Ambushers took their steps back after seeing Commander Eiga rising with his orange eyes glowing. They had no desire to get anywhere close to him. But Eiga had another thought. He ran at five of them just with the trust on his sword which he gripped by both of his hands. Eiga leaped and kept himself in the air till he reached towards them. And when he was there, he sliced all of them with a single blow.
On the other side, attackers who saw the malice threw their remaining lances at Eiga.
Eiga took all of them in his chests. Instead of displaying pain, he showed anger. And he was about to unleash it on them.
Soldiers behind the ambushers rushed inside a carriage to bring some weapons in the meantime. Wernh’An’s men still were outnumbered so they made their mind to compensate the short-coming with tactics.
Attackers looked at each other then at their maces. All of them ran at Eiga with their heavy weapons held over their heads. Eiga blocked the hits by his sword just above his shoulder. Maces were thrusting his sword down but Eiga didn’t back down from the battle of strength.
One attacker dropped his weapon all of a sudden. It didn’t take longer for the remaining to do the same because of unbearable heat of their maces. Red blisters surfaced in their palms.
Behind them, a group of archers drew their bows and arrows at the ambushers. One by one the archers loosened their arrows and with each passing arrow, the number of foes reduced.
An arrow cleared the last man standing.
“Dimwit commoners.” Commander Eiga spat at the corpses.
The soldiers also took breath of relief when chaos came to it halt. Eiga didn’t let them rest for long.
“Pick the arrow. Recycle everything possible.” Eiga said by dropping the sword of his own.
He started counting the number of dead bodies. Distinguishing commoners from the soldiers was easy. Commander Eiga walked towards an injured horse and stroked on its head. Commander Eiga couldn’t regroup himself from the great loss of his soldiers. Tears kept rolling on his cheeks till the horse took its last gasp.
Eiga took out a helm from a soldier’s corpse and put it on his own head. He didn’t want anyone to see his soft side. But the orange tears which had dropped on his clothes were enough to tell the tale to everyone.
“What about the armors, commander?” asked a soldier.
“Don’t strip them of their pride. Let it remain on them.” Eiga stopped touching the immovable horse.
Breeze from North-East touched his face. The cold wind from Hilcastle reminded him of the risk their ancestors had agreed to endure to serve Wernh’An.
“HELP ME!” a shriek echoed to intervene Eiga’s peace. Unlike his expectation, the rescue call wasn’t coming from Shinji’s carriage.
“Genzou!” Commander couldn’t swallow his fear.
The soldiers ran towards the noisy carriage on the front. The grounded horse tied to the carriage had its tongue between its teeth. Screams amplified with each step being taken. Commander Eiga ran around the dead horse then reached the door. He caught the handle and heaved it out of its hinges.
The door wasn’t locked! Eiga came to realization when he spotted Genzou at the corner of the chamber.
Gazing in, he saw Shinji standing tall with broken handcuffs. At his feet was an infiltrator who had a sword ornamenting his chest.
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