The First Encounter

As the fighting at the beginning of the column started to die down and Werten assumed his commanding position in the middle of the column, he started to hear one of the uncanniest sounds in his life: marching footsteps thundering across the forest. Although he was all too familiar with this rhythm, it was the location that made this particularly bizarre. And as his mind

was still rejecting the idea, there it was, right in front of his eyes, an army of marching orci came into his line of sight and suddenly ground to a halt. The longer Werten observed these orci, the more he felt that he was betrayed by reality itself. Different to the orci he was familiar with and had even fought against just a few days prior, who always wore nothing more than a pair of trousers for protection and wielded extremely cumbersome weapons, the orci neatly lining up in front of him seemed to come out of a different world. They wore heavy chest plates that covered most of their torso besides their arm. These plates, while very poorly crafted, and some of them are basically just thick metal plates strapped to their body, they still were not something an ordinary human could pierce through. Their heads, thank Singen, had virtually no helmet except for a few special ones. They often were a size bigger than their fellow orci and if Werten had to guess, they must belong to the rank of commanders. The orci' long spears closely mirrored their own, and while the shields can also be counted as another resemblance, theirs was oblong in shape, while orckish shields were rectangular.

But the most mind-boggling detail was undoubtedly their commander. Sitting atop a wolf, the enemy general held a smaller circular shield in one hand and a significantly longer spear in the other. Werten estimated that it must be 8 cubiti in length, almost double the length of a traditional spear. He wore a pointed top helmet with a metal face mask that obscured his entire countenance and full body armor, even his wolf was lightly fitted with a set of customized leather armor, with two strange hoops hanging from the side. The most striking feature was, while this commander of theirs was clearly as tall as any other orcus, he was not at all robust and eerily lean. So much that… you would think he was a human. Until he opened his mouth that was, and a low and orotund yet savage tongue resounded across the battlefield.

"Al! Phalanx giburt! Fordaro dri legen helfan!"

Immediately, the first two ranks of orci raised their shields and locked them together, only leaving a small gap between every two soldiers just enough for a spear to stick out horizontally while the third rank assumed the same stance, but with their spears poised at a diagonal angle. After taking less than a second to form up, all three ranks advanced simultaneously in a disturbingly disciplined fashion.

"Werten! Legatus Werten!" The urgent shout woke him up from a daze. Werten turned around and was met with a nervous gaze from a soldier fitted in light leather armor.

"Sir, legionarius[1] Degan from the First Scout Contubernium, at your service. I brought news from Lady Reni, sir!" The soldier spoke his piece in one breath as if he had rehearsed this particular sentence extensively and carefully presented him with a papyrus sealed with a luminous glyph.

"You are excused. Return to your post at once." Werten issued a standard order and received the scroll. As soon as he touched it, the seal on the document promptly dissolved and a series of glyphs started to flood his mind, injected the recorded information directly into his brain. The vision was an exact replica of what Reni had seen using the Eye of Magic at the moment the orckish army appeared within its range of vision.

"Almost as long as our column, at least five ranks deep. Harkon can't do anything at this rate," he mumbled frustratingly. Snapping his vision back to the battlefield, he worriedly observed the orci approaching closer by the second. There was truly no fancy maneuver that he could pull at this moment. While the River Covrunach did indeed provide them with a tactical advantage by securing the rear, it also acted as a wall, or more accurately, a precipice of their utter annihilation should they lose the melee to come.

"Men! Brace yourselves! They are nothing but overgrown beasts! Hold formation and they will flee just like those who came before! For Singen!" Werten roared as the two sides were about to clash.

"For Singen!" The men frantically followed suit, their morale soared after hearing the thunderous war cry bellowed by their 5000 brothers-in-arms. They gripped their shields a little tighter and raised their spears a little higher, ready to meet whatever came their way.

"Arbalests! Aim high! First angle! Fire!" The centuriones commanding the ranged infantry cohors[2] ordered in unison. Almost half a thousand bolts were let loose from their respective crossbow, forming a shower of deadly projectiles above the ranks of orci. However, the supposedly fatal attack proved almost useless in this particular terrain, as most of the bolts pinned harmlessly into the trees, and the rest were effortlessly blocked by the gigantic orckish shields. Only a handful of orci could be seen tumbling down to the ground after the first volley.

"Legatus! We do not have a clear line of sight and there are far too many obstructions!" The praefectus[3] of the ranged infantry cohors hastily reported his observation.

"Again! We have no choice but to whittle them down as much as we can." Werten understood the delicate balance of power very well, and now was absolutely not the time to conserve ammunition. If he could deal enough damage to the first wave and force the remaining ranks to join the melee, Harkon's equites[4] could freely charge into the orcus' rear and broke their formation completely. The most significant advantage he had at the moment was that the enemy did not seem to possess a cavalry division.

"Arbalests! Aim high! Second angle! Fire!"

Just as the bolts were released from the crossbows for a second round, a primitive horn blast echoed throughout the forest, completely drowning the sound of nearly a thousand bolts taking flight. Werten subconsciously tried to decipher the command for a second, thinking it was sounded by the cornu from the princess' headquarters. After a brief second, he immediately realized what was wrong:

"That was not out cornu." He muttered quietly to avoid causing any further confusion among the men, grabbed one of his praeco, and whispered. "Send word to tribunus Oga, tell him to report anything abnormal to me in the vicinity. Any…"

Before Werten could even stress how important this would-be mission was, a new recruit stationed at the very back of the army rushed up to him and loudly screamed:

"Sir! I saw enemy riding wolves across the river!"

The arbalests were instantly startled by the news, some even forgot to load the bolts for the third volley and involuntarily looked behind them. All the way on the other side of the river, they did indeed hazily see a small group of orci mounted atop their wolves.

"Arbalests! Aim high! Third angle! Fire!"

The absent-minded soldiers were dragged back to reality rather abruptly. Some tried to hastily load their crossbows, while the more experienced others only hung their head low shamefully and awaited the soon-to-come punishment. Third high angle was the last volley that could have been fired without endangering their own vanguard, and they had stupidly missed the most important of shots. The enemy was as at the closest distance possible and they could have inflicted far more damage than the previous two volleys. Alas, now the melee infantry would have to bear the price of their mistake.

Werten was fuming, and seeing what he had done, the young soldier also went pale under the glare of the legatus. He was terrified of what could happen and began to babble mindlessly.

"Sir, I…"

"Centurio Gyrthor, organize the ranks." Werten gave a succinct order, sparring the incompetent fool from any further embarrassment.

"Yes, sir!" The centurio bowed deeply, only daring to look at the sandals of the legatus, while silently breathing a sigh of relief inside. Should the legatus had phrased his order a bit differently, something along the line of "organize your ranks", he himself would be in no less trouble than these buffoons. Cursing his luck, he knew that although legatus Werten had let him off easy, the fellow centuriones in the cohors and the praefectus would not treat him as gently.

As he approached the river, Werten could single out an oddity amidst this peculiar group of wolf riders. An old lanky orcus with a wooden staff ornated by two strings of skulls tied to its head stood in front of them, donning a tattered cloak painted with exotic symbols. He was looking at the sky, waving his oversized pole around frantically, and soon, a blue sphere of energy started to condense at the tip of the staff.

"Magic?" Werten muttered, an unsettling premonition started to creep up his gut. He grabbed the praeco who was still with him from earlier and urged "Tell tribunus Harkon to lead the equites here fast! Make sure he understands this is a direct order from me!"

Looking at the fading back of the messenger, Werten could not shake the uneasy feeling, not just because of the unit of wolf riders at the other side of the river, but mainly because moving the equites to the rear was too large a gamble. By now, the two sides have already engaged in a brutal melee, and despite outnumbering the enemy's vanguard, their army was not gaining any ground. The only reason two-fifths of the orckish army was still held in reserve was because of the threat posed by less than 200 equites. After the cavalry had been moved away, the enemy could go in with full force and completely overwhelm their frontline. However, Werten was banking on the fact that the enemy commander was no fool and thus would be overly cautious and could mistake this for a feint. But then again, he could just as easily figure out that the equites had to counter the wolf riders, a threat that although was looming heavily upon them, their means to cross the river had yet to be seen and could very well be a feint itself.

Werten quickly found the praefectus and have the ranged infantry cohors turned around and faced the wolf riders. Soon, the praeco returned, alone, with a face mixed between fear, indignance, and anger. Werten closed his eyes and lightly pinched his glabella, knowing full well what had happened "Tell me what he said, verbatim."

The praeco hesitated for a moment before answering "Sir, tribunus Harkon said: 'That's obviously a feint, I don't know what that stupid bear is thinking. I'm not going.'"

While not even knowing how he would have to properly react to such blatant insubordination, movement was made on the other side. An incantation reverberated throughout the river, in the unmistakable Orckish tongue:

"Iise, senten pfad duruh deser mihhil fluz!"

As he slammed his staff down onto the riverbank, into which the cyan ball of energy sunk and frost started to spread from the feet of the orckish sorcerer at an alarming speed.

"Oh fuck no." Werten silently cursed. He turned towards the praeco and hastily ordered. "Return to tribubus Harkon and inform him that the wolf riders are crossing the river. He is to rush here immediately! Go! And you," he turned to another praeco "send word to the primus pilus[5] and tell him that half of cohors prima[6] is to come here and defend this position. I will lead them personally."

The ice bridge was completed almost instantaneously, wide enough for three orci to ride side by side. As the wolf riders began to rapidly make their way towards the rear of the army, all non-combatants in the immediate vicinity of the bridge were evacuated towards the center of the army, leaving the arbalests, now formed up to 5 ranks deep and 40 files wide, having to face the enemy cavalry almost directly, with only a few wagons for cover.

"Arbalests! Aim low! Aim for their mounts! Fire!"

The problem with having 5 ranks deep of arbalests is, only the first two ranks can effectively aim low for their mounts, while the rest had to aim a little higher at the rider to avoid hitting their own comrades. After the first volley, the three wolves at the front were all killed, two of which fell off the ice bridge into the river. Unfortunately, the riders hiding behind the massive shields were virtually unscathed, and after quickly discarded of their shields and heavy chest plates, they simply swam back towards the sorcerer. The death of the third wolf, surprisingly, gave a huge boon to Werten's army. As the lifeless corpse of the wolf in the middle slumped to the icy pathway, an obstruction was suddenly presented to an entire column of wolf riders behind it, rendering them unable to advance. It was not until the last rider of the other two columns had passed that location before they could toss the dead mount into the river and belatedly rushing into the fray. However, the human army's abysmal luck ended there. The arbalests could only fire one more volley before being torn to shreds by the charging wolves. They impaled anyone unlucky enough to bear the brunt of the charge, and once their spears broke or wound up stuck in a corpse, they would decisively discard them, drew their gigantic broadswords, and started hacking away everyone in sight. Corpses littered the rear as strewn mangled bodies with crossbows on their backs and short swords in their hands could be seen everywhere.

[1]: Legionnaire, a soldier of the legion

[2]: Cohort, a unit typically consists of 10 centuriae (800 men)

[3]: Prefect, or in this case praefectus cohortis (cohort prefect), is the commander of a cohort

[4]: Cavalrymen

[5]: First file, the commander of the first cohort

[6]: The first cohort, twice as large as a regular cohort