The group took up their different positions. Dalsk and Claude moved to either side of the clearing whilst Mik, Dalsk, Adrien and the other mercenaries moved behind trees and shrubbery. The Ashen Demon, Edelgard and Dimitri did the same further back.
Above, the sky was gradually brightening, but it was still dark amongst the trees, and Edelgard hoped that that would work to their advantage. She waited, and soon she heard the bandits shouting and cheering nearby. She guessed they'd given up on finding them and were celebrating because they'd found a village to plunder.
But to get to the village, they'd have to get through her… and of course, Dimitri and Claude.
And they would also have to get through Jeralt and his mercenaries. She gazed at them in their different ambush positions. They were all in front of her and Dimitri.
Except the one called Byleth.
She looked across at him. He leaned against a tree with his blade in his hand. His eyes were fixed downward. She gazed at him and frowned.
'They're nearing,' Dimitri murmured nearby.
Edelgard blinked and then nodded. The voices grew sharper and soon she was able to hear their thudding footsteps closing in. Close by, she also heard the footsteps of Jeralt and the rest of his men. The valley was busy now. Both parties had arrived.
And then she heard the mercenary leader's voice. It wasn't clear what he said, but she could piece it together. She mouthed it.
'We want no trouble. Turn back now and you will not be harmed.'
The bandits gave their response in an echoing cry. They trampled forward and there was a loud crashing clang of steel, bangs of shields, twangs of bowstrings and sickening cries of pain.
'It's begun,' Dimitri said.
Edelgard gripped her axe, waiting for the signal from Adrien to commence their flanking manoeuvre.
But it didn't come, and soon, she saw the shrubbery beyond the clearing sway back and forth.
'Into the trees!' a gruff voice shouted.
'Move, move, move!' another screamed.
Men emerged through the overgrowth, one, two, four, eight, ten, fifteen, more of them. Edelgard's eyes widened.
How many of them are there?
'Fucking hell!' Dalsk spat.
The bandits charged. Arrows flew through the trees, knocking two of them down, but more appeared. Jeralt's mercenaries jumped from their cover and crashed into them.
'We must move,' Dimitri said.
'Right!' Edelgard said. She jumped from her cover and rushed forward.
But as she ran, she looked back.
The Ashen Demon remained at his tree, gazing downward.
The high-pitched voice yawned again and uttered a single word.
'…repose.'
The voice was soft, yet it echoed through the darkness.
The steps once again lit up in green light one by one, this time closer to the Ashen Demon.
'There's so many of them,' Jeralt breathed.
A sea of dirt-covered men in ragtag tunics holding torches, axes, lances and swords crashed into his mercenaries in the valley. There were lots of them, perhaps more than there'd been the day before.
He saw some of them rush up the side of the valley into the trees. He cursed.
In the woods, mercenaries and bandits fell.
The bandits outnumbered the mercenaries and their allies. Mik, Ralph, Dalsk, Alexander, Gregory, Rufus and the rest of the men formed the main line of defence. Edelgard and Dimitri supported from one side whilst Claude and Adrien hid amongst the shrubbery, picking off men with their arrows.
The Ashen Demon was nowhere to be seen.
Dalsk raised his axe and slammed it downward, connecting with his opponent's head. He pulled his weapon free and looked up. 'More assholes incoming,' he shouted.
He glanced to one side. A further two mercenaries crumpled to the ground. He cursed. He then looked to the other side and saw Edelgard and Dimitri.
His eyes widened.
Both of them, who to Dalsk looked about eighteen or nineteen, were holding their own. A burly man with arms thicker than Dimitri's legs swung at the boy. Dimitri parried the blow and knocked the bandit to the ground before impaling him with his lance. Edelgard was small, making her opponent look like a giant, and yet it was him on the backfoot. Edelgard sidestepped one and then two swipes before swinging her own weapon and flooring the man.
'You kids ain't bad,' Dalsk muttered. He turned and faced his next opponent.
Jeralt had thought their battle the day before against Ronan had been difficult.
He'd been wrong.
The tip of a lance scraped his cheek. Hot pain seared across his face and he grimaced.
'How is there so many of you?' he growled, yanking the lance towards him and connecting his weapon with man who'd thrust it.
'What a shitshow,' Pascal growled.
'Agreed,' Jeralt said. From the corner of his eye he saw more bandits emerge from the darkness and joining the fight.
And then he spotted him.
'Just my fucking day.'
To one side, men continued to climb the hill towards the trees.
'How many of them are there?' Dimitri breathed.
Edelgard thought the same thing, slamming her axe down on a bandit's head. She looked up in time to see four more closing in.
She wasn't sure how much time had passed. Bandits were everywhere, despite the bodies that littered the ground. Her axe trembled in her hands, fresh cuts stung on her arms and face and large purplish bruises thumped on her shoulders and chest.
The four bandits approached. Edelgard raised her weapon. The largest one, bald and bearing a potbelly, swung his axe. She ducked and kicked her leg out, toppling the man and driving her own axe downward before he could move. She pulled her weapon free, inhaling short, sharp breaths. Her shoulders burned and her legs trembled. Dimitri, leaned against the side of a tree, gasping for air.
The two other men approached. Edelgard raised her axe, panic panging in her chest for the first time that evening.
And that was when someone moved from behind her towards the bandits. Her eyes widened.
'You…,' she breathed.
The bandits slowed, the anger in their eyes fading.
The Ashen Demon marched towards them.
The bandits looked at each other and then charged again; their weapons raised.
The Ashen Demon closed in and struck. She and Dimitri froze.
The bandits didn't scream, they couldn't. The Ashen Demon didn't let them. They fell to the ground, motionless, sending a shiver down Edelgard's spine. The man's face was blank, as if he'd just awoken from a deep sleep. It'd been an understandable expression earlier; he almost certainly had awoken from a deep sleep.
But he still bears that… expression… even now, she thought. She studied his dark purple eyes. Her father had insisted she learn how to read people, and yet she was unable to now. The mercenary's blank face hid everything.
The man motioned in the direction of the clearing where the rest of the mercenaries were. Dimitri nodded and the two men moved. Edelgard, blinked and then followed.
Up ahead, Gregory the mercenary was outnumbered and outfought. He crumpled to the ground. His killers turned and charged at them. Edelgard watched the Ashen Demon sidestep an axe swipe. He was quicker than any soldier she'd seen and yet it played out to her in slow motion. The man pivoted and drove his knee into the bandit's stomach. She heard the sickening thud.
Who is he? she thought.
She watched him finish off his foe and then limp towards the surviving mercenaries in the clearing. She shook her head and then followed.
The mercenaries breathed heavily, coated in blood. Adrien was crouched next to a tree. At first, Edelgard wasn't sure why, and then she did.
'Claude!' Dimitri said, rushing over to where the man lay unconscious against the tree.
'He's okay,' Adrien said. 'He broke cover to save Mik and got a nasty head knock for it. We killed the bandit before he could do any serious damage.'
'A knock to the side of the head is no joke,' Dimitri said.
'He was throwing up,' Mik said. 'Like he was drunk.'
'Now is not the time to worry about him,' Edelgard said. 'We must ensure our own survival first.'
'I agree,' Adrien replied. 'He'll be fine there as long as he isn't on his back. The bandits will think he's dead anyway. We need to focus on'-
'More assholes incoming,' Dalsk hissed.
Within a matter of moments, more men with weapons piled through the shrubbery.
'How many of them are there?!' Mik cried.
'We'll deal with them, keep pushing,' Adrien said.
The high-pitched voice yawned again and this time the Ashen Demon pressed his hands to his ears.
'Where… you….'
The seven stone steps reappeared once again, this time only ten feet from him.
The steps and the voice were getting closer.
Thomas grinned.
He'd never killed before, but tonight was the night.
As the fighting raged amongst the trees, he spotted a man standing alone, staring at the ground.
'He's mine,' he said, charging towards him.
'Not if I get to him first,' Marcus spat.
The two of them ran, closing in on their target.
The Ashen Demon blinked.
He was standing on grass and shrubbery. He stared at it, his body tense.
And then he looked up.
Something as hard as rock crashed into the side of his face and he slammed to the ground.
A bandit kicked Dalsk to the ground. Another rammed Dimitri against a tree, Ralph missed an axe swipe by inches and Alexander took a blow to the face.
'Can't keep this up,' Rufus cried.
'We can,' Alexander shouted, wrestling his opponent to the ground.
'Keep pushing!' Adrien shouted.
'Assholes!' Dalsk roared, spinning to his feet and lunging at his opponent.
Edelgard had the urge to say something similar as she wiped blood from her face. Her body trembled and her chest pounded. Bandits charged towards her. She backtracked-
-and caught her foot on a vine.
She tumbled to the ground. She cursed, scrambling to her feet. Bandits closed in. One of them swung. She raised her axe and her opponent's sword slammed into it. The force jerked her backward, tumbling into the shrubbery and dropping her weapon. She clawed at the ground, pulling herself back. She looked up. One of the men closed in with a lance. He thrust.
And that's when the Ashen Demon crashed into him.
Where he'd come from, Edelgard couldn't tell, he'd been too quick. The bandit slammed to the ground and before he could move the Ashen Demon was over him, slamming his heel downward. He spun and parried an axe swipe. Another man bulldozed into him but the mercenary kept his balance and elbowed him aside.
The Ashen Demon fought and Edelgard watched, frozen.
The bandits fell, one by one, until only the Ashen Demon stood. Edelgard caught a glimpse of his face, still pale and blank. Blood trickled from a fresh wound on the side of his head. He swayed on his feet and then bent over and vomited.
'Byleth?' she said, rising to her feet. She waited a moment until he was done. 'Is everything alright? Are you'-
The Ashen Demon turned and stared at her. A moment later he collapsed.
The giant swung and another mercenary fell.
'Screw you,' Jeralt spat. He thrust his lance at the giant who pivoted and slammed his two swords downward. Jeralt parried but stumbled back. Conrad, one of the mercenaries, stepped in and kicked his leg out, pushing the giant back.
'He won't fuckin' die,' Pascal said.
'Deal with the others first,' Jeralt said. 'Once the rest of these clowns are down we'll surround him.'
But then the giant turned his head to one side and looked in the direction of the trees-
-and the village.
He turned and shoved his way out the back of the attacking group towards the trees. Jeralt's nostrils flared.
'You son of a bitch!'
'We lost two mercenaries in five years before today,' Adrien said, shaking his head. 'And now we've lost fourteen in a single morning.'
'We're gonna lose more if we don't hurry up and get down to Jeralt and the others,' Dalsk said. 'Let's move.'
'Will he be alright?' Mik asked, nodding to where the Ashen Demon lay slumped at a nearby tree. Dalsk nodded.
'Head knock. Not much we can do for him apart from end this fight, same with the other kid. Let's get to Jeralt and finish this.'
'Right!' the remaining mercenaries said. They moved towards the clearing. Edelgard glanced at the Ashen Demon a final time.
'You gotta be fucking kidding me!' Dalsk cried.
Edelgard snapped her head around and froze.
'W-Who is that?' Dimitri asked. 'How tall is he?!'
The stone steps were now only five feet from the Ashen Demon, still he did not move towards them.