In war you need wisdom and brutality

The rebel and grey skin army finally reached castle Heinfel. It was a strong castle meant to protect the region from grey skin raids. It didn't work for its function very well. The raiding grey skins just avoided it always and just passed by it at most. It still was an important castle to take. It was the closest castle to the grey scale mountains and much of the supplies coming to them from the mountains could be intercepted by the garrison of the castle.

The castle had a sturdy keep with a wall surrounding it. It had four towers and the entire castle stood on top of a small hill. The castle had around three hundred soldiers garrisoning it yearlong with sometimes some additional forces enlisted in times of war. The castle also had some ballistae on the wall that had a range of at least five hundred meters.

Doreen worked as the tactician of the army or how she described herself, strategos. She ordered the army to surround the castle and prepare siege equipment and start to build other siege weaponry like trebuchets and battering rams. Edward was starting to feel annoyed by all this elaborate warfare. It was very different from what he was used to when he was young and thought all of this was pointless.

"Listen Doreen. I realize this is important and all, but we can't just start a long siege," Edward argued.

"If we don't do that we will have many unnecessary deaths. We have to save our manpower. In this war, we still are outnumbered. We need to spare every soldier and warrior we can," Doreen explained.

"Yeah I know, but time is also very crucial. We don't need this. Let us just charge the walls right now," Edward argued.

"Don't you idiot see those walls? Don't you see those archers? Don't you see those ballistae? As soon as what is left of our attacking force reaches the wall, they realize they have no way to scale the walls. What you are suggesting would be suicide," Doreen said and pointed at the well-defended castle.

"I did not suggest we send some grey skin warrior with some Wallach spearmen to storm the walls. I have a better idea," Edward said and gave a creepy smile.

Edward dragged Rufus off his black yak. He then also dragged the always quiet Pema.

"Rufus my buddy. What do you think? Do you think taking down that castle would be so hard," Edward asked from Rufus smiling.

Rufus looked at the castle.

"Hmmm. Let's see," said Rufus who also smiled.

Edward then looked at Pema.

"Pema my good friend. You want to go have some fun with me and Rufus," Edward asked from the very quiet Pema.

Pema smiled back.

"Let's go have some fun," Pema said with a small smile on his face.

"Oh no. GUYS! Don't be stupid!" Doreen yelled at them.

"Too late Doreen. You know how Rufus is. He is a pushover and I asked him to do a thing," Edward said and waved back at Doreen.

Pema, Rufus, and Edward started slowly and with confidence walking towards the castle. The entire army came to look at what their Raja and his three warriors were about to do.

As soon as they were in range, the ballistae started to shoot its large missiles at them with pinpoint accuracy. Edward was deflecting all of them with his sword before they were able to land. Pema turned his fists and feet into carbon and kicked and punched the ballista spears away. Rufus just walked while the three of them blocked all the missiles coming at them

When the three of them were in the range of the bows and crossbows a large hale of arrows was shot at them. The sky almost completely blackened with arrows. Rufus conjured a divine sphere and threw it towards the incoming arrows. It expanded to a large size and disintegrated all the arrows that were about to hit them.

Rufus's army looked in awe as these three monsters were just walking towards a heavily defended castle. Instead, the soldiers of the castle started to panic. Anything they threw at the enemy was destroyed and they were just calmly walking like looking down on all of them.

"Don't just watch. Keep firing at those three. It is just three men!" the captain of the castle yelled to the soldiers.

When they were around ten meters away from the walls Edward and Pema jumped onto the walls of the castle. The soldiers looked shocked and in complete panic and charged at Pema and Edward.

Pema and Edward started to take down all the soldiers on the wall both moving like a boulder destroying anything in its wake. Edward going one way on the wall and Pema the other way.

Rufus then touched the wall. The wall crumbled with just one small touch. The army just looked at the power of their Raja or the famous Rufus depending on was a rebel soldier or a grey skin warrior.

Pema and Edward both were stopped by a noble who had also divine power. That didn't slow down them much. Both Pema and Edward just walked all over them. Pema getting close and getting an armbar and breaking the arm of the noble. Edward who dodged all the flaming arrows the noble shot at him and then slashed the arm off the noble.

Rufus simply walked inside the castle through the wall. He was met with tens of soldiers holding halberds who were trying to stop him from getting any further. Rufus just charged the soldiers. With his own impressive martial skill and the divine power to destroy anything he touched, he instilled fear into the eyes of the soldiers. He threw divine sphere here and there making the battle, even more, one-sided.

Rufus's army just watched as smoke started to come from the castle. Explosions were heard and occasionally could see soldiers were being thrown out in almost a comedic way when Pema punched them.

After a while, Rufus, Edward, and Pema just walked away from the ruined castle. They returned to the army. All of them didn't even get a single scratch. They passed Doreen and the rest of their crew.

"I believe Rufus made a hole bigger enough for our army to storm the castle," Edward said to Doreen in a snark tone.

Doreen looked at the three of them. They were the three strongest people they had in the entire army by far and everyone in the army knew it from count Hunyadi to a normal soldier of the army and from Tashi to the most average grey skin warrior there was.

"You have your way. I have my way. You may be a strategos or whatever, but war is always fought with the sheer willpower and strength of an individual. Just trust more in your men. They have the strength to carry this war with you," Edward said to Doreen.

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[In the future]

"As Athena and Doreen represent the civilized and intellectual side of warfare so too do Ares and Edward represent the chaos and brutal aspects of war," Zeus said to Rufus.