The streets of New Rosa City thudded with the rhythm of boots and shouted orders. Snow lay in brittle sheets across the cobblestones, half-shoveled, half-trampled to slush beneath the hurried steps of the Kylian Blue Army. Their breath rose in clouds of white as 4,000 soldiers moved with practiced urgency through the city's narrow districts, transforming the once-peaceful urban sprawl into a fortress of grit and frost.
Above them, banners bearing the Blue Banner of Kyla snapped in the sharp winter wind, mounted on the upper ramparts of the inner wall. The scent of oil, steel, and gunpowder hung heavy in the frozen air, laced now with smoke from hundreds of fire pits and coal stoves used to keep hands and weapons from freezing solid.
The outer perimeter—farmland and low structures stretching beyond the stone wall—had already been scorched and cleared by controlled fires a week earlier. What remained now was blackened earth and skeletal trees beneath a thin crust of snow. Nothing was to be left for the Hylians to use.
Teams of sappers and engineers, scarves wrapped over red faces, worked in squads of twelve with numb hands and frost-bitten fingers. Ice formed on their tools as they dug zigzagged trenches and laid down angled firing pits at key choke points along the frozen roads leading into the city. Sandbag barricades were stiff with frost. Salvaged timber groaned in the cold as it was hammered into place. Rail spikes and broken furniture were turned into makeshift chevaux-de-frise—spiked anti-cavalry barriers that gleamed with frost, lining icy boulevards like teeth.
Dozens of carts arrived hourly, their wheels creaking, axles iced over, bearing crates of iron nails, coiled barbed wire, and the occasional ration of black powder from the rear depot.
Every second block was converted into a fallback zone. Bricked-up windows became gun ports. Alleyways were narrowed into kill corridors with stacked debris. Civilians—those who refused to flee—watched in bitter silence as their homes were half-fortified, half-dismantled. Wood was taken for fuel. Furniture repurposed as barricade filler. Water buckets froze solid between uses.
On the northern ridge overlooking the main Hylian approach, a row of deep gun emplacements had been carved into the frozen hillside with pickaxes and fire-burned ground. The Blue Army's artillery—eighty pieces in total—stood silent and menacing, their barrels swaddled in canvas wraps to stave off the frost.
Sixty were smoothbore cannons, as most of the new howitzers were sent to the 1st battalion up north. They were arranged in batteries of five, each served by five-man crews bundled in wool coats and fur-lined gloves. Twenty howitzers stood farther back, their high-arcing barrels trained toward distant snow-covered valleys, where the Hylians would march.
Gunnery crews moved with mechanical efficiency, despite the biting cold. They calibrated angles with frost-covered instruments, logged distances with trembling fingers, and stacked ammunition in careful, canvas-wrapped rows. Shouts of "Elevation three degrees—lock it!" echoed in the freezing air. Officers barked firing patterns over steaming mugs of chicory tea, marking Hylian movements on sand-filled crates turned makeshift tactical boards.
The Kylian infantry carried bolt-action rifles, most of them worn but cared for like sacred tools. Their barrels were kept heated near fire barrels to prevent freezing. Rifle squads practiced snap-fire drills from behind icy barricades. Room-clearing squads rehearsed movement through snow-covered courtyards and frozen taverns, some turned into kill houses.
Sharpshooters—wearing cloaks bleached white with ash and snow—took up roosts in the cathedral bell tower and along merchant rooftops, their scopes fogged and cleared repeatedly as they scanned the tree lines for movement.
Squads rotated through frost-bitten shifts: one hour of drill, one hour of fortification duty, one hour inside warming halls before returning to the line.
At the southern gate, a lone figure approached through the swirling curtain of snow.
She moved steadily up the road, boots crunching over frostbitten gravel, her uniform stiff with frozen black blood on the right side. Her hair partly shadowed her face, but the sentries recognized her silhouette long before she stepped through the wooden gate.
"Her Majesty?" one whispered, half in disbelief.
She said nothing at first, only nodded once. Her right arm was bound in a makeshift sling—a crude splint clung to her arm—no more than a snapped tree branch lashed into place with twisted bits of bark and frozen vine. Her hand was half-blackened with bruises, swollen and immobile. The sleeve of her coat hung empty and stiff, a tattered banner of its own. Snow clung to her boots and leggings.
Word spread faster than the wind. By the time she crossed the first checkpoint into the inner ward, officers were clearing the streets ahead of her.
She passed a squad of riflemen drilling behind overturned carts and frost-covered crates. They cleared the streets ahead of her. Troops paused mid-shift. Artillery crews fell silent. A young captain stumbled in the snow trying to bow too quickly, his voice cracking as he said, "Your Majesty!"
She didn't speak until she reached the courtyard of the command keep, where a cluster of officers stood near a brazier. One of them turned sharply at her approach and stared.
At the courtyard of the command keep, several senior officers stood near a brazier, warming gloved hands over a dim flame. One of them turned sharply and froze at the sight of her.
"Your Majesty," he said at once, bowing low. "We—we thought you were still in the mountains."
"I was," Kylia replied, her voice gravel-rough. "Where is Valord Rosa?"
"She's in the war room, Majesty. Shall I send a message—?"
"No need." Kylia felt that only by discussing with Rosa in person could she get the grasp of the current situation. The guard at the stairwell saluted and stepped aside without being told.
Inside the keep, the warmth hit her like an afterthought. The corridors were close and dim, lit by iron lanterns and stinking faintly of coal smoke and sweat. Tactical reports lined the walls. Muddy bootprints stained the red stone floors.
Officers stepped aside without a word as she passed. One knelt on instinct.
At the war room door, she paused only long enough to push it open with her left shoulder.
Valord Rosa stood over a wide strategy table, flanked by Kylian artillery commanders, Rosian captains and a Rosian messenger mid-sentence. She looked up as the door opened, and for a moment her voice caught in her throat.
Kylia entered without announcement. Her presence was all the introduction needed.
Silence fell across the chamber.
"I…oh, about the arm," Kylia changed her words as she saw the expression on Rosa's face becoming richer.
Rosa stared—at the sling, the bruises, the filthy uniform. Her brows knit in a rare flash of emotion.
One of the Rosian captains began to kneel instinctively. Rosa raised her hand sharply. "Leave us."
The both Kylian and Rosian officers exited immediately, not daring to disobey either Valor.
The door clicked shut.
Rosa crossed the room slowly. Her eyes didn't leave the blood-stiffened sling or the bruises trailing down Kylia's neck.
"What happened?" she asked while crossing her arms.
"Lynel ambush," Kylia replied. "So, well, I was flying over the New Rosian Mountains, then it shot me out of the sky. We had a battle, which I lost and it stole both my horn, my sword, oh and shattered my arm too. So then-."
"You splinted your arm with branches," Rosa interrupted flatly.
"I didn't have many options. It worked."
"You're half-frozen. You don't even have a weapon."
Kylia's expression barely changed. "I can still fight. I learned more in those months than I ever did since I left Viskov to establish Kylia! If not for my arm, my strength may have actually improved over the last couple of months.
Rosa folded her arms. Her voice turned firm. "You're strong, but strength isn't everything. If you don't treat the next battle seriously, you'll die."
She wasn't exaggerating.
Rosa knew exactly how dangerous the Hylians were. She heard the Battle of Pavo clearly. Their father, Vladislav, had fought there with three other Valors. Even with four of them together, he was still nearly killed.
This time, it would be just her and Kylia on the front line. While the combined Blue army and Rosian army outnumbers the split Hylian army, the Hylian elite are still very dangerous.
Even worse, Kylia now does not have a weapon. In Rosa's opinion, Kylia without a weapon may be even worse than her. The only ability that Rosa had seen from Kylia is her 100 meter long sword slash. A normal valor without a weapon cannot use their supersonic speed to kill their enemies.
A Valor trying to punch thugs at that speed? I'm afraid their hands will be blown off!
"I'll have a blade brought to you," Rosa said, turning back to the map.
"I don't need one," Kylia replied.
Rosa looked up. "You're going to fight barehanded?"
"I have other ways."
Rosa hesitated, clearly unconvinced. But she nodded. "Fine. Just don't die."
Kylia turned toward the door. "I won't."