Hope to Restore Order
Hope to Restore Order
Hearing the sound of fighting outside, she walked out of her high tower and saw faint red lights shone through dark clouds, which looked as if they were soaked by sticky fresh blood.
"But my sister hasn't come back yet." finally she answered.
"She's a warrior in the Defending Army and cannot leave her position without permission." Kaff sounded more and more anxious. "If you die here, you'll definitely let her down!"
Hesitated for a long while, she nodded and said, "I see."
Refugees poured down to the streets. The guards there stretched themselves to preserve order. Mixed in the moving mass of refugees, she moved helplessly towards the South Gate, accompanied by Kaff who stayed by her side closely all the time, protecting her from the panic crowd with his tall and strong body.
It was an overwhelming defeat.
She was wondering, "Is this our end?" She looked back at the Tower of Babel which was both the highest building of the city and the center of the Union. Flying demons carried Mad Demons into the top of the tower and occasionally some of them would be shot down by lightning. However, the situation would hardly be improved as there were so many demons.
As the most thriving Holy City on Fertile Plains after hundreds of years of development, it would probably be destroyed today. The efforts of several generations were falling into ruins, like a kid's sand castle, whose creation required a whole afternoon but its downfall could happen in the blink of an eye. After that, the greatness would once again sink into to chaos and disorder.
...
Passing through the South Gate, they found that demons had already come to besiege them. Those who could still fight voluntarily joined the guards in the combat with the demons.
With Mad Demons, Fearsome Demons and Lords of Hell, the enemies were much stronger than the people. After a round of spear thrower attack, dozens of people were lying in pools of blood. Some of them were impaled by spears in the stomach and their warm guts fell out of their body, onto the snow on the ground. Some got severely injured and held their wounds, crying and wailing.
"My lord, where are you going?" Kaff stopped her.
"I can fight." She took a deep breath. "Let go of me."
"No, you are much more important than them. You cannot ..." Kaff insisted.
"Let go!" She used her magic power and an overflowing chilliness to break his grip, and then she strode off without taking a look back. Seeing the ferocious masks and bloody weapons of the enemies not far away, she felt her stomach knotted at the sight. Despite the horrible scene, she made up her mind to fight till death. She was fed up hiding in the crowds. As a witch of the Holy City, she believed fight was her destiny.
"Get away!"
Just at that moment. someone shouted from one side of the battlefield. The next thing they saw was a god-like figure descending from the sky.
She was there with her back to everyone, raising up a long sword in her hand. Her reddish-brown hair flew upward like a flame, and instantly kindled everybody's hope.
"She's a Blessed Warrior from the Union !"
"She's... a Transcendent!"
High above the cheering crowd, a light from her sword's blade quickly changed the whole sword into a beam of dazzling golden light, glaring like a rising sun. It lit up the earth and pierced through the clouds, circling the dark red clouds with golden tassels in the sky. When the light became as strong as it could be, she leapt forward and stroke the demons in front of her.
A profound silence prevailed over all.
At that moment, time seemed to stagnate. The shadow of the demons, like the last faint trace of darkness at dawn, was engulfed in an overwhelming light.
The demons, even powerful Mad Demons and Lords of Hell collapsed in the light.
When the witch of Holy City opened her eyes again, she only saw a scorched land and the demons facing them just now were all gone, as if they had never existed.
Seeing it, the other demons spontaneously withdrew. As more and more Blessed Warriors arrived to hunt the demons, the siege was lifted.
"Get out of here as fast as humanly possible!" said the witch carrying the sword. She seemed exhausted and was down on one knee, catching her breath. "Now, leave."
"But... my lord, where can we go?" someone in the crowd asked.
"Good question, where can we go?" she was deep in thought, the last Holy City had fallen now and tens of thousands of human lives had been wiped out. The witches did all in their power trying to win, but still had to face their defeat.
"Never give up, we still have hope!" the red-haired witch said firmly, "Go over the mountains and cross the rivers to the wild lands."
"But there are only some rural villagers." someone said.
"We can restore the order there. As long as we can survive, we'll see the day of our victory!" the Transcendent said.
...
"My lord, why don't you go with them?" Kaff asked,
as the witch of Holy City rushed out of the crowd and headed for the west, followed by a team of people. Except Kaff and her family guards, the team was composed of servants from the tower, who couldn't fight at all.
"I left some Magic Stones and documents in the Misty Forest. They're of overriding importance for the witches to restore the order. I must bring them to the other side of the mountains." she answered.
"The demons were catching up!" someone shouted.
"Thresh, you go to block them," Kaff commanded.
"Yes!" Thresh answered.
Clenching her teeth, she forged ahead with her head down. She knew that mortals could only block the demons for a while and they could never beat the demons and that if she left them here, they had no chance to survive. However, she must leave for her destination as soon as possible.
Suddenly, some black and white spots appeared in the sky and blurred her sight.
...
Sturdy as Kaff was, he was exhausted after three days' of long trek, puffing heavily and dragging his feet.
She looked back and saw only six people were still following her. She remembered that she left with a team of more than thirty. Some of them escaped on the way and some were too wounded to follow. She was wondering if the demons caught up...
"Don't worry, my lord. I'm behind you." -Kaff seemed to be able to read her thoughts and comforted her-"I will do my best to block those demons."
"Why?" she asked.
He was a little surprised by her question.
"Why do you want to fight for me to the end? If you escape now, maybe you'll survive," she said. "Witches always feel superior to you ordinary people. I don't understand why you're willing to fight till death for a witch."
"Yes, you're a witch, but you've never treated us badly. I didn't have any magic power, but I knew it was my duty to protect you." Kaff answered.
Then they heard the demons' sounds coming from behind and understood that was the horn calling them to their last battle.
"My lord, go! Never look back." Kaff said.
There were more and more black and white spots before her eyes.
...
She stumbled into the basement to pack the documents and Magic Stones on the table.
Somehow, she was still puzzled by Kaff's words.
A long-held view in the Holy City was that witches were the chosen ones of gods and ordinary people without magic power were ignorant and incompetent. Because of this, ordinary people, or the mortals, were just used to serve and support witches. However, the courage and resilience of Kaff, head of her family guards, made her believe that the ordinary ones were not that incompetent and useless after all. In fact, she even thought if witches and ordinary people could work together, the situation would be better. She could tell this from the successful experience in her own stone tower.
Such being the case, why were the people so badly defeated more than 400 years ago?
Roars of demons from the other side of the door interrupted her flow of thought.
"Damn it, they get here so fast." she thought.
As her vision was blurred by numerous black and white spots, she could not see anything. Her strong desire to survive enabled her to fight, straining every nerve to bring her research achievements to the wild lands where the witches would restore the order.
She took out an Stone of Echo and gave it an injection of magic power, making it send out distress calls continuously.
Suddenly, she heard a loud band. The wooden door fell apart and the demons broke into the basement.
The moment she centralized magic power to fight, her magic chillness started to surge and a Mad Demon also lifted a spear with its swelling arm. In her heart, she prayed for someone to come to her rescue as she saw the spear flying to impale her.
She subconsciously closed her eyes and then black and white spots turned into utter darkness. She could not see or hear anything at all. She felt as if she was being wrapped with a warm and comfortable velvet, the same feeling one would get lying on the grass in the sunshine. She felt as if she was not in the dim basement anymore, no pain and no tension.
Am I dead?
After a while, she felt a growing light in the darkness and tried to open her eyes. A gray roof gradually came into her sight.
She heard someone said, "Your Highness, she is awake."
.