This might be a teeny tiny bit longer than my usual chapters, but I did not want to spread this out, so I decided to just finish it in one chapter.
The battle goes on
Mercury POV
Mercury was deep behind enemy lines and completely alone. He had ambushed a few small patrols and groups of reinforcements for the front line, but had so far managed to avoid any larger battles and more importantly: detection.
Suddenly he heard loud yelling and the sounds of fighting coming from one of the nearby alleys, and as he moved to investigate, he discovered that a force of approximately 30-40 imperial soldiers had cornered around 50 Varden soldiers.
Although the Varden soldiers were superior in number, they seemed to lack any kind of organisation and leadership, so they were naturally being pushed back by the imperials. The Varden group would surely be destroyed if things were allowed to proceed as they were, but luckily for Mercury none of the groups had spotted him hiding in the shadows of an adjacent alley.
Mercury silently crept well behind the imperial line, after which he then started to run towards the back of the imperials without making a single sound. When he was still approximately 10 metres away from the imperials, he reached behind his black cloak with both of his hands, grabbed four of his shurikens and threw them at the back of the neck of the two outermost imperial soldiers at each side.
The shurikens hit their target with a small thud, which was soon followed by the clang of the dead imperials hitting the ground. The other nearby imperial soldiers did not even have time to react, before a decapitation strike slashed the necks of four more of the imperial soldiers, which had been in the middle of the back line.
Panic soon spread to the rest of the imperial soldiers, as they realized that they had come under attack from behind, but did not yet know by how large a force. Two more imperial soldiers died, as they were turning around, and the Varden soldiers at the front used the sudden panic and disorganization of the imperials to kill another five, which only made the imperials panic even more.
What had been intended as an easy cornering of a group of Varden soldiers, soon turned out to be a full scale slaughter for the imperials, as the Varden soldiers stormed the broken front line, while the back line had been decimated, and the troops in the middle were currently too occupied with dealing with this new threat to reinforce the front line, which soon after broke and left the middle soldiers completely defenceless, as they were trapped between a rock and a hard place, and then quickly joined their dead brethren.
"Thank you for the rescue, friend", one of the rescued Varden soldiers said, right after slewing the last imperial soldier.
"No need to thank me", Mercury said, as he began to search the dead corpses for his thrown shurikens, "now tell me, why you are here and where your commanders are? Because the last time I checked, the front line of the Varden was supposed to be at least another half a kilometre further towards the wall".
"Aye, we were ambushed earlier and lost both our commander and our second in command", the soldier spoke with sadness in his voice, "we knew not which way to go, so we ended up here, where we ran into that imperial force".
Hmm, if I leave them, they are sure to die without proper command and direction, but I will not be as mobile if I take them with me, Mercury mused to himself, perhaps it is time that I took a more active role in this battle, instead of simply harassing the enemy from behind.
After he had decided what to do, Mercury examined the state of the soldiers and their numbers, which he found to be 48, and noticed that all of them were also looking at him curiously, no doubt thanks to his strange sword and very unusual armour. He then cleared his throat, looked directly into the eyes of the soldier, which he had spoken to earlier, as he assumed that this was the temporary leader, and said, "you are currently leading this group, am I correct?"
"Yes, I am", came the soldier's a bit nervous answer.
"Good, then I am relieving you of your command and placing this group under my direct command", Mercury firmly stated, which he hoped would leave no room for arguments.
"What, you cannot just do that", a soldier from further behind the rest shouted. "Yeah, Frederic is leading us, we do not even know you", came another soldier's response, which was soon backed up by several similar exclamations.
Mercury gave an irritated sigh, before he eyed the ones who had started the shouting with his most intimidating glare, and said in an annoyed and slightly threatening voice, "your current command is ineffective, and as a result you were nearly wiped out. I know my way around here and is capable of properly leading you, so therefore I am taking command of you, or perhaps I should rather leave you here to perish as you see fit?", and as he said this, he noticed a movement in his peripheral vision.
One of the imperial soldiers had only pretended to be dead, and was now storming towards Mercury with his two-handed sword pointing straight at him. Mercury knew he would never have the time to draw his own sword again, so he quickly turned around, sidestepped the first strike, grabbed right under the soldier's hands with one hand, then with his other hand, he grabbed right under the man's elbow, moved his leg in front of the soldier's legs and used the soldier's own forward momentum to propel him up into the air and then slammed him down on his back a little further ahead. As the man was halfway done flying through the air, Mercury released the man's elbow and used his now free hand to grab his knife at his waist, and when the soldier landed on the ground with a big thump, Mercury stabbed the knife into the soldier's throat, which effectively killed him with a gurgling sound emanating from the throat.
All of this had taken place in less than two seconds, and as Mercury withdrew his knife from the man's throat, he looked at the stunned Varden soldiers and said in an intimidating voice, "any further questions?"
It took a few seconds for anyone to speak, but then Frederic broke the silence by saying, "what are your orders, sir?"
Finally, Mercury mused to himself, two parts respect and one part fear really does make for the best command styles.
"I want everyone to line up in four rows", Mercury said in a clear and commanding voice, "are there anyone proficient with bows or crossbows among you, or any mages for that matter?"
A few hands went up in question to the bows, but no mages were with the group, so Mercury continued in his commanding voice, "I want you six as archers. You three will walk at the houses on our left side and you three on the right. Each side will have an archer forward in our column, one at the middle and one at the back. Your objectives are to scan the rooftops opposite from you for enemies, but the first and middle archers must also be ready to fire at our front on a seconds warning, and the same for the back archers, who will also make sure that we are not surprised by attacks in our back", Mercury then divided the remaining forces into groups of ten, with the exception of the first and last group, who had eleven soldiers, "you eleven will be first squad and are lead by Frederic, which will receive his orders from me. You ten will be second squad and is to be lead by that man", Mercury continued this until he had established four squads, with the first and fourth being comprised of eleven soldiers, and then made the first squad form the first lines in the column, followed by the second squad, then the fourth squad and lastly the third squad, while the chosen archers were at each side of the column and were covering their opposite side.
"Move out men!", Mercury shouted from the front of the column, and received a loud, "Aye, sir", from everyone behind him, after which they began to move forward, while still keeping in formation.
After marching for about 10 minutes, Mercury spotted a large force of imperial soldiers near a junction, while his force was in a relatively narrow alleyway, which would only allow for seven soldiers to be confronting the enemy in the width.
"Archers!", Mercury shouted, and a second later four arrows imbedded themselves into the sides of imperial soldiers, who only then spotted the Varden soldiers, but before they had time to regroup and raise their shields in defence of the arrow attacks, another four arrows hit their marks.
"Front archers, withdraw a few lines back", Mercury commanded, "First squad, form a defensive line in the front. Fourth squad, form a secondary defensive line behind first squad. Third and second squad, prepare to advance through the ranks of first and fourth squad", and as he said his orders, the men followed them, although with some hesitation.
The enemy force soon clashed into first squad, and as they did so, Mercury could more efficiently count their numbers, which he estimated to be around 80-90 soldiers, but due to the small alley, they could not effectively use this number superiority to their advantage.
First squad was soon pushed a bit back, and Mercury knew that if it continued this way, then the enemies would win through sheer numbers, so he quickly ordered the commanders from second, third and fourth squad to his position among third and second squad.
He then looked the commanders directly into the eyes, and said in a tone, which left no room for questioning, "I want fourth squad to be ready to form a new defensive line in front of first squad and tell first squad to rest behind your line until needed. Third and second squad are to advance on the enemy when their lines are disrupted and confusion spreads. Am I clear?"
"Aye, sir", the commanders said in unison, but then the commander of third squad said, "what will cause the disruption, sir?"
Mercury grinned evilly at the commander, while he sheathed his sword on his back, then turned both of the buttons, which were locking his arm-blades into place, threw his arms down, so that the blades sprung forth and said in an intimidating voice, "me".
Mercury then did something, which neither the commanders nor the enemy had anticipated, he ran as fast as he could towards the front line, but instead of meeting the fighting soldiers there, he jumped up and continued to run on the vertical surface of the buildings in the alley, which he could do because he secretly used his magic to tie his feet to the wall each time they met its surface.
The front imperial soldiers all looked up at him in disbelief, but the front Varden soldiers did not, as they could not see him until he had run way past them, so they quickly slew the confused soldiers ahead of them, which then caused the rest of the squads to follow their given orders and attack the confused imperial soldiers.
Mercury ran on the wall until he was three fourths through the enemy lines, after which he then pushed himself off from the wall and dove straight into the middle of the imperial line, where his two arm-blades quickly stabbed the two soldiers, who also cushioned his fall, in their chest.
Mercury then quickly spun around with his arms as wide as he could, and managed to slash the throats of another six soldiers, before the rest understood what was going on and formed a wide circle around him.
Three soldiers attacked with swords from three different angles, but not at the exact same time, so Mercury used his left blade to deflect the first attack towards the third attacker, who then had to parry his friend's attack, and in the meantime used left foot to kick the second attacker's sword away from its path, before he used his right blade to quickly stab the man's throat.
The other two attackers had been too confused by having to parry each other's weapons, to manage to regain their stances, so Mercury quickly stabbed the first soldier in the back with his right blade and then stabbed the third soldier in the side, which did not kill him, but it did incapacitate him.
A handheld spear whistled past Mercury's head right as he killed the two men, but the man holding the spear's aim had been off, so the attack did not hit. Mercury quickly grabbed the end of the spear and pulled at it, which surprised the man holding it, so much that he stumbled and fell to the ground, where his skull was soon split open by one of Mercury's blades.
Mercury kept holding onto the spear as another five men, which were wielding swords, entered the circle, but they were kept at bay for a moment by the long ranger of the spear, which Mercury had taken, before he tried to throw the spear at one of the men, but since Mercury had never learned to properly wield a spear, his aim was off and the spear fell harmlessly to the ground.
I cannot keep doing this. Why have my forces not pushed through yet?, Mercury warily thought to himself, before he leaped towards a lone swordsman, so that he attacked him from above, then pushed the soldier's sword away with his right blade, and stabbed him with his left, before he used the soldier's body to leap further into the air, where he turned in midair and threw another three shurikens at the four remaining swordsmen, but only two managed to kill their targets, as the third was stopped by a shield, before Mercury landed in the middle of the circle again.
Mercury was now panting slightly from exhaustion, whereas the soldier, who had blocked his shuriken with his shield, was grinning evilly at him, before he charged at him with his fellow at his side.
The second swordsman was not very well trained, so Mercury was able to kick his legs away from under him, before he deflected the blow from the more experienced soldier. The experienced soldier was however surprised when Mercury used his left blade to push the soldier's sword the side, and then used his right blade to get under his shield and push it to the other side, before Mercury plunged both his blades into the chest of the man, which made the man replace his evil grin with a gasp of surprise.
The reason behind Mercury's ability to block, deflect and push other people's weapons away, was that when he was able to get in close with his blades, he was able to much faster and much more efficiently move his blades around, than the long blades of the swords or the spears were, and because his blades were secured to his entire forearm, he could use much more force without having to concentrate on holding onto his blade, and then there was also the fact that the people of Alagaësia had never seen this type of fighting, so they did not know how to respond and what to fear, whereas Mercury knew how their fighting styles worked.
By this time, complete panic had spread throughout the imperial lines, as they were being decimated by the advancing forces of second and third squad, while nearly a quarter of their men had been killed by Mercury alone. Mercury took a quick glance behind him and saw that the back of the circle had turned around to face his advancing forces, which he quickly used to kill another three of them, before the rest were slaughtered by his men.
The few remaining imperial soldiers, who had been at the back of their force, were now running in a full retreat, but they were soon killed by a few well placed spears from some of the soldiers of second and third squad.
As the Varden soldiers approached him, Mercury forced his breathing to calm down, although his heart was still racing, so that the men would not see how tired he truly was, and said in the usual commanding voice, "alright men, we have won this battle against a force nearly twice as large as ours, but more still await, so I want fourth squad to take the lead from now on, while first squad will covers our rear, and second and third squad recovers in the middle. You have five minutes to drink a few drops of water and eat, before we move out again".
During the rest, Mercury helped to bandage some of his wounded men, count their and the imperials' casualties, and kill any imperial soldiers, which were still alive on the ground. They had lost a total of 13 men in this battle, with first squad being hit the hardest by six casualties, but in Mercury's mind 13 losses was not a large price to pay, when they had managed to kill 93 enemy soldiers.
Although the rest was not over yet, Mercury still called three of his archers towards him and said, "I want you three to climb up on the rooftops and see if you can spot any enemy forces, friendly forces or anything else of interest and then report directly back to me", to which he received an, "aye, sir", from them all.
When they came back, they reported that they had seen a few enemy forces battling some Varden soldiers towards the north, some larger enemy forces to the east, a few small solitary groups of no more than 5-10 Varden soldiers to the west, and the major front line of the Varden to the south.
After considering their information, Mercury roused everyone and shouted, "The break is up. We are going to replenish our force with some minor isolated Varden forces to the west, where most will go to first squad, before we move northeast and help out other groups, which are trapped and are fighting the imperials".
This time there were no hesitance when the groups moved into formation, and Mercury even heard a few mumble, "the commander is even worse than Stronghammer. Even he would not have been crazy enough to make a stunt like that, and then come out unscathed, while looking like he had just taken a peaceful walk", to which someone replied, "aye, I do not know whether to respect him or fear him, but I surely will not dare to disobey him".
Good, I have their complete obedience, Mercury mused to himself, as he marched with his forces to pick up lost Varden forces, and when I regroup with those new forces, then they will quickly get in line, because I have way more men than any of their commanders, and as long as I make sure to only pick up a few forces at a time, they should not question my authority.
Mercury's forces had finished with picking up stragglers and now numbered 83 men, but had not yet found any magicians to help them. A fifth squad had been added with each squad now counting approximately 15 soldiers, and two more archers had been posted in the middle sections of the column. Only a few people had initially resisted to let Mercury be the commander of the force, where some of them actually held the rank of captain, but each and everyone had been given Mercury's most intimidating stare combined with a not so slightly threatening speech, which had left most of them wanting to run away screaming, but had at the same time been rooted in place by his merciless stare.
"Was it really wise to do that to the officers?", Frederic asked Mercury, as they marched northeast through the city, "at one point, I actually thought one of them was going to start crying".
"It was effective, and if they are going to complain, then they can do so after the battle, provided that we actually win", Mercury simply stated, which ended that conversation, but in his own head, he continued, besides that is the only way I know how to make people follow my orders. It worked just as effective during my school groups, but back then I had to use way less effective threats to make the group obey. I wonder why they kept wanting to be in group with me? It might have been that my groups were always functioning as a well oiled machine, and most often getting way better results than the rest.
During the next half hour, Mercury's forces ran into a few enemy groups, but none were as large as the first group, which they had run into, and due to their additional numbers, casualties were limited, but then as they were walking up a rather large road, which required three squads to form a proper defensive line across, they encountered a larger force, which Mercury estimated to approximately 150 enemy soldiers.
"Your orders, sir?", Frederic asked, as Mercury met with the commanders of his squads.
Mercury quickly eyed the battlefield, the enemy numbers and their general organisation, and then his own forces, before he crouched down on the ground and quickly began to draw his battle plan on it.
"Take second and third squad and guard our flanks, while fifth squad gets the middle", Mercury said, as he visually showed his plan on the map on the ground, "then have first and fourth squad stand directly behind second and third squad, but have the soldiers face the middle of the road instead of the front. I then want fifth squad to feign to be pushed back, and make sure to draw as many enemy forces into this hole as possible, before first and fourth squad attacks the enemies in both their flanks at my signal. Further orders will come after this is done".
"Aye, sir", came the commanders reply in perfect unison, before they instructed their squads on what to do.
Well, here is to see just how much I can use all my hours playing the Total War games, Mercury mused to himself, as he prepared for the upcoming battle.
The battle went even better than Mercury could have hoped, because the enemy commanders apparently thought that the sudden gap in the Varden lines were the start of the complete breakdown of their entire line, so they sent almost all of their forces through the hole, which were then taken completely off guard, as their entire force was attacked in both of their flanks, while fifth squad steadily held firm at their front, and because they used so much of their entire force to push through, second and third squad were able to kill the few enemies still attacking themselves, after which second squad swung round and attacked the primary enemy force in the rear, while third squad guarded second squad's rear from the few enemy stragglers, who had chosen not to rush into the gap.
When the battle was over, Mercury counted the enemy dead to be 143, while his own casualties had been severely lessened by the idiotic leadership of the enemy force, so that the Varden only lost seven of their men, which, combined with previous losses from the small skirmishes from before, reduced Mercury's forces to only 67 men.
It was while Mercury was letting his forces rest and was cleaning up after the battle that Mercury felt something, which he had desperately hoped not to feel at all: his wards protecting Kilgharrah had been activated, which Mercury had only designed them be when all other wards around Kilgharrah had been depleted or broken.
No, they should not be activated, Mercury thought to himself with a bit of fear creeping into his mind, he had 10 elves and a large force of urgalgra and men with him, so that must mean that his protection force is either completely dead or close to it. Judging from his wards, he should only be a few hundred metres east of us.
"I know you are tired men, but we must move out faster than anticipated and help our greatest hope in the battle outside the castle", Mercury shouted, which roused his men, before he gathered the commanders and said, "we move through that alley, and then take the first turn to our left. I want fifth squad to remain at that junction and form a defensive line, so that we will not be attacked in the rear. If fifth squad is about to be overrun, I want you to send a fast messenger to me, and then fall back until you meet up with us again".
"Aye, sir", the commanders said, before Frederic asked, "sir, what is the hope, which we are supposed to rescue, and how do you know of it?"
Mercury looked Frederic directly into his eyes and said, "you will find out soon enough, and I have my own ways of ascertaining this knowledge", which silenced any further questions and made sure that Mercury's ability to use magic did not become common knowledge, even among his own forces.
Before long, Mercury's forces reached a large marketplace, where the men gasped as they for the first time saw a deep royal purple coloured dragon, although many of the scales were covered in blood, and his remaining force of a few elves, a small group of kull and perhaps 10-15 men.
None of the fighting parties had noticed the arrival of Mercury's forces, so Mercury allowed himself to survey the battlefield for a moment, before he would form his battle plan. At the rooftops were about 20 archers firing down on Kilgharrah and his few remaining forces, while a larger force of perhaps 500-550 men were attacking them head on, but from the amount of dead bodies on the ground, Mercury guessed that the enemy force had started out with at least ten times that number.
"Listen up, because I will only say this once", Mercury said in a hushed tone, so that he did not alert the enemy to their presence, "our primary mission objective is the rescue of the dragon, our secondary is to salvage as much of the force assigned to protect him as possible. I will lead first squad around the enemies and cut a path through their rear, while second squad covers our rear, fourth squad then attacks the enemy in their rear and third squad remains as reserves to back up any group, who is about to be overrun. The archers will take cover among the market stalls and begin to pick off the archers on the rooftops. This should enable us to move the dragon and his forces around our fighting line and down through the alley, from which we came. After that, I will fall back with first squad and we will then make a controlled withdrawal to the alley, while the archers cover us. Remember, this is not a winnable battle, so do not try to push through their lines, but merely keep them occupied, and if we are lucky we can retreat back to fifth squad with only minimal casualties".
"Will they not pursue us, sir?", the commander of fourth squad asked.
"I have a plan for that, but I need the dragon alive and well to complete that plan", Mercury simply stated, while he drew his sword, and then moved his men into position.
"On my mark...CHARGE!", Mercury shouted, and as one all of the squads charged and the archers began to fire, which took the imperial soldiers completely by surprise, and enabled Mercury and first squad to cut through the enemy lines and relieve Kilgharrah and his defenders.
"Well met Ensom Vandrer...or should I call you the guardian or some other name?", the elf Laurali tiredly but happily said, as he and his remaining elves were able to rest behind the lines of first squad.
"We can talk about that later", Mercury snapped at the elf, before he chopped off the head of the enemy soldier, which he had been fighting, "right now I need you to take your forces and Kilgharrah, and move behind our lines and towards the alley over there".
What about you? I will not leave you to die, while I flee as a coward, Kilgharrah's voice reverberated through Mercury's mind.
I will have my forces withdraw as soon as I know you are safe, Mercury quickly said, before adding, stay near the beginning of the alley. I have a plan to ensure our retreat.
Kilgharrah grudgingly did as he was told, and when they saw their dragon do as he was asked, the few of his remaining forces did too. Upon seeing that the dragon had reached the alley, Mercury withdrew first squad and fell back to the alley with what remained of his remaining squads.
"Squad one to four, escort the remaining protection force towards fifth squad, where you will regroup. The archers will remain here", Mercury ordered his men, who obeyed with a single, "aye, sir", before they took the protection force and moved out.
Hatchling, use your tail to smash the houses on either side of this alley. The rubble must be high enough to form a temporary wall, which will then give us the time needed to escape, Mercury quickly said to the panting dragon.
It will take time to form a wall high enough, Kilgharrah stated.
"I know", Mercury said out loud, which only made the archers raise an eyebrow in question, but otherwise remain silent, before he added, "archers, cover me as I block the enemy forces, while our escape is secured", after which Mercury moved in front of where he wanted the wall to be, and took a fighting stance.
Behind him, he could hear Kilgharrah start to tear down buildings behind him, and as he saw the first 10 men move towards him at the entrance, he heard the whistling of arrows passing by him, which was quickly followed by a few thuds and some groans, as eight of the 10 men fell forward with arrows in their chests and necks.
A quick block and slash with his sword killed another soldier, before he used the confusion of the second to knee him in his solar plexus and then cut his back open. Another 20 men soon approached, but due to the small width of the alley, only seven could walk in at a time.
Arrows whistled by Mercury, as he continued to stall the imperial soldiers' advance into the alley. Mercury knew that without the cover of his archers, he would have been overrun in minutes, given the less than fortunate surroundings, but a constant rain of arrows really helped to even things up.
As the monotone fighting dragged on, Mercury's mind began wander, I think I am a bit hungry at the moment, but not really that much. What I would not give to get a crème brûlée right now...or a piece of cheesecake. Oh, how I wish that I could make one here, but I do not think they even have the required ingredients on the continent, Mercury's musings was interrupted by the whistle of an enemy arrow flying only a few centimetres next to his head, ...or perhaps I should just focus on the battle instead of desserts.
As Mercury's mind returned to the battle, he noticed the absence of arrows pinning themselves into the imperial soldiers, so he assumed that the wall had reached a height great enough to halt his archers' continued support, which just made his task all that more difficult.
During the next few minutes the imperial soldiers seemed to notice this as well, so they stormed forth with new courage and ferocity, which slowly but surely drove Mercury back towards his own wall. A small growl escaped him as five soldiers encircled him, which seemed to startle the soldiers enough to allow Mercury to slip past the defences of two of them and kill them.
He jumped back just in time to avoid being cut open from the side, but then managed to cut off the arm of the soldier, who had attacked him, before he was forced to block a strike from another soldier, and then retreat to his previous position.
The wall is finished, Kilgharrah said in his mind.
Good, take the archers and regroup with the rest of my forces. They are now yours, Mercury said, before he added, I cannot both keep them at bay and climb this, and then closed his mind off from Kilgharrah.
It was not exactly the way I had planned this to go, Mercury mused to himself, as he prepared to go down fighting, all my hopes now lie with Eragon. I sure hope he does not fail me.
It was then that a deafening roar reverberated through the air, which effectively stopped the enemies in their tracks, before they were incinerated before Mercury's very eyes by a crystal clear torrent of flames. Mercury looked up to the top of the wall, where he saw a great deep royal purple dragon sitting on the top, while he was spewing flames at the approaching enemies.
Those two-legs would have never stopped bickering about who should lead them if you died, so get up here already, Kilgharrah quickly commanded, which Mercury quickly obeyed without question.
Soon after, Mercury, Kilgharrah and the archers were marching back through the alley, where they would meet up with the remaining forces.
I see you have finally learned to spew flames, Mercury stated, as they marched.
Yes, they are quite beautiful, are they not?, Kilgharrah proudly stated.
That they are, Mercury confirmed, before they arrived at the rendezvous point, where his squads immediately formed ranks, whereas what remained of Kilgharrah's protection force stood isolated to the side. Mercury eyed his own dwindling supply of men, the battle had taken at least half of the men, which he had brought with him, but it did not matter as long as Kilgharrah was safe.
With a small grin and a wave towards Kilgharrah, Mercury spoke, "men, meet Kilgharrah. Kilgharrah, meet your new protection force".
"Wait, that is our job!", one of the four remaining elves exclaimed.
Mercury eyed the elf, who had spoken, with a scrutinizing look, while he said, "your forces are diminished and incapable of properly protecting him, so I have decided to merge your force into mine. I WILL be commanding this force and you WILL obey me, is that understood?"
The elf looked ready to object, but he was stopped by Laurali's hand on his shoulder, after which they spoke together for a few moments in the Ancient language, before the elf finally looked at Mercury and said, "we accept your leadership for now".
"Good, now listen up humans. Due to recent losses I want fifth squad and what remains of Kilgharrah's human defenders to spread themselves out among squad one to four", Mercury spoke out loud and clear towards the human soldiers, before directing his attention towards the elves, "you elves will be my magician corps and are to set a few wards against magic around the rest, not to mention snuff out any enemy magicians that we encounter", before he directed his attention towards the kull, "all remaining kull will be-".
"The urgalgra does not recognize your ability to lead us", one of the outstanding kull loudly said and interrupted Mercury.
An irritated sigh escaped Mercury, before he quietly went to stand directly in front of the kull, which was towering a staggering 2.8 metres, and said, "I guess you want a test of strength, am I right?"
The giant kull looked down and in his own guttural accent, he said, "You are".
"Good then", Mercury said with an evil grin, before he quickly stepped to the side, put one foot in front of the kull's feet, grabbed the kull's arm with one hand and the kull's back with his other hand, and then pushed the kull of his feet and headfirst to the ground, where he quickly held the arm in such an angle that he would be able to hold it there with minimal effort, while the kull would have excruciating pain if he moved the arm but a fraction.
"Submit", Mercury hissed into the kull's ear.
"You cheated", the very angry kull managed to hiss out.
"You challenged me to a fight, so I simply started it", Mercury growled back, before he added in a deadly whisper, "now submit or I will kill you right here and now for insubordination".
The kull growled for a moment, before he finally obliged and submitted to Mercury's rule, after which Mercury let him stand again, and then brushed off dirt from his own armour, while he in a calm voice said, "now that that is out of the way, I will continue as before. All remaining kull will now become fifth squad and are to be lead by that kull over there, who receives his orders directly from me. Have everyone understood their orders?"
"Aye, sir", came the unified shout from the humans, the elves followed with an, "we hear and obey", before the kull finally grumbled, "understood".
Mercury let his eyes roam across his forces, before he settled his attention on his magician corps, "elves I need you to contact the main force of the Varden, and ask them how things are going there, and whether there are any strategic objectives within our vicinity. I would have done so myself, but none of them knows me, and they would not let me into their minds. The rest of you can rest in the meantime".
A moment later one of the elves came up to Mercury and whispered into his ear, "the queen has deployed her elite forces to deal with a titan of a man called Lord Barst in the grand market. The rest of the main force is there as well, but the battle is going ill"
"Understood", Mercury whispered back, "have her know that I will be leading this force to attack them from behind, but ask whether she knows of any smaller Varden forces isolated near the vicinity of our route there", before he cleared his throat, which gained the attention of his forces, and in a loud and commanding force said, "Break-time is over people. We move out to assist our primary army in what will most likely be the deciding battle. For the Varden, for your people, for VICTORY!", after which he silently added to himself, victory, hmrf! Even if the Varden beats the Empire's army with but a single casulty, their fate would still be doomed if Eragon lost, but I suppose that it would not motivate them greatly if I told them that.
Twenty minutes later Mercury's forces arrived at the grand market. They had rescued a few groups of stragglers on the way there, so Mercury had been able to expand his squads to encompass 20 men each, except for fifth squad, who still only had the nine kull from Kilgharrah's original protection force, and he had expanded his archery division by another four archers, which gave them a total number of 12 archers.
Mercury quickly scanned the battle to be able to form a temporary battle plan. The grand market truly was a huge market place, where thousands upon thousands of men were currently fighting in an area, which easily measured half a kilometre in both width and length. The primary battle seemed to resemble that of a straight line going from one end of the grand market to the other, with the exception of an isolated group of Varden warriors, which were riding under the royal elven banner, that seemed to have been cut from the main Varden force and were currently fighting someone, which Mercury could only assume was Lord Barst, because this man seemed to be able to not only match the elves in speed and strength, but even surpass them. On either flank of the fighting line, the fighting seemed to be somewhat even, but in the centre the Varden had been hard pressed and would soon collapse, if something was not done quickly.
"Commanders, listen up", Mercury said in a hushed tone, which was to avoid having the enemy accidentally discovering them beforehand, "I want the archers to fire a volley at the centre of the line at my signal. Fifth squad will then take charge and storm straight through the enemy lines, while second and third squad covers their left flank, while first and fourth squad will cover their right flank. I want to cut a direct and open passage through the enemy lines, so squad one to four will remain at their positions and protect the passage, while the Varden's centre force will be able to use this passage to move through and surround the enemy lines. After the passage is established, I will personally lead fifth squad to aid the isolated elven queen. Elves, I need you to relay this information to the appropriate commanders on the other side and afterward continue with your primary objectives. Have everyone understood their orders?"
"Aye, sir", came the hushed reply, before Kilgharrah privately asked Mercury, what should I do then?
Mercury let a small smile creep onto his lips, as he in a partly amused voice said, I believe it would be a shame, if it were only me who should witness the beauty of your flames, would you not agree?, and then sent a picture of Kilgharrah making a quick flyover of the enemy line, while burning most of it to the ground.
I most sincerely would, came Kilgharrah's way too happy reply, before he launched himself into the air.
"Archers, take aim...FIRE!", Mercury shouted and immediately heard the whistling of arrows flying towards their target, before the trampling sound of nine kull in a full frontal charge noised out everything else, and made the very ground rumble beneath Mercury's feet.
Only some from the Empire's rear line soldiers managed to actually turn around with complete dread clear on their faces, before they were run over by the seemingly unstoppable force of kull warriors. Anyone still alive was quickly stabbed, cut, slashed or simply trampled to death by the four squads, which were using the new opening to push into the enemy lines and sow confusion and panic among them.
Mercury himself was running as fast as he could to keep up with the kull warriors, but not nearly fast enough, so he was forced to fight against any stragglers, who had survived the initial charge. To his right, he could hear the screaming of burning men, and guessed that Kilgharrah was already making good of his new talent, which oddly enough managed to get Mercury to chuckle a little at the dragon's sense of having fun.
I think I should probably see a psychiatrist about my sudden development of a morbid sense of humour, Mercury mused to himself, before he cut off the right leg of one soldier, then kicked another in the nuts, before he plunged his sword into the back of a third, while he continually became more and more soaked in the blood of imperial soldiers, on the other hand. My new morbid sense of humour might be the least of the things, which I probably should talk to a psychiatrist about. On a not completely unrelated topic, I really should talk to a mage about a spell, which could render my armour water- and bloodproof, as I am already dreading to clean this.
Third and fourth squad finally caught up with him, and together they paved the way through the few remaining enemies, before third and fourth squad went to each side and continued to hold off the enemies, while hundreds of the Varden soldiers of the centre force poured through the newly opened passageway and began to encircle the left flank, because no one wished to be near the right flank, where Kilgharrah was still burning and spreading chaos.
Mercury was panting slightly from the run and subsequent fighting, but he could not wait to regain his breath, so he quickly found his fifth squad, who had lost two kull during the charge, and said in what he hoped was a steady voice, "fifth squad, you are with me".
It truly must be a strange sight to see a 1.8 metre human lead seven kull of more than 2.7 metres in height to battle, Mercury mused to himself, as he sprinted to elven queen's aid with his sword raised high, and seven kull forming a spearhead formation behind him.
They clashed with Barst's personal forces, and soon began to slaughter the unsuspecting men. Blood splattered everywhere and entrails flew through the air, like snowflakes on a winter day. From the corner of his eyes, Mercury could see Barst killing another elf, before he turned his attention towards Islanzadi. Their fighting was too fast for Mercury's eyes to follow, but he just continued to push through the enemies standing between him and them.
Right as Mercury slew the last man between him and them, he saw something, which made his breath catch in his throat: Barst had just broken Islanzadi's sword with his mace, which had sent her sprawling on the ground, and he was just about to give her the final strike.
No!, Mercury angrily thought, before he threw a shuriken at the tip of Barst's mace, which deflected the mace's course just enough to miss the elven queen's head by mere centimetres, and then bury itself deep into the ground.
Barst snarled, ripped his mace from the ground and turned around faster than Mercury had thought possible for even an elf, before he in a clearly angry voice said, "you dare to attack me in the back".
Oh crap, I should have had a plan now, Mercury thought to himself with a little bit of fear mixing into his internal voice, before he in an external mocking voice said, "are you not a little too fat to be a commander?", while he simultaneously caught Islanzadi's gaze and hopefully conveyed with his eyes for her to get out of here, while he had Barst's attention.
The ruse seemed to work, because a moment later Barst threw himself towards Mercury with a loud yell and a wide swing of his mace. Mercury only just managed to duck and roll under the mace, before he stood behind Barst, who impossibly quickly turned around with his mace flying through the air. Mercury's last thoughts, before Barst's mace hit his sword head on, were, you just had to piss off the guy taking down elves as if they are nothing. Why not just go up and kick Shruikan on the snout, while you are at it.
Right as Barst's mace met Mercury's sword, time seemed to move slower, and Mercury witnessed with shock how Barst's mace broke his katana's blade in half, which then sent Mercury flying through the air, and made him land directly into the now reformed personal guard of Islanzadi.
"My sword", Mercury groaned, as he began to raise himself from the toppled elves, only to look upon the handle and half of the broken blade of his once so perfect katana. From his peripheral vision, he noted that Barst were moving towards them at a leisurely pace with a large grin on his face.
I need time to rethink this, Mercury warily thought to himself, before his eyed spotted the seven remaining kull of fifth squad standing in the perimeter of the circle. "Fifth squad, charge!", Mercury shouted, but the normally so courageous and threatening kull seemed less than inclined to take on a man, who had singlehandedly beaten several of the strongest elven warriors.
Mercury growled at this, before he in his most threatening voice said, "fifth squad, if you do not charge, then I will personally make sure that none of you leave this place alive and that all urgalgra, who survives this war, will hear of your cowardice and dishonour to your tribe".
The threat seemed to work, despite the fact that Mercury probably would not be able to make true of it, and with a large warcry, the seven kull charged at Barst, who although greatly surprised, seemed to be able to hold them off.
A few of Islanzadi's personal guards charged as well, which bought Mercury some more time and the ability to finally speak with the elven queen and commander.
"Why have you not just crushed his mind?", Mercury asked the still slightly confused queen.
"We cannot find it. It is hidden behind a shield, which we cannot break", Islanzadi spoke and regained her usual commanding attitude.
Mercury took a quick look at the battle behind him: three of the kull had already died and one of the elves as well, before he surveyed the surrounding area for possible advantages and possibilities. One place sprung to his attention: the corner of the grand market had three buildings leaning into it, which could collapse onto one spot if the foundation was weakened properly.
"Do you have any hope of breaking his wards?", Mercury bluntly asked Islanzadi, to which she replied with a slightly defeated, "not that I know of".
"I have a plan, but I need your elves to weaken the foundation of those buildings there, but not so much that they fall right away", Mercury quickly said and pointed out the buildings, "if we can draw Barst into that area, then the rubble of the falling building should hopefully be enough to either severely weaken or even break his wards, after which I will need all of our remaining forces here to move in and finish him".
"It will take time and complete concentration from my elves to do that, but it could work", Islanzadi spoke with a glimmer of hope in her voice, "but how will we ensure that this beast of a man or his soldiers does not simply wipe us out in the meantime?"
"My kull and the remaining humans will protect you from the soldiers, while you work", Mercury said, while he fiddled with the buttons on his bracers, "I will delay the Lord Barst for the required time".
"But your sword-", Islanzadi started, but was interrupted by Mercury, "I have more", before he threw his arms down and let his blades spring forth.
"Fifth squad and all remaining humans, pull back and protect the elves. Elves, your queen has new orders for you", Mercury spoke out loudly, before continuing in a taunting voice, "Barst, what do you say about taking round two?"
The elves, humans and kull quickly did as they were told, which left Barst eyeing Mercury again, before he started to laugh at this 'challenge', and said, "I see you have more blades than one. I wonder how many I will break before this day is over".
"Let us find out, shall we?", Mercury spoke, before he started to run through some market stalls towards the still laughing Barst.
Barst readied his mace to smash this head on approach, but as he began to swing it, Mercury jumped with his feet first towards the stalls on his right, which he then used to push himself up so that he could grab the roof of the left stalls and make a cartwheel around Barst, which ended in Mercury landing with both his feet on Barst's back, which he then used to push off from and do a backwards summersault, while he threw two shurikens at Barst, which unfortunately incinerated before they hit their mark, and then landed a few metres behind Barst, who had toppled over for a moment.
"You will pay for that insult", Barst growled through his clenched teeth, as he stood up again and turned around. Mercury noted how he was practically shaking with fury, which made him think, good, now I have his attention, before he in a mocking voice said, "not with that potbelly. You could not even catch a cow if it tried to run away from you".
The insult seemed to work, because Barst soon charged directly at Mercury, who quickly used the tight space between two stalls to escape from the onslaught, before he ran towards the side buildings of the grand market.
Barst smashed the two stalls away from his path, and then continued to try and run Mercury down, which he did when Mercury apparently ran straight towards a dead end wall. Barst continued his charge at Mercury, clearly hoping to crush the irritating little blackclad warrior, who had insulted him, but to Barst's complete surprise, Mercury did not even slow down as he reached the wall. Instead Mercury seemed to speed up and then apparently run up on the straight wall, before he pushed off with his feet at about 2 metres up the wall, and landed behind Barst, who could not stop his own momentum and crashed headfirst into the wall.
Barst however quickly regained himself and withdrew from the wall, which had gained an imprint of him on it, and snarled in rage, before he again continued his pursuit of Mercury.
This cat and mouse play went on for at least 15 minutes more, where Mercury often only narrowly dodged Barst's attacks. Mercury had used two more shurikens during this time, and quickly made a mental note to himself, that he only had one ordinary shuriken left and then his four special shurikens from Orik, which he would prefer not to waste on Barst, unless his plan with the buildings did not work.
Mercury was currently jumping from the rooftops of one stall to the next or the opposite, while Barst used his mace to smash the stalls, which Mercury had just been on. Go to another world, they say. It will be fun, they say. You will get to meet completely new people and places, they say. Why could I not just have done as everyone else, and just begun on paragliding or some other extreme kind of sport, Mercury thought to himself, while he only narrowly managed to slipped past Barst's mace, as he jumped down to the ground, and kicked Barst off his feet in the process, before he added in an amused inner voice, nah, I have not been this entertained in ages. Hmm, it must be the adrenaline speaking, because if my rational mind was viewing this, it would have screamed at me to get the hell out of here.
As he thought this, he noticed an elven mind request entry to his own mind, which he only hesitantly obliged to.
Yes?, Mercury hastily spoke, while he turned and did a pirouette, which caused his cloak to temporarily blind Barst enough to let Mercury slip past him.
The preparations are complete, Islanzadi's musical voice spoke through Mercury's mind.
Good, I will lead him there. Let the buildings fall on my signal, and then attack with everything we have left, Mercury said as quickly as he could, but Mercury did not cut off the connection from the elven queen after finishing, because he needed to be able to quickly have her make the order, and from her mind, he sensed that she was connected to several other elves, which would no doubt be ready to let the buildings fall at her command.
Through taunting and a planned series of escapes, Mercury quickly managed to position Barst in the chosen spot. Unfortunately for Mercury, this also involved having Barst believe that he had cornered Mercury in this corner of the grand market, so that Mercury's only way out was through him.
"Now I have got you, you little insolent coward", Barst said with an evil grin.
"Oh, do you? Because I believe the hunter has just become the hunted", Mercury said in a smug voice, while he mentally screamed, NOW!
The three buildings quickly began to topple forwards, which caught Barst's attention, so that he did not realize that Mercury had jumped with all his might, and a little bit of magic, so that he could reach an open window on the second story of the building, which he had been leaning at. He then managed to get through the window of the falling building, and continued to try to make his way towards the other side of it, which became harder and harder as the building continued to fall, which turned his run more and more into a climb. On the way there he faintly noted a crying woman cradling her screaming infant baby, while two children, which could be no more than 10, were holding onto each of her legs.
Mercury just managed to reach the other side of the building, when the building had basically turned so much that the walls had become the floors and the floors had become the walls, but to his dismay, there was no windows there, so he only just managed to channel what remained of the energy in his dwarven ring, which he had been storing up for six months now and had previously used to sustain his continued escape from Barst, and blast a hole in the wall, which he only narrowly escaped through, before the building completely collapsed on top of Barst.
That was not so hard, Mercury thought to himself, while brushing off some dirt from his armour, immediately before his supply of adrenalin completely ran out, and he fell asleep standing.
Wow, to think that I had originally only planned for one chapter to encompass most of this, as well as the previous chapter. I sure did underestimate how much work it would take to properly write this, but here it is then, 21 pages in word.
So, what do you think about Mercury's command style. I thought the style would suit him well, but I seriously doubt that he could ever be loved/admired by his subordinates, as he controls them through a mixture of fear and respect, which also is why I desperately hope that he never gets a royal title and land with subjects.
Oh and btw, if Mercury had had to continue his flight from Barst for perhaps another 10 minutes, then he would have run out of energy from his dwarven ring and simply collapsed from the loss of all of his adrenalin, whereas Barst could have probably continued this all day.