Though the harpies may have posed little threat to him, the fires would kill all who were caught in them. Dascha had to snap Alisson out of his mania, and they mounted up, and began to dash away. The edges of the forest had yet to catch fire – There was still an open route to escape from. The harpies promptly ignored Alisson to save themselves, trying to evacuate and prepare their brethren for the coming blaze.

  When they reached the edge of the forest, as Alisson expected, the 7th army had deployed to block any escape, and welcomed Alisson back into their lines.

  “Continue the barrage. Let’s hope this wind keeps blowing into them.”

  Alisson ordered, turning his horse toward the burning forests. In the distance, the 7th army’s engineers had deployed several siege weapons that they had brought with them, which now lobed flammable materials into the forest.

  The fires would burn long into the night. Alisson saw harpies catch fire whilst trying to fight the flames, before flying around and burning up in the air. Others tried to rise above the forest, where the smoke choked them out, and left them falling toward the ground helplessly into the fire’s embrace.

  They had successfully brewed a firestorm. The heat of which was able to burn through the thousand-year old trees, and with them, the entire land of the harpies was reduced to a blackened crisp from which no life remained. Some tried to escape and found their way through the flames, to be met with the battle lines of the 7th army. Mages and siege emplacements quickly shot down any fleeing harpies, and those on the ground were overwhelmed by a tide of Nekomata clad in shining white armor.

  In the morning, Alisson ordered the army’s advance into the burnt lands ahead of them.

  “Our path is now clear. Advance.”

  “Forwards, march!”

  The lines of Sidonians crept into the harpy lands, finding survivors and holdouts as they went. A lot more harpies had survived than Alisson had initially estimated. Among them, the brood mother and the diplomat that had disrespected him. He had them brought before him in chains. They begged and pleaded with teary eyes, beseeching his mercy and offering anything he might desire.

  “We will fight for you! You need airpower to defeat Irine, right?! We can help! Please, spare us!”

  Alisson looked upon them with dark eyes. “The Angels are better than you poultry in every way. I don’t need rotisseried oafs in my army.” He looked to Hoffman, the Inquisitor commander of the special police detachment. “Leave one-in-ten, dispose of the rest.”

  Hoffman had but a single following question to ask, which he did in a slow, deep, and crackly voice from under his large helmet, “And of the leaders?”

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  Alisson looked down across the broodmother and the high-ranking harpies. He waved his hand. Hoffman nodded.

  The 7th moved quickly through the harpy lands. Alisson only allowed them one day to rest, recover, and purge the harpies. A small number were kept as prisoners, and would travel with the 7th.

  A command tent had been set up in the center of the burned lands, where Alisson met with his subcommanders.

  “I thank you all for your cooperation thus far. I will now explain why we are here.” Alisson pointed to a map hung up behind him. “The 5th is being pushed back by a large tide of Irinians. Instead of moving to support the 5th, we will do something different.”

  His eyes sharpened. “Using this new corridor, we will swing around the Irinian armies, march to their coast, and cut them off from their supply routes. We will then engage individual Irinian units from behind – In doing so we will annihilate the enemy’s frontline.” He drew a line along the Irinian border. “This will both relieve the 5th and put an end to the immediate threat on our border. We need to be quick with this – Before Irine responds and sends reinforcements and we are placed between two overwhelmingly large masses of humanity. Understand?”

  His commanders nodded.

  “Afterwards, we will march north, on Irine’s capital, and destroy any and all resistance we find. They should be momentarily surprised by our action – And we will be able to penetrate deeply into their territory before meeting a response.”

  Night fell, and the army began to move out once more. The gripes they had welled against him were dispersed with that meeting. His men now grimly moved with determination. This massacre would undeniably lower morale, but with the prospect of wiping out the Irinian frontline instilled in them, no one complained. Alisson saw the work of Hoffman’s unit as he rode past the harpy’s lands:

  Harpies lay skewered on their pikes wherever one looked. He made sure the prisoners gazed upon their dead brethren; he hoped they felt in their souls that these were the consequences of denying Alisson Vi Nuam anything. The bodies of hanging harpies were laden with scripts of the Inquisitorum, which fluttered in the wind, denouncing their corpses as untouchable to any well-to-do Sidonians.

  “Not to rain on your parade master, but…” Firo whispered to him, “Doesn’t this sort of maybe remind you of what Andestine did to Sabasa?”

  He looked to Dascha grimly, wondering if she held his actions against him. “And what of it? Does one need some righteous justification to kill? Does merely thinking differently suddenly vindicate a murderer of sin?” He thumbed the cross on his chest.

  Dascha looked to him guilelessly. She didn’t care. These weren’t her kin. These weren’t her comrades. They were enemies. Even the women. Even the children. All of them.

  “Well it’s not the thought I’m talking about…This wasn’t something you had to do, was it? They forced your hand, right?”

  Alisson looked grimly ahead as Firo spoke. “No, I came here with this in mind. Nothing more. Burning our way through these lands was the fastest option.”

  Firo shut up and they continued forward. Was she really him? She should’ve understood his mind if she had absorbed it. He looked down into his stallion.

  Unless he had changed that much since she’d imprinted on him. He gave a deep sigh to himself and set his eyes forward again.

  The harpy’s had always been a thorn in Sidonia’s side. This was a long time coming. Nothing more needed to be said.

  Utilizing this new corridor, they would strike into the undefended belly of Irine – A land they had thought neutral and impassable which they left undefended. The burning of the flora here opened way for the 7th army to cross into Irinian territory within a single night. Roads were paved by the engineers to make way for future supply wagons to fuel the flame that was the 7th Army.

  ***