Cataclysm War | Chapter 95: Know True Fear (First Draft)

Friday, August 12, 4 S.E.

Leonidas regarded Xarina in silence after she spoke and then glanced at his sister, whose sword was still at the Svartfar’s neck. He’d erected a small [Psionic Force] bubble around them after the woman had spoken, and was contemplating what to do with her. The guess, or perhaps not-quite-guess, about who he was remained troubling—but the sincerity in her eyes was hard to feign. There was an easy way to tell if she was lying, though.

“Swear on the System that what you have told me is the truth,” he instructed the Svartfar flatly.

“With the System as my witness, I swear I have spoken the truth to the best of my knowledge,” Xarina said in return.

Leonidas raised an eyebrow when the System chimed in response.

“To the best of your knowledge?” he queried.

“My belief is what it is, Archon-King,” Xarina said steadily, her eye faintly twitching as she glanced down at Kairi’s sword. “But I could be wrong. I do not believe I am, but I could be. Swearing an absolute understanding over this matter is perilous.”

Leonidas considered her for a moment longer, then finally nodded.

“Let her go, Kairi,” he said thereafter, waving a hand to his sibling.

“She knows what you are,” Kairi responded, her words a low growl.

“And she chose to come to me with it,” Leonidas pointed out impatiently. “If what she says is true, she may have just handed me the victory in this mad conflict. Let her go, Kairi.”

His sister glared at him, but finally lowered her sword, staring up at the taller Svartfar.

“I’m watching you, asshole. Don’t try anything funny.”

Xarina, despite the threat, seemed to react with the oddest sense of approval—glancing at Kairi with unveiled respect as she simply inclined her head.

Leonidas was spared from another response when Legion-Master Randul Endymion abruptly arrived in a crack of displaced air a moment later. He dismissed the [Psionic Force] bubble when the Army Officer approached and took in his appearance.

Instead of the dark robes he’d worn in the War Room, the Haelfar was now resplendent in a suit of heavily reinforced silvered warplate, wielding an immense Lance resting on one of his pauldrons, with a veritable armory of weapons sheathed across his body. Where before he had been somewhat unassuming, even humble, that appearance was gone—swallowed beneath the terrifying panoply of war decorating his body.

“{Your Majesty,}” the Legion-Master said, saluting fist-to-heart and bowing to Leonidas. “{I am here as commanded.}”

Leonidas nodded and returned the salute, glancing at Kairi and Xarina, and then returning his eyes to the Legion-Master. “I have a task for you, Randul,” he said in English, turning toward the distant mass of the irregulars that were finally starting to mobilize, while his grandmother rode away from them toward the massing Cavalry. “I want you to go with the Guild Mistress and her Adamantines, and I want you to smash that formation,” he said without preamble. “I want you to make a statement, too. No mercy, no hesitation; I want you to live in their nightmares for generations.”

The Legion-Master’s helmet turned to follow Leonidas’ gaze, and then shifted to Sinalthria, who smiled mildly at him as her yellow eyes flashed.

“I see,” the Legion-Master said, turning back to Leonidas. “And when they break, my King?”

“Let them break,” Leonidas commanded flatly, “assuming the retreat is genuine. Once they’re routed, collapse onto the rear lines of the Alliance and obliterate them. We need to wrap things up here swiftly, so that we can deal with the Moonrise and Sunrise battlefronts.”

The Legion-Master nodded and turned to Sinalthria.

“Are your Adamantines nearby, Guild Mistress?” he asked politely.

“They will be joining us presently,” Sinalthria said, followed almost prophetically by the arrival of the ten Adamantine-ranked Adventurers within the Guild, each one an Elite, two of them—Marthulf and Telaria—on the very cusp of Ascendant.

“So it seems,” Randul said and nodded toward the arriving Adventurers.

“Guild Mistress, Legion-Master,” Marthulf said jovially, turning then to Leonidas. “Archon-King. Looks like my son made a good friend, eh? Ha!”

Leonidas couldn’t help but grin under his helmet.

“He has good taste, Marthulf,” he replied as Bardulf, Parnym, and Synthra finally joined them, drawn from the far side of the circle they’d been assisting by the commotion.

“Father!” Bardulf said gleefully, hugging the smaller man.

“Mother?” Synthra questioned, eyeing her terrifying parent warily.

“No time for a catch-up, I’m afraid,” Leonidas cut in apologetically. “Randul, Sinalthria, I need those irregulars broken. Put the fear of God into them.”

The Guild Mistress and Legion-Master nodded to his words, and the Adamantine Adventurers rallied to them as the pair stepped toward the Guard’s cordon and then launched into the air. Marthulf spared a final wink back for his son before he followed, and the twelve-person strikeforce exploded into the advancing force of humans.

Carnage would have been a kind word for the slaughter that followed.

The Terrans initially tried to react to the attack, only for their front ranks to be turned to red mist by devastating strikes from the two Ascendants and equally horrifying assaults from the Elites, obliterating dozens in precisely as Leonidas had ordered. A few of the highest-tier humans tried to resist, only for the Ascendants to intercept them with methodical precision. Against the Elites, the human Elites may have stood a chance—against the Legion-Master and Guild Mistress, they were thoroughly outclassed.

Leonidas forced himself to watch as the slaughter unfolded, and Sinalthria’s draconic roar echoed over the battlefield, followed by a calamitous eruption of flame that claimed almost a hundred lives in a single line of terrifying dragonfire erupting from her extended left palm.

“Divines of Altera…” Synthra muttered, watching her mother fight—or rather, watching her mother commit an unrelenting massacre. “I knew she was strong, but this…”

“There’s a reason the Nobles fear your mother, Synthra,” Bardulf said cheerfully.

Leonidas turned away from the display at the sound of a horn and shifted his attention to see the Royal Army finally taking to the field, marching forward in a wall of undecorated steel as they finally left the City gates. He was glad to see the doors shutting slowly behind them and turned back to his companions.

“Okay, now it’s time to do our part,” he said to them more calmly than he felt. “My grandfather is about to slam into us with Cavalry, but I think he’s overestimating how useful they are.”

“Cavalry?” Synthra asked as she turned toward the massing horses. “Mounted warriors? Really? I thought they were preparing to run, not charge.”

“He thinks they’re going to overrun us,” Leonidas said with grim amusement, and turned toward Verity and Ilsan. “Lance-Masters! Are the Guard prepared to move?”

“At your order, Your Majesty!” Ilsan confirmed, unbothered by the screaming chaos around the Royal Guard cordon. “The Alliance forces are too preoccupied with the Shield-Host to stop us.”

“How do you feel about breaking a cavalry charge?” he asked the Haelfenn.

Both women glanced at one another, then turned toward where Artur was rallying the cavalry with a speech and a wave of his sword.

“...they cannot be serious…” Verity said in a perplexed tone.

“Terrans have had great results with Cavalry, prior to the Integration,” Leonidas explained as he started moving toward the Cavalry massing to their North, and his companions—including Xarina—moved with him, along with the Lance-Masters. His mana cycled rapidly as he walked, and he started channeling it steadily toward his [Archon’s Psiblade]. “But that plays into our needs quite well. We’re going to use that charge to shatter the last of our enemies’ morale.”

“So what’s the plan?” Kairi asked, still keeping an eye on Xarina as they walked.

“Put the Royal Guard and two Lances of the Army in front of the Cavalry and ruin Pops’ last hopes,” Leonidas said, glancing at Ilsan, who turned and called for a runner at his glance. “After that,” he said as he walked to the Northern edge of the Guard cordon, “it’s a matter of how stubborn he’s feeling.”

“It’s Pops, Ace,” Kairi said as she shook her head. “He’s always stubborn.”

“We’ll see,” Leonidas said and raised his voice. “{Royal Guard! Make me a path to face that Cavalry charge. Now.}”

Discipline won out immediately over confusion, and the Royal Guard flowed, shifting from a circular containment position to a four-thick spearhead with Leonidas and his companions at the center. The formation shifted so fluidly he’d have believed it impossible if he hadn’t seen it himself. One of the golden warriors separated at the same moment, racing at full speed toward the approaching Army forces as Leonidas slammed his fist to his chest.

“Forward!”

“{FOR THE KING!}”

The guard surged forward at his order, and Leonidas moved with them, jogging with the golden warriors as they smashed into the Alliance forces ten meters distant and butchered them in a controlled demonstration of violence. The movement seemed to draw attention from the archers, who started peppering them with arrows again, but Leonidas simply created a [Psikinetic Shield] above himself and his immediate companions and ignored the missiles.

Where they struck the Guard, they bounced off their reinforced golden warplate, bent and deformed by the powerful aethersteel.

The seartip formation cut its way through the battle, brutalizing anyone who tried to halt it as the guard raced toward the now-cantering Cavalry with increasing speed, and Leonidas was forced to run to keep up with them, blade in hand as thunder roared in the sky above. The grass beneath their feet was sodden with blood and the mud caused by it, as well as littered with the corpses of the Alliance’s soldiers—and some of the Shield-Host’s, as well, as much as he hated to see it.

The Shield-Host was doing well, but the battles were far more evenly matched between it and the Alliance, and Leonidas had lost people—hundreds of them by that point. It pained him to have allowed the sacrifice, but he was determined to make it mean something as they charged through the chaos of the battlefield while Sinalthria’s roar echoed across the grasslands again.

When they reached the edge of the battle, a few hundred meters distant from the accelerating Cavalry, the guard rapidly redeployed at Verity and Ilsan’s joint instruction, forming a line forty wide and two deep, with Leonidas and his companions behind them at the center.

Moments later, as the Cavalry thundered toward them and ate up ground, that line of forty became eighty as the Army joined them, and slammed their shields down into the earth on the outside of the Royal Guard formation, also creating a formation twenty wide and two deep, on either side of the Royal Guard. A wall of gold with wings of steel appeared as a result, as one hundred and sixty Haelfenn created a bulwark against the charging humans that were rapidly closing the distance.

“THIS IS WHERE WE MEET THEM!” Leonidas roared, sprouting his [Manastorm Pinions] and rising above his protectors. “THIS IS WHERE WE SHOW THEM WHAT IT MEANS TO FIGHT AGAINST AVALONIAN MIGHT! HEED MY DECREE, SONS AND DAUGHTERS OF AVALON: BREAK THESE INVADERS, AND TEACH THEM TO KNOW TRUE FEAR!”

His [Archon’s Psiblade] vibrated in his hand, and Leonidas drew it backward as he hovered, pouring his mana into the sword and expelling a slow, long breath. He saw the halberds readying behind the shieldwall, saw the mana building as the Guard and the Army prepared their counter-blow, and he summoned his Intent and Ideation, building them within his mind as his [Cataclysm Core] screamed to be unleashed.

“{Make ready!}” Ilsan bellowed, her voice firm within the second rank as the Cavalry drew close enough that he could see the mist from the horses’ nostrils. “{Shields up!}”

Leonidas focused inward at her words and summoned the lessons Miranda had taught him, focusing his desires into his [Archon’s Psiblade] and picturing the exact expression of Intent that he desired from what he was about to do.

“{Prepare to repel these savages!}” Verity roared. “{For King and Country!}”

Leonidas let out a breath and spoke as the first of the Cavalry drew within twenty feet.

“Third Sword Art,” he said in a voice that was both a roar and a calm invocation, “Parting the Waterfall!”

The activation phrase solidified his Ideation and flowed his mana with Intent, stabilizing an immense extension of his blade as he swung it forward. Cataclysm mana roared to life, and he slashed down at an angle from above his protectors, cutting with enough force to obliterate flesh as his concentrated assault sliced through the air and left a momentary vacuum in the wake of the all-consuming, primordially destructive energy.

Cataclysm Mana was the essence of a natural disaster.

Where it struck, Humans and Horses detonated.

The front line of his grandfather’s charge was obliterated; bodies exploding into gore and mist as Experience flooded Leonidas in a tidal wave. His level ticked up to 27 almost instantly, and he ignored the influx of power, finishing his slash moments before the following ranks of the Cavalry charged through the bloodied remains of their comrades and crashed head-first into the shieldwall.

The moment they did, the ancient spellform used by the Haelfenn of Altera to make Cavalry outdated finally manifested: Kinetic Inversion.

The impact of the Cavalry was turned on its head, amplified, and redirected with every iota of its power exploding toward the charging Alliance in a wave of destruction. Humans and horses were blown apart messily, flung backward to smash into the rest of the Cavalry as hundreds died almost instantly, followed by dozens more as Horses tripped, soldiers were tossed from their saddles and trampled, and chaos consumed the charge.

“{BREAK THE WALL!}” Ilsan roared, and eighty shields moved aside as forty Haelfenn in gold and forty Haelfenn in silver charged forward, blitzing into the melee to devastate the chaos-riven charge with murderously precise halberds. Contenders, Elites, and Adepts slew with abandon as the charging Alliance was thrown into nightmarish disarray, their seemingly-unstoppable advance truncated by the Kinetic Inversion, and their ranks thrown into confusion by the sudden violence of their foes.

“{SHIELDWALL, ADVANCE!}” Verity roared, ushering the ranks of eighty forward in lockstep coordination. The halberdiers retreated in an orderly manner as they did, sliding back between the shields as the Haelfenn slammed themselves together and reformed their ranks with practiced efficiency.

“{READY SPEARS!}” Ilsan commanded.

One hundred and sixty disposable javelins appeared in the assembled formation, drawn from specific storage items, and the Royal Guard Lance-Master snapped her arm forward.

“{VOLLEY!}”

Spears were deadly enough in the hands of a trained soldier, but when hurled at over sixty miles an hour by System-tempered warriors, they became kinetic bombs. Each polearm, made entirely of steel, blasted through multiple Terrans and their steeds, obliterating bodies and mounts as they flew with terrifying precision. Leonidas watched in silence as the Cavalry charge was turned into a charnel house, decorating the earth with streams of blood and endless viscera.

“{VOLLEY!}”

Another one hundred and sixty spears flew true, and the regrouping riders were obliterated once more, smashed apart and sent screaming to the earth where death was not instant; limbs dismembered, mounts crippled, and fear rapidly replacing confidence as the Haelfenn taught them exactly why mounted charges had become a thing of the distant past.

“{FINAL VOLLEY!}”

Leonidas watched with a locked jaw while Synthra vomited beside him, and reached out to hold her hair in silence, letting her empty her stomach as the stench of death filled the area, and hundreds more died. Each volley killed thrice or even four times its number, reduced only by how few remained to be struck. Horses screamed, Terrans wailed, and Leonidas observed in silence as one hundred and sixty Cultivator veterans from Altera rendered thirty times their number of enemies utterly defenseless.

Over three thousand Cavalry had charged the shieldwall.

Less than five hundred remained to ride away in clusters, surging for the hills as terror and disbelief undid their discipline and shattered their morale.