The Battle

The sky was red….. blood red.

The sun, crimson, almost bleeding, struggled to shine what little light it had upon the fading horizon. The air smelled of depression and the scarlet soil, already of the blood that was to spill on it. Everything seemed to hail impending dismay. The very aura of the battlefield was unnerving. The silence was untouched….. that too, to a chilling extent.

And then it broke, with sounds of footsteps. Quick. Rhythmic. Coordinated. Knifing the very atmosphere. In the beginning, much akin to the beating of a distant drum, and then slowly multiplying, the countless sounds slowly fading into existence. The sounds of an approaching army. The sounds of undoubted conflict.

The slow, horrific and dismal sounds……of death.

An armor-clad horseman appeared, apparently out of nowhere and then behind him, lines and lines of countless soldiers. An army of unfathomable magnitude. Emerging out of inexistence. Hastening towards the field of battle and still, somehow, unbelievably coordinated.

All were silent save for the footsteps and the sounds of the horses they rode and these too, kept rising, till it was impossible to say what one was hearing. The footsteps, once separate, unified into single graceful harmony. In the thick and blurry air, one could barely make out the colors of the armors they wore. There was no doubt now.

It was the white army.

The knights of the one true order. Devout soldiers of the wise court. Hell bent upon destroying evil. They were what brought harmony to the land, vanquishing all evil that stood in the path of eternal balance. Few known stood a chance before these mighty warriors.

And here they came, the length of their ranks growing as it slowly came into full view.

None spoke a word.

Dust swept past them as they sprinted. The sight was too grand to behold.

Seldom did these men gather in such large numbers. But when they did, one was forced to wonder.

Who, or…… what were they, to fight?

What was it that meant so much harm? What was this behemoth, that this grand army had been called to vanquish? Did it really stand a chance before the knights of the one true order?

The army lost pace.

The answer to all questions, emerged from behind the distant mountains.

It made the sky shudder, the ground rumble. The air was filled with a shrill, distant and deafening sound. It was a screech, from the beyond. It took one some time to take in the sheer size of the monstrosity. It was an amorphous being, every shape and no shape at all. You could see it but you could not understand it.

That was when they realized…. there wasn’t one. Out came another. Then another and then another. Covering the sky overhead, blocking all light. Darkness fell upon the land. A breach to the overworld had just been opened, too big to fathom.

Breaches this big, were truly rare. But when they were created, creatures of the unknown made their into the world. Regaining composure, the commander ordered the mages to make haste and seal the breach. It could take some time.

For now, it was time to fight.

At once, in harmony, all the soldiers slid out their swords. All of them knew it would be a fight to death.

Then they charged.

The scene was picturesque. Two forces, good and evil, standing before eachother. The knights. Valiant, fearless and devoted. The beasts. Feral, Savage and abominable. They descended from the sky crashing upon the army, killing countless soldiers in one sweep. Bodies flew as if playthings and blood spilled as if water. The soldiers dug their swords into the loathsome creatures whenever they got the chance. The archers fired arrows and the cavalry assisted on horseback.

Each time one of the creatures dived, the soldiers tried to maneuver away from the point of impact. But the damage was inescapable. Bodies were minced beneath the crushing impact of the force.

Their numbers quickly decreased by the thousands. They were no more than mere ants before these creatures.

The battle ended before one could declare it had begun.

The knights had lost.

The giants flew away nonchalantly, indifferent towards the damage and ruin they had caused. The bodies lay littered upon the ground. The world was once more silent. No different from how it had been before the battle.

But the bodies of the martyrs lying on the battlefield begged one question.

“Was it really?”

At that very time, in a world that evaded view. A child cried to his mother “Mom! There’s something on my arm!”

The mother, warm and considerate, carefully observed the wound. A pustule had grown nearby.

“Come on Alex,” she said, taking him by the arm ,”lets get that wound cleaned.”