They were uniform in their gait, any small splinters of personality stripped from their being as they resumed their advance on Union City.

They walked slowly and with single-minded purpose, pressing forward even as Union City’s forces bristled and hesitated.

“Do we…kill them?” Someone called out.

Nobody responded. There was fighting willing opponents who were fighting back, and then there was fighting the puppeted bodies of those who clearly wished to surrender a moment earlier.

It was a lot easier to justify killing in one of those scenarios than the other.

All the while, they marched onwards.

Theo opened his mouth and, taking in the biggest breath of air he could, started to sing. It was the same song he sang the night before, and for a moment the crowds stumbled.

“It can be interrupted!” The control re-asserted itself moments later, but the sign was clear. There were ways to wake them up, or even put them to sleep.

Theo kept singing, but it didn’t affect them again. Still, that wasn’t important.

There was a chance.

“Any bards or mages who has something that might help, to the front lines. Warriors, protect, defend, and fall back when necessary. We’re aiming to delay and incapacitate here.” A commanding voice rang out, as the nature of the battlefield changed. Theo recognised it as Maria’s, but there was a certain quality to it that he hadn’t noticed before.

More voices rang out, more spells were cast, and more trances were temporarily broken, but even so the army shambled forward.

And then stumbled, as the ground beneath their feet liquefied. Theo changed his tune, leaving the matter of breaking the spell to others and focusing on slowing them down. A moat of free-flowing mud appeared in a ring around the perimeter, tripping several and trapping others as he moved his attention to another part of the earth, greaves and boots stuck in the mud that rapidly hardened.

As they tried to remove themselves and pull themselves out, the earth around their hands also liquefied and resolidified, removing any chance they had of getting themselves out of their predicament.

He wasn’t the only one, as Jade and Sasha were also trapping their adversaries in an impromptu mud bath.

This scene repeated itself across the battlefield, as other bards and mages and instructors trapped them in all manner of ways, from freezing in place, to pushing them into the ground through force and wind, to others manipulating the mud.

The churned earth became a forest of limbs and metal, swaying in an invisible breeze as they struggled against their trappings.

The Woods took offense to that mockery, as hundreds of vines emerged from the earth, surreptitiously wrapping themselves around the ankles of everyone still standing, and pulling them off balance. Once they fell, stronger roots and brambles emerged to encase them in a cemetery of coffins.

Once more, the battlefield fell silent, as all adversaries were incapacitated.

Theo and the others waited around, on edge, for an hour or so, but there was no activity or movement from Etol besides the constant attempts at moving by the unfortunate puppets stuck in The Woods’ limbs.

After that, they returned to the wall, to meet up with the priests and everyone else.

While they were farther away from where the action had taken place, they were still on edge, anticipating a surprise or stealth attack at any and all points, especially after those hidden rogues snuck up on Theo.

Theo sat down, got checked over by a priest, and looked out over the battlefield as the midday sun beamed down. It was bright and cheerful, and felt completely inappropriate for the amount of blood that had spilled onto the land.

Jenny sat down soon after, close enough to chat to him, but far enough away that they couldn’t touch.

They sat there, in the silence, as the sun moved overhead and there was no activity on Etol’s side.

As the kept watch, some of the tension drained out of Theo, his shoulders relaxing as he closed his eyes for a moment.

---

Theo woke to Jenny gently shaking him. “Meeting time.”

He looked over to see people gathering, trickling in from all over. He spotted his fellow bards, the warriors he’d been fighting alongside, the mages and priests and everyone else. Well, almost. Something felt off but that was hardly unusual given the circumstances.

It was like the meeting last night, except the events of the past few days were definitely wearing on everyone.

If there was a general word to describe the mood, it was exhausted.

Looking around at the dark rings starting to faintly form under eyes, Theo knew he wasn’t the only one who hadn’t been sleeping well.

Beyond the bags, there were unfocused eyes that stared straight ahead at nothing, bodies slumped over in chairs, chins propped up on hands, and a general air of sweaty slouching.

“There is news.” John rasped, voice hoarse and scratchy. Theo wouldn’t have been surprised if he had been shouting the whole day. “We have all seen now what they are using those prayers for. It is another perversion of faith and decency and violates basic autonomy. There is no action too shameless, too unethical for them to consider. We must prepare for the worst, and assume they will continue to act in this manner.”

The air sharpened, less a honed blade and more a heavy, rusted axe head still capable of splitting a log through sheer force. It was a tired focus, dark and hardened by the horrors of the recent past,

“But thankfully, during the lull we were able to conduct research. Duncan?” The blindfolded man gestured and Duncan, as muscular as ever even under his priestly garb, became the centre of attention.

He coughed, clearing his throat. “We uh, tested the prayer theft’s area of effect. It covers almost half of Union City, and is not static. We hypothesise that it is related to Guiding Will’s location, and we will continue to test it tonight.” He tried to not stammer, face drawn in a tight, terrified look.

“Thank you, Duncan. In summary, we are not without divine magic from now on. We just need to be cautious about the location of our priests. As such, we will be dividing our priests between two outposts: one for triage close to the frontlines; and one in the Commerce District. Those in critical condition will be stabilised in triage by bards and then brought into Union City for further treatment. Any priests that exhaust their mana supply will head to triage and swap places with a priest who still has mana.”

Heads bobbed in agreement, and there was a sense of relief, especially among the bards. The priests, however, looked eager, restless after a day of not being able to use magic.

“Thank you, Contemplation of Moonlit Silence.” Maria nodded in his direction, and received a nod in return. “The other major issue we must address is the nature of the control itself.”

The mood died, as everyone remembered how horrifying it was to watch the spell assert itself. They became puppets unable to fight against the strings around their limbs.

“We know there are people in there. We know this is not their doing or desire. However, we lost warriors today. To the families of those twelve brave souls we will be organising memorials and commendations once this matter is all settled. It shouldn’t have happened, and we will do our best to make sure it won’t happen again. If the choice is between saving your own life and sparing that of the enemy’s, you know what to do.”

Theo scanned the crowd again, and found that the number of warriors present was indeed smaller than yesterday.

Nobody he was close to, thankfully.

He felt relief, then guilt.