Chapter 5: the front lines

Making their way through the astran country side within a little less than two weeks. Rex and his squad find themselves in a astran village on the other side of the potami river. They look over the quiet little hamlet with little interest as they observe the land it rests on. It seems the levies have already started reinforcing the area the around the village with wooden post. Rex finds his way to the generals camp as the others go to set up their camps"commander rexan lacerana astra reporting in. me and my six knights have arrived to lend our aid"

As he enters the room with cofus and gora at his side, all other conversations seem to halt as rex enters their presence. They all look at him curiously as the general and the knights all salute him. But his fellow commander and his juniors simply nod their head to our rex

The other commander walks up to him and looks him in the eye. Hed be a much more slender man than rex having a more athletic build. His body was adorned with armor made of a mixture of bronze and scales his hair flowed down to his shoulders with several stripes of red partitioned throughout it. the two men stare at each other for a moment before a big grin meets both of their faces."sir rexan how nice it is to see you again its been so long i don't think I've laid eyes on you since the union of our kingdoms"

Their hands lock with each others as their eyes never leave one another's" Aemulus you bastard i thought id never meet you again. When was it we last locked eyes like this?"

Both of their voices have much passion to it gora and cofus smile at the seemingly happy reunion wondering about their past together."well i never did get to see you at the union celebration so to my knowledge the last time we met was at the battle of the deosuma river"

They both laugh but cofus seems to be taken abit back by this. Gora looks over to cofus wonder why the sudden look of tension. Rex cant help pat his fellow commander on the back as the laughing dies down"i remember that day like it was yesterday. I remember when my forces shattered your mens defenses allowing us to push through into your fathers territories. Did that slash i leave on your waist leave a scar by any chance?"

Gora is now taken back as well. As sir Aemulus raises his shirt to reveal a nasty scar on the side of his stomach he does it with a grin. Cofus just looks at the two with much discontent. Gora feels off by the whole situation but for now keeps her cool and continues to observe their conversation."yes i had to spend many months in bed due to your cut almost cost me my life. So if you disappoint me in the upcoming battle i will kill you myself sir rex"

Rex grins widen becoming quite sinister as he looks at his former foe."right back back at you sir Aemulus"

Gora coughs into her hand and looks at the two reunited combatants. Rex gives her a look of acknowledgment and nods"any way now that we've got the pleasantries out of the way whats our next actions"

Rex says looking towards the general. The general a man of middle age looks at the two commanders and nods"ive been told the last attack has been over 2 weeks ago meaning any day were due another attack rex, Aemulus your soldiers need to be ready at all times station them among my men so they can help with the reinforcing of the town"

Rex nods and looks at cofus and gora"you two go tell the others then go join the levies with them"

They both nod and scamper off Aemulus junior commanders quickly following them behind. The general waits for them to leave the tent and for everyone to get back settled in"good now that the reinforcements are handled we can breathe abit of fresh air i'm sure the watch towers will soon be put in place and well fend off theses malicious invaders."

He says quite calmly fully believing peace is now at hand all but one in the room seem to share his perception for the future sir rex still has an uneasy feeling abit the oncoming days."i wouldn't celebrate so easy yet sir the luutons are a powerful foe and though we've only seen one massive raiding party so far i wouldn't be surprised if they have twice that number"

The general smiles and sits down still feeling confident"no you are right sir rex this is most likely not the full force but even if they were to have four times the number of troops theyve displayed so far it wouldn't matter with the 600 knights from the western kingdom and 540 from the eastern kingdom we have a overwhelming force of over 1000 knights. Even if they were to to show up with 1000 of their flying beast with the 2000 levies that are scattered around the front we can wear them down to nothing by the new year!"

Rex sighed and nod the general was right. While the luutons were strong theres no way they could ever face their sheer magnitude of the astran army. The astrans have gathered a force over 10000 men along the potami river and its northern tributary. In each village there were well over 400 men then 200 on each side to send for as reinforcements. The 400 men or so the luutons bring will surely not stand a chance against our defenses as more warriors are sent to come help, Rex thinks to himself.

Elsewhere gora and the rest of Rex's knights walk along the defenses. crudely constructed wooden walls litter the village that would provide archers some cover as they would fire back at the luutons. A lieutenant runs up to cofus and the others and catches his breath before standing back up and saluting the nobles. He was a skinny man with no red hairs he was undoubtedly from a lower class only given a chance to shine through the astran military"good you must be the knights lets see i see six of you here and i believe the other commander brought five so plus your two commanders thats 13 knights in total not a bad number at all i say."

He chuckles abit to himself before continuing" now we've already evacuated this village and repurposed some of the wood from the houses to fortify our spots for now go help the soldiers break down more."

Gora looks confused as she hears this" what about the villagers will they not be upset when they come back to find their house completely torn apart?"

The lieutenant scoffs" its better to rebuild than to be annihilated madam"

He says no more before heading off he seemed to be quite busy and had no time to argue. Gora sighs and heads over to where she sees soldiers dismantling houses and begins to help them along with the rest or Rex's squad.

For the rest of the day this is what they would be doing.having them around really speeds up the process. The highly strengthened body of the nobles made dismantling the houses an ease. By the end of the day almost all of the village had been dismantled.

As night comes around gora finds herself sleeping in some large tent fitting her and the entirety of Rex's squad. While unhappy that she was sleeping in the same tent as everyone she knew that this was an inescapable part of coming and fighting their war. With her spear laying underneath her bed; wrapped in its covers she falls asleep into the night fully prepared for whatever tomorrow may bring.

gora wakes in her tent the next morning to the morning bells ringing. she gets out of her bed in the barracks and grabs her wrapped spear putting it on her back. As she prepares for the day. As she makes her way out of the tent following the levies to find some food while slumbering around tiredly. The smell of a boiling pot and a burning fire attracts her. She finds the levies commercing among themselves and eating their bowls of soup, spread out among themselves as they occupy the village.

Gora grabs a bowl and sluggishly starts eating her food sitting by a random fire lit in the area for feasting soldiers. As gora just sits by the fire soaking in its warm glow Sicus and Arvus sit next her acknowledging her before they start eating themselves. Within the hour everyone is done eating and back to work fortifying the barricades.

Gora sighs as shes carefully dismantling a house piece by piece. Arvus and Sicus would be sitting down pulling he nails out of any logs as utum and gora dismantle while cofus and secomi haul the stone and wood. Gora in the distance can see the other squad to arrive doing the same across the side of the street and plops down onto the soft grass crossing her arms"screw this i may be here helping you astrans in this war but that doesn't mean im a simple grunt you can push around!"

Gora whines as she sits on the ground with her feet and arms locked her posture holds no fault in it as she so boldly whines in front of her comrades. Cofus shaking his head but knowing better than to argue with the princess just keeps hauling stuff. Though sadly one of their members doesn't know better. Secomi the silent swordsman looks at gora with much annoyance.He walks up to the pouting princess and bends over to meet her at eye level" i don't care who you are this what you signed up for to be here what did you think was gonna happen we pull out the red carpet and let you rest in our tents between fights?"

Gora huffs and looks away from the annoyed Secomi '' well it would of been nice"she pouts.

Secomi sighs and just gets back to work, now too recognizing the pointlessness of arguing with the princess. Secomi simply grumbles to himself as he starts hauling pieces of the dismantled houses.

As the day progress and more houses are dismantled to assemble their fortifications, a scout standing on top of a recently built watch tower would be surveying the land looking through a little telescope quite diligently. He inspected every part of the great plains that encompasses the village. As he surveys the flat fields a grass his eyes skims over a little black dot in the distant. He quickly glances back over to it. quickly wipes the glass of his telescope with a little cloth in disbelief at what he sees.

The dot grows larger and larger by the second it shape develops spreading out as it begins to fill the sky. He quickly drops the telescope and claps his two cupped hands together to create a fire ball to which he quickly proceeds to through in the air. Everyone in the camp falls silent as the roaring fire ascends into the air only to combust it a beautiful wave of fire.

Bells start to ring across the camp the whole village is now running around with a furious pace as many run to get their weapons. Gora gets up trying to find where the ringing is from. trying to figure out where the danger may be, but just finds herself swirling around as shes overwhelmed by the simultaneous ringing of multiple bells.

Rex's squad quickly rush to grab their gear. Gora stands up and spots the approaching hoard her eyes go wide at seeing the sheer number of them. While impossible to tell while their flocked together, gora looks at the massive amount of men on flying beast heading her way its obvious they're severely outnumbered .

She quickly throws the wrapping off her spear and charges towards the front line. The luutons are here. The battle for survival commences. Arrows fill the air coming from the hoard. Gora jumps towards them holding her spear in front of her with two hands and starts to spin it with an incredible amount of speed. bolts of lighting fly in random directions snapping apart arrows as the very action of spinning generates geia and the rotating shaft of the spear shatters any arrows that come even close to gora.

Now with the hoard roaring above head gora suddenly stops rotating the spear sending all the electric geia she just generated flying towards the luutons. The unrelenting wave of lightning pushes through the luutons like a tsunami of energy. Who ever the wave hits is a gonner as their body is scorched to char as those unlucky to be around them face sparks of geia arching between their dead ally and them.

The horde quickly splints as the luutons forward approach is diverged. In a single attack gora has killed 100 of the luutons. She grins looking at her spear clutching it tightly"so this is what you can really do huh?"

Though goras glory is cut short as an arrow that barely misses her. The luutons hoard start to refocus themselves as many of them fly past gora they fire arrows at her. She quickly starts spinning her spear again trying to hide as much of her person underneath her weapon. A luuton warrior dives closer to her taking advantage of her attention being pulled upward .He pulls a riding glove off with his teeth and winds his arm back getting ready to release a wave of ice. Goras eyes widen seeing the luuton riding right for her her but unable to shift her attention to him as she blocks volley after volley of arrows, but before he can attack a sound like stampeding beast comes from behind her. Utum rushes past her colliding straight into the mounted warrior with his massive shield

The man and his beast are sent skidding across the ground their bodies rolling on top of itself as nearly every bone in their bodies are fractured and splintered. The man never gets up but the beast makes a single attempt to stand before pitfully falling over and dying. Utum stands infront gora his ginormous shield that he holds with one arm taking all of the arrows with ease nothing even leaving a single scratch on his mighty wall.

Gora looks at the giant shield with astonishment. It had to weigh over a ton pounds and yet here he had just charged with it as if it were any normal shield. The absurdity she thought to herself as she stood in the life or death situation.

Arrows are sent flying upwards at the luutons from all directions from the village. The entire village had been turned into a maze of arrows. The astrans archers fire aimlessly into the sky trying to hit the massive conglomerate of luutons as arrows rain down upon them

The rest of Rex's squad and sir rex himself join gora and utum. Flares are sent flying into the air to confuse the luuton flying lizards. All chaos has now ensured. As the flares hit the drakes and catch fire to them sending their flaming carcass down to the ground."When will the reinforcements be here?"

gora shouts as she continues to rapidly rotate her spear. Rex tries if the reinforcements were coming yet. Surely they had seen the flare.Within the second a flare shoots up from both sides of the village though Rex's face quickly becomes that one of horror as both flares were facing towards the next villages. With this signaled the ruin to any idea of reinforcements."it seems we have to deal with this ourselves it seems you were right about the eastern border miss grigora because both villages are being raided as well."

This news fell heavy on the party of seven warriors. With the their survival now uncertain Sicus lets out sigh and starts strumming away on his pandura"well then lets get this party started."

The air becomes warm filling the astrans with a new sense of energy. Utum grins and grabs one of the javelins on his back and starts throwing them at the enemy. Sending the flaming javelins into the bodies of their beast and themselves. Secomi draws his sword from its sheath deflecting the arrows as they come as any luuton foolish enough to try and dive at him is sliced apart.

Cofus and rex charge together dodging and deflecting arrows as they come.They jump on top of the houses and fortification running roof to roof slicing and burning any luuton rider that gets close enough to them always staying on the move as to not become an easy target.

Arvus stands in between gora and utum using their protection to fire arrows into the luutons. Quickly grabbing a handful of arrows she fires a veracious volley of arrows using her geia to set the tips aflame.

The battle is fierce as the 400 astrans take on the luutons who most likely had over a thousand men both sides take heavy causalities. While the knights seem unstoppable in the ferocious onslaught of the mounted invaders. the levies were having a harder time only able to kill a few if any before being picked off.

Aemulus charges on with his squad into the battle his sword held high as he hops onto the roofs with rex and cofus aiding them and cutting any luutons with his sword trying to dive."it seems multiple villages are being raided rex this means were not the only ones to get reinforcements i guess"

Aemulus says sounding quite annoyed to rex as they face on the luutons back to back. "What you saying you cant deal with these flying savages yourself? How sad i shall remember you fondly if you are to fall here today sir Aemulus"

Rex says with a smile on his face"hey don't get any bright ideas asshole im just telling you there's no one coming to pick up your slack!"

sir Aemulus yells at him sounding quite angry. While these two commanders commerce with each other their focus never feins from the battle at hand. Not a single arrow gets close to touching them as they us their swords to make quick work of them.between deflecting they send waves of fire towards the luutons maiming and killing quite a few.

Though as the commanders are easily dealing with the front of the luuton hoard more of them are coming in and they seem to be getting tougher and tougher. Their beast are getting larger and the number of luutons with geia seem to be increasing as not only are their dives becoming more frequent, deadly arrows now start freezing whatever they hit.

Whatever hope their was of rebuilding this village is now gone. As falling burning beast crash into houses destroying them and causing the fire to spread. arrows fill every other inch of the land. Gora releases wave after wave of her lightning though with each attack its gets a little smaller and smaller. The color starts fading from her hair coming from a pure blond to a lighter dirty blonde."Utum you bastard i hope you have two of those shields because im not sure how much longer i can protect your back!"

Gora shouts sounding like shes starting to get tired. An arrow coming from their side gets through their defense aiming straight towards Arvus, but before it can hit her Sicus stops playing his instrument for a moment and releases a burst of fire from his hand destroying the arrow. The wooden shaft is burnt to crisp though the metal from the tip now molten still finds its itself flinging towards Arvus.

Thinking quickly Sicus reaches for his dagger and swats the molten slug away from his sister, though directing it instead onto gora. It hits gora on her back melting through her clothes and burning through her skin. She screams in agony and stops spinning her spear and falls to the ground screaming"gora!"

utum shouts as he puts his shield on his back grabs Sicus, Arvus and gora and starts running with them in his arms as his shield protects his back. He finds a stone wall to stand in front of, giving him enough cover to put everyone down."gora are you alright!"

Utum shouts to the dazed gora Arvus quickly flips her over and pulls up the back of her shirt to view the burn. They all gasp at seeing the fist sized burn on her back. While it seems most of the metal slipped out tiny pieces of it can still barely be seen sizzling on the lower side of her back."fuck it really got her we need to find someone with water geia quickly to cool it down!"

Arvus and Sicus nod though wondering what they should do."um if i recall didn't sir Aemulus had an Alquur woman in his in his squad?"

Arvus says while pouring her pouch of water onto the wound as gora writhes in pain. Utum and Sicus try to recall if that was the case"she was right there talking with us earlier as we stood outside the tent remember?"

Sicus and utum look at each other and shrug" doesn't matter lets just go look for her i think i saw sir Aemulus fighting with captain rex and cofus so they must already all be fighting"

They nod and get utum holding gora with one arm as he carries his shield with another. Sicus restarts playing his pandura as Arvus watches their back with he bow. Hitting any arrows with incredible accuracy with arrows of her own as utum keeps charging forward with his shield.

As they make way through the village utum charges through whatever he has to. Be it a stone wall or diving luuton nothing stands in his path as he makes his way through the village. Eventually spotting her blue hair utum changes his direction and runs towards her"hey Alquur woman we need help our junior commander got hit with some metal slag.!"

Utum shouts at the top his lungs getting not only the Alquur woman attention but also a few nearby luutons and as they finish diving they fly back up and point at the charging behemoth utum.

Arvus does her best to stop any arrows that come their way but with the added attention shes starting to not be able to keep up. Sicus stops playing for the moment and pulls out a dagger from his belt and starts helping deflect the arrows not wanting to repeat last time he doesn't use his geia.

Though the closer they get to the Alquur woman the more ferocious the attacking luutons become. As they finally reach her utum grabs her from the battle field and runs away her"sorry i hate to grab and dash you like this but our friend gora here is in serious danger!" the Alquur woman points a finger at the large man"it fine but you can put me down now i can keep up ok!"

Utum nods and drops her on her feet. she quickly starts running with them deflecting what she can with her little metal flat club it was a strange weapon with the top of it being flat and shaped like a paddle, but it was edged as to be able to swing quickly. She could easily deflect numerous arrows with her odd weapon.

Utum quickly finds another stone wall and braces his shield onto it providing cover for gora and the alquur woman. Holder her hand above the wound she closes her eyes as water starts pouring from her hands cooling down it down and washing off anything that got in it. As arrows still fly at them utum has no time to stick around ripping a piece a large piece of wood from their fortifications he waves goodbye to his comrades

"Sorry i cant stay around here without my shield im a massive target so i have to keep moving! Sicus Arvus you two stay here and protect gora and this woman!"

he quickly runs with his improvised shield not getting far with it before having to rip another piece off before tossing the arrow ridden piece of lumber at the luutons.

Arvus puts her back to the wall and starts firing at the luutons with some of their attention grabbed by utum shes able to get a few cheap shots in and hit a few, between deflecting their arrows with her own.

Sicus standing facing away from the wall as well holds his dagger deflecting any arrows his sister misses as the Alquur woman cools goras wound down. While the water from her hands quickly evaporates. it acts like real water taking away some of the heat as it flows off her back.

Gora lies on her belly with her cheek in the dirt. She had passed out from the pain but is now resting easier with the pain being delt with. Though as time goes by the blue hairs start draining from the Alquur woman. she starts sweating as the use of her geia seems exhausting.

Elsewhere on the battle field secomi has dashed onto the top of a roof and jumps toward a diving rider. With quick cut secomi removes the luutons head from his body. quickly kicking the raiders body off his mount and rides on top of it pulling up on the rains to hold himself down on the beast causing it to quickly ascend. He holds tightly onto the reins with one hand and his sword with another with a vicious grin. he gets in a more comfortable standing riding position and carelessly steers the beast into any nearby luutons and their mounts.

Not having any real experience with flying secomi isn't able to keep himself upright but it doesn't matter as the skies are littered with other flying beast and any of them that are unlucky enough to get within the range of Secomi's sword are cut down instantly.

Though as he flies irresponsibly around in the sky the luutons take notice and shoot the belly of his beast. Secomi shouts some profanities at the luuton before quickly jumping off the descending beast.

He free falls for a moment in the air before falling down onto a random luuton. Secomi quickly stabs into man though unfortunately in his haste it goes through him and into his beast.lucky for secomi There happened to be a second rider who had been flying next to the now deceased luuton. Secomi departs from the beast and grabs a hold of the startled luuton. Now hanging off the side of the flying beast holding onto its reins the drake starts to spiral uncontrollably. Barely able to hang on Secomi quickly plunges his sword into the mans stomach and throws him off his own mount to die.

trying to pull up on the beast but they had gotten too low. He stand on the drakes back and jumps off it as it crashes. He hits the ground rolling and quickly pushes himself back up into the air to land on his feat sword still in hand. Looking between him and the beast he lets out a heavy sigh"well im not doing that again"

He says before resuming deflecting arrows and slicing diving luutons though keeping his feet well on the ground. Elsewhere cofus rex and Aemulus are running roof to roof through fire balls at the luutons blowing them out of the sky and slicing them apart if they dare get close enough.

The sound of music warms the air while the luutons seem to only be weakening. the astrans forces keep their composure and retain their fighting strength to the best of their ability. The last of the horde has shown up maybe already half of the luutons force has been defeated while the astrans forces are devastated as the levies corpses litter the burning battlefield.

Though as the last member of the hoard shows up he blocks the sun from the sky. His mount is massive, bigger than any thing the astrans had seen before. It was incredible it was impossible, it was the doom of the astran people. The last luuton to arrive rides upon a majestic white dragon, With beautiful clear wings. As it descends and returned light to the battle field the man on top of it is revealed. A middle aged man with pure white hair looks down upon the astrans with a gaze the sends chills down their spine to all who see it. not a single black hair adorned on this man he looked around the village and shook his head. His fine white scaled leathers made it hard to tell where he began and the dragon ended he simply pulls a fan from his pouch and looks towards the battle field and with saying anything he swings the fan.

Suddenly a gust of wind starts blowing apart some of weaker fortification as a unrelenting wave of ice takes out a good chunk of the battle field as a new giant spire of ice had been created from his attack. It stood a hundred feat tall and could be seen from every where in the village as he descended all fighting had stopped as he had not only killed quite a few astrans but several of his own men.

Several half frozen luutons hang out of the frozen spire screaming for help as the frost bite spreads. As he hits the ground the spire collapse and sets whoever was in free. If they had managed to survive that is. Many were nothing more than frozen statues at this point; those lucky to have geia are the only ones to survive in varying degrees.

The man hops off his majestic and massive dragon and looks around saying nothing his face not showing any signs of fear or anger. Having landed on the battlefield he begins to speak with the everyone's attention on him"behold for my glory has arrived in your corner of the world. I have personally come from the east and halted my conquest of the lands of jin to offer the astran kingdom the honorable position of vassal to the great luuton khanate. enough blood shed has been shed today so now you must retreat back to your kings and tell them to submit them selves to the almight Aklha Fon!"

The luuton says in a heavy accent though any mistake he made he made no attempt at correcting himself. Rex and aemulus look at eachother and approach the luuton cautiously. "You cant be serious right we have slaughter twice the number of your troops today we will surely be the victors of this fight luuton i do not care how big you are in the east you have arrived in the lands of astra and our kings will never submit to you"

Aemulus say with a quite abit of confidence as he point to the white haired leader. who simply looks at sir Aemulus with a frown and points at him and says something but knows not what "For talking back your arm shall be removed from your person astrou count yourself blessed i do not take more"

the fon releases a blast of ice towards aemulus so quickly he is unable to dodge or deflect it. It pierces into his left arm in his bicep. quickly spreading throughout his arm and onto his chest. He screams in pain as grabs his arm and starts lighting it on fire to counteract the insane cold. Rex seeing no other option quickly cute the frostbitten arm off at the should and lets it fall to the ground. The ice quickly overcomes the flames and even freeze them as it shatters once it hits the ground the geia from his sword cauterizes the wound as well as removing the remaining frost bite.

Its tough but Aemulus manages to stay on his feet though clenching at his lost arm as he does. The fon shakes his head and looks at the dismembered astran with pity as he himself felt sorry for what he did. He resumes speaking and the astrans wait for the translator to translate."I will return in 3 months in that time you will have collected your tribute or your kingdom will be destroyed without any mercy with a force twice as big as we have brought today"

The fon gets back on his mythical mount and once again ascends into the sky no more is said and no more is done the luutons leave. as fast as they came as fast as the left. Rex holds sir Aemulus up as he almost falls to the ground" sorry about the arm sir aemulus i saw it spreading and did the first thing that came to mind."

Rex says holding up the dazed Aemulus who is still clutching at his missing arm. He glances down at the pieces of thawing shattered chunks of flesh and sighs" i think you did well sir rexan if not for your quick action who knows how far that would of spread and how much more it would of took"

They both smile for a moment and rex throws Aemulus arm over his shoulder so that he may help his kinsman walk"while i must say i had my regards for you from the war Aemulus i must say it much better to have been fighting with you rather than against you"

Sir Aemulus looks at his arm and a single tear is shed as he looks at rex with a smile" well friend something tells me it will be a sweet but short memory as i doubt well be fighting together much after this"

The men walk back to their tent to see it completely destroyed the general stands beside and sighs looking at the wounded knight"well then pack your bags were heading back to the capital the demands have been set and now we must consider them"

The general eyes never meet rexes as he dazes off slightly down. Rexs fist clench as he looks toward the battlefield "tell me sir do you think this is our defeat

The general looks further down" it surely isnt theirs a retreating army doesn't set the terms a victorious one does. both watchtowers sent their reinforcements to the other villages that means they had enough troops to send 3 different villages at once what about the war party that had been moving down the potami river wouldn't that make 4? And if it is true that he plans to bring twice that much is that not enough men to raid 8?"

The general seem quite somber with his concern. Rex stood there considering his point but shakes his head"it doesn't matter right now. we have 3 months to find a way to deal with them. right now many of our soldiers don't have 3 hours to live so i think its better we focus on dealing with the wounded first sir."

Rex says abit somber himself. Aemulus had passed out while leaning on him and rex is now the only thing keeping him up. The general sighs and nods. beckoning to his lieutenant and starts putting things in order to help any of the injured.

Elsewhere gora lies unconscious on the ground as a heavily exhausted Alquur woman is trinkling bits of water over her. Arvus and Sicus are resting against the stone wall pretty exhausted themselves. Sicus looks at the Alquur woman with pity as most of the blue from her hair has been drained"im sorry my lady i don't carry any blue strings if i did i could help you recover your lost strength."

She finally pours the last out of her and collapses against the wall" no i am sorry sir for i have truly done all i can i just hope its enough." she pants heavily against the wall seeming more exhausted than the other two. Sicus pulls out his pandura and starts playing. His once bright red strings were dark and dull. As he strums a few black hairs in the astrans regain their red. Though before he can continue anymore they turn black and snap apart making the instrument unplayable until re-stringed."dammit"

Sicus says before putting the instrument aside. The four of them just lay their for a while until eventually a tired looking utum approaches them a cheerful secomi right beside him. Sicus smiles and manged to stand up and wave to them"hey utum, secomi im glad to see your both ok!"

Sicus shouts from the top of his lungs. The two knights grin and make use of the last of their energy to jog over to them. Utum falls over and sits on his rear completely tired his legs layed out straight as he looks at Sicus

Cofus finally arrives and sits among his friends sheathing his sword Secomi smiles and sits next to utum. Sicus plops back down with them the alquur woman moves out from under the shield and lays against the wall out in the sun as gora continues to sleep under the shield they all sit their trying to catch their breath