spirits… those that didn't flee.
So forward she went, exhausted, the colors and sights and sounds all seeming to bleach out for her. Some mystics said that you lost yourself in them. But for her, it was always different. Instead, it was more as if they lost themselves in her. As if she had ten thousand arms and legs, all at once. It was hard to control, and yet it was addictive. You lost yourself, because there were so many emotions, but not in the way that they said. Not because you were less than the spirits, but because you were more.
Her limbs shook and her voice babbled with a dozen voices at once as she pressed home the attacks. It was bleeding, it needed to retreat, and yet it was angry. It was angry, and all it needed was one good, true blow to triumph.
Were she a warrior without peer in addition to being a spirit-sage without peer, she could have called on the spirits to strengthen her arms and could have charged the monster and fought with it one on one, her sword flashing with the bright power of a dozen spirits.
Instead, a single hit would leave her down, and two would kill her.
But she was not hit.
She danced between the raindrops, she called up spirits, one after another. They died for her, died as they would not for someone whose very understanding of their natures went beyond names. Beyond, but including.
It fell to its knees, just three heads left, and she stepped towards it. "I know you," she said, quietly, her words echoing through her spirits. "I name you. I feel you in me. A thousand heads, you are that which cannot be stopped. Rumor, and an army, all as one." She panted, her limbs aching, and she felt the awareness start to fall away. "I name you Raelis, and call upon it all of the names you hold. I call upon it." She took a breath. Archers were firing again now, and the army was advancing, and that meant she was safe, for the moment. But she needed to retreat.
Eventually.
Both of its hands rested now, at either side of her. Its arms were black tree trunks, and its two hands were each sprouting more hands, as if it wanted to strange her. Rough, scarred hands. Hands that had wrapped around throats. The one face had hair all over it, and a nose that was more a broken hole, and its mouth now had broken, jagged teeth like a mountain range.
It watched her, not sure what to do. She felt its power. She felt the threat of it. Her heart was racing, and her arms ached. If she let go now, it would eat her. She would sprout dozens of heads, and, screaming, dissolve into nothing. It'd burn her alive from the inside and then push out of her, for she would not be a strong enough vessel for such a spirit.
"No." She growled it. "Mine!"
The weapon, the artifact, it was her family's, it was her brother's. It was her duty, and no woman should hold such a tool, or so she was told.
This, though, she could do it.
Another breath, and now it was breathing in the same rhythm as her. She would pay: for all powerful spirits, there was a cost. A cost to pay for holding them.[1]
But not today.
*******
Legend says that Ayila walked away from the battlefield, returning to her horse to ride back behind the lines, holding a wooden mask, a grotesque thing.
And smiling.
*******
The army surged forward, and the enemy retreated, falling back. A line became a wavering set of lines, and then became two pushed back flanks, like a sort of upside down cup, as seen from above. Which could have been a trap, and might have been used as one, if they pressed on too far. If they let themselves be lured in and the rest collapsed on them.
Still, it was a genuine opportunity. Jinhai had lost his spirit, in circumstances that Ayila had not seen fit to tell Kiralo.
Kiralo who now stood in front of a man who he hadn't expected. "When?" he asked his scout.
"The army's three, three and a half hours out."
Hari-Nat was arriving.
It was a shame that at the rate the fight was going, it'd be over before they arrived, but Kiralo knew that the more thoroughly he won, the better. Jinhai's path was now insanely narrow, if not nonexistent. He had to win within two hours, when at the moment it seemed he might lose within one, or even less. And then he had to gather his strength, and make sure that none of Kiralo's retreating or routing army found the Hari-Nat army and their spine.
Do all of that, and then hope that Hari-Nat was exhausted or disheartened enough, and use the superiority of numbers to overawe them. And then?
Perhaps Jinhai would try to win them over.
It was just possible, tricky monster that Prince Jinhai was, but if so it was barely possible.
"Ah, well, this fight will be over by then, but…"
"Two thousand are coming ahead. They will be here from the west within the hour," the scout said, breathless. "It's their scheme, the Governor's. If Jinhai sees the two-thousand men and enough dust, he'll either think that the full force is here, or know…"
Kiralo nodded. "Know that the war is over. That he's lost. Or at least, his generals will know that."
Kiralo almost itched to take the field himself, but he held back. He had orders to still give, and a battle that might still be lost.
What are those orders?
[] Write-in.
[1] Such as how Kiralo now feels random aches and pains and annoyances every so often for the far less powerful spirit he has bound.
*******
Round One--Approach: 1d100+15=102
Round One--Gods Calling: 1d100+15+3 (Destiny Piety)=75
Round 2--First Assault: 1d100+15=95
Great Spirits Gaze?: 1d100+20=77
Round 3: Twelve Heads as one: 46
Ayila's Dust: 90
Come now, rise up, serve your masters: 1d100+15=41
Or Be the Slaves of Kings: 1d100+20: 54
Round 5--Ayila: 1d100+15=55
Monster: 1d100+18=56
Round 6: 1d100+15=...272
Monster: 1d100+18=44
Round 7: 1d100+15+10 (Spirits Smiling Upon Thee)+10 (The Will of the Mages)=80
Monster: 1d100+12=41
Round 8: 1d100+35 (Temporary, last round)=91
Monster: 1d100+10=98
Mages retreat?: 1d100=82. No!
Round 9: 1d100+15+5 (Mages still providing cover)=142
Monster: 1d100+11=75
Round 10: 1d100+15+5=60
Monster: 1d100+8=185
Mages retreat now
Round 11: 1d100+14=64
1d100+8=18
Round 12: 1d100+14=73
Monster: 1d100+5=45
Call for Retreat: 1d100-5 (Monster engraged)-5 (Ayila's pursuit)=Natural 1
I Know Your Name?!: 1d100+30=79, maybe
I Know your Power: 1d100+15=75
I Can Hold It: 1d100+15=65
You are mine, but not today: Nat 1… but she rerolls automatically for that stuff. Second roll, 81
Round One--Gods Calling: 1d100+15+3 (Destiny Piety)=75
Round 2--First Assault: 1d100+15=95
Great Spirits Gaze?: 1d100+20=77
Round 3: Twelve Heads as one: 46
Ayila's Dust: 90
Come now, rise up, serve your masters: 1d100+15=41
Or Be the Slaves of Kings: 1d100+20: 54
Round 5--Ayila: 1d100+15=55
Monster: 1d100+18=56
Round 6: 1d100+15=...272
Monster: 1d100+18=44
Round 7: 1d100+15+10 (Spirits Smiling Upon Thee)+10 (The Will of the Mages)=80
Monster: 1d100+12=41
Round 8: 1d100+35 (Temporary, last round)=91
Monster: 1d100+10=98
Mages retreat?: 1d100=82. No!
Round 9: 1d100+15+5 (Mages still providing cover)=142
Monster: 1d100+11=75
Round 10: 1d100+15+5=60
Monster: 1d100+8=185
Mages retreat now
Round 11: 1d100+14=64
1d100+8=18
Round 12: 1d100+14=73
Monster: 1d100+5=45
Call for Retreat: 1d100-5 (Monster engraged)-5 (Ayila's pursuit)=Natural 1
I Know Your Name?!: 1d100+30=79, maybe
I Know your Power: 1d100+15=75
I Can Hold It: 1d100+15=65
You are mine, but not today: Nat 1… but she rerolls automatically for that stuff. Second roll, 81
A/N: This is rather unexpected, honestly. Also, if you'd taken the "Spirit Name" thing and won, she would have assumed direct control and then sent it on a rampage against Jinhai's troops.
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- Pronouns
- They/Them
You've committed almost all of your reserves, other than what's basically the honor guard/make sure he doesn't get sneak-attacked for Kiralo, yes. Your whole line is currently holding. Your center is engaged, but might be pushing too ahead of the rest if their center keeps on retreating, unless it falls apart.
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Also, more than a few people worship Great Spirits like, well, Gods.
Ayila just caught one. More or less on her own, except for some moderate help midway through.
Ayila just caught one. More or less on her own, except for some moderate help midway through.
[X] Order the center to hold position at the next defensible point, and the flanks to press forward. Make it clear to the enemy's generals that you are in no hurry.
-[] Have the mages amplify Kiralo's voice over the battle to invite the enemy's generals to parley, for their defeat is inevitable by now, stating that you would prefer not to spend good Csiritan lives demonstrating it the slow way. Jinhai is doomed, they should know, but those deceived into fighting under his banner need not share the same end.
Okay, assuming this is interpreted through Kiralo's military experience and field knowledge, probably won't wreck us.
What's our imperial policy on surrenders and defections anyway?
The subvote isn't checked in yet, since I'm not sure how it'd be taken and would like feedback before I make it official.
Alright, Kyurem was caught.
Give it a nickname?
-[] Have the mages amplify Kiralo's voice over the battle to invite the enemy's generals to parley, for their defeat is inevitable by now, stating that you would prefer not to spend good Csiritan lives demonstrating it the slow way. Jinhai is doomed, they should know, but those deceived into fighting under his banner need not share the same end.
Okay, assuming this is interpreted through Kiralo's military experience and field knowledge, probably won't wreck us.
What's our imperial policy on surrenders and defections anyway?
The subvote isn't checked in yet, since I'm not sure how it'd be taken and would like feedback before I make it official.
Alright, Kyurem was caught.
Give it a nickname?
bookwyrm
Doom of Public Libraries
- Location
- Wichita, Kansas
so what I'm hearing is that the official histories will posit Jinhai as such an evil and impious figure that the all-seeing and mighty Gods favor a barbarian whelp of a girl over his ill-gotten power and enslaved monsters, reminding us all of the absolute power of the divine order over mortal craft?
Zeitgeist Blue
Currently Made of Metal
- Location
- Manila, Philippines, GMT +8
[X] Order the center to hold position at the next defensible point, and the flanks to press forward. Make it clear to the enemy's generals that you are in no hurry.
-[] Have the mages amplify Kiralo's voice over the battle to invite the enemy's generals to parley, for their defeat is inevitable by now, stating that you would prefer not to spend good Csiritan lives demonstrating it the slow way. Jinhai is doomed, they should know, but those deceived into fighting under his banner need not share the same end.
-[] Have the mages amplify Kiralo's voice over the battle to invite the enemy's generals to parley, for their defeat is inevitable by now, stating that you would prefer not to spend good Csiritan lives demonstrating it the slow way. Jinhai is doomed, they should know, but those deceived into fighting under his banner need not share the same end.
- Pronouns
- They/Them
The flank is the center? Remember, the army spread out rightward (from Kiralo's perspective).
What used to be the right anchor of the army (the hills) became, more or less, the... rightish side of the center?
And that's what's pushing forward, with the reserves.
Jinhai definitely still has stuff up his sleeves, he wouldnt have been so confident if all he had in reserve was that spirit. Either we push hard enough that he cant organise proper utilisation of his trumps or we back off so we arent in range for what he has planned and our lines get less spread out.
His morale is a weak spot we should hit though. I cant imagine many of those knowledgeable enough to be aware of their strategic situation want to continue fighting for him. Telegraphing really hard that we expect the friendly army to appear from a certain direction could enhance this.
His morale is a weak spot we should hit though. I cant imagine many of those knowledgeable enough to be aware of their strategic situation want to continue fighting for him. Telegraphing really hard that we expect the friendly army to appear from a certain direction could enhance this.
I still think Veekie's goal is quite solid, so I'll start with that as a base. If Kiralo is aware that the margine of victory and defeat is quite wide, and is getting worse, then it's highly likely that Jinhai's various nobles and generals are too. Thus advance our "centre" to the closest defensible point as this mitigates any last roll of the dice shenanigens, then focus on bringing the flanks more level with the centre or if possible have some of the units from the centre swing either left or right and cut of the enemies forces as if you're potentially in a pocket, it means you can also pocket some of their forces.
This should be enough for the actual tactical portion of the battle, then when the Hari-Nat forces get there there's a good chance it signals game over. This would really be when Jinhai's various forces make their decision, as with the majority of our forces probably not engaging theirs, there is a brief chance to turn your cloak or just abandon the battle; but it's limited as when the armies engage again the severity of the terms given to you drastically go up, if they even accept it.
[X] Order the center to hold position at the next defensible point, and the flanks to press forward so there is less vulnerability. If possible have skirmishers and cavalry attempt to make a hole that can cut off one of Jinhai's flanks (or a section of the flank) line of retreat and envelope it, and if not able to cut it off, make any rout or retreat more costly.
This should be enough for the actual tactical portion of the battle, then when the Hari-Nat forces get there there's a good chance it signals game over. This would really be when Jinhai's various forces make their decision, as with the majority of our forces probably not engaging theirs, there is a brief chance to turn your cloak or just abandon the battle; but it's limited as when the armies engage again the severity of the terms given to you drastically go up, if they even accept it.
[X] Order the center to hold position at the next defensible point, and the flanks to press forward so there is less vulnerability. If possible have skirmishers and cavalry attempt to make a hole that can cut off one of Jinhai's flanks (or a section of the flank) line of retreat and envelope it, and if not able to cut it off, make any rout or retreat more costly.
[X] Order the center to hold position at the next defensible point, and the flanks to press forward so there is less vulnerability. If possible have skirmishers and cavalry attempt to make a hole that can cut off one of Jinhai's flanks (or a section of the flank) line of retreat and envelope it, and if not able to cut it off, make any rout or retreat more costly.
Alright, going with that.
No word on the feasibility of trying to goad a surrender or rash charge out of them yet, so not doing that.
Alright, going with that.
No word on the feasibility of trying to goad a surrender or rash charge out of them yet, so not doing that.
- Location
- Germany
Wow, that was excellent. The description of the spirit battle was weird enough to convey a sense of how alien spirits are, but clear enough that it was easy to follow the course of the fight.
Now to the vote:
@The Laurent, what is our cavallery doing at the moment? Have the already enetered the battle and if so, where?
Now to the vote:
Moving forward to a defensible position with the centre and attacking with the flanks makes sense. I dislike the envelopment, however. A full envelopment prevents the enemy forces from routing, and I want them to rout and not fight on to the bitter end. And if we try to cut off a flank as in this description, it would place part of our enveloping army between Jinhai's center and the cut-off flank, which doesn't seem wise.
@The Laurent, what is our cavallery doing at the moment? Have the already enetered the battle and if so, where?
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- Pronouns
- They/Them
A good deal of it is pushing with the center at the moment, while other parts are watching your flanks/etc.
- Location
- Germany
I don't quite understand the positions of the armies. Is our army pushing back Jinhai's center and thus inside a cup formed by his army, or are our flanks pushing back his flanks, with our army on the outside of the cup?
Or something else entirely?
- Pronouns
- They/Them
The former. His center is retreating faster than his flanks, but aren't breaking. Thus the cups. You pushed forward with your reserves, and the cavalry came with them, to try to chase down the enemy.
- Location
- Germany
Difficult decision. On the one hand, the best plan seems to me to push further until Jinhai's lines become stretched too thin and his army breaks into pieces. This is unfortunately also rather risky.
But if we stop advancing, then our army will be caught in a pincer. Not a good position to be in, and if Jinhai's army manages to rally and counterattack we would be in serious trouble.
On the whole, the first option looks preferable to me. So, unless someone comes up with something clever that prevents us from being pincered but with less risk, I will vote for:
[X] Keep pushing forward with our army to further thin Jinhai's lines until they break apart.
But if we stop advancing, then our army will be caught in a pincer. Not a good position to be in, and if Jinhai's army manages to rally and counterattack we would be in serious trouble.
On the whole, the first option looks preferable to me. So, unless someone comes up with something clever that prevents us from being pincered but with less risk, I will vote for:
[X] Keep pushing forward with our army to further thin Jinhai's lines until they break apart.
Random Member
Gardener of Human Happiness
- Location
- Behind You
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Hmm, coincidence or part of his plan?
Kiralo, with 30 Martial, is pretty sure that he didn't plan on being hit this hard, but having a retreat turn into *that* is a decent plan, which is why Kiralo is worried about playing into it.
It's a flattish plain, I'm not sure there is a defensible point to stop at. A slow advance keeps up the psychological pressure.
[x] Order the center advance to slow, maintaining an organised front and cycling units through the line. If the enemy stand we kill them but we aren't going get drawn into chasing them. Order the flanks to push on, especially the un-anchored right flank.
-[x] Mages to prepare an attack on Jinhai's artillery.
[x] Order the center advance to slow, maintaining an organised front and cycling units through the line. If the enemy stand we kill them but we aren't going get drawn into chasing them. Order the flanks to push on, especially the un-anchored right flank.
-[x] Mages to prepare an attack on Jinhai's artillery.