Downtown Minerva

At this point in the war, the Iscariots had come to see the dawn of a new type of warfare for the first time. One where mechanical leviathans and behemoths dominated the air and ground. One where fire and ash rained down from the skies above to decimate those on the ground.

"RATATATATATATA!"

"BOOM!"

"RATATATATATATA!"

An Iscariot Badger took cover behind a collapsed apartment building to shield herself from the bullets whizzing past. Her army was putting up what little resistance they could, on the edge of being annihilated. Explosions were going off everywhere, blowing dust and debris into her face, and she stumbled to the floor too many times to count. Bruising her paws as she did. When she managed to find cover, she stumbled over her own leg and fell to the floor for the billionth time, unable to stop herself from getting scrapes a-plenty all over her body. She cursed as she tried to straighten herself, sitting against the rubble of the building in temporary safety.

She was completely drained of everything. For the past two days, she and the rest of her allies were fighting. This was the fifth skirmish she had been in. Her team would get into a skirmish, they would take casualties, and they would retreat. Just to repeat the cycle all over again. Her unit had well over half of its original soldiers killed, with a lucky few surviving long enough to fight just a few hours later. It was endless and it was terrifying. A battle could last for five minutes, or it could last for hours. And this skirmish was on the latter side. Each battle was one after another, the only break they had received was the period in which they would fall back to defend a new block. She hadn't slept in thirty hours, and it felt like her world was collapsing in on itself.

Her commander, a Raccoon, managed to evade the bullets from Ithacan guns and slid into cover next to her. He was yelling something that she couldn't understand, her brain failing to translate words into ideas. Everything was so muddled, so confused. To think she was living at home with her family just a few short days ago, only to be trapped here in hell…

The Raccoon put his claws on her shoulders, shaking her, "LISTEN TO ME!"

The words finally broke through the fog. She blinked a couple of times to clear it further, "We need reinforcements!" He screamed at her though his words were slow to ensure understanding, "Take this message down and give it to our messenger!"

The Badger didn't say anything, only nodding as she moved to the satchel around her waist to pull out a pen and a sheet of paper. It was getting dirtied in the snow that nibbled around the paper's edges, but she made do with it.

"Minervan Royal Garrison to Imperial Commander Wendover!" He spoke. She scribbled the words down, "We need dire aid! We cannot sustain the fight for much longer! We have heavy casualties, please send assis-" The Raccoon didn't finish his sentence before a bullet caught his throat. A burst of blood spewed onto her face, causing her to shriek and scatter backward. She only stared as the Raccoon went down, convulsing. His body fell to the ground with a thud. His golden eyes were trained on her though as he struggled.

"GO!" Was the only word he managed to get out, as he gurgled on his own blood and the newly opened hole in his throat. The badger, though full of fear, got to her feet. Keeping her head down, she still looked at the Raccoon, though his squirms were no more. She felt her body shake, her legs could barely support her. But she kept moving anyway. The sounds of battle intensifying…

She made it halfway down the block, nearly to the position the messenger and a few more mages had taken. Almost making it… so close… until an explosion knocked her back down.

Her world went black for a few minutes as she lay on the ground. Slowly moving. Everything about her hurt. She didn't want to fight anymore. She didn't care about the Imperial Throne or about defending her city anymore. None of that mattered. The King never cared for her family anyway. Her husband worked as a serf in the farmlands, and her children had no guarantee of food. The King never cared for them. She held no will to fight for the Empire. She just wanted this nightmare to end. And return home to her family…

But that brought the badger back to her feet. She needed to survive. She needed to make sure her family was safe. She had to! She coughed, inhaling a lot of dust and ice after the explosion. Clearing her eyes of mud, she was able to see what happened. An Ithacan weapon had exploded, eviscerating another large chunk of her team. She looked on. Horrified at what she had seen. Fires in the street. Soldiers cried out, missing body parts and wearing uniforms stained with blood. The gentle snow fell on top of them. The skies wept. Again, she was one of the lucky to survive. But she didn't feel lucky at all. Instead, she felt like she had been damned! Burdened to be among those to witness the death, to feel this torture! It was unbearable!

She climbed up and over a wall of dirt constructed in the street to defend the mages and the messengers. They were all that was left of the unit, besides her. She stumbled and fell into the trench that they dug. She was approached by a reptilian, green scales, black horns, and the eyes of snakes. A Battle Thrall. In fact, a large chunk of the few remaining survivors were thralls. Some human, others elf. They fought against the Ithacans who were definitely human. To see them forced to fight for an Empire that had enslaved them, against their own people… it was humiliating. Battle Thralls were often the first to surrender. She knew for a fact that the only reason why the Thralls hadn't surrendered now was that an officer somewhere nearby threatened them with an even harsher sentence if they did.

She handed the dirtied sheet of paper to the lizardman who in turn carried it to a homing wyvern. He put the message inside of a satchel placed around its back, and a team of soldiers took off its restraints, allowing it to fly back to the Magical University. The wyvern spread its wings and took off with a puff, leaving the death and chaos of the battle behind. The Badger wished that she could do the same. She felt envious of the wyvern, able to escape -- even if temporarily.

The fog of battle returned for the Badger. She watched as the soldiers put up a hopeless fight against the Ithacans. The environment had blended into various colors, shapes melted around her into moving and screaming blobs of colorful goo. Uncertain of what to do next, she looked over the trench. One shape stood out as distinct to her. It was a large metal contraption, boxy in shape with colors of green and brown splotched all over it. It was one of the Ithacans' war machines. She'd seen them many a time before, both the ones that crawled on land and the ones that roared in the air. She managed to evade them by being able to escape just before it could find their location, but there was no escaping this.

Her eyes widened as she saw fire…

"BOOM!"

She flew backward. Hitting her head on the cold hard ground. Her helmet had been thrown off, a lot of her fur had been burned. Her world had faded to black but she remained conscious of everything around her. She could hear a distinct buzz in the air. As her senses tightened, the buzz transformed into screaming. She squirmed, unable to bring herself off of the ground. Her body not allowing it, protesting with another jab of pain coming from everywhere.

"BANG!"

And then something stabbed her, right in the chest. She felt nothing, collapsing onto the floor with a thud. Frozen, with the snowfall covering her body. Her eyes wide open, frozen in time…

"Alright Demon Dogs! That was the last of 'em! C'mon! We'll win this war by Christmas!" Espinoza told his men as they brushed past the Badger's body. The Marines pushed on to the Downtown area…

Tabitha Carlisle

Nationality: Minervan

Race: Badgerman

Age: 26

Unit: Sir Galahad's Band, Minervan Garrison

The war was rearing its ugly head across Minerva. Many Iscariots had previously joked about how they'd crush the Ithacan advance in one great push. Many Iscariots now lay dead on the battlefield. Everybody in the Empire joined the army for a multitude of reasons. Most were forced to fight. Given a notice about the invasion and finding themselves pressed into the Garrison, taken away from their homes, their families, and their lives…

Some were young revolutionaries, eager to fight a war to liberate their common man from the shackles of oppression. Among them were the foolish, looking for a new adventure in a path full of glory. The elders would tell them later that this war was no adventure…

The Central Borough

The war brought about new technology in the field of killing. Advancements from the engineers in the Falkland Commonwealth brought about revolutionary new weapons in the field of battle. Things like the musket and rifled barrel, better steel, new attitudes surrounding warfare and tactics changed the course of battle overnight. While still unable to compete with Ithacan technological supremacy, the Reformation held a distinct advantage with Falkish guns and tactics. Luckily those weapons were mostly on their side. Mostly…

Yelling. No, not yelling. Screaming. Hysterical screaming. It broke through the smoke of battle in the midst of an urban battleground. Reformist Militants had taken the insides of buildings as cover against the fire of dragons breath. Their clothes ill-made to fight against the freezing cold of the southern continent's winters fared even poorly against dragon's breath. And yet, a band of Revolutionaries held on in the ruins of what was once a grand and luxury apartment for the rich. The roof had collapsed, windows were gone, and walls caved in many spots. Yet it provided the only cover in the kill zone that was the streets of Minerva. Any civilian crazy enough to have remained in the area had already died. Frontlines changed faster than many families could adapt, and one could go to bed in a completely peaceful neighborhood and wake up an hour later in a living nightmare.

A human crouched behind a blue couch. Despite stains from fire, mud, and the snowfall, it remained the brightest object inside of a room filled with nothing but greys and blacks. Red flames burned everything in the building to a black ashy color. And yet, the couch remained untouched. The human, despite his naked fingers turning to a bright pink color due to the cold, managed to reload his rifle. The complex process of reloading a musket was difficult enough even without frozen hands, and yet the human managed to pour the gunpowder down the barrel, pack it down, add a bullet, pack it down, and ready himself to fire into the streets below. A comrade next to him aimed his rifle into the streets and took a shot to kill an unlucky Imperial, before crouching down and repeating the same process.

The human bounced up to look out the window. Through the ruins of the once posh and well-to-do part of town, the Central Borough now resembled a ghost town. Ruins of what once was a great city were lost to the destruction of warfare. Down the block in front of them was the Imperial Army. He knew they weren't Garrison troops by how well they fought. They ran with speed, taking cover, returning fire with their magic, lobbing bombs filled with dragons gas at them. The bombs were an extremely effective weapon, to which the revolutionaries had no counter, and it was a weapon that even the Garrison didn't have.

The green cloud would seep into the windows of a building and kill the entire block before one could even realize the need to vacate. The human had survived a gas attack by being on the edge of the clouds' radius. And despite being exposed to dragon gas for just a second, his lungs felt like a sword had torn through them. Ripping and pulling away at his most vital flesh. He spat out blood before he let a bullet fly again. White smoke billowed from the gun, creating a fog that helped conceal him as he moved back to the blue couch.

He heard the screech of a dragon fly overhead, and then the screams of multiple soldiers being burned alive.

"AAH! MOMMA! MOMMA! PLEASE!" He turned to look at another comrade of his, curled up into a ball, tucked into a far corner of the room where the roof hadn't yet collapse in on itself. Eyeing the militant, he was only a boy. But the Human couldn't judge, for he was only seventeen. Fear worked in one of two ways, either locking your mind and freezing every single joint and thought process until the only thing you could do was maniacally scream into the air and hold your head with bloody hands. Or it turned you into a machine, doing what had to be done to stay alive. The Human was grateful that he was the type that did the latter and he felt sympathetic for the other kid.

He fought with the ideas of revolution in mind. He hated the Imperials. All of them did. He worked in the farmlands all his life as a peasant. Not quite a slave, but not quite free either. Even then, he hated the Iscariots for what they had done to him and his family. He wanted to see them all killed, their bodies hung, their homes destroyed. This was supposed to be the glorious battle they fought to achieve that, but now he had felt even worst than he did while working on a potato farm. The second day of a never-ending war for the young human. His once pure soul was tainted with a heap of black tar that seemed to surround him. His coat was not enough to fight in this cold, and he shivered like mad. And yet, his hands burned themselves each time he accidentally touched the barrel of his rifle. Too hot to handle, too cold to stand. Never was there a moment of comfort. Never was there a moment of peace. Sleep evaded him like a shadow. He felt exhausted, he could close his eyes and just rest. But each time he did, another gun fired off somewhere next to him, forcing his burning eyes open for another firefight. Everybody in his team had been reduced to little more than shells of men, despite the cause they had fought for. The only thing other than fear that kept him going was the blue fabric wrapped around his arm. Reminding him of what this was all for.

So he poured the gunpowder down the barrel, packed it down, placed a bullet in the barrel, and packed it down.

"INCOMING FIRE!!!!" A commander screeched at the top of his voice. He looked up, and a dragon had flown overhead sending a wave of fear into him. It looked down, right at them. And his eyes shot open in horror. The scaly beast opened its jaws to reveal a red hot ball of light.

Around him, Reformists stood to try and run. But it was too late…

First the fireball. Then the fire. He was blinded by the light, unable to see nor feel anything. Everything felt peaceful. He wanted to stay here. Rest. Eternally even. He didn't want to go back out there. He didn't want to Survive in Hell. But his eyes unfortunately opened, and instead of waking up at home in bed after a nightmare, he was in the place where he had started. Sort of.

Face buried in a mix of snow, debris, and mud, the human looked up to eye his surroundings. The building partially gave in, and he fell two stories. The remainder of the building uneasily bent over him. The wooden supports were on the verge of snapping as they groaned and creaked under the weight. He looked over to his team. The militiaman next to him had been killed, impaled on a wooden beam that had entered into his chest and out of his spine. Blood dripped down the wood and spewed out of his mouth. His eyes looked on with horror, the tears were coming too. Not the tears. Anything but that. First, it would be the tears, then his heart would start giving him that dull aching pain that felt like it was literally breaking in half. And finally, he would shut down. He looked over to the boy. Younger than he. And his face was gone. Closed. Getting his longest sleep. His body had been wedged between the wall and the ground. Crushed alive.

The tears came. Then his heart broke. And then he fell to the floor. Screaming, yelling, pounding the floor with his fists. His face was hot despite the snow. He was angry, sorrowed, on the ground wishing that he had never done any of this. Wishing that he had just remained home. Wishing that he could just rest…

And then the building fully collapsed...

Jacob Emerson

Age: 17

Nationality: Falkish

Race: Human

Unit: Reformation Volunteer Militia

Each soldier fighting in the hell that became Minerva had been reduced to little more value than a number on a General's report. Never given a name. Lost forever to History. They were the brave and idiotic. The expendable, and the invaluable. The rats in the mud, the eagles in the sky, and the fighters in the ring. The hopeless. The courageous. Those destined to make their mark on history, and yet their names would be forgotten. Withered away to history books. That's the pain of being a fighter. Everybody remembers the commanders, the generals, the guns, and the equipment. Books remember the battles fought and the wars won. The land changed and the kingdoms that rise and fall. But forgotten were the ones who made that change. Fighting on every side. Fighting for every reason. Not all of them good. Not all of them evil.

They were the criminal. The slaves. The greedy. And the desperate.

They were the heroes. The legendary. The revered. And the noble.

Yuri thought about that as she became one of them. This group that everybody knew of, could talk of, could name their existence. But nobody, not even they themselves, could seem to understand. She lost herself in the battle. Losing the name Yuri, losing her identity, her value. She became a piece of something far larger. A story in which it wouldn't matter if she died, or if the man next to her died, or if the enemy died. Nobody would remember anyway. And yet she kept fighting. Fully embracing the legacy of a warrior.

The Minervan City Hall

Yuri

Age: 26

Nationality: Falkish

Race: Human

It must've been hours later for Yuri as she ducked behind a wall in the process of reloading her rifle. Gunshots popped off all around her, the mages skilled in using magical offensive spells did their thing, and the elves tended to the wounded. The Minervan City Hall was their garrison, and they were going to defend it. The civilians sheltered inside as the Revolutionaries fought back against the Iscariot attacks. Yuri stood outside of the City Hall, huddled next to the stone wall that separated the street from the garden of the building and the Exeter River. They fought with the Imperials at their front and the icy waters of the Exeter to their backs. Other Revolutionaries kept a hold of the main entrance inside. She shuddered as a cloud formed from her breath, it was colder today. The warm temperatures early in the morning plummeted. She pushed the lead ball down the barrel of her rifle with a long metal rod. Packing in the gunpowder with it. Done reloading, she hauled the rifle up and took aim. One Imperial soldier was in her sight, the tip of the gun falling right on top of his very unlucky silhouette. She pulled the trigger. Fire, smoke, and then "BOOM!"

The Imperial was dead. The sounds of repeated gunfire came from the rest of the riflemen, it sounded to her almost like raindrops falling on a drum. A very loud drum. It pittered and pattered. Going off almost randomly. The heat of the battle was coming as it grew ever more intense. Becoming stronger and stronger, until the only senses that could function were those that knew how to reload, aim and shoot.

They had been discovered. Sort of. Sir Ann had sent his forces out to figure out who was behind the Revolutionaries throughout the city. And their suspicions closed in on the City Hall. Instantly, the battle broke out between the Revolutionaries and Sir Ann's army. The injured civilians who were recovering and being treated by their care were moved deep inside of the building, where the battle would hopefully not affect them. Despite the Revolutionaries warning Sir Ann that there were hundreds of wounded civilians--mostly women and children-- inside of the city hall, Sir Ann committed to battle anyway. Labeling the group inside as terrorists.

There was a silver lining. They had no idea that the Revolutionaries were connected to the Reformation, meaning that everybody back home in Fargo doing Reformist work would be safe. Cathy and Professor Hyde both did a fantastic job of keeping the actual Reformation small, disconnecting the party from the wider cultural shift. Everybody outside of their small circle thought that Professor Hyde was the sole leader of the Reformation, and they had no idea of Cathy's work in the movement. It was secretive and hidden. It allowed them to commit to acts of revolution in the non-core provinces of the Empire, like Minerva.

But in the meantime, there was war. Yuri hadn't thought too much of it. One second, she was tending to the wounded with Cathy, and the next, she was holding off an Imperial offensive. Cathy was right, her time to fight came much sooner than imagined. And yet, she felt all the more prepared for it. Shifting into the mindset of a warrior like she had been on a battlefield before. Well, she had. A very long time ago, however.

"BOOM!"

Yuri took another Imperial's life. Despite the inaccuracy of the Falkish muskets, at this close range gunfire was almost a guaranteed kill.

As she crouched back down to reload the gun, she heard the voice of a Revolutionary commander yell over the sound of battle, "GET DOWN! FIREBALLS! GET DOOOWN-"

His voice was abruptly cut off by the sound of an intense "WHOOSH" and a huge explosion. Another fireball came down upon them, and this time, it was going to hit her lines. She stood to run. But the fireball was faster. It impacted the ground and exploded, throwing her body backward by several yards. Everything became dark…

She saw the Mirrorface. Briefly though. Lurking somewhere in a dark recess of her mind. Watching. Never speaking nor acting. Just watching. When color returned, she was lying in bed. At home. Her old home. Her first home. Her happiest memory. She turned on her side to watch her mother stoke the embers in the fireplace. She was tall, had night-black hair the likes of which Yuri had inherited, and a sharp face that glowed in the light of the gentle fire. She had a smile on her face, and she was humming a tune. A lullaby. Just for her.

"Saaay nighty night. Kiss the dark sky. I'll sing a song, to tell you I love you. Up in the place where you'll dream of me," she sang. Her voice was smooth, gentle, and beautiful. If flower petals had a sound, that was what her voice was, "I'll always dream of you…"

Yuri smiled looking at her mother, and as if on cue, her father arrived inside of her bedroom. He too had a smile on his broad face. He was a big bearded man. Though his face looked young and handsome. Her father wrapped an arm around her mother as he too joined in the singing, "I'll blow out the candlelights. You fall asleep."

"The taste of the air is so sweet," She finished the line.

"Say nighty night! Go play with the stars above!"

"I'll sing a song, to tell you I love you!"

"Up in the place where you'll dream of me!"

They both looked at her now, embracing each other. All smiles. All love, "I'll always dream of you." They sang together. Yuri's smile reached from ear to ear. Nothing could ruin this moment. Not a single thing…

Her father reached down to touch a rosy cheek of hers. As his hand descended, the sounds came back. Intensifying as his hand made contact…

She woke up.

"COME ON! GET ON YOUR FEET!"

She was blinded by reality. Dragged up to her feet by another soldier. She woke up. Descending from her blissful heaven and dragged into hell. Bewildered, she looked around. Ash. Smoke. Gunfire. Death. They filled the garden in the shadow of the Minervan City Hall. The Iscariots had breached their line.

Everywhere she looked, she saw death. Everything she listened to, she heard screaming. Her mind was still half stuck in her dream. But her eyes saw everything.

"Say nighty night. Go play with the stars above…"

An Imperial Wolfman charged into a Revolutionary Lizardman with a spear. The sharp object pierced the Lizard's stomach, and he doubled over, the spear sinking further in. He collapsed as it was drawn out and the Wolfman used his fist to knock the Lizardman down.

"I'll sing a song, to tell you I love you…"

She looked elsewhere. An elf with baby blue skin used magic to hold an Imperial Eagle in place. The Imperial slowly started to shake and collapsed. Vomiting blood and spazzing out in a seizure. Blood boiling…

"Up in the place, where you'll dream of me…"

Horrified, Yuri's eyes darted someplace else.

A human fixed his bayonet into his rifle and charged straight into the back of a fox. The bayonet sunk into the fox's spine, and she screamed as it went in, falling to her knees. Using his boot, he kicked her dying body off of his musket. On to his next target. Until a panther used a sharp metal object lying on the ground to slit his throat. He died instantly as a line of blood fell to the ground, falling face-first into the mud.

"I'll always dream of you…"

"AAAAAAH!"

Yuri turned just in time to see a Goatman charging straight at her with a spear from the ash. She unsheathed her dagger, reflexes carrying her, and sidestepped his spear charge. Plunging the knife right into the Goat's belly. He fell over, still alive, and trying to hit Yuri off of his body. Yuri's heart was thudding fast, her mind gone. She held him down with her left arm and a knee to the chest and proceeded to pummel his face with her right fist. Each time her fist made an impact with his face, a deep 'Thud!' erupted.

"Thud!"

"Thud!"

"Thud!"

Still not dead, Yuri reached for a stone nearby. Raised it. And slammed it into his face. Killing him in an explosion of blood and broken bones. The gore terrified her, and surprised at her own savage killing of the Imperial, she fell off of him. Scrambling to her feet. A dragon flew past somewhere, incinerating soldiers on the ground as they cried for help. Burning alive. Explosions kicked up dirt everywhere, trees caught on fire, people fought and died. She had woken up in the closest thing to Hell in Minerva.

"FALL BACK TO THE TRENCHLINE! GO! GO!" A commander yelled out over the fog of combat. The Revolutionaries disengaged from the fighting, abandoning the line at the wall to a better defensive position further inside of the Garden. It shielded the rear doors of the City Hall with trenches dug into the ground, and mounds of dirt built up to act as a very effective wall. Yuri didn't register it, but her legs had started carrying her there. Bursting into a sprint. The dragons begun torching everything in their path. Their screeches sounded like metal against metal, filling her spine with terror. Keeping her running. But something grabbed her shoulder, she was turned around to face an Imperial. She was unable to determine the species, the visor of its helmet covered its face. In its clutch was a mace. Yuri wore no helmet. If the Imperial succeeded in slamming the mace into her head, she had no chance of survival.

"SCREECH!"

The Imperial stopped to deduce the source of the frightening sound. They both looked up, and they beheld a dragon. About to torch everyone in its sight. Friend or foe. It opened its jaw and blew a huge fireball out from the depths of its throat. Both the Imperial and Yuri began to run, but the fireball exploded before they could get out of its path…

Yuri awoke again, wiping off the dust and the mud from out of her eyes. She slowly got to her feet, rifle at her side. Every part of her body was paining her, she had received a lot of injuries this battle. It seemed quiet… too quiet.

She looked to her side, and the Imperial was getting to its feet too. It had raised its visor to reveal the face of a human. Like her. When they locked eyes, they both raised their weapons. She her rifle, he his spear. They were bound to kill each other. Staring into the other's eyes, the windows to the soul.

But they just stood there. Either exhaustion, or sympathy, or both, holding them back. They both had enough of the fighting, and the death. They both wanted this to end. She could see it in his eyes. He could see it in hers. Maybe it was because they were both humans. Maybe.

Yuri held her rifle up, staring into his eyes. He into hers. She began to lower it, just a little. And the Imperial did the same. She nodded, he nodded. They both lowered their weapons completely in mutual understanding in a silent, unwritten, and yet heartfelt agreement.

She looked up to the sky. The sun was shining through the clouds. Rays of golden light had fallen upon them. The Iscariots fought. The Revolutionaries fought. Sometimes, they fought hard enough that they would break through the cloud of war, and find a new world all in its own…

Just out of reach…

A snowflake fell onto Yuri's nose. Melting on her skin upon contact. It snowed no longer. The Imperial took a breather, hands on his knees.

"Fall back! Fall back!" Said an Imperial general. Yuri and the Imperial Human locked eyes again. Saying a final farewell. Maybe it was final. Perhaps they'd meet again. Yuri hoped not. The Imperial would live to see another day, as all creatures should. He had a story to tell. And Yuri had one too. They all did. Many stories had ended today. Never to be heard by anyone ever again in the future. Buried in the face of when the creatures devolved into their most savage state in warfare. But behind every flag, behind every gun, behind every sword, was a living creature. They came from all over the continent to fight in this war. Each for different reasons. And here, they fought without the guarantee of a tomorrow…

Yuri knew what Combat was now. She hated it. One taste and she never wanted to see it again. She knew Cathy was right. Despite the intense hatred she had felt for the Iscariot Empire (Which she still felt), she hated the violence and the bloodshed. But she was in too deep now. There was no chance to back out.

Yuri reflected on this as she and another Revolutionary carted the dead bodies into graves a few hours later. They were right next to the Exeter River. Separated from the land by a stone wall that bordered the dirt and the water. Across the Exeter was the Magical University, its bright and colorful blue, purple and pink rooftops stretched into the sky like crystals. The tallest buildings in the entire city.

The battle was over a Revolutionary victory. They kept the injured civilians inside of the City Hall safe and kept the Hall as a functioning center for all of the displaced in Minerva. They had won a huge victory, proving that the Revolutionaries could fight.

There was something else in the air too. Two objects flying in the skies. Yuri's eyes had caught it. They looked like black dots flying in the air. Dragons maybe?

"Those aren't dragons!" A Revolutionary said looking at the two objects.

"Well, it has to be! It's big and it can fly! It has to be!" Another argued.

"I dunno, but they certainly aren't dragons! Whatever they are."

Yuri and a Lizardman put an Iscariot body into an unmarked grave. Using a shovel, they covered the body with dirt and patted it down. It was the least they could do to clean up after such a battle. Doing such hard work had left Yuri thirsty, and so she joined the Revolutionaries by the water to pick up her canteen. She looked at the objects, her mind thinking of what they could be.

"Choppers," Yuri said.

A pink elf with white hair turned to look at her with a puzzled look, "What?" He asked.

"Cathy told me about those. They're Ithacan. She said that the Ithacans called them Choppers."

"So the Ithacans can fly, eh? I've heard of their mechanical beasts of war," Said a human woman on her opposite side, "They can tear through an entire army of Imperials in one go."

"Yeah? Well, where the hell were they in the battle we just fought? We could've used their help y'know…" The elf asked.

"They probably don't even know we exist, truthfully. Their fight is against the Iscariots. Not with us!"

The two choppers had gathered quite a lot of attention, as a group had formed to watch the mechanical beast fly. True to their name, they made a distinct chopping sound as they flew through the air.

"They're flying too close to the Magical University!" Said a Reformists from not too far away, "If they fly any closer, the Mages there could shoot them down!"

And as if he had spoken it into existence, it happened. A bright red flash shot from inside the walls of the University. It followed one chopper, impacting into it, and bursting in an explosion.

"Woah!" The crowd let out a shocked gasp, witnessing the chopper being shot down. The chopper caught on fire and started to spin out of control until it rose and impacted with the other. Now they both were spinning out of control. And they were coming closer. Straight towards the City Hall. One splashed into the Albya river not too far away, and the other was going to impact right into the crowd!

"RUN! GET OUT OF HERE!"

"GO! GO!"

The crowd began to run as they made way for the crashing chopper. It straightened out just above the ground before it slammed into the ground and took out a bunch of trees with its blades. Its impact shook the ground, as it tore through everything. Pushing dirt aside like a toy and uprooting trees in its path with its greyish metal body. Yuri had already begun running, but her exhausted body was too slow. She felt herself get pushed forward into the dirt in the chaos. Narrowly missing death, and yet impacting the ground hard enough to lose consciousness…

"Say nighty night."

"Kiss the dark sky."

"I'll sing a song, to tell you I love you."

"Up in the place where you'll dream of me."

"I'll always dream of you."

"I love you…"

"It's true…"

"I love you….!"