Struggles on the rearguard

Hera was fighting together with the other guardians in the rearguard of the formation. They were taking care of the kobolds and orcs that were able to approach their troops with their attacks. 

The truth behind that formation was precisely to use the guards as meat shields to prevent the arrows and spells to get to the trainees and novices. Hera planned it since the start, and the only ones that knew about it were the guardians themselves. Differently from the trainees and novices, they didn't enter the battlefield aiming to survive, they had accepted their deaths before even going out of the forest. 

The biggest problem was that the former guardians were the subgroup of Stokil's survivors with fewer troops. The novices and trainees had a way greater number. It meant that they needed to fight with the lower number to protect a way bigger one, surviving until the last second, so they would be useful enough.