The silence before the storm was deafening. Twenty thousand Falcon soldiers stood frozen, the once-proud thunder of their march now reduced to trembling breaths.
Opposite them, the black tide of twenty-five thousand death monsters waited in perfect stillness.
No clamor, no snarling, just silence, the kind that gripped the marrow of men's bones and whispered of inevitability.
For a heartbeat, the battlefield was frozen in time, two oceans staring across the shore at one another.
Then Duke Albrecht raised his sword. "Falcons! Forward!"
The words were steel and fire, ripping through the army like lightning.
Even after the initial intimidation, the duke's army recovered its bearings under the duke's influence.
Trumpets blared, war drums thundered, and the soldiers roared their defiance. Shields locked, spears leveled, cavalry surged to the flanks.
