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So they'd been taken hostage, dragged all the way out here, and... despite being useless in negotiations, despite being their enemies, despite holding up guards that otherwise could've been used to storm the citadel, STILL the Watch was alive? And they didn't even try to hurt the Watch at all, despite the completely obvious goal of Mihira and the wyvern riders! This was just... stranger than fiction.

"...Y-yeah, I'm fine. Thank you," Charice said, taking hold of the firm grip on reality that was the Guard coming to their aid. No time to say anything more; there was an epic battle afoot!

"Captain! Now what?"

The NPC portion of the Watch began undoing each others' bonds. Apparently a few of the more enterprising members had already undone theirs, but had kept them on for the sake of appearances.

And as more bonds quickly came off, eyes turned to the Captain.

Ghis just shot his gaze ahead toward the battlefield. To this point, the Sniper and Sage had been defending this part of the field. The Sniper was taken down by Isadora, but the Sage... was still free.

The logic hit Ghis like a ton of bricks.

They didna do nothin' tae us. If we sae much a' scratch th' Sniper, we stoop b'low 'em. Dame Knight'd know 'at better 'n most... n' so would th' Sage!

Ghis pointed a large finger directly at Antonio.

"Charice! Stop 'im!"



"Aph! Come on!"

The pegasus rushed forward, stopping only a split second for Charice to get her left foot in the stirrup before taking off, flying low to the ground, rapidly gaining on Antonio.

Charice was firmly seated, but do you have any idea how tough it is to grapple with a Sage while seated? You just can't do it. Aph might be able to tackle him, but ran the risk of trampling him.

The Falcoknight took a deep breath.

"Steady, girl."

She took her right foot out of the stirrup. Slowly rising, she placed that foot in the saddle. She wobbled for a second, but by placing her palms down on Aph's back prevented herself from falling off.

Next, in one fluid motion, showing better balance than many an amateur surfer, she placed her left foot towards the back of her saddle, spreading her arms wide for additional balance.

Yes, it was a battlefield, but Charice couldn't help but crack a smile--ahh, Pegasus Surfing. Flying through the air, wind whipping past your entire body--now THESE were the moments every flier should live for! Playing by the aptly named Rule of Cool!

...Only this time, as she approached Antonio...

"Turn right!"

Just as Aph banked right to avoid a potential magical disaster at the hands of the Sage, Charice jumped. Her pegasus' momentum carried her forward, gravity pulling her downward. It was just a bit off--she seemed to be a bit low, and would probably get Antonio's knees if she managed to tackle him.

But such was what Charice called "Pegasus Surfing"... extremely hard to perfect, lots of practice required. But damn, did it look cool And probably illogical.

Upon closer inspection, Milan could see that the redhead was sporting a nosebleed from the head-to-floor business. And dammit, he had a massive headache. The only reason why he was still able to fight despite this was because if he faltered for even a moment, he would die. And that would create a time paradox starting from the Valentine's Day mini event.

His kick was stopped, surprisingly, by her own. With that sort of block, he was very much surprised her speed wasn't reduced from the pain. He put a lot of power behind that kick, and it wasn't like she was wearing steel on her shoes. She quickly retaliated with a sword swipe at his ankle, but the armor there managed to hold off most of the attack. Her swing still got through, and Roy could feel it a little when he landed from the lunge that should have pierced her, but instead slashed at her thigh.

Seriously, with a shallow cut like that on her leg, why wasn't her speed dropping, even a little? Was she some sort of superwoman? Or was she so high on drugs that she couldn't feel pain? Oh wait, she was slashing at him again.

Roy took a series of small steps backwards, trying to minimize the amount of weight he put on his injured ankle as he blocked most of her strikes. On the last hit though, the force of the strike almost made him lose his balance, and he was forced to take a step back...unfortunately, with his wounded leg. In that brief moment, he winced, and his defenses were lax.

Milan took this moment to pierce his armor, and thus applied her sword's ice power with some force to penetrate it more.

"Nggh..." he grunted, a trickle of blood escaping his lip.

He had to admit...this battle was almost as deadly as the ones against Zephidel, Idoun, and the dragons, only this time he was on his own. Was he going...to die here? In this icy coffin Milan was preparing for him? It was so tiring...this battle, this war. Perhaps here...he could finally rest, after everything he had been through. The war against Zephiel, Lord Hector's final moments, the battle against the dragons, and all the battles he had here in this new continent against resurrected heroes of old, morphs created by his aunts, rapists, and more. He had fought so much...and in those brief moments of peace, he had met so many people. So...many people. In the brief life he had lived, he was satisfied.

Sorry Mother...Uncle...Uncle FD... he thought weakly. his eyes drooping.

Uncle FD! His eyes snapped open, and the swordsman became alert. If he fell here now, this woman would go after the dragon. And if FD was somehow defeated, that would be two people his Mother and Uncle would have to grieve for. He couldn't die here. Not without stopping this swordmistress. There was still so much he had to do. There was his Uncles' wedding, after all. And dammit, he was not going to miss that! Not because some woman killed him in a swordfight by freezing him to death! And who would protect Ninian in his stead? His Uncles? They had enough on their plate as it was. His father, where ever the hell he may be, whether back in Elibe or in this world? No. He had to live on.

With renewed vigor and a shaky hand, he grasped the icy sword tightly, not at all caring how cold it would be. His grip on the fire sword tightened. He chuckled a little before flames erupted around his sword, much larger than they had been throughout this duel. His hand and lower arm would definitely sustain some moderate burns, but that and the frostbite on the other hand would just be a small price to pay if he could finish Milan here and now.

"Sorry miss...but I have no intention of dying just yet...but..." he spoke, just loud enough to be heard over the crackling flames. "If it is destined that I'm going to die here, I'm going to be taking you with me!" he shouted, before he swung the sword upwards, intending to slice Milan in half from the bottom up.

She could try moving to the side, but the flames were hot enough to leave some serious burns. And if she tried to back away, she would find that her sword would not budge, for Roy had a deathgrip on the frosty weapon. She could risk backing away without the weapon, but Roy was just as prepared for that option too, for at the end of the swing, the flames would leave the blade and move as a pillar of fire for a short distance.

FD had gone out of his way to come off as intimidating to the Archaneans, having thought doing so would unnerve them, violate their courage and bravery to fight, have them quiver in their boots out of fear, send them running away – something that would take them from being a threat to Archesis to not being one. But fracturing their sanity had never been the dragon’s intentions. So when the commander of all these Great Knights had dismounted from his steed to construct snowballs which he then lobbed at FD’s face, the dragon couldn’t even process what he was witnessing at first; He was perplexed. Was this man, one of the higher ups in the army they were facing, REALLY throwing snowballs at him, a Flametongue-breathing, claw possessing, capable-of-eating-you-if-he-was-into-that dragon who could kill him with one attack? Snowballs. At a dragon. During a battle.

FD was actually petrified for a few moments out of disbelieve when the first few snowballs crashed against his face, exploding from the impact. This guy couldn’t really be a threat to Estarcia, could he (although he clearly had moxy)? FD decided to humor himself and intercepted a batch of snowballs with his mouth, where they… omnomnom melted upon impact with his fire-lickin’ tongue. After that, he stretched his wings out and dramatically roared at the snowball-hurler. If this guy was throwing snowballs, FD would go after someone who still might actually be a threat. The dragon proceeded to flap the wings typically had folded on his back when on land to lift himself into the air. The Bolting casters would see him, but if they were going to go after FD, FD could go after them since he’d finally know their exact position, too.

As the dragon gained height during flight to the point the point where he could see over the wall, he flew in a wide circle to study his surroundings. Obviously, there were copious skirmishes between the two sides, a large group of casters to the south (presumably the Bolting bunch), tons of action to the east, and a couple of red heads which he presumed were Roy and Melethia, along with flashes of fire in their respective vicinities. Yeah; definitely Roy and Melethia. And although he couldn’t tell what the details were, one of the two looked to be in quite the battle with just one other individual, and looked to be struggling. Judging by how close the flames of that fight were to the redhead in question, it had to be Roy; those flames must be coming from a sword, not a spell.

While he’d planned on landing behind the additional mounted troops that must have gotten into the city when his attention had been on the snowball man, Fire Dragon couldn’t be certain from his position in the air if Roy was in trouble or not, and that wasn’t something he would simply wait until later to look into. While he knew Roy was a very capable individual, FD needed to make sure his nephew was doing alright. Especially with the wedding coming up, since Roy was going to be his best man. And like hell he would let someone lay waste to his best man, damnit! Family comes first, so off he flew towards the source of the flames.

LANCELOT

It had been a long time since his last spar with a wyvern lord of any sort, let alone one of his own rank. Already, she had proven that her own beast flew with just as much maneuverability as Mordred... and unlike them, the scarred woman had no one to look after. She looked only after her own safety, her own skin, and her own pride, whereas- in split second moments- Lancelot's eyes flitted down to the sniper whose barrage of arrows had suddenly stopped. Esmeralda was loyal and determined, and he knew that his words alone wouldn't dissuade her from providing cover fire. So why...?

Umbriel's voice came just a moment before the madwoman's javelin would have punched through his skull. With only instinct guiding the way, Lancleot swung his lance in an arc, hoping to at least divert its path away from his face. He didn't even have time to change Mordred's flight path before the inevitable rendezvous...

SHREEEEEE!

The voice of a panicked, hurt wyvern split the sky as Mordred felt Umbriel's talons punch through her scaled hide, and felt those savage fangs tear at her neck. Though her skin was thick, and her nerves accustomed to the pain of steel striking at her body... the feeling of another wyvern tearing through all of her training with its powerful jaws was nigh unbearable. Though she felt her rider's body react to the impact and heard him scream her name, it all seemed so far off- something to be shrugged away, in light of the fire that seemed to tear through her.

Umbriel had just as much training as she, but it appeared that this larger beast had caught her off guard- try as she might, she could not reach her assailant with her claws. With her neck securely in Umbriel's grasp, she could not even reach around to snap at her opponent's belly- and her rider could do no more to help her, or he already would have come to her rescue. A cold dread settled into her gut, offset by the feeling of hot, thick blood rushing from the puncture wounds that were only growing worse as the other wyvern clung tight to its resisting prey.

So this was it.

So this was what prey felt like. This is why prey squealed- no matter how futile it was- before they breathed their last.

Still the battle-hardened Mordred flapped her wings in a fight to stay aloft, and still she fought to keep her rider steady. However, even as she felt her rider's weight shift as he pulled an axe from the side of her saddle, she could feel the futility as a cold certainty.

...It was strange. It was almost as if the cold was coming from the outside, not the inside...

----

Lancelot hadn't been able to keep his balance for the first few moments of Mordred's thrashing, desperate movements, and it took all he had to stay astride the rolling wyvern's attempts to stay alive. Blinking through the hot tears as he realized the inevitable, he knew he could not save them both- with Vaida's spear held away from his head by his own in one hand, he had only one other hand with which to defend one of them; Mordred, or himself. With a desperate, blind grab for the hatchet tied to the side of Mordred's saddle, Lancelot felt its handle and released his other lance, knowing full well that no matter what happened, he would not get a chance to use it again.

Though Vaida's dark magic was pointed straight at Mordred's side, it was towards Vaida's own abdomen that Lancelot threw the hatchet.

Umbriel would have to release the hold on Mordred in order to get her mistress away in time to dodge the blade.

But nothing could stop the burst of cold, dark magic from burning Lancelot's wyvern alive.

...

By the time Lancelot had heard the declaration of surrender, there was nothing to stop the inevitable fall from the heavens as Mordred's smoldering corpse sheltered her rider, one last time. Though he should have thanked the member of his brigade that had saved him, pulling him free from Mordred's falling form, he found that he couldn't bring himself to even recognize the man who had stolen from him Mordred's final moments.

He remained silent- completely, utterly silent- as his soldier brought him to the ground. He had no right to be the one left unscathed.

Charice came to realize that nope, she was falling short. As a result, she tackled the ground and bounced away. But hey, it delayed him, right? At least it wasn't utterly pointless... yet it took her a bit to get oriented with the world around her, being dizzy from the subsequent rolling.

"H-hey, come on, I'm not trying to kill you, really, all we want is a surrender and--" was all she got out before a messenger rode up and... oh, good. They'd surrendered. Nobody had to care anymore. The Watch looked relieved, certainly. Now it was just a matter of going home and doing what they normally did.

Buying enough time for Antonio so that nobody (himself or other people) got killed off gave her a strange sense of victory.

Even if it was done by being crazy.

My answer is...

→I will always be here.←

As the battle continued on, Cornelius had been called into the castle. His fears had come to fruition; the king was calling him. He must at least have heard the noise, he may have even already been aware of the battle. But whatever the king knew, Cornelius knew that it would not be good for their situation.

As he entered the room, the kind asked him what the noise was outside. Cornelius pretended to not be aware of any noise. The king didn't buy it. Eventually, the truth came out. The king cowered in his throne, and demanded for Cornelius to surrender. The general tried to plea with the ruler, but it was to no avail. The coward's fear had sank too deep for reason to pierce him. Eventually, Cornelius reluctantly agreed to go raise the white flag.

He slowly made his way to the highest tower. He climbed the staircase, as if trying to buy Cyric time to end the fighting before he had to do what the king had commanded. Eventually, he made it all the way to the top and looked upon where he could change the flag. Right now, the glory of Estarcia's true flag blew in the wind. But it was about to come down. Cornelius walked over and slowly placed his hand on the rope, to pull it down.

This was really the end. This would be how Estarcia fell; by the order of its own king. And there was nothing that Cornelius could do about it.

Just as the general was about to start taking Estarcia's flag down, a soldier ran into the room. He told Cornelius that the enemy had surrendered, that Commander Cyric had been successful. "Indeed?! Ah... thank goodness. Thank you, soldier. Now, hurry, we must go meet with the leaders of our former foes. This mess will be straightened out." The soldier ran out to continue doing his task. Once Cornelius was alone, he released the rope, smiled, then left the room and began to descend the staircase. "Nicely done, Cyric... You are truly a man worthy of praise. May your valor lead you to greatness."