Chapter 258 - Victory

Note : Chapter 262 has been written and added to the queue !

Chapter 258

Red Sands Desert, Duchy of Sarth

City of Darthar

Alexandra took a step back as she reloaded, trying to assess the situation.

Things had gotten desperate when CQ had left, forcing her to throw her ambassador golem into the fray lest the line collapse in its entirety, but they'd regained their foothold when she'd returned.

Alexandra had just flat out refused to leave the deck however, fighting on top of her daughter's unconscious body with a fury that seemed to have left several of the royal knights, still rappelling down as fast as they could to join the fray, speechless.

It wasn't like there was more she could do. She'd expected to have to take command of the defenders when the So Much For Subtlety landed at the command post, but not only had Philia been on the ball there, the knight-commander had actually had better plans in motions than she had in reserve.

CQ's power was fading, but the pressure was actually much lesser, from both sides. One was running out of men, as royal troops carved a bloody path in, supported by the entire city's airfleet, following the Grehai's example in bombing the streets, and the other was under a constant artillery barrage, the trebuchets and catapults that had been defending the other sections of the wall moved dangerously close to the warriors still within the city to be able to unleash hell on the breach.

Yeah, they were far less effective than her cannons, but much of her artillery was no longer available, what with the enemy having simply choked the guns with their bodies or dug their way into the side of the ship and effectively neutralized part of the magazine ammo feed before being pushed back.

And, well, the Freedom-class only had six guns on each side to begin with, and there was something close to a hundred trebuchets out there. It was a shame that the tesla point defence weapons were useless at these ranges, especially with bodies already underneath the ship, or Sunrise would have never even gotten to the hull, but she worked with what she had.

Trumpets sounded, and the soldiers on the city side began to retreat. Finally, they were so threatened by the royal troops that they had to pull back lest they lose their beach head.

Unfortunately, the same could not be said for the other side, as Alexandra ordered her troops to shift. She couldn't just remove everyone from the city side, there'd be observers looking for an opportunity for another strike, but she had to move some forces over.

It was grim work. She started losing track of time as she reloaded her prototype assault rifle, and just poured more and more fire into the mass of soldiers beyond. One of the problems of fighting yourself was that you started to lose sight of the bigger picture.

Which was why she was mildly surprised when she heard the trumpets outside the walls.

They were retreating? Wait, no, Sunrise's troops looked as confused as she was and-

She smiled as she heard it.

The sounds of hoofs hitting the sand.

Thousands of hoofs.

Sunrise's troops barely had the time to react as three thousand cavalrymen, the entirety of the mounted force from the city and the troops Philia had dragged back from the fortresses once defending it, crashed into their rear.

On Earth, cavalry charges were actually much different than depicted in the popular medias. Horses were freaking herbivores, they didn't want to charge angry bipeds, much less angry biped with sharp pikes or spears. Thus a cavalry charge was only viable on units that were unprepared or running away, making them supreme for mopping up after a battle or taking the flanks.

On Alcheryos however…with good alchemists, you could juice your horse with enough potions that not only would they survive a pike to the body, they'd also be berserk enough to try and eat the pikeman's face, in the most literal sense of the word.

Sunrise's rear units weren't there because they couldn't get to her. They were there because they wouldn't. Slowly, over the course of the battle, the less eager forces pushed to the back by the ones trying to get to the fray.

They had just seen their duke get killed…and watched for almost an hour now, the ungodly carnage on the breach.

They broke. The slaves, of course, had the brands forcing them to stand their ground…if their commanders did.

The officers panicked, and gave contradictory orders. The chain of command collapsed as whoever was closest in it to the slaves took control and went in their own direction.

They outnumbered the cavalry a hundred to one. Had anyone been able to force through a coherent battle plan, they could have rallied and crushed them.

But any semblance of communication structure had collapsed in the mad rush for the breach. Messengers had no clue where officers where, and most of them didn't even know where all of their troops laid anymore to begin with.

The cavalry carved a bloody path into the flank.

A company began running for the shield, and the trenches beyond.

Then another. And another.

Less than five minutes later, over half the army was routing.

The other half was trying to disentangle themselves from the breach, and dying in droves doing so.

Alexandra sat down. Her body didn't have adrenaline and couldn't come down from it, but her mind remembered and did do a passable approximation.

She took a look at CQ, who was still twitching feebly under her bandages, and took her daughter in her arms.

She needed to get her somewhere safer. And then get her ambassador to Philia's command post.

The battle of Darthar was over. They'd won. If the enemy couldn't take the breach now…

They never would.

She was just glad her core wasn't there to feel the constant barrage of essence. Even the slaughter in her teleport redirect room couldn't hold a candle to what had happened here…and that didn't even count some of Sunrise's tricks.

For if there was a sight Alexandra could have gone without having to behold indefinitely, it was a swarm of infantry charging her gun line, crying and begging for mercy, or at least a quick death.

That had to be a conscious choice on Sunrise's commanders, to give the slaves the freedom to do that. They had to have realized she was trying to keep slave casualties to a minimum, and attempted to capitalize on it.

She made a mental note to ask Philia for sharpened stakes.

A lot of stakes.

She had a message of her own to send.

TO-DO LIST UPDATED

*****

Philia looked at the ranks upon ranks of kneeling soldiers, before looking up as Elkaryos walked in.

"This is going to be a mess." Said the knight-commander, almost conversationally as she went back to gazing at the prisoners.

"At least they surrendered. That's something."

"It is, but they can still order the slaves to do whatever they want, and these brands aren't easy to remove, by design. Simplest solution would be to execute all of the officers, but…"

"Not willing to cross that line just yet?"

"Yep. Doing that would antagonize the other side for another generation. Hell, the king's grandfather doing that is what got us in this mess." She sighed. "The problem is going to be guarding and taking care of them since their supplies, for what little they had, are still in their siege fortresses."

"Well, I'm sure the dungeon core will be happy to assist us getting to them. Speaking of the devil." They both looked as the dungeon core, accompanied by a posse of combat golems, walked into the bazaar square. Philia had to blink were there…two bosses?

Wait, no. One was a hologram. An illusion, she saw it flicker.

The other was the real deal, heavily wounded and surrounded by equally damaged guards.

Uh. Apparently the dungeon core had found a solution to avoid having to possess her boss for meetings, but still have a face. Smart.

She shuddered as she looked at the golems however. She'd heard tales from the survivors of the fight, of those that had rappelled down.

Undead were already unsettling, but mechanical ones? That reached a whole new level for her. What if this could be applied to war machines? Ships? The possibilities were horrifying.

Elkaryos stepped forward as the delegation reached them.

"Lady Crystal! We meet at last. I'm Elkaryos Rapier, and I'm sure you and the knight commander need not be introduced to each other."

"Neither did you need to introduce yourself, Master Merchant, Allya spoke a lot about you."

"In good, I trust?"

"Indeed. But you were correct, in that this meeting was long overdue." Crystal extended her hand, Elkaryos took it, trying not to jump as his hand went straight through the hologram, to grasp the cold metal underneath. "It seems we have a lot to do as well."

"Thanks to you." Said Philia. "Otherwise the only things we'd be doing is begging for mercy."

Or, in her case, fall on her sword rather than be captured. She didn't want to end up some vindicative officer's plaything. Her rank didn't protect her without titles of nobility to come with it.

"Generous of you to say so."

Philia shook her head.

"Don't sell yourself short. We were starting to rout. I would have tried to hold them here, but…"

"It would have been a last stand."

"Yes. With access to the city, they could replenish their ranks. Falling back to the count's palace would have only delayed the inevitable."

Alexandra looked like she was about to disagree, but she kept her peace.

"The city has suffered extensive damage." Said Elkaryos. "With the breach reinforced, they won't have an easy time trying to rush it again, but this fight isn't over yet."

"Yes it is." Said Alexandra, smiling viciously.

Philia and Elkaryos exchanged a look, before the knight-commander spoke up.

"What? How?"

"With Sunrise's airfleets obliterated, the baroness and I are requisitioning many transport vessels to ferry troops in. I will also have shortly an artifact in my possession that should allow my main army to cross the wasteland."

It didn't take much thought to realize where the artifact must have come from.

"Main army?"

"Fifty thousand of those, give or take." Said the dungeon core as she patted one of the nearby golems on the shoulder. "Plus artillery, spider tanks, missile batteries…the works."

"They could still attack the city."

"They could indeed. Except that if they do they won't take it before the army arrives. They're too exhausted, too demoralized, and their feudal command structure has been ripped apart. The news of my army starting the march will shatter what's left of their fighting spirit. Their choices will be either to try to assault the walls while the hammer closes in, or run the hell away from the anvil and pray they make it out of the deserts before my golems overrun them."

"You're awfully confident you can be there quickly."

The dungeon core smiled. It wasn't a particularly nice one.

"My golems do not sleep, eat, drink, or tire. They can march all day, all night, and the only reason they won't be running is that they'd outrun their artillery." Artillery she was actually dragging with spider tanks, some of them obsolete, others up to date, so it could keep up. She really needed to make some self propelled guns for a mobile force.

TO-DO LIST UPDATED

"Ah. I see."

"The baroness will also be heading here as soon as I can get her into the city safely."

"Why? She never went to Erakis, did she?"

"True, but we intend to march north, to lift the siege of the capital. And for that, we'll need Darthar as a supply base. Moreover, the duke of Sarth is on his way with his army. An additional reason why the people outside might want to start running is that they won't have a path of retreat soon."

"There are still the fortresses in the desert."

"The ones Sunrise pounded into rubble on their way in?" Alexandra smiled. "Even if they were still useable, I've sent over some of my siege guns to the duke. How long do you think they're going to last against howitzers?"

Philia winced.

"Not very long."

"Exactly. Once we're done with this force, one way or the other, we'll need to regroup, and prepare. This? This is only the first step."

Philia met the dungeon core's eyes, and shivered.

There was…something there. A shadow of zealotry.

And it terrified her.

She mentally thanked Elkaryos, for counseling her to take the dungeon core's side, and advise their majesties to do the same.

Because gods preserve them if the dungeon core was ever against them.

Any doubts she'd had about the wisdom of siding with her were dead, scattered with the mountain of corpses the dungeon core had built at the breach.