I rushed through into a field of high grass, the crisp stalks whipping at my bare feet. It was a bright sunny day, and a group of at least a hundred soldiers in blue not twenty feet away were screaming as they ran towards me. I reached down and clawed at the ground as I spun in a tight turn and lost my footing trying to reverse directions. There was another group of men, this time in red coming from that way. Laying in the field between them was a recipe for disaster and I lunged to my feet and started to sprint parallel to the line of battle. It was a race no one could win. Both sides were closing in and the noise was incredible even before they met.

Everyone was shouting and as the gap disappeared I flashed a frantic look to each side. The guy in red had a bald head with a nasty scar and a raised axe, while the man in blue had on some kind of chainmail poncho and a sword. He was smaller but for some reason he looked more competent than axe guy, and on that quick glance I commited and veered left. I gave a stutter step so the timing would change before I crashed into him, ready for that axe to come down at me. He’d ignored me and focused on his opponent in blue instead, but it was too late to stop as I’d already plunged my knife into his kidney. A desperate sound came out of my mouth as he lurched sideways in pain and just barely blocked the strike from the man in blue.

I was past the front line now, but the second row recognized me as a threat and I just barely side-stepped a spear thrust at my middle. The guy next to him swung a sword at me and I ducked underneath it, but something struck me from behind and I crashed face first into the grass.

I immediately crawled forward so no one could follow up, but a boot crashed down on my thigh as someone stepped on me and I screamed. It was lost in the general confusion, and while no one was actively attacking me I still wasn’t safe. I slashed with my knife to stop another one from stepping on me, and then rolled to the side just in time as someone chopped down with an axe. The roll had been a mistake because someone kicked me in the head before I had recovered and could get my bearings I fell to the ground and blacked out for a second, but came to when someone stepped on my arm. I twisted loose and tried to crawl forward again. My head was pounding and I threw up when I got back to all fours. A hand came down and made a fist in my hair, dragging me to my feet. That’s not the sort of thing I accept from anyone but a very close friend so I came up with the knife and stabbed the man in the armpit. His hand stayed locked in my hair and I rabbit punched him with the knife, sticking it in a half dozen times in the space of a second until his grip loosened and he let me go. I’d lost track of which direction I had been heading, and I was dizzy from the blow to the head. Standing still seemed more dangerous than the alternative though.

I staggered into the first gap I saw, then weaved left to avoid a knot of guys grappling. I rammed my knife home into someone’s back to open up a space. It was nasty and brutal and loud, and I wanted to be back home in my bed with a bottle of wine and a cheesy romcom on netflix, but I did what I had to to survive. The battle seemed to be getting more frantic now, and suddenly one of the men in front of me’s head exploded as a mace came crashing down from above. A massive black horse and an armored rider forced its way into the opening he’d created. I tried to dodge but there was nowhere to go in the press and the horse’s shoulder struck me a glancing blow as the armored rider tore through the infantry with devastating effect.

I fell to the ground again, and this time I didn’t even try to recover. The grass field had already been churned to mud with blood and bodily fluids, and I slid into the muck and grabbed the closest corpse. It was a young guy, hardly more than a boy really. What was important was that he was small enough I could manhandle him though. I dragged him a couple of feet over to where there were two others lying where they’d finished each other off. One of those was still alive, but in no condition to defend himself when I slit his throat to make sure. I cuddled in between the two of them and pulled the little guy up on top of us. It was hard to stomach, but I took a quick handful of gore from one of the bodies and smeared it over my face. I wanted to play dead, and it gave me that little extra bit of verisimilitude.

The battle raged on around me, and I got stepped on a couple of times. Eventually the battle shifted and while the fighting continued it moved further away. I continued to play dead, occasionally peaking out from underneath my corpse shield to judge the position of the sun in the sky. Survive till nightfall had seemed easy enough back in the other room, but here on the battlefield it had been a close run thing. My whole body hurt and I was a mass of bruising underneath the lingerie, but I decided to undress one of the soldiers and put his clothes on when it got closer to sundown. Even clothes stolen off a casualty couldn’t be any bloodier than my own at this point, and at least in a uniform I wouldn’t be flashing T and A on the next task. I just had to keep still for a few more hours and then put my plan into action.