A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor
Chapter 1747 - 1747: A Long Slumber - Part 4

It was a corridor, almost bereft of men, that Oliver found himself running down. There was enough room for three men to run abreast. It was immensely strange to have been fighting his way through a mass of men – both allied and otherwise – and then suddenly have nothing in his way. Not the slightest shred of resistance. Only ever a single, barely displaced man that was easily danced around.

There was such a freedom of space, that Oliver found himself going faster, and then faster some more. Speed had always been Oliver's greatest weapon. Even before the Gods had looked down on him, as a candidate for the Second Boundary, they'd seen him born with a speed and athleticism that was the envy of the other local children.

He smiled at the opportunity Jorah had given him. The man's expert, micromanaging of the battlefield. A sort of strategy that Oliver still, after all his efforts, could never be able to achieve. It was something that Jorah's eyes alone exclusively saw, and it was Oliver's privilege to make use of it.

His legs gathered more strength, and he accelerated, leaving Blackthorn and Gar behind him, in a sudden burst of ever-increasing speed. He had his sword down by his side, in a single hand, feeling as free as the very wind itself.

His eyes glowed purple, as he could feel that wanting in the air. The desperate struggle from the men around him, both Blackthorn and Patrick. Ex-peasant and slave, and current soldier. They all could see of the peril they faced. They had the anxiousness written in their hearts, as they saw man after man descend down those steps, barely held at bay thanks to the arrows that Nila and Professor Yoreholder sent their way.

They all had a want. They all had a will. And they all desperately searched for a path towards it. On the very other side of the enemy formation, Firyr and Karesh were no different. They desperately fought for a means to plug that gap.

All around the fortress of Ernest, there were those that could see. There were officers of the highest calibre, aware of the peril that they faced from the two-pronged attack that Tavar had delivered them. Even as General Blackthorn fought around King Germanicus, and desperately tried to hold on to his own life, there was a part of his awareness, dedicated to that northern wall, willing that the problem there might be solved, so that he might operate with his own degree of freedom.

There was a want, and Claudia responded to that want. The desperate need for an act of heroism, something beyond a single man. It lent Oliver a weight that it otherwise would not have. It lent his legs a speed that it otherwise would not have.

That open hole in the enemy formation – that was his alone. There was not a single allied man to bar his way. And when Oliver did crash into it, and when he did slide a second hand onto the grip of his sword, and when he twisted his hip, matching the step of his run, to deliver the most powerful strike that he could, with all the perfect timing that he could muster, the results themselves were godly.

Men immoveable for their animation. Men that had been a veritable brick wall. Oliver found in them opportunity. He filled his lungs, felt Command swirling around himself, that feeling of rightness, that touch of the wind of his back. That overwhelm that once he had only known through the realm of Ingolsol, and he let below his order to all that could hear it. "SHATTER THEM!" He declared, and like an act of magic, that was exactly what his sword did.

Ahead of Blackthorn and Gar, Oliver crushed them alone. His sword caught a man on the right, just above his hip, in a sideways slash, and the sheer force of the strike carried him off his feet. It ran through to the two men next to him, and sent them hurtling backwards into their own formation.

It was a shattering effect that rippled right to the heart of that little landing point that General Tavar had seen inflicted in all of them. The perfect little stone structure of men that they had seen constructed, and Oliver Patrick's sword was the chisel that brought it crashing down.

The Command that Oliver had bellowed with was all the more effective for the reality that he had brought about. Those soldiers that had been struggling before his arrival heard his order, and saw the effects of his charge, and they felt the kindling that was their struggle catch blaze in a sudden conflagration of fire.

That burden that they had endured. That desperate stress of sitting so close to defeat. All that mighty struggle – it was the fuel that saw those soldiers of the northern wall transformed into a singularly unstoppable fighting force.

From the other side of the enemy formation, Firyr and Karesh broke through, as if the enemy before them had been replaced with something far weaker. Those that they had failed to budge even an inch before, they now sent hurtling back into their own men.

Transformed they were, into giants. Peasants loomed more frighteningly than Captains with decades of experience. They thundered. No matter their weapons, they fell with all the force of hammers. They chiselled their way through. Their only want to destroy.

But nor did their officers forget what their original intentions were. With the opportunity that Oliver had created, Jorah sent his men funnelling after him, along the footsteps of Gar and Blackthorn. He had them cut through, and place a new wall in front of the stairs, trapping the men that had already gone down them, and cutting off the others that might have wished to join them.

The men on the stairs turned back, sensing a reversal of tides. They were presented by the backs of Patrick men, as they attempted to hold the stairs against future enemies. It seemed far too enticing a sight. Far too easy a problem to solve. And far preferable to the volley of arrows that beat down on them whenever they tried to descend down the stairs.