Wrangel's spear parried the descending arc of Nikolai's greatsword.
It was a precarious defense—hardened steel against a shaft of wood. The grain of the spear groaned under the pressure.
As Nikolai put his weight into the strike, seeking to bite deeper into the wood and the man beneath it, Wrangel found himself pushed to the brink.
"Gugh!"
He was forced to concede a step backward. It was a desperate maneuver, but it saved him from immediate decapitation.
"The dog who asked if I was frightened is now scurrying back in terror. Have you no shame, rebel?"
Nikolai's jaw was set tight, his pride clearly wounded by the earlier provocation. He twisted his lips into a grotesque, mocking sneer. In his mind, there was only one conclusion for this insolent traitor: to tear him limb from limb while he still drew breath and leave the remains for the forest scavengers.
Nikolai raised his greatsword once more, settling into a heavy offensive stance. He brought the massive blade down toward Wrangel with the force of an executioner's axe.
"Dammit..."
"Die!"
Wrangel raised his spear to intercept the blow yet again.
Crack.
A spiderweb of fractures raced down the length of the wooden shaft. Wrangel threw himself backward, Narrowly evading the follow-up strike, and stared at the splintered wood that was no longer fit for use as a polearm.
He glanced toward the distant village, his voice low and raspy. "Vladimir... forgive me. It seems I won't live to see the world you're trying to build."
With a sharp snap, he broke the spear in two.
All that remained was the metal spearhead attached to a jagged, short length of timber. He gripped the remnant like a trench dagger.
"Ha! You think that toothpick can stop my blade? Reclessly suicidal!"
"Whether I can or not is something we'll only know once I've tried," Wrangel spat.
"Indeed, the words of a typical dreamer. Come then, try to entertain me." Nikolai's eyes flashed with a predatory hunger, his initial rage cooling into a more calculated cruelty.
"I shall decorate this forest with your blood, traitor."
"It won't be mine, Inspector," Wrangel replied. "It will be yours."
The two men clashed once more amidst the frost-covered trees.
***********************************
"Masha! Where is Masha? Where did that brat run off to!"
"Wasn't Masha part of the evacuation team? I told her to start packing her things..."
"She's on the combat team, you idiot! Get her here, now! Comrade Chairman ordered every able-bodied fighter to assemble!"
Wrangel was fighting alone against the imperial agent.
Mobilize every available person. Those were my orders.
The response wasn't perfectly disciplined, but the villagers moved with a desperate urgency I hadn't expected. They began to cluster in the village square.
"Lyova, present. Seva... where the hell is Seva?!"
"Here!"
"Right. Let's see... Alexi!"
The appointed local cadres went down the list. By the time they finished the headcount, over sixty men and women had gathered. In terms of pure numbers, it was more than enough to overwhelm a single man.
"Listen. We have to move quickly," Comrade Maxim urged, his face pale with worry. "Wrangel is the best fighter we have, but even he has his limits. He's at his breaking point."
"I understand, Maxim. Just wait a moment longer."
I left Comrade Maxim—who was practically chanting his concerns under his breath—and looked out at the faces of the people. Some were grinning at the prospect of earning a 'revolutionary' distinction; some were sick with worry for their comrade; others were paralyzed by the looming shadow of their own mortality.
Amidst this sea of conflicting emotions, I raised a spear of my own—this one adorned with a crudely fashioned red flag.
I marched toward them.
Several men spotted me and shouted, "Let's save Comrade Wrangel! We cannot afford to lose him!"
These were the ones who had fought beside him, the ones who truly understood the stakes. I looked into their eyes and nodded firmly.
"Naturally. We go now. To save a comrade. I will take the vanguard."
I placed myself at the front of the column, signaling my intent to lead from the front. I began to run toward the forest.
The soldiers—the peasants I had turned into soldiers—followed. Behind them, even the old men, including one grandfather who refused to stay behind for his granddaughter's sake, joined the march. The revolutionary column surged forward into the white tundra.
************************************
"Dull! Quite dull!"
"Ghuak!"
Nikolai's boot slammed into Wrangel's stomach. The veteran warrior let out a pained wheeze as he was thrown backward, his body a map of lacerations and shallow stabs. Only through sheer instinct had he avoided a fatal blow to his vitals thus far.
"Yawn... the novelty is wearing off. Shall we end this? It seems your 'comrades' were too cowardly to come for you after all." Nikolai stood over him, chuckling darkly.
"Shut... shut up... I'm not finished yet."
"Ha! Fools often mistake ignorance for courage. You fit the bill perfectly. Goodbye, rebel."
With another sneer, Nikolai approached the trembling man. He delivered a casual, cruel kick that sent Wrangel spiraling into the trunk of a white birch tree.
"Gugh! Hek!"
"Oops! My foot slipped."
Wrangel's blood painted a grotesque, crimson streak across the pale bark of the birch. He leaned against the tree, his breathing shallow and ragged.
Nikolai stepped closer once more, kneeling to bring his face level with Wrangel's. He tapped the flat of his blade against Wrangel's blood-soaked shoulder.
"I'll admit, it was interesting for a moment. You actually managed to scratch me."
Indeed, a bloom of red was spreading across the abdomen of Nikolai's imperial uniform. The stain was widening with every passing second.
"It was fun! Until you lost your weapon, of course. Then you became a bore."
Wrangel's eyes drifted to the distance, where the broken spear-shaft and the bloody tip lay forgotten in the snow.
Nikolai pressed the edge of his greatsword against Wrangel's throat. "Tell you what. I'll give you a chance. Say one thing, and I might choose not to kill you here."
He leaned in, his voice a venomous whisper. "Say: 'I am a dog. I swear eternal loyalty to the Great Empire.' Go on. Say it."
Wrangel's lips mumbled something unintelligible. Nikolai's face lit up with sadistic delight.
"Haha! Yes! That's it! Say it, you cur! Hurry up and say—"
Thwipt!
Wrangel gathered the bloody phlegm in his throat and spat it directly into Nikolai's eyes.
The inspector recoiled with a shriek of primal rage, clutching his face as the gore blinded him.
"Aaagh! You filthy animal! You piece of shit! I should have slaughtered you instantly!"
Blinded and hysterical, Nikolai began swinging his massive sword wildly in every direction. "Where are you?! Where are you, you bastard?! I'll kill you! I'll tear your soul out!"
He flailed about, his blade suddenly catching on something hard.
"What is this? A tree?"
As the stinging pain in his eyes receded enough for him to blink them open, Nikolai realized his blade hadn't hit a tree. Wrangel was gone—no, he was being carried away by several men who had appeared from the shadows, supporting his broken body.
"You cowards!"
Nikolai grunted, heaving with all his might to wrench his sword free from the wood. He prepared to lunged at the retreating group.
Or rather, he tried to.
"Where do you think you're looking? Your fight is with us!"
"Strike! Surround him! We have the numbers!"
"Archers, ready!"
A wall of commoners—armed with crossbows, spears, hoes, shovels, and flails—blocked his path. Utilizing their overwhelming numerical advantage, they began to press him back.
Nikolai stared at them, his eyes bloodshot and bulging, before unleashing a savage horizontal swing. "Back!"
"Eeek!"
"Help!"
The peasant line wavered. Several men at the front recoiled in terror, their formation fracturing. But then, the cadre leaders took charge.
"The line is breaking! Loose the arrows!"
"Fire!"
A volley of bolts and arrows hissed through the air. These were hunters who had spent decades stalking the Ursus forests; their aim was true.
Yet, Nikolai was a veteran of the Empire's meatgrinder. "You think these toys can touch me?!"
With frightening precision, he parried the incoming projectiles or sidestepped them entirely.
"He—he's a monster!"
"He batted them out of the air!"
The fearful villagers began to step back again. The encirclement was on the verge of collapsing.
"Heh... this is the 'people' for you. A bunch of cowards who crumble the moment their momentum breaks. I'll kill every single one of you here."
Nikolai raised his sword against a single villager who had become isolated from the pack.
"H-Help me!" The man raised his hoe in a desperate, futile defense.
It was then that a voice cut through the chaos.
"That's enough bullying for today!"
A spear trailing a red flag flew through the air like a bolt of lightning.
"What?!" Nikolai pivoted mid-swing to bat the spear aside with his greatsword.
The deflection was successful, but it cost him his focus on the enemy right in front of him.
"HYAAAAH!"
Thud!
The sharp prongs of a hoe buried themselves deep into Nikolai's shoulder.
"AARRGGHH!"
The Inspector stumbled back, the pain shattering his momentum. The spell of his invincibility was broken.
"He isn't immortal! Look, he bleeds! Tighten the circle!"
"Archers! Reload and fire on my command!"
The villagers surged forward again, their fear replaced by a frenzied bloodlust. They closed the gap, forming a hedge of sharp steel and rusted iron around him.
"You coward traitors... do you have any idea who you're touching?!" Nikolai screamed, swinging his sword one more time. But this time, though the villagers flinched, they did not retreat.
Thwack!
"Gugh!!"
An arrow found its mark, sinking deep into his gut. While he staggered, the villagers moved in for the kill.
Crunch!
"Ack!"
A pitchfork pierced his right forearm, pinning his sword hand.
"Die!"
Shlick!
A spear tip erupted through his chest from behind. The force of the blow shattered the imperial medals pinned to his breastplate.
Clatter!
"You... you sons of bitches...!!"
Despite his curses, there was nothing Nikolai could do. The 'rebel' peasants swarmed him, forcing him to his knees and wrenching his arms behind his back.
Finally, the man who would oversee his end approached. It was Pyotr, the Village Head.
"E-Elder! You shouldn't be here in your condition!"
"I... I will finish this," Pyotr rasped. "This mess happened because of me. Because of my granddaughter. May I borrow that?"
"Of course! Take it!"
He took a heavy threshing flail from a nearby farmer. Despite his age and the tremor in his hands, his frame was still solid, a testament to a lifetime of hard labor in the Ursus soil.
"You senile old fool! Betraying the Empire for a dying brat?! Do you not fear the Emperor's wrath?!" Nikolai screamed, still spitting vitriol even in his shattered state.
Pyotr looked down at him with an expression of cold, hollow indifference.
"Yes, I am an old man. An old man who cast aside his country to save his granddaughter."
The old man knelt. Vladimir Park stepped forward to support him, lending his strength to the elder's weary frame.
With Vladimir's help, Pyotr continued. "But tell me... is a nation not supposed to exist for its people? If a country discards its citizens simply because they have Oripathy, what meaning does that country have? Why should I give my loyalty to a void?"
Nikolai prepared to spit at the old man as he neared the end of his speech, but Pyotr was faster.
"Save your breath for hell!"
Thwack!
"Guk! Kehg!"
Nikolai couldn't even manage a spit. His front teeth were shattered by the flail's strike, tumbling out onto the frozen dirt.
Pyotr stood up straight. He signaled the end of the play.
"My answer is this: It was the Empire that betrayed its people first. I did not betray my country; my country abandoned me. Now, get out of our village."
Pyotr raised the heavy flail high above his head.
Then, with the full weight of a grandfather's grief, he brought it down.
"This... is our will."
Blood splattered against the white bark of the birches. The gore of a butcher, who had long terrorized the weak, was finally returned to the earth.