Jean stood in the bridge of one of the three Purifier ships.

On the ground, the sea of yellow collided with the sea of red. Purple rune blades clashed with metal swords and lances. The sparks of purple rune blasts hitting Roman Equites and Legionnaires could be seen across the field as Swordguards used both of their armaments at the same time with full efficiency.

One Swordguard slammed into the side of an Equite like a furious bull. Its rune blade expertly cut across the horse’s legs, sending the beast to the ground. The Equite retaliated as he fell down. His lance formed a beautiful curve as it went for the Swordguard’s chest, but just before it could collide, a purple shield appeared out of nowhere and formed a slope in front of the lance. The tip of the lance slid to the side and missed.

Using this opportunity, the Swordguard sent the Equite to the ground. The man stood back up, dropping his lance and pulling out his sword. It was nearly impossible to use a lance this long on foot, so the horseman didn't hesitate to switch to a short weapon.

The Swordguard quickly raised its rune blaster. Its AI computed for the best tactic in this scenario. Purple blast after purple blast smashed into the grounded Equite. The Roman waved his sword and slashed onto the blasts. Each blast sent his arms back a little, but he was already recovered by the time the next one came.

The man smirked behind his helmet. He was a cavalry, true, but if his foe thought dismounting him made him any weaker, he has made a terrible mistake. Every Roman Equite could get off his horse and be a good legionnaire given the proper armament.

The Equite started taking steps forward. Suddenly, he glanced at the sky, but it was too late. His instincts screamed a warning, but it was too late to move. The next moment, a S-3 shell landed right behind him.

The Roman was tossed forward, trying to keep his sword between him and the Swordguard. A few shrapnel found a new home in his back. It wasn’t a fatal wound, but the fatal wound appeared when the Swordguard deflected the Roman’s sword and emptied five rune blasts into his unprotected face. By the time it was done, no one could tell that the mixture of flesh and bone once belonged to a human being.

Countless Equites were dismounted by waves of rune blasts. Now that they were sandwiched between hostile Purifiers and friendly legionnaires, they have lost the speed that they relied on. Without the ability to pierce through any obstacle in their way, the horsemen were merely giant targets for the Swordguards to shoot at. Their skills weren’t diminished, but their nature made them vulnerable.

The legionnaires immediately went into hand to hand combat with the Swordguards, but the melee side wasn’t the main damage dealer. Rather, it was the artillery on both sides.

With only several thousand legionnaires fighting with swords and spears in the front, the rest of the men pulled out their javelins and expertly chugged them at the front. These projectiles formed perfect curves as they went over the head of friendly Romans and landed among the Purifiers, pinning them to the ground. Even with proper deflecting angles, the Swordguards couldn’t keep themselves safe under a forest of shots.

Two rounds of javelins quickly destroyed over 2,000 Swordguards. Across the field, yellow wreckages were covering the floor. Giant openings in the Purifier lines were cleared up.

But the Purifiers weren’t sitting back either. On the three Capitalguards, Rune energy were harvested and converted to its more volatile form before being spat down on the lines of red. Maybe the Equites with sufficient space could dodge some of those shots, but the legionnaires crammed together had neither the talent nor the skills. Each shot killed at least a dozen of them. Within minutes, over a thousand elite Roman troops have been terminated. Their blades barely touching their foe before the owners lost their lives.

A short distance away, a squad of five Cruiseguards dashed over. It was one of the bombing parties, and it was back for another bombing run. Some legionnaires pulled out their last javelins or picked up the ones from their fallen comrades and sent them into the air, but while Cruiseguards weren’t as fast as F-1s, they were equipped with rune energy converters of a higher caliber than those of Swordguards. A thick layer of purple shield appeared and deflected the random and unorganized shots.

The Cruiseguards dove down, unloading its twin rune cannons in the process. With a crowd of legionnaires as far as eyes could see, they could barely miss. The purple blasts were followed by a series of screams. The Roman armors failed to protect their owners again the large caliber rune blasters.

Countless legionnaires rose their large shields into the air, only to be gunned down by Cruiseguards coming from another angle.

Yet despite all this, more and more legionnaires poured into this world from the portal, replacing the numerous fallen. At the same time, the Purifiers didn't have the luxury of being reinforced. Slowly, the Purifiers seemed to be beaten back.

On the flagship, Delta warned Jean.

“The Romans are making a move across the globe. Detachments across the other six continents have reported enemy movement as well, but the attacks are not as heavy as the one here. The other attacks are most likely distractions, preventing us from moving those detachments to reinforce this location.”

“What’s the status on the ground?”

“Over 16,000 Roman units have gone through the breach. Since the initial wave came through, they have taken 4,000 casualties.”

“Hmmm. So there are 12,000 Romans still alive here.” Jean frowned. Her face ice cold. “And our units?”

“The Warden task force is mostly gone. We have lost 3,500 Swordguards and 12 Cruiseguards. Simulations show our lines will be broken through in 20 minutes. If we want to hold the gate, we need to deploy reinforcement.”

Delta knew the tricks Jean had left. The Purifiers here were just a portion of her Purifier armada of 300,000 Swordguards and 7,000 Cruiseguards. Even without the Purifiers, Jean’s Worldship could easily wreck these Romans. There shouldn’t be anything their javelins could do to the vessel designed to simulate the power of a dimension.

Plus, nukes exist. An army of men with swords and shields could dodge missiles and deflect bullets, but what could they do against a shower of nuclear warheads?

But Jean didn't do a thing. She merely stood by and watched, and Delta decided to remain quiet as well. She didn't know what Jean was planning, but she did know it would be something well worth all the losses.

Jean glanced at the portal again. It was still spitting Romans by the hundreds.

16,000 Romans? Not bad, but she wanted so much more.

She was always a greedy girl. She was like this in the Starcraft world, she was like this in the World of the Runes, and she had no intention of making any changes now.

And so no Purifier reinforcement came to help their distressed people.

Swordguards and legionnaires fell one by one. The Equites were pretty much gone. Even the strongest of them were overcome by exhaustion and injuries. In the back, a lines of S-3s kept on firing. Some of them were damaged by random javelins, but the mostly melee Romans were kept away from the artillery. They were the only Striders left in combat status. The B-1 was pulled back for repair. Most of the F-1s were either destroyed or too damaged to fight. S-1s and S-2s were mostly on the ground. Their remains crushed beneath the feet of friend and foe alike.

Rune cannons and S-3 shells landed among the center of the Roman lines, throwing dozens into the air with every shot. The Romans had no effective way of fighting back. Their javelins couldn’t reach ships in the air or S-3s miles back. The only thing they could do was raise their shields and hope they wouldn’t be struck. Everytime, a number of them would be disappointed.

That was until another Roman faction entered the playground.

At the portal, three thousand fresh troops came out. Just like all the other Roman unit types, they wore helmets and armors and carried daggers, but their main weaponry wasn’t melee. They were carrying composite bows. Arrows strapped on their back.

After the Roman Equites and Roman legionnaires, Roman Sagittarii, archers, have entered the field.

If the javlins of melee legionnaires could take out thousands of Swordguards in one round, what could specialized ranged archers do?

“Jean?” Delta glanced at Jean again.

“Order all units to maintain their position. Put all Cruiseguards in defensive formation.”

Jean wasn’t intimidated.

“Copy that.”

Across the three Cruiseguards, all the rune energies were transferred from the rune cannons to the rune shield. Purple energy condensed into a barrier between the starships and the archers.

“Lock! Loose!”

A wave of arrows crossed kilometers in less than a second. Before Jean knew it, thousands of explosions rang out across the rune barriers.

A squad of Capitalguards circling back was unfortunate enough to be caught in the crossfire. All five vessels exploded instantly. Their shields riddled with arrows of impossible speed and fortitude.

“Our energy are down to 46%. Another round will break our shields.”

Jean nodded. She glanced at the battlefield on the ground again.

“How many Romans are through the portal?”

“21,000. 15,000 are still alive. Our Swordguards are down to 14,000.”

“21,000 elite Romans, the best of the Empire. Exterminating them will teach these Romans to think twice before attacking again.” Jean turned back to Delta. ”Hold this position. Protect this vessel at all cost.”

“Copy that.”

The other two Capitalguards quickly positioned themselves between the archers and the flagship that Jean and Delta were on. They have stopped wasting rune energy on attacking altogether. All power were diverted to the shields.

The remaining Cruiseguards were rallied together once again. They dove down on the Roman archers with all the fury in the world. Rune cannons ripped paths of blood through the tight formation of these light-armored range units. Hundreds were slaughtered almost immediately.

Even before the commanding officer gave an order, the archers decided to prioritize protecting themselves over shooting at the Capitalguards that were no longer attacking. When they loaded their arrows once again, they were taking aim at the Cruiseguards.

Big mistake, and also, their last mistake.

Inside the flagship, Jean raised her arm into the air. Her halberd formed in her hand. Across the deadly weapon, thousands of faces screamed in pain and anger. They were Jean’s soul collection, gathered from the first engagement. Some were killed locals, but most of them were dead Romans. Their souls were unnaturally strong, but they have been tamed, and now, they have became Jean’s slaves.

Brought back into the material world, they could sense the slaughter below. Every single one of their instincts demanded them to charge into the battlefield and feast on the newly bodiless souls. But Jean held her weapon tightly. The prisoners had no way of resisting. They were fully chained to Jean’s weapon.

Black energy flowed from Jean’s hand into the weapon. The souls screamed even louder, but their size were obviously growing. What Jean was doing was stuffing them with more Power of Death than they could handle. They had hours to live before the rogue energy rip their souls to pieces, but before that, they were merciless, tireless killing machines.

But a few thousand souls weren’t enough. The Romans were strong. Their souls will be difficult to devour without adequate numbers. Wraiths are powerful, but they still have weaknesses. Stripping the soul out of twenty thousand elite soldiers would take them a long time.

Those were time these Romans could use to retreat across the portal.

Jean couldn’t allow that to happen. She has been setting this up for a long time. When she devoured the memories of the first cohort, she realized that if she let this war drag out, then the Romans would be endless. They would keep on opening portals across the world, and sooner or later, her observers would miss one of them. Before she knew it, millions of Romans would be at her gate.

She had to slam down the initial Roman assault decisively. Beating them back wasn’t good enough. Wiping them out piece by piece wasn’t good enough. She wanted to slaughter every single one of them in moments. Not a single Roman could be allowed to retreat across the portal and tell his commander what happened.

The Roman commander would hear news about a likely victory one moment, and the next moment, he would lose all contact with the multiple legions he has sent across that portal. The mysteriousness would be more than enough to make him and his leaders hesitate about sending in more forces. Plus, even Romans weren’t endless and fully loyal to the cause. As far as Jean knew, there were dozens of factions inside the Roman Empire. They have united in the promise of a new world to conquer, but if that new world turned out to be a death trap capable of consuming tens of thousands of the Empire’s best without letting a single survivor to tell that tale, well, maybe it was time to change the target. No faction would risk going through the portal and being stabbed in the back.

That was why even though she saw the attack through the portal with her observers, she only waited until the Warden Command Unit called for help to deploy the reserves. When she did that, she sent in a small portion of her forces with little fire support. She had nukes. She had a Worldship. But she stood by and watched as basic Swordguards were pushed back.

She wanted to lure all the Roman elites into a battlefield that would soon turn to hell.

She reached inside her watch and pulled out something.

The Sea of Souls

Cost: 3,000 coins

Description: A sea of 12 billion easily manipulable human souls.

If a few thousand souls couldn’t devour twenty thousand Romans, how about 12 billion?