That Resolve Was the Battle Cry

A great body, towering.

Wings like blades — built more for cutting the wind than for catching it.

Trunk-like core strength, but the limbs hadn't lost any of their suppleness. Plainly built for running.

Anyone seeing that body, on first sight, knew it.

〈Land Dragon (Reirnote)〉.

A species sometimes called the king of the surface ecosystem. An apex predator.

And —

— adults.

The word came up in Merea's chest.

The dragons in the distance were considerably larger than the black-scaled Noel he was riding now. Beyond size: the development of body parts was visibly different. Adult-spec.

The instant his head landed on adults, Merea also locked into combat readiness.

While the rest of the party was still reading the situation in confusion, Merea was already running cold analysis.

— Just that one?

The dust kicked up by the cross-wind had been swept clean once, but a fresh dust-curtain was already rising at the dragons' feet, smoke-like, fogging the area around them.

— No. Two more.

Merea's wide field and high motion-acuity had not let go of the half-second of information the wind had given him. Two tails, slightly different colour from the first dragon's, had flashed in the dust.

But that wasn't enough yet.

Collect data. Combine. Forecast.

The breeze was nudging the dust left to right, which was capping the size of the dust-cloud. From the first dragon's adult-spec body he could estimate the others'; he overlaid the estimated bodies onto the dust-volume.

— That dust isn't large enough to hide four.

In a perfect calm, the dust would have stayed broad and curtained the formation widely. The breeze had, ironically, helped him.

Three. Confirmed.

He locked on the front threat first, then turned his head to check the rest.

A small look back over his shoulder.

— Half.

Half the party had taken in the threat. The riders at the column's front had seen the dragons cleanly and their survival instincts had ramped up. The riders at the back had been craning to see between the others when the second wave of dust reset their view, and they hadn't quite locked.

He'd shouted land dragons, but the news was unbelievable news. Hearing it didn't carry the weight of seeing it. Sight is faster than sound — yes, he found himself thinking it precisely.

But — right then —

"—"

— it came.

Wind.

Another gust to clear the dust.

For a fraction Merea almost felt grateful for the convenient gust. He immediately revised.

— Wrong direction.

— Bad.

What surfaced was three dragons, exactly as forecast. And the moment they surfaced —

— he heard the air freeze behind him.

Not an actual sound. The phrase rose because the tension coming off the column was that vivid.

The full silhouettes had pushed the party's tension to its ceiling.

Possibly the dragons had been hiding in dust deliberately, to land the bigger impact at closer range. Even the riders who had braced earlier looked, on the new view, to be flinching.

Should he say something? Merea hesitated.

A seasoned commander would have lifted a battle cry in the moment to convert the tension into momentum. Merea had never led a unit. Words didn't come.

---

While he was running this in a tight slice of time, his senses caught something else.

— Left.

To his left, another column of dust. Live, still rising. This one wasn't hiding-dust; it was the inevitable wake of a force running at speed.

Easy to read through.

— Black armour…!

A cavalry force.

Light black armour, several Mūzeg banners up, riding hard, on a course that pointed straight at his column.

Unlike the three land dragons in front, the cavalry was on horses. The numbers were enough to chill the chest at one glance.

But, simultaneously, watching them, he caught something.

— They've only just arrived themselves…!

The lead black-armoured rider was still issuing commands. The rear of the column was slightly ragged. There was a faint flustered note over the whole thing.

Not ambush-in-place. This read as reached the spot now.

The fact that there were only three dragons in front of them, with no other forward presence, also said the other side wasn't fully consolidated.

— Dragons are the chock.

The plan, evidently: send the fast dragons forward to hold the column long enough for the cavalry to close.

— meaning: there was distance left between the column and the main cavalry.

If they could deal with the dragons, they could clear this position before the cavalry sealed the road.

"—"

He hadn't decided yet.

Two options.

Stop, intercept, exploit the opening, slip east.

Keep speed, plough straight east through.

Either way, securing the eastern retreat line was non-negotiable. Surrounded with no exit was death.

— …Intercept? Against that?

He cut option one almost immediately.

Alone, fine. But behind him —

He couldn't see how he was going to defend the flanks and rear of the entire party against that volume.

Save everyone. That was non-negotiable.

— Hands, eyes, feet. How many bodies would I need? — Plough through. Only choice.

He locked in.

He himself would shove the dragons standing on the eastern arc out of the way; the rest of the party would slip the gap. Once on the east side of the line, intercept on retreat.

A retreat-fire engagement at least had some chance of working.

To make the move clean, he wanted the dragons knocked off-balance early. He could plan that part live, on contact.

What mattered first —

— move the column.

— and that meant the riders behind him needed to hold composure when they hit speed-from-zero combat.

The look on their faces from a moment ago came back to him.

"…"

A battle cry would help.

He opened his mouth — and stopped.

— My voice — won't tremble, will it.

Merea kept the mouth half-open, frozen.

---

He carried the 〈Pleasure King's Vocal Cords〉 — Yurun Yura's. A naturally striking voice. Charm, hold-the-room.

He knew it. So he knew, in principle, now should be the moment to throw a battle cry. Voice-quality alone — he had what was needed.

— But —

— will the words come?

Truthfully: he wasn't sure.

Could he produce, syllable by syllable, with no slips, words that would carry across the column?

Could he choose the right words to begin with?

Even if he chose them, would the words actually pull the riders' fight-spirit up?

Several worries went through him at once. The half-open mouth stayed half-open.

Noel, beneath him, kept the steady forward pace, waiting for orders. They were closing on the three dragons.

Noel was waiting on his master's voice.

So, behind him, were the riders.

In a tiny window of seconds Merea ran the loop, and finally —

"—"

He shut his mouth.

---

Considered through. Decided not to cry.

— A misfire would feed back into the column as worse panic.

He recognised the risk clean. Clear-eyed about his own position. No vanity in the call. No grandstanding. Pure objective accounting.

— If I waver even slightly, the column wavers.

Why he was, in this group, in this role — early on it had puzzled him. By now, after the conversations on the road, the reason had partially crystallised. He had begun, gradually, to accept the role.

With his own version of resolve, his own version of responsibility.

Which is exactly why he could see, sharply, that a misfire from him would shake the rest.

So — he switched policy.

— Show it through action.

He wasn't experienced with battle cries. He was experienced with being the first to step in. He had stepped in already, on Lindholm. He knew, from inside, that that he could do without slipping.

So —

— go further forward than anyone.

Open the line. As shield, if nothing else. As sword, if it came to that.

Between the column and the enemy —

— stand.

---

So that they, even slightly, could move calmly.

---

He chose not to throw a cry.

He chose instead to be the body in front. He recognised, in a single flash, that that was the form of leadership he could actually deliver here.

— Plough.

"— Go!!"

The shout came.

It was an order.

The order's target was the column behind him.

The riders at the column took in the meaning of go immediately.

The line wasn't grand enough to rate as a battle cry. It didn't carry an easy-going note either.

"—"

To them, that line was the cry.

They understood, in the same moment, why Merea had said the line as he had — and what action he was about to take next. From the time they had spent with him, the read came naturally.

The tension in their chests converted, in the same beat, into resolve. The fight-spirit set.

And in the moment they understood his intent —

"Spell-formula deploying—"

Merea, on Noel's back, brought his hands together in a sharp clap.

Toward the three land dragons in front, in the moment of their unguarded approach, white lightning tore through the air.