"Sieges are in my opinion the ugliest form of combat possible. Strategy and tactics rarely play much role in them, as it was instead a pure contest of who would break first. Either the attackers were worn down, or the defenders' willpower failed them at last, or, at times, the walls broke before either did." - Xaliburnus the Conqueror, First Emperor of the Elmaiyan Empire.

When the over twenty thousand strong enemy force marched, it was with loud cries and yells that carried with the wind. As they approached, Reinhardt could hear their yells even inside the fort, as well as the amplified voices of the preaching priests that drove the mob into a more vicious mood, almost a frenzy.

He was not particularly familiar with the language used in the Holy Kingdom, but had learned some words that Elfriede often used in her swears over the years. His keen ears caught repeated mentions of the words "heretics", "unbelievers", and what sounded like praises to the God-King, a name his wife only ever uttered in conjunction with vile curses.

It was still early in the morning that day, the sun had only risen for a few hours. Their enemies had set out and marched just after breakfast, it seemed, and it would take them over an hour to close the distance at their marching pace.

Rather than standing tensely as they awaited the arrival of their enemies, Reinhardt ordered everyone to sit down and rest, to conserve their energy as they waited their turn. There was no point in tiring themselves out when the enemy might not even breach the gate at all that day.

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From high above the ground, at her precarious perch on the bell tower's roof, Salicia watched the enemy forces approach the fort from every direction, an encirclement that left no gaps whatsoever.

The enemy forces - more a gigantic mob frothing at the mouth with zealotry, really - were still a good kilometer away by then, too far for arrows to reach, although their loud yells and magically amplified preaching was loud enough to be heard already.

Most of the archers under her command were humans and orcs, a few therians whose builds were suitable for archery and a bunch of half breeds, all from the Free Lances. Some were professional archers, others just hunters who were good with a bow. One of them was even their bowyer, who was a decent shot himself.

She watched closely as the enemy troops closed within three hundred meters, close enough that she could be certain of placing her arrow exactly where she wanted it to be, but stayed her hand. It was only their front lines, full of cannon fodder, without worthwhile targets.

The dwarven marksmen also held their shots, as they allowed the enemy ranks to close for another fifty meters. Then they let loose.

From her perch high above, it was a pleasant scene to witness. Hundreds of dwarves on each of the fortress' four walls turned the cranks of their repeating crossbows, and the mechanism within drew the string, nocked a bolt, and loosed as the crank turned.

Thousands of bolts were fired within the following ten seconds, as they rained down upon the approaching enemies. As it were, the enemy held their shields high, prepared as they were for such a bombardement, yet the force of the impact still caught them by surprise.

Here and there a shield flew away or turned as its wielder lost their grip on it, as the heavy impact of the bolts were more than they expected. Where the bolts met the haphazard collection of light armor the militia wore, they punched deep into flesh. Some even went all the way through and only stopped when it embedded itself in a second target.

Despite the fearsome rain of bolts, most of them were actually caught on shields, and of those that made it past the shields, only a few were immediately fatal. Even so, the barrage scored at least a few hundred casualties, both injured and dead, amongst the enemy, which they seemed to ignore as they marched on.

Salicia watched as the dwarves on the walls handed their empty repeaters to another dwarf behind them, who in turn handed them a fully loaded one, before they quickly reloaded new bolts into the empty repeating crossbow.

Like clockwork, the dwarven soldiers on the walls rained arrows without a pause on their enemies, slowly but surely taking their toll. Against a normal group of peasant militia, just such a sight alone would have likely routed them.

These enemies, while also militia gathered out of peasants, had zealotry and belief backing them however, and they marched onward, unheeding of casualties.

By then the enemies had closed to a hundred meters. The expert marksmen amongst the dwarves began their grim work, as they sought out those who looked like commanders and tried to take them out of the equation with a quarrel to the head.

After a couple salvos however, the enemy grew wise to it and kept their commanders covered, which made it harder to snipe them out.

By then, the archers amongst the enemy's back lines had approached close enough to fire back, and the dwarven marksmen on the walls had to look out for return fire as well.

Incidentally, that placed them within range of Salicia's group of archers. Due to their elevated position in the middle of the fort, and their use of bows, which allows arcing shots unlike crossbows, they had a lot of range covered.

"Archers, face west! Follow my arrow! Ready!?" yelled Salicia from her perch at the roof, as she turned towards the west. The enemy army's advance wasn't too uniform, and their west side had pushed the farthest so far.

The gathered archers on the chapel's roof nocked an arrow on her call, and raised their bows to face the west. Salicia herself kept her one good eye on one man who looked like he commanded the enemy archers, a good hundred meters away from the walls.

In one fluid motion, her left hand nocked an arrow on the string of her massive bow, then her right arm pushed, as her left arm pulled the string. She took but a mere moment to correct her aim, before she let go of the string with her fingers.

"Five volleys! Loose!" she yelled as she let her arrow fly.

Below her, the waiting archers kept a close eye on the trajectory of her arrow, and adjusted their aim to follow behind it. They loosed five volleys of arrows as she commanded, without questioning the order.

Despite the ridiculously long range - around three hundred fifty meters - most of those arrows fell on the surprised enemy archers, who were mostly unarmored and unprotected. Despite the rather crude targeting of the volleys, the arrows still caused at least close to a hundred casualties, and sent the enemy archers into disarray.

Their commander was in no state to restore order, as he was too busy dying at the moment. A large, meter-long arrow as thick as a small javelin had punched through his nose and out the back of his head.

Salicia Adenauer, the Silent Reaper, does not miss her target often.