Legendary: Darkness Awakes

Chapter 11- The Monarch's Summons

They rode back to Shira that morning, tired and ready to return home, but they still had about half a day to go. Daniel, Cole, Lucy and Tim rode near each other on their journey back "Hey, you think Nina's going to be alright?" Daniel asked them, staring forward without turning to face them.

"It's very rare to see a case in which a person exposed to the sporeshroom spores are put into a coma or poisoned to the point of sickness. I'm sure she'll be fine, plus Ben has been working closely with the medical teams recently, I think he wants to become a field doctor." Tim said in an attempt to reassure him.

"Yeah, I'm sure she'll pull through." Lucy added with a hopeful smile.

"She's tough, it'll take more than a stupid cloud of spores to take her out for the count." Cole chimed in with the same wide open smile, a bandage on the side of his head, another scar to add to the left side of his face. Their effort to comfort him worked, making him feel better and smile as well.

A couple minutes of peaceful riding was then interrupted as something approached from the horizon. "ENEMY HORDE INCOMING AT TWELVE O'CLOCK!" A soldier from the vanguard shouted.

"We'll push through! Only fight if you have to!" General Ashdown ordered as they entered the cloud of enemies that were none other than sentinals, the vanguard shouted in brave battle-cries, as they cut through the threats, spraying blood to the ranks behind them as the whole army charged through, like a spear through a wall of flesh. As far as Daniel could tell, there were at least a hundred if not more, swarming them. A sentinal then made a b-line for Daniel, one with razor sharp teeth and cut opened mouth, the most dangerous variation of sentinals. However, instead of trying to bite a chunk out of him like a drumstick, it tackled him off of his horse onto the sharp blades of grass and into the paths of his rushing comrades, some of which were also thrown off their horses.

The sentinal put Daniel on his back and tried to tear his throat out but he was quicker, pulling out his pistol and firing into its torso three times, effectively shredding its insides, but also temporarily deafening him. He slid the corpse off of himself and stood back up, seeing his comrades fighting well against the sentinal horde inspired him. Two more sentinals flew at Daniel, both their jaws sealed, he drew his sword and fought, the first one reached for him, but he cut its arm off as the other tried to claw him, it missed and was cut in half before Daniel returned to the other and beheaded it. Its top half tried to crawl away, desperate to consume the souls of the living as its organs trailed behind it, finally dying as it was drained of blood within seconds. A few hours later, the battle was over, they had prevailed as much of the army was forced to fight, the sentinal horde was wiped out and the entire army stopped to take care of any wounded from the battle, eating before they resumed their journey.

After they ate, Daniel pulled out his Creature Guide and turned to the chapter about sentinals. Tim sat across from him on the ground "Hey Tim, do you ever wonder who the sentinals used to be?" Tim lowered his field rations and looked at him.

"Huh! What do you mean by that?"

"I mean before they changed, have you ever thought about what kind of person they used to be before they became these monsters, a criminal, a soldier, a civilian, a brother, a friend..." Daniel asked again, looking down into his own lap.

"Why are you thinking about such things?"

"It's-it's just the fact that sentinals are just diseased humanoids is disturbing to me in a way...that's all..." Daniel explained.

"Well, I think it just depends on how you look at it. I mean, let me ask you a question, do you think they like being like that?" Tim asked, Daniel responded with the obvious answer with a shake of the head. "See, I think of it like I'm freeing them from their monstrous prison, and of course you can say some of them could've been criminals and murderers, but I think of it as freeing them to go on to the afterlife, whether that's heaven or hell, the gods will decide." Tim explained.