Strategies For Mountains and Valleys
"Hhn. We're in trouble," Smiling Tao said, his red cheeks a cheerful counterpoint to the gravity of his words.
"You think?" Choshu Ishi looked around. He stood at the head of a talon of his men, in a thin valley between two hills. A scale of enemy archers in skirmish order topped the hill to his left, with arrows knocked and ready to fire; the other carried a scale of close-packed heavy cavalry, riding Marukani Battlers and armed with lances that seemed pointier than was strictly necessary - the vengeful remains of Mayhiros Xenon's Black Thunder Lancers. Both units looked well-rested, like they'd been waiting on those hills forever.
Ishi's own troops, a double line of mixed infantry and cavalry, were ordered for march, not battle. Weary from the road, they still sensed the danger of being penned in and shifted their feet, trying to face every direction at once. Soi Fang and Ashitare Wei, relays of The Qinglong Alliance rode up and down the line, holding their banners up in the Rout-Stemming Gesture. "Steady," they called. "Steady!"
The Ivory Dragon drew his sword, Hidden Riches, and the ground shifted beneath him, steadying his stance. "If we form in close, shields high against the arrows and spears set against the horses. Our own cavalry could circle around the hill..." He caught Tama Gui's eye and gave the Gunchei of The Zhuque Brotherhood a subtle nod.
Tao shook his head. "Not on the hills. Them. Over there." The fat man nodded ahead along the ravine floor, where two riders sat ready. The first was Mayhiros Xenon, seemingly healed from their earlier encounter, but Ishi didn't recognize the second. She wore a suit of gunzosha armor beneath an undecorated war-robe and held a signaling fan in her hand. But her most distinguishing feature was the mask she wore - a passionless face of glazed white porcelain, painted red around the lips and eyes. Its resemblance to the human was only superficial.
"Mayhiros Xenon and... uhm... another Dragon-Blood? So what? We still have numbers, discipline and training on our side."
"Not another Dragon-Blood. Or not just another, anyway," Tao said. "There's something about that mask..."
"It has a demon's face?"
"No..."
"Yes, it does." Ishi pointed at the mask with his free hand; Tao gave him a cross look.
"I think it's one of Shalrina's masks."
"Whose?"
"The Face-Craft Masks are magic - they channel the faces they show. A demon's face can give you extra power in battle and war, or in sorcery."
Ishi brandished Hidden Riches. "That's nothing; every dragon has some bit of wonder to call his own."
"This is different. You have to be skilled already to get one of the Face-Craft Masks; they come dear. And that's a mask made with the Face-Craft Mastery Spirit."
Ishi sighed. "You're sure?"
"Very."
"Then we're in trouble."
In Mountains, Occupy the Heights[edit]
Mayhiros Xenon all but bounced in his saddle as Choshu Ishi, unwitting, marched his talon into the valley. "We've got them now. Order the archers to fire and I'll..."
"No," said Xenon's companion, a woman who rode no horse and whose face was locked away behind a white porcelain mask - a woman named Waterless Rain, the Lost General.
"What do you mean, 'no?'" said Xenon. "He's got no formation, he's perfectly vulnerable to an arrow attack!"
"The sages say that the art of warfare is the art of deception. Is Choshu Ishi vulnerable or does he only wish to make himself seem so? If the later, we waste our moment on archery; if the former, superior tactics will serve to crumble his forces just the same." Waterless Rain turned her head towards Xenon; he could just make out her eyes behind the mask, and they were as placid as the face she wore. "If he is vulnerable, though, he is not the superior foe you said was worthy of my emergence from seclusion."
Xenon suppressed a shudder. "I fought him at Madai and found him crafty, if over-bold. But this Ivory Dragon isn't the foe I told you about. He is but a servant."
"Superior masters have superior servants."
"Then push your skill at war to its limit. Defeat the servant to draw out his masters."
Waterless Rain sighed; it was a sound of resignation, the noise of one who is long used to the world's small disappointments and has come to accept them as unavoidable. "A simple task, if he can't draw upon the power of his Essence. Behold!"
The strategos stamped her foot into the dirt and snapped her hand forward in the three-fingered gesture of the Essence-Disruption Attack. Static Earth Essence poured into the Ivory Dragon and his two song-filled relays, sealing off their chakras, while a backlash of Essence poured through Rain's anima, kicking dust high into the air and raising a legion of terra cotta warriors from the earth.
"Second formation," the enemy commander shouted, and his relays took up the call. Waterless Rain saw the pair posture, but only the Ivory Dragon could muster up the inner will to use a Charm; the air around him glowed as he invoked an Aura of Invulnerability. The Essence of the extra effort bled into his anima and a towering colossus of stone rose solid-spectral around him. This Choshu Ishi was brave, Rain had to grant him that, and he had his men's loyalty - none of them hesitated when he called for their rush forward, towards her and Xenon.
"But his bravado outweighs his intellect after all," Rain said, and she invoked the Elemental Battlefield. The earth shook, stone columns shot up from the ground and the terra cotta warriors of her anima rushed forth en mass to grapple with the enemy. Only Choshu Ishi, Ivory Dragon that he was, held firm; his men and horses staggered left and right, fighting just to keep their feet beneath them let alone press their charge.
That was when Rain waved on the archer's first volley.
But Choshu Ishi's men were just too damn good. Even when they couldn't charge they kept to small, five-man fangs, held their shields above their heads and turned back most of the arrows. Ishi hung back with his men and dropped into the Five-Dragon Form.
Waterless Rain breathed deep. She closed her eyes of flesh and opened her inner eye as she shaped a spell of the Emerald Circle in her mind. She only dimly heard the roars of battle, but the Ivory Dragon's desperate cries of "Arrows! Arrows!" rang clear, and the iron sound of Xenon's spear and horse's hooves told her that at least some of the shots would have struck true despite the Elemental Battlefield. Well-trained men, indeed.
But it was too late for them. Behind her mask, Rain opened her mouth and let loose a cry that sang like a hawk on the hunt as a great bird of fire sped away from her outstretched hand. "Flight of the Brilliant Raptor!"
In Valleys, Deploy for Defense[edit]
As the sorcerous, fiery bird streaked towards him, Choshu Ishi threw out a prayer of thanks to whatever god had given him strength enough to use the Five-Dragon Blocking Technique when his archers let their volley fly. He certainly needed its strength now, with no Essence left to call his own. He cut his white jade sword, Hidden Riches, through the bird's wing and turned its flight.
It wasn't far enough. The bird-spell washed over Ishi and his men, burning past their armor. A moment later, it exploded. The men screamed; some ran, others could only drop to the ground and writhe in pain. The inferno devoured the air like a hungry beast, and still the enemy's terra cotta soldiers clutched at Ishi and his men, trying to force them down.
Ishi stabbed Hidden Riches into the ground and the earth trembled. He supported himself on the blade as he rose, and took a resolute step forward. The spell's flames flickered away, their Essence spent, and the Ivory Dragon saw that Soi Fang and Smiling Tao were still with him, even though the rest of the Scale had scattered. As the trio strode across the scorched earth, Ishi felt the chains of his enemy's Essence Disruption fall away and the Essence he had reclaimed flooded into his arms with the Strength of Stone. "Not yet," he called. "I'm not done yet!"
From where he sat his horse, two hundred yards away, Mayhiros Xenon pointed to Ishi's right. "You will be," he shouted as his twenty five Black Thunder Lancers tipped their spears for the charge and started down the hill. Ishi never broke his stride; he didn't have to.
Tama Gui and The Zhuque Brotherhood leapt from the brush before the Lancers' charge, streaming flame from their fire lances in wide arcs. The Lancers and their mounts were disciplined, but the Brotherhood were beings of terrible magic, and the fires of Cathak Nekuto's anima raced through their skin. They broke the Lancers charge and shattered their formation. Ishi smiled. His plan had worked; in the earth-shaking chaos of battle, no one had noticed the Zhuque Brotherhood slip away from his line.
Xenon cried out in rage and kicked his horse into a furious charge. "No," cried the masked commander from behind him, but she was too late; Essence poured in a cloud off of Xenon, snaked across the ground, forced grass to grow from the beaten earth. Xenon leveled his spear, Pine Needle, and Ishi raised Hidden Riches to meet its strike.
The hills shook with the force of the blow, but Ishi stood unbowed. He saw the enemy commander desperately signal for her archers to fire and their arrows, now lit with pitch, rained down around him as he answered Xenon's stroke with one of his own.
Hidden Riches passed through Xenon's defenses, but the Exalt's armor, Four Layers of Bark, turned the blow aside. The sword shifted in Ishi's hand, as if about to jump free, and the ground buckled beneath him. He was thrown to his back. That's when Xenon came around for his second strike.
Only Soi Fang and Smiling Tao saved Ishi, dashing between him and the blow, buffeting Xenon with a series of harmless, but confusing, strikes until the Ivory Dragon regained his feet.
"Fight me without your lackeys," Xenon said, sneering. "If you have the courage." The Zhuque Brotherhood was working its way around the hill, maneuvering around to deal with the archers, who were already pulling back. Smiling Tao and Soi Fang hovered nearby, waiting for Ishi's command. But the Ivory Dragon's eyes were fixed on the masked woman behind Xenon. He took a step towards her.
"I said fight me!" Xenon spurred his horse between Ishi and his goal, but the Dragon Blood only sped on. He raked Hidden Riches across the ground and when he lifted the blade it trailed glittering quartz, dragged up from the depths of the earth. Blade and quartz struck Xenon with the force of the Mountain Toppling Method, and though the blade sliced through armor and flesh, the quartz took on a glittering dragon's shape, the jaws of which wrapped around Ishi's foe and pinned him in place.
Ishi moved only a handful of paces forward before the enemy commander called to him. "You are more of a challenge than I thought you'd be. I am Waterless Rain."
"Is that what you're here for? A challenge?"
"Aren't you?" Ishi could feel Waterless Rain's smile, even though he couldn't see it behind her mask. "I left my command in Lookshy for seclusion because nothing they fought challenged my skills. Xenon promised that your masters would be a more worthy test of my talents; if you are any measure, I see that he may be right."
"My lords take up arms against the Mask of Winters, Ma-Ha-Suchi and, if they're unlucky, your native Lookshy as well. The Marukan Alliance stands surrounded by enemies on every side. If you would have a true test your talents, let that test be against foes that honed their skills in the First Age."
Waterless Rain was a long time responding. Finally, she said, "Great foes, indeed. But you feel your masters will win their war; that makes them the greater test for me.
"Farewell, Choshu Ishi. We will meet again." Waterless Rain made a two-handed gesture and called forth the Ramparts of Obedient Earth. Ishi surged forward, but Rain's terra cotta warriors fell over each other into his path while great piles of soil tumbled down from the hills and rolled up from the ground. Within moments, a wall of earth blocked off the ravine.
Ishi lead with Hidden Riches and crashed into the wall with the power of his special technique, Submission to the Stone's Judgment. The barrier never stood a chance, but when the dust cleared, Waterless Rain was gone.
The Ivory Dragon sighed and turned back. Soi Fang was rounding up the scattered men, while Smiling Tao was seeing to the wounded. Mayhiros Xenon was gone. Ishi sighed. Being a hero was harder than he thought.
