Commander Dreth lay curled in the damp gravel at the base of his ruined altar, coughing up thick droplets of black blood.
Behind him, seven hundred and four surrendered Flint soldiers watched in breathless silence, their hands raised in submission.
"You really believe you won this war, northern mongrel?" the fallen noble hissed, his mouth curling into a grotesque, bloody sneer.
"A field commander of the southern alliance never surrenders to a commoner summoner!"
"The southern alliance has a grand host of one hundred thousand imperial legionnaires waiting beyond the pass!"
"The second the winter snows melt, his vanguard will march across this valley and hang you from your own gates!"
"His supply lines through the pass are already sealed by forty feet of mountain snow," Hajin answered calmly, his voice level and steady.
"And his vanguard lies disarmed in this crater, bowing before the standard of the Sixth Region."
