Chapter 2:  The Assault

“What's wrong?" Merin asked jumping out of her chair.

"There's no time!  Get to the castle's main gate now!"  the messenger shouted and ran back out into the downpour.  Aceton and Syphil looked at each other.

"We'd better get going," Aceton said.

With his hand on his chin, Syphil suggested, "It sounds like trouble.  We shouldn't go unarmed."

"Something tells me you're right," Aceton replied.  "I've got some weapons in the forge."  He picked up a lamp and rushed out of the dining room and into the forge with Syphil following.

The blackness of the forge was interrupted by a warm amber light when Aceton entered the room.  He walked over to a table strewn with half-completed projects and ordinary swords.  There he found his newest, most precious, and unnamed sword, sheathed it, and tossed another sword at Syphil.  Barely catching for lack of light, Syphil asked, "You don't have any spears?  Swords aren't really my thing."  Aceton promptly tossed a spear at him, which the guard caught enthusiastically.

With the words "thank you" travelling into his ears, Aceton attached the sheath to his waist and grabbed a shield.  "Ready?" he asked.

Letting a smile show, Syphil answered, "As ready as I'll ever get."

"For Gradice!" Aceton declared.  They exited into the torrent of rain.

Running was not Syphil's favourite thing to do, though he seemed destined to do it perpetually.  He recalled his long hours of training to be a guard.  He remembered the heat of a relentless sun beating his shoulders while he would run enormous distances.  Now, as icy shards of rain struck his shoulders, he found running easier, not because he wasn't hot as he had been in the past, but purely because of the contrast in scenarios.

Aceton was not so opposed to running even though he preferred anaerobic activities.  Of course he could not enjoy this dark run because of the weight he had on his mind.  He too had been having prefigurative feelings.  The difference between the premonitions of the king and his premonitions was that Aceton ignored his own.  His next thought almost stopped his running:  What if his lord was correct to plan the formation of an army?  He shuddered, partly because of the cold rain and partly because of his thoughts.

Their vision started to stretch out into the light of the gate torches as they approached their destination.  There they saw a huge crowd of drenched, dim figures gathered around the gate.

In the middle of this human semicircle stood King Riten and his top adviser, Wilder.  Riten was always composed, though not stoic; he was a warm and generous man.  He understood the weight of his responsibilities, and rather than stuffing his ego with it, Riten let it fuel his vigour for the maintenance of their grand state.

That is why he'd been so troubled lately.  His majesty loved Gradice.  It had been good to him and to all that he had known.  But now these dreams.  Dreams that were not eventful or narrative.  Dreams that were not concrete but completely abstract.  They were a psychological ambiance that contained nothing but strife, suffering, darkness, and evil.  In his sleep he felt thousands of voices crying in agony and fatigue; and it never stopped.

After their first occurrence, months prior to this dim night, the dreams plagued Riten for the rest of his life.  A good night's sleep would have been the king's new holy grail had he not been so selfless.  Rather than burden the populace with profound, grim descriptions of his feelings, he told only his most trusted friends.  Wilder was one of the first.

His majesty's Royal Adviser of the People's Wellness was an old and wise man.  Wilder stood bald in the crown, wrinkled and compacted in the face, and hunched in the body.  He had been old for as long as Aceton could remember.  His manner was slow, cautious, never presumptuous.  No one ever challenged his suggestions because no one ever found fault with them, and no one ever wanted to find fault with them.

Wilder was shocked when he learned of the king's troubles and amazed doubly when he heard of his lord's proposition of an army.  Though reluctant, even as he stood at the gates in the rain, he had assisted the king in planning a complete and organized Grand Army of the Kingdom Gradice.  If not for this initiative taking place months before, much, if not all, would have been lost on this night.

Aceton and Syphil finally reached hearing range.  The king spoke.  "My loyal and dear friends, it is with my worst fears realized that I speak tonight.  For months, my slumber was plagued with fear and darkness.  From this I knew a terror was coming, but I knew not when.  And though these 'dreams' were not pleasant, I am thankful that I had them, for now, I speak not only with my greatest fears realized, but with my greatest hopes in mind.  Wilder and I have devised a strategy for such a situation as tonight.

"To those who have not been informed: a group of ships have come from the north and landed on a beach west of the city.  It appears to be an assault force, designed to strike quickly and to retreat quickly.  They are setting up camp as we speak and will arrive here shortly. We  greatly outnumber them. Our main objective is to defend human lives; all else is secondary.  Half of you will take the offensive, the other half will hold for charge. Every thirteenth person reporting for a weapon will be assigned as leader over the previous twelve.

"Though I thought it unlikely, I dreaded the possibility of war.  Ours is  a peaceful kingdom.  But tonight, we must take up arms hesitantly, our goal being, not slaughter, but defence.  And so, as a new enemy approaches to challenge our strength, let the enemy be refuted, as it is destroyed!  Now, forward! For Gradice!"

"For Gradice!" the crowd echoed, and with high morale formed a file passing by King Riten, Wilder, and the assistants passing out weapons.  As each passed by he was blessed by the king and handed one of the relatively new weapons that the king had obtained – the very same weapons Aceton had forged for the walls of the castle. Since they already had weapons, Aceton and Syphil did not pass through the queue and hence were not assigned to groups. They thought that they would be most useful in the offensive group and moved toward the forming group of infantry.

While walking into the formation, Syphil's eye caught sight of some dim, orange, flickering halos in the distance. It was the enemy – the mysterious, foreign force that unnaturally thirsted for Gradician blood. It was something that Syphil, or any resident of Gradice, could not comprehend. Violence without provocation, conquest, and greed were as foreign to them as airships.

Shaking! Courageous as they were (they were indeed there at risk of their own lives) the limbs of the troops quaked in anticipatory fear of the battle nigh. The ground rocked under the might of both armies marching toward each other. On that night, all the world's souls shivered.

The two men stood betwixt the two groups, weapons drawn. They marched, closer and closer towards the adversary. Finally, the men in the front line, including Aceton and Syphil, caught sight of the individuals in the opposing force, and eventually they discerned: It was not men that they were fighting but unholy beasts. They were scrawny, swift, and sickening beings that were  languidly vicious. Each one rose at least a forearm's distance above any one man. Their skin was grey and shiny in the wet torchlight, and their yellow eyes had nothing but withheld hate, waiting for  wild release.

And so it began. An event began that no imagination would ever have envisaged the night before. The enemy drew their brutal, alien weapons and charged into their opposers' ranks with a harrowing shriek. Some men of good reflex were able to defend themselves against the first rush; others without such skill, overcome by the speed and suddenness of the attack, were felled immediately, much to the distress of the men behind them.

Aceton's instincts and Syphil's training took over. For the duration of the fight, their whole beings were entirely physical. Thought was not present in either person's mind. They were machines that slew beasts. Nothing more.

Fortunately for the new army of Gradice, the beasts were easy to destroy. Their expertly crafted weapons tore through the fragile bones of the evil fiends. Unfortunately, the wicked weapons of these scrappy imps seemed to have been designed primarily to torture rather than kill. Their barbed, studded, and spiked weapons would lodge in the bodies of the men, wounding but not killing them, and there they would lay with icy shards of rain battering their open wounds.

The battle raged, back and forth on the great coastal plain west of Gradice. As the offensive group started to diminish in number, it was pushed back (somewhat of its own intention) towards the city. There, the defensive group combined with them to form a single, united unit. Unfortunately, the enemy suddenly lost interest in fighting the army when it saw the city. The beasts started leaping over and around the Gradician ranks and into the city, showing no concern for their own lives but completely focused on the destruction of the city above all else.

Aceton and Syphil met with each other and rushed into the city to stop the enemy. There they slew an uncountable number of monsters while watching their glorious urban landscape blaze. By the time the enemy fell into retreat, half of the city was engulfed in flame.