Chapter -24: Crush the Dynasty
The battle lines had been drawn, and all sides of this conflict were focused on their opponents regardless of what they felt.
Cecilia held her swords and waited for Colrez to make his first move. But he was intent on proving that she was beneath his notice, forcing his men to charge at her with but a raise of his lance.
The first wave rallied forth with a scream that disguised their hesitation.
Cecilia sighed and then tossed her swords back for the armor to hold, choosing to engage the army with nothing but her body and wits.
She skated along the ice her hands created and jumped with her knee out to strike the lead man in the nose.
She carried him down and then hopped off, evading two swordsmen.
She landed on one of their shoulders and used her weight to slam them to the ground.
The other swordsman thrust and she pushed ahead, sliding her hair along the blade until she was close enough to grab the wrist and disarm him with a crunchy twist.
She then put him against her back, elbowed him in the gut, then flipped him overhead to knock him out.
She ducked under a lance thrust and used a burst of ice to skate out of the closing crowd, then summoned a wall of spikes to buy some time.
In the quick scuffle she recognized a few old faces from her short time in the army. They were aging poorly, their eyes twitching and lacking rest.
There were many who gladly indulged in excess, she had no sympathy for them.
But Colrez was their enabler. He failed as their ruler, and he now fails as their commander.
Taking him down was the only thing that mattered right now. Dealing with the rest of the gluttonous rabble could come afterwards.
Her defensive line was shattered by a giant ice ball and she was forced to roll to the right.
A volley of arrows had been prepared to hit her regardless of where she went. She pulled her arms in and the arrowheads cut her skin.
But compared to the scrapes she's had mining rocks, this only made her grunt as she pushed forward.
The speed she skated let her slide between multiple soldiers in a second and punch them in the face, gut or chest.
Once she was too into the thick of things she ducked low and swept her feet out to topple the enemy formation.
Then she gauged the weapons of the other soldiers and leaped at the longest spear, taking it while they were surprised and using it to perform a sweeping circular swing to knock down more soldiers.
Colrez yelled at his backline, "What are you bumbling fools doing, it's just one demon!"
Cecilia stopped and lined up her shot over her shoulder, taking the first shot at Colrez while he was distracted.
The man's pauldron was impaled and forced him to look and acknowledge that her approach was inevitable.
He thrust his lance out and shouted, "Fire! Fire away!"
One soldier showed a conscience, "B-But our men…"
And was frozen on the spot by his commander's power.
The other archers scrambled to launch arrows onto the battlefield.
Cecilia created a shield over the side of her body and ran around, bouncing arrows off and shoving soldiers out of the way.
Meanwhile the other soldiers kept attacking her, the hesitation of their blades acting as an advantage in her current state.
Between volleys she swung her shield off and bowled over multiple soldiers.
And this allowed one soldier to sneak up from behind and cut her across the back.
She let out a quick cry and then turned around. Her attacker, a young man who showed shadows of her former desires, fell into her with a couple arrows plunged into his back.
The light in his eyes faded, lacking any gratification.
This was a child who had to grow under the rule of Colrez' declining sanity. Who knows what he wanted, if this was right or wrong.
It was a life trampled over in the name of glory, a glory fit only for one man's ego.
Cecilia set the boy down and then glared at Colrez.
"You couldn't even set aside your pride to be a father to your men…!"
Colrez plucked at his mustache and looked off to the side, "Good boys already know to follow their leader."
He then faced her and wiggled out a smirk and dark chuckle, before setting another volley upon the battlefield.
Cecilia stood tall and swung her arm out, pulling an equal amount of ice up for every arrow.
Then the icicles speared through, suspending to be redirected down, and raining upon the soldiers to break their bows.
Cecilia's presence now commanded enough attention to freeze the surrounding soldiers in place as she spoke, "This is your chance to break free…! He has shown you how little he thinks of you! If you must fight, then fight to break this pathetic cycle of indulgence and violence!"
Her words shook the weapons free from some of the soldiers, but too many were true believers in this unrighteous cause and kept attacking.
"Tch…!" Cecilia ducked under a few slashes and got her hits in across the limbs until they crumbled under pressure and allowed her to lay them out with a strike across the jaw.
She knew every weapons' strengths and weaknesses, and she could gauge how experienced each soldier was from this.
Her analytical mind, bred from the urge, the hunger, the NEED to survive and conquer, was now being aimed with a purpose that made her feel good.
There was no hope for these soldiers to land another hit on her once she got her rhythm down pat.
She could draw and discard the weapons from their lands to counter others, and the backline was out of projectile weaponry.
This was a pathetic strategy, sacrificing the benefits of positioning to focus on overwhelming the target with raw numbers.
And despite that, they couldn't take down this one warrior.
Eventually the humiliation Colrez felt seeing his power challenged started to blind him, and he gestured his lance towards the remaining soldiers.
The moment he saw a sign of retreat he released his power from his lance ready to freeze a soldier solid.
Cecilia dived at them and pinned them to the ground just in time, then punched the side of their head to knock them out.
Colrez fired off another attack and she rolled out of the way whole carrying the soldier. She tossed the unnecessary weight aside and stood up.
Colrez was now hyper fixated on taking her down himself and became ignorant to the remaining soldiers running back into the city for shelter.
There were still too many bodies on the battlefield, too many chances to make a mistake.
Cecilia swiped her feet at the ground, creating spikes to block Colrez' attacks while she carefully hopped around and over the bodies to get in closer.
"Hold still you slippery devil!" He shouted, his nonchalant attitude becoming shaken by a mild sense of panic.
He was locked into attacking this way. He was refusing to use anymore of the crowd's illustrious power.
The window for Cecilia to gain an advantage would start dwindling the further along she dragged this out.
She weaved between the icicles and used the movement of her feet to kick up a veil of icy dust, leaving only her shadow visible for him to attack.
He fired wildly in multiple directions but the shadow kept moving out of the way and left him frazzled.
But this was all a ruse, with the shadow belonging to none other than her armor, while she ran off the battlefield and up the mountain part way, pulling from the stronger ice in the ground to create a flurry of shards wrapped in a sphere between both hands.
She then grit her teeth and jumped straight at him, shouting his name, "COLREZ!"
His stunned expression slowly turned to see her barreling down. He tried to thrust his lance out, but she slipped past it and slammed the orb into his chest.
Then all the shards sharpened into crystals that she blasted into him on command, puncturing his chest plate and delivering a direct hit to his chest.
"Gyuagh…!" Colrez was knocked off the back of his mount onto his feet, stabbing his lance into the ground and forced to put a hand over his chest.
Blood was dripping out until he got ice over it, a little bit of it still trickled out of his mouth.
Cecilia dropped right into a roll and stood up, pulling her armor in behind her back so she could take up her swords for real this time.
She immediately threw herself at her enemy and started slashing, furiously bringing forth a mist of ice crystals as she struck away at Colrez's armor.
Colrez picked himself up after a few attacks and tried to break the onslaught with a forceful thrust of his lance.
Cecilia flipped over him and slashed harsh waves of ice down the back of his body then charged forward exactly when her toes hit the ground.
She drove her swords across the side of his armor and flipped around, delivering a few more slashes across his body.
His eyes widened and intoxicated steam spewed from his nostrils, his face bulging with a dark red tone.
Cecilia stopped and hunched forward, giving her blades a twirl to position them behind her.
A towering shadow loomed behind her, the fierce growl of the mighty bear giving it's attack away.
Her armor moved into position and grabbed the bear's claws, pinning itself to the ground.
Cecilia's focus was broken by a loud, cold snap, caused by Colrez snapping his lance in two and morphing them into two long dadao swords.
He then swung them out, pushing away all the snow in the sky from here to the other end of the village.
"Hmph," He smirked, "Come, she-devil, let a man show you how to handle a sword."
Cecilia gripped her swords and fought back against his pitiful taunt with courageous confidence, "I know how to fight with swords, I learned how to all on my own!"
Colrez's smirk faltered and he took one meaty step forward, releasing a plume of frost around him, his voice becoming as wintery as the look in his eyes, "Perhaps…You do not comprehend what this crown on my head entails."
"I AM King…thus I know best."
"Your crown is just a prop! You have no real strength."
Colrez kept marching with his swords drawn overhead, "Scream all you like banshee, for my blizzard of conquest shall soon consume your vulgar tongue!"
He swung down and unleashed a furious storm of black snow across the battlefield, which was carried all the way up to the mountain's peak.
Cecilia quickly felt the nip of the snowflakes on her skin. It was trying to burrow deep within and freeze her blood solid.
She savored every breath and refused to lose focus on her enemy, plunging himself straight through the dark snow to cut her down.
She jumped back and slashed both her blades out to counter his strike, then plummeted to the ground and charged ahead.
The length of his blades made for a dangerous engagement at a certain distance, but left him much more vulnerable directly near his body where the handles could not reach.
She stabbed one sword into the ground and hung low, beginning to pivot around while taking a stab at his chest with the other sword.
When all her might couldn't break the ice she pulled the sword up and dashed to the left, narrowly escaping his swings.
The first bites of fatigue from his snow started to settle in.
She spun around and started to back up, leaving him to pursue.
She could keep matching his attacks for now, but she was starting to feel the pressure on her wrists getting the better of her.
She looked back and remembered the icicles she left around. A little concentration pulled them up and flung them at his body.
He took a couple hits then started slashing at the rest with one hand, commanding absolute confidence as he continued to march forward.
Once she dried out her supply of icicles she was outside of the black snowstorm, which allowed her to shake off the bite of frost.
Colrez' upper body poked out from the edge of the storm and he drew one sword up, guiding the storm to funnel towards their opposition.
Cecilia rolled out of the way and took a deep breath as she landed on one knee and pulled her swords behind her shoulders.
Her exhale was heavy and her mind was clearing. She paid extra close attention to the way he moved his swords, seeing afterimages of them as he guided his hand.
The moment they hit the sweet spot she lunged forward and managed to push between the swords to slash him horizontally across the gut.
Her blades shattered, but she managed to tear a deep scar through his armor and pushed him back.
The wound reopened and began to leak out. There were bits of purple ice mixed into his blood that bloomed into ugly crystals upon his armor.
His swords hung upon the ground and his pants were caked with a grimy, mucous sound, "I…I…"
It seemed his rage would soon come forth, but upon looking at his enemy he began to crease his lips into a more upright, cocky smile.
"Hmm…It seems you've lost your weapons."
Cecilia rose to her feet and remained calm. Her wrists hurt like hell, and squeezing her fingers would just make it worse.
But HE simply did not understand why his boast was wrong.
A weapon isn't that important in the grand scheme of things.
A few cuts or bruises can be healed from.
But he valued everything only under the label of power. The ability to fight, the ability to win, and even the ability to care about others.
He assumed his enemy conquered, his pride mended.
But there was a reason Cecilia Frost was once worthy of the title of "Arctic Knight of Black Winter".
She thrust her hands out and from behind her, the black snow flung itself straight at Colrez in a condensed form, shredding down the integrity of his empirical armor and deepening the pain of his wound.
"GHHH…!" His face twisted in anguish before he howled in lunacy and disbelief, "I-Impossible…! This power…IS MINE ALONE TO COMMAND!"
Cecilia held her ground and kept wailing on him over time with this flurry, refusing to let him have a chance to take it back, "And for what?! Conquest?! Even if a blowhard like you took over the world…you'd find no satisfaction in it!"
Colrez finally regained his grip over his swords and slashed the black snow away. His eyes were locked in this dilated, bloodshot state.
Cecilia started to pant, and called her armor over to deliver her lance, which she thrust at Colrez's face.
And in a deep, bitter tone she delivered the most scathing blow to his ego, "Your reason for living is as empty as your heart, Colrez Frost."
Colrez's veins began to bulge out of his forehead, his laughter laced with this unhinged, forced sense of confidence and grandeur.
"Empty? Empty, you dare say to me you mad woman? Why…it is filled with all the splendors of life one could ever ask for!"
He glared at her and could barely retain focus, "Gaze upon me in judgment…but your hands have never felt the joy of seizing a breast, nor has your stomach been full of merry and wine. I can take it all for myself, and discard it at my leisure…! Don't you GET IT…?! Life is about satisfaction, yet just because I discovered the secret and obtained a life fulfilled I am to be condemned by your mewling tongue?!"
"You know what? Yes…I was TOO nice before. This crown has opened my eyes to my own weaknesses. Once I've dealt with you, I will easily bury every other Tribe in snow! Every pleasure they own, every sow they've bred, I will feast upon them in excess."
"And I shall do it all from my glorious new throne, built upon the skulls of all those barbarians who have troubled me the most…" Colrez wiggled his smile like an armed weapon, "Starting with that dirt-ridden loud-mouthed son of Johnathan Gaia…"
Cecilia internalized the sound of a loud, cold snap in her chest and her eyes dilated to the extreme.
Her heart started pumping feverishly and she propelled herself forward, stabbing her lance towards Colrez's chest.
The man quivered and barely swung his swords down in time to divert it.
He then stretched his smirk, widened his eyes, and began slashing out with all his might to chip at her lance.
"Yes, like that…! Those barbarians always wore those very same eyes when they tried to fight me…!"
"Such a fitting look for you…"
Cecilia kept thrusting and swinging her lance and despite Colrez' demeanor remaining strong…She was pushing him back.
This was not her strength carrying her weapon. In fact her wrists were being damaged with every strike.
This was the purest form of power. This was love.
She felt it rise up from underneath all her rage, delivering her reminders of where this all began to where she was now.
Her heart could no longer remain cold to this much warmth swelling inside of her. She was sweating, desperate to protect her family from this man's ego-driven insanity.
She had pushed herself away from all forms of attachment in the pursuit of finding her place in the world.
The person she once was would have mocked her relentlessly for even having these sorts of thoughts now.
But now, she has figured herself out.
All Cecilia Frost ever wanted…was to be accepted for who she was.
And there was no greater proof of that than the embraces she shared with her husband and son.
She bit her teeth and started to clear the red fog in her mind. Her attacks became more targeted at Colrez's weakpoints, his wrists and chest specifically.
Colrez started to slip and let out more grunts, the facade of confidence breaking down at a rapid-pace until reality came crashing down upon him like an avalanche.
"Why won't you FALL ALREADY?!" His crown glowed with a deep violet aurora borealis and black ice burst from his body to push her back, littering the ground with jagged ice of various sizes.
Cecilia used her lance to slow down while Colrez formed both his swords back into his own lance, taking aim and firing that dark liquid through the ice.
Cecilia leaned her shoulder out and her armor dropped in front of her to take the hit, removing that limb from the overall whole.
She then ran forward, jumping and spinning while using the tip of her lance to carve up the ice and send them ahead at her enemy.
The armor continued to tank hits from the liquid ice, shattering apart more and more pieces until soon only the chest plate remained.
Colrez' whole body then glowed with that grim aurora, but the jewels on his head were starting to empty.
His whole face throbbed with darkened veins and he coughed up blood in excess, his tongue becoming laced with those spiky ice crystals.
His mount rode up to his side and roared at Cecilia.
Only to be impaled through the skull by his master, where he proceeded to hunch over him in an inhuman posture and gesture at him like a thief greedily demanding from a passerby.
"More…! I need more…!"
His lance siphoned the blood from the beast and filled the crown back up, regressing most of the marks to his body.
He then channeled black frost into his lance, spiraling outward so far that it tore apart the ground beside his feet.
He aimed at Cecilia diving at him and thrust, the power contained in the lance fighting back.
Thus emerged the mightiest power he could muster, enough to freeze these lands into an inhospitable wasteland.
Cecilia's armor stood in defiance, with her feeding it most of her power in hopes of outlasting his attack.
She began to see her younger self in the broken down house her and her mother lived in.
She felt her body get cold as she saw herself nestling up against her mother's cold body with their only blanket covering her up.
Her mother had already lost her battle with life…
Cecilia saw the liquid wrapping around the armor and reaching for her body and began to cry, her heart aching at the possibility that she might…die.
In the silence of her mind, another memory rose.
Little Pitori, at the same age she was when she lost her mother, had trouble sleeping that night.
He wandered into their room and put himself between his parents.
She stayed awake a little longer, watching him fall asleep with a smile as his tiny arms cuddled around her body.
She held him closer and felt warmth, his…and hers.
Her tears ran warmly down her cheeks and she grit her teeth one last time, pushing forward with a roar.
This gave her armor the last push it needed to survive Colrez's assault, shattering at the same time his attack fizzled out.
He wiggled his lance and the deadly realization that he was empty hit him too late.
Cecilia flew at him with tears flying off the sides of her face and lance pulled back.
There was a violet flash, then silence. Snow began to fall upon the lands again, as the black crown went flying off Colrez's head and onto the ground a couple feet away.
The backdraft of Cecilia's attack toppled the man onto his rear and he grasped at the ground, heart racing and fear-fraught face haunted by the specter of death.
He scrambled to grab the top of his head and then turned around, his crown cracked but still intact.
He gasped and dragged himself over on his elbows and stomach, clawing at the crown and panting like a dog.
But when he took hold of that mighty crown he saw it be reduced to snow dust between his fingers.
"No…no no no…! It was mine…!" His tyrannical garb melted away into a black puddle and he swung his clawed fingers at the ground, trying to scoop up the crown's remnants upon his head.
"NO NO NO!" He screamed, his voice whimpering in a high-pitched tone.
He froze against Cecilia's lance pointed at the tip of his nose. She lorded over him with her eyes still shaky with rage-fueled dilation.
"H-Haaa…haaaa…!" Colrez' skin was pale, he was but a shivering and wrinkly man clawing at the ground for power…
He could hear her heart pumping as she pulled her lance back in both hands.
"T-This isn't right…!" Colrez sniveled, "I…I was supposed to rule everything…! Why…why must you demons haunt me in this shape…?!"
Cecilia's eyes flared open one last time and she thrust her lance down, Colrez letting out one pitiful squeak as he squeezed his hands into the snow.
The ground beside his face was pierced, and he slowly raised his head off the ground to look at her.
She took a deep breath and let go of it all with a single long exhale. She then pulled her lance from the ground and dictated to him in a firm, triumphant tone, "Your reign…is over."
She then raised her voice to declare her verdict, "You are to be banished to the Wilds, with no armor, no weapons, and no food except for what you can salvage from the environment."
Colrez gulped and his lips began to quiver, "You…you're…banishing me…? But…but…I'll die like this…!"
Cecilia looked him dead in the eyes and said, "If that's how nature wants to play, that's not my concern. You said you have the strength to conquer the land? Well…prove it."
Colrez tightened his fists and pulled himself up onto his knees. Frenzied, desperate, and angered, he tried to get the last laugh in by announcing, "You think…you can command…ME?! I have led these men through many battles! I AM BELOVED BY ALL…AND YOU ARE JUST A WHORE, LEECHING OFF THE SYMPATHY OF FOOLS…!"
He was plucked up by the arms and forced to stand thanks to two young soldiers at his sides.
His eyes widened and he took one quick look at their faces in a panic.
Cecilia closed her eyes and then turned away.
Colrez pried himself free with one tug and collapsed onto the ground, flailing his fingers at Cecilia's legs, "N-No…! This can't be what you want…! P-Please…! I beg of you…! I'll give you anything you could ever want, just let me die NOW…! Don't make me suffer…! PLEASE!"
The young men pulled him back up and Cecilia opened her eyes, for a brief moment, disgusted that she would feel sympathy for him.
"...I already have everything I needed you for. You've already stained me enough, Colrez Frost, I refuse to add your blood to the mix."
The young men held onto him tighter and dragged him away ranting and raving before all the men he used to lead, and the women he left forsaken.
And now, in his final moments of power, he saw those women find the courage to look at him in utter disgust, a couple spitting in his face, reducing him to silence.
And when he was gone, Cecilia…smiled.
Her heart felt at peace, and her face was radiant. She finally let go of her lance and wiped her eyes dry with her knuckles.
"Ha ha…" With a brief sniffle she turned her head up and saw that many of the soldiers were looking upon her with admiration, too scared to get any closer.
That is, until one brave young man stepped out, gesturing with a soft, confused look in his eyes, "W-What does this mean for us…? What…are we supposed to do now?"
Cecilia triumphantly declared loud enough for all to hear, "LIVE! It's time for you to stop being an army, and learn to be a Tribe again!"
"...Can you…teach us how…?" Asked that same man.
Cecilia's chest fluttered, and with a mild blush in her cheeks she admitted, "I have my own obligations to uphold as a citizen of Oreore but yes, whenever I can, I'll show you how to live…To be better men, and better people."
She laid a hand on her chest until the fluttering stopped and then looked up towards the sky, "After all, I owe this peace of mind to the greatest people I know…"
She saw the reflection of her found family in the sky smiling and waving down at her, and never again would her eyes be this tender with joy.
Next Time: Last Inferno