Sha Yu Had fallen.
The months had blurred together in a dance of feinting and counterfeiting. Eking out small victories, large forces prowling around each other without ever pouncing. The enemy looked for the decisive advantage to crack open and eat He Jian. They looked for openings to stop that from happening, for as long as they could.
Already fifty of his own two-hundred dead, nothing to be recovered, even with his Horn. Hundreds of casualties in other legions.
What a waste.
He looked at the map again.
A blue circle indicated as He Jian amidst a sea of red.
He was swimming in the red.
His ears rang.
Suddenly, two red drops appeared on the blue circle.
He frowned, displeased at the omen.
Another red drop outside the circle, nearly invisible against the bright red backdrop.
Three Monkey Hill – wasn't that where he was now?
He raised his hand to his face.
Wet.
He pulled it back.
Blood.
How long had he been awake? Two months? Three?
He still hadn't recovered from that tussle a month back. His head ached.
"—athos!" "Centurio Kalokagathos?!"
He looked up and at the entrance of the makeshift command tent.
A golden-haired youth, Ninth Heavenstage. He belonged to one of the other legions. Not of his
centuria.
The boy was taken aback by his half-lidded look. He hadn't time to look presentable. He had to think and at some point fight. The rest was superfluous.
The legionnaire was well-trained however, debriefing him in a clipped cadence.
"Reporting an engagement fifty-two li to north-by-west, at Li Da Wen Farms. Squads five and seven are down to three soldiers. Forty-six Demon casualties, including an expert, presumably First Pillar."
Aris dabbed a bronze-nibbed pen in ink and indicated it on his map with rigorous accuracy, jotting the essentials down in less than a second.
Aris didn't focus – focus needed to be conserved.
"Copy. Atipathes is in charge until I return. Move the command centre in an hour as planned."
Then, Qi was in his legs and he was out of the tent.
He expelled Qi in a series of staccato bursts, signaling his orders in code to his troops.
"
Prepare for assault, 112 li from HJ, 345° 18'. Attack vector: 40 li to approx. 135 li, 33° to HJ
."
His enemy had dug himself in there, he knew with some certainty – his men had been screened by enemy skirmishers at every turn when they had tried to approach.
He let out a second, muted burst of Qi, the indented recipients some five hundred li from where he was. He had to hope it would be enough.
--
The three Bronze-blooded survivors of the battle were quite rattled. He supposed it must have been quite the fight.
Aris put his hand on his horn, feeling an echo of joy and belonging course through him.
He brought the wicked thing to his lips.
One blow of the horn. It was a mournful and terrible sound.
He looked upon the three survivors. They were expendable. If they didn't die here, they would elsewhere.
War was writ across his entire being now. War did not feel, war crushed thousands between its cogs with unfeeling unpliancy. His one Pillar resonated with a pleased hum.
War. Its name was War.
Bellum.
Not a fight, nor an engagement, nor a reprisal, nor a battle. Full-on war. He hated and loved it. He dreaded it like an old foe and desired it like a long-missed paramour.
Over sixty spectral figures rose from the lifeless figures of his comrades and dead Demons.
Ten more Golden Devils had gathered around him, rallying to the communicated staging point.
He spoke to them, but mainly to the three survivors of the skirmish with the Demons.
"Are we ready for battle?"
Solemn nods and grunts of affirmation followed. Most were unsettled by the casual display of necromancy.
Most pointedly did not look at the reanimated spectres or the horn by his side.
Something in him burned and grated, the emotional pain rubbing against his numbness.
He bared his teeth, letting a hair of the carefully-hidden reservoir of pure rage spill out.
"Are you disgusted by this, devils? Do you resent me for calling to my side your compatriots who have earned their perpetual rest, devils?
Do you fear me, devils?"
More were here now. Some twenty living Scions of Gold, ready for combat.
They all recoiled a step or more.
"If you do, devils, then let me end your fear here now. Better to die at my hand now and serve as a spectre than let your fear eat your wits and heart whole."
He Breathed in, and his next words quivered with Qi.
"
YOU ARE CALLED TO DEATH, DEVILS. YOU WILL DIE HERE, DEVILS. I ASKED WHETHER YOU WOULD RATHER DIE NOW OR LATER, DEVILS?!"
"WE DIE AT YOUR COMMAND, CENTURIO!"
His nose was leaking blood again.
He felt his arms and legs again. Good.
"Good."
He breathed in through his mouth, tasting blood on his lips.
"The spectres cover the centre of the force, you strike at the flanks. Murder, don't wound. Don't conserve your strength, don't survive. Murder and kill."
"COPY, CENTURIO!"
He smiled. He raised both his hands high in a gesture of prayer.
"Imperator
Imperatorum, defend us in this day of battle. Be our safeguard against the wickedness and snares of the Foe. May Thou rebuke Him, we humbly pray. And may Thou, Lord of the Blessed Host, through your faithful servants, destroy the Foe entire and all evil men that walk with Him, who prowl the worlds, seeking the ruin of Man.
ᾱ̓μήν."
"
ᾱ̓μήν"
His men echoed in turn.
"To the slaughter, then."
--
They cut through the few elements of resistance on their way like hot butter.
No units of sufficient strength to challenge them. Infuriatingly, not enough to expend one of the uses of his Horn for.
His spectral soldiers were faster than his men, floating across the landscape like shades, striking like vengeful ghosts.
They were fifteen
li from where he thought his enemy was, approximately.
His men had heeded his orders well, flocking to his force by the dozens. They were now a force over two hundred strong, next to the sixty-or-so dead.
The ball was rolling now. Any advantage would have to lead to a much greater one. Played right, he could summon a force a thousand strong from nowhere and throw a spanner into the enemy's plans. Not merely a tactical victory, but a strategic one.
He Jian was lost, all knew that. But an immaculate retreat would save them men and face, both priceless commodities.
The city needed time. Time he could purchase for them. Time he himself could use to feed his enemy into war's maw.
The terrain around him was ruined. A muddy, stained field of shades of brown, the grass ruined by malignant Qi and destruction.
On the horizon, amidst the torn hellscape, a force gathered. Dots of pink and red flesh around a few dozen black-and-red ones.
Many smaller Qi signatures, about a thousand. A handful of lesser experts in the middle of their formation, but nothing more. It seems his true enemy hadn't taken the field yet.
There was little to be won by waiting.
"
Men, advance in formation!"
They jogged forwards at a pace even the most athletic mortals would struggle to match.
From the flanks of his formation, the occasional bright flash of bronze shot out towards the enemy formation. No return fire.
When they were within hundred and fifty metres of each other, the enemy reacted as a beehive shaken.
Masses of junior Demons swarmed towards them, skin red with the marks of lashes and other cruelty. Shock troops.
Pathetic.
"
Devils, close formation!"
The flanks of his force flowed towards each other and sealed his spectres behind a wall of bronze.
The fastest sprinters of the Demons were only a few seconds away now.
"
Brace!"
Shields and spears were set, defensive techniques activated, the resonant hum of Bronze Qi a familiar and comfortable rhythm that made their bodies heavier, their footfalls more confident, their arms stronger.
He stayed back, towering half a metre above the lines of battle, kept aloft on a shield borne by four spectres.
Then, the tide struck the wall of bronze, meaty thuds drowning out their battlecries and desperate shrieks.
They were butchered like carcasses in the grinder, his men not yielding an inch.
As the enemy Demons fell by the droves, realization quickly struck Aris. These were dregs, whipped into a frenzy by someone who knew full well what he was doing.
His enemy knew about the horn.
Surprising, such knowledge was not common even in the clan. He supposed his enemy thought to bait him into using it a second time on this group.
To what end, Aris could only wonder. An advantage acquired here was still an advantage. He'd have less spectres to command than if there was a pitched battle with many casualties on both sides, but if he raised these dregs he'd have the forces to enter such an engagement with greater numbers than he would normally be able to.
A frenzied half-naked Blood Demon leapt three metres over the battle lines, heading straight towards him. His sabre left its scabbard for a bare moment and the battle-mad junior was cleft in two.
The only way this made sense was if his enemy foresaw a great opportunity to use his horn at some near point in the future and sought to deny it to him. Perhaps another battlefield nearby?
He consulted his mental map of the battlefield.
Fifty li west from where he stood was a large Strength Purity force, supported by bear cavalry. Eighty li to the north, deep in enemy territory, a smaller Saber force. Hundred li to the north-west a large ragtag band of Flower and Arrow bandits and Gemstone Justice auxiliaries around a Strength Purity core.
He let his senses spread out across the terrain around him, blocking out the din of battle. That suite of sensory arts he had purchased had been worth every dearly-earned contribution point. Being a superior commander meant above all having superior information.
He detected no large expenditures of Qi or other anomalies over the cacophonous hum of ambient Qi and lesser active arts. No large-scale battles nearby.
Then a miniature pulse.
Innocuous enough, a few Strength Purity sensory specialists of the force fifty li away activating a cycle of perception arts. No one would have thought twice about it.
Yet the simultaneous activation meant that they all had the same reason to start looking at something at the same moment. Coupled with the timing…
Before him, the battle was winding down, a sea of gore before an unbowed line of bronze-faced killers. A handful of bronze-clad warriors lay unmoving amidst the gore, their shining armour tarnished by mud and blood.
He let out a short sequence of Qi pulses. He raised the horn to his lips. The core of the Demon force, still standing some few hundred metres away from them, seemed to brace.
Then, his men broke formation and darted off at a fast run, westwards, further away from He Jian. He drew the Horn into his storage ring again.
Their opponents seemed dumbstruck.
They eventually gave chase and tried to harry their flanks, but the spectres moved faster than peer immortals and as always proved an excellent deterrent by out-flanking skirmishers, bogging down lightning strikes and making setting up any sort of concerted attack a frustrating proposition.
After a while, the Demons regrouped and gave up their pursuit, and his men continued to the presumed site of battle.
It might be nothing, Aris thought, and he could be wasting valuable momentum and the opportunity to feed more demons into the grinder on a whim. Yet he smelled mischief, and the foreign, murmuring voice in his head muttered caution.
Being a superior commander was not only having superior information and a superior intellect, but also knowing when to trust your intuition and when to throw it into the wind, he liked to imagine.
--
Hours later, their force came within a li of the position of the Strength Purity force.
As expected, or perhaps entirely unrelated to his expectations, they were currently locked in pitched combat. Some three thousand Strength Purity troops against…ten thousand? Twelve thousand? Perhaps as much as fifteen thousand Altar Demons.
His men moved across the ruined, muddy terrain slowly and cautiously.
They had split up and were slowly encircling the site of battle from both sides in a pincer manoeuvre, aimed at the enemy's flanks. His spectres would lie in wait in the enemy's back, making use of their superior speed to strike at the enemy's most exposed spots. Normally, it was folly to attempt stealth on flat terrain against an enemy that was on its guard, unless you were really good at it.
Yet they had been far away enough when the battle erupted, were in a position to make a beeline for the battle without having to hurry, and their enemy was distracted. Reinforcements could either be in time or be in a position to flank or ambush. Seldom both, unless they knew exactly when and where to be.
He hadn't informed the allied commander of his approach. Too risky, both in terms of signalling their approach to the enemy and trusting the Strength Purity commander to act sensibly. Perhaps he was a strategic genius who would use every one of his men to the utmost. It might even be likely.
Yet Aris was entirely sure of his own capacities. An undead Strength Purity warrior under his command would be used to its greatest effect. They were generally weaker than the living version, but operated in perfect unison and obeyed his commands instantly. Individual strength – which the Sect's members so clearly possessed – did not mean nearly as much as perfect synergy in warfare.
Perverse, to consider that whether they were more useful alive or dead depended on the acumen of their commander.
They were within striking distance now, on the horizon the clear shape of a cultivator battlefield.
Two large blobs, one white-and-blue, the other red-and-black, with a large zone between them swarming with small groups doing battle in squads or as individuals. Flashes and booms rang out from a handful of spots where experts did battle. Here and there on the battlefield the large shapes of bear corpses were visible, their lives spent in a first charge.
His allies were being pushed hard, but were reaping a deathly toll from among the Demons. Yet it didn't seem to be enough – the Strength Purity Sect would likely not win this battle.
Occasionally a larger force from either side sallied forth and was rebuffed. The dance would continue until one side had the advantage, then that side would surround the other and attempt to destroy it.
Crude and ugly – this was how warriors, not soldiers, did war.
He would show them a thing or two about tactics.
A high whistle rang out, and he
pulsed his Qi.
One. Two. Three bursts.
As his force ran the last hundred metres, he finally signalled to the enemy commander.
Push.
And then they were onto the Demons, two arrow formations slamming into the teeming mass of Demons, a third force of spectres hovering near their back at a distance.
He was at the head of the southern flanking force, the tip of the spear, the wings of the arrow flaring out from him. The other one was lead by his
tessarius, Thyrsis.
His enemy had had only bare seconds to brace, and Aris' charge cut though the first five lines with relative ease.
One burst of speed, his bronze sabre sharp with Sword Qi and he mowed down nearly two dozen Demons, spraying severed limbs and viscera everywhere.
His Vanguard was behind him, flowing into the breach he left with bloodthrist, tearing open the small wound he had made in the enemy formation and making it a gaping one.
Yet it seemed these Demons were no pushovers – they solidified into a compact defensive circle after a scant few seconds.
His arrow formation blunted as their charge lost its momentum and now resembled more of a reverse triangle, the wide side against the enemy lines. The numbers were against them; they were a hundred soldiers on each flank and sixty spectres in the enemy's back. Based on a quick count, the main body of the enemy was about five thousand strong.
Their enemy immediately moved to engulf and surround Aris' flanking forces with superior numbers. The Demon commander was very well capable of tactics if needed, or so it seemed.
An enemy expert muscled his way through enemy lines, heading straight towards Aris to tie him down. A large man, wearing a heavy suit of black armour and a large polearm. Three heads were spiked on each of his pauldrons. Mid Foundation Establishment.
Aris lashed out two, three times in quick succession before the armour-clad titan reached him, cutting down handfuls of Altar demon juniors. Just as the halberd came down for a first strike, the main Strength Purity force crashed into the Demon formation.
The halberd came down, fell onto Aris' armoured shoulder, cracked lamellar and then stopped its movement. Aris was pushed two inches into the muddy soil by the force of the strike, but was otherwise unharmed.
He didn't see his armoured adversary's reaction behind his helmet as he immediately made use of the opening to plant his sabre into his opponent's gut.
Then a flying kick by a young Strength Purity expert wearing a bright white
tangzhuang pulverised his opponent's head, splitting and tearing the metal of his helmet. The armoured demon slumped, and Aris withdrew his sabre.
His men pushed into the enemy lines with renewed vigour, passing him and the white-clad expert by in their charge.
The expert turned towards him and bowed.
"You come Heavensent, Golden Devils. I didn't know there was another force close-by. I am Major Fengxiang Da."
Aris returned the bow.
"
Centurio Aristoteles Kalokagathos. We are here on our own objectives, they just so happened to require us helping you."
The young – he couldn't be more than a hundred-and-fifty years – commander titled his head. He was powerful, Aris felt. Late Foundation Establishment. A true talent. He was marked with scars and his soul felt
solid.
Then he gave a small nod, beckoning towards the centre of the Demon force.
Hah, it seemed this Fengxiang understood some things quite well.
They charged forward side-by-side, carving a cruel line through the gathered demons.
They sought out enemy experts and slew three of them. Aris was the perfect anvil, durable as Bronze and with a near-perfect defence. Fengxiang proved to be an exceptional hammer, his axe kicks obliterating all before him.
The battle had turned, and at the back of the enemy formation, small groups of Demons started breaking away from their formation to flee.
His spectres sallied forth and cut them down time after time.
Just after finishing off the third expert – a diminutive woman with a bald scalp and frighteningly large fangs – the enemy commander had calmly walked towards them, the tide of battle parting for her.
She was – for all intents and purposes – an incredibly plain woman, almost to the point of suspicion. She was tall but not overly so, an angular face beneath chestnut brown bangs. She wore a plain brown
hanfu, unadorned and rough-spun. Aris activated his most demanding spiritual insight art and identified six Pillars in her
dantien.
Her voice was deep and weathered, her tone dry and clipped.
"An unwelcome surprise, Devil. We finally meet, Major."
Fengxiang responded easily.
"Well, we need not fight. Leave and we shall –"
Suddenly, in the middle of his sentence he shot forward with a pulse of killing intent, and a mere moment later the enemy commander was bent double over a horizontal kick to her gut.
In that moment, Aris imagined he might even grow to like the Strength Purity commander.
Then, he seized upon the moment, and glided forward with his sabre high, prepared to end the fight with a guillotine cut.
Then, the Altar Demon's skin bubbled, and a grey chalk-like substance emerged from her form in rapidly-blooming twisting shapes, growing metres in a bare moment, obscuring her form and seemingly trapping Fengxiang inside. His sabre came down, and cut about half a metre into the hard substance before it became stuck.
A voice rumbled from deep within, the tone as emotionless as before.
"You mistake inaction for unpreparedness. You will not make this mistake again."
Corpse Bone Manipulation: Execution
A dozen spikes shot out from the grey mass where the Strength Purity commander last stood.
An instant later, the mass shuddered and reached out towards Aris with blinding speed, seeking to engulf him. His sabre was still stuck.
A sword cultivator sharpened the soul, not the sword. A truth everyone seemed to forget despite its ubiquitousness.
He wasn't the most dedicated to his path. He used the sword because it was convenient, a commander's weapon. Easy to replace in the beginning and immune to degradation at higher levels. To cut was simple. To punch, destroy with one's fists and manipulate bodies to cause hurt was difficult.
The sword was the ultimate cutting implement, and therefore the ultimate offense. The body was the root of everything, and therefore the ultimate defence, if one treated it properly.
He released his sabre.
The top half of the grey mass now nearly five meters in diameter was cut cleanly off. In the middle, an unimpressed-looking Altar Demon commander stood out amidst the flat surface which now reached to her shoulders. Like a statuette from a mold.
A
yanmiaodao appeared from nowhere and shot towards the brown-clad women like a missile.
Bone growths appeared along her arm and she parried the flying sword with a sharp clang.
That's all the time he needed.
From the still-intact part of the bone growth, Fengxiang
flowed upwards, more than he burst or moved.
He seemed unhurt, his soul flaring with Water Qi.
"Seven Thousand Streams Leading to Enlightenment"
"Third Confluence"
He spinned around in what seemed like a roundhouse kick, but moved too fast for even Aris to see.
Bone growths started forming on the Altar Demon commander, but it happened so agonisingly slow.
Then her upper body was torn nearly shoulder-to-shoulder, as if cut into by a giant, blunt cleaver.
She twitched once, and Fenxiang shifted slightly, projecting a dozen booming strikes too fast for his eyes into the maimed corpse of the Altar Demon. In a flash, her body was pulverised, punctured by wounds the size of small fists.
The remaining bone growths around him dissolved.
Fengxiang nodded towards him.
The back of his foe was broken. All that remained was the cleanup.
--
A scant hour later, Aris looked out over the site of a slaughter.
Altar Demon juniors were stacked like bushels of wheat, interspersed with white-and-blue clad Strength Purity disciplines, shining bronze heroes and the occasional giant bear.
The Strength Purity contingent had left.
He had told Fenxiang that leaving the corpses of his comrades be would be the fastest path to victory. Fenxiang had held him with a hard look for near a minute, then he had agreed.
He had told his men there was a poison expert among the Demons, and that the corpses were contaminated. That the Golden Devils would take care of the cleanup with their constitutions.
Aris hummed pleasedly. What a bounty. Twelve thousand dead. He wouldn't be able to raise the enemy commander and their top experts, but all others would be at his command.
His men kept watch.
He raised the horn to his lips.
The moment exactly before he blew into the instrument, a man appeared before him as if from thin air.
Aris hadn't time to react, and even so, any threat could be better answered with twelve thousand soldiers than without.
Air passed through the horn, and the familiar mournful tune rang out.
The stranger clapped his hands, some sort of substance in his hands muting the sound of the clap.
The tune was cut short.
Aris' eyes opened wide.
"It seems you forced me to use my contingency after all, little Aris.
My name is Wen, and I look forward very much to consuming you."
----
A/N
This one was on the drawing table for nearly two months, and takes place during the previous Song mission. Bear with me, Aris' story will reach the present shortly and all of this will remain very much relevant for the turn to come.
@no. @Kaboomatic @ReaderOfFate
