Chapter thirty-three: Know the Power of Xandar.
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~~~Viewpoint: Third person, sixth moon, 276 AC~~~
~~~Sunset gates, Xandar~~~
Moments before the parrots sounded the attack alarm, in the tent of the mercenary leaders, a meeting was taking place.
The whole place reeked of liquor, plus in the tent, the atmosphere was heavy from the verbal fights and bickering over who would lead the attack.
"I don't care who will lead the attack; what I want are ideas on how to attack those damn gates." One of the leaders raised his voice, dressed in simple armor, over chain mail, and carrying a shield on his cape of blue and white bars.
That calmed the verbal fight in the tent for a moment, giving space for them to calm down and give ideas for future attacks.
The leader of the company of the sons of the wind, the ragged prince, continued speaking: "Over the mountains it is impossible; those mountains are over a mile high; climbing that is a useless task; besides, the peaks are too steep to climb on horses."
"Yes!" I agree with the other leaders: "Besides, the canyon is too wide and large to put up suspension bridges; besides, there are no forests to create them."
"The only way to enter the city is to breach the dawn gates or the river passage, but we have no boats to go upriver, so that way is out of the question."
A bearded, old man, dressed in ragged clothes and with a scarred body, decided to interrupt: "Haven't you realized what those gates are made of? Unless someone can destroy the Valyrian steel, all these preparations will be useless."
The motivation vanished immediately; everyone had already realized the metal the doors were made of; however, they believed that by attacking them with a single blunt blow, it would be enough to make an opening for a few to enter and manage to open the doors from the inside.
"What do we know about the army in the Bay?" asked another leader suddenly, tall and older, with graying white hair and a fractured aquiline nose.
"Not much; there are no beaches on the mountain range that is in the bay, so ships can't send men in boats up to it, plus they can't get very close because of the big rocks that stick out. Currently, the only safe passage is the one in front of the big bridge that gives the entrance to the fjord, but, there are huge chains of the same metal as these gates stopping the passage."
"Then the navy has had no progress either."
Just then, a man came running into the tent, causing all the leaders to tense up and lean their meek on their guns. "What do you think you're doing coming in like that?"
"Pardon me, but I bring news." Said the man, as he rested his right hand on his chest, in an attempt to control his rapid breathing.
"What do you think you're waiting to tell them, winter?"
The man walked over to the table where all the leaders were standing and, pulling a scroll from his robes, began to read it: "The mercenary companies in front of the gates of Xandar are ordered to begin attacking their gates, the navy is currently attacking the entrance to the fjord, so they are expected to act fast in a simultaneous attack."
"Are they out of their minds? We don't even have a detailed plan for the attack, let alone any idea how to get out of it alive."
"Let them fight us if they think they're so manly!"
Quickly, many negative and disgruntled comments poured in, filling the tent with a symphony of shouting and boisterousness. "If you do not do as ordered, the Free Cities will terminate your contract, and the payment will be revoked."
With the comment made by the messenger, the poor man received scathing dwellings from all the leaders in the tent, making the boy nervous to no end.
"Tell your masters we will attack the gates; now go, or you will face my sword." Ben Plumm the Brown, the leader of the second sons, told him, then turned to the other leaders.
"Then, there is no more time to choose a leader, so here is what we will do."
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Above the Sunset Gates, a group of unsullied were stationed on the ledge above the great gates. The unsullied, after Azrael gained their loyalty and regenerated their parts, had many of them begin to create families with the former slave women of Azrael's Khalasar, which increased the birth rate of Xandar by thirty percent, along with the births now being very healthy.
In addition, every time a woman became pregnant, as long as she was an original citizen of Xandar, then she would have the power to stop working during her gestation period, in addition to receiving a monthly income of five gold coins every two months for the simple fact of contributing to the great city of Xandar.
This, together with the preventive measures of the city's healers and the presence of a witch during the entire childbirth for greater risk prevention, led many women to marry many unsullied to receive a higher status in the city, in addition to receiving a higher income.
Therefore, it was not uncommon to see an unsullied man finish his workday and arrive at his home in the upper area, where almost all the members of the army, government personnel, and important members of the city lived, take his wife and children, and go out for a walk, eat in the most luxurious inns and lead a life full of pleasures and luxuries.
It was undoubtedly a life full of happiness and pleasure that they could not have years ago, being a better and long-awaited end for those men who had suffered much throughout their lives.
"Sound the alert; they are finally showing their move." One of the unsullied, wearing strong steel plate armor, said to another of lesser rank, who nodded and moved to an artifact near where they were standing.
The unsullied pressed a lever, causing a projectile to shoot skyward.
"Pooh!"
The projectile, after reaching a certain height, exploded into the sky, momentarily painting the blue sky with a blood-red explosion. "Waaaaaaa!"
Within seconds, many alarms began to be heard near the cannon and the three eastern gates of the city. It could be seen how hundreds of trained soldiers, with coordinated movements and in complete synchrony, were heading to their posts.
The posts were located in several strategic places in front of the canyon, where weapons of war were placed at a precise distance from each other.
On the stone bridges, thousands of men ran like chickens to reach the gates, carrying ribbons and running at full speed.
However, when the first line was thirty meters from the huge gates, countless scorpion bolts and long spear-like arrows pierced them. This created a collective scare, bringing the more than five thousand men on the bridge to a halt.
"Archers!"
One of the commanders shouted to the men carrying bows, directing them to aim at the unsullied men controlling the weapons.
"Fire!"
Thousands of arrows were launched toward the turrets where the mighty weapons stood, cutting through the wind and flying at surprising speed.
The mercenaries, while not the golden company, the most acclaimed mercenary company in Essos, needed to be more organized and faster... Or at least not much.
So although the front line suffered greatly under the yoke of the bolts and scorpions, the archers were undeterred and followed their orders to the letter.
However; a startling scene happened: the weapons that the unsullied operated turned and came face-to-face with thousands of arrows in the air.
And in one joint movement, ten three-meter-long bolts were fired. The surprising thing about this was that they were not ordinary scorpion bolts.
Instead, from the end of the bolts came attached several metal wires, which, thanks to the spinning on themselves of the scorpion bolts, spun at great speed, producing a loud sound of wind being cut, like when you hear the crack of a whip being lashed.
The strange scorpion bolts flew at full speed, and upon encountering the thousands of arrows shot by the mercenaries, the latter ended up all broken and crushed, pushing them out of the way and rendering them useless, as well as making not a single one reach its destination.
But it didn't end there, and, following the parabola of their shot, the bolts continued their descent, falling on the thousands of men on the bridge and killing hundreds in seconds.
In just ten minutes, there were already over two thousand dead decorating the stone bridges, forcing the remnants to desist their attack and retreat.
"Retreat!"
"Everyone back!"
With several desperate orders, the leaders of the attack had to throw overboard the idea of climbing the gates and thus climbing onto the platform above them and opening them, to save the lives of the few men they had left.
The land attack had failed; however, even the city was still in a fight at the entrance to the fjord, where brave men protected the sea entrance to their beloved city.