A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor
Chapter 1591 - 1591: The Dragon's Wrath - Part 3

The dragon already breathed its fire on him, it already slashed at him with its claws, and saw him wounded, but Oliver Patrick bore a stubbornness that allowed him to hold on to the tiniest of wills, despite the situation. It was a tiny will that had kept him pushing through slavery. Each day, when he had awoken with shackles on his wrist, and remembered the hurt of losing his family in a fit of bloody slaughter, it threatened to break him. If he had dared to let it all in his mind at once, it would have.

His was a method of self-preservation that he had learned, forcefully, all that time ago. It was that which had allowed him to endure Ingolsol. Against that mighty God of Power, there could never have been a prospect of standing up to him – but nor could he have let himself be defeated, for to do so would have meant to submit entirely to the curse, and to lose himself.

The smallest of wills, just enough to retain oneself. A lack of will that was entirely the will of the defeated. It did not attract the gravity of the strong. It had no presence of its own. It was a void, in a different way to the void that Gar had within him. It existed, but not enough for any to acknowledge. A quiet stream, steadily, everso steadily, wearing away at the rocks.

There was no alarm from the enemy Generals. They could feel it building. Their victory. Everso carefully, had they worked their way towards it. It might have not been flawless, and they might have lost more troops than they otherwise would have wished to, but such was the nature of fighting a troublesome man like Oliver Patrick. One could not be greedy, they simply had to do all that they could to crush him.

"I mislike this," Hendrick said. "Where is the cleanness that you two promised me? With twenty thousand men, how could you still present this battle as such a struggle?"

"The enemy struggles," Fritzer said. "Not we. We have the most careful of positions put in play. We could have taken risks, and dealt with them faster, but you yourself ordered us not to. We have kept inside the walls, out of interest for that carefulness. If either of us had taken to the battlefield, this would have been an entirely different story."

"It was you both that suggested you remain inside, to deprive the enemy of targets," Hendrick said accusingly.

"And look, have we not done so?" Fitzer said. "Where do you see the fire of Oliver Patrick? He has achieved nothing in this battle. We have robbed him of all fuel to burn. Such is how you deal with Swords. He wastes his presence dealing with ordinary men, and we do not even hear a shout from him. He knows not how to overcome a strategy of absence – all these Swords are the same."

Hendrick looked doubtful, but he had to admit that Oliver Patrick had been quiet. Jokingly, on the march there, all three of them – Generals and Prince alike – had declared that the young man could not have been much. They pointed to the propaganda likely sewn into his achievements, for it was his current allies that tooted his worth so loudly. One did not simply begin a rebellion overnight, they argued. They'd set the plans in motion for a while, making their strength seem far greater than it was, spreading the seeds of propaganda. The death of Ferdinand had merely been a catalyst in that.

"But, who's to say that they didn't fake his death?" Tussle had said deviously. "Would that not be expected of them, when they wished for rebellion from the start? I would not put it past that old goat Blackwell, especially with that sinister creature Karstly whispering in his ear. This has been planned for a while, I can assure you. There's more illusory little curtains here than you might think."

It was to the point that Hendrick almost found himself convinced. There seemed to be the ring of truth in many of the things that they'd said, but he had remembered his father's words. He held the greatest of respect for his wisdom. Despite his own thoughts on the matter, he endeavoured to carry out his father's will to the letter.

There it was, the dragon's claws, finally finding significant purchase on Oliver's flesh. He looked up, and his eyes, for the first time in a while, properly saw the world around him. Valiant the efforts of Yorick on the enemy archers had been. Thanks to him, they had likely culled a thousand of their number, with the help of Nila's bombardments. But it was still far from enough.

It was a tragic valiantness. It was the sadness of a deer that raced all day to be free of the wolves that pursued it. To dodge the chase for so long, and to be soon enough put in the ground.

Oliver witnessed the slaughter of that dear. He saw the crushing wave. He saw Yorick turn to meet it. And he saw the moment in which his comrade was overwhelmed. Ten thousand infantry came sweeping through all at once, bowling over their own allies in the form of their archers, and immediately crushing all who did not have the power to resist. Yorick, with his Second Boundary strength, stood alone on his horse, after his allies were flattened in an instant.

His was the tragedy of a man capable of resistance. His sword fell, swiping at whatever he could meet, and he slew man after man, even as the wounds to himself piled up. It was the barest span of thirty more seconds that he lasted for, but that thirty more seconds required more courage and grit in their endurance than an entire lifetime. It was as though he had the chance to live twice.

Oliver felt his heart creek. He had been the cause of many of the deaths of his men. It was a matter on the battlefield that he had never learned to reconcile. He had read the works of the First King, and the joyful way in which he described his savage and reckless attacks, and the cost to life that they had tolled, and he had never understood it. He had only seen a man entirely different from himself. In every battle that Oliver had fought, his mistakes weighed heavily on him. Each man and his loss came at a great burden. They would fall upon Oliver and eat away at him, limiting him, as his body grew tighter, and he grew less willing to make such sacrifices in future.