by Robert Jaek
Book 1- Chapter 1
As dawns light crested they stood by the thousands. Shoulder to shoulder, breast to breast, brother by brother, enemy by enemy and so forth. All joined in common cause. From their forefront beyond the trees of the wild lands they came. A few hundred at first trickling in until a meager host was assembled. They were the weary, and the strong. They came staggering, walking, limping, limping, loping lean muscled men and women. The forest lords and their comrades were’s beasts and peasant born alike. Slowly they came as they drew up their lines. Giant wolf beasts taller than a horse twice as long and thrice wide lumbered prowling the meager lines with carefree abandon shaking the very ground their giant paws deigned to light upon.
Twenty three - twelve thousand score hordes arrayed in deadly fashion stared silently, stonily at the small, laughable, insignificant number of their pathetic opposition. A lone whole blooded
ghostly scream rent through the very boughs of the forest. Barely conceived as audible at first growing slowly rapidly rising strongly from crescendo to crescendo. The scattering of troops as Urals’ nymphs flowed out of the trees. Unclothed but with The Mother Earths own cloth dancing nimbly. Howling winds tore at faces tearing men off their feet, ripping thousand year old boughs from the very ground catapulting them into lines of well-formed squadrons, phalanxes’, battalions, companies, yet still they held their ground staring steadily forward at the foes. The howls rose once more violently striking to the very core of the hardest man’s deepest primal fears. It was a howl promising pain, death, and destruction.
The echoing howl was laced fully of pure unadulterated sadness, overwhelming fear, and complete and utter loneliness.
It was the noblest of sounds truth by truth be told. Even in this though it was the roar, the scream, the cry, of a pained cursed being, creature, a monster, a damned soul. From the distance a unseen force tore through and uprooted trees in its incoming ravenous wake. Fear greatly abounded in copious unending insurmountable amounts as the amassed hordes stared and knew their lives were forfeit in the foreboding doom that was nigh approaching. Across the lines drawn silence reined as from the trees a singular haggard yet commanding looking being steeped out. Celestial perfection forever to be frozenly etched upon his jaggedly marred visage. His eyes gleamed eternally angelic but their untold depths held a secretive demonic sway that gazed upon the many unsuspecting.
As this seemingly proud lone-like general walked with a slow loping gait through the lines of his meager but loyal host jests, laugh’s, hand-shakes, embraces, and words of encouragement were offered freely to the unsecure, and the fearful.
This being of untold strangely proportions was widely now known as the Renown Liege-Lord Solidus Dire. His origins seemingly just as unknown as the grace he had to inspire and lull men to his side with total loyalty, to lull them into pledging their entire ancestral houses into complete and utter fealty. Even as he strode forward his majestic white fur cloak fluttered sparkling a thousand miniscule unworldly ethereal rainbows across silent and awed faces.
As slowly as he strided steadily forward through his men his pace quicken ever so slightly to the point of a quick briskful gait. All hints of japes and other words of encouragement ceased as he grew ever nearer to the assembled horde. What seemed like an eternity spanned only but a few minutes until he was suddenly at his men’s forefront staring silently at the innumerable faces staring right back at him fear evident in their eyes. Genuine peace radiated off his face but the foreboding his presence bought spoke innumerable uncontained volumes to his quietly shaking enemies. "Brethren" he implored hands outstretched mock-feigning surrender as his melodious tone began echoing out in a gravelly yet beautiful distinctive way. “You will find that in this world of kings, lands, realms, and kingdoms in this whole world there are many goods and also so if not numerous more evils. I stand here even now my hands outstretched in gestures of peace to implore to you. I am not of the very evil you so desire to snuff out of very
existence. Yes my men and I live cursed lives, immortals yet in eternal living personal hells not of our making. Truly what gave us the powers to protect our lands, our families, our very lives, and even unbelievingly gave us the powers to protect you and yours also very well damned us as a whole entire. In this I beseechingly implore you to lay down your arms we mean no harm upon you and your kinsmen arrayed here unless otherwise provoked". So impassioned by his own captivating speech Dire failed to realize movements from the rear farthest recesses of the the endless enemy horde. "Why I ask you should we be forced to kill in resolute anger and hate when all of us share the same blood. As that very blood still courses through our veins.
We are brothers, fathers, sons, mothers, daughters, sisters, cousins, we are also neighbors. Why harbor such unadulterated hatred when we both do what must be done for the protection of our people albeit unforeseen un-understandable means to such an end. Though we are few and you are many numerous times a greater host we are not so different. I dream of a ever-lasting peace knowingly you do so also. I implore you brothers the cost of a battle even now is too much too bear, too much we cannot afford to sparingly sacrifice to hatreds own twisted whims.
So let us make peace and talk or let us make war and die. Let us bathe these lands in red covering these lands with newly formed rivers slick and fast flowing with our freshly spilt blood".
And as Dire himself shrugged off his ivory white cloak enemy lines opened and a brute of a man, no not a man, a giant of mountains hammered towards him. Wielding a double edged gigantic battle hammer raised shining above head spittle flying. As the giant beast-man from the Istani Isles roared incoherently thundering ever closer. Behind him a hundred- score lesser yet almost just as imposing giants broke through the lines arraying themselves in a disorderly fashion armed with massive claymores, pikes, staves, knives, daggers, swords, battle hammer, and axes.
The very sight of so many of the ancient secretly rumored Istani Militia at arms together shook even Lord Dire to his very inner-most core. However resolutely he focused on the defeat of the ever impending mountain man drawing ever so swiftly closer. Too close for comfort by all. Lord Istani descended upon Dire as he nimbly weaved in and out of the way frantically from the sweeping hammer-wielding giant. The thundering of a hundred thousand weapons unsheathed beating upon shield echoed across the plains. The chants, the screams, the bestial war cries deafening. Bellowing giants roared spraying spittle on all within their near vicinity. Dire's eyes blazed opaque blue white eyes his figure growing as he turned within seconds into beast to combat his foe. Claws slashed as hands tried to squeeze delivering death. Fur and hair tore. As the battle grew ever more heated and the armies more loudly, more crazed as battle-lust started to take over. Their volume rose more and more loudly echoing into leagues afar. Dire suddenly twisted pouring all he had into one final desperate move tearing with a fierce feral
primalistic guttural half growl half roar he tore through the giant lords legs subsequently rendering him lacking of legs. As Istani fell upon the grounds Dire strode forward speaking one word thrice of desperation as one such unwilling to lose such a prince like commanding brute like Istani had almost bested him earning him honor in Dire's eyes. "Yield" he whispered imploringly. However as he spoke those words Istani started to quiver body wracked with shaking heaves.
His eyes light rapidly fading he uttered one last string of defiance " I shall not yield let me die a warriors death" he gasped. " Dire stared at him a moment before enunciating "So be it" as he spoke claws elongated as he bodily tore the great lords head off his shoulders showering the nearby warriors in a mist-like sprayof blood.
Blood-curdling screams rent out of hoarse throats as the two sides converged into maleficent disarray. Across Dire's lines men turned into great furred beastly monstrosities.
Tearing through desperate men ripping them apart. Their ravenous maws tore throats shaking the victims tossing them aside to start afresh upon a new found victim soon to be turned chewed cor
pse.
Upon both sides the synth-weavers of magic Wizards, mages, sorcerers, witches, mage born battled in their own domains filled with demonic summoning’s, illusions, wild untamed magic’s black in origin rent the sorcerer ranks. Rain of fire and ice freezing, yet burning everything upon its given path. Lances of lightning smashed down as magical energies collided.
The mage born and their summoning’s across the field of battle some fate deemed right dealt upon blows across enemy lines decimating them while others fate deemed otherwise rent panic and ruin among their own ranks. Standing shows of magical mastery blazed across all the lines as Acolytes of the fabled Temple Of Necrolis chanted consistently rising the in-numerable fallen knights, lieges, prowlers, mage, squire, were cats, Minotaur man, elf, dwarfs alike. Deathwytes they were rumored. Grotesque risen constructs of their former selves. Their loss of all sensible emotions made them perfect for their task of never-ending distraction for both opposite combating forces. Minotaur’s roared locking heads trying to topple and overcome each other heaving as their great hooves dug deep into the ground straining corded bulging muscles. Elves and their darker counterparts the Drakine darted here and their flashing surefooted and fleetingly stabbing, and tossing bouts of wild untamed elven warfare magic’s disappearing only to appear further along the lines zipping ever so fastly. Waddling dwarves two and fro hacked at feel cleaving man from appendages barreling away like miniature engines of war seemingly unseen for their stature. All around healing nymphs lighted, flew, ran, walked, and hurried among the wounded and the dying. Their very hand weaving the fabrics of nature’s healing lore. Mending, healing uplifting. The fallen that had not yet been claimed by the clash of steel. Yet even in this their efforts were naught for many sad circumstances tore the living from their grasps. Even still they tried harder pouring more and
more of their spells powers into the healing till they started pouring their very being into the casting but to no avail adding only to the ever growing numbers who forcibly embraced deaths lulling call. Relieving them of the horror wrought upon the horrendous battlefield.
