The Fog of the Ipael
‘I had a bad dream last night, and this is the disaster it was warning me about!’
The sudden ambush left the guard captain utterly dumbstruck, and all he could do was stare slack-jawed as the mercenaries came pouring down on them. Suetleug's voice rang out, far too powerful for an old man's frame.
"Red Iron Mercenary Company, forward! Knight Monastery of Saint Galanto, forward! The hour has come to honor our contracts!"
Any other company of mercenaries would have balked at charging into hundreds of elites brimming with killing intent. They might have hesitated. They might even have run.
But the Red Iron Mercenary Company was a dwarven outfit famed for its loyalty, and the battle-brethren of Saint Galanto were holy knights who would strangle themselves with their own hands rather than break a sworn oath.
Waiting in reserve at the rear, they did not hesitate for so much as a breath before sprinting out to the flanks.
"Loose!"
At Centurion Qumal's shout, the dwarves drew their pre-loaded crossbows and unloaded them into the onrushing mercenaries.
THUNK-THUNK-THUNK-THUNK!
With a series of meaty impacts, mercenaries collapsed mid-stride with strangled grunts. A few took bolts squarely on their shields and still went rolling.
The dwarves' crossbows were simply a different class of weapon from the light pieces the mercenaries carried — the raw stopping power was on another level entirely. Reloading took tremendous strength, but then, the dwarves had no intention of reloading anyway.
"Shield wall! Form ranks! In the name of the Red Iron, no one retreats! Your ancestors are watching you!"
"Blessed be my rock, my god — my fortress and my deliverer..."
The battle-brethren of Saint Galanto murmured scripture as they drank the liquid from their leather flasks. Their eyes flashed, and a savage light kindled within them. They had entered their frenzy.
Suetleug grimaced at the sight. He knew how devastating the fanatical holy knights were in battle, but every time he watched it with his own eyes, it turned his stomach.
"In the name of Saint Galanto! Charge!"
The holy water, brewed through the secret rites of the Knight Monastery of Saint Galanto, was a substance that, once drunk, compelled a man to fight onward in obedience to his god until the moment he died.
But in a situation like this, he had no choice but to lean on those monks. Suetleug drew out his reagents and began to chant.
"O Ipael River, a mere mortal who knows your secrets makes this plea..."
Thick mist began to billow up from the rear. It was fog so dense that one could not see a hand's breadth before one's face, and it swallowed up the ground behind the dwarven mercenaries and the holy knights.
"Master Mage! Magnificent!"
The guard captain sang Suetleug's praises. To answer such an ambush with a response like this.
The attackers, for their part, were thrown into confusion. Not only was their reserve meeting them with brutal ferocity, but fog had risen at their backs. No man alive, however elite, stayed calm in circumstances like these.
Have we walked into a trap ourselves?
That suspicion slowed their steps.
"Lord Baron! These foes are stronger than we expected! Is this not precisely what you told us would not happen!"
"Reinforcements are coming. You were told we brought a troll, were you not!"
Baron Einben cursed his scribe under his breath. The troll needed to be shoved into the enemy's opposite flank right now — what in the blazes were they doing? Someone, somewhere, was dragging their feet. He was certain of it.
Battles in this world were chaotic and hopelessly unpredictable. More often than not, nothing went to plan, and even a short separation made communication all but impossible.
Still, things had unfolded almost exactly as he'd envisioned. The punitive force, contemptuous of mere bandits, had pushed deep inside. One more crushing blow and the whole structure would collapse on its own.
"No one thinks of retreating. Push forward. Try any clever tricks and I will not forgive it! Turn back here, and every last one of you swings from the gallows."
The mercenary captain nodded at the baron's words. He had spoken up only to hurry the man along; retreat had never crossed his mind.
A mercenary caught banditry received no mercy, none at all. Every last one of them would be sold into slavery or hanged.
If he wanted to go home and hold gold in his hands, he had to win — even if the enemy was a frenzied holy knight or a dwarf.
The mercenary captain cinched his helmet straps tight and roared.
"Attack! Reinforcements are coming! They're exhausted! One more push and they'll break!!"
"So let me get this straight — the Emperor was so bothered by the free city of Marcel handing out gold to his opponents one after another that he cooked up this little scheme? What a genuinely pathetic way to fight."
Too unsure of himself to drag a noble into a proper court of law, the man fabricated evidence and arranged assassinations; unwilling to send soldiers to attack a city openly, he resorted to this kind of sly underhanded filth instead.
All of it, every piece, was the behavior of a man short on power. Had the Emperor's authority been truly formidable, he would never have stooped to such things.
An emperor elevated by the votes of the prince-electors held no real power beyond his own personal domains, yet he ceaselessly hungered for more. It was only natural that the nobles ruling their own territories pushed back.
"He must have grown desperate now that the dukes are rising against his tyranny. That man has no right to the crown — none at all!"
"Y-yes, quite right, my lord."
"Shut your mouth, you contemptible wretch. Wag that tongue once more and I'll tear it out."
"I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!"
When the scribe sidled up with his flattery, the elven knight lashed back at him in fury. If it were up to his mood alone, he would have cut the man down on the spot.
Meanwhile, Johan ran through his mental checklist. What mattered most in this situation?
Joining the main force and fighting was the obvious choice, but above all—
Capturing Baron Einben is the best play here.
As a noble, the man carried enormous hostage value, and he was also the single most useful figure for humiliating the Emperor over this whole affair. Even if everyone else cut ties and disclaimed involvement, Baron Einben was too notorious as the Emperor's hand and foot to squirm free of blame. Anyone with eyes could see it plainly.
"Sir. Give the order. If it comes from you, I'll follow it gladly."
"No, just do as you've been—"
"Quite right. If it is your command, Sir Johan, I will carry it out with pleasure. Pray, give the order."
Johan recoiled from the elven knights forcing this awkward familiarity on him. Honestly speaking, he did not mesh with them personality-wise. He would take his payment for saving their lives, but he had no desire to grow close as people.
Yet the elven knights kept chattering away at him, friendly as could be.
Where in the Empire was he from, did he know any nobles, was he interested in serving under Count Bartok, how much did he owe the merchant guilds...
And so, when the battlefield finally came into view in the distance, Johan breathed a silent sigh of relief.
"Good work, Karamaf."
Johan praised the wolf. Fighting off the troll, gathering intel afterward, hauling in that scribe, and now guiding them to this battlefield — all of it was Karamaf's doing.
"...Are you chewing troll meat right now?"
-Grrr.
Johan glanced around, but apparently nobody had noticed. What on earth was the timing of that — when had the beast stuffed a hunk of meat into its mouth? A genuinely uncanny talent.
"Prepare to charge. We hit their rear and break their formation by whatever means necessary."
Plunge in, turn it into a melee free-for-all — that much was enough.
"Sound the horn. Charge! Sir Johan, take the lead and we'll follow!"
"Charge! Charge! For honor!"
The moment the knights burst from the forest's edge, the bandits panicked outright. These elite mercenaries from the Empire hadn't even managed to push the enemy back yet — and now knights had appeared out of nowhere behind them.
"Loose!"
The Knight Monastery of Saint Iena fired from behind. Their arrows were tipped with the Fire of Saint Iena — flames that clung and spread even when blocked by shields, and the mercenaries screamed as the fire took hold of them.
It's over.
Even before the cavalry crashed into their camp, the enemy mercenaries were already scattering with screams. No man on earth holds steady when cavalry strikes him from behind, unprepared, rather than from the front.
And mercenaries like these made for delicious prey. Johan's face was cold and composed as he swung his lance, skewering the throat of a fleeing mercenary, then raised his mace in the other hand and hammered down the man on the opposite side.
"F-fuck! Just die!"
A fallen mercenary flailed wildly, lunging to stab Johan's horse — but an elven knight came sprinting over almost instantly and crushed the man's skull under his horse's hoof.
"How dare you bare your fangs above your station, you lowborn filth! You there! Guard Sir Johan properly!"
"Forgive me, my lord!"
The elven knight's subordinate rushed over in a panic and glued himself to Johan's side. Johan grimaced and drove forward into the charge.
Just as Johan had known in his gut that it was finished, Baron Einben and the captain of the Bull Mercenaries both felt it too.
Once the mercenaries and bandits who were supposed to hold the line had been smashed to pieces like that, the men behind them were not long for the field either.
"Th-those gutless dogs! Do you have any idea how much gold I scattered for them!"
Baron Einben screamed abuse at the mercenaries, his eyes nearly bulging out of his skull. How much had he spent — bribing the Oak Mercenary Company, then paying again to make them fight with any spine at all?
And they couldn't even hold, just shattered like glass!
But to the mercenary captain, it had been beyond anyone's power. Knights slamming into you from the rear — who holds against that?
"Listen up. Get ready to run."
He whispered it to the veteran mercenaries guarding him and to his lieutenants. The Bull Mercenaries would collapse soon. If they wanted to escape, they had to be out before that happened.
"What's your plan?"
"You have to get out, my lord."
"Get out! And how do you propose to deal with what comes after!"
"It's already lost. Even with ten trolls, those men won't regroup again."
"Don't spout nonsense! You took the money, so earn it! You think you'll walk away unscathed after this?!"
"Take the Baron. We're leaving."
The mercenary captain had no interest in arguing with the man. The mercenaries seized the baron at once and began pulling back behind the battlefield. The men up front, fighting and bleeding, hadn't the faintest idea what their captain was doing.
-Grrr.
"Yeah. I saw it."
Johan crushed the chest of one fleeing mercenary, then narrowed his eyes. Amid the chaos, a group was slipping away in the far distance. Suspicious as suspicious could be — they weren't even trying to hide it.
"Karamaf. We're chasing them. Let's go."
"Sir Johan, I'll help! Let's go together!"
-Grrr.
Johan couldn't make out exactly what Karamaf had said, but it felt something along the lines of 'that elf is annoying.'
The escorting mercenaries fell back from the battlefield and tried to find horses to mount. But before they could, the pursuers came into view in the distance.
"We've got pursuit!"
"What the... damn it all, they're knights!"
The mercenaries looked at one another. Losing a fight and running for it was something every mercenary lived through sooner or later. What mattered in moments like this was...
someone to leave behind and tie the pursuers' feet.
"Damn it!"
A few unlucky souls were picked out to stay behind, and the baron and the rest bolted. The men left standing bared their teeth and raised their weapons. Knights or not, if they could just hold out and drag them off their horses—
Johan didn't slow down. He simply raised his mace. One look at the mercenaries raising their shields and he could read their whole plan.
CRACK!
With a bone-deep thud, the mercenaries dropped where they stood. Those who had taken the mace blow on their shields couldn't rise from the sheer shock of it. To the mercenaries fleeing behind them, it was beyond absurd.
"Who the hell taught these idiots to use a shield?!"