CHAPTER 121: THE BATTLE BEGINS

The moment those iron gates finished opening, the plaza imploded into chaos with all the elegance of a tavern brawl thrown into an alchemical explosion.

The Man in White’s neat little parade turned into a storm, his orderly forces surging forward like floodwaters, clashing headlong into the Sun Cult’s bleach-robed zealots. Steel screeched, voices howled, and blood instantly decided it had been waiting far too long to make its entrance onto the cobblestones.

Somewhere amid that opening cacophony, the Lady of Fang’s dreary recruits, pale and listless, stumbled in with all the energy of corpses trying to remember what muscles were for, and promptly became battering rams in the Man in White’s favor.

Now, most men in my position would have chosen the noble tactic of hiding behind the nearest overturned cart and reconsidering all their life choices.

I, on the other hand, am blessed with an almost terminal case of hubris and an unfortunate fondness for theatrics.

So when the Man in White raised his pale hand and the front lines locked together like the jaws of some great beast, I found myself bolting to the right along the plaza perimeter, spear angled across my shoulder, with Salem matching my stride.

Rodrick barked something about formations and responsibility before dragging Dunny to the left like an exasperated father corralling his idiot son.

The naked knight ignored any and all signs of strategy, sense, or even basic survival instinct, charging dead center, swinging his fists as though he were some obscene champion of raw human anatomy.

And then there was Nara, ears flat against his skull, running after the knight with his dagger in one hand, summoning a squeaking battalion of rabbits that poured out across the battlefield like a tide of fur and floppy ears.

The whole spectacle had a kind of deranged beauty to it—knights and cultists hacking one another to pieces while trying desperately not to trip over a stampede of carnivorous bunnies.

But me? I didn’t have time to admire the fine art of war as comedy.

A cultist in golden trim lunged at me with a curved blade, shouting something about the Southern Sun’s divine light, and I promptly cut his sermon short with a thrust of my spear straight through his ribs.

The weapon slid in with a wet crunch, hot blood slicking my hands, and I pivoted immediately to use his collapsing body as a shield against the second cultist charging in behind him.

The man’s blade glanced off his own comrade’s falling corpse, and in that heartbeat of hesitation, I spun the spear shaft low, sweeping his legs out from under him. He landed flat on his back with a gasp, and before he could recover, my pen was in my hand, silver glinting, stabbing three quick marks across his exposed throat like I was signing a very urgent letter.

The ink sizzled, glowing faintly against his skin, and then I whispered the words, "Velvet Command."

The cultist stiffened, his eyes dilating as though the divine sun had been replaced with a new god entirely—me

.

I didn’t pause to savor it. Another zealot appeared, and my freshly converted femboy sprang up to intercept him with all the loyal enthusiasm of a puppy finally given a bone.

Blade clashed on blade, the cultist’s former comrade fighting for me now, and I felt that familiar rush—that awful, intoxicating thrill of bending the chaos to my will.

Salem fought beside me, though "fought" seems too delicate a word for what he did.

He was carnage in motion. Every step he took split the air, every swing of his twin swords drew screams and arterial spray. He didn’t dance through the battlefield—he stormed it, hacking down figures with the grim inevitability of a scythe cutting wheat.

For a moment I thought him untouchable, until I caught sight of the shimmer of power from across the plaza.

Three mages stood in a tight knot—a central psychic, face twisted in concentration, flanked by two others who pulsed with energy, amplifying his ability like sinister batteries.

I realized what they were doing an instant before it happened, my stomach dropping as the psychic raised both hands and a nearby stone pillar tore itself from the ground with a deafening crack. The pillar hovered, pulsing with raw power, before being hurled straight toward Salem with all the subtlety of a mountain deciding to take a stroll.

"Salem!" I screamed, my throat raw with panic, mind flashing through every possible outcome, all of them ending in the unpleasant sound of my comrade being reduced to a handsome stain in the dirt.

But Salem didn’t flinch. He didn’t even blink.

He drew one sword back, muscles coiling, and with a single, feral snarl, he cleaved downward, splitting the pillar clean in two. Both halves thundered past him, shattering against the cobbles in explosions of debris.

Salem didn’t stop there.

He hurled that same sword across the battlefield, a streak of silver that buried itself into the chest of the psychic mage with a sound like a butcher’s cleaver finding purchase in meat.

The amplifiers shrieked in panic, their focus broken, but it was too late. Salem was already upon them in a flash of inhuman speed, dislodging his sword from the man’s chest with one savage twist before whirling in a blur of steel and severing their throats with the precision of a master executioner.

I barely had time to be impressed.

In fact, I had precisely half a second before an arrow came whistling down from a rooftop, missing my head by a hair’s breadth and embedding itself in the overturned stall behind me.

"Saints damn it!" I cursed, scrambling for cover as another volley rained down, thunk-thunk-thunk into the wood.

I dragged myself behind the shelter of the market stand, my loyal new converts tumbling in beside me with the grace of a cheerleading squad that had accidentally joined a battlefield.

I risked a peek around the corner, breath held. On the far side of the plaza, I caught sight of Rodrick’s familiar form, blade flashing in tight, disciplined arcs, holding a defensive line with soldierly calm.

Dunny crouched behind him, chanting with that quiet, frantic intensity only a man who knows he is profoundly squishy can muster.

Thin barriers flickered into life at odd angles, catching arrows and deflecting sword strikes just enough to keep Rodrick alive. Relief slumped my shoulders. For now, at least, they were managing.

I turned back to my huddled little femboy squad, all wide eyes and eager loyalty, and felt the stirrings of what could only be described as a very stupid idea. I pointed at one of them, a slim lad with trembling hands and a sun-embroidered cloak. "You. Take your cloak off, now."

He blinked, then hurriedly stripped it from his shoulders, offering it up like a sacred relic. I snatched it, tossing my own battered coat at him in exchange. "There. You get the coat, I get the cloak. We swap, we confuse the enemy. You look like me, I look like you. Classic battlefield misdirection. Works every time."

He nodded solemnly, clearly convinced that I was a tactical genius rather than a desperate idiot playing dress-up in the middle of a warzone.

I draped the cloak around my shoulders, the fabric heavy with sweat and sun-prayers, and tried not to gag at the smell. Still, it made me look just enough like a cultist to pass in a crowd, and sometimes survival is just committing to the bit harder than your enemy expects.

"Alright," I said, hefting my spear, "let’s make ourselves useful before someone realizes the idiot with the pen is hiding behind the fruit crates."

And with that, the femboy in my coat darted from cover with all the subtlety of a startled rabbit, arms pumping, hair flying.

Predictably, the rooftop sniper zeroed in at once.

The snap of a crossbow string cut through the battle din, the bolt whistling down and burying itself in the poor boy’s shoulder before he could even scream.

My heart clenched—but only for a heartbeat, because his distraction was precisely what I needed. The sniper leaned out, preparing to reload, but I was already in motion.

I bolted from my cover, spear gripped tight, every nerve in my arm thrumming with familiar power, four incarnic enhancements layered one atop the other.

The world slowed as I locked eyes with the man above—he saw me, and perhaps he thought me ally in his matching colors.

That would be his last mistake.

I hurled the spear. It left my hand like a thunderclap, streaking through the air with all the force of divine retribution disguised as spite.

It punched through the man’s chest before his fingers could so much as brush the quarrel he meant to reload, bursting from his back in a spray of blood. His body crumpled against the ledge, arms twitching, before collapsing lifelessly onto the tiles below.

The sound was lost in the roar of battle, but I felt it. Saints, I felt it. For once, I’d done something impressive on purpose, and no one was around to clap. Typical.

I dashed forward, snatching another spear from a nearby corpse as I went, and slipped into the roiling mass of figures.

The cloak worked better than expected; in the chaos, no one questioned me as I pressed close, too busy hacking at Salem’s storm or Dunny’s barriers to notice one cloaked figure weaving like a shadow among them.

My pen kissed flesh again and again, little strokes of ink across arms, necks, backs.

Men stiffened, gasped, and fell in step behind me, confusion etched across their faces until my command whispered its truth into their marrow. They were mine now—lost lambs turned into obedient femboys, eager to serve their new shepherd.

All the while, my eyes never strayed far from the heart of the storm.

The Man in White hadn’t even dirtied his hands yet.

He stood with an infuriating stillness at the plaza’s edge, his hidden gaze tracking the battle like a scholar observing ants in a glass box.

His hand lifted occasionally, a flicker of command sending his faction to flank, tighten, or strike with surgical precision. Calm as the wind, unmoved by the carnage he himself orchestrated.

And opposite him, blazing through the battlefield like a mad sun, was the High Priest. His smile never faltered, wide and childlike, even as he swung his gaudy sword of gold and white, each stroke a flare of burning light.

Every few seconds he erupted in a flash so blinding my vision went white, and I had to turn away, blinking furiously.

When my sight returned, the ground was always littered with more corpses—his own followers gladly trampled to death in his wake, ours bisected in radiant arcs.

I barely had time to process such an ability before another sound cut through the chaos: a whistle.

It was Fitch, strolling through the plaza as though he owned the place, hands behind his back, lips pursed while his stitched monster swung his maul with terrifying brutality.

Every man foolish enough to approach was reduced to pulp, flesh and bone splattering like crushed fruit. Fitch didn’t even glance at them, too absorbed in his little tune, as though the carnage was just background noise to his melody.

By now, my retinue had grown.

A handful at first, then a dozen, each marked with my pen, trailing at my heels like well-trained hounds. They wore the robes of the cult, bore the marks of their old faith, but their steps were mine, their blades were mine. A parody of loyalty, saints help me, but loyalty all the same.

I pushed toward the right, keeping low until I burst back into Salem’s orbit.

He stood blood-soaked, his chest heaving with something that looked far too much like delight. His eyes flicked to me, narrowing at the army of cloaked cultists marching in my shadow, then back to my smirk.

"I’ve decided," I said breathlessly, "that it’s time we made a push for the center. Straight through. Cut out the heart before it cuts us."

His lips curled in a grin sharp as his blades. "Good. I was getting bored."

Of course he was.

He stepped past me, swords raised, posture the very embodiment of violence given form. "I’ll lead. You follow. Keep your... flock in order."

I nodded, wiping sweat and grime from my brow, trying to ignore the way my stomach twisted in anticipation.

This was either the bravest idea I’d ever had—or the last. But with Salem at the tip and my ridiculous little army at my back, perhaps we actually had a chance of carving a path through the madness.

And so we plunged, shoulder to shoulder, deeper into the fray.