>>6289015Oswalds’ men have succeeded in defeating the final line of prisoners. Those that were not outright killed have routed, and are currently in the midst of fleeing towards the tower, desperately looking for safety from the relentless march of the foreign enemy that was currently chasing them. The battle was over, and the Contenders were now free to reach the Tower of Illusions.
>“You look pretty pleased.” You say to Sid. “Your men are dead. And it doesn’t look like they managed to kill a single contender. Even if you somehow survived this encounter, you’d get no time off your prison sentence. Tough luck.”“You think so?” Sid grins. “We were promised a year off our sentences for every contender that failed to reach the tower. Stopping all of you was never within the realm of possibility for these common cutpurses and rogues, but we had to at least to run down the clock as much as possible. Now, you contenders are but a stone’s throw away from the Tower, with no enemy in sight, and with even some time to spare! What do you suppose will happen now?”
Before you can answer Sid, your attention is drawn by Oswald shouting orders at the contenders under his command. He leads the group from the front, and raises his spear towards the sky to rally them.
“They’re on the run!” Oswald bellows at the top of his lungs, being met by cheers from the others. He turns towards the various warriors under his command and continues shouting. “The enemy is finally broken, and the tower is within reach! Quickly now, make way for the goal so that we can-”
A familiar sword pierces through Oswald’s back and straight out his chest. Whatever the esteemed tactician was about to say falls on deaf ears as he begins to froth blood from the mouth. He drops his spear and grasps for Mystletainn, but Elric cruelly twists the sword and yanks it out. Oswald collapses facefirst to the ground, dead before he lands, and the cheering crowd is suddenly silenced.
“Ahh, so that boy is the first one to strike?” Sid says, rubbing his chin contemplatively. “What a little devil.”
One by one, the realization of what Elric had just done falls upon the contenders who’d witnessed it. No one makes a move at first, each of them instead eyeing the person next to them. Up until this point, they’d been content working together. No matter how brief or temporary, Oswald had managed to instill a sense of camaraderie as they worked towards a common goal. With his death, the illusion of “unity” had shattered, and everyone seemed to quickly remember that they were not teammates, but rivals.
“H-hold on now, what’s going-”
The contender that speaks quickly has his head severed by Butch. He grabs the next nearest person by the throat and squeezes tightly, crushing the man’s esophagus with a wet gurgle. That is all it takes for the remnants of Oswald’s temporary party to break out into a fevered battle.
