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--- Italica, Palace Balcony ---

May 10th, 2025

Princess Pina stands on the palace balcony watching over the battle. She tries to count the number of bandits out there but is unable to figure out the total number. She cannot believe the size of the force attacking the city.

"Princess…" Hamilton said in a scared tone. "There are so many…"

"I know," She replied.

All her life, Pina wanted to be a female knight on the battlefield, and now she is going to die on her first mission. "This… this is what war is like?"

She looks at her servant Hamilton and sees the fear in her eyes.

She then sees Countess Myui Formal standing there, looking out onto the battle. A part of her is angry at her for allowing the Americans to take control of the city defenses. She thought about enacting her royal powers and stripping Myui of her powers in order to take direct control of the city.

"Why did you give the Americans control of your city?" she asked.

"Because he was correct," Myui replied. "You didn't have a plan to protect my people. My father died for the Empire and the Empire returns that favor by abandoning us."

"We didn't abandon you," she replied. "I am here, risking my Knights' lives. My own life. And don't forget, they killed your father."

"In your invasion," Myui replied. "He died in your invasion of those people. And that man spoke like my father(1)."

Now she wished she had used her powers to strip Myui of her Countess, but it is too late.

She looks around and sees soldiers clashing on the eastern wall. It looks like the bandits are making one massive push to overwhelm the gate. She can hear screams and cries throughout the city.

"Princess," Hamilton said, shuddering a little. "I think you should escape."

She looks at her servant. She has been very loyal, serving her since when they are young(2). "Grey is still out there. I promised to defend this city and I won't let these Americans take the glory."

A part of her wants to run, knowing she can escape from the north to the Row Stream. But she knows her Knights are coming. They will come too late but when they arrive, they will be slaughtered by the horde of bandits.

--- Italica, Eastern gate ---

The attack came out of nowhere, none of the sentries that were on the wall noticed the small sneak attack. Some of the bandits were able to get on the wall, distracting the city militia, allowing the main force to advance against the east gate uncontested.

Vanguard-7 is rushing to the western gate after hearing the battles.

"Sergeant Major, take Alicia and guard the gate. Everyone else with me, we’ve got to hold the wall," Sharpe orders over his radio.

Everyone acknowledges his order and splits up into the assigned teams.

It takes some time to get back to the wall as many of the townsfolk are getting in the way. Everyone is panicking and the little discipline that was left vanishing. He sees the ranks forming up, but they are sloppy.

Randy is a war veteran from the Middle East, and Alicia’s record in Ranger training shows that she specializes with close combat. He hopes they will get to the militia’s position and rally them to hold the line.

The sun begins to rise, peeking over the mountains to the East.

He stands there and looks at the view. He finds it surprising that they attacked this early. The nights in this world are darker than on Earth. He wonders if that is because there is little light pollution or something related to the planet's orbit around its sun or as Lelei calls it, Flare.

Knowing that the enemy does not have night vision, he wonders if they have some way to see in the dark. Maybe they are species that can see at night so they can organize without torches.

Once they get to the stairway that leads up the wall, the situation looks like it is falling apart. Suddenly, a bolt of lightning shoots out from a crowd of the attackers.

Sharpe's Rangers finally gets up on the wall and take cover by the wall’s battlements. They begin opening fire on the bandits below, trying to present as small of a target to the archers shooting volleys of arrows at them.

"Holy shit, there are a lot of them." Andrew comments, looking over the wall.

He looks to where Andrew is staring, and his eyes widened at the sight. There must be thousands of them, far more than he expected. He sees where that bolt of lightning came from and assumes it is a magic user like Lelei.

"This is like the battle of Helm's Deep(3)," Andrew mumbles.

This is the first time he even thought about there being an enemy magic-user. The only time he has faced one was clearing out that Imperial staging area(4) so the idea of it hasn't become normalized for him. That is something he should have expected given what world he is at. He is still fighting like he would fight a modern military on Earth and must check his bias. He starts to wonder what else might be out there.

"Scott, hold this position and provide suppressive fire," he orders. Scott is the unit support gunner, using an M240 machine gun.

Sharpe then rushes down the wall, Andrew right behind him. Fighting is happening all along the wall as more and more bandits keep climbing up siege ladders. They must have set them up during the sneak attack.

To their right one of the militiamen gets hit by an arrow, falling off the wall. The militiamen around him start to panic and the attack comes.

"Stay away from the edge, stay low. Don't get sniped," He orders as arrows fall around him.

After the two of them kill three bandits who were on the wall, he gives the hand signal to Andrew to throw a grenade. They toss a fragmentation grenade towards the base of the nearest siege ladder

. Once that was done, they could hear the screams of people dying after the small explosion.

"Alright, we will work our way down and frag these bastards," he said.

Andrew nods as he fires his M4A1.

Before they could start moving into position, they hear Scott yell 'Incoming!'

Both look out over the battlefield and see a large boulder flying towards them. They jump for cover as the bolder hits the wall, causing some damage to the wall.

"What the fuck was that?" Andrew yells confused about what just happened.

"Don't think about it and get back in the fight," Sharpe tells him.

He is forced to use his rifle as a shield when one of the bandits that got on the wall attacks him. That is when the bandit was split in half before his eye by a large halberd.

"No dying on me today Major," Rory said to him in a flirtatious tone. She then winks at him. She holds out her hand and helps him up.

He looks at her hand and takes it, being pulled up. Both look at each other in the eyes, giving a respectful nod to each other.

Then, another boulder flies towards the city, smashing the wall again, taking out a mixed group of militiamen and bandits.

Seeing that, Rory bursts out a laugh in a sadistic tone and then charges forward, slashing anyone in her way. Blood and body parts are spraying all around as she cuts them down.

He stands there watching, never having seen anything like that before. "Note to self, never be on her bad side." He said to himself as he raises his rifle and covers Rory.

The fighting seems to be stabilizing, until he sees another boulder moving through the air. This boulder looks different compared to the others. It seems to be glowing with some kind of magical spell. This time it hits the gate, smashing it wide open. Sharpe stands there as he witnesses hundreds of them charge through the broken gate.

The bandits outside the wall all cheer and start storming towards the barricades that were set up. Sounds of screaming and death can be heard as both sides clash down below.

He then hears Norma yelling at the fleeing militiamen. "Don't run, hold this wall! Cowards! Fight!... ahh!"

The city militia begins to flee for their lives, after seeing Norma get stabbed through the chest. As everyone watches as that young knight gets executed, the people of Italica begin to lose faith that they can hold the wall, or the city for that matter.

He sees the execution and sees the militiamen abandoning the wall from the overwhelming force. The men inside the walls giving ground, on the verge of breaking. He knows once the plaza falls, the battle is over. It does not matter if they hold the wall, these bandits will storm the city unchecked, killing everyone.

He looks at Rory and yells. "Rory, get down there and hold the line!"

He then sees Rory jump down from the wall, land in the middle of the bandits, and begin fighting them off. She keeps talking about how special she is, so he must trust that she is telling the truth. She could be able to help hold the plaza.

However, she is outnumbered, there is no way she could take them on alone. Even with her superhuman abilities, she cannot be everywhere at once. Even if she could, they are still pouring through the gate.

Seeing this, he rushes off the wall and quickly gets to the barricade. Once he gets down there, he sees both Randy and Alicia firing their weapons into the enemy crowd. But he also sees the town's militia running away.

He rushes to what is left of the defensive line. "Hold the line! Hold the line here!"

He gets between them and the attackers, trying to inspire the townsfolk to hold their ground. Letting them know that they are not alone.

---

Rory laughs as she slashes her halberd, killing five bandits.

A big man with an ax appears right behind her. He screams as he swings his ax down at her. She just smirks and jumps up and lands on his shoulders.

Rory just giggles that the man thought he could kill her, and then winks at him, cutting his head right off his body.

She looks at the large mass of bandits in front of her. Some of them seem to be scared of her, but others look way too confident.

She has seen this before; they know they cannot kill her, but the thrill of battle can cloud a man's mind. So far, winning is all they are thinking about, which is fine for her. More souls for Emroy.

"We can take her if we all attack at once! Charge!" One of them yells, clearing acting as one of their leaders.

The large horde of bandits rushes towards her. She slashes as some of them get close. With each strike, she is slashing off their arms, legs off and other body parts. She sees two more of them by her side, ready to strike. That is when both die from bullet wounds.

She looks over to see who shot them and sees Alicia.

Alicia is yelling as she stabbed another of them with her knife that is on the barrel of her weapon. She pulls out her pistol and right over her head, killing another.

She looks at her and smiles.

Alicia sees her and smirks. Both give each other a nod and begin killing everyone around them.

---

Randy rushes over to Sharpe. "Sir, we are being overrun. Should we retreat?"

Sharpe looks at him. "There is nowhere to retreat to. There are thousands of them out there." He then looks out and watches as the two girls kill everyone around them.

"They have the center covered, gun down anyone on the flanks. We must hold here." Sharpe orders.

They stand by the barricade, shooting anyone trying to flank both Alicia and Rory.

---

Another bolder hits the wall, which forces Andrew to drop to the ground for cover.

"Andrew, get back here!" Scott yells as he fires at the bandits chasing him.

He rushes back to where Scott is. Once he gets there, he takes cover by some barrels and opens fire at the bandits.

They keep on fighting. Even with their advanced weapons, hundreds are still swarming the wall. A stray arrow hits Scott in the helmet, making him fall on his ass.

"Scott!" Andrew looks behind him, checking up on him as he still tries to provide cover.

"I am okay! Damn. That hurt." Scott said, feeling up his helmet with his hand. The arrow did not hurt him, but the impact was still hard.

That is when They hear a roar come from the sea of soldiers. They both look over the wall’s edge and see this massive troll charging towards the wall. The troll jumps and lands on the wall, its hands grabbing the edges. It begins pulling itself up, working on getting over the wall.

Both look at it in horror, trying to figure out what to do with a beast like that. This is the first time they have encountered a troll, a big bellied, massive naked beast.

The troll sees them and lets out another roar as it lifts a large ax, planning on striking the two Rangers.

Right then, the troll explodes, sending a shockwave knocking them both over.