It was Hubert that saved them from an arrow-filled mass grave. He seemed to instinctually create one of his magical walls just within the entrance to the Tower of Black Winds, effectively cutting off the Black Eagles from the Gautier Horde archers.
Against any normal group of bandits, this would've been the end of the battle, as taking them out would've been as simple as keeping them inside this tower until they all starved to death. It wouldn't have been a very honorable way to go, but it would've kept Aster's own casualties to a minimum.
Unfortunately, this was the Gautier Horde. They had at least a few mages that could likely blast through a wall if need be, and they didn't yet have a good enough idea of the basement floors to know whether there might be a hidden exit that they could use.
Part of Aster was regretting not going to House Daphnel in advance and asking for proper maps and plans; the ones the Church provided for this mission were older, and were from a visiting source. The Daphnel maps might have shown indications of hidden entrances and exits, should there even be any.
But on the other hand, it would probably have been a waste of time. Daphnel, after their fall from grace, had become a paranoid bunch, if their hasty modifications to this fort to ward off their old family was any indication.
Aster focused her mind back onto the mission, and was close to calling for order and taking command, but she refrained. This is their mission, she told herself. Let them figure out a way around this setback.
As all eyes were on her, Aster pointedly turned to Edelgard, whose buggy eyes betrayed her anxiety. It didn't help when the rest of them looked to her for guidance. She remained silent, though she at least closed those disconcerting eyes. Finally, Aster spoke, but only to provide assurance. "With this wall, we have time to plan. So long as Hubert can keep it up against any potential magical threats, we have all the time in the world."
The words seemed to reach the snow princess, as she nodded and took several breaths. It wasn't good that she showed this weakness to the others, particularly given how she wanted them to view her, but at least she was calming down. "O-okay…" she started. "We...we need to know how many are in there."
Without being asked, Lysithea set up a 'Libra' spell. It appeared like a multi-layered crystalline diamond, refracting light in seemingly impossible ways. Soon, specks of light drifted off of it, each a different color. Some went toward the new wall and passed through them, red and purple. Lysithea's eyes glowed the same colors, like she was seeing through those specks. Then, with a pulse of distortion from her hand, the crystal reflected what those specks saw.
Six archers, three fighters. The walkway they were on was relatively narrow, about five feet in width, just allowing room for all nine people. Due to the soundproofing of the magical wall, the Black Eagles weren't able to hear as the fighters bashed against the new wall with their axes, to little avail. It wouldn't be long before they called mages to try to take it down.
Edelgard took too long to speak, but she eventually did. "...Linhardt, when Hubert makes a small hole, I need you to fire a 'Wind' spell and blast all of them off."
"That will take a 'Cutting Gale,' but fine," he replied. The correction didn't go unnoticed by the princess, but, wisely, she didn't comment on it. The bookworm began prepping the spell. "Ready."
Hubert, wordlessly, made the necessary hole . Thankfully, his own magical prowess gave him enough knowledge of wind magic to know how wide to make it. Linhardt fired off the spell, and the cries of the falling bandits were heard through the hole.
Aster saw at least one problem with this plan, which was that, since the majority of enemies were below them, the screams of the falling bandits would alert all of them, assuming they hadn't been alerted to the Black Eagles' presence already. She could easily see them having to face down a dozen bandits at once, which wasn't a tempting prospect.
Hubert lowered the wall; a nearly fatal error when it turned out that not all of the bandits stood directly in front of the wall like they'd assumed. Aster's crest flared up upon seeing the archer loose his arrow, and she managed to deflect it before it struck Lysithea behind her, who was preoccupied with her 'Libra' spell. It seemed to take several seconds for it to fade, or else she had to wait and maintain it until it was finished scanning the entire area. At the very least, she was too distracted to even notice that she'd almost died.
Caspar was quick to rush in and shove the archer off the edge before he could nock another arrow, and thankfully there was only that one man to deal with at the moment.
The party entered the structure at last, and immediately heard shouts from both above and below. Right...there were bandits above them too.
The structure of this tower must've been changed sometime after the Church made their maps, as the layout didn't match the maps at all.
The building was a long shaft, with stone steps and walkways protruding from the edges. As well, there were several paths that jutted out into the center of the shaft, liking to help Pegasus Riders take off. There was a large floor below them—in Aster's estimation, it lined up with what could be considered ground level—with two large wooden gates which seemed to line up with the bulges that Aster saw at the tower's base. It was difficult to tell from this distance was with relatively dim lighting, but from the times, Aster would guess they functioned off of some kind of pulley system.
Aster looked to Edelgard, wondering if she should take command. However, the girl seemed to have sufficiently stilled her mind since the wall had been erected. "We need to, um...we need to…" but stilled mind or not, she was still a novice commander.
Aster looked up, seeing and hearing dozens of footsteps. "A minute to engagement," she announced. It didn't help with Edelgard's mood, but a commander needed information to lead.
"F-Ferdinand, c-can-" she cut off, taking a calming breath. "Can you protect our backs?"
"Of course, Edelgard!" he gave a cocky grin, and moved to face the stairs.
"Professor, you and Caspar can keep in the front. Caspar, switch to your axe now that we have more room. Bernadetta and Petra will help Ferdinand, Dorothea and I will help Caspar and the Professor as we move downward. Linhardt, you keep watch for injuries, and heal what you can. Hubert and Lysithea will be backup. Hubert, be ready to erect walls to protect us, and Lysithea…" it was painfully obvious that Edelgard didn't know what spells she could use.
"I have arcing spells," the Golden Deer said with a huff. The disrespect earned her a glare, but no confrontation arose.
They barely made it ten steps down as a unit before the above-troops were on them. Ferdinand likely worked best on his own, at least in this close of quarters. He kept his lance longer than was standard, which in this case allowed him to fairly effectively ward off their pursuers. He didn't seem to go for any kind of kill shot, instead letting the archers' arrows do the job.
Bernadetta was much better with a bow than Petra, and was much better than she would ever admit. Her Crest of Indech—and the accuracy and speed it endowed—was invaluable in making precise shots. Meanwhile, Petra was, at best, proficient. She wasn't suited to this kind of open combat, especially in such claustrophobic circumstances. Aster would have to help remedy that with her weekly assignments.
With a few commands to follow, Ferdinand, Bernadetta, and Petra didn't slow the group down all that much. They steadily made their way down until they were met with the Gautier Horde's next line of defense.
A group of mages fired spells at them from below and across the tower. They were joined by two lance fighters approaching from the very front, if only to keep them pinned for the mages to pick them off. The Black Eagles' only advantage to this engagement was that they were on the level of one of the outcroppings, providing some small amount of cover from the opposite side's artillery.
Aster fought with half a mind, just enough to keep from being skewered. It was a task that proved more difficult than fighting with all of her might, and it almost made her wish that she could switch places with Edelgard. Still, she did it.
Caspar bashed against the bandits' lances with reckless abandon; never truly in danger of disrupting the formation, but close enough to doing so that Aster was put off. Still, she didn't speak up, just kept fighting.
Dorothea was returning fire at the mages, and she proved to be much more proficient with her spells than they were, which wasn't surprising since she'd had formal training. Edelgard, meanwhile, was using her Hand Axe to help Aster deal with the range disadvantage of fighting against a spear.
The Hand Axe was a fantastic invention of modern times. Attuned to a person's unique resonance via a small gem, the Axe could be called back to the user so long as they willed it. Edelgard herself seemed an expert at it, easily weaving it between Aster and Caspar as it came back. It's only downside was that, unlike a bow or javelin, an axe wasn't exactly designed for throwing. It could work, and the necessary modifications were in place to make it more consistent, but there would always be that little detail of it being an already unwieldy weapon being thrown like an oversized knife.
But even with their help, Aster and Caspar weren't making any progress. Should Aster have been fighting on her own, she would've rushed in to get close to the spearmen, but that would leave Dorothea and Edelgard too exposed. As well, the longer they were here, the more time their enemies from above would have to catch up, and Ferdinand could only handle so many. Sooner or later, the mages would pick them off, or they'd be crushed between two forces. Something had to budge, even if it meant a retreat.
Aster might have voiced this concern, if she didn't see Edelgard break into a run—her Crest of Seiros shining white around her—and leap across the gap. For her crest, the distance was nothing. If anything, she overshot it and had to make an effort not to smack her face into the wall as she landed.
The mages were too shocked to see the damned Crest of Seiros to put up much of a real fight. Edelgard cut them down quickly, though more bandits were approaching from below. Reinvigorated and without the mages to harass them, Caspar and Aster surged forward, trailed by Dorothea. With a swipe of Caspar's axe, a follow-up slash by Aster, and a 'Thoron' spell by Dorothea, the two spearmen were dealt with.
"Forward!" Edelgard called from her position, facing the incoming bandits with her axe poised to strike. Aster and Caspar took point in time to clash with the coming axe fighters, but there were more easily dealt with.
In Aster's experience, bandit hordes didn't have many spear fighters. Maybe because it was viewed as a 'knightly' weapon, and thus would be frowned upon, or maybe it had to do with spears being more difficult or more expensive to forge or some such. Either way, it helped immensely in this particular battle.
Without spears to zone them out, the Black Eagles were able to systematically carve through the rest of the Gautier Horde, at least those in this central stairwell. Now on solid ground with some room to maneuver, the students instinctually gathered into their usual formation, Aster, Caspar, and Ferdinand in front, followed by mages and archers, followed by Edelgard and Petra in the back to protect against flanking. With this, they were able to finish off those of the Horde that pursued them from above, leaving the tower in eerie silence for the first time since their arrival.
Aster let out a breath of tension as adrenaline faded from her body, and she saw the others do the same. Dorothea's eye shown an uncharacteristic distance as she numbly wiped the blood from herself with a kerchief. Ferdinand and Caspar hastily sharpened weapons with whetstones they'd brought, Petra and Bernadetta counted how many arrows they had left, and the mages sat to recover their strength. Already, Aster would have considered this a tough battle and a well-fought victory, but they were only halfway done.
She moved to one of the gates, and saw that, indeed, it was a pulley system. Two parallel lengths of chain, pull one down to open it, and gravity would cause it to close back up once you let go, though the makers had at least made a stopper to keep the door open should th indeed arise.
Edelgard moved over to her. "Let me," the girl said, making a show of it in the process. Her crest flared briefly, just long enough to open the gate, and then Aster put the stopper in place. "What do you think?"
"About what?" Aster wondered.
"About...the mission, I suppose. How are we doing?"
"None of you are dead," Aster replied, before quickly moving on. "I suggest we close the gate as we go down. We have crests that can break it open, and they don't. On the off chance they have pegasus riders or are able to get past us, they won't be able to escape as easily."
"A sound idea," Edelgard agreed, looking around at the others, whose chests had barely stopped heaving from the effort of it all. "...How long should I give them?"
"However long it feels right to," Aster said, thankful that she was so readily accepting her advice. Aster had actually been worried that Edelgard would be too prideful to even consider it. "Consider your options, and decide based on that."
"And...in this particular situation?"
Aster glanced her way, seeing her nervous ticks; playing with the ends of her hair, tapping one foot incessantly, nose flaring a bit as she breathed. Aster sighed. Well...she supposed it wouldn't be an instantaneous process. "I doubt that word hasn't been sent down about our arrival. The longer we rest up here, the more time they'll have to prepare themselves."
"So we should move quickly?"
"But," Aster stopped her. "When we engaged them outside, a scout was immediately sent inside to warn the others. A similar method was probably used either at that point, or when our engagement started here, namely when we sent their men flying off of the walkway."
"Which means they've had ample time already…" Edelgard put a hand to her chin, thoughtful. "In that case, we should rest for as long as we're able. If possible, it would be beneficial to engage them up here," Aster was about to correct her, before she did herself. "Although, that none have come up already instead indicates that they're fortifying their current position. That would be my play, at any rate."
"Mine as well," Aster agreed, noticing that she was still having a hard time deciding. "If you don't want to feel like you're wasting time, go gauge the others' status. Make certain you know what they can do with what energy they have left."
"R-right, of course," Edelgard said. It was plainly obvious that that was the last thing she wanted to do. From everything Aster had seen, Edelgard wanted to talk to her classmates about as much as she wanted to live in poverty. Yet, she still went to do so—and as predictably as she could, in going to Hubert first.
Aster herself went over to the second gate and cut the chain that served as its opening mechanism. Best to have only one available for a fleeing enemy.
It was several minutes later that the Black Eagles gathered to continue their mission.
The path through the gate—more a tunnel than anything—was wide enough to allow for their usual formation. It was substantially weaker without Sylvain there to round everything out with another lance, but it was effective nonetheless.
The tunnel sloped downward, and appeared to be carved directly out of the earth. The only thing that illuminated it were small torches that were about to smolder out, making the unusually long and quiet trek uncomfortable. Darkness was the enemy of every warrior.
"Hey, Dorothea, you mind making a light?" Caspar whispered.
"Sure thing, Carton," she replied, cheerily enough through her hushed voice. She was halfway to producing a 'Illuminate' spell when Hubert stopped her, grabbing her hands and preventing her from making the necessary glyph. "Hey!"
"No, he was right to stop you," Aster said. "The enemy could be watching for that."
And so they continued on in eerie silence. They went slow so that they could not only find their footing in the darkness, but also to check for any potential traps, of which there were none.
After what felt like an hour, Aster saw light ahead.
They merged in a large square room, artificially made into a spiral due to the walls and elevation changes. Currently, they were on the very edge, what Aster assumed was the western edge, going down to the path proper, which started in the south.
The room appeared to have once been some kind of a prayer hall, with religious candles burning all throughout, but with a particularly large congregation of them—most knocked over haphazardly from the occupation—in the room's center, and the end of the spiral path.
A dozen and a half of the Gautier Horde were waiting for them. Thankfully, there were only two mages, though there were a healthy number of archers to help them. As well, there were no spear fighters, so they'd only have to deal with swords and axes, which gave Aster an advantage against them.
That is, unless you counted Miklan.
He had the same dashing red hair as his brother, though his was ungroomed, splaying out over the back of his neck. A scar ran down his face, destroying what might have once been a traditionally handsome face, not to mention it was stained with a permanent scowl.
"Is that…?" Ferdinand noticed it soon after Aster. Eyes went to the disowned Gautier.
"No way…"
"Things just became impossible, didn't they?" Dorothea furled her brow with worry, despite her casual tone of voice.
Aster sucked in a sharp breath, having to instantly rethink their strategy in the face of this new threat. Now, it made sense why the Gautier Horde attacked the Margrave, yet there were no major casualties. The attack hadn't been to kill the Margrave.
It had been to steal the Lance of Ruin.
Miklan ordered the attack, and everything fell to chaos.
Author's Note:
Hey guys, sorry about the late upload and dumping both chapters at once. I wanted to space them out a bit, but I unfortunately didn't get a chance to upload them during my day trip, so that sucks.
Anyway, here's the first half of the mission, where we just get to where the map starts in-game, with the spiral room. Hooray!
Thank you all for reading, review if you like, Discord in my profile for questions and suggestions, and I'll see you guys tomorrow!