‘Negotiate… how silly.’ Shalltear thought and felt the army at her back grow tense with anticipation. “That’s nice!” She shouted back at the big froglady, “But I don’t!” She all but cackled at her answer and lowered her lance toward the wall. “Go on, get even… but leave a few alive as a tribute to our Lord.”

Crusch Lulu shouted her orders and her magic casters launched fireballs toward the walls, even from where she stood, it was obvious that the glorious days of yesterday or earlier were gone. They were weakened, weary, and some of those on the wall still had obvious small wounds on their bodies. They leaned on spears rather than standing proudly at the ready, as the big one did.

Flames roared forward, arcing overhead to crash into the walls. Frogmen leapt away from the flames, diving behind cover with their powerful fear-fueled legs.

At her back, Crusch Lulu heard the shout of [Magic Arrow], and frogmen began to tumble from the wall. Frogmen magic casters had yet to respond, but the albino lizardwoman had little hope that this would remain the case forever.

Kyuku bellowed an angry roar and charged ahead, his white bone armor was attention getting in the best of times, and coupled with his angry roaring and furious charge, he drew missile fire from every corner that could reach him before the frogmen realized their spears were just not enough by themselves to draw blood.

The weary warriors of the frogmen were heavy-limbed and slow, but they had the high ground on the walls, and whether Zaryusu wanted to admit it or not, he was compelled to acknowledge that they were brave, even fearless. The sound of voices activating warrior arts was punctuated by the cries of slaughterers and the slaughtered, the shouts so loud and ferocious that the sprays of blood were buffeted farther away from the wall than force alone allowed.

The frogmen were clearly much reduced in numbers, and their martial arts had begun to flag, the tide of fighting went back and forth at the low walls, howls, ribbits and hisses of pain or fury went on while the two sides tore at one another.

“Again!” Crusch Lulu shouted and held her hand commandingly out from her body, sending another wave of magical blasts that tore into the ranks of the frogmen on the wall, Some fell down, pierced through and through by magic arrows that hit hard enough to carry their bodies back onto their fellows waiting.

But fearless enemies jumped to take the place of their comrades, regardless of the stones that flew from slings to pierce their brains.

All was chaotic and madness, with no gate to batter down, the lizardmen hacked at the wall or climbed over each other to mount and fight claw to hand, club to club, or spear to spear. The few frogmen to pick up swords found that they were less useful than they hoped, requiring more skill to use despite their greater sharpness, and so they threw the swords down at lizardmen and chose to revert to their spears instead.

Heads jabbed up and down, and the fighting teetered back and forth between the press of both sides until the big one holding the strongest point taunted the ranks of the chiefs behind the lizardmen and bellowed out.

“Behold the chiefs of the lizardmen! They hide while your Queen stands with you! Will you let her die here, protecting your own young from cowards?!”

Invigorated by her projected voice, the frogmen struggled on, the bodies of defeated frogmen falling before the walls, and the lizardmen who died attempting to rise to the top in turn, slowly became a rampart that led up to the wall itself.

And on these dead and dying, the lizardmen began to rise.

Foremost among them, came Kyuku Zuzu, his white bone armor fending off every blow, and his fellow lizardmen began to follow him to the top, his fists deflected blows, his tail lashed with fury. “Kill frogmen!” He bellowed his rage out, snatching spears that missed his body and yanking so hard that the frogmen flew from the walls and fell into the mass of lizardmen whose clubs and spears quickly ended the screams of pain the fallen let out.

Heketi recognized the threat he posed to the wall when her heavies confronted him, and their blows, for all their efforts, seemed to not harm him at all. Kyuku Zuzu’s fist came out, and a frogman’s head exploded in a spray of blood and brain matter that, ever so briefly, froze stiff all those who saw it.

“Queen Heketi challenges you!” She bellowed instantly before another of her elites could fall.

She didn’t run, she jumped, her massive and powerful legs carrying her to soar over the battle area like a bird in flight, and cover her soul with despair at what she saw. The far side of her wall where her people remained was littered with the dead who had fallen to magic, stones, and spears, while the fresh lizardmen had fewer dead to show for it all as near as she could tell.

She landed before the lizardman and snapped her spear down atop the wall, her people cleared the way and the lizardman in white bone armor, and an idiot by her reckoning, held up his fist. “Kyuku fights you!” He bellowed, and the two rushed at one another, his fist was faster than it had any right to be even being martially enhanced, her spear deflected him only by the purest luck again and again, her own martially enhanced body barely kept up.

She landed blow after blow with her free webbed palm, but his bone wrapped armor caught the broad blows, his tail added to the fight, every time he spun she had to leap, to avoid it.

Back and forth they went, a brief truce coming between the two sides for the duel of champions, the Queen versus the Chief, her towering height gave her reach, but his armor and strength was second to none. He stepped on the carpet of bodies as she forced him back away, only for him to advance again threatening to grab her body or her spear.

But such a close fight could not endure forever, and among the chiefs at the rear there was one singular moment of absolute horror when Heketi’s spear struck home, hitting the gap in his armor that only barely exposed his throat… her spear opened up his throat, and Kyuku fell backwards, toppling over the bodies spraying a fountain of blood that stained the white bone armor as he tumbled into the now shattered but freezing places in the water with a sickening splash.

Heketi held up her spear, “Heketi strikes down the one lizardman chief with courage!”