Primordial Villain with a Slave Harem

Chapter 1570  Heavy March

"[Moonlit Aegis]!"

The defensive spell formed in the instant between the warhammer connecting and the force transferring, a disc of silver light manifesting across her torso that absorbed the first layer of the impact. It bought her ribs. It did not buy her anything else.

The remaining force launched her off the ground.

Aelindra crossed a hundred meters of open field in a flat trajectory that ended at Myrasyn's feet. She hit the earth and bounced once, rolled twice, and came to a stop on her back in a cloud of dust and debris with both blades still locked in her grip.

"Commander!"

The cry ran through the elven ranks. "Reform around the commander! Close the gap!"

The elven elites surged backward, collapsing their spread formation into a tighter defensive cluster around the spot where Aelindra had landed, blades out and bows drawn.

Across the field, Stormlord rolled his neck. Blood ran from the cuts Aelindra's blades had opened on his ribs, dark against the storm-grey plate, and his left pauldron was cracked enough that the joint creaked when he moved his arm.

"Healing," he ordered and without waiting for the magic to even begin being cast, turned his back on the elven line and walked toward Alexios.

"Apologies, my king." He planted himself at Alexios's right flank and drove his warhammer into the earth. "The elves kept me busy."

Alexios did not respond.

Stormlord's gaze found the puppet Morgana standing at Quinlan's side, the queen's broken body bleeding from every wound the healer was struggling to close. The composure drained from his face. "What has he done to Her Majesty?!"

...

Myrasyn looked down at her sister.

Aelindra lay in the dirt with a caved-in breastplate and blood running from her mouth. Her silver-green armor was cracked across the sternum where the warhammer had connected, the defensive spell's residual light still fading from the fractured metal. Dust clung to her black hair and one of her curved blades was embedded point-first in the ground beside her where it had stabbed in during the landing.

Myrasyn smiled softly.

"Are you alright, big sis?"

Aelindra spat blood into the dirt, grabbed the embedded blade, and pulled herself to her feet in one violent motion. She swayed once, steadied, and wiped her mouth with the back of her gauntlet.

"Worry about yourself, damned brat."

Myrasyn's smile widened as she giggled. "I'll take that as a yes. What happened?"

"The boy became sturdier than I expected."

Myrasyn shook her head. "Truly, the tragedy of the elven people cannot be understated. Lacking capable men, we're a people of fragile backliners."

"Shut it!" Aelindra cursed, hating that line of thought. Wanting a man to help you, thinking yourself incapable of certain tasks just because you're a woman…

Disgusting.

...

The marching came from the south.

*Thoom. Thoom. Thoom. Thoom.*

Heavy. Rhythmic. The kind of cadence that came from boots built to crack stone, landing on blackened ground in perfect synchronization. The sound cut through the chaos of the battlefield with an indifference that demanded attention, and every head within earshot turned.

Dwarven blacksteel caught the light of the burning field.

Two hundred warriors in blacksteel plate advanced in a column four abreast, their shields locked and their axes resting on armored shoulders. They marched with the mechanical precision of soldiers who had been marching together so long that the rhythm was encoded in their bones, and the ground shook beneath them with every synchronized step.

*Thoom. Thoom. Thoom.*

At their head strode a dwarf on his lonesome.

King Ragnar.

His blacksteel armor was trimmed with gold runes that pulsed with a deep light. The warhammer strapped across his back had cracked fortress gates and crushed skulls belonging to creatures many times his size. His beard was braided with iron rings, each one a campaign marker, and there were enough rings to fill a small chest.

He looked at Quinlan, at the puppet Morgana bleeding at his side, at the stone-and-ice hands and the hovering saber and the blood streaking down the black armor.

Ragnar's lips split beneath his beard.

"Well," he said to no one in particular. "Looks like I'm right on time."

The dwarven column split into two wings and fanned out across the field behind Quinlan's position, their shields angling outward to cover the flanks, and King Ragnar marched forward until he stood ten paces from the Primordial Villain.

"You look like shit."

"Yeah, I've been better."

Ragnar snorted and looked over his shoulder at the elf queen, her staff still trailing ribbons of golden light.

"Myrasyn." He said her name the way a man said the name of a headache he'd been nursing for centuries.

"Ragnar." She landed beside them with the grace of a woman stepping off a staircase. "You've taken your time. You were supposed to be here minutes ago."

"I made a pit stop."

"…While I was fighting for my life, lacking a frontliner?" Her green eyes narrowed at the dwarf who offered no apologies.

Then she turned to Quinlan. "I must say, Mr. Villain, you do know how to draw a crowd. I haven't attended a gathering this exclusive, and I'm..."

"You are?" Quinlan prompted.

"…" Her gaze turned scrutinizing as she realized she almost revealed her age to a young man. That would be a blunder a lady of her standing simply couldn't commit. Well, the history books recorded her rough age, and at her digits, even if they were off by a couple decades, they would only be minor errors.

She somehow didn't like that fact, refusing to finish the answer.

"Focus!"

"I'm focused."

"…"

...

The Scarlet Lilies hit the soul army's defensive line one final time, and this time, the line gave.

Lilith's spellblade blazed white and the shield wall that Scar had erected between them blew apart under the combined assault of four fighters who had spent centuries learning how to break exactly this kind of defense. Jallen's spear took the left tanker through the visor. Bronnya's shield charge crushed the right. Void's dark pulse erased the mages behind them, and Lilith drove through the center with enough force to scatter the debris.

Scar met her on the other side.

The duel lasted four more exchanges. Lilith fought with the desperation of a woman who had seen her sister's empty eyes and could not live with what they meant, and every swing carried more power than technique, more fury than discipline.

Scar gave ground.

She parried, redirected, absorbed what she could and dodged what she couldn't, and she let the momentum carry her backward because fighting Lilith head-on when the spellblade was burning this hot was a calculation she'd already made. She couldn't match this output.

Scar's boots hit the ground near Quinlan's position and she rolled once and came up with both daggers raised, settling into a guard stance at his flank.

Lilith landed opposite them. Jallen touched down on her right, spear leveled. Bronnya planted her tower shield on the earth at Lilith's left and Void materialized from the shadows behind them, dark energy coiling around his frame.

The Scarlet Lilies reformed around Lilith, and Lilith reformed beside Alexios.

For a moment, the battlefield went quiet.

Lilith Ravenshade looked across the distance at Quinlan Elysiar, and the hatred in her eyes was the kind that aged a person.

Her gaze moved to Scar. To the woman standing at his side with blue-tinged blood running from three wounds, and Lilith's throat worked once before the words came out.

"You took my friend." She spat with hatred. "And now you're taking my sister."

Scar's gaze flickered. She said nothing.

Quinlan tilted his head.