The Battle of La Roche

The dawn wind was stiff and biting, something to be expected in the foothills of north-eastern Minstrel, some leagues south of the incredibly long mountain range that ran across the lands of Minstrel, Desierto and Joya. Although the illusion of distance made the mountains look deceptively close, the cloaked figure who stood silently watching them knew that they were actually quite far away. And presently, they were not of the utmost importance to her, although she had wished, for the umpteenth time, that they were. Because anything was a preferable venture to her than the one which she had found herself prepared to undertake. Prepared, but very unwilling. For it was quite certain that such a beautiful land such as this was soon to be marred by the vanity of mortals once again, and she was set to take part in the proceedings.

As the young mage known as Ms. Fortune had feared, war had finally come. And as was the case with rulers, they seemed to take the business of war as a game, uncaring and heedless of the many lives that would be snuffed out and crushed by the inexorable wheels of conflict, once the steel wheels of the juggernaut of war began to turn. Even now, as her eyes roved across the shadows of the mountains in the distance, Nita knew that her people, her nation, was presently invading the lands of their greatest enemies. And she felt some degree of sorrow that she was not there. Ironically enough, if she had been at the Bellum lines, she would have found her steel and wits pitted against those of her own birth country. Perhaps it was for the best that she was here. Many would surely berate her for her choices: if she despised the war, why was she choosing sides? To make matters worse, everyone knew of the lack of... war etiquette, to put it politely, that Desierto had when engaging in battle, and yet, for one who found slavery reprehensible, she was on the same side as slavers.

It was a cursed dilemma, this pickle that Nita currently found herself in. If she chose not to involve herself in the war, it would still continue without her. How could she stop it? She had neither the strength, nor the influence, to even influence the key players in this theater, and so she had picked the side which she felt, which she prayed, was more virtuous, and the maiden had marched to war. If she could not influence the cessation of hostilities, she would have to strive to see its conclusion as soon as possible, even if that meant taking up arms. The only problem was that in war, the only innocent people were the casualties. She remembered now that her father had often said that nobody was right in war. Looking at how the Luminous Covenant seemed the more noble faction, comparing it with the Ironheart Pact, it was a slap to her feelings of sanctimoniousness to see that a country that practically thrived off slavery in many areas was a key member of the Luminous Covenant.

The camp was beginning to stir. Although Nita was close to a mile away from where the invading Desiertians had been camped for the night, she could almost sense that they were beginning to rouse themselves. Very soon, the bugles would be blown, and the soldiers would prepare for blood, blood that would flow surely with the rising of the sun. The goal of this venture was to capture a small but important fortress located in the hilly region. If it remained under Minstrelian forces, Minstrel would be quite able to hold an important pass in the hills, which was a rather strategically important location to be controlled by Desiertian forces, if they wanted to invade Minstrel unharrassed from the north east. The name of the fortress was La Roche.

And the Battle of La Roche would be decided this day, at sunrise.


WC: 665

The member 'Fraag' has done the following action : Dice Rolls

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'Monster Dice' :

In an hours’ time, the sun would appear on the dark line of the horizon, and the invaders from Desierto would begin their march towards the fortress, and the bloodshed would begin. Sunrise was expected to see the beginning of the battle, but Nita had a different plan, and a different hope. If she was successful, sunrise would see the end of the battle. That would be a rather difficult thing to attempt, but given the size of La Roche, Nita was sure that she could accomplish it. She was, although relatively unknown, quite dangerous in her own right, and had what it took to probably go toe-to-toe with a Wizard Saint or Warlord. That she was yet unsung was only due to the fact that she had presently not performed any acts that would grant her global recognition. Perhaps today would be the day all that changed. The fact that not many people knew her, at least outside Fiore, meant that a threat such as she was could march along with the rank and file forces, and the enemy would be none the wiser of what danger they faced. She could only imagine what would have happened in La Roche, if word had been leaked that a Wizard Saint was among the ranks of their attackers. She was sure that the army that would have been sent to La Roche would have been too large for the small hill fortress. It was all well and good. Best to enjoy her present state of inconspicuousness while she could. It was likely to change after today.

In any case, there was something that displeased her. She had the desire to become a Wizard Saint, a mage known for their virtue and stalwart defense of all things just and good. Sadly, the war between the Luminous Covenant and the Ironheart Pact had begun blurring moral lines, and it was this blur that displeased her. Perhaps this was one of the reasons Nita had decided to fight the Battle of La Roche singlehandedly: because despite the fact that she was a Luminous Covenant soldier, she was not going to stand for the disregard of human dignity that the Desiertians would show their defeated foes. Perhaps if she was successful in this battle, she would be able to ensure that when the children of the desert learned of her feat of singlehandedly taking a fortress, they would fear her battle prowess enough to be amenable to her conditions, which she was certain would normally not be so pleasing to the lot. She had not taken great efforts to hear the hopes of the Desiertian soldiers about the slaves they would win in battle, while she and the forces of the Rune Knights around watched in shamed silence. If she gave everyone there a reason to be afraid of her, they would not refuse when she made her demands. That was the way of the powerful. They forged the world into what they wanted it to be. If anything, Nita wanted the world to be as fair, and perhaps as merciful as she could make it, and most, if not all, of the Minstrelians in the towers beyond were not deserving of death. Death, she could deal, it was not particularly a difficult thing to do. But to determine who was deserving of such a steep punishment often left her nauseous. Power was a good thing to have, but it came with a burden and a price.

”Are we getting cold feet, Nita dear?” Maria intoned, half-mockingly and half-encouragingly in the Pergrandian’s mind. Nita made no reply, but she steeled her mind for the battle to come. It would be as short and decisive as she could allow it, but she would go out of her way to take no lives, if she could help it. Rather naïve, some might believe, but she had a code she lived by. If in the face of adversity, she could not even do what she thought was right, she could never in good faith stand before people and permit them to see her as a beacon of hope, or justice, or goodness, or whatever it was she wanted to inspire in others. For a moment, the cloak round her shoulders billowed in the silent night wind as the young mage drew a card, just as she pulled it from around her. A portal opened, and she stepped into it. And all that existed as proof of her presence was the discarded cloak on the grassy earth.

Nita’s plan, seeing as her long-distance portals were rather poor at bringing her with sudden speed onto the battlefield, was to use gravity to approach. Her portal opened high above the fortress, and she dropped. The fall would probably have killed a normal person, but Nita was miles away from normal, and this drop couldn’t kill her, not even if she was stupid enough to land on her head. With a graceful flip, she landed in the courtyard of the fortress, startling the sentries present. Of course, it would have been better if she had approached via covertness, but while Nita was quite capable of stealth, she felt it would be somewhat dishonorable. Her intention was to ask them to surrender, although she knew they wouldn’t. Yes, well, it was just a formality. She could feel Maria rolling her eyes in as many different ways as possible, making her almost laugh, even as weapons and lights were turned on her.

”Bonjour,” the Luminous Rose mage said in fluent Minstrelian, ”I have come here to ask you to surrender. If you do, I can promise you that all your lives will be spared, and you will not be sold into slavery. If you do not, well, I will still try to do what I can to ensure your safety, but don’t blame me if…” she was cut short as a bullet missed her head. Actually, it would have hit her, had she not moved her head at the last moment. Almost at the same time, a loud alarm was rung.

”And look at me, imagining that Minstrelians were all culture and averse to bloodshed.” Well, they couldn’t be blamed. War was what it was.


WC: 1041
TWC: 1706

In order to make sure that as many people had been gathered to her vicinity, made even easier by the sounding of the alarm, the Pergrandian had announced that she was a messenger who had been charged with delivering a message, and that soldiers had really poor war etiquette, if they tried to kill a messenger, which was against the expected rules of engagement. There were more soldiers presently facing her than she had anticipated, but the fact that the fortress was not particularly huge, and her naturally far-reaching spell abilities meant that she would be able to reach everyone if she cast spells that had areas of effect. The fortress itself was approximately about 300 meters in diameter, so even though many spells didn’t have such ranges on their side, Nita was quite sure that she could whip something reasonable out. The plan was to end the hostilities as quickly as possible, while at the same time minimizing casualties if she could help it.

”Don’t say you hadn’t been warned. Wild Card: Quadrille!” Even as she moved to draw her black card, she could hear the clicks of scores of muskets being primed to fire. Unfortunately for the gunners, she was much faster than they were, by a long margin. A bright pulse of light emanated from the black card the young mage had drawn, and swept over much of the fortress, sending the soldiers to the ground. And then there was silence. For a while, Nita stood waiting, to see if anyone was going to get back up again. There was no movement. Well, that had been much easier than was expected. ”You would be wise not to become lax, girl,” Maria warned her from within her mind. ”Well, you do have a point,” Nita conceded, as she kept herself vigilant, walking among the fallen bodies. She knew they were alive, but presently unconscious, but she could not allow herself to imagine that everyone had been knocked out so easily by her spell. For starters, her spell was not armor-piercing. It was likely that someone hiding behind a wall would be able to avoid being damaged by the spell. And also, the commanders of this fort were expected to be a much higher cut than the mere rabble of soldiers, whose leaders in the highest echelons of government cared not whether, and how, they lived or died. And Maria’s warning proved on point. For Nita sensed, with her Aspect of Knowledge, that someone was stirring, although surreptitiously. She pretended as though she was simply looking around, and began walking slowly in the direction of the pretender. They stopped moving until Nita had passed by, and then she could sense them raise a musket, aimed at her back.

The musket did not fire. One moment, the soldier was aiming at the back of this powerful enemy, the next, they were receiving a chop to the back of their neck. The force of the blow was sufficient to knock Nita’s would-be attacker senseless. Almost immediately, five other soldiers, realizing that they would probably be more successful attacking as a mobbing group rather than individually and stealthily, having seen what had just happened to one of their own, leaped to their feet, and with war cries, aimed their guns at the Pergrandian. Still, none of them got to fire a shot. Those weapons, though effective, were in the hands of people too slow for the Chosen of Arcanos, and well-placed strikes brought them down, even as Nita ensured that she was always keeping an ally within the firing sight of another, until they were all floored. Before she could breathe, a door suddenly burst open, and ten soldiers, clad in different uniform than the ones of the soldiers littering the courtyard, charged out, their sharp swords aimed at the Pergrandian. With the way they were moving, Nita was sure that they weren’t going to attempt the corny and highly ineffective technique utilized by mobs when facing a main character: attacking one by one. These ones intended to attack her en masse. Even though the Pergrandian felt their numbers wouldn’t matter, due to the differences in skill level between them and herself, she was unwilling to get careless. She suspected that she was yet to face the true powers of this castle, and it would not do to be found wanting when they arrived. She ran to her left, so that the wedge of soldiers approaching her would be narrower than if she faced it head on, before suddenly charging at top speed, leaping knee-first into the face of the first soldier. Even as her knees connected, she was drawing a card. ”Suit of Battle Card: Regulus!” The black card transformed into a scepter, which the Pergrandian brought down on the head of her second assailant, even as she evaded the stab of his rapier, before kicking him away. Only eight more left. The shaft of the scepter extended, transforming the weapon into a staff, even as Nita twirled the weapon as her opponents tried to circle her. She would give them that false hope and let them. But it would all be in vain. As soon as the circle was complete, Nita charged the soldier in front of her, dodging his flame-imbued swipe, while parrying that of the woman beside him, before planting an elbow in the man’s gut, and sweeping his partner’s feet out from under her. The others closed in as fast as they could, but Nita was having none of that. Two swift blows from her staff laid the two downed soldiers out cold, even before the tips of the others’ rapiers could reached her, and she had danced away again. Nita had to hand it to these fencers, though. At some point, they realized they were facing an opponent far beyond their level, but they kept fighting. It was very impressive. But vain. Soon, the courtyard was silent again, as Nita stood victorious among the unconscious forms of the musketeers.


WC: 1003
TWC: 2709

There was a sudden flash, and the Pergrandian girl found herself looking at a sword aimed at her throat. Interestingly, though, the wielder of the sword was standing motionless, as though waiting. Nita raised her eyes from the blade to look at its wielder. He was tall and quite easy on the eyes, dressed in a rather flamboyant but practical military garb, and his stance told the Pergrandian that he was no stranger to the weapon in his hand. Flanking him, with similar weapons held at the ready, were well-armored soldiers clad in steel and leather, their faces hidden by visored helms. ”Ooh la la,” Nita said, smiling as she raised her hands in mock surrender. ”I’ve been caught.” The man remained silent, though he had a smile of his own on his lips. One of the soldiers beside him bristled. ”Run her through, Comte,” the armored one said. ”In due time,” said the Comte, still unmoving. ”She will evade me if I tried to strike now. She is aware of me, as I am of her.”

Nita raised an eyebrow. ”That sounds suspiciously rather flirtatious, but don’t take that for a complaint,” she said. That he could surmise that she would probably be fast enough to dodge his attack if she was aware of it informed Nita that her new opponent was not to be underestimated. He gently moved his sword, letting it move some of her hair. ”It is quite a pity, though. I’m torn between kissing you and killing you. But despite my appreciation of art and beauty, war destroys many such comely things. If we had met in other circumstances, I’m quite sure we’d have enjoyed each other’s company. As things stand, you will have to die, my dear.” In response, Nita gently stepped back so that the sword was not within touching range of her. ”You are quite popular with the ladies, aren’t you?” she replied. ”But you seem to have missed the memo detailing how pickup lines involving the death of your target are not very successful.” The two musketeer vanguards suddenly charged, each one a dizzying flurry of slashes and stabs. These ones were quite a decent notch above the fencers she had faced earlier, and they began pressing her backward, even as she parried and tried to sneak in attacks of her own. The Comte, however, stood silently, his sword at the ready, although he made no move. Nita was not sure she could tell why he had chosen not to attack, when she suddenly sensed Maria’s alarm in the back of her mind. And she knew why. For one moment, the man was there, watching, and the next he was gone. Fortunately for the Pergrandian, her sixth sense immediately caught on to a third mass directly behind her, aiming to skewer her from behind. She could not dodge and parry three attacks at the same time, so she took the less dangerous attack, a thrust by one of the vanguards to her right shoulder, even as she moved out of the way of the Comte’s attack, parried the second vanguard, and cast a spell in tandem.

”Orison of Desire: Love Tap!” The wave of magic rippled outwards, and all three opponents backpedaled at once to avoid it, but their proximity to the Pergrandian made it impossible. Without missing a beat, Nita struck the bottom tip of Regulus on the ground, using the magical staff to cast the Starburst spell. The magical explosion sent everyone but Nita flying, and she took the opportunity to take a flying leap of her own, catching the vanguard nearest her with a swing of the staff. She wouldn’t be envying the poor fellow’s headache when that one awoke. In any case, Nita was quite surprised, and not a bit impressed, to see that the Comte was still able to move. The other vanguard was still conscious, but immobilized. It was a very temporary thing, so she had to take advantage of the time she had. The Comte seemed slower than before, but if he could still move, he was a danger. Regulus vanished, as Nita drew another card, dodging the man’s slash as she did so. Two small derringers appeared in her hands, and she pointed at two separate targets and fired. The noble failed to parry her bullet, which struck him in the side, causing him to snarl in anger and pain, as he noticed that her second target had been the other vanguard. ”You shot an incapacitated enemy. That is dishonorable,” he growled. ”Come now, attacking me from my blind spot wasn’t dishonorable? This is war, dear, and you know what they say about all things being fair and stuff. Besides, he is still quite alive,” Nita replied coolly. ”I’m not interested in killing anyone; my goal is simply to take this fortress.”

”And what about the howling desert animals? Will they not come here and subject the soldiers under my command to a fate worse than death? Perhaps it would have been more merciful if you had slain my soldiers.”

”I don’t kill if I can help it,” came the reply. ”And yes, I know you’ll say I’m being naive and impractical, but no matter on whose side I find myself in this war, I will continue to hold life as sacred, and I will not take it if I can help it, which I hope I presently can. And I’m also very much invested in ensuring that none of your soldiers, nor you yourself, if you’re willing to let me, will be sold as slaves. But the longer you fight me, the harder it will be for me to accomplish this, seeing as I shall need my magic to ensure that you all arrive safely in Fiore, where I’m certain that they will treat you as prisoners of war, and that’s a very decent conclusion to your present predicament. Even if you managed to strike me down, you can’t fight the approaching horde. The sun rises; they have begun their advance. If you listen carefully, you’ll hear their cries. So, trust me. If I wanted to kill you, or do anything untoward towards your people, why would I go to great pains and risk to myself to try to subdue this castle before the main force arrived? Don’t make this hard on either of us. You and your people have families you’d want to return to. While this is a war, Minstrel has been on friendly terms with Fiore in the past. You will have a greater chance of seeing your loved ones again as prisoners of war in Fiore, than as slaves in Desierto.” Nita saw the look in the man’s eyes. He knew she spoke the truth. Quietly, he let his sword drop, as he sighed.

Nita was worn out, but she had prevailed. She raised her eyes, to see the light of the sun, as it rose over the lands in the east, bathing the country in the rubescent tints of dawn. The tumultuous sound of an approaching host meant that the Desiertian force would be quite close to the fortress by now. Fortunately for her, she had quite some time to work before the Desiertian horde arrived. First, she started by healing herself, then she turned her attention to the Comte and his vanguards, making sure they were not in critical condition. Next, she cast Wild Card: Sybil Flourish on the fortress’ garrison, trapping all the soldiers, the Comte included, in cards. Then she opened the gates of La Roche and strode forth to meet a rather confused attacking force. ”Fortunately for us all, there’ll be no bloodshed today,” the Pergrandian announced. ”Quite unfortunately though, there’ll be no slaves, but you can take whatever loot you find in the castle.” The attacking force warily entered the castle, but it was empty. What had happened to all the soldiers? Nita simply replied that she had ‘witched’ them away. Then she called aside the commanders of the Rune Knights assigned to the Desiertian force charged with taking La Roche, told them what she had done and why, and then created a portal which would take her to Era, where she offloaded her prisoners of war at the Rune Knights HQ. She was sure Fiore would treat these soldiers way better than Desierto would have treated them. And while she could not say what her actions would accomplish, whether for good or for ill, she was hopeful that anyone who heard about the Battle of La Roche would give thought about the proper way to treat one’s enemies, even in wartime. But while she had done this, Nita was quite sure that the day would come when she would have no choice but to use lethal force, whether she wanted to or not. And hopefully, when that day came, she would be able to face it.



WC: 1485
TWC: 4194