The sound of bells, yells, and screams filled the air as the demonic menace swarmed the fortress. Each second was of the essence, as every angel was rushing to take his position and fight the enemy to his last breath. The demons themselves consisted of imps, satyrs, and grolls (which were the only ones with whom Lucius didn't have the pleasure to fight yet), and they were all flying through the air on the backs of various winged creatures of unnaturally large sizes, among which bats and crows were the most numerous. Both demons and their rides were lightly armoured, as if they were pillagers and not warriors. In a sense, they were. The only difference was that they didn't come here to pillage material goods, but the lives of the angels.
Each variety of demon employed a different strategy. Imps would fly right above the fortress and then drop bombs on the angels, sowing death and flames among the angels. Satyrs, who flew on giant crows, would rush at individual angels and make the crows grab them with their talons and then drop them from big heights. Since most of the angels didn't have wings, this usually led to death, and only the lucky ones survived, albeit with heavy injuries. Grolls were a bit more direct. They were above imps and satyrs in strength and size, but they weren't as strong as minotaurs. They were essentially human-sized trolls. Strong, dumb, and expendable, they were the perfect addition to the expendable section of demonic armies, which consisted of imps, satyrs, them, and minotaurs. They shared their bloodthirst and recklessness with the minotaurs, so it wasn't surprising that their strategy in this battle consisted of flying to the battlements and attacking the angels directly from their rides by throwing javelins at them or jumping off them entirely, bringing the battle to the ground.
The angels retaliated with their weapons of light, blasting the demons out of the sky with the help of lightcannons and lightbows and fighting them on the ground with lightswords and other weapons made out of light. The whole battle was one big mess, and both demons and angels were dying or getting injured left and right. There was nothing heroic or grand about it. It was just a pure instinctive battle for survival.
Unsettled by this chaos, Lucius realised that he had managed to lose sight of Nicholas. No matter. It didn't make sense for him to follow him like a loyal dog anyway. Nicholas was far more experienced than him and undoubtedly more powerful, so worrying for him wasn't necessary. Instead, Lucius had to decide upon his method of approach. If he had wings, he would have had options. This way, there was only one option, and that was rushing straight into the battle and trying to cause as much damage to the enemy as quickly as possible. It was not the best option he was ever presented with. The risk of getting blown to pieces by a bomb or being carried into the air by a crow and dropped like a walnut it was trying to break open was high, but there was either that or not fighting at all, and Lucius was not a coward. Calling for the Lord's blessing in his thoughts, Lucius jumped into the fray, and as soon as he did so, another option presented itself to him. He noticed a groll who was flying on a crow above the battlements, throwing javelins at the angels he was passing by. He was flying quite low and in Lucius's direction. In that moment, Lucius thought that he could use a good ride. He made the lightsword disappear and waited a bit.
At the exact moment the groll came near him, Lucius jumped at his crow from a nearby elevation, and as soon as he established balance, he punched the groll in the face with all his might. The groll didn't even have time to react, and he took the hit of Lucius's metallic glove right in the face, which immediately knocked him out, and Lucius just had to push him from the crow, sit into his place, and take the reins in his hands.
This was supposed to be a small victory for Lucius, which would have allowed him to be far more useful in this battle, and it would have been if it wasn't for the crow itself. It seems that the damn thing sensed that its original rider was not with it anymore, so it started throwing a tantrum, trying to throw Lucius off itself. Lucius knew this could end pretty badly if the crow decided to do so from a bigger height or not above the battlements, so he had to react quickly if he didn't want to unceremoniously end his career as a stain his brethren would have to scrape off the battlements. He immediately summoned his lightsword and stabbed the giant crow in the neck all the way up to the lightsword's hilt, killing it at the spot.
The crow fell on the battlements, and Lucius went along with it. What is more, the place where they fell was where the skirmish between the grolls and angels was the most intense. Luckily for the angels, they were not the ones with their backs turned to the falling crow and Lucius, so they moved out of the way, while the grolls got a nasty surprise. Agile and quick as a wild cat, Lucius jumped from the giant crow and immediately began finishing off the grolls that somehow managed to evade the danger that incapacitated their comrades. The overall surprise and his speed were too much for them, and they all fell by his hand and the hands of the angels that jumped back into the action as soon as they possibly could.
Seizing the momentum they gained, Lucius rushed past the angels that stopped for a second to decide on their next step and continued cleaning up the battlements of the grolls that dared to defy them by their presence. A few more grolls fell to his lightsword along the way, but then one groll worthy of a fight appeared in front of him. He was bigger than the rest, but Lucius didn't allow that fact to discourage him, as he jumped right in front of the groll, striking at him with all his might. The groll not only managed to block his attack with his black sword, but he also pushed him back with impressive strength. Lucius did manage to remain on his feet, but he had to focus to do so. This groll was definitely not a pushover like the others. He also wasn't dumb either, because he immediately followed his push with an attack of his own.
Because he was caught off-guard by the groll's strength, Lucius was forced to block this strike instead of evading it, and the groll immediately followed it up with another. This one Lucius managed to successfully evade. Though he didn't think he's paired with an enemy that's impossible to beat, Lucius couldn't help but ask himself in a split second while he was evading the groll's strike:
"Where have all those angels who were behind him disappeared, and why aren't they helping him to get rid of this alpha groll?"
After his evasion, the groll stopped for a moment and looked at him with a grin on his face. He was obviously very happy that he met somebody who could pose a challenge. Grolls were like that. They lived to fight. Since he wasn't going to live long anyway, there was no reason for Lucius not to make the groll's last moments worthy of living.
Not in the mood for a staring contest with the groll, Lucius again jumped in front of him and attacked him. Groll expected this and went into a frenzy, attacking Lucius himself. After one's strike, the other would immediately follow with a strike of his own. Their strikes were fast and strong, but Lucius now expected the groll's strength and refused to budge. It was impressive that one groll had such impressive skills with the sword, but his reliance on strength, with which he wanted to overcome his enemy, proved to be his downfall. Lucius allowed him to strike at him three times in a row, and each time he successfully blocked his advance, though he could feel the sheer force of the groll's strikes vibrating in his hands. After the third time, Lucius swiftly attacked himself, and the groll, exhausted by striking at Lucius with all his might, ended up with Lucius's lightsword in his chest. The duel was over, and Lucius was the winner.
But there was no time for celebration because, with his peripheral vision, Lucius noticed an imp approaching him fast on the back of the giant bat. He had a bomb in his hand, but not for long. Seeing that a bomb was flying through the air in his direction, Lucius was forced to react and not think. Crouching at the feet of the lifeless groll, still impaled on his lightsword, he made his corpse fall onto his back, straining all the muscles in his body and letting out a loud cry; he raised him high into the air! The bomb connected with the groll's body and its blood, and its pieces scattered into the air as Lucius was pushed to the floor by the strength of the impact.
"You're not that bad at all, son! Get up!" said Nicholas's voice as his hand appeared in front of Lucius's face.
He accepted his help and got back on his feet. He was still a bit dizzy because of the force of the bomb's impact.
"Are you alright?"
"Yes."
"Good! Then let's clear the battlements of our guests. It's time to make them homesick."
But as Nicholas was saying that, Lucius noticed a giant crow soaring straight at him.
"Watch out!" he yelled, pushing Nicholas from the place he stood.
In a second, Lucius was in the air, being carried by the giant crow. He would have done something to set himself free, for sure. He would have tried to injure the crow's talons with his lightsword. He would have… If another bomb didn't fall nearby at that exact moment and a piece of rubble didn't fly with high speed straight into Lucius's head, knocking him out cold. That was the last memory of that battle at the Morning Star fortress that Lucius had before darkness fell over his eyes.