chsdbacks Chapter 28 Geralt's Exhaustion
Chapter 28 Geralt's Exhaustion
Three days and nights of meditation made Kilyam's senses exceptionally sharp.
When the first tremor came from underground, his body, which was sitting cross-legged in the center of the tent, did not move at all. Even the black hair hanging over his shoulders did not tremble with his breath. However, the mutated nerves under his skin had already converted the tremor into a clear signal.
That wasn't the sound of horses' hooves, nor the beat of drums, but a muffled thud, accumulated from the impact of giant logs striking rammed earth, emanating from beyond the horizon. La Valéry's walls were being gnawed away. A second wave of tremors followed, twelve heartbeats later.
He mentally calculated the interval—the catapults. At least twenty. Foltest had clearly not been frugal with the oren from his national treasury in this civil war.
The Witcher's distinctive vertical pupils narrowed into two golden lines in the darkness, and his nostrils were filled with the musty smell of a military tent and the pungent odor of evaporating sword oil.
The sudden commotion outside the tent confirmed his judgment. Three warhorses were galloping southeast, the crisp sound of their iron hooves crushing the morning dew mingling with the clanging of messengers' armor. He could even discern that the iron on the left hind hoof of one of the horses was slightly loose, and the sound of the nail hitting the ground was slightly different from the other three hooves.
"Master! His Majesty summons you!"
The young soldier's voice trembled, and Kilyam could clearly hear the sound of his Adam's apple bobbing. He deliberately slowed the tightening of his wrist guards, making the rustling of the leather exceptionally clear in the silent tent. So that those outside would know he wasn't talking to a humanoid monster.
Even through the tent, Kilyam could seem to sense the fear of the soldier outside. He suddenly flung open the tent flap, and the cold morning air, carrying the acrid smell of burning tar, rushed out.
The soldier staggered back half a step, almost tripping over a bundle of damp straw. In the morning light, a pair of dark gold, vertical pupils, like the forked tongue of a venomous snake, were momentarily fixed on his acne-covered face. The rumors that witchers were monsters who only knew how to kill seemed to be true, and now His Majesty was finally going to use this trump card to quell the rebellion.
"lead the way."
Kiliam spoke, his voice low and devoid of any superfluous syllables. The soldier nodded stiffly, almost scrambling to his feet as he turned. He carefully drew a blessing symbol of the goddess Meriteli on his neck, as if he didn't want the Serpent Master behind him to see it.
Giliam saw it, of course. He just didn't say anything. He couldn't help but be angry at such a small gesture; after all, he wasn't a real monster.
The open plain in front of the military camp was already filled with huge heavy catapults.
As their boots pounded across the muddy training ground, twenty massive catapults roared menacingly. It wasn't a poetic roar, but a reverberation of wood groaning under stress, cast-iron hinges whistling from immense torque, and hundreds of taut ropes humming simultaneously. Before each launch, the entire camp seemed to hold its breath for half a second.
Kiliam paused to observe these war behemoths. Each machine required forty burly men to operate the winch, their upper bodies bare, sweat streaming down their backs despite the cold, rising in the morning light. The torsion arms, constructed of iron and wood, were wrapped with cables soaked in pine oil, which made them strong and resilient. The oil gleamed a dark red in the sunlight, like a layer of unwashed old blood.
As the engineer waved his red flag, massive, 500-pound stone projectiles whistled through the air, exploding into a rain of stones against the walls of La Valédi Castle. Each time a stone struck the wall, a small section of the tower's carvings vanished from view, followed by a faint, yet still audible, scream from somewhere on the other side of the wall. The uneven impacts of the stones accumulated in the morning mist, resembling the teeth marks left by a giant beast repeatedly gnawing at its prey.
These heavy catapults were loaded with heavy stones quarried nearby, requiring no careful polishing. These angular stones, after being forcefully struck onto the triggers by nearby soldiers, would become symbols of destruction, crashing into the castle walls. The engineers clearly had no interest in aesthetics; all they wanted was destruction.
Once stones pelted La Valéry's castle, the unpolished stones, unable to cause significant damage to the castle or its inhabitants through continuous rolling after landing, clearly demonstrated that their destructive power was not diminished much, given the cratered and mangled walls. Those jagged cuts created more footholds on the walls and could even give the defenders the illusion of being torn apart by wild beasts.
After watching for only a short while, Kilyam realized that Foltest was absolutely superb in siege warfare. He was like a calm butcher, dissecting his prey piece by piece, knowing exactly where every joint was.
Geralt had been waiting for a while on the dusty ground that had been shaken up.
The Wolf School witcher leaned against a broken flagpole, likely severed by a stray arrow, the splinters still fresh. His right hand unconsciously rubbed his temple; after several days and nights apart, he seemed inexplicably weary. His stubble was an inch longer than the last time they met, clearly unkempt.
He wondered if he had secretly accepted some demon-hunting commission, or if someone had kept him up all night. Giliam found both possibilities amusing, but his face remained expressionless.
Almost identical to Gigliam's equipment, Geralt also carried two swords on his back: a silver sword to slay demons and monsters, and a steel sword to kill humans who were even more evil than monsters. On the entire continent, only one kind of person carried swords in this way: those belonging to their dying profession.
The Wolf School is a very traditional school of thought. They don't like to wear heavy armor like the Bear School, looking like knights under a baron. Nor do they wear leather armor, which is merely symbolic, like the Cat School, in order to ensure agility.
A deep indigo tanned leather coat reached mid-thigh, with grey Caldra leather trim at the elbows that gleamed matte in the damp air. Combined with armor plates protecting vital areas, this constituted Geralt's entire protective gear. Such equipment maintained a degree of defense without overly hindering his agility.
Gilliam nodded to Geralt. He was about the same height as Geralt, perhaps even slightly taller, which allowed him to easily look him in the eye. He could see the dark circles under Geralt's eyes, suggesting he hadn't slept well. The long-haired red-haired sorceress wasn't beside Geralt; perhaps she couldn't accept getting up so early.
"Where is your sorceress?" Giliam asked. "I thought she would follow you like a cocoon around its larva."
Geralt paused for a second as he adjusted his sword belt. "Triss is checking the protective barrier. You know, sorceresses are always busy."