Commander Nikolas Campbelle of the First Kadrac Ranger Regiment wasn’t a happy man. Not since his daughter was a prisoner of war, and not when he was practically forbidden to initiate a ransom offer. The war between Rumiga’s Empire and the Federation of City-States was just ramping up in the West, even though the fires of war in the east raged hot enough to melt iron.

Simply put, they couldn’t afford to go to the negotiation table this early, not when doing so would betray their plans and goals. Convoluted plans, unnecessarily so, in his opinion. If they were to wage war, then they should do so open and aboveboard. Not like this, where they lingered and stalled.

Faron’s Crossing wasn’t so much a military goal as a target of opportunity. It was the jewel of the west, where wealth passed through its coffers. They were excellent trade partners too, and they bought up nearly a quarter of Kadrac’s beef exports.

But the Council had voted and agreed. War. And they must drive the Verdanians from the plane, or suffer the consequences of failure.

He wasn’t truly on board with allying with the Chaos Courts either, but at least none of their Chaos Lords were here now. They will be after the Celestial Refraction, and then the next phase of the war will begin.

Right now, he was blowing off steam by yelling at the Verdanians behind their walls. They weren’t fools after all, but one could hope some would be hot-headed enough to answer his provocation.

He was quite well-protected and, barring a Sorcerous attack, he was quite certain of survival.

The Sorcerer. He shivered at the idea of a battle Sorcerer in Faron’s Crossing. Intelligence reports indicated that there was no such being in town, but early reconnaissance had spotted trouble from a detached element of the Empire’s legion. Thankfully, the entire battle group had crossed the Zarek over to the east and they would be Ivala’s problem now. Unfortunately, the weapon that had been reported turned out to be a Sorcerer and that said creature was here as evidenced by the molten slag that was the remains of the Steam Cannon.

The bigger question now was how many Adept-level or higher fighters the Verdanians had. Faron’s Crossing was an elders’ town. He knew that from visiting a few years ago. There were fewer children compared to the number of adults, though the ratio of Adepts to weaker humans was below the published Imperial average of one per five hundred.

Yesterday’s skirmish with the marksman, Knight Marron Davar, against Archer-Adept Melissandra Hartman had been enlightening. Intelligence reports had Davar as a relatively fresh Knight, although if he remembered correctly, he was the son of Knight-Captain Virgil Davar. His prowess certainly matched his lineage. Hopefully, as a young man, he would be temperamental enough to rise to his baiting.

There were always two parts to a battle. The first was the common warriors. The infantry, cavalry, and archers. Marksmen now too, actually. Training and discipline, as well as equipment, would help determine victory in battle. Then, there were the elites.

Adepts, Barbarian Elders, and Knights. Warriors powerful enough to take on an entire platoon on their own. Common practice pitted elite against elite, and commoner against commoner. Elite units can be overwhelmed by common units, but do so by paying a price in blood. However, a large enough gap in numbers, by hundreds or thousands, would see elites overwhelmed, though only if they were foolish enough not to flee. But elites waging guerilla battles was a nightmare for any invading force.

Common units left without elite backup eventually found themselves routed by the elites, even if the common units backing them were outnumbered. Elites fought against elites, and if one wasn’t contained, then that elite would wreak havoc among the other units. If he could take out an enemy elite then that would go a long way to winning this war.

Even if the objectives of this campaign didn’t call for a swift victory, he would rest easy if things were tilted in Kadrac City’s favour.

“Commander!” His chief bodyguard, Gerhard Svanon, grabbed his shoulder and pointed at Faron’s Crossing’s walls. He didn’t really need to as what happened was rather eye-catching.

A flare of golden light, reminiscent of the one a couple of nights ago, flared up. He could make out a figure within the golden bonfire.

“Are they going to fight?” He whispered with a savage grin. “Get ready.”

Other than himself, Svanon was also an Adept. Even better, he was close to becoming a Master and has a firm grasp of his Ennoia. The rest of his security detail were the cream of the crop. All twenty men and women at the Intermediate level, each were carrying varied relics and reproductions of ancient pre-Shattering age weapons and armour. He was quite confident, especially if the golden bonfire-clad Knight was brash enough to come alone.

Ah, there he went.

The bonfire receded but a bright glow still covered the figure, who had just launched himself off the wall. Nikolas blinked and the figure was already halfway across the three hundred paces between the walls and his squad.

His men spread out, readying their weapons. None of them carried the hand cannons as they were too bulky. Instead, five of them carried tower shields, ten carried halberds, and the other five wielded composite bows. Nikolas had a longsword on his hip and a hand crossbow on the other side. He didn’t have a polearm or spear. He was a commander and didn’t fight in the vanguard if he could help it. His Animus spread out and connected him to each of his warriors as well as with Svanon. The nearly invisible tendrils would allow them to communicate wordlessly and immediately. He had a rather modest range, just under a longstride. Commander Holster exceeded that range by a couple hundred paces and could sustain more connections too.

The enemy Knight had come close enough for Nikolas to make out his…her features.

A young woman. And incredibly beautiful. Why was she fighting for the other side? A treacherous whisper at the back of his mind told him that it was he who was fighting the wrong side. He should be at her side and doing her bidding…

What in the Abyss?!

The thoughts of everyone around him, except for Svanon, were in the same vein. They started to put down their weapons, and all of them, men and women alike, had a silly grin on their faces.

A mental assault!

It took a long heartbeat, but Nikolas sent a pulse along his connections that jolted his people from their stupor. Barely in time. The woman was close enough to strike. She was surrounded by flying golden daggers that revolved around her body, and she wielded two weapons, a sword and dagger. The flying daggers, about half of the dozen, stabbed straight towards his vanguard, who barely managed to raise their shields in time.

He barely had time to gasp when the daggers flew around the shields and stabbed into the vanguard’s arms and shoulders, while one nearly got stabbed fatally in the eye. Only their helmets and armour allowed them to live.

Another step and the frightening woman slashed horizontally with her sword. The tower shield of her target, sheathed in Animus, was cut in twain, and the man’s arm with it. The wounded man fell back, not even able to scream before his eyes rolled and he fainted.

“Enough!” Svanon grunted as he disappeared from Nikolas’ side and appeared behind her, stabbing at her back with both of his short swords. Each blade, Nikolas knew, was sheathed in elemental wind, which made the weapons sharp enough to cut through the thickest forceweave.

The woman’s flying daggers intercepted Svanon’s stabs, and the man jumped back, nearly faster than Nikolas’ eyes could track. That also meant that none of his guard would be able to catch his movements. Was the Verdanian woman able to see?

It turned out, yes. She spun around and matched Svanon’s follow-up stabs easily, dodging by a hair’s breadth, and easily counter attacking with either her handheld sword or dagger. All the while, the flying daggers moved to fend off the rest of them.

Flank. Pen her in. Archers, loose on my command. Loose!

They shot their arrows as soon as they sensed his command, and each one targeted a different space, blocking of her avenues of retreat. The flying daggers moved to intercept.

Spears, strike!

A couple of spears made it past her defences while Svanon pinned her with a windblade. She dodged the elemental attack, but couldn’t do the same for the spears.

Nikolas felt a pang of pity, for the lovely flower was about to be plucked. The spear points struck at her back, only to stop less than an inch from her overcoat. The golden light around her solidified and repelled the spears. The spearhafts visibly bent, and then the woman leaned into the attack, and the spearmen had to step back or have their weapons break!

Nikolas gritted his teeth, and briefly considered engaging in battle too. But no, he couldn’t risk himself. The woman…girl, now that he had an even better look, was incredibly strong. The way she fought against Svanon, the way she avoided his strikes as though she knew exactly how and where each strike would go, made it seem like they were in a dance.

It was a dance that would quickly turn into an execution.

Sweat beaded on Nikolas’ forehead. Svanon was holding his own, but…there were nearly two dozen of them against one woman! And somehow, he knew that she was still holding something back!

He had to help. He drew his hand crossbow. The range was minuscule, less than ten paces. The bolt was an injector type, and there was poison in it. The problem was, would the weapon even penetrate the woman’s defences?

He shoved his Animus into it, building and shaping it to become as sharp and as penetrative as it could go. He invested nearly half of his five hundred lumen reserve into it, and the weapon shook. The thing wasn’t built to hold that much Animus, and the bolt was within seconds of breaking apart. He aimed and commanded his troops to force an opening.

Twang.

The thudding of the string was muted, barely audible a couple of paces away. And he had manoeuvred himself and his team to strike her from behind.

She didn’t even look back. Her hand simply whipped around and batted the bolt out of the air. It struck at muddy ground and bounced off, landing a couple of paces from where Nikolas stood.

“Burn you!” he snarled.

With a deft twist, the woman, the Golden Terror, spun under Svanon’s guard and stabbed him with her dagger. His dark-haired bodyguard’s green eyes widened in surprise and a little bit of fear, but before the weapon could so much as graze his leather coat, he blurred and disappeared.

The woman spun around as she deflected the spear strikes and arrows. Her eyes darted about and zeroed in on Nikolas, and then shifted to his left where Svanon had reappeared. The look on her face was…strange.

He had seen anger and hate just before she engaged them, but it was absent now. Her eyes twinkled with excitement and joy, and she had a wide, heart-stopping grin on her lips. He felt his heart skip a beat and his mouth grew dry. The mental influence redoubled and it took all he had just to stop himself from kneeling.

The woman said with sultry tones, “Don’t tell me that’s it? I’m far from satisfied.”

What kind of…? Nikolas gulped as his body reacted to her voice. No, no! He was happily married and she was a Verdanian!

Svanon howled and launched himself at her. He vanished from sight and appeared at her left. She reacted instantly and deflected his thrust with her parrying dagger, and retaliated with the other weapon and the ones revolving around her. Svanon ducked the sword, but the daggers stabbed into his armour. It immediately turned red and started to melt. With a curse, he retreated back to Nikolas’ side.

A fiery arrow dropped from the skies, and the woman slammed it away. But Adept Hartmann’s attack wasn’t that easy to neutralize and the Golden Terror had to step back even as her arm shook after the forceful deflection. It only took her a couple of steps back, and the mud around her feet rippled away.

Another Adept, Gian the Hammer, landed near Nikolas, holding his greatmaul with his gauntleted hands. His metal plate armour covered nearly every inch of him, and he was as wide as three normal men. The mud hardened beneath his feet, and he stood threateningly.

Melissandra was some distance away and Nikolas quickly connected with her. Now, there were four of them against one Golden Terror.

But why did her grin grow wider?