Lightstar Family/Xarnelf/Roleplay 16

Second Battle in Larmebsi

"Here they come! Farsighters at the ready!" Xarnelf cried as he drew an arrow from the quiver on his back, nocking it to his short bow.

The five Lasanaran units charged forward in an odd infantry formation of sorts, with the body made up of two tightly packed troops in a rectangular shape composed of two squares. Flanking this center force were two significantly larger units, both stretched out considerably farther than the core.

"It appears that they intend to engulf us with their thinner, but longer, flanks while their middle holds our attention," Captain Feralgem remarked casually to the young knight as he readied his longbow.

Xarnelf raised an eyebrow at Urjintah. "Don't they realize that the majority of our forces are dug in behind trenches? How are they going to surround us only with what they have?"

The captain shrugged and let fly a probing shot, which fell less than one hundred yards short. "Mayhaps they hope to draw us out into a trap. In any event Xarne, we shall remain within the relative safety of this earthen bulwark which you ordered constructed the night before."

Xarnelf nodded resolutely to himself, trying to assuage his concerns about his troops' welfare and not wanting to experience again the destruction suffered at Akanos. This time, the tables had turned; this time, they would be the defenders who would hold, who must hold, for Taith Aenil depended on her troop leaders in Larmebsi.

When he judged the foe to be within range, he signaled to his men to commence firing. The Farsighters released with the others, and a storm of arrows from five archer units rained death upon the enemy.

Suddenly, the air was filled fast with fanning, flaming fireballs fired ferociously forwards from behind the charging infantry of Lasanar. The approaching wave fazed quite a few of the defenders, especially the inexperienced ones, who stared in awe with open mouths, struck dumb.

Xarnelf gasped in shock. "What in the Aenil's name is that? They don't look like arrows..."

Wincing, Captain Feralgem replied, "That, my friend, is the work of the special forces unit which our scouts had spied earlier in Arempos. Everyone, take cover!" Urjintah yelled as he dropped down behind the embankment.

The passionately pitched pitch plummeted presumptuously, plunging painfully into unfortunate soldiers who had stood petrified; they now stood burning and screaming from the deadly projectiles.

Gazing around the scattering of smoldering spheres stuck in the earthworks, Xarnelf regained his senses and stood up. "Farsighters! Return fire!"

Most of the other troops had recovered from their initial confusion by now and continued their charge to meet the enemy, crossing the outer perimeter of trenches. They were spearheaded by Lord Amedeo and his unit in wedge formation. As the two armies collided, the Notorious Horseless Berserkers! broke into the Lasanarian core and began splitting them into two forces. They continued their slowly faltering charge, carving deeper into the ranks, seeking to completely separate the center units and reach the fireball-flinging, fiasco-forcing foes in the rear.

Meanwhile, the defending archers focused their arrows on the deadly, burning-tar-covered-stone throwers, thinning their ranks with every passing moment as the infantry engaged the divided Lasanarians, filling and further widening the gap left by the continuing cavalry.

The enemy started panicking then as their plan backfired; the previously entrenched militia had rushed out to surround them. After causing a fair amount of havoc with their unorthodox method of aerial assault, the fire-slingers finally fell to the unrelenting barrage of arrows from the archers, who fired at approximately twice the rate of their opponents.

Before the second hour of battle passed, the Lasanaran troops were routed, forced to flee from the field in defeat.