Chapter 34: The Defense Line That Refuses Life

Night fell.

On the city wall, we stood against the wind, watching our enemies surge forward in madness once again.

Under our gaze, countless Winston soldiers raised torches, carried scaling ladders, and charged forward shouting. I didn’t know what was driving these fanatics. They completely ignored our deadly arrows, sprinting like madmen, crossing the harbor road that had brought them shame and casualties at extreme speed, and set their ladders against the wall.

We should be thankful, because the Winston had originally planned to launch a surprise raid to seize this small town, and had never considered a frontal siege. Apart from scaling ladders, they had brought no large siege equipment, not even a battering ram to smash the gates. But the mere swarm of people was already enough to flood the entire wall.

Armed soldiers with blades clenched between their teeth climbed onto the ladders one after another, step by step pressing toward the top of the wall. In their eyes I saw no fear; all I could see was the frenzy and desire of battle.

A sharp shriek from powerful bowstrings rang in our ears. The last few dozen ballistae left over from the exchange between the city and the ships, following Riley’s decisive choice, finally howled into the most crowded and densest part of the Winston Army. No aiming was needed at all; any single bolt pierced at least three enemy bodies. These weapons, originally meant to attack ships far out on the river with enough power to pierce sturdy ship decks, caused great chaos among the surging Winston crowd. Some people saw with their own eyes a transparent hole suddenly appear in the back of the person in front of them, and before they could cry out in shock, they were carried away by the powerful bolts in the same bloody manner, their souls taken.

Riley, as he had promised, made them perform at maximum effectiveness in battle. At no time could they have caused greater slaughter than they did now. If these mighty weapons had had enough bolts, I thought this battle would have been without any doubt. Unfortunately, just as the enemy below the wall fell into some disorder, we also lost these powerful weapons.

The first Winston soldiers to step onto the ladders had already neared the crenellations. One hand still held the ladder, the other swung their weapons. Most of them, before they could even steady themselves, were pierced by several or even a dozen spears, and without even a single cry, rolled miserably down the wall tower. Most of those who fell from the ladders kept their lives—our wall was not very high—and those with broken bones rolled on the ground wailing in pain, with no one to help them. Their comrades on the chaotic battlefield could barely protect themselves, let alone lend them a helping hand. Some of them struggled to leave the foot of the wall, surviving with their wounds in this death zone; some were robbed of their fragile lives by heavy objects dropped by the defenders on the wall; more of them wailed and groaned weakly, unable to move. No one could guarantee what would become of them; it would depend on the outcome of this battle. And before that outcome appeared, most of them might have already silently become empty shells.

The defenders on the wall hurled all kinds of deadly objects down, though what exactly they threw was uncertain. We did not have much time to find enough war supplies, so we could only rummage through citizens’ homes for substitutes. Clay pots, stone benches, smashed marble statues, crates filled with rubble… The soldiers even tore down a few old, dangerous houses that were unoccupied, carrying bricks, tiles, and logs up to the wall to use as weapons. War sometimes displays an ability possessed by the noblest art: using fear to push people’s imagination and creativity to their limits.

Our collection efforts were very effective: those objects that had originally been harmless or even pleasing were now all stained with blood. A dressing box filled with pebbles smashed a screaming soldier’s brains out—it had originally been the wedding dowry of a sixteen-year-old girl’s mother when she married at sixteen. A millstone crushed a burly soldier into pulp; he would never again smell the rich barley scent on that millstone. The most protruding part of the chest of half a beautiful maiden statue pressed down on a soldier’s lower body. He struggled and groaned, powerless to escape the beautiful weapon’s grip, and could only slowly feel the world turn cold. No one who saw this scene would have thought of indecent amusement; in this place, there was only thought of death. The question of survival was enormous here, so enormous that it filled everyone’s mind, leaving no room for anything else.

I now held a blunt-tipped fork and pushed away the scaling ladders set against the wall again and again. This was not an easy task. The weight coming through the handle was suffocating. Ladders covered with climbing men sometimes required two or even three people working together for a long time to push over. Once I looked up and saw the face of a Winston soldier on the ladder across from me. He was not tall and strong like most of the enemy. He was very young, even younger than me, clearly still a child. He struggled, waving his right hand wildly in the air, his face distorted by fear. At that moment, I almost felt pity for our enemy: an aggressive war harms not only the people who lose their land, but also the soldiers who leave their homes.

But I had no choice. Kill the enemy or be killed by the enemy—this was the unchangeable iron law of the battlefield.

After the ladder fell, I could not help looking at what had become of the young soldier who had fallen. I hoped he was at least still alive; he was so young. He lay pinned under the ladder, blood seeping from the back of his head, his hands and feet twitching constantly, white foam spilling from his mouth. It seemed he would not live.

“Kick them down!” I shouted neurotically, waving my fork. It was not because of any passion for killing, but to hide the too much unease and fear in my heart.

There were too many Winston. Even though we threw their assault soldiers off the wall again and again, the following ranks surged like ants from an emptied nest, never stopping for a moment. They seemed as if they would never stop until they stood where we now stood, took our place, and erased our lives. The overloaded burden made fatigue come faster; some of us began to be unable to withstand it. Gradually, some enemies had already set foot on the wall and were fighting us head-on. The Winston were so close to victory that even we ourselves felt as if we had already failed.

“It’s time. Let’s warm them up!” Riley’s voice suddenly rang out. Then one huge wooden barrel after another was thrown down from the wall, smashing into pieces on the ground. As transparent, slippery liquid splashed out, a sweet, cloying fragrance mixed with the smell of blood spread in all directions.

The soldiers stained by this liquid immediately realized the danger of their situation and cried out in alarm, trying to get away from the foot of the wall, but it was already too late. Torch after torch, in the posture of free fall, drew lines of light across the bleak black curtain of the spring night. When they landed, the scattered torches instantly wove into a complete net of fire, engulfing the soldiers below the wall.

Fire. Fire again. Just when the previous night had not yet fully faded, this gorgeous energy shimmering with danger had already cast a deep shadow in the hearts of the Winston people. Soldiers draped in burning armor finally broke apart. They retreated with howls of misery, only wanting to get as far away as possible from the wall with its flickering beautiful light and shadows. Not many people were actually burned to death. After all, they only needed to take a few steps back to leap into the riverbanks on both sides of the road and put out the flames on their bodies. But this great commotion was already enough to make the enemy below the wall cower and retreat. The soldiers who had already climbed onto the top of the wall lost their support behind them and were quickly swept clean. We were temporarily safe.

What was burning below the wall was forty barrels of ordinary cooking oil that I had stumbled upon while buying supplies. When I handed the money to that honest, timid merchant, perhaps he could never have imagined that his goods would now be flickering so eerily, becoming a hell of slaughter that buries lives.

“You should be ashamed!” The enemy had retreated, and the soldiers on the wall finally got a rare moment of rest. And Riley’s always teasing, sarcastic voice for the first time became so severe. “You actually let your enemies set foot on the land you guard, and even nearly let them take your lives! Do you remember what you promised me, and what you promised your brothers and sisters in the city? You would fight bravely, you would win gloriously, and you would defend your loved ones’ lives with your swords and your blood.”

“Commander, you can be dissatisfied with our fighting, but you cannot insult our courage!” A soldier’s face flushed red, and finally unable to hold back, he rebelled against his young, thin superior. He tore off his armor in a few quick motions, revealing his bare upper body. His body was covered with fresh wounds. Some wounds had not yet healed, and blood was still flowing in streams.

“I prove our courage with my wounds. I have suffered fourteen sword wounds, and not one is on my back! Commander, you cannot question our courage.”

“Put away your wounds, soldier.” Riley, furious, gave this brave soldier a loud slap. “Is being wounded such a great thing? Is being hit something glorious? What you need to do is not send your body onto the enemy’s weapons, but stick your own weapons into the enemy’s body! This is not courage; it is stupidity!”

The soldier’s face suddenly darkened.

“It is stupidity, but I am still proud of you.” The former juggler’s tone shifted. “Not proud of what you have done, but proud of what you are about to do. Tell me, will you once again let those damned murderers set foot on our wall?”

“No!” The soldiers were stirred up. The soldier who had argued with Riley before was especially excited, shouting hoarsely.

“Will you once again let Winston’s mad dogs kill our fellow countrymen?”

“No!”

“Let us swear in the name of the weapons in our hands…” Riley drew his own weapon, solemn and dignified.

“Leave the enemy’s corpses behind. Only the dead can pass through here.”

“Only the dead can pass through here…” The pride of this declaration caused an unusual feeling to rise in everyone’s heart on the wall, making this short, small wall tower no longer the same as it had been a moment before. The soldiers, surging again with immense confidence, let out hoarse yet majestic long howls from their mouths, and strength returned once more to the warriors’ bodies. I no longer believed anything could break through the defense line guarded by these soldiers. What made me believe deeply was that as long as there was still one person, as long as there was still a spear, a short sword swinging, this was an unbreakable defense line.

The way they looked at their commander was clearly different from just now. Unlike the steady Rodrick and the strong Dakla, Riley, who looked somewhat thin and was short in stature, seemed to have nothing that could win a warrior’s respect. But after decisively resolving the crisis on the wall, and especially after rekindling the soldiers’ courage, the defenders on the wall tower were already able to acknowledge his position in their hearts.

Riley stood on the wall, facing us. The towering firelight blazed behind him; we could not see his expression. It was just that, standing there now, silent and still, he made people cannot help but have the illusion that the unremarkable short man standing there was a brick of this wall, a crenellation, a part of this wall, a part of this wall that would never crumble.

As the fire below the wall went out, another attack came. We all knew that this would be the last wave of assaults today. Whether it was us or the Winston, neither could endure a whole day of life-and-death struggle. People always get tired.

But before the final exhaustion came, we still had to fight.

The Winston were surprised to discover that the opponents before them did not seem to be tired soldiers who had already been baptized by a day of battle, but a group of heroic warriors who had just stepped onto the wall. For the soldiers who had already climbed onto the wall, every crenellation was dangerous. The enemy’s attacks came not only from the spears in front, but also from the short knives lurking below the crenellations. No matter how fearlessly you threw yourself into the crowd, you could not disrupt the dense and orderly defense of the defenders. A scene like just now, where someone desperately broke into the crowd and caused chaos, never appeared again. The soldiers used their own actions to keep their oath: only the dead could pass through this defense line!

After Riley set up the defensive formation, he personally led more than a dozen strong soldiers patrolling the top of the wall. He seemed to have a natural keenness for his defense line. He could always arrive first at the area under the greatest pressure, and at the moment the defense was about to fall into disorder, he would strike the Winston who had boarded the wall head-on, helping his soldiers steady their position. When the soldiers here returned to their positions and held fast, he had already appeared in another place, driving the enemies who had stepped onto the wall back down, like a fast-moving solid shield that always appeared in time wherever the enemy attacked most sharply. That was not a tactic, or rather not an orderly and rigid defensive method that could be learned from books, but a behavior purely born of instinct and observation. Riley displayed astonishing reactions that ordinary people did not have at his post, shattering wave after wave of attacks in his fearless fighting.

The final wave of attack, without any suspense, collapsed before the defenders who were like a steel dam. Cheers rang out from the top of the wall. The cheers spread far out of the city, all the way to the Winston warships on the docks not far outside the city.

Today, we won the victory.

Don’t think about tomorrow. At least, for now, we are still alive.

As I slept in my clothes on the top of the wall, I felt this relief.