The warning cry split the silence like a thunderclap, slicing through the illusion of victory and shaking the Oizen soldiers from their daze.
"IT'S AN AMBUSH!"
The panicked shout echoed down the narrow street as the soldier who had seen the enemy sprinted back toward his comrades, desperation in his voice. But before the full meaning of his words could settle in their minds, the darkness itself seemed to erupt with violence, like shadows rebelling against their masters.
Their cover blown, the hidden defenders struck.
From alleyways, doorways, and behind carts long abandoned, steel flashed in the moonlight. Blades came alive , cutting through the night as they approached the attackers.
The Oizen soldiers were caught in a tightening trap. From every side, the enemy poured in, swift and silent no more. There was no clear direction to run, no line to rally behind. They were surrounded, cut off and flanked.
"FORM UP! WITH ME, MEN!"
An officer's voice rose above the chaos, sharp and commanding, his cry a lifeline in the raging storm. Rallying whoever could hear him, he threw himself toward the enemy in a desperate attempt to stabilize the line, though it was like trying to dam a flood with bare hands.
With a defiant roar, the officer and his hastily gathered force charged into the melee. Their weapons met resistance at once, sword against axe, shield against spear. The tight confines of the city street turned the skirmish into a slaughterhouse. Bodies slammed into one another. Blades hacked blindly in the crush. Men died screaming, their voices drowned beneath the roar of battle.
The officer fought like a man possessed. A lance came for his chest, he turned it with his shield, the force of the blow numbing his arm. He stepped in, shield-bashing the attacker full in the face. Bone crunched. The man went down. Without hesitation, the officer drove his blade through his opponent's throat, then kept moving.
He had no time to count his kills. They needed to break through. Someone had to warn the rest of the army still pouring through the gate.
Luckily the enemy seemed not to be in greater numbers, which meant that if they concentrated on a point in the enemy line , they could make a breakthrough.
"STAY TOGETHER!" he shouted, cutting down another foe. "DON'T GET ISOLATED! PUSH FORWARD OR DIE WHERE YOU STAND!"
His voice carved through the mayhem like a beacon, and his men followed. Each foot of ground was paid for in blood, but the officer never wavered. He led from the front, shoulder to shoulder with his soldiers, his sword a blur as he carved toward what looked like a weak point in the enemy's line.
A sudden opening, small, fleeting.
He saw it and acted instantly.
"NOW!WITH ME" he roared.
With renewed fury, they charged. Steel rang. Flesh parted. The enemy faltered for a heartbeat too long, and the officer drove his men into the breach.
The formation fractured but held just enough to punch through.
Boots pounded on blood-slicked cobblestones as they burst free of the encirclement. Gasping for breath, faces streaked with grime and gore, the survivors didn't dare slow down. Behind them, others still fought, cut off, trapped, screaming and soon to be deserted.
But there was no turning back.
The officer's chest heaved as he ran, his sword still slick in his hand. They had to reach the others. They had to tell them.
The city wasn't theirs.
As they ran, the sounds of battle dimmed behind them, replaced by the harsh rhythm of footfalls and the ragged gasps of breath. Each step was a sentence to death for those who stood behind. The breach they'd clawed open was now closed behind them, sealed by blades and blood.
The enemy hadn't even bothered to pursue. Perhaps they didn't need to.
Finally, they stumbled out of the road and aimed to go back toward the gate, battered but breathing. The officer's lungs burned with the cold night air, each breath scraping down his throat like ice. The commander must know, he told himself. He has to know what happened. From the one hundred men he'd led into the city, fewer than fifteen remained at his back, exhausted, wounded, and silent.
"Where are we going, sir?" one asked, clutching at a blood-soaked shoulder, where crimson spilled onto the street.
"We link up with the main force," the officer replied through clenched teeth, quickening his pace. He didn't look back as the sound of someone failing to keep up echoed in his ears.
After what seemed like long minutes worth hours, they finally reached the gate, hoping to find there the salvation they searched for.
They found none, as it was then and there that the officer who had just crawled out of certain death froze.
What awaited them wasn't order. It was a collapse.
The rest of the army, still funneling in through the gates or clustered within the courtyard beyond, were under siege. From every rooftop, from towers, windows, and walls, a torrent of arrows and stones descended upon them. The air was alive with the whine of projectiles and the crunch of steel on bone.
The ambush was total.
The only light came from the enemy's torches, carefully placed to expose the Oizen soldiers while shrouding the archers in near-total darkness. Oizen's warriors stood as clear targets, silhouetted like ghosts against the flame, while the enemy remained invisible, every shot a death without a face.
"Why aren't we pushing forward?" the officer muttered aloud, staring at the chaos. "Where are the reinforcements? The army—weren't they supposed to be outside the city?"
No answer came.
Then a shout, from the wall. The defenders had spotted the returning officer and his group. Fingers pointed. Voices called out.
And then the sky turned deadly.
Arrows screamed down like thunderbolts. The officer barely had time to shout before they struck. They raised their shields too late; the shafts were black against the black sky, silent until it was over.
Screams rang out as men crumpled around him.
An arrow pierced his side; another struck his thigh. He stumbled, then fell.
The survivors of his group, scattered and few, joined the countless others now falling under the same merciless fire.
Around them, the main force did not fare better; it was being crushed.
Trapped in the city's throat, hemmed in by walls and buildings, the Oizen army found itself encircled, bottled and bled.
Still, they fought.
With shields raised and swords drawn, they tried to surge forward in desperate charges, but the enemy met every attempt with a rain of missiles and immovable shields. Arrows sliced through armor. Stones cracked helmets. Men dropped mid-step, trampled by their own as the pressure from behind drove them forward, even as the slaughter at the front never ceased.
Some tried to break out, gathering for final charges, hoping to smash through one of the flanks. But at every turn, they were met with locked shields, spears braced, and more arrows loosed from above, denying them the momentum for any successful maneuver.
The defenders were relentless. They gave no ground.
Each failed attempt thinned Oizen's ranks further. The initial confidence, the belief they had taken the city, was gone. Now, all that remained was panic. The formation broke. Orders went unheard. Comrades fell and were left behind. The ones still standing swung blindly, knowing escape was a fantasy.
And high above them, the architect of the ambush, a man still unknown to them, stood atop the wall, stretching his back like a man surveying a harvest, unmoved as scores of Oizen men died below him.
Desperation turned to even deeper despair. The trap had been perfect.
It all happened at once. The soldiers had been marching through the city with an ease that had felt almost preordained; the gate was theirs, and the streets ahead seemed empty. But the darkness atop the gate was no accident; the enemy had deliberately snuffed the torches, leaving the invaders blind to what lurked above and around them.
Those who had climbed the gate towers never descended. From the shadows, hidden men struck swiftly, cutting down the unwary before they could react.
Panic rippled through the ranks.
Then, without warning, their escape route vanished. A massive net, heavy with boulders hidden by the dark, crashed down behind them, sealing the avenue of retreat and cutting off the vanguard with the rest of the enemy army.
Ordinarily, such an obstacle could have been overcome: men could cut the ropes, push the stones aside, clear a path. But fear spread faster than reason.
Soldiers scrambled, some attempting to clamber over the obstruction, only to be met with a deadly hail of arrows from behind. The clanging of armor echoed from the darkness as squads of enemy fighters emerged, charging straight at the main body of the army that had entered the city.
Whatever great skill and achievement those elite had died there, kindly sharing the tomb with any hope of victory they previously had.
With no path forward and no hope of retreat, the soldiers were trapped in a perfect death trap. The enemy moved while they panicked, closing the circle with rather ease. Arrows rained from above. Spears and swords struck from every alley and shadow. Mobility was crushed; survival became a game of inches.
Surrounded, outnumbered, and utterly exposed, the Oizen soldiers fought with courage born of desperation.
But courage alone could not overcome the choreography of the ambush. Each attack pushed them closer to annihilation. Every attempt to break the lines failed. Every soldier who fell was just proof of the trap they fell in.
It was tactical brilliance in its cruelest form, a decapitation strike without hope to escape.