All eyes in the forecourt remained locked on Lorian. Everyone wondered what the young lord would decide, and what strange thoughts were moving through his head.
Lorian stepped down from the stone steps, walked over to the messenger, and casually rested his hand right on the man's greasy, messy hair.
"Humor me, my dear friend," Lorian said with a sharp, cold smirk on as heavy sarcasm dripped from every word, "What were you planning to do if, heaven forbid, Veridia had fallen yesterday?"
The messenger stared back with a blank, panicked expression, his mind started racing to find an answer that might please the king.
"Here, let me help you," Lorian chuckled softly, patting the man's head, "You don't need to trouble your little head trying to come up with it. If your friends had succeeded in killing me and the Throne Guards yesterday, today you'd be walking around this very courtyard, claiming it as your own. Your men would be looting our treasury, stripping the nobles' coffers, and selling our people into chains. The women would face fates far worse than death. Am I right, or am I…. right?"
The messenger's face drained of all color. He could not find his voice, his jaws kept stuttering uselessly.
"So, my friend," Lorian continued, as his tone gradually hardened, "if you were fully prepared to enjoy the fruits of a victory, you have to be ready to face the results of a defeat. You don't get the best of both worlds. Look over there..."
Lorian pointed a finger toward the two severed heads resting in the boxes.
"If you had won, your people would be crawling to your late Pirate Empress's feet and kissing her boots. Because your mission failed, those two lost their heads instead. If your leader and her own flesh and blood couldn't escape cause and effect, why should you?"
Panic surged through the messenger. Throwing off all pretense of calm diplomacy, he scrambled up onto his feet and bolted backward, putting as much distance between himself and Lorian as he possibly could.
"No, no, no, boss, you can't do that!" the pirate yelled, his voice was now cracking with sheer terror as he spun around to face the watching crowd, "I was told messengers can't be touched! Why doesn't somebody tell your boss that messengers aren't supposed to be killed?"
Anya Vesper and Lucien hurried over, leaning in close to murmur in Lorian's ear.
"He's right, my lord," Anya whispered urgently, "You can't kill a messenger. It goes against every rule of diplomatic protocol."
"They don't represent a real state or a crown!" Lorian snapped back, his annoyance flared "They are just a filthy pack of criminals. Why should diplomatic immunity apply to them?"
"You're right about that," Anya conceded quietly, "Technically, from a strict legal view, they don't have it. But if we slaughter them here and now, word will spread across the coasts. We'll face a heavy backlash and a massive hit to our reputation."
"She's right, my lord," Lucien added in a hushed, steady tone, "We should just let them walk."
"So, we can let them run back and warn their friends?" Lorian hissed, turning to the grand commander, "So the enemy gets all the time they need to prepare a proper defense, putting our own men right back in danger?"
"My lord," Lucien tried to reason, keeping his voice low, "we aren't going to have the element of surprise anyway. They can see our army coming from miles away now that the surrounding structures are cleared. We'd be taking a permanent stain on our honor for practically nothing."
Before Lorian could answer, another pirate delegation member- the one who had kept quiet until now- suddenly stepped forward.
"My King, forgive me for speaking out of turn," the man stammered, holding up his hands defensively, "but please, consider what your own men just said!"
Lorian turned his head slowly, one eyebrow climbed high, "What?"
"If you decide not only to spare us, but to let us serve you, you'll gain a navy capable of ruling the entire ocean," the pirate urged, his eyes were wide with desperate ambition, "Think about it. By letting us join your ranks, you save your own men from bleeding out on the field, and you actually gain power. Crushing us down to dust gives you nothing except more casualties. But saving us turns you into a winner- you walk away with more ships and more sailors than you lost. You can turn this war into a profitable venture. You're a businessman, right? Veridia is a city of trade. You're all traders at heart, not heavy-handed brutes like Valoria or Aethelgard. So, think like a trader! Is a bit of bruised ego worth more than a golden windfall?"
Lorian narrowed his eyes, staring at the speaker, "Who in the hells is this?"
The lead messenger swallowed hard, "My King... he's our treasurer."
"I am no pirate, your highness!" the treasurer blurted out quickly, "I'm a merchant, just like you all! I handle the ledgers, the expenses, and the trade routes for the goods these men bring in. I have deep connections to every market, both above ground and in the shadows. Just think of the possibilities if I work for you. Veridia will swim in an endless flood of wealth!"
Lorian let out a long, ragged breath, rubbing his face with a calloused hand. His voice then dropped into a dark, frozen low, "One more word out of your mouth, you snake, and I'll cut out your venomous tongue."
"You filthy serpent," Lorian snapped, pivoting back to the main messenger as his anger flared hot and sharp once more, "You think you can just flash some coin and buy your way out of this? Do you seriously take Veridia for some two-bit gang of cutthroats? Sure, we are a merchant city, but that doesn't mean our people sell their mothers for a quick buck! We love money, yeah- we respect wealth. But never at the cost of our dignity, our values, our morals, and above all... our loyalty to Veridia.
We are traders, not animals. We trade things that have a price tag, not the things that are priceless. You honestly think a man who watched his brother get butchered by your blades is going to hug you just because you drop a bag of gold at his feet? Not a single true Veridian would ever do that. Hell, just look around- a father here literally executed his own flesh and blood yesterday because the boy tried to backstab the realm. And you thought you could waltz in here and bribe a city like that?"
Lorian huffed, his chest heaving as he glared down at the trembling group.
"And listen to me, you absolute clown," Lorian muttered in an icy cold tone, "If the old Pirate Queen herself had walked in here with her own troops to negotiate, I might have at least respected the hustle. But you? You lot murdered your own captain just to save your own worthless skins. I am no idiot; I am not taking backstabbers under my wing. No army is better than having a pack of rats who will knife you the second things get tough. Look at my men- they would gladly throw themselves in front of a blade just to keep their leader from getting a single scratch. That is our standard. And you actually had the nerve to think you belong in the same breath?"
Lorian swept his gaze across the sea of faces gathered tightly in the courtyard, raising his voice so every corner rang with his words.
"Listen to me, all of you! Veridia is not called the crown jewel of Tir-Luthar for nothing. It is not just because we are the wealthiest nation on the continent. It is because we have lions guarding that wealth, and owls with minds sharp enough to pull a fortune out of thin air when everything else is burning!
We are not cut of the same cloth as rest of the world. We are morally and intellectually on a completely different level. That is why we can take a hit that should kill us, pull ourselves up from total ruin, and still soar right back to the top. We don't quit. And we certainly don't fall for cheap tricks or little bribes that ask us to sell our self-respect, our sovereignty, or our people.
Why? Because there is literally nothing anyone can offer us that we can't just go out and build for ourselves all over again, twice as fast and twice as big.
We don't need their handouts. We are Veridians! Gold in our blood, iron in our bones!"
The entire forecourt erupted. Commoners, nobles, and hardened soldiers alike roared in absolute unison, the shockwave of their cheer shaking the stone walls.
"I am not killing you right here, and I am not locking you in a cell," Lorian shouted over the noise, pointing a finger at the terrified messengers, "You're riding with us- right now- straight to your own camp! Veridians! Get yourselves ready. It is time for the final push. We are going to scrub this foul stain from our motherland and stamp out the rats at our door once and for all. For Veridia!"
"For Veridia!" the army roared back as one.
The mass of soldiers, who had been standing at the ready since dawn, surged forward in a disciplined wave. Against the advice of every advisor and commander present, Lorian drew his blade and marched right at the front of the offensive.
The open expanse between the towering Gold Wall and the distant docks was no longer a sprawling cityscape. Rather, the war had turned it to a jagged, smoking maze of churned earth, collapsed timber, and burnt-out market stalls. The residential quarters and merchant plazas had been reduced to skeletal ruins during the siege, their stone foundations were choked with ash and soaked in drying blood.
The remnants of the pirate host were trapped among the debris. Mathematically, they still held a numerical advantage over the advancing Veridians. But numbers meant nothing when the human mind had already snapped. Their spirits had been ground to powder the night before, shattered by the massacre in the Spire and the chilling realization that their leaders were already rotting in wooden boxes. They had no appetite left for glory or gold, no stomach for a fight. They only wanted the salt of the open ocean, a clear horizon, and a way out of this burning graveyard.
They had sent their delegation forward to beg for mercy, clinging to the desperate hope that the young king would grant them safe passage to their ships, ensuring their backs wouldn't be riddled with iron the moment they turned toward the docks.
Then, the vanguard of the Veridian army appeared the rise past the inner gates. The messengers were riding ahead of them.
At first, a few of the more delusional outlaws let out a ragged cheer, thinking their messengers had somehow worked a miracle, returning with an escort to wave them toward freedom.
The illusion however was ripped away in a single heartbeat, when the experienced and veterans identified the obvious.
There were no flags of truce. There was only the low, vibrating thunder of heavy hooves and the cold, unyielding shine of morning light flashing off polished steel.
Grand Commander Lucien Lehance was leading the advance. He was mounted on a massive warhorse clad in spiked plate. Today he was looking less like a man and more like Prince of war Khor-Val himself. His face was looking like a grim, dead-eyed mask. Flanking him were the Elite Throne Guards- forming a terrifying wall of golden armor, and moving with mechanical perfection.
Behind them came the main body of the Veridian forces- the Veridian Guards. Their ranks spread across the ruined streets. Rena Tharford commanded the infantry battalions, while young Lord Lorian rode at the absolute front. Jax, Zara and Kaelen were flanking him.
The realization hit the pirate camp like a physical blow. They realised that the king of Veridia hadn't sent their men back to negotiate an exit. He had sent them back as a prelude to a slaughter.
"To arms, boyz! The landlubbers are coming to butcher us!" a frantic voice shrieked from the ruins.
The limited discipline that was remaining among the pirates however evaporated instantly. They did not form any grand organised battle line; no tactical formation was there. The pirate horde devolved into a terrified, squalling mob of cornered beasts. Men scrambled blindly for dropped cutlasses, tripping over the charred beams of collapsed houses and slipping in the crimson mud. Some sprinted desperately toward the distant docks, to get on their boats to get as far as possible from the encroaching army; while others turned back to face the oncoming tide, paralyzed by a primal, animalistic terror.
However, it was going to be easy for Veridians either. Because of the narrow, choked geography of the burnt cityscape, Veridian heavy cavalry could not execute a clean, sweeping charge. Instead, Lucien drove his warhorses straight into the plazas to seal off every escape route, while the real horror unfolded in the alleys and market stalls.
The Veridians pounced on the Pirates to finish them for once and all. They were not fighting like disciplined soldiers either today; but more like executioners. Rena Tharford was however trying her best to keep the men in disciplined line, so that they can respond to any unforeseen situation. This had made her target of many pirates who had decided it was wise to take her out as early as possible. When a desperate pirate lunged out from a shattered doorway with a rusted dagger, she swung her Veridian shield and caught the wild blow effortlessly. Her mithril sword drove straight up under the pirate's ribs with a sickening crunch of cartilage. The war had turned to a brutal savagery. There was no hesitation, no quarter asked or given. The cornered pirates were fighting back with the feral savagery of dying animals, biting, scratching, and hacking wildly at anything that moved. In the narrow, smoke-choked alleys, the battle quickly dissolved into brutal, intimate violence. Men hacked at each other in the mud, rolling over broken glass and charred woods. A pirate who had dropped his blade would claw desperately at a soldier's throat, only to have a heavy metal gauntlet cave in his skull. Blood sprayed across the soot-blackened walls of the ruined shops, painting the stone in thick, dark layers of crimson.
Lorian was leading the men hurling command and keeping the morale high at the epicenter of the carnage. The modern boy who once used to hesitate at the sight of a spilled drop was completely gone, drowned out by the roar of adrenaline and the cold necessity of survival. Beside him, Jax, Zara and Kaelen's blade rose and fell in quick succession, severing limbs and opening throats with casual brutality, leaving spray of blood and a trail of twitching bodies in their wake.
Those who tried to flee toward the sea found their paths choked by the very ruins they had tried to capture days before. Trapped between the advancing wall of Veridian shields and the impassable barricades of rubble, the pirates began to crush each other in their panic. Men were trampled underfoot by their own fleeing comrades, their ribs snapping beneath heavy boots as they shrieked for mercy that never came.
The air grew heavy with the choking stench of copper, feces, and burning flesh. The Veridians carved through the labyrinth of ruins step by step, house by house, leaving no pocket of resistance alive. By the time the sun climbed high into the sky, the open docks were silent save for the wet, ragged gasps of the dying and the steady, rhythmic march of the iron-clad victors cleaning their blades in the blood-soaked dirt.
The cacophony suddenly got drowned with sound of bugles coming from nearby.