Nobody spoke a word as they witnessed the silent anger of the Light Faction's most powerful being. They understood just how much the matters related to demons affected her, especially now that she was one of less than a dozen people that had experienced and survived the horrible war during the Heroic Era. From what they knew, her entire family, along with close to everyone she ever knew, perished by the hands of the demons. While they were all too young to understand such deep anguish, at least compared to Norani, they knew better than to speak while she thought of such painful things. If not for the fact that he had to show his memories, Luca would have changed scenes already.
Then came Luca's recollections of the first wave of demons. Within only a few days, everyone in Valour City learned that any cities outside of the capital had been crushed. This meant that the only safe haven in the kingdom was the capital alone. As most people grieved for the loss of their kin and friends outside of the capital, so also did they fear the coming tide. The three remaining royal family members each made a vow to their ancestor's statues in their alcoves in the palace gallery before giving each other one last hug. The three had always been close, so parting was hard for them, but they put their duties first. The Third Prince, the eldest of the present trio, took some of the old armour and weapons from the palace treasury, as did the other two, before sealing it off. He then made his way to the outer walls, where he began using his charisma, strength and honour to inspire and prepare the soldiers and those who decided to remain behind after the Second Princess announced that she would activate the escape array for everyone to evacuate. Those that stayed willingly decided to take up arms, if only to make sure that their remaining loved ones evacuated in time.
The palace itself, where the soon-to-be evacuees gathered quickly following the announcement from the three royal family members, was defended by the Fourth Prince, who used every possible option available to protect it. If the palace's defensive walls fell, then any unlucky people still inside would have to endure the destructive demonic beings. While the outer walls had most of the defenders in the city, the palace itself had more of the most powerful people on hand. This was decided by the three royals, who divided their duties between them. The Third Prince chose to be the frontline commander with the majority of their forces, aiming to drag out the siege as long as possible. The Fourth Prince took station as the second line of defence, bearing the same goal as his elder brother in buying time for the evacuation. The Second Princess, as the only mage of the three, had to take point as the array activator, though she adamantly stated that she would not leave while any evacuees remained behind. As such, she was essentially the final rearguard of the plan, the last line of defence.
Luca experienced the siege firsthand due to him being in the capital at the time. In fact, most players had received a major notification to return to their respective capitals for an enormous event. The event in question was the first wave, and it came with main storyline quests, something that hadn't appeared in the fifteen years within the game so far. The very first quest was to defend the capital walls for as long as possible, and any deaths would be locked until the event ended, so if one died, they had to be a spectator for the rest of the event. This was a unique event, as locked death scenarios were generally impossible to do. Only an event such as this, where an endlessly respawning group of players would break the story of the game, could satisfy the requirements for a quest concept that most players would hate. They did still leave resurrection/resuscitation spells active, but with one-time-per-person limitations.
Due to his naturally weak talent, Luca was only able to be helpful by using his calculative abilities to assist the Third Prince and his forces with defending the city. Despite the endless assault, he made sure that at least some people were battle-ready, along with having several mages destroy areas of the city to create enormous obstacles and traps in the event of a breach. After three days of constant battle, or in Luca's case three days of constant calculation, without any time to rest, the frontline defence finally crumbled starting from the westernmost section of the walls. At this point, the Third Prince had already taken to battle, and he rallied every last man with one final cry to fight for their family's survival and lightened the mood partially by challenging every fighter to bring three demonic beings down before death took them. From this moment forward, everyone took count of their kills, with some even competing until the end. The Third Prince sent Luca to help his younger brother, and the last he saw of the heroic royal was from the palace walls, standing where a chokepoint had been made by self-sacrificial mages using destruction to guide their foes towards the only accessible part of the inner walls, as the last man standing. Despite his fatigue and anemia, the Third Prince never took a step back, cutting down foe after foe for forty-five more minutes. With a triumphant, insane laugh, he detonated the magical explosive he'd prepared for his final stand, exploding in a literal blaze of glory that wiped out a third of the foes that had already entered the capital.
Despite grieving for his elder brother, the Fourth Prince did not falter, using the defensive fortifications, obstacles and traps he had his people construct within the three days that the Third Prince had fought to provide. Though he provided a day less than his brother for the evacuation, he had made sure to turn the interior of the palace into a maze of deadly proportions in the process. The absurd amount of effort put into the rushed plans, which even included the statues, which were in fact golems, from the galleries had been activated to assist with defence, still managed to earn another half-day of time for the Second Princess.