The fighting on top of the walls was fierce!
Human and reptilian trash troops alike swarmed eachother and fell down both sides in equal numbers.
Cochi watched as his troops initially had the high ground and killed trash troops in the thousands, by stabbing them before they reached the top, tumbling over the ladders and even the small scorpions killed a vast amount of troops.
But as the reptilians gained access after access, the top of the walls became a mess of screaming bodies.
Half dead humans screamed and used broken spears to wound reptilians. Wounded reptilians whrithered through the high hills of dead troops, trying to grab and kill before they died themselves.
Of Sha'ri's initial 100.000 strong first wave, tens of thousands were killed before they even reached the ladders. Shot dead by volleys of thousands of arrows.
Cochi felt the chaos first hand, but Sha'ri was furious watching from afar.
She wasn't used to the high walls and this kind of warfare.
She hissed in her reptilian way, yet felt confident as she could see Ang'ris troops appearing behind her.
"Second wave! Storm the north castle and add pressure on the center walls! Warbeasts charge the north army! Capture the castle!"
The second wave of more than 100.000 trash troops hissed and their long tails swayed as they all began to storm forward.
The 50 tri-horn war wagons began to move quickly towards Rubens army in the north side.
"Follow the wagons and punch through the holes!" Sha'ri lifted her hand in command.
50.000 common reptilian troops similarly began to chase after the wagons.
Meanwhile Jack and Gunnar had taken the field.
The 6000 common riders crashed into the disorganized reptilian trash troops beneath the walls.
More than 10.000 reptilians died in a minute in the initial charge.
The power of a militarized horse charge, counting in thousands, is not to be underestimated.
They charged directly into the mass of reptilians. pushing away any resistance.
Spearmen threw spears or stabbed with lethal aim.
Swordsmen swung their specialised sword, making reptilians die by the second.
Heads, arms and any other limb that came in the way of the charge, where all butchered instantly.
Upon the walls, Cochi and his troops gained new battle fever as they saw the complete slaughter their lord made beneath them.
"Stand strong men! Push the ugly lizards back over the wall!" Cochi yelled.
With renewed strength, and reinforcements running up the inner ramparts, they managed to reclaim major parts of the walls.
But the tide would soon turn.
"My Lord! Turn around, the next wave is coming!" Cochi frantically waved down to the riders from the top of the walls.
Jack was filled with bloodlust.
Riding on Blackmane in a full charge with 6000 of his own troops, slaughtering the reptilians who had almost made him succumb in their prison...
One would understand if he might loose himself a bit and savor the slaughter a little too much.
Yet Blackmane, his noble steed, was the one to call him back from his frenzy.
He nighed loud and refused to move any further.
As the lord of horses, the other normal mounts naturally gathered around Blackmane with their riders, forming a shield of body and steel.
No reptilian could get to Jack.
Jack had an intimate bond with his warhorse, and quickly understood that he wanted his attention.
Blackmane kept stomping his front hooves and neighing towards the wall, which finally made Jack look up.
Cochi's warning was finally heard, and Jack turned his head.
To the north, left side of Jack, he finally noticed the warbeasts in action, and the waves of tens of thousands of troops following in their wake.
Dead ahead of him, he saw the more than one hundred thousands fresh troops who came storming in.
'So Ruben and the north castle is your way in, Sha'ri' Jacks eyes gleamed.
"Gunnar! Take the riders, circle back around the castles, reach the rivers and flank them! Prioritise the warwagons! Kill the tri-horns!" Jack yelled.
Gunnar nodded and the riders followed him back from where they came.
"Cochi! Keep the walls. Focus everything on removing those ladders!"
Jack saw Cochi nodding before he turned out of sight.
'The full assault is in the north. There is no reason for William to stay in the South side!'
Jack quickly turned Highmane and accelerated towards Williams army.
"Get into lines!"
"Shieldwall!"
Rubens voice boomed from behind the 15.000 heavy-clad spearmen.
They locked together into a dense mass.
A line of 1500 men with large inter-locking tower-shields.
Behind them with shields against their backs, another row of 1500 men.
10 of such rows in total, tightly packed, not braced firmly against the ground as the tri-horns reached them.
It's wasn't a boom that sounded as the impact came.
It was more like a hundred heavy trees snapped and broke before the heavy 'thud' of them falling.
The high pinch of snapping wood was the huge shields breaking against the huge tri-horns.
The 'thud' that followed was the human bodies crashing against the soft earth.
The tri-horn war wagons had successfully penetrated the wall in 50 places.
The archers upon the wagons now shot hundreds of arrows against Rubens archers and swordsmen around him.
"Close the holes!"
Ruben had not expected this!
At the very least his heavy spearmen should have toppled a wagon or two!
And now he watched as the front of the 50.000 common reptilians crashed against the scattered shieldwall!
"Swordsmen, push through the center! Make room for the spearmen to remake the wall!"
Ruben had his own common horse and drew his sword while he yelled.
"Archers scatter! Aim for the flanks and closet tri-horns!"
With this he charged ahead of his rushing 5000 swordsmen.
He reached his spearmen who had formed countless clusters of smaller circle walls as they were relentless taking blow after blow by the onslaught of enemy common troops.
But their gear was not for nothing.
The reptilians, even if equal in rank, more often than not, broke their lesser weapons against the large and sturdy shields.
Through the dwarf-made holes in the sides of the large shields, the spearmen could with practised hands easily thrust their spears.
Many reptilians fell. Many smaller circlewalls were overrun.
But Ruben appeared in the center, slashing reptilians from his mount.
And behind him, a dense storm or swordsmen came crashing into the blurred lines.
Sharp dwarf-forged swords easily cut through the reptilians scales, ringmail and leather armour alike.
Their spiked round shields smashed into reptilian heads and left them without eyes, teeth and broken bones.
The center fight belonged to Ruben.
But the flanks were falling.
The reptilians excelled in messy fights. And Ruben had yet to firmly re-establish his shieldwall.
The south side of Rubens army were the most pressed, as the 100.000 trash troops had reached the walls of the castle, and the flanks of that army poored into the common ranked fight.
The river side of the fight was about to be equally pressed as the warbeasts had circled around and began to charge for a second assault.
The smaller circle walls of spearmen, nearest the river, all fought with all they had.
They braced against the tide with the tall and heavy shields.
Their lesser plate-armour adding weight to their resistance and absorbed most of the hacks and stabs from the reptilians.
They pushed together with their shields, pushed a wave of reptilians to create space.
Space the utilised to thrust out their spears and slay countless enemies.
However it also createsld space to see the incoming warbeasts, aiming straight for them.
After their initial thrust and kill, their arms became numb. They completely understood what happened to any man standing in the way of a charging tri-horn.
Plate armour or not. They were dead men.
But the impact never came.
From behind them, rushing past the spearmen in circles, cutting down any reptilian in their paths...
Thousands of riders rushed past them and the spearmen cheered them loudly for saving their lives before they resumed the fight with renewed strength and merged circles.
Gunnar led the charge directly into the mass of reptilians.
He was like a brief wave, washing away the filth between the stones.
He emerged through the battlefield with his riders, blood on his sword as they accelerated towards the tri-horns.
The warbeasts and the human riders collided on north flank.
Countless riders where pierced by arrows, horses run fully through by giant horns or completely swiped aside by the bony membrane between the those horns.
However the riders had seen the entire battlefield and knew how dire the situation was.
They would fight untill their last breath!
Riders gathered around the slower tri-horns, throwing spears at their heads, thrusting at their sides.
Swordsmen riders slashed the wagons wheels, breaking them appart. Some even jumped into the archer-filled wagons and swung their swords untill they fell off, pierced by arrows.
The numbers taken into account, the fight was equal.
On Cochi's center walls, the situation had turned desperate yet again.
A renewed wave that also aimed for the north castle.
He had less than 10.000 troops and found it very difficult to reject the ladder-crawling enemies.
Jack was aware of this. Cochi needed reinforcements, fast!
But just as he had met up with William and turned the army around, a new wave of enemies were seen.
200.000 troops, at least 30.000 of them common tanks, had marched into the battlefield from the south flank.
"We can't fight them in the open. It's impossible for our flanks to assist eachother and our center is falling my lord!"
William watched the new approaching army and pleaded with Jack.
"You're right William! Retreat inside the walls. Mobilise the spearmen in the yard, let the swordsmen assist Cochi, and put our archers on the castle walls!"
William was fast to react once he knew his lord had seen the truth.
"Everyone! Triple tempo! Into the castles! Spearmen, guard the gates! Swordsmen reclaim the walls! Archers, find a high wall or tower and shoot that army on sight!"
Williams army knew this was the right and only call, and moved as fast and as orderly as they could inside the castles inner area.
Unbeknownst to either side fighting on the field, a new army had entered the zone and watched everything as it happened before them.