Talon carefully applied soothing balms and clean linen to the mercenary's burned arm, his hands shaking slightly. The soldier's sniffles reminded him of his sister, Amelia, and the painful moments he had tended to her childhood scrapes.
The memory hardened his resolve, he would save this young man as he reminded him of his own family.
"You'll be right as rain in a few days," Talon murmured to the groaning soldier. He squeezed the young man's hand, wishing he could take away his pain.
Talon placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder before moving on to the moaning mercenary in the next cot.
His fingers worked swiftly as he secured the bandage, the familiar motions second nature after years of practice. As the soldier sighed in relief, Talon felt the corner of his mouth lift in a slight smile.
"There you are, good as new," he said. The soldier chuckled at the healer's favorite line. Talon made the same joke with every patient, but he enjoyed trying to coax even a flicker of laughter from these battered men. It was the least he could do.
After the man was taken away, Talon slumped down, staring at his stained robes. He had the skill to heal but could not undo the violence that kept him employed.
Talon sighed. If the endless bloodshed could somehow stop, he would happily burn these robes and go home to his family. But as long as men kept fighting, the people needed alchemists.
Wiping the sweat from his brow, Talon looked out over the sea of tents sprawling as far as he could see.
As an alchemist for the Kingdom's army, Talon tended to the countless injured and dying. He struggled to keep up as more arrived each day,
It had only been a month since this hell started, one month, and the number of Alchemists in the Kingdom wasn't enough to heal the amount of injured piling up in their medical tents.
Talon had only taken a short rest and the tent he was stationed in already had 20 more men lying in the blood-dried beds.
No one knew this would happen; in fact, no one knew it would be this bad. Out of nowhere, the mercenaries under the Church unified, and leaders were sprung up on pedestals. It was strange; these mercenaries could lift ten men or survive terrible attacks, it was unnatural.
What ensued could only be described as madness, as a wave of the mercenaries spread through Netherane and killed everything in sight. In a fortnight, the population was slashed, and war began.
The Federation clamored to defend themselves, but they were hit hard by a combination of mercs and the Kingdom's military. War enveloped the entire territory as battles popped up everywhere; no one knew which side the other was on, but it didn't matter.
Come to find, many of the battles were people against their own, and more chaos came from it. And now? Now Talon worked on the biggest battlefield to date, where the Kingdom and Empire used to hold their regular wars.
It was in the plains above the free city; the swamp had been slowly chipped away, and with it, the ground became dry over time due to past Union involvement. Now, this place had become a swamp once again; blood soaked the plains and turned the ground to mud. It was a quagmire of despair and greed.
Reinforcements came daily only to come back annihilated; the Alchemists' reputation was truly on the line. Even with all the rumors of them being better than the Plague Doctors of old, this was their first test to see if they could endure this great reputation they were given.
Talon himself went to a prestigious school of Alchemy in Carc; it was one of the best in the country due to funding from the Church.
He was proud of his title at first, but now he hated it. Every day he woke up to save dead men who were somehow still living. Day in and out, he saw scenes that should tear someone's mind apart.
Yet he pressed on; he had to do this, his teachers and comrades needed him. All he had to do was press on, and he could one day return to his family in Carc.
His sister was soon going to be married, and his mother and father would soon retire; his wife and son were waiting for him while he was away.
He told himself these things as he pressed on against the despair that seeped into the camp. But even so, his mind was crumbling; the war seemed to go on endlessly, day after day, and no progress had been made on either side. Talon felt like he was doomed here for eternity.
But it changed one day; he and many others surrounded a convoy that entered the camp. Soldiers made way as large cages were pulled, draped with a tarp.
People followed as the convoys headed to the edge of the camp and to the frontlines. People seemed drawn to it; their eyes bulged as they looked at the people escorting the convoy.
Defending the cages, steering the horses, even just as normal personnel, each of these people had a symbol on their clothes the people hadn't seen for a long time.
The Church of recent years had been closed off from the outside, and only priests remained, giving sermons and doing their daily duties.
Yet before them was the Church that started this war, the ones who controlled the Kingdom and Mercenaries; they came to the battlefield for the first time ever.
At the edge of the camp, the horse-drawn cages were stopped, and the personnel pulled off the tarp. Gasps entered Talon's ears as his eyes seemed to pop out of their sockets.
"Everyone! Back away, let the war beasts do their job!" The one who seemed to be commanding the rest yelled out orders while everyone acted accordingly.
The cages opened, and hulking grey beasts.-like monsters stepped out and looked up at the sky in a daze.
They had dark grey skin and seemed human in form but with rough stony limbs and empty, glowing eyes no one could call them human.
"Beasts! Charge into the battlefield and eliminate everything you see! Go!"
At the commander's shout, the creatures lumbered forth into the blood-soaked battlefield.
At the commander's shout, the creatures lumbered into the blood-soaked battlefield. They glided through the mud and disappeared into the fog of war.
As an Alchemist, Talon didn't stay long and returned to heal the injured.
...
As Talon stitched the gash on the soldier's arm, he hummed softly under his breath. His grandfather's favorite tavern song had stuck in his head, the jaunty lyrics and rollicking tune transporting Talon briefly away from the groans of the tent.
The soldier raised an eyebrow but said nothing, seemingly soothed by the odd but comforting melody.
As Talon stitched the gash on another soldier's arm, his mind wandered to thoughts of his family back home.
He thought of his wife, his son, and the life they were living in Carc. The soldier raised an eyebrow, noticing Talon's distracted expression. "Everything okay?" he asked.
Talon nodded, forcing a smile. "Yes, just... thinking of home." He finished dressing the soldier's wound and finished his work for the day.
Talon left the medical tent, wiping away sweat.
As he stepped outside to take a well-deserved break, memories of the chaotic events that led to the war flooded his mind. He sighed, feeling the weight of time on his shoulders.
After that day the Church first came, convoys would come and go as soldiers no longer went on the battlefield. Cries came from the battlefield as people worked in the camp; they knew the Church's weapons were quite effective.
It became normal for screams coming from the other side so people ignored it. Many would go near the front to eat lunch and read their mail as a sort of gesture of fearlessness or courage.
Like many, Talon too received a letter from his wife. He went to the edge of camp to read it as he ate lunch.
As he opened a letter from his wife, his heart sank, and tears welled up in his eyes. The letter's words hit him like a tidal wave, shattering his emotional armor. He choked back sobs, trying to comprehend what he was reading.
Talon dropped his sandwich as he read between the lines of the letter.
He read his wife's scribbled words, barely making out what they said.
Carc was attacked, and his sister's fiancé died in defending it while his sister went missing.
Tears fell from his face as he read his parents had died, and his heart broke when he learned his son lost his leg to fallen rubble. Vomit rose in his throat as he found that most of the city was destroyed, and his family lost all of their belongings.
Talon looked at the tear stains on the paper; above them were words that caused the vomit to empty from his mouth. His son and wife were in a brothel; his wife worked there so she could make money so they could survive.
With their home gone, the money he was sending was not reaching them, so she needed to take matters into her own hands.
Unfortunately, the only job she could get was the worst one for a woman. The stress building inside Talon broke as his tears flowed, and he screamed in agony.
His surroundings became blurry, and he was lost in his own head. Due to this, he couldn't see other soldiers and workers staring into the fog covering the battlefield.
As Talon read that letter, many of the people sitting on the frontlines realized that the screams of the Federation's soldiers had stopped. This had never happened this early, and many smiled, thinking victory was reached.
But their faces turned to stone, holding faces of exasperation. They watched the fog make way as a figure entered their vision.
A person in a white suit with a mask that looked like a bird, the mask had a long beak that made them look foreign and ominous.
Some tried to speak out, while others backed away, but soon they coughed and choked, others screaming in pain as they looked at their skin.
They felt immense pain as their bodies decayed. Lungs collapsed, or skin bled and showed muscle and veins; Some fell to the ground quickly as blood leaked out their eyes, and others had lumps accumulated on areas of their body as other symptoms flared up.
Talon was on the ground as he cried. However, his mind gained clarity as he saw his tears turn scarlet, and he saw his blood flow into the soil. He looked upon it all, a white figure walking through the camp as corpses followed.
Talon rushed to the soldier's side, reaching for his bag of remedies. But his fingers froze as an icy pain clutched his throat. He gasped for breath, only to choke as the taste of iron flooded his mouth.
All around him, cries of agony rang through the air, along with the buzzing of flies. But they faded and dulled as Talon's vision darkened, his mind gripped by terror.
Talon coughed violently as blood spattered the ground before him. In his blurry vision, he saw others collapse convulsing, clawing at their eyes now oozing a sickly yellow pus. Those still standing staggered about blindly, their moans filling Talon's ears before they too fell victim.
Flies piled on the dead, and the once lively scene of battle was turned into a scene of horror and despair.
'What was going on? Why am I dying? I've never heard of symptoms like this, what is this disease?'
Talon's robe grew sodden with blood leaking from his ears and mouth. His lips moved soundlessly as he gazed at the letter's last words. A final, rattling breath escaped him. His confused face remained as his thoughts slowed and stopped. Talon collapsed to the ground as blood flowed from his orifices, and he died.