Northern Border

The trip to the border was mostly uneventful, the only time there was any semblance of danger was when a lone wolf who was too weak to pose a threat to anyone.

Once they arrived, it was as if a switch had been flipped. There was no laughter, no singing, and hardly any safe sleep, everything had its own dangers. Leto followed Mara to large brick building, inside, he was given a room close to Mara's, armor, and a sword. Although Leto had his own armor gifted by god, he didn't wish to reveal it as his body wasn't recovered after his supposed death, so the public was beloved he was still alive. When practicing at the manor, Leto had developed multiple techniques he'd been hoping to employ on his monster conquest.

They arrived early in the morning and so around midday, the gate of the bailey would open its gate and allow soldiers to exchange posts. It was a dangerous process as if they weren't careful, monsters would spill into the camp, wreaking havoc all around.

Leto was in his room sitting on his bed with his legs crossed and his hands resting on his knees, practicing his magic circulation to augment his body, when there was a knock on the door.

"Come on, kid. Didn't you want to fight? Are you going to stay in your room all day?"

Leto hopped up, put on his armor, and a few minutes later was joining Mara at her side.

"Took you long enough."

"So… who's going to be my gaurd?"

"Hmm? Me obviously!"

Leto stared at her with disbelief. 'Is she serious!? I thought she was their general and had to command them in battle! But she's going to stay with me!?'

"I- Wha- Huh?"

Mara bursted into laughter and wiped a tear from her eye.

"Calm down, calm down. Well see plenty of battle, in fact, we might be in deeper water than almost anyone here. Well let's stop wasting time and get a move on. Let's go soldiers!"

Leto followed Mara out the gate and within moments, harrowing beasts were lunging at them. Leto reacted and brought his sword up and across his chest but it was too late, the beasts gray coat was already spilling blood across the ground, Mara had already killed it.

"Head on a swivel, kid."

With that, Leto took the left side as Mara was already slaughtering many abominations on the right, drenching the area in even more blood than what was already there. Leto lunged at another beasts which had a white fur coat, a terrible maw, and sharp talons, he thrust his sword forward and pierced its neck.

Another beast of the same kind was behind it and Leto coated one edge of his sword in ice, which was one of the many things he hoped to perfect in the coming month. He raised the sword above his head and performed a downward slash, slicing its snout apart. The beast fell to the ground and a smaller, faster creature appeared. This one had brown flesh, two tusks protruding from its mouth, and a a mane of black spikes leading from its head to middle back. Not stopping the fluid motion of his slash, Leto twisted the blade and curved its path to prevent it from hitting the hard soil. He slashed to the right and as the swine-like creatures head neared, it was met by ice cold steel.

After that, they fell back and allowed a barrage of arrows to pelt the approaching beasts, then pressed on once again, gaining much needed space between themselves and the bailey. The short respite ended abruptly as a large beast with black fur, sharp fangs, and a ear piercing roar slammed into Leto from his right side. He'd missed it as he was tunnel visioned on a group of approaching wolves with dark gray hide was closing in on him. He flew back a few yards and slid across the bloodied, frozen soil. He stopped at another soldiers feet and was helped back up quick, but not quick enough, by now the wolves he'd tunnel visioned were upon him. Two were leaping through the battle, maws open displaying their horrifying fangs, their paws in front were displaying their revolting talons.

Leto repositioned as fast as he could and narrowly avoided having the beasts four left talons piercing his face, he didn't have such luck with the right taloned meat hook. Two sharp, metal like claws plunged into Leto's left arm, eviscerating his armor and skin alike. He was thrown to the ground as the beasts claw tore its way out. A deep red liquid flooded down his left arm, color drained from his face, as he had a stifled expression.

His arm was severely injured but intact. If he wanted to retreat and receive healing, he would have to deal with the beasts first. But luckily his gaurd came to the rescue. Mara dashed over, mutilating beasts along the way.

"Leto! Retreat and get that treated, I'll cover you! Go!"

Leto was a little slow to rise as he was losing much blood, fast. He concentrated and covered the wound with ice, stopping the bleeding but also partially freezing his arm.

With the color slowly fading from his face, he ran back toward the gate and approached a heavily guarded tent, there were multiple guards in the area, wooden pikes, and torches with special enchantments that repelled beasts… few beasts. He entered and rushed in and a medic ushered him toward an open bed, he sat down and removed his vambrace to receive treatment. With it, blood came pouring out. He'd mostly stopped the blood but what was left was a staggering amount, he dismissed his ice magic and the medic began to use a unique technique. She was wrapping his arm in a bandage that was infused with healing magic while also using healing magic of her own, after she gave him a shot that would help with blood clotting. In second, the wound was mostly closed and the bleeding halted, leaving only a thin red line appearing through the white bandage.

"Rest that arm for two hours, don't do anything with it for that time. Tomorrow you can go back and fight but keep the bandaged on."

Leto shook his head and got up, he went to a different area that had multiple pallets played down for injured to rest at until they were cleared. The area was quite large, housing over 100 pallets with many already occupied.

He'd only been in the chaos of battle for less than five minutes but was already decommissioned for the day. Luckily, he would be able to fight again tomorrow so he did the one thing he could do, sleep to pass time. He was fast asleep, although he wasn't there long, he did a lot of mental calculations to perceive his surroundings, study his adversaries, and was drained from the loss of blood.