novelzi Chapter 233 – The Beaches of Rilia
Chapter 233 – The Beaches of Rilia
Agrita, in her heavy plate armour, armed with spear and shield, jumped off the roof of the train as she looked out over a beach in eastern Rilia. Her land, no matter what anyone else said, was the most beautiful in all Epa. The tall cliff immediately behind the beach, the multitude of stairs carved out into the rock for men to walk down, the benches and villas placed high on the cliffs, now empty. The lone trees that peered over the cliff to gaze out onto the ocean. The magnificent Sun above was only rising in the dawn, casting long shadows onto the ocean and the sea beyond the beaches. If there wasn’t an invasion going on, Agrita would have taken a moment to enjoy the view.
But there was an invasion going on, and Agrita had been sent to this location. The land here was mountainous and grassy, Agrita could not even begin to consider how the White Pantheon thought moving onto Rilia from the eastern coast would be feasible. But frankly, she assumed Fortia knew better than her. There was no reason to have an ego here, maybe if it was some minor invention from Olympiada, Agrita could argue, but against the Goddess of Peace? The woman who led the White Pantheon’s forces against Kassandora’s Legions? No. Agrita was not going to start pretending she was a better strategist than Fortia. Not today.
“STOP!” She shouted to her unit. Each Epan army was fielded in a different way. Rancais and Doschia had both amassed their troops into overwhelming forces, but Rilia had too long of a coastline to defend. If one of the major Divines came, then a retreat would be called. Saksma and Olonia had both grown the stupidity to somehow think they could match Fortia in combat, but Agrita knew that wouldn’t happen. They couldn’t defeat Kavaa yet, and she saw how Fer had handled Kavaa.
Fortia and Maisara were simply in different leagues. If Agrita saw them, she would order a retreat immediately. But what was the chance of that? Sonar from ships and stations said that there were more than forty different armies approaching Rilia under the ocean. It was a short walk across the sea from Gracya. News said that Allian ships were being intercepted by mermen and sea-monsters. That wasn’t surprising frankly, the White Pantheon had plenty of friends. “AIM! AT THE BEACH!”
Two forces had already landed elsewhere in Rilia, both had been small scouting forces of a few hundred bronze-clad Guardians. Both had been quickly routed by men armed with the Weapon Divines that had been rescued from Drayim. Both had been recorded by drones. Agrita could have watched those videos a thousand times, and she still would struggle to believe what she saw.
But now, the same scene was unfolding before her. The ocean was retreating in an unnatural manner, as if it was preparing to unleash a tidal wave on that thin beach. And then the water stopped, it started to swirl and spin like a carousel. And it spun itself until a tunnel was opened in the ocean. As if it had just been dug out of a stone mountain. A tunnel formed in the ocean, as if a giant snake had just burrowed out of the water and left a giant opening.
Inside, through that opening, men with flashlights were slowly marching towards the beach. It would be good if Agrita could find whoever it was that was creating these underwater tunnels, she was sure that some magician could be shot to collapse them, but that was a question that would not be answered today. The first man left the tunnel, turned off his flashlight and looked up at the beach, the cliffs that immediately followed it. There was a set of stairs for civilians here, most had been evacuated or chased away by Agrita’s forces to make sure they would not be hurt in the crossfire of the battle.
The men behind her started to take position, lying on the ground, rifles in front of them as they crawled towards the edge of the cliff. They were only here to mop up the survivors, Agrita turned to look at the train that had brought her here. Rilia had an expansive train network, it was easier to lay rail around cliffs than it was to excavate a wide section of rock in order to clear enough space for a road. And those rails gave Rilia the unique opportunity to use these.
A steel monster so grand it was almost farcical, it was a train. This one came with the main engine and three wagons. Two armed with massive cannons, the calibres were large enough for Agrita to stick her entire leg into the barrel. The third wagon, sandwiched between those two gun-carts, sat one filled with ammunition. Pistons were hissing as arms were extending out from the base of the cart, the rails themselves groaned as the guns turned. Men ran out, some fixed steel supports to the wagon, others were running on the structure of the train, on those thin platforms, most without even a railing, and small cranes were ferrying the shells from the ammunition wagon to the guns themselves, with each shell being as large as a man’s entire torso.
This was the first time Agrita had seen them in action. The Cannone di Leonardo, named after the engineer who had designed the monster. Agrita took a step back as the engineers started pulling leavers, more pistons hissed, the two railway guns slowly crept upwards. Their barrels casting long shadows as they started their calibrations. When Agrita had seen them, she was sure they would not work. Now, seeing the rails strain as the cannon’s moved, seeing the supports being driven into the ground, she still doubted it. Even as the metallic tang of oil and that smell clean steel always, the engineers that were mere ants scurrying on the two metal colossi, even as it all worked so beautifully together, Agrita could do not see how something so large could ever work.
“FIRING IN TEN!” One of the engineers shouted from the highest pointed of the ammunition wagon. Other men were signalling to him, and Agrita took a step back, towards the cliff. She drove her spear into the ground and made sure to hold on, just in case. She turned back to look off the cliff. In the distance, on the other side of the beach, more Rilian soldiers had positioned themselves to block off the route south. “NINE!” The engineer started counting down.
“EIGHT!” The set-up had taken so long that the Guardians had all made it onto the beach, and that underwater tunnel which had allowed them to step onto Rilian soil had closed.
“SEVEN!” Agrita felt her fingers tighten around her spear.
“SIX!” She saw the around her put earplugs into their ears.
“FIVE!” Most of the followed up the earplugs by sticking their entire fingers in.
“FOUR!” Agrita supposed she should do the same.
“THREE!” The sound of the engineer’s count-down was somewhat muffled now.
“TWO!” Agrita squinted, half of her still in disbelief and half of her excited.
“ONE!” Here it went.
“FIRE!”
The explosion came first. Then the wind. Agrita was almost knocked off her feet as her ears started to rings. Her nose forgot how to breath, her mouth forgot how to close. Her ears started to ring as she fell down onto her knees. Her vision went dull for a moment, and she had to blink that stunned feeling away.
Agrita’s eyes re-focused on the Guardians on the beach. If she were a human, she would have missed it. But she was Divine, and she saw the two large shells crashing down upon them. They came from almost straight above, as if the Heavens themselves had decided to smite that part of Rilian sand on this day.
For one moment, there was a beach, the rolling seaside, Fortia’s Guardians in their bronze-gold armour organizing themselves into parties. Some had noticed the sound and were quick enough to react and look up. Others were still reacting, looking around at the cliffs in confusion. Agrita was sure a few of them had seen her.
And the next moment, there was two massive eruptions. She had expected fireballs but somehow, these two defeaning eruptions were more impressive. Agrita watched as those men in that gold-bronze armour scattered on the beach. She watched as they were flung upwards by the huge explosions from her artillery, it was just two, and they had just singlehandedly stopped an entire invading force. She had thought she’d need to go down and assist them, to duel with the leading Divine, but no. Nothing like that, Fortia had not even sent a Divine to support these men. Was that why the White Pantheon had lost in Kirinyaa? Because this is how they fought? That was no surprise then that Kassandora could defeat them even when her nation was put under a global embargo. Frankly, Epa should be free rather than under the boot of people who threw lives away so carelessly as Fortia had just done.
Agrita allowed herself a smile. This war was going to be easier than she thought.