Valkyrie's Shadow

Chapter 15

The skies remained overcast and the winter winds carried their chill over the land, but the brisk weather did not deter the crowd of excited onlookers. Contests between Captains always drew soldiers regardless of their vocation: enjoying rousing bouts was something like a national pastime of the Baharuth Empire. Its minority of detractors claimed that it only whetted an appetite for bloodshed amongst the citizens, which supporters claimed in return was, in reality, a benefit.

As an ascendant power, pacifism would only hinder the Empire’s rise to prominence. At least that was the prevailing attitude before the appearance of the Sorcerous Kingdom.

“It appears that the Empire’s appetite for this sort of activity extends beyond the bounds of the Grand Arena,” Lady Zahradnik said.

“Yes, my lady,” Rangobart nodded. “Everyone loves a good fight.”

“It’s something I can understand those invested in related vocations might be interested in, but I was surprised to find that the fervour of the civilian spectators was even greater than that of the soldiers I observed in Arwintar.”

“That’s to be expected,” Captain Germund said. “Those who have not experienced life-threatening conflict tend to lean towards one extreme or the other. They can be absolute pacifists that abhor the application of martial power for any purpose, or they can be bloodthirsty fanatics ignorant of the tolls of war. Soldiers who have seen action usually have a more tempered attitude. Our appreciation of these sorts of matches is somewhat different than that of the average citizen.”

“I can see that being the case,” Lady Zahradnik scanned the faces in the crowd. “My people had a similar attitude, I think. I suppose I never extended that idea to the point where it transformed into what I’ve witnessed in the Baharuth Empire. Re-Estize is very different in the sense that the vast majority of its leadership was civilian…I wouldn’t say that they were ‘bloodthirsty fanatics’, but my lord father told me they had a large degree of separation from conflict that made them trivialise its realities.”

As they made their way to the edge of the field, the spectators gradually became aware of Baroness Zahradnik’s presence. A space formed for her, creating a makeshift booth out of standing soldiers. At some point, a chair appeared for her to sit on.

“Yes, well, we could see that from the annual skirmish in Katze Plains,” Captain Germund seated himself on the grass beside her. “Though the fact that we were content to simply hold Re-Estize’s Royal Army there probably fed into that. One year, we were on the way to teaching them a hard lesson for overestimating their chances, but Gazef Stronoff came out and evened the score. It wasn’t a pretty fight for either side, but it seems the idea that they had someone there who could do some real damage to us gave them something to hide behind and keep on with the sort of delusional thinking that you described.”

“Beyond his name,” the Baroness said, “My knowledge of the ‘Warrior Captain’ is little more than hearsay. Have you seen him fight?”

“I was there when that mess I described happened. Frankly, I never want to be on the wrong side of anything like it ever again. He’s supposedly a student of one of the schools of swordsmanship in Re-Estize, but he was so strong that I don’t think that it mattered. Plate armour may as well have been paper – he went through entire squads of veteran knights in seconds.”

Rangobart had watched matches between the army’s Captains before and it wasn’t anywhere near what Captain Germund described of Gazef Stronoff. The Captains all fought at a level that the rest of the soldiers could at least comprehend. The Martial Lords of the Grand Arena were perhaps the only individuals that he had personally witnessed who stood in the same realm as Re-Estize’s Champion.

The scattered conversations around the field quieted down as the Captain of the First Division’s Fourteenth Company faced off against the Captain of the Second Division’s Fifteenth Company. While they were both fully armoured, they used practise longswords.

Rangobart leaned forward slightly as the taller Second Division Captain struck first. His opponent’s figure blurred as he evaded the attack and came in with a diagonal counter that slammed into the side of the shorter man’s left arm, just below the shoulder. No audible report issued from the blow. The First Division Captain followed through with his strike, pivoting to block the blade coming in from his own left.

The resulting bind was brief. Both moved to separate, blades held out in a long guard.

“Are these matches decided using some predetermined method?” Lady Zahradnik asked, “Some way to score exchanges, perhaps?”

“How angry the Clerics get at us is one measure,” Captain Germund smirked. “Duels like this one usually go on for about five minutes. Roughly three minutes in, the exhaustion and loss of focus from constant exertion result in telling blows getting through.”

“This flow in your matches is the result of the Imperial Army’s schools of combat?”

“That’s right,” the Captain nodded. “Infantry train in spear and shield, sword and shield, longsword, and two-handed spear. Our cavalry have their own schools for mounted combat in addition to that and then there’s a loose ‘archery’ school that our scouts train in.”

“Is there much variation in the Imperial Army’s combat styles? It looks like these two know exactly what to expect from each other.”

“We train our soldiers to be able to perform the same set of basic Martial Arts, so there isn’t much in the way of variation in the rank and file. How we use Martial Arts as an army is more important than the variety available to us. Even when officers start mastering advanced Martial Arts, their combat style is still reflective of the ‘pace’ that our squads and companies can handle.”

As Rangobart understood it, this ‘pace’ was already more than sufficient for dealing with the majority of the threats that the Imperial Army was meant to deal with. A student’s materials on the subject often used the levies of Re-Estize as a point of comparison: the average Imperial Knight could last five times longer than their poorly trained and conditioned counterparts. Being a Wizard, he couldn’t exactly lay claim to this same feat, but even he could easily outlast the average commoner.

Endurance was crucial for war – soldiers weren’t very effective if they only had enough stamina to fight for a minute. He wasn’t sure whether this was of much relevance to Lady Zahradnik, as the Undead forces under her command never tired, but it was something often overlooked by those who only considered conflict as a matter of relative strength.

“What if one becomes significantly stronger than the average Imperial Knight?” The baroness asked.

“We don’t impose many restrictions on how they develop themselves,” Captain Germund answered, “but they still have to be mindful of the army’s standards. Since they undergo the same, basic training, you usually don’t see anyone with a wildly different combat style. The only person I can think of who did was Lord Enec, and his two-shield style was still complementary to how the Imperial Army operates.”

“…two shields?” Lady Zahradnik frowned.

“I know it sounds strange, my lady, but it worked somehow.”

“Ah, no – it’s just that I’ve seen someone wield two shields before, so I was wondering if they were related in any way.”

The noise from the spectators grew as the fight progressed out of its first few minutes. Defensive Martial Arts became erratic and differences in training and experience grew more apparent. As their blades appeared to be headed into another bind, the First Division Captain shifted his left hand to grip his longsword mid-blade. He turned his opponent’s weapon aside, bringing the point of his own in line with the other Captain’s neck.

To his credit, the Second Division Captain reacted in time to push the attack away, but the First Division Captain went with his opponent’s movements. The pommel of his longsword came around to smash into the other Captain’s helmet. The man’s head snapped to the side and the First Division Captain stepped in to shove him onto his back.

Shouts of approval rose from around them and the match was called. The combatants walked off of the field together towards a station where a handful of Clerics waited to inspect their injuries.

Another pair of officers walked onto the field. This time, it was the spear-wielding captain of the First Division’s Second Company and the longsword-wielding captain of the Second Division’s First Company. An excited murmur rose from the crowd.

“Are divisions and companies ordered in the same way that Legions are?” Lady Zahradnik asked.

“It’s not as clear-cut since we don’t shuffle people around all the time,” Captain Germund answered, “but it does loosely work as a rule of thumb. Agil – the swordsman – and Orex are two of the strongest Captains in the Second Legion, so this should be interesting.”

If Rangobart recalled correctly, both Captains were said to be on par with Platinum-ranked Adventurers. Imperial Knights, however, tended to place themselves above Adventurers of roughly equivalent strength under the reasoning that their formalised training, consistent stream of duties and traditions developed out of generations of service made for better fighting men.

Much like the previous two Captains, the current combatants stood across from one another but the tension in the air was far more tangible. Captain Agil had his longsword raised in a high guard while Captain Orex held an opposite stance that brought the tip of his weapon several centimetres over the grass.

“「Dragon Fang Thrust」!”

Orex moved first, exploding forward in a single, smooth motion. Lightning coursed over the blade of his spear. The weapon seemed split as it curved like the fangs of a Dragon.

Agil brought his blade down in a savage, diagonal slash, hammering the attack aside. Though he had deflected the strike itself, the elemental component travelled along his blade and coursed up his arms.

Rangobart couldn’t see the man’s expression through his full helm, but he imagined Agil gritting his teeth as he lunged forward with a full-bodied thrust at Orex’s shoulder. The First Division Captain was jarred to the side while bringing his weapon back up again, and he opted to disengage. The two Captains eyed one another from a seven-metre distance, gathering their steps as they tested one another for openings.

“Who came out on top there?” Rangobart asked.

“Captain Orex is almost entirely unscathed,” Lady Zahradnik answered. “What was the attack that he used?”

“It was a variant of Dragon Fang Thrust,” Captain Germund said. “It’s one of the most popular advanced Strike Arts in the Empire, developed two generations ago.”

“What are the components?”

“It stems from a twinned Thrust, then incorporates an elemental component to the attack. Each element is attributed to a Dragon’s signature breath weapon. Since he used lightning, it was a Blue Dragon Fang Thrust.”

“Isn’t that unfair? They’re using training weapons.”

The two Captains in the field went through another exchange of blows. This time, Captain Orex didn’t employ Dragon Fang Thrust.

“That’s an ongoing point of contention, my lady,” Captain Germund said. “Many say that unapologetic use of Dragon Fang Thrust will spur the other weapon schools to come up with elemental attacks of their own. So far, there haven’t been any breakthroughs, but the spearmen still love to remind the others at least once a fight.”

“I can’t even imagine how the original developer figured out how to add elemental damage to a Strike Art,” Lady Zahradnik muttered. “Aren’t Martial Arts conceptualised as the evolution of mundane techniques?”

“That would be a question to ask one of the Weapon Masters,” the Captain said. “Most of the army simply performs drills developed to lead to the use of existing Martial Arts – they don’t go into theoretical stuff like that.”

“So there’s some sort of manual?”

“It’s a monstrous thing,” Captain Germund indicated the thickness of the manual with his fingers. “The Sergeants usually just focus on what they’re supposed to be training the men in, which is the basic stuff. The rest is just beyond what’s needed or what most are capable of.”

At least the Captain seemed to understand what Lady Zahradnik was referring to. Rangobart considered Martial Arts as esoteric as most people considered Arcane Magic. All he knew was that warriors could perform seemingly magical acts without expending mana and they never failed to impress spectators in the Grand Arena.

Shouts rose from around the field as Captain Orex hurled himself into another rapid sequence of powerful attacks. Agil worked his blade deftly but only redirected a third of his opponent’s strikes. Most of the hits glanced off of his plate armour, though a few landed solidly and managed to keep him on the back foot.

“Captain Orex’s style is very aggressive.”

“Is it?” Captain Germund raised an eyebrow, “I believe most consider it extremely well-balanced.”

Rangobart wasn’t sure what constituted a balanced fighting style, but the onslaught certainly seemed aggressive. Despite using practice weapons, dents started to riddle Captain Agil’s plate armour. The deceptively soft tap tap tap of the wooden spearhead striking against metal continued until one of the strikes suddenly stopped.

“Uh oh,” Captain Germund said.

Agil grabbed the arrested spear in his left gauntlet, stepping forward to secure it under his arm. The crowd erupted into cheers as his longsword worked in a merciless reversal of Orex’s assault. Under the rain of furious strikes, the First Division Captain relinquished his polearm. He fell back as he drew his sidearm, but, after taking several more telling blows, a Cleric on the sidelines called the match.

“It seems Orex wasn’t the only one taking advantage of their training equipment,” Lady Zahradnik said as the two Captains made their way off of the field. “There are things you simply can’t get away with against real weapons.”

“Well, it’s partially recreational,” Captain Germund replied, “and we still draw much from these matches. It’s instructional for the spectators, too…if you’d like to go get your equipment, I’m sure they would welcome your participation. Having the student of a combat school from outside the Empire will really spice things up.”

“I think it would be better to leave the Captains to their bouts,” the Baroness said. “There’s still the rest of the encampment to get to before I need to meet with the general staff in Enz tomorrow. We’ve yet to settle on the details of this operation, but chances are that you’ll get to see me do a few things on the battlefield.”

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