Chronicles of Metal: Chapter 11 – Broken

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Aeirfin awoke to the smell of smoke filling his bunk. He barely had time to get out of bed before flames began jumping through his window at him. Never had he been more thankful that he went to bed wearing his guard trunks. Throwing on a tunic and grabbing Frostbite, he dashed out the door to see the town in chaos.

Fires leapt from the rooftops, and burning debris filled the streets. The gatehouse next to his barracks wase engulfed in flames, with only a small handful of people fighting to put it out. When Aeirfin ran to assist them, he found the pump they used to draw water from the river for just such an occasion had been smashed to pieces. It hadn’t been crushed by falling debris or anything, it looked like someone went at it with an axe.

The sight made him pause, but the growing heat forced him to move on. He and the handful of others scattered throughout the city, trying to help where they could. Unfortunately, months of military drills and defensive tactics where little use when it came to fighting fires. He occasionally ran into one of the buildings, yelling for someone to respond. When someone did, he'd do whatever he could to help. But unfortunately, that amounted to very little other than dragging some old hermit or injured civilian out onto the street to watch their house go up in flames. Though they professed their eternal gratitude, Aeirfin felt practically useless.

His thoughts though, where on Aoi and her family. The words of the Viscount's wife held fast in his head. She couldn't have expected something like this would happen, could she? She'd have told him if that where the case... Right? This fire had to be the fault of all the oil they'd stockpiled. Some careless idiot had let the whole thing go up in flames.

A woman's scream from down one of the side roads stopped that thought cold. Aeirfin slid to stop himself, turning back down the ally just in time for something to fly at him. He flattened against the wall just as another guard crashed into a stack of creates next to him. Aeirfin knelt down, but the man was already dead. A single puncture mark through his chest plate right over his heart. He looked back for the perpetrator, but all he saw was a tiny blur through the smoke. He tried to give chase, but came across the woman whom he'd heard, sobbing inconsolably. He tried to ask her what happened, but she couldn't get the words out. Eventually he led her to another small group that had begun to gather and treat the wounded, and headed off once more.

"Elf!" Another call stopped him, and he turned to see one of the guards running towards him. "What the hell took you so long, boy?"

"Trying to help people!" He shouted back over the roar of the flames. "Who's attacking us!?"

"What do you mean!?" The guard shouted back.

Aeirfin stopped dead. Was he serious? Did he seriously not know there where hostile forces within the city? "The fire!?" He said, gesturing to the half of the street currently engulfed in flames.

"Don't worry about it." Aeirfin's jaw almost hit the ground. Half the city was burning, how could he not worry about it? Before he could complain, the guard turned and began jogging away. "Capitan Anders is lookin' for ya. This way, knife ears."

incredulous, Aeirfin was left with no other option than to follow after him. They dodged through the next few streets, stepping around fires and, unfortunately, the civilians asking for aid. The guard he was following didn't even give them a second glance, but Aeirfin at least tried to offer some explanation. They where reinforcing the garrison, regrouping to counterattack, going to the other gatehouse for aid. Whatever he could say to get them to let him through. It made the young elf sick to lie to people like that, but he was getting no other explanations and that seemed like the easiest way to proceed.

They rounded the corner to come into a small plaza that hadn't been touched by the flames yet, where half a dozen other guards all stood around a cart, currently arming up for what Aeirfin assumed was a counterattack. Captain Anders was among them, and they all looked up when the two approached.

"There you are, Theocrie." The Capitan said, slapping a hand on his shoulder. "Hop on, we're going for a ride."

He and the guard he followed here crawled up the back of the cart, as did the handful of guards around them. They where all wearing full armor, and armed with crossbows that had already been drawn. He knew the Hashigin guard had such weapons, but rarely saw them himself. Apparently, this really was serous. "Are we mustering a counterattack?" He asked, being the last to climb up on the cart.

"Yeah..." The Capitan nodded, as the guard he'd followed snapped the reigns, urging both horses forward. "Good thing you brought your sword too."

Something was... Off, about the way he said that. Sure, he'd brought his sword, but he had no armor. And despite them obviously waiting for him, they didn't bring a crossbow for him to use either. He'd never practiced with them, but it was odd that they'd knowingly go into battle with someone so poorly equipped. Standing in the back of the cart, none of them so much as looked at him, but an obvious sweat seemed to fall from each and every one of them.

As the cart began to pick up speed, Aeirfin slowly approached the Capitan. "Is it the Norn, sir?" Even as he spoke the words, he knew that wasn't the case. "Is there a raiding party?"

"Yeah, elf. It's a raiding party." The captain said again, still keeping his eyes ahead.

Something was wrong. The Capitan was lying through his teeth. Aeirfin's grip tightened on the scabbard of his sword. "Sir, the Norn always attack the west gate..." He pointed ahead, towards a fire in the distance. "We're going east."

Suddenly, one of the guards dropped a bolt into his drawn crossbow. As he tried to aim at him, Aeirfin batted it upwards with the scabbard of Frostbite. The arrow loosed into the air, but by then the others set upon him. Two of them grabbed each of his arms, forcing him to his knees. One of them tried prying frostbite from his hand, but he kept a firm grip. The last guard pointed his crossbow at him, but the captain raised a hand to stop him.

"You're way to smart for your own good. You know that?" He said with a condescending sneer. "Couldn't just play along, take a few bribes here and there, ignore stuff when we tell you to. But noooo. The elf thinks he's better than the rest of us."

Aeirfin tried to shake loose, but the others held fast. "You did all this, didn’t you?" He spat, watching as a flaming roof passed overhead. "We're supposed to help people!"

"We're supposed... To do what the Viscount says." He slowly approached, reaching out to touch the hilt of Frostbite. "Like get him a sword from some nosy elf that thinks he knows better than everyone else."

The blue glow of the sword reflected off the guard's armor as the captain drew it from the sheath. As he held up the plade ot admire, the guard in the rider's seat called "Capitan? Ahead!"

All eyes fell down the street, just as an absolutely massive figure stepped into the road. It looked like a knight, with a furred collar and waist cape. But the armor was strange to all of them, like nothing they'd ever seen before. Their footfalls where audible even over the rattling cart or roaring flames, and the eyeholes in the helmet where dark when it turned to face the oncoming cart.

"What the hell?" Capitan Anders said, shoving Frostbite back into the sheath and grabbing the crossbow from the last guard not restraining Aeirfin. He fired and the bolt cracked against the knight's round helmet, but the large knight didn't even seem phased. "Whatever..." Capitan Anders tossed the weapon back to the one he'd taken it from, turning back to Aeirfin. "Just run him over!"

However, will all eyes on him, none but Aeirfin and the driver could see the knight slowly draw an equally huge sword from his hip. It glowed bright crimson, even against the backdrop of the flames. "Capitan?" Aeirfin gasped, suddenly filled with a sense of foreboding. "Capitan we should stop."

"Too late to beg, knife-ears." The captain said as the knight raised the sword over its head.

At the last moment, the knight stepped aside and swung his sword. All Aeirfin heard was a sickening crunch as the blade carved straight through the chest of one of the horses, out the back, and into the cart. Wood snapped and splintered, and the glowing blade bit into the legs of two of the still seated guards. Suddenly the whole thing bucked forwards, launching everyone into the air. With his arms free, Aeirfin did the only thing he could think of. Tuck into a ball and hope he didn't break his neck.

He was successful in avoiding that last part, but it didn't make the landing any easier. He mostly landed on his side, trying to roll with the momentum to come out with as few injuries as possible. Finally stopping on his back, his entire body ached and his ears rung. He could feal dozens of tiny cuts and scrapes all over, and it hurt to just breathe. For a moment, he thought he was in the middle of a dream. This all felt so surreal that he had no other way to describe it.

A growing commotion quickly broke that notion. He sat up on his elbows to see a scene of complete chaos. Two of the guards lay in a crumpled heap, missing both their legs just below the knee. One of them was dead already, judging from the funny angle his head sat at, while the other clutched as his missing limbs. Another, the driver of the cart, now lay crushed beneath it next to the remains of both horses.

Where his attention fell through, was the knight.

Three of the guards were fighting him. Though, fighting may have been the wrong words. The knight held one of them by the torso, its fingers crushing into the guard's breastplate. As blood spilled from the bottom of his helmet, the enormous knight simply dropped him to the ground. The next guard ran at him, only for the knight to grab him same as the first. Rather than just crush him however, he hoisted him up, slammed him into the nearby wall, and then tossed him across the street through the wall of a burning building. The last tried to retreat, but quicker than anything Aeirfin had ever seen before, the knight swung its sword. It cut through the man's left arm, carved through his torso, then cleaved through his right. He fell to pieces a second later.

"Dammit..." Aeirfin looked down to see Capitan Anders hand landed not that far away from him, his leg twisted at an obviously broken angle and a large gash across his forehead. "What is that thing?"

Whether it was the pain he was in, or the confusion about what was happening, Aeirfin didn't so much as move as the knight approached them. It's footfalls seemed to shake the entire city, it's breathing low and raspy, and when it looked up, he saw a pair of deep green glowing eyes under it's helm. It executed the one remaining guard with the missing legs, driving its sword through the center of his chest. It them moved onto the pair of them, grabbing the captain by the shoulder and flipping him over.

It lifted the captain up, putting its faceplate just a few inches from his. "Slaaaaaaves..."

A hollow, echoing voice rung from within the helmet, sending a chill down Aeirfin's back. This wasn't a raider from Norn. Hell, it didn't even sound like a human. It's strength was something otherworldly.

The captain however, failed to make this connection. "Go to hell!" He screamed, kicking with his unbroken leg. "You don't know jack shi-."

He cut himself off with a guttural scream. The knight tightened his grip on his shoulder, filling the air with a cascade of sick crunching noises. “"Teeeeeell meeeeeee..."

"Stop it!" Aeirfin cried, fighting through the pain to get to his feet. "You're killing him!" He threw the scabbard of Frostbite aside, taking a fighting stance. He had no idea why; the captain was just about to kill him. But his body just seemed to move on his own. He couldn't just watch someone be murdered and do nothing about it.

He raised his sword and stepped in, hoping that he'd have a better chance than the others. He'd taken the training more seriously, been tutored by his father, who said he had some genuine talent for sword fighting. If anyone had a chance against this thing, it was him. He swung his blade, leaving a glowing blue arc through the air. Just as quickly however, the knight lifted its sword to intercept.

It was over before it even began. Frostbite snapped in two the second the metal connected. The knight extended its arm, more moving into Aeirfin's path than anything. The young elf's face collided with the knight's armored gauntlet. He'd barely moved an inch, but the force caused his nose to brake and his vision to go hazy. He dropped onto his hands and knees, blood spilling onto the two halves of Frostbite's blade. He'd barely lasted a second against this thing. Now it would slaughter him like it had the others.

Through all that though, his thoughts where on Aoi. He didn't even know of she was safe or not. Her last words to her where about how he'd keep them safe if there was trouble, and now he was going to die not even knowing if she or her family was alive or not. It made him sick to think about, but with Frostbite broken, there was nothing he could do to delay his death now.

Which made it all the more surprising, when death didn't come. "Nooooot..." The thing groaned. "Guaaaaard..."

Aeirfin looked up, finding the knight had raised to its feet. Its sword hummed with red energy, but remained at its side. Was... It showing mercy? After slaughtering the others so callusy, it was sparing him? But he was a guard. They'd betrayed him, sure, but the only difference between them was... It was then that he remembered that he was he only one not wearing his armor. To this thing, he must've looked like just another civilian. But that only raised more questions. If this thing was only attacking the guards and not the town, then who set the fires?

Still dangling from his mangled arm, the Capitan muttered an answer. "T-The Viscount..." He finally muttered, his face turning pail as blood spilled from his shoulder. "The fires..." He wheezed, blood spilling from his mouth. "It was... The Viscount's idea..."

Just as easily, the knight dropped the wounded captain and began to slowly stomp away. It reached into a pocket and withdrew a scroll, that unfurled in its hand and evaporated away in a burst of blue fire. "Maaaaaasterrrr." Its hollow voice drowned. "Visssssscount." It stowed its glowing sword, stepping through the flames and vanishing from sight.

The second it was gone, Aeirfin realized he had been holding his breath. He gasped, all the pain he'd been powering through hitting him all at once. What the hell was that? What was going on here? So many questions flew through his mind that he didn't even know what to do next.

"E-elf..." The captain moaning drew him from his racing thoughts. "C-can't... Die."

A sick feeling formed in the young elf's stomach. Was he asking for help? After what he'd done? He and the other town guard? He wanted to leave him to his fate. Who knows how many others had died due to the fires they set? Yet he wanted to be saved? That had to be the sickest joke he had ever heard.

But... No matter how much he wanted to, Aeirfin couldn't just leave him. He couldn't dig deep enough to callously abandon someone like that. He crawled back, retrieving both halves of Frostbite. It pained him to see the sword that his father had passed down to him broken like this, but that was hardly something he could complain about. A few seconds ago, he was making piece with his death. A broken weapon seemed like a small issue by comparison.

Stowing the blade back in the hilt, Aeirfin took the hilt, and the tiny bit of the blade that remained attached to it, and plunged it into the Capitan's shoulder. Ice formed over the mush of skin and blood. Anders gasped and slumped to the side as most of his ruined arm crumbled away, but the stump remained frozen, stopping the bleeding.

"This isn't mercy..." He spat, too tired to carry on. "You'll answer for what you did."

He slumped over as the fires around him began to smolder. Again, his thoughts drifted to Aoi. It sickened him how powerless he felt. Had that knight not shown up, or had he tried a little harder to get his armor when he woke, he'd be dead right now. Dead and unable to help her. Even now, he couldn't do anything. He could only wait for the fires to stop and for someone to find them. His only hope was that they weren't more guards, or anyone else under the Viscount's thumb.

After all, he'd lived through too much tonight to die.

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