Chapter 6 - Chaos At The Camp

Being unable to fall asleep Pan decided to walk around the camp, there were some young people like him still awake near the fires, as well as some crusaders on guard.

 He stopped when he recognized a familiar figure. It was Ava, who was standing by a fire and looking at the fire dancing in the night lost in her thoughts, the captivating smile normally on her face could no longer be found and her brow was slightly furrowed.

 'Maybe I should talk to her,' thought Pan.

 After Nanna's death, Ava had no more reason to visit and Pan preferred it that way, he wanted to be alone in mourning.

 "Ava?" Asked Pan approaching her.

 But before Ava had any chance to respond, a scream was heard far away in the night, followed by others, and then a trumpet blew.

 "Crusaders! Prepare to battle," shouted Leopold.

 Pan and Ava were caught up in the sudden agitation of the crusaders waking up and entering the defense line, he looked to where they were defending but there was nothing there, only night remained.

 But he drew his sword anyway, for the feeling of being watched became infinitely greater, he felt something ominous in the dark, something cruel and ancient, something that didn't like him.

 His palms started to sweat, his legs and arms were shaking and his breathing was heavy before the first downer even appeared. There was silence for a few moments and then everything changed.

 A fallen threw himself out of the darkness at the Crusader barrier, Pan could see his features faintly thanks to the flickering light of the fires, the fallen looked like something between a wolf and a bull, that and if wolves and bulls were born in hell, the beast It was almost two meters tall while four and easily five meters long, its legs ended in what appeared to be spears made of bones, spears that balanced in turn a body so muscular that even the shaggy black hairs were unable to hide the unnatural force concealed over them, its head resembled that of a wolf, but more square like an ox, and with two horns protruding from its sides, there was a tail as long as its body, with the same spear-like appearance at the tip. than her limbs, she was tense, like a snake waiting to pounce. The fallen one had no eyes, only a throaty mouth occupied its face with a crusader still being chewed hanging from it.

 However, before the vile being was able to finish his delight, his head was ripped from his body by a blow so fast that Pan was barely able to understand what had happened.

 "Hold the horde until I'm done with the fallen lord!" Leopold screams beside the headless fallen. "For the Order!" Declared Leopold to the Crusaders with his ax raised in defiance against the night and its terrors.

 "For the Order!" Replied the crusaders.

 Leopold was a full-fledged Crusader master, his great war ax still dripped with the blood of the fallen as he threw himself into the darkness of the woods, Pan could barely keep up with his movements in the night, only the silvery glow that the ax left in its wake are indicative of where Leopold was.

 'Lorde? Horde? What horde?' Thought Pan after losing sight of Leopold in the darkness.

 As if to answer your questions, dozens of fallen ones like the first appear one after another, but these were the size of a large dog, with only a few just as large as the first, not that that made them any less deadly.

 The fallen threw themselves into the line of defense with ferocity and unassuming violence over their lives.

 The crusaders intercepted the fallen who attacked with mastery, the whites had impeccable teamwork. They used triangular shields and short swords and kept themselves in groups of three, Pan saw a fallen one use its spear-shaped tail against a white's shield, but before the tail made contact the shield glowed slightly, causing the tail left only a small hole before the other white man beside him rushed to slash it with his sword, making the fallen writhe in agony.

 The reds, in turn, were in pairs and used weapons of different types, most of them axes. Pan watched in a daze as their blades glowed red, as if they had just been born from the Order's forges. The air around the reds was hot to the point of slightly warping how people viewed the scene, making Pan remember seeing this same visual phenomenon on the city streets on a particularly hot summer day.

 The blues and browns were few and they acted alone, giving support to those who needed it. Pan saw a brown one crush a fallen one with a warhammer twice his size, then swung the giant hammer as if it were as light as a leaf and then hurled it at another fallen one who was about to devour a blue one, before turning and face the nearest fallen with bare hands.

 The blue one that was saved simply started running towards a group of surrounded whites and with each step taken his speed grew, his hair started to get spiky and little flashes of electricity ran through his skin over and over again, he tilted his spear it snapped with electricity forward, and by the time it reached the white group, it was as fast as a prized stallion galloping to its fullest. The blue then nimbly passed from one side to the other between the three whites who were surrounded, while massacring the fallen who dared to stand in the way and soon after fell gasping on the ground.  One of the white men in turn came to his side and leaned on his shoulder, giving him vitality to compensate for the exhausting load.