With a thunderous roar, the greatsword skewered several men at once, while pounding hooves trampled bodies into the mud.
Nolan yanked hard on the reins, his gaze locked on the Cuckoo Knight charging at the very front, and drove straight through the mass of enemies.
The knight commander was lost in the frenzy of slaughter, hacking down Carian soldiers without restraint. Both hands clenched around his straight sword, he prepared to ram it mercilessly into his opponent's armor.
But the instant a sound reached his ears and he turned his head, two familiar severed heads snapped into view, shocking him into a daze. The gleaming sword tip rapidly filled his vision.
To have climbed to a mid-level position within the legion, he was no stranger to bloodshed.
He had ample battlefield experience and sharp instincts, yet this strike came too fast, too suddenly. There was no time to react at all.
He felt as if a sharp blade pierced the skin of his forehead, followed immediately by searing pain.
His skull burst apart, bright red blood spraying out like a fountain.
Blood-soaked knights surged forward without hesitation, plunging into the enemy ranks one after another.
Warhorses screamed as lances carved vicious arcs through the air, while spiked maces smashed down with dreadful force.
Some were flung backward by the sheer impact, their bodies tracing pitiful arcs through the air.
Others were impaled clean through by razor-sharp spearheads and collapsed to the ground in agony.
Still others had their bones crushed by heavy weapons, releasing shrill, desperate screams.
"Die!"
A sorcerer from the Haima Conspectus rushed forward in fury.
He instantly realized that this terrifying spark could not be allowed to keep burning. If it did, the consequences would be unthinkable.
He raised the Gavel of Haima high overhead and brought it crashing down, the immense force seeming capable of shattering everything in its path.
Seated behind the horse, Sellen had already prepared her staff. The glintstone at its tip blazed with brilliant light.
Shattering Crystal!
A massive block of crystal rapidly took shape at the staff's tip, gleaming with a cold, icy sheen. With a sharp motion of Sellen's hand, the crystal shattered instantly.
Countless tiny crystal spikes blasted outward like shotgun pellets, riddling the Haima sorcerer in the blink of an eye. His body was hurled backward, slamming heavily into the ground as blood spilled across the earth.
The Cuckoo soldiers behind him fared no better. The scattered crystal fragments swept through them like the reaper's scythe, mercilessly harvesting their lives.
The shards flew nearly ten meters before finally losing momentum. Within the fan-shaped area they covered, broken limbs lay strewn amid flowing blood. The scene was utterly horrific.
This was the power befitting a high-tier sorcerer: overwhelming magic unleashed in an instant.
No matter how many ordinary soldiers were thrown at her, when facing someone like Sellen, their only apparent purpose was to exhaust her magic.
But Nolan had no intention of allowing that. Even before charging into the battlefield, he had already given the witch teacher several Flasks of Cerulean Tears.
The soldiers stared at them in stunned silence, eyes filled with shock and terror, though it was not the magic itself that left them frozen.
By the flickering firelight, more and more of them had recognized those two grotesque yet all-too-familiar heads.
Many warriors still held their raised weapons in mid-charge, as if time itself had stopped. The atmosphere grew heavy, suffocatingly still.
Some swallowed unconsciously, as a deep, nameless fear spread through the silence like an unseen shadow.
"Forward! Get moving! No retreat. Keep killing!"
Kercius keenly sensed the subtle shift in morale and shouted in alarm, his voice sharp with urgency.
He could not understand how his vice commander, together with a deputy professor from the Haima Conspectus, could possibly be losing.
But there could be no withdrawal now. If even one man turned back, everything would collapse.
Yet in the very next moment, that fearsome knight charged again.
In his left hand, he gripped a heavy Claymore. In his right, he raised a staff that shimmered with an uncanny light.
Two blades of light swept through the air in brilliant arcs, cleanly severing the heads of two Cuckoo commanders.
Blood sprayed like fountains. The horrific sight jolted everyone present into sudden awareness.
Those who had been drowning in chaos and terror felt as though a new force had been driven into their bodies.
More and more soldiers cast aside fear and hesitation, clutching their weapons and rushing forward without restraint, throwing themselves into the brutal slaughter.
The Cuckoos could barely maintain their composure, but the militia and the magic apprentices were another matter entirely. The former had been driven onto the battlefield against their will, while the latter had recognized the identity of the Haima deputy professor.
The contrast between motion and stillness was like a sharp blade cutting through the scene, splitting it into two utterly different halves. The sense of rupture was so intense it felt as though it might tear their hearts apart.
In that brief instant, some militia seemed to lose all courage, dropping their weapons where they stood.
Even certain magic apprentices, usually so confident and composed during their studies, turned and fled like startled rabbits.
They had fought through the entire night, bodies and minds pushed to their limits. With the deaths of the two champions they relied on, the weight pressing on them finally became unbearable.
Caria remained unstoppable. The glorious conquests beneath the full moon of the past now seemed anything but a hollow fairy tale.
Panic flooded their minds, overwhelming all reason. Their thoughts dissolved into chaos, leaving them unable to even grasp the situation unfolding before them.
But no one truly cared. They were Carian subjects who only wished to live quietly and safely. If not forced at blade-point, who would willingly fight a war for the Cuckoos?
In truth, the few dozen riders led by Nolan could never reverse the battle. The enemy numbered in the thousands. By sheer weight of numbers alone, they could crush the Carian army like a mountain of piled stone.
The formation collapsed in an instant. Weapons clattered to the ground, scattering in all directions.
The troops still outside the city likely had no idea what had happened. Seeing their comrades ahead fleeing outward, fear took hold, and they simply ran as well.
Once morale breaks like a bursting dam, this is what follows.
Without a warrior capable of standing alone against a thousand, how does an outnumbered army ever win?
By personal valor?
No. Setting aside timing and terrain, it comes down to momentum, to one unbroken breath of will.
When that momentum fails and that spirit scatters, numbers mean nothing. Even a massive army becomes lambs waiting for slaughter.
If, at such a critical moment, a commander with true unifying strength had appeared, there might still have been a slim chance to turn the tide.
Kercius was clearly not such a leader. He did not command through personal charisma.
Nolan glanced sideways and saw Raziel drive back several knights with a single sword strike, while Bols finally broke free from the suffocating press of bodies.
Both snapped back to themselves and roared out attack orders. Adrenaline surged through them, and despite the prolonged fighting, exhaustion seemed to vanish entirely.