“There are many lessons we’ll have to learn from this battle,” the Jaguar seriously intoned to the assembled host.  “Chief among them, I believe, is that our old ways of fighting with arks have changed, thanks to our new weapons and the maneuverability of our arks.”

As he spoke, he manipulated the projection enchantment in Leon’s simple throne room, which displayed several simple shapes fighting each other, with those colored blue representing friendly arks, and red the hostile arks.  After his manipulations, the arks separated, increasing the distance between them by several times than it had been before.

“The first is range,” the Jaguar continued.  “Our weapons have vastly increased our effective range.  We shouldn’t seek to close with our enemies until our other options have been exhausted.  It is my firm belief that our losses would’ve been cut in half had we not sought to engage in relatively close quarters as we did.”

Split-Knuckle, the Lion elder, growled.  He’d sustained a nasty wound during the battle, having lost his right hand and had much of the rest of his arm badly mangled, but Clear Day had fixed what he could.  It would take some time, but the hand would also be restored, though for the moment, he was using a prosthetic designed by Nestor.

“We must be ready to engage our enemies at any distance!” he declared.

“No one here will disagree,” the Jaguar stated, only sounding a little annoyed at the interruption.  “All I will say is that we failed to properly account for the increase in capabilities our new kit affords us.”

Marcus leaned forward.  “Our fighters and Ulta suits have… limited range, and our flying war beasts need cover as well.  If we keep our larger arks miles further back, then how do you propose we use these other weapon systems?”

“With more judicious application,” the Jaguar responded.  He waved to Lana, who stepped forward to offer further explanation.

“Our losses among the fighter and Ulta corps were light relative to losses of other systems.  It seems they’re more survivable than what we’ve given them credit for, especially after evaluating the damage done to the remaining platforms.  Right now, we’re considering using them in a more general screening role than as direct attack systems—at least, when it comes to ark-on-ark battles.  For ground support roles, they can be deployed further away from their bases.”

Leon sighed as the meeting continued.  About a week had passed since the pirates had attacked his Kingdom’s colony, and the majority of the wounded had been healed.  The battle had been studied, and he’d assembled this council to allow the Jaguar to share his findings.  So far, he wasn’t opposed to the proposed changes, though as he looked around the room, he could tell that the more warlike among the council were less impressed by the Jaguar’s proposal to increase engagement distances.

Sensing the beginnings of an argument, he flexed his aura subtly enough to not physically affect anyone, but still more than noticeable enough to silence the room.

“How many of our downed arks can be repaired?” he asked, shifting the topic away from the proposed change in tactics.

Lana reported, “Shadow Above the Ocean and Lion’s Fang will fly again.”  Leon knew that she was referring to the downed carrier and destroyer.  Both arks were still relatively intact compared to the rest of their losses, and the possibility of repairing them was never in question, as far as he was concerned.  “The rest of our arks,” Lana continued, “we’re still evaluating, but our initial estimates are that one heavy cruiser and one destroyer may be repaired.  The rest of our losses will have to be scrapped.”

Leon frowned.  That meant one heavy cruiser, two destroyers, and one frigate were lost permanently, and that was taking the possibility of repairing the rest for granted.

“All of our downed Ulta suits and fighters will have to be scrapped, too,” Lana concluded.

There was some whispering amongst the gathered group, though Leon noticed Seeker-of-Mountain-Springs, the captain of Raindrop, the first frigate to be engaged by the pirates and chased almost back to Artorion, was quiet.  The man had managed to evacuate most of his crew before his ark was shot down, though he had lost an arm and an eye in his own evacuation.  Despite these injuries, which had largely been healed by Clear Day as much as possible, he didn’t seem that vindictive.

Leon made a mental note to give the man a promotion.  The mettle he was displaying was worthy of more than just a frigate.

“And what of our remaining prisoners?” Leon asked as he turned to Ustaloch, the Spider elder.  “Have their interrogations yielded anything?”

The pale, black-haired man gave Leon a thin-lipped grin.  “Though we have… few prisoners, their minds have been thoroughly plundered.  We have identified the ark that these pirates managed to find: Wind Under Wing.”

Leon’s heart sank, though he couldn’t tell if it was out of relief or disappointment.  Wind Under Wing was one of the two lost frigates from their jump, not the destroyer that Alcander’s son Elias had been on.

Ustaloch continued, “We have also confirmed that there were no survivors among the crew.  These pirates disposed of the frigate’s crew once they had no more use for them.”

“Savages,” one ark captain declared, and Leon couldn’t help but feel some amount of irony in the statement.  He’d killed prisoners himself, and though he didn’t regret it, he also wasn’t going to claim any moral superiority over those who performed similar actions.

“We must execute the remaining pirates we have!” Split-Knuckle demanded, his orange eyes practically glowing with passion as they fell upon Leon.  “Let us send them to the arena!  Have the Bears give us their vilest beasts to send against them!”

A shallow frown crossed Leon’s face as he glanced at the leader of the Booming Brown Bears.  Until the battle, it had been Beast Breaker, but the elder had died in the battle, leaving a seventh-tier warrior to take his place—not even a Clan Chief.

“We have no beasts of such dread as to fulfill the spirit of your request,” Eyes-of-Glass stated neutrally.  “Our stables were reserved for war beasts, not those suited for the arena, and certainly not for executions.”

“Then let us have their heads!” Split-Knuckle shouted.  “For the blood of our kin, we shall have their blood!”

Some in the room shouted and stomped their agreement, while others vocally disagreed.  Leon largely ignored it, having long since decided to execute the pirates anyway.  Still, letting the rest of his advisors make their desires known was good for morale, he figured, so he let them keep going for a while longer.

Before he could bring order back to the room, however, Gaius hurriedly entered the room, looking rather worried.  The room became much quieter as most eyes locked onto him and followed him as he raced over to Leon and whispered his report into Leon’s ear.

As he listened, Leon nodded, scowled, and called the meeting to a recess.  Their pirate issue wasn’t necessarily over, it seemed.

---

From one of the nine peaks, Leon projected his magic senses, focusing his attention on the southeast.  Thousands of miles in that direction lay the closest large settlement to Artorion, the city-state of Alhamachim, which he’d only recently made direct contact with.

When he’d last seen the city during that introduction, it had been a pleasant place.  Its terraced fields running down mountain slopes and into valleys had given the city an air of serene, pastoral beauty even though the city itself looked highly developed.

Now, however, it was on fire.  Many of its vast terraces had been pillaged and burned, the towers on the city wall armed with Lance-like weapons had been destroyed, and several arks had been shot down to the city’s west, now burning on the terraces and further down in the valley.

It seemed the surviving pirates’ desire to raid hadn’t been quelled by their loss to Leon’s fleet, and they’d gone after what appeared to be a more vulnerable group instead.  Now, despite their additional losses, the remaining arks of the pirate fleet either hovered close to Alhamachim or had landed within the city, knocking over buildings or flattening small parks to make room.  The defenses of the city had collapsed, and now buildings were being ransacked, and people hauled off or brutalized with wanton, shameless cruelty.

There were still signs of resistance in the city as the more powerful locals organized improvised defenses within the streets and more defensible districts, but it was clear to Leon’s eyes that any coordinated defense among them had been shattered.  The pirates weren’t numerous, but they’d managed to use their arks to overwhelm the Hamachoi.

Notably, Leon didn’t see any sign of Asa Hamil-Untar, the Speaker of the city, which had him more concerned about the city’s fate.  They had no post-Apotheosis mages, but Asa, if he remembered rightly, was a tenth-tier mage.

“When did they reach the city?” Leon asked.

“A few hours ago,” Gaius replied.

For long seconds, Leon was silent, many thoughts racing through his head.

His forces had been ravaged, he’d lost ten percent of his initial force of twenty-thousand, and lost a greater proportion of his material resources on top of that.  Even if he gave the order to engage the pirates now, his fleet was combat-ineffective at the moment.

On the other hand, these were people who’d attacked his people for no reason, who had encountered one of his missing frigates and instead of rendering aid, had tortured them to find more potential victims, and now rampaged mercilessly through a neighboring city.  It was hard to turn away from their actions; Leon’s blood burned at the thought of letting them continue and escape from his justice, and sang at the thought of blasting them to ash.

He could do nothing.  That would be the prudent move, especially since his forces had already suffered such huge losses.  Securing his position had to take priority over everything else.

And yet… surely he could spare some resources for the Hamachoi?  Did he truly have no way he could help?

In his conflicted state, long seconds passed while he watched the sacking of the city.  Buildings burned as the seconds turned to minutes.  Gold, silver, and other precious materials were carried away, captured women and children were gathered in large open spaces and put in chains, while the men, whether they resisted or not, were put to the sword.

And yet, if the defenses in the other districts held, the city would survive.  The people would survive, though greatly reduced in number.

‘That’ll hardly alleviate the suffering they’ll undergo,’ Leon thought as he watched one fourth-tier woman in particular being dragged through the streets by her hair, her clothes in disarray.  The pirate dragging her didn’t look even remotely like he had pleasant plans for her, especially since he appeared more concerned with finding a secluded place than taking the woman to the nearest captive gathering point.

“I’ve seen enough,” Leon spat, a dark look passing over his face.

“Leon?” Gaius asked, uncertainty creeping into his voice.  “What… are you planning to do?”

Leon’s eyes remained locked in Alhamachim’s direction as he responded, “Fetch Anastasios, Eva, Red, Naiad, and Cassie.”

---

Alhamachim had been a hellscape for almost two days.  First, the pirates arrived and the city put up their resistance.  There had been time for most of the people to reach safe places within the city, but those places had become considerably less safe when the city’s walls were breached.

As the pirates gained more and more control over the city over the subsequent day, more and more people were ferreted out of their hiding places.  Many of the city’s leaders were found and crucified in front of the Great Temple of Leth, which also served as the place of assembly for their elected leaders and the office of their Speaker.

Asa himself was not among those nailed to planks outside the temple.

Those still resisting were gradually reduced more and more as the hours passed, leaving fewer and fewer places for the people to flee to.  The pirates still took casualties, but not enough, it seemed, for them to leave those safe places alone and content themselves with the plunder they’d already secured.  They kept pressing for more.

Tauri Prest-Jahan was a seventh-tier mage and a high-ranking official in the city.  He wasn’t affiliated with the city defense force and so had been taken off-guard by the pirate attack, but he’d managed to save many thousands of the city’s inhabitants within a lower district far from the Great Temple of Leth.

Bitterness threatened to overwhelm him as he bore witness to what seemed like the end of his city.  He resisted with all he had, taking up a spear and manning the makeshift fortifications some earth mages had created in the streets.  He was terrified, having never seriously fought anyone before in his life, but all he had to do to find the mettle to continue fighting back against the pirates was to think of his wife and children in his home.  Any of them in the hands of these savages was simply unacceptable.

Unfortunately, street by street, the pirates forced him and his dwindling comrades back.  The Hamachoi were a strong people, so they kept resisting even as their numbers fell with every cobblestone beneath their feet they were forced to cede, but the pirates were better equipped and more bloody-minded.

Still, Tauri thrust his spear, catching a pirate in the neck, piercing the skin, and nearly severing the pirate’s head from his body.  A wave of his hand sent spikes of ice slamming into another pirate, though his ice met stone skin instead of soft flesh.

The pirate shouted in some guttural barbarian language, glaring at Tauri with bestial malice and crushing his way through Tauri’s ice with a hammer that no mortal could wield.

Panic bloomed in Tauri’s heart, though he shouted in a voice as steady as stone, “Fight back!  Fight!  Think of your children!  Your sisters and brothers!  Your parents, your wives!  FIGHT!”

His comrades shouted their agreement, giving their all in defense of their city.

The hammer-wielding pirate advanced upon Tauri, and the seventh-tier Hamachos engaged the pirate in a spectacular duel.  Spear met hammer a dozen times, each blow creating shockwaves that broke the earth beneath them.  Spikes of stone met spikes of ice, vying for magical dominance in the fight.

In the end, Tauri knocked the pirate down and drove his spear into the pirate’s eye, killing him almost instantly.  He was unable to savor his victory, however, for another pirate was on him immediately, forcing him to cede a few more steps to the advancing pirates, who still seemed unperturbed at having to step over many of their own fellows to reach Tauri’s people.

‘We can’t win,’ Tauri realized as with a powerful overhead strike from a vicious falchion, his new opponent snapped the haft of his spear.  The enchantments in the weapon were broken, leaving Tauri with only his magic to defend himself and his people.

And yet, he fought on, even as the hope in his heart began to flicker and wane.  They could beat this group of pirates, but many others were rampaging throughout the city, and eventually, Tauri’s numbers would give out.  Eventually, their resistance would be overcome.

After another intense duel, Tauri left his opponent impaled upon a ten-foot-long ice spike, though he’d suffered a nasty stomach wound and a broken arm in the process.

Despite his injuries and the fact that the rest of the pirates had reduced his group of resistance fighters to twenty-five when they’d numbered forty not even half an hour previously, Tauri roared his anger and defiance for all to hear.  His roar was echoed in those who fought at his side, finally giving the pirates pause.

Or, perhaps it was the rain that suddenly started.  The sky had become overcast at some point; Tauri had been too preoccupied to notice exactly when.  Nervous looks were cast upward by the pirates as a bright bolt of strange-colored lightning flashed overhead, but all Tauri could think was, ‘Strike now!’

He lunged forward, ice bursting from his fingers, and as his hand closed around a pirate’s neck and squeezed, the sky above came alight with lightning—far too much and far too silver to be natural.  An ark hovering above a terrace to the west was struck by hundreds of bolts in seconds, overwhelming its defenses and nearly destroying its rear thrusters.  The ark tilted downward and fell from the sky.

More lightning fell throughout the city, with other magics joining it.  A strange winged beast that looked rather reminiscent of a dragon roared as it came diving through the clouds, and the pirate in Tauri’s hand breathed his last as his brain was eviscerated by Tauri’s ice.

“FIGHT!!!” Tauri roared again.  “FIGHT!!!”

The pirates finally faltered, panic spreading through their ranks.  Some turned and ran away, and as more lightning fell throughout the city, more pirates followed suit.

It took all Tauri had not to pursue.  “Secure the street!” he shouted, keeping the security of the thousands of people who were taking shelter in the homes and buildings behind them even as the panic in his heart lightened.

He was treating the situation with all due caution, but it seemed that salvation had come.  From where he couldn’t say, but at this point, he wasn’t going to argue.  It seemed that his city had been saved.

—-

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