[ET] THE UNDEAD RAID OF SOLLAND

[Petsch2k 1851]

 

THE UNDEAD RAID OF SOLLAND

 

 

18th of the First Seed, 219 S.A.

 

It was a peaceful morning within the Commonwealth, children played in the streets, knights and soldiers speaking kindly to the citizenry. The tavern was lively, by all accounts all was normal. Suddenly people started speaking out, calling out that something was on the horizon towards the east. A dark ominous plume of black smoke, billowing upward in thick, rolling clouds, again the pale blue sky. Its signal was undeniable, veteran knights and soldiers would halt, standing still for a moment, their expression changed. They had seen war before, they could feel it deep in their gut, that unmistakable dread sharpened by experience. A raid. Towards the east lay the Solland Hamlets, and no merchant’s hearth fire or field blaze would send such a warning. Hands found the hilts of swords, murmurs filled the streets of Vallagne, and across the city the uneasy silence before the storm took hold.

 

Soon after the Knight Commander, Sir Artair von Theonus, began the call to arms, knights and soldiers readied themselves to ride east. The Knight Commander quickly climbed towards the eastern walls of Vallagne to scout the horizon. The smoke from the Solland Hamlets thickened, choking the sky in an unnatural black. Fires raged, destroying and devouring homes and fields, yet something was off. The Commander could tell, this was different, the wind carried more than the acrid bite of burning wood and flesh—it carried something fouler, something rotten. Then it struck him. The putrid, unmistakable stench of the undead. His grip tightened on the cold steel of his blade as a chill ran through him. 

 

The Commander rode at the head of the column, his voice steady as he barked orders, he rallied the men beneath Petra’s banners. Hooves thundered against the dirt, the earth shook as they rode towards the Hamlets, yet as they neared, they slowed, stopping just before the threshold of fire and death. The air was thick with smoke, but worse still were the sounds. The distant, harrowing screams of the peasantry, the guttural moans of the undead, the sickening wet crunch of something feeding. The flames painted over the darkening evening, flickering hues of orange and black, the burning village a scar against the land, an image none would soon forget.

For the veterans of the rally, knights and soldiers alike, this was war. But for the younger ones, those who had never seen battle beyond training yards and drills, a fearful dread crept into their bones. Hands tremembers on weapon hilts, beads of sweat formed beneath helmets, breaths quickened. They understood something very clear. Tonight, they might not live to see another dawn. This is what they have signed up for, this is the oath they have taken. To defend these lands, to defend this kingdom, to defend its people. Some made peace with their fate, others couldn’t control their fear, their shaking, they attempted to steel their resolve, but they hoped that they will go back home alive.

 

The Commander took out a war-horn. 

It was time.

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

As the charge thundered forward, the grim reality of the massacre unfolded before them. The brutal scenery would be seared into the minds of some of the men, what had once been the Solland Hamlets was now a grotesque display of Slaughter. Bodies upon bodies of the peasantry lay strewn across the dirt roads and fields, torn apart in gruesome displays of violence. Some hung upside down from scorched beams, chained together, their blood pooling beneath them in thick, blackened puddles. Others had been disemboweled, their entrails spilled out like offerings to something sinister.

 

The undead moved with purpose, these were no mindless husks, no shambling remnants of men left to rot in rags. These were warriors of death, clad in rusted chainmail, their rotting forms armored and armed. Their shields bore faded sigils of wars long past, and in their hands, black-stained war-axes gleamed with fresh gore, as if the very weapons were feeding upon the blood upon it, and they demanded more. Their hollow eyes, glowing a bluish hue, sunken into decayed faces, carried no life, only flickering embers of dark magik.

The remaining peasantry cried for help still alive, screaming in terror, they’d scrambled through the bloodied mud as the undead hacked them down. A woman clutched her child pleading to god and the knights to come save them quickly, only for an armored corpse to cleave her down. A farmer, wielding nothing but a rusted sickle would be swarmed by the undead, his throat crushed beneath the heel of a boot before an axe split his skull in two Even for the veteran knights and soldiers who’ve witness the atrocities of war, this was horror, these things should not exist.

 

As the Commander yelled out a war-cry, the earth trembled beneath the weight of the charge as warhorses crashed into the undead. The shield wall that was formed to counter the Petran levymen crumpled, bodies breaking, bones snapping, yet the undead did not falter. Even as they fell, those still standing fought with terrifying precision, their war-axes rising to meet the knights in grim defiance. The battle had begun in full, and the field of fire and blood was now theirs to claim—or to die upon.

 

The battle was swift and brutal.

 

Within minutes, the last of the undead fell to the ground, lifeless once more. The black-stained war-axes slipped from bony fingers; the rusted armor no longer held together by whatever dark magic had bound them. There came a silence on the battlefield as the crackle of fire and the labored breathing of the surviving knights and soldiers were all that remained to be heard. They had emerged victorious. The undead had fallen. And yet, as they surveyed the ruin, victory felt somewhat hollow. There was nothing left of the Solland Hamlets but charred corpses, shattered houses, and dead streets. The knights were supposed to save these people. But standing among the ruins, staring at wreckage and blood-stained earth, none could feel other than they had come too late.

 

As the fires crackled and the last echoes of battle faded into silence, the survivors began to emerge. From the shattered remains of homes, from beneath fallen carts and within the scorched husks of barns, children crept forward, their small faces streaked with soot and tears. They clutched tattered blankets, gripping one another with shaking hands, their wide eyes filled with fear and confusion. The few surviving peasants, those who had managed to hide from the slaughter, stumbled into the open. Some fell to their knees, their bodies wracked with sobs, crying out the names of loved ones who would never answer again. Others wept quietly, holding onto whatever scraps of their former lives they had left. Some of them looked upon the knights and warriors with gratitude, their voices trembling as they whispered, "Thank you… thank you for saving us." But others—the grieving, the broken, the ones who had lost everything—stared with different eyes.

A boy, no older than ten, stepped forward, still shaking with each step; his fists were clenched so tightly that his knuckles had turned white. His voice broke as he shrieked, "Where were you?!" The question seemed to hang in the air, a dagger that cut deeper than any blade. Some of the knights stood still for a moment. A woman rocked back and forth, clutching the body of her slain husband, her face contorted in anguish. "Why did my mother have to die?" she sobbed, her eyes red-rimmed as she looked up at them. "Where were you?" she repeated. Their cries cut through the night-raw, anguished. 

 

For these people, victory had come too late.

 

[Destructokeith 1142]

Rage.

 

It filled the heart of the Knight Commander as he charged head long into the ranks of undead.

It fueled his slaughter of the twisted creatures that stood in his path.

 

Blinding and fierce his roars of fury had filled the battlefield as the silver blade cleaved through the ranks of undead.
And yet.

 

Artair had come to late to save them all, their blood pooling at his feet, mixing with the stale bile that had flown through the undead, The Knight had failed to defend the innocents.

 

Silently, he was glad he still wore his helm as a child no older then his son screamed at him that he had failed.

 

The visor hid the pain of failure,

and the few tears that came with it.

[Deets 1130]

Sir Clemens sat atop his steed in the aftermath of the battle in Solland. "The command of God is justice, and the unjust are punished." He repeated to himself from the Scroll of Auspice. Such had been the prayer upon his lips entering the fray, and it rang true in its aftermath. Yet still, the words of the boy echoed in his mind.

 

"Where were you?"
 

Each word stung far greater than any injury inflicted by the warped steel which the undead had wielded. For it provided a stark reminder that the countryside of the Commonwealth was only as safe as its Swords were vigilant, and in this they had failed that day. He knew the sentiment well, for it rang true when he had returned from the East many years ago. From brigands and highwaymen to the undead and their vile necromancer lords, the Commonwealth would need to grow stronger under the King's banner, and her Swords make ready to meet the new tribulations head-on.

 

Spoiler

Awesome event, thank you for running it Petsch!

 

[Zemzy_Oakheart 347]

The small gobliness returned slowly back to the safety of Chambery's library to delve into her work after aiding the soldiers on the field firsthand as well as tending to her own life-mate's coughing fits back home between the trip, Gummy would struggle to shake the sight of the blackened smoke engulfing the homes during the waagh-zone outside of Vallagne's walls.

 

There were so many bodies, so much blood & carnage the nub'ded had wreaked upon the hamlet's once peaceful space. Thoughts continued to stir within Gummy's feral chitterings, mumbled under her breath as the inner turmoil festered within her soul like a plague of its own as she was at least grateful none had seemed to bother her in the silence of the book-lined walls.

 

There was no peaceful rest for this small goblin; everything she'd done to try & help, everyone she'd seen flattened & hurt during the massacre outside Vallagne & her own preparedness of the event instilled a newfound fear.. & resolve within her at the same time.