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The original was posted on /r/hfy by /u/Napsarion on 2024-09-27 21:10:35+00:00.

She had been fighting for a day now.

The woman spun and slit a flanking Striker’s throat with a dagger slash, taking two more Strikers down in quick succession as she stabbed one in the eye and kicked the other in the chest, sending him tumbling down with broken ribs . There was a sizable pile of bodies around her now, though it was only a small portion of the Striker army.

Ashyn was the commanding officer of a 400-soldier battalion assigned to guarding a section of the Southern Passes from raiding bands who sought the bountiful lands to the North. Last night, her scouts had reported on the arrival of a five thousand-strong Striker raiding band, the largest she’d ever heard of.

With the average Striker standing at 8ft tall, their pale-blue skin and deep, glassy yellow eyes made for an imposing figure. They had only developed rudimentary societal structures, and no raiding band had ever surpassed 400 members. Until now.

In the face of such overwhelming numbers, the officer had immediately ordered a retreat in order to seek reinforcements at Fort Hope, a day away from her current position. Strikers were fast, however, and, while she wouldn’t send her men to die, letting them cross the Passes would be incredibly dangerous, for this was no raiding band, but a full-on conquering force. As such, Ashyn stayed behind, alone.

Several Strikers threw obsidian-tipped spears at her, and she immediately moved to dodge them. The woman drew Strength from her sapphire amulet, enhancing her physical abilities beyond that of a regular human, grabbing a spear in the air and hurling it back to its thrower, piercing the Striker in the chest in a burst of deep blue blood. As she did this, three more of the creatures approached her sides, one producing a gash in her waist before she took him down with a stab to the throat, rapidly disposing of the other two with an inhumanely fast sweeping motion, severing their legs as they fell to the ground.

As the sun rose and fell, she kept going, kept alive from the various severe wounds she’d received by the Strength within the sapphire, which had begun to run out as the gem started cracking and fading into a light blue gray. Strength could not heal her, but it could keep her alive from any except the most dire of wounds. Ashyn had the resolve of steel, and a willpower fueled by the lives of her men at stake, which would be lost should she fail. 

She moved like the wind itself, her adorned officer’s cape flowing behind her, now stained with Striker blood, mixed with some of her own, and filled with various holes and cuts from the prolonged battle. As she killed more and more of their ranks, they grew agitated, and she could see an uncharacteristic emotion in some of their faces — Fear.

Here, after nearly two days of fighting, nearly six hundred corpses lay strewn about all around Ashyn. The Strikers had not stopped coming, for, despite their fear, they could see her wounds stacking up, and movements becoming sluggish despite her Strength. She would soon be overwhelmed, more and more Strikers approaching her in an attempt to swarm the lone warrior.

Suddenly, as First Light broke, marking the second day of the battle, a blowing horn was heard, announcing the arrival of the reinforcements her men had gone for. Soon after, drums came from the other side, a sort of signal, and the Strikers started to retreat.

Hope had arrived. Her people would be safe.

A fleeing Striker hurled one final obsidian spear at her, turning back on his way without checking where it went. The spear hit her in the chest, breaking the amulet, and with it her final sliver of Strength. There, Ashyn, commanding officer of the 512th Battalion of the Rose Republic, died, with a smile on her lips.

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Hello everyone. For those who recognize my name, its been a while huh? This is very much my first time writing a fighting scene so I hope it was nothing too terrible, this story started gnawing at me earlier in the day and I was forced to write it down lest I suffer for the rest of the week due to a sudden creativity burst.

Additionally, my apologies to those of you who were expecting a continuation to my last couple stories, I might revisit that at some point though I just wasn’t happy with what I tried to write and ended up dropping it for the time being.

On a final note, thank you for reading through this one! Feedback is, as always, appreciated.