Demon continent Alsace in the year 307 in the 10-month Asmodum on the 26th day after the shattering of the empire.

 

 

From the corridor in front of her sounds of a clash raging between the defending Larrua and the forces of Meinoume could be heard.

The clash of swords and shields was occasionally interrupted by cries of pain or explosions, only to continue unchanged, only to be drowned out again by another cry of pain or another explosion.

Without even peeking around the corner, she knew that the screams of pain were coming from the defending Larrua, and after a whole day of fighting Larrua under the influence of the Meinoume, she knew that they were never cried out in pain. 

In fact, they never made a sound. Whether they were hit by a sword or pierced by a spear.

Nor was there any real tactic to be seen except that they tried to run down their opponents and drag them away at any cost, even if it cost their own lives and they found themselves in the spears of Meinoume's enemies, they only tried to hold on to these with their hands and allow their comrades to get at Meinoume's foes through them. The survivors would take them to a priest of Meinoume, where he would force one under the spell of Meinoume. 

"Beyond this corner is the prison of Diva." Said one of the Larrua officers, whom she had managed to free from the clutches of the Meinoume.

She indicated with a curt nod that she understood, even if she wondered why he was telling her this. After all, it had been her who had led the Larrua to Diva, even if she hadn't wanted to at the time and she had been heading for Diva's prison as if controlled by an alien force. Shivers still ran down her spine when she thought back on it, and this time, too, it had been she who had led them here.

Barely noticeable her muscles had tensed, and her mind was racing, with slow breathing she brought her heart back under control and forced herself to relax her muscles, and shook her head to get rid of the thoughts, after another brief moment she had herself back under control.

Slowly she continued breathing, it didn't help her Diva, and because Larrua if she wasn't in control and didn't focus entirely on the current situation. 

With a quick and decisive movement, she had peeked around the corner, so close to the priests of Meinoume she did not want to risk betraying herself with her domain and therefore refrained from using it. Even if she felt a bit strange to have spread it only to such a small area.

But if it meant that she could avoid giving away the chance of a surprise attack, then it was a sacrifice she was happy to make.

All of this was only because the freedmen couldn't tell us what it was like to be under the Meinoume's spell and whether he even cared about losing followers, let alone that his priests could sense my domain.

At least they had never changed their approach towards us and kept coming at us no matter how many times we fought.

In that brief moment when she could see around the corner, she saw the Larrua at the end of the hallway, under the influence of the Meinoume, running against the remaining Larrua defenders. However, they seemed to be held back by something more than just the shields and weapons of the defenders.

A certain aura lay over the entire scene, and if one could look closely, it seemed as if discharges were taking place in the air where the two auras met.

Diva's prison had only one entrance, which was fiercely fought over, but around her prison ran several corridors, from which other corridors branched off to go further into the depths of Arcan or met with others to form a larger corridor upwards or elsewhere, she was never able to explore all the corridors she only knew how to get to Diva's prison and from there back to the surface.

The plan she and Commander Panos had agreed on was that they would wait for each other before attacking Meinoume's forces together from behind, thus wearing them down between themselves and the defenders.

Commander Panos, however, kept them waiting, they had been here for quite some time already, waiting, and with each passing moment that went unused, it became more likely that the forces of Meinoume would defeat the Defending Larrua and force them under their spell as well. 

Then there were the civilians and Diva herself, who was probably Meinoume's main target.

So the question she faced was, should she wait for Panos or should she attack without him, risking the lives of the Larrua under her command and those she had freed from Meinoume's clutches, only to possibly lose after all?

Even if I don't really ... She interrupted herself, everyone knew that one should never assume that a victory was set in stone, it could still turn out differently than one thought. 

A glance at her Larrua told her that something was going on in them and the longer she looked at them, the more it became clear that something was on their minds and seemed to be getting heavier.

She, too, could feel something trying to settle on her, like a heavy cloak, only that it settled on a person's spirit and stifled its will to fight. 

The air around her also seemed to get colder and colder, and the back of her neck stood up.

She saw tentacles of mist rise from the ground and out of the cloak, grabbing and wrapping around each other until the Larrua was encased in a cocoon of Meinoumes Arcane Energy.

With a brief mental motion, the tentacles and cloaks lost substance before being blown away altogether.

Already the Larrua's posture changed and they stood before her with pride, anger, and determination.

I guess that settled the question, shall Diva and the Larrua forgive me after the fight.

The longer she waited with her attack order, the more likely it was that she had no Larrua who would follow it.

There was not much she could do, since it was a long and wide corridor, and the enemies would be able to see them early enough to prepare for them.

She would be able to silence the noises they would make with a few tricks, but she had nothing in her repertoire to make them invisible.

Something I should change, as this situation shows.

She turned to her troop of soldiers which had swelled to a good five hundred Larrua, she wouldn't be able to use the archers either as the risk of hitting her own people was too great.

Unless they run ahead of all the other soldiers and are the ones to attack first, only to fall back behind the spearmen and swordsmen to be able to shoot an arrow or two at an enemy from their cover. Maybe the ranged fighters have the possibility to shoot more than one volley before they have to hide behind the melee fighters. If that doesn't work, they could still have our backs in case Meinoume wants to do the same thing to us that we want to do to him.

"Bows and other ranged fighters forward you are the ones who will be allowed to make the first attack against the Larrua who are threatening your families, if you could make more than one ranged attack then take the chance. I cannot promise you that we will be able to free all your captive brothers and sisters, but you must not hesitate anyway, because they will not do it and will make you one of theirs without hesitation or kill you." She paused to let what she had said sink in and let her gaze glide over the assembled Larrua before her, looking at all of them as much as possible, or at least giving them the feeling that she was only talking to them personally.

"The spearmen among you will stay behind the ranged fighters and take their place when the enemies counterattack or when we meet the enemy's ranks, the plan is simple, we want to have the enemies between us and the defenders and wear them down, saving as many of your comrades as we can. "The Larrua gave her a nod to indicate that they understood, none of them said a word as they prepared to run around the corner and into the corridor. They were all familiar with what it was like to fight Meinoume's troops and knew how to behave, yet it was her duty to remind them before each and every fight for their own sake. 

She stood at the corner again and quickly peeked around the corner to see what the current situation was, then she gave the signal and the Larrua ran past her into the hallway.

In her mind, she could see them wanting to yell out a battle cry but refrained from doing so to not give the opponents a chance to notice them.

As she had seen several times, none of the opponents were concentrating on what was happening behind them-they were too focused on what was happening in front of them and seemed only concerned with getting ahead, even if it meant climbing over each other. It was like watching a colony of Ants out of Larrua. 

Behind the ever-advancing mass from Larrua, bodies of the deceased or dying were scattered everywhere.

"Don't stop, keep going, the faster we can win the battle, the sooner we can help your fallen comrades." With a little Arcane Energy, her voice became audible to all, though she whispered. 

You could see the change in the Larrua's faces and posture as they hardened to the images before them, and even though they appeared cool and focused on the outside, their spirits were in agitation.

Only a hundred meters now separated them from the rear ranks of the enemy, as the ranged fighters who were running at some distance from the others began to attack.

The first volley was devastating and before the enemies could recognize the new danger, the next volley came. The long-range fighters had waited just long enough for the enemies, who were among their fallen or wounded comrades, to free themselves from them to inflict as much damage as possible. 

The anthill, consisting of Larrua, needed a few precious moments to adjust to the new situation, and then it changed again, as the melee fighters crashed like a pile driver into the slowly forming Larrua of Meinoume.

Not a moment later, she was in the thick of the battle herself, busy clearing out the priests, the greatest danger to herself and the Larrua. 

The priests appeared to be in the middle of the horde of bodies, and she had some trouble fighting her way through to them. 

The good thing was, they didn't seem to notice her domain, with which she could see all the fighting in minute detail. There was no more reason for her to stop herself and not use her domain and intervene here and there in the battle turmoil with Arcane Energy. 

To let weapons or enemies fly at each other with telekinesis or to create a protective wall or bump with an element or to fight enemy Larrua with water or fire. 

So she blocked attacks of the Arcane users under the influence of the Meinoume only to attack them in the next moment from their unprotected side and take them out of the game. 

Meanwhile, with swords, axes, daggers, or any other weapon she could get her hands on, she fought her way through the ranks of enemies towards the center where the priests were. 

Any fireball or other elemental attack she hurled at the Priests was countered or bounced off a barrier, and she could see the hold the Priests had over the Larrua weakening.

Unfortunately, she had not had more time to familiarize herself with other more powerful uses of Arcane Energy of Will, and on a battlefield even as small as this one, she did not want to try new things.

I don't want to bring down the ceiling and bury us all down here.

That was still an option, but for later if this battle turned sour.

Lerna was surprisingly a pretty good fighter, even if she was content with biting those who fell to the ground or creating Complex Arcane Constructs of Will that went through the ranks of the enemy Larrua like Arcane Spinning Tops of Death until they hit the Priests' shield and exploded with a clap of loud thunder.

The Larrua on her side did not leave these gaps unused, they rushed forward to fill the vacated space with soldiers and catch up to her, she could see that and also that the Priests wanted to lure her into a trap by offering no resistance.

This did not stop her from wounding or killing as many enemy Larrua as possible. 

She tried to make sure that she only killed Larrua that did not have the symbol of the city or was running around in its colors. But this could not always be guaranteed and the Priests seemed to notice this and also the hesitation of her allies when they met one of their own. For there were more and more allies of Larrua who had fallen under the influence of Meinoume that she and her allies had to fight.

Still, she could see through her domain that the enemies who were opposing the defenders of the civilians and trying to overcome them and get to the civilians were weakening. 

They and her Larrua seemed to have priority for now.

Eder and his defenders, however, did not let this go unused and, for their part, increased the pressure on the attackers, with which, however, they left the protection of the prison and entered the corridor where the will of Meinoume prevailed.

The discharges in the air, where the Aura of Divas and Meinoume met, became more and more violent so that the Larrua under Eder had to be wary of them.

The battle was not yet won, but they were beginning to be outnumbered and she could not yet see any enemies behind her allied ranks, so if this continued and they could defeat the Priests, they would win this battle.

The ranged fighters were careful not to let their enemies pile up too high and fall behind or into their melee lines, at least not alive. 

With each new corpse that poured into the enemy ranks and another tower of bodies that was brought down, they were able to make up more ground.

Even though she could see over the whole carnage, she could only just avoid killing one of the defenders when he suddenly stood in front of her, and the Larrua soldiers below her had the same problem. 

Slowly the fight around them came to a halt and a sphere remained between them, in which the priests of Meinoume had retreated. 

All that could be heard around them was the heavy breathing of the Larrua and the clang of blades as they were deposited on the ground or fell from the hands of the exhausted combatants.

"So ... and what ... do we do with these traitors here?" She asked no one in particular as she tried to catch her breath like everyone else. 

"Kill." All eyes jerked to Eder, who pushed his way through the crowd of Larrua to stop beside her. "What other choice do we have? We can't trust them, and if we let them go, they may come back and threaten our tribe again."

"Well -" It was not for her to judge the customs of the Larrua, and she would do the same if she had had to fight such a cult in the Empire. - "So how do we get through their barrier?"

"Like this." With this Eder simply walked forward toward the traitors' barrier and touched it with a symbol on a chain.

With the sound of shattering glass, the barrier broke into pieces, and before anyone could do anything the priests fell to the ground dead.

Now this was a bit disappointing, when I look at the faces of the soldiers they see it the same way.

Not only their faces but also their thoughts told her that they would have liked to take revenge on the traitors.

Slowly, the group dispersed and poured into the great hall that served as Diva's prison.

"I am glad we had you by our side and I don't know if we could have done it without you, therefore my thanks and also on behalf of my tribe." With these words, Eder bowed to her and the surrounding Larrua did the same.

"We had an agreement and I would like a chance to explore the Golems and any further mystery of this ancient city." 

Eder nodded thoughtfully before starting to answer and she avoided reading his mind.

I will also have to see about investigating or replicating this barrier, when do you ever find a barrier that prohibits a psion from reading the minds of those protected by it and protecting them from physical attack as well.

"The halls and tunnels of our city are open to you." As he spoke these words, Eder looked her in the eye and extended his claw-like rat-like hand.

She had to bend down a bit to be at eye level and accept the hand. 

Before she could answer, however, the trampling of many feet was heard, all eyes followed the sound and looked down the corridor where a troop of Larrua approached them, these also in the colors and with the coat of arms of the city. 

But they looked battered and she could recognize one of the officers who had gone with Panos.

She turned to the group as Eder shouted for the soldiers to line up and stretched her domain toward the Larruan troops to look into their minds.

"Don't worry, they're allies, even if I can't tell yet what they're doing here and where they left Panos." She called out to Eder as she approached the troop.

Even though I can't tell why they didn't appear until after the battle and what stopped them or if there was something that stopped them.

She wanted to wait until the officer himself could tell, the thing was these were not her Soldiers and so they were not bound to each other with an oath, and because of that she did not want to have to intrude on their minds more than necessary. 

She would wait and if it was something dangerous for her, she would have perceived it already. Since danger was an all-encompassing situation and this was easily heard by any Arcane user of the mind. 

The officer came to a stop just a few feet in front of his squad and the quickly erected shield wall.

"I bring news of our victory against Meinoume's forces, unfortunately, we suffered significant losses and before we could advance to you, word reached us that a new army is gathering at the gates of our city."

The officer blurted out, before trying to take in all the air that he no longer had in him after running here and announcing the news, in one big breath.

"Healers to me. And you, I ask to help us once again and defend yourselves and us against this new threat."

"The new army is still gathering, and by regaining control of the Golems we can repel these attackers more easily than last time." 

She couldn't help but raise an eyebrow, the Larrua also had Golems in the first attack and it had done them no good, so why this confidence now?

"Why do you think you can win this time with Golems when this morning you had no chance against Meinoume's forces with them?"

Eder and the officer looked at her in surprise as they heard her voice in their heads.

"So Commander Panos ..." She interrupted him, using Arcane Energy on his snout to shut him up.

"Don't say it out loud you idiot, I have to thank you for reacting so quickly." Thought Eder as he approached the officer to talk to him privately.

"The Healers will go with one of your soldiers to the wounded, the rest will get ready to defend the city against the new danger.

Eder nodded his thanks to her once more as he started the long walk back to the surface with the Officer and the Soldiers, his orders passed from one Larrua to the other.

This was going to be a long night. With a sigh, she also made her way to the surface. She would have to make up her mind about the situation and then decide how to proceed. Even though, knowing herself, she didn't think she would leave the Larrua to their own fate.

"Come on, let's see who wants to get their hands on us now." With which she lifted the exhausted Lerna.