A Savior's Legacy: Ch. 1: Heavy Metal

Chapter 1: Heavy Metal
In the middle of the larger continent on Tierran, amongst peaceful rolling hills topped with hundreds of trees with massive rocky mountains capped with snow setting the backdrop, eleven Phoenix bomber transports thundered through the air thousands of feet above them, carrying the supplies of war: bomb payloads that could devastate entire divisions of vehicles and troops, tanks that could roll right through the defensive systems of their enemies with impressive firepower, scout vehicles that could provide reconnaissance for the unit's next move, and an invasion army's worth of soldiers that could quickly take over any city with guns, rockets, and bombs ripping through their targets.
Within the troop bay of the lead bomber, Javen was present with his troops, thinking over the strategy that he would use to subdue the city.
"From what we've seen with the fighters' recon mission, our target is located on the top of a cliff overlooking the river below. Our ships ran into a little bit of a snag back at the Rhineshin Pass, so we'll have to do this without their help. I've got an idea for what we could do, but I'd like your input on the matter," he said, looking to all of his troops in the bomber.
The difficulty that their warships had run into was a sandbar that prevented them from entering the branch of the river that would take them to the location of the city on the bend. Without the naval support, it was going to be difficult to subdue the city, since there was no way to surround its entire perimeter with their troops without losing large numbers of them.
"What I'm thinking is we could send our scout vehicles with sharpshooters to the small mountains overlooking the river, where it would be the perfect place for our snipers to hide in the forest and hit their marks out of harm's way. The lighter tanks would provide most of the cover for our troops while they advance forward towards the city, with most of the heavy weapons soldiers launching their payloads into the enemy from behind the armored row of vehicles. Our troopers could advance with the Behemoths that we'll have with us, providing cover fire for the pilots of the heavy tanks. We'll have to advance carefully, though, since we don't want to invade the city directly, but cut them off from any escape besides the steep cliff behind them. Once they have no escape, we'll see if they surrender. If they keep attacking us, we'll have to call in the bombers to prepare to make a run on the city to see if then they would surrender. If not, the bombers will decimate them; then we'll advance within the city to take any survivors willing to call a truce and take out anyone that is still hostile. Until then, just like every time we battle, we only cripple them; not kill them. I hate it when lives are wasted that don't have to be when a truce is reached."
He looked from the corporal beside him to one of the privates sitting across from him, wanting to hear some suggestions from his own troops. His strategy didn't include asking for peace first for a good reason: these dracorians needed to know who had the superior firepower. If they tried asking for peace before the battle, they would get a solid "No", since every single being Javen pit himself against was crazy about their God, the Zven, thinking that with Its help they would be able to destroy them. Someone had to show them who was the boss first, before he put the choice in their hands to live or die.
Javen was a man in his mid-twenties, a rare age for such an important officer as he was: the Supreme General for the King's Armies, or the Warlord, for short. This included the authority to execute several missions with most of the troops in the nation, which spanned nearly half of the continent, from the Tikal Ocean in the east to the Tractyn Desert in the west, a desolate land possessing a deep canyon with a river large enough to fit two full-size battleships side by side, and still able to allow the draft of each ship on either side to fit without even coming close to grazing the surface underneath.
Javen's facial features were relatively rough, almost like cut stone, but with the softness of his skin keeping it from looking chiseled, with a brow that could make two heavy creases across the bridge of his nose when he concentrated on a thought or became angry, and a pointed nose that didn't dominate his face. He had brown eyes, slightly low cheeks, and a single chin, and a small goatee that started from an inch from the center of his face around it and came to a point about an inch in front in smooth black hair, along with a strip of hair growing beneath his lips into the goatee. He also had four deep red scratch marks over his right eye, the result of a tussle he had with a dracorian some time ago. He was also moderately muscular, although his frame was covered by the heavy steel armor suit that protected him from any heavy damage until it was literally shot off. On his back, he had an assault rifle that fired several armor-piercing plasma projectiles from a drum that held nearly one hundred rounds capable of piercing the thickest skin or armor for any being, efficient in crippling enemy troops. Javen's weapon was modified to have explosive rounds, intensifying the firepower it put out by more than five.
"Anyone have any questions?" He proceeded to ask.
"Permission to speak, sir," one of the soldiers asked.
"Permission granted."
"Instead of taking only sharpshooters and scout vehicles to the nearby hills, could we take a tank for every two scout vehicles, in addition to a few heavy weapons soldiers to cover the main advance?"
"That sounds better than what I said. It does seem best to keep a little bit of the heavier firepower scattered amongst the hills with the snipers to rain artillery on the enemy."
"General Vündrache, we are nearing enemy territory," the pilot of the craft spoke through the radio. The aircraft that was transporting them to their destination was a flying fortress, with two levels, the flight deck and the cargo deck. The flight deck contained the cockpit, within which the main pilot and the co-pilot steered the aircraft towards its destination, the bombardier station in the firing control room, which could open the bomb-bay doors in the cargo bay below to drop lethal ordnance, the communications room, and several gun emplacements that wielded two rapid-firing plasma bolt guns. Along the "back" or ventral side of the aircraft, there were two turrets that were controlled from their mounts. Along the sides of the aircraft, there were two turrets on each side, placed in front of and behind the main wings. Below the hatch in the back that opened for the troops to deploy, there was a lone plasma bolt cannon turret. There was another turret on the nose of the craft. On the cargo level, there was an area that stretched from below the firing room to nearly the same termination point as the beginning of the communications room in the stern, separated by a wall offset from the center, towards the back. In the fore area, several lethal bombs were carried, which could be dropped from their clasps that held them by the bombardier when the doors below them were open, capable of propelling themselves towards their targets with short-lived propulsion systems. In the area in the back was the main troop bay, which could carry twenty-four troops, fully equipped with their weaponry, seated in four rows of six. On the walls of the bay, the rows faced inward; the rows that were in the middle of the area faced outward from the center. Every hallway between the rows was wide enough for a man to pass comfortably among others that were seated.
Outside the craft, using strong electromagnets to anchor the vehicles in place, there was a slot directly beneath the tail section, that hung over the troop bay doors, which could carry one Behemoth-class tank, which was a heavy tank that utilized two heavy Plasma-projectile cannons, as well as two plasma-bolt machine guns placed on the turret and beside it, controlled from stations behind the guns themselves. Further towards the front, on either side of the troop bay, were magnetic slots that could hold one Scavenger-class tank each, which wielded a normal Plasma-projectile weapon, as well as a plasma-projectile machinegun attached to the side of the main turret. Further up, beneath the massive wingspan of the bomber, were two small slots on each side that could hold one Scout-class assault vehicle, which was a 4x4 design with an armored cockpit and canopy, utilizing a plasma-projectile Gatling gun that was placed nearly directly above and behind the main cockpit, fired from a station directly behind it in the bed. Behind the gun, two seats faced towards the back, which could hold two troopers, no matter what they were armed with, from assault guns to bomb launchers.
Javen placed his helmet over his head, and pushed it down on top of it to enclose it in the somewhat spherical piece of steel that protected him while still enabling him to see outside through a bulletproof visor.
The bombers didn't even make it to within four miles of the target city when a flaming ball rocketed towards them, almost hitting the lead bomber, which climbed in altitude to keep from getting hit.
"That was a close one," the pilot remarked. "Maintain present course; they must be trying to ward us off."
However, the peace was short-lived. Soon, the radar showed several objects coming towards them like the  flaming one before, except they were all different; a few of them were made of ice, some of earth, and others of fire or electricity.
"Holy Mother of—EVASIVE MANEUVERS, NOW!!" the pilot of Javen's ship exclaimed.
"Break formation! I repeat: Break formation! We've got to keep the main assault force intact!"
Each bomber began turning and twisting off from their set courses, trying to avoid the onslaught of different objects. For one bomber, this proved futile, since a stream of lightning hit it, disabling its systems before a ball of earth sheared through the wing, and a fireball hit the bomb compartment dead-on through the bay doors, causing the ordnance inside to explode and tear the bomber in two, leaving the pieces falling out of the sky with thick trails of black smoke following behind them until two explosions in the forest below signaled the craft had reached the ground.
"General, we can't get as close to the city as projected in the strategy, we'll have to land your division further from the mark."
"That's an option I'm willing to take. We can't keep losing men like this."
"Yes, sir."
"All craft: new directive: Land your troops as fast as you can, it doesn't matter where you release them, just get them where they'll be of most use!" the Lieutenant told his squadron.
"Incoming!" The co-pilot shouted.
Another wave of projectiles came in, but they overshot their marks, since the transports were now flying low to land the force in several clearings amidst the dense forest. The lead bomber now hovered over the treetops, getting ever lower, camouflaged by the trees around it, and protected from being seen.
The electromagnets holding the vehicles to their sides were switched off at ten feet above the ground, letting them drop to the grassy floor with a hearty thump. The bomber jumped up slightly from the shedding of nearly hundreds of tons of weight, moved a little further forward from the main drop of vehicles, and as it got closer to the grass to land, the rear door clanged open and hinged out to hit the grass, and all of the troops within stormed out to man the vehicles they would need to drive to their destination, with some of the assault troopers staying on foot.
"Alright, get some snipers and heavy troopers in those scouts, and send them off with a Scavenger to those mountains we pointed out in our strategy," Javen said on the broadcast radio to inform his troops.
"Roger that," one of the snipers acknowledged. Within a minute, most of the scouts were packed with sharpshooters and heavy troopers, slowly beginning to make the trek to one of the nearby mountains that surrounded the city with a tank escorting two vehicles each, their engines growling and fading out as they got further from the landing site.
"And the rest of you, make your way through the forest, and form your ranks behind the tanks!" Javen ordered.
For a few minutes after his last orders were issued, there was only the rumble of the engines and squeaking of wheel bearings from the tanks occupying the air, the near-ritual calm before the battle, when neither side knew where the other was, but were trying to find each other through the dense growth of the forest. The occasional falling of a tree from the weight of the tank pressing against it would echo through the air, but their position was, for the moment, undetected.
"General 'Dragon, this is Echo 5, we've made it to the top of the foothill, and we can see the city now. From our visual, it looks like they have their warriors ready to start through the forest to find ya. Echo 5 out."
"Thanks, Echo 5, General Vündrache out. Alright, men, keep alert, spread out so that we can take more shots at 'em."
The moving wall of armor was taking out many of the thick trees along their trek towards the city. Although, they still had to watch out for the large open area which held a stone road that led into the city. They had to stay hidden until they made it out into the clearing. The groups were spread out in the forest, but some of them found each other, with two of the other groups finding Javen's force.
The gunners in the Behemoth tanks were at their positions, their fingers resting on the triggers for the machineguns to fire, ready for the enemy to come out to fight them.
"Sir, they're in range; permission to fire?" One of the snipers requested.
Javen hesitated, trying to think of what might happen if they gave their positions away. After all, if the sharpshooters began picking off the enemy, then the scout vehicles would be able to maneuver with the heavy troopers in them, quickly moving their destructive firepower across the battlefield.
"Fire at will!" He commanded.
Instantly, several riflemen took their shots, and the arcs of smoke trailing from the quick bullets overhead let Javen realize how close they were getting. Many rockets also flew over the main attack force's position like a destructive banner that would tear anything to shreds, painting the sky with fire and smoke, impacting into the wall and other places near the enemies that were stationed just outside the city. A salvo of shots rang out from the Scavenger tanks above on the small mountains, destroying some of the towers on the wall that had been erected around the city through some intense and fiery explosions which took out several large chunks at a time, sending them crashing to the ground behind the warriors that were gathered out of the city. The main wall was nearly seventy-five feet high, and tens of feet thick with steel armor and stone. Scavenger tanks were good at taking out lighter targets, like unprotected buildings and smaller vehicles, but the Behemoths' heavier firepower was need to penetrate the thick armor that surrounded the entire perimeter of these cities.
"Oh, crap, they're moving now; we can't hit them as well!" one of the snipers exclaimed.
"Oh, no, everyone, look out! Stay behind the tanks!" Javen directed.
Only a minute or so after the first shots, he could hear the deep, snarling growls of his adversaries bouncing off the trees nearby, their feet rustling the sticks and leaves on the ground.
A dracorian could move swiftly, even though they grew to be eight feet in height in their main body, not counting their wings. Every time Javen and his troops faced them, he was always afraid that their speed and agility would triumph over their firepower, but it seemed that their heavy use of the blade kept their incredibly brutal damage at a distance from them. A normal human grew to six feet, much smaller than dracorians, but were able to use long range weapons to their advantage. During every battle, there were casualties suffered, and Javen always resented sending a message to a fallen soldier's family of his death. He always sent his condolences to them with heavy sorrow for the loss of a loved one, a hero downed in the line of battle. Sometimes, it seemed, the best were taken from the world they lived in during each battle; including those who were kind, warm-hearted and courageous. Still, they kept on in the face of unimaginable danger for their families back home.
"We've engaged them now; it's time to kick some tail!" one of the other commanders said through the radio to Javen.
A blade flew from the trees in front of them, spinning through the air before lodging itself into the gunner on top of one of the behemoths' turrets through his armor, severely injuring him in his chest. The blade's wielder quickly jumped onto the front of the vehicle, climbed onto the turret, took the blade out of the man above it, and proceeded to slice off the barrel next to it with a strong stroke, letting it fall to the top of the tank's hull, and rolled off onto the ground.
"Fire!" Javen ordered.
Machinegun fire ripped through the air, while the dracorian took several hits in his scales, jumping heartily off of the turret to re-group with his comrades, who now started to appear with different weapons; some of them with staffs, others with scythes, and more still with other radical blade designs. They flashed with different colors; some were green, other blue, purple, red, white, and all other hues mixed in, the males wearing combat robes and the females wearing more revealing dresses. They started for Javen's troops, with a few of them getting cut down in the midst of the carnage from the soldiers and the snipers, but they did manage to take out many of Javen's men. They were whipping their strong, well-built bodies around in a manner that seemed graceful, kicking and slicing at the troops. One soldier was taken out by a dracorian that kicked him hard in the chest, sending him to the ground on his back and sending his helmet flying, and then was impaled by the being's sword, straight through his heart, making him scream in intense pain. Javen shot the dracorian with his weapon, deterring the dragon-like figure from damaging him even further, forcing him to run for cover. Within minutes, the initial wave of able dracorians had been drastically reduced, and they retreated as swiftly as they had come through the trees to regroup their defense.
"Cease fire! Halt!" Javen commanded, and the snipers and tanks stopped their barrage.
Javen instantly kneeled next to the wounded man beside him, took his helmet off, and grasped his comrade's hand, his rifle still held in the other one.
"Jansen, can you hear me?" Javen said, trying to give him an uplifting talk that would leave him fearless of his imminent death.
"Yeah," the fallen one responded chokingly, blood spitting out of his mouth as he coughed.
"Listen..."
He didn't know what to say.

Not another one...

He thought to himself, trying to choose words that would help him pass. He knew he didn't have much time to think about what to say, so he said what he thought was best for him to accept his fate.
"You did good out here; your father would be proud. All of your family would be. Please, tell me what parting words you want me to recite to them," he said, fighting the tears that were threatening to come forward. He wasn't afraid of crying; he didn't want the dying man with him to break down with him, and have an even more painful death than if he had kept his composure.
"Tell them...Tell them; I love them very much" he said, and sighed through clenched teeth from the pain he was bearing.
"Also...Tell them they were worth dying for, every single one of them. I wouldn't stop my death for the world. I was proud to serve for them," he said.
"I will," Javen said.
With a final deep breath, the man's life left him, his face turning pale form the loss of blood flow. The hand Javen grasped turned cold, and silently slipped out of his grip onto the dirt, lifeless for the first and last time.
Javen stood up from the fallen hero, and placed his helmet back on his head, drawing his firearm into his hands and placing it on his back.
"We have to tend to our wounded. Most of you stay here; and some of you go protect them as you try to get them to safety, out by the transports. Don't let them die!" He ordered.
"Copy that." Some of the soldiers said, helping any critically wounded comrade back to one of the transports, which carried a medical team. Several Scouts were called in for rapid transportation, and picked up all of the men that were crippled.
Javen held the dead man's body in his arms, silently stepping to one of the waiting Scouts to place him in the bed for its transport back to the area where the transports were landed, to keep them from being destroyed while they were on standby.
After he had placed him in the bed, he nodded at the driver of the vehicle to take him away, and the truck responded with a low growl slowly going up in pitch before shifting into the next gear, the large tires kicking back dirt as they strived to get grip on the ground.
He had done this all too much. The reason why he was doing it now and not after the battle was that the dracorians they were facing were licking their own wounds as well; taking care of those who had suffered and escaped, and readying for the next round of fighting. It was all too similar to a fatal death match.
While the group was waiting for the Scouts to return, the entire army was resting against the tanks' rear panels, and sitting on the ground, some of them inspecting their weapons, others just taking a rest to be ready for the next battle. Many of the soldiers were posted to keep watch to make sure they weren't attacked while they were vulnerable.
"Warlord Drache, we've got everyone that was wounded from the battle. We're sorry for what Jansen had to endure."
"He died well. I'll have to tell his family that he wouldn't stop his death for the world."
"He was a good man. The Scouts are heading for the hills again, so you'll be able to continue your course shortly."
"Thanks. I'll wait for their mark."
Javen was set up at the edge of the army, his assault rifle clenched tightly in his hands, waiting for someone to come out and catch them off guard.
"Sir, we are back in position," Captain Larsey, the director of the vehicles' movements said.
"Alright, everyone, let's go. Let 'em rip!" Javen broadcast on the radio.
With everyone back in place, and the troops accounted for, the armor row resumed its course, with the snipers taking shots when they got the chance to cover their friends, and the tanks relentlessly beating the wall into scrap. More dracorians appeared, and a fight ensued in the forest, with everyone taking cover behind the trees as the tanks moved forward behind them, their gunners firing the machine guns when they sighted a target.
Javen ran to a nearby tree and stuck his back heavily against the bark, his rifle clenched in both hands, readying his attack from his position. Taking a deep breath, he ran from his cover, meeting the gaze of a couple dracorians that were dashing for him. He started shooting at them both, and took out both of them, sending them reeling for cover as a blade spun out from another one's hand towards him. He ducked just before the blade sliced through the air over him, took a few more shots at the one who threw it next to a tree, and rolled behind another tree as the blade came back around to the wielder's hand the same way it had come.
"We're in a fix, here. Can you Scouts take care of some of them for us?" He suggested. He leaned out from his cover to take a few more shots, hitting the same dracorian that had thrown his blade with impressive accuracy, taking him down for the count. Javen turned back around to keep his cover, waiting for the Scouts to show up.
Some of the scout vehicles entered the battlefield, their gatling guns ablaze and their engines roaring, taking out some of the dracorians that were hiding behind the dense growth of the forest. The heavy troopers that were in the vehicles spread their firepower amongst the front, deterring the enemy even more from engaging them fully. A tree was shot through from bullets and a rocket, and tumbled down through the forest, hitting the ground with a loud bang, making the ground tremble for a split second and making the dracorians hiding next to it run for other cover.
Without warning, a dracorian shouted something unintelligible, and some of the earth came up quickly directly beneath the damaged behemoth tank, catapulting it through the air to land on its top, causing the soldiers to scramble and crashing into a scout vehicle.
This was where the battles got interesting. Every time they faced them, they seemed to test the enemy with their blades, and if it was too difficult to defeat them, they used some sort of ancient force that enabled them to accomplish almost supernatural deeds. This never ceased to amaze Javen, since they didn't need any guns or technology to fight them well.
The rest of them proceeded to use their abilities against the advancing army, setting tanks aflame, some of them taking out soldiers with lightning, others with pushing and pulling at the tanks and other vehicles going against them towards men and other vehicles.
One tank was flipped by a dracorian, and flew into two more tanks, putting them out of commission for combat. Another dracorian shot lightning from his fingertips, zapping several men with several thousands of volts before he was forced to take cover from the amount of fire being concentrated on him.
However, their destructive streaks were short-lived, since the tanks and heavy weapons troops amongst Javen's army used their heavy firepower to cripple entire groups of them at a time, with the smaller rapid-fire weapons keeping the rest of them at a distance.
Seeing their second foray had once again failed to stop the army, the remaining beings turned and fled back to the city, letting the advancing army continue inching their way to the city like a creeping death.
Amidst the carnage, Javen's army made it through the forest into the main clearing before the wall now mere hundreds of feet from them. The other groups soon caught up, the tanks' guns glimmering in the light of the sun that was shining through the clouds.
"Fire the main guns!" Javen vehemently commanded.
The Behemoth tanks lifted their heavy barrels to lock in their targets; and opened fire with powerful explosions emanating from them, demolishing several sections of the steel wall, bending and twisting the metal on the outside with a vivid display of orange and red flames, as well as some of the internal frame. The battlefield changed from close quarters to open air, and the heavy weapons troops were finally able to use their ordnance to great effect against the enemy, firing their bombs and rockets into the fray, destroying the wall that put a protective veil around the city and turning it into rubble and fragments.
The absence of some of the wall left the city open, and several hundred dracorians were waiting just within to begin battling them. A battle cry was sounded, and the entire mass of them began to dash towards their enemy, wielding their impressive blades. Most of them were able to cut through the ranks of tanks, with some of them slashing the scouts' tires as they went by, resulting in a few of them turning over and flipping; and others still impaling human soldiers on their blades and cutting through them with unrelenting accuracy and speed. However; they were losing their numbers faster from the amount of firepower being unleashed upon them, from machine guns riddling them with bullet holes and rockets and shells making nothing of their efforts. Two heavy tanks and many soldiers were being lost to the abilities of the dracorians, though, since their numbers nearly overwhelmed the invading army. If one was taken out while destroying a tank, another would take his place, and so on until the vehicle of interest was destroyed.
It seemed that even with the amount of soldiers and vehicles Javen had and how much the dracorians were losing, they weren't relinquishing their defense.
A red one closed in quickly towards Javen, who brought his gun up in front of him to block his attack from his blades, which he had crossed to slash Javen to pieces. Both of them struggled, but Javen attempted to get him to see their battle was lost.
"Look at your numbers; they're dwindling quickly. Please, surrender while you have the chance!" He said through clenched teeth.
The dracorian glanced at the battle around him, at several of the reptilian beings going down in the line of fire, and then concentrated his gaze back on Javen, his blue eyes burning with rage.
"We will not surrender...we will die for our kind, if that means we shall sacrifice ourselves for the Zven's sake!" he said, his sharp teeth gleaming from his snarl.
"Then so be it." Javen regretfully uttered.
Javen pushed his weapon towards him, pushing it to the side slightly, making the blades slide off, and shot the dracorian with several rounds, the gun thumping heavily with the rounds being ejected.
The dragon-like being fell in front of him, heavily beaten, and unable to get back up, writhing in pain from the damage taken. A dracorian could take many shots from a gun; almost two times as much as what was needed to shoot the humans' armor so its protective plating failed, but Javen's weapon was five times more powerful than a stock machinegun.
"It looks like they won't comply," Javen thought out loud on the radio. He had to make a choice, and it had to be fast.
"Squadron Alpha, this is General Vündrache. I am requesting your assistance at the city; we need air cover, NOW!"
"Copy."
Emerging from the canopy of the forest and coming around the city, the bombers prepared to make their runs on the city. Smoke was rising from where the wall was, which was becoming twisted and weak from the amount of heavy weapons firing directly at it. Several explosions peppered the field and wall around the main gate.
"Good Lord, this one's a real heavy one," one of the pilots remarked about the battle below.
At the sound of the bombers flying overhead, the battle was temporarily suspended, since the dracorians now realized they had put too much focus on the enemy directly around them, and they were waiting for the question that would make them think about their fate. They knew they were in trouble with the bombers threatening their city, and the army that was so effortlessly disabling them all to fight.
Each of the ten remaining bombers sped over the city, turning around in large, lazy circles to get them set up for their runs. Each one of their noses was pointed towards the settlement, and they hovered in place, waiting for the order to speed forward and release their destructive payloads or retreat back to their original locations.
No one spoke; they only stared at one another, waiting to see who would make the first move.
Javen stepped forward, hoping he could negotiate a truce. He didn't want anyone else to suffer, but if the city didn't surrender to them, they had to be destroyed. After all, Javen would leave them with the choice to live or die, not make the choice for them. However, anyone that would have surrendered to them would evacuate the city when they heard that an army was coming, often times trekking to a nearby military base to confirm their surrender. They would be found with several smaller ones; the fledglings of the family.
There were still others that took refuge in other cities in the dracorians' territories, acting as nomads that would move away from any battle that they didn't want to be a part of.
"My fellow beings, I have one question to ask you before I give any other orders whatsoever: Do you wish to surrender and live under our government, or do you wish to die for your nation?"
They all began to look at one another, trying to decide whether to surrender and leave their empire they were so loyal to and live, or die trying to defend themselves in the name of it.
"For the sake of the Zven, the One who created us…we will NOT surrender to live as slaves under you humans. We will either be victorious over you in the remainder of this battle, or die trying!"
Every single one of the other dracorians nodded their head in agreement with the one who spoke, sealing their fate with their faith.
"Very well. Good luck." Javen said, and walked back to his troops, his lips quivering to make the order:
"Squadron Alpha...Commence your attack."
"Yes, Lord Vündrache."
The bombers throttled up, the four heavy engines on their main wings gunning them to full speed, sending them well on their way to destroy them.
"Opening bay doors," the bombardier on one of the craft said. The belly of the steel beast opened, revealing the lethal weapons that were about to devastate the Dracorian city. There were two main clasps that held three bombs on each side, the canisters for the explosives long and sleek, featuring several fins on the outside to guide them to their targets.
Amongst their ranks, fighting broke out once again, with gunfire erupting all throughout the frontlines, the dracorians fighting for a lost cause.
A loud, screeching roar echoed through the landscape, and the remaining dracorians in the field looked back and started running back into the city.
"What are they doing?!" Javen asked. He was now thinking about calling the bombers off, so that they wouldn't kill everyone in the city without them putting up a fight.
"We're almost in range," the co-pilot said, looking at a screen beside him that indicated the distance to their target.
A blinding red and orange fireball hit the lead bomber, completely destroying it in a vivid explosion.
"What in the name of our King--?" one of the other pilots said as he watched the bomber's pieces fall aflame to the ground. A loud, ravenous roar echoed through the valley, and the pilot looked towards its source.
From the city, a large black dragon with a purple belly rose from the spires, rage burning in its red-orange eyes against the weapons being brought against it. It had wide shoulders, and a rather large chest that curved out and back in to a relatively smaller yet muscular waist, its rear legs coming out of hips that were nearly as wide as it was at its chest. On top of its head was a crest that split into two with two large black horns in between the halves. It had frills at the back of its jaw and on its forearms, the membranes between the bony extensions colored like the crest and wings, with purple next to the bones that faded to black as the colors extended towards the center of each leathery membrane. Its muscular structure was well developed, yet graceful in appearance.
"PULL UP! OPEN FIRE!" the pilot desperately shouted, but it was too late. The dragon ripped through another transport with its black claws, tearing it to pieces, and flew up quickly behind them to deliver another devastating wave of reddish-orange fire breath that took out three additional units while it filled the sky with flames, and shot another faster fireball from its jaws, demolishing another bomber. All the guns on each of the bombers were opening fire, with several projectiles impacting the dragon's skin, but not phasing it in the slightest.  It cut across the squadron, sinking its claws into the rest of the transports and damaging them, swiping at the starboard engines of one of them, sending it careening off into the middle of nowhere on an unknown course.
"Break off! BREAK OFF!" Javen said, and the damaged bombers went off of their path, back towards the forest where they were to take the soldiers back home. The dragon also broke off its pursuit, pausing in midair as the bombers turned away, and turning its gaze towards the main group of men commanded by Javen.
The remains of the destroyed bombers rained down amongst Javen and his troops, killing some of them, and battering the tanks to the point of becoming inoperable.
The dragon roared heartily in its anger above the battlefield, and dived to the earth, its wings tucked in beside its body to make itself more aerodynamic. It was now only less than five hundred feet from the ground, and unleashed a river of fire from its mouth into the mass of troops, making the carefully planned strategy turn into a nightmarish dash for every man's life.
"Stop the advance! Retreat! RETREAT!" Javen desperately commanded.
As Javen's troops were scrambling to get into the forest and into safety from the dragon's rampage, the black creature flew low over them, flapping its wings when it got the closest to the ground to immobilize many of the soldiers with a rush of air. After it flew away, the sound of the strain of metal creaked through the air, and the tanks all around Javen's troops began to shift suddenly and quickly, as well as the Scavengers and the scouts on the hills in addition to the bombers' remains. Everything made of metal was soon flying through the air, knocking into Javen's troops, and almost killing Javen as he ran to the forest.
As he was trying to run away, the dragon flew back over their position, and flames erupted from its mouth once again, trapping him within an arc of fire that left him no choice but to enter the dracorian city, separating him from safety.
It appeared the dragon knew who he was.
"Sir, are you alive?!" his sergeant asked over the radio as a piece of one of the bombers flew by Javen. The wreckage stopped moving, as well as the dragon, which was waiting above him, flying in a tight circle above him while waiting for him to move closer to the city it was so furiously defending.
"Yes, I am; but don't worry about me! Get out of here!"
"But, General Vündrache, we have to--
"Go, now! I can be taken prisoner--I'll get back somehow!"
There was only silence on the other end, and then the sergeant gave him one last message:
"Good luck, Warlord."
Looking directly at the city in front of him, he drew his firearm into his hands, and started running for it, his legs carrying him as fast as they could to an unknown fate. The twisted metal of tanks and bombers now continued their movements, as did the dragon, roaring at Javen's foolhardy decision to try and reach the city, flying down towards the city within the wall, its gaze composed and focused.
A piece of one of the bombers came too close for comfort, taking off his helmet. He still pressed on as the chaos unfolded around him, ducking and rolling when a tank came close and dug into the ground right beside him, and tumbled away.
Broken, beat, and scarred, Javen finally breached the remains of the wall, and was met by the cold gazes of several hundred dracorians waiting for him, standing around him as if they were about to kill him, one by one taking a slash at him for the damage he commanded.
After briefly looking around at the overwhelming amount of foes, flames filled the sky directly above them, giving everything beneath them a reddish-orange shine. A female dracorian landed heavily in front of him and bent her knees, clothed in a dress, and stuck her staff into the ground as she stood erect, previously engulfed by the fire.
A female. Javen and his army had just gotten their hides beaten by a female!
She stood in front of him many meters away, her left hand clutching at the staff, and her right hand clenched in a fist that was aflame, burning from her fury within, snout contorted into a nasty snarl with her eyes cutting through Javen in their unrelenting gaze.
Javen doubted he would get out alive, now.