"Hey… have you heard?" Bertho's voice sounded like dry leaves scraping across stone, brittle and barely holding together. "They say the goblin portal has been spotted at the tip of the V formation. Some officers are saying this might end today." He tried to inject a sliver of enthusiasm into his tone, but it collapsed halfway through, as if even hope required energy he no longer possessed. He stood beside Arin on the battered rise that passed for a defensive platform, both of them staring out over a battlefield that had long since stopped resembling anything human.
Arin didn't answer immediately. His bow moved on instinct, fingers drawing and releasing without thought, sending arrow after arrow into the shifting mass below. "Good," he muttered at last, his voice hollow and distant. "Let it end." His eyes were sunken, ringed with shadows so deep they seemed carved into his skull. "This is worse than the fortress… at least there we knew when the fighting would stop."
The past five days had erased whatever remained of normal rhythm. Sleep had become a rumor, rest a distant memory. When the goblins had gone mad after their emperor's death, something fundamental had shifted. They had not simply charged blindly. That would have been easier to handle. Instead, they had become a horrifying mix of chaos and coordination, as if madness had sharpened rather than dulled their instincts. Some threw themselves forward without fear, while others directed the tides with cold precision.
"The first day wasn't so bad," Bertho said, forcing himself to keep talking just to stay conscious. "We even got a full eight hours. I remember thinking it might be manageable." He let out a dry laugh that had no humor in it. "Funny how fast that illusion shattered."
Arin nodded faintly, though he wasn't sure he truly remembered that first day anymore. Everything blurred together into a continuous stretch of noise and blood. "After that, it all collapsed. One hour fighting, four hours resting… then less. Then nothing." He paused as another arrow left his bow. "I don't think I've actually slept since day two."
Below them, the battlefield churned like a living sea. Goblins surged forward in endless waves, their bodies piling upon one another, forming grotesque hills that shifted and collapsed under their own weight. The smell alone was enough to break most people, a suffocating mixture of decay, blood, and something far worse that clung to the air like a curse.
Bertho leaned heavily on his bow, his grip trembling despite himself. "They're different now. Before, they felt… manageable. Predictable." He swallowed, his throat dry. "Now they don't care. Not about death, not about pain. And the worst part is… some of them are still thinking while they do it."
Arin's lips pressed into a thin line. "Yeah. That's what makes it dangerous. Mindless enemies are easy. Directed madness isn't." He glanced briefly at his status window, the faint glow flickering in his vision. "And we're running out of time."
His gaze lingered on the numbers longer than he wanted to admit. HP: 50 / 100 (130). The bracketed number pulsed faintly, an unsettling reminder of something not quite right. "I'm draining my health now," he said quietly. "No stamina left. Mana's been gone for hours."
Bertho gave a tired smile that didn't reach his eyes. "Same here. My mana just hit zero." He shifted his stance, barely managing to stay upright. "Looks like your fancy skills finally caught up to you."
Arin huffed weakly. "Yeah. Guess they did." He loosed another arrow, watching it disappear into the swarm. "Doesn't matter. We just need to hold on until they reach the portal."
Around them, the line of soldiers moved like machines. There was no chatter, no shouting, no emotion. Just motion. Swing, stab, release, repeat. Humanity had been worn away, stripped down to the bare minimum required to keep fighting. Even the screams had dulled, replaced by a low, constant hum of violence that never stopped.
"They don't even look alive anymore," Bertho murmured, glancing at the surrounding troops. "Just… moving."
Arin followed his gaze. He knew what Bertho meant. The light that once burned in the soldiers' eyes was gone. In its place was something empty, something mechanical. "We've all seen too much," he said simply.
Five days of nonstop fighting had carved deep scars into everyone present. Soldiers had watched their comrades torn apart, had felt blades sink into flesh again and again, had experienced death itself only to be dragged back into the line. Counting kills had stopped early on. There was no point anymore. The numbers had lost all meaning.
"But that's not even the worst part," Bertho said after a moment. "It's the waiting. The knowing." His grip tightened on his bow. "Before, death felt… distant. Like something that happened to someone else."
Arin nodded slowly. "Yeah. Now it's just… next."
The mixing of forces had shattered the illusion of safety. Veterans and newcomers stood side by side, distinctions erased. There were no longer separate lines for those who had died before and those who had not. Everyone shared the same space, the same danger, the same inevitable outcome.
"And when the veterans go down…" Bertho continued, his voice lowering. "It hits differently."
Arin's expression darkened. He had seen it happen too many times. Fighters who had survived countless battles suddenly overwhelmed, their final moments erupting into desperate, violent frenzy. They fought like cornered beasts, taking as many enemies with them as possible, as if trying to carve out a path back to life through sheer force.
"Some of them go berserk," Arin said quietly. "Not because they want to… but because they realize what's coming."
Bertho let out a long breath. "And the rest of us just keep moving."
Silence fell between them for a while, broken only by the steady rhythm of combat. The battlefield stretched endlessly in both directions, a five-hundred-kilometer line of exhaustion and desperation. Somewhere ahead, beyond the chaos, the portal waited. The end of it all.
"They're saying we've only got about two billion battle-ready soldiers left," Arin said eventually. "And half of those wouldn't even be considered fit for combat before all this."
Bertho scoffed weakly. "Yeah. I've seen worse-looking corpses stand up and fight."
Arin managed a faint, humorless smile. "Same." He adjusted his grip on the bow. "And the line compression isn't helping either."
"Don't remind me," Bertho groaned. "Archers on the front line, mages scrambling to hold gaps… it's a mess."
Breaks in the line were becoming more frequent. Whenever one appeared, goblins poured through like water through a crack, forcing desperate counterattacks to seal the breach. It was chaos layered on top of exhaustion, and somehow they were still holding.
"I do wonder how your brother gets his information," Bertho said after a moment, trying to distract himself. "Stuff like this should be classified, right?"
Arin shrugged faintly. "Probably. But he's always had his ways." He loosed another arrow. "Besides… maybe they want us to know. Gives people something to focus on."
"Better than listening to this," Bertho muttered, gesturing vaguely at the flood of notifications filling his vision. "I swear, if there was a mute button…"
Arin let out a quiet chuckle. "Yeah. That'd be nice."
For a brief moment, the two of them simply stood there, watching the battlefield. The endless tide, the flickering spells, the rain of arrows. Somewhere out there, the end was waiting. Not just for the goblins, but for them as well.
"I wonder how close they are to the portal," Arin said softly, almost to himself.
Bertho didn't answer right away. He followed Arin's gaze, staring into the distance where the fighting seemed just a little brighter, a little more intense. "Close enough," he said at last. "They have to be."
Arin nodded, his eyes heavy. In his mind, he could already picture it. The moment the portal fell. The silence that would follow. The chance to finally rest, to close his eyes without fear of never opening them again.
For now, though, there was only the present. The next arrow. The next breath. The next step.
And so they kept fighting, not because they had strength left, but because stopping was no longer an option.