Fall 157
Doom falls on the capitaleFor a season that did not know Osmite invasion, it was surpizingly combat-heavy. A lot of things happened – and as we will see in that report, we seem to sail through the storm more easily than through calm waters.
Early projectsSeptember started rather peacefully. After the capture of Azstrogstram, the town wanted to settle down and recover, reconstitute its forces and keep the war effort at a slower pace. Notable efforts were deployed to clean up the battlefield in the western side of the town – considerable effort with the number of bodies accumulated since the fundation of the city. This effort took the whole city – everyone went to the outskirt to lend a hand in that ungrateful task. Undressing the bodies, picking up decayed severed limbs, braving the swarms of flies to bag the liquefying corpses and transporting the sinister load to the trash compactor where they were disposed of.
That effort was made necessary by the project of expanding the town to the western side of the sea – but also to secure all the metal we can to produce more gear for the war effort.
Ultimately, this is the transformation the town is based around : transformiung wood and metal into gear, transforming gear and manpower into victories. All the rest, the trade, the craft, the culture, the hierarchies, the crafts of various sorts – are all subordinate to that main transformation, pushing toward the end of war.
In the meantime, urban development was also conducted in the west – the old barracks were upgraded, with the long term goal to transform them into an archery platform, with a ballista on ground floor, and a first floor dedicated to Histamine’s crowwbowmen so they can be used defensively. Roads were also planned in three cardinal directions to help the merchants to reach the town. Gates and walls were also planned so it would not come at the cost of the town’s defensive capacity.
Unwelcome guestThe evening of the 21 september, as a handful of new migrants came into town, we were pretty much extatic – we need more manpower to replenish our squads, and we need more hands to clear the western end of town.
However, a routine verification of the identity of the migrants threw the swornmen into a frenzy.
Most of them were totally unremarkable – mostly farmers from neighbouring villages. Two of them came from Thomocemir, but were similarly unremarkable be it by their skills or patrimony.
But one of them threw the alarm immediately ; he had the reddish skin of a man from Xakedgil – he was around thirty years old, but his hair was white as snow. This alone was enough to give the swornmen the certitude that he was a vampire – but that was not all ! On his head, a crown made out of human hair. And above all, during his travels, he mentionned to his companions that he was married to a woman by the name of Stran « Little Sadness »… a vampire we slain in Thomocemir.
He claimed his name was « Thep », that was of course a pseudonym – his real name was Mudung, a 120 years old vampire from Xakedgil.
Yeah we’re not letting you free-roaming in town, buddyMudung was locked in a sealed room inside the upper mine. In time, we will give cure him of vampirism through the treatment we gave his wife back sixteen years ago – in the meantime, he can rot in his room. We might find a use for him – if not, we have an eternity to dispose of him.
When we have a bit more time, we might interrogate him – or find another use. So far, we have not considered anything besides locking him up to preserve our population.
Amxuespo fallsSeptember came and went. With october, the military brass decided to capitalize on the momentum gained in late August – our objective was to capture two more villages before the winter.
Considering the terrain, our grand offensive strategy practically wrote itself – we had to take all osmite villages, one after the other until we reach fort Stustonako. After that… we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.
Our assault tactics of storming their villages with heavy mobile infantry then rotating in lighter formations having proven effective so far, we decided to replicate it in our next target, the village of Amxuespo.
The first clash happened in the 11th of october. The village was protected by a handful of professional soldiers – mostly crossbowmen – reinforced by conscripts. In total, 13 souls. Islas’ heavy mobile infantry and Histamine’s tactic squad made very short work of them.
The 21 of october, Anthil’s light infantry was rotated in and took control of the village. Two remaining fighters, who were exercising noble functions between the first and the second assault, were executed for their effots : the new lord was drown, and his commander was beheaded.
Kimaeslo Ori rejoiced of that success ; as unsurprizing as it was, and immediately made preparations to push the conquest forward.
Underground duelCelebrations went however very shot lived. Two days after the fall of Amxuespo, Kimaeslo Ori was woken up by tremors coming from deep underground.
It was no earthquakeOsman, an old god, had just woken up deep inside the earth and was quickly making his way to the surface. He happened upon the old pearlite mine, and the creature, although its sapience was still unclear, understood the mine to be the shortest path.
The large mass of gemstone crossed the drowned mine without problem, then squirmed his way through the old tunnels.
When we heard the death screams of the moor vagrants who had taken shelter in the mine’s lower levels, we could not ignore the creature any longer.
We deployed Islas’ the heavy mobile infantry, Princeling Sothro’s medium infantry and the swornmen to deal with it.
The first to arrive at the scene was Izem Konzekonli, Princeling Sothro’s right hand man – large man with a distinctly square jaw and a wide body. He was wearing a medium armor, and was armed with Kerlebero, a blade of pearl-iron -all considered not the best gear to face such a foe.
Three mine-dwelling vagrants were already slain, it was too late for them. But itw as still time to prevent the monster from reaching the surface.
Against an enemy so large in a corridor so tight, waiting for reinforcements would have been pointless. He gathered his courage and engaged the old god.
With all the strenght he could muster, he hacked into the mineral body of the monster, which emited loud cracks after each blow. The creature squirmed and wriggled independently of the fight, visibly insensible to pain, causing the underground corridors to vibrate, causing a rain of dirt.
After a lucky shot on the creature’s leg, Izem managed to jump on Osman’s back
The creature contorted itself and Izem lost his footing – reflexively, he swong his blade in the cristalline monster and grpped it with the energy of despair. Izem’s strenght and gravity combined almost split the old god in two in a sheaf of gemstone fragments.
## 23rd Sandstone 157 14:57:36
The forgotten beast misses the Swordmaster!
The Swordmaster slashes the forgotten beast in the lower body with his
Kerlebero and it is mostly cut away from the rest of the torso!
The bodies of the three slain mine-dwellers were recovered and destroyed to prevent miasmas in the caves – and to mbstones with their names were added to the underground memory hall.
As for Izem, he was treated as a hero as he came back to the surface, victorious. We’re considering bethrowing him to Lady Desli after that remarkable feat of arms.
Massacre at NgebzorekoNext on our path to Fortress Sustonako was the small hamlet of Ngebzoreko – diminutive settlement of no more than a dozen souls. At this time, we still had one light infantry squad to expand – Anthil’s squad.
Due to the absence of a professional fighting force in the hamlet and to its diminutive size, it was decided not to operate our rotation tactic and to send directly Anthil’s men to capture the settlement.
It was our hope that the residents of Ngebzoreko would recognize immediatly that the situation was desperate and would lie down their arms without resistance and save us a lot of time.
Which they did… however, Anthil’s squad was not as professional as we may have wished. The inhabitants of the hamlet were all captured, tortured and slain – two were drown, one was burried alive, another was burned at the stake.
We do not condone the acts of barbarism even when they are conducted by pearlites. Even though we are still far behind Osme in war criminality in this conflict, we have to remind ourselves that they are the monsters – not us – and we should act accordingly.
We’ll train our occupation squads so such incident is not emulated further.
In those circumstances, Ngebzoreko falls under our control the 8 november.
We are still outnummered 3 to 5, but the difference is reducing after each assaultIn the meantime, we have no more light infantry to expand in offensives until further notice. We have to painstakingly wind up our next blow by training and gearing up the next wave.
Our next target is the twin village of Ngomzolak and Spugkadkustmob – of about one hundred souls each, we estimate we need two half-squads to occupy them.
Starting next season, we’ll try to scour the population for mobilization candidates – but we will recquire more migration as our population is dropping dangerously.
Icgilmater the Esteemed Star is killedAfter the assaults were conducted, the town set itself to a lower tempo – everything that needed to b done was done, the war agenda had advanced furiously this season, the old battlefield was almost cleaned of corpses and the gear production continued steadily. We expected a calm but productive end of season, followed by a tranquil winter spent re-fattening the town.
A week after the capture of Ngebzoreko however, we received the visit of yet another unwelcome guest.
Icgilmater « The Esteemed Star » was a cyclop older than civilisation, that was used to raid Osmite properties and devour its population. It has been attacking Bosangasma, Osmestobûb capitale city, for over 150 years.
Our progression in the south would have attracted his attention -the 15th of November, he appeared near the town.
He soon noticed the beach dwelling vagrants and made a straight line to them – he took especially interest in that elven girl by the name of Vinena. Immediately, we scrambled every fighter at our disposition and threw them against the monster.
We couldn’t save the poor souls in the mine, but we would not let those in the outskirt die.
Luckily for us, unlike Osman, Icgilmater was made of flesh – it was soon charged from all sides by heavily armed weapon masters and easily slain.
Abuth, a member of Totten’s command squad, is the one credited for the deathblow with her bronze morningstar.
I see after verifying that Abuth is Anthil’s wife… I don’t like separating couples, so we might recall her husband from Ngebzoreko soon.
At least in those circumstances, the exploits of the wife lessen a bit the infamy of the husband.
Vinena suffered an injury to her shoulder after endring Icgilmater’s abuse, but we believe she’ll be fine.