Steel and Sorrow: Rise of the Mercenary king

Chapter 426: Ants in a hive(3)

Chapter 426: Ants in a hive(3)

In all his life, Torghan had never felt as small as he did now, walking past the silent ranks of armored warriors. Nearly two thousand eyes followed his every step, pinning him in place like a creature under a predator's gaze. It was as if he were an ant wandering into the den of giants.

The men before him were not mere soldiers—they were killers, hardened and sharpened like the steel they wore. Their nasal helmets built with chainmail attacked concealed their faces, but not their eyes. Cold, calculating, and utterly without fear, they watched him with the quiet assurance of those who had spilled blood and would spill it again without hesitation.

Their chainmail draped down over their ears like woven ironwood, their bodies encased in metal as if it were their second skin.Torghan had known warriors all his life. But these men were something else. He could see it in the way their gazes lingered—not on his eyes, but lower.

To his throat. He had seen that look before. It was the look of men who had killed so often that their minds had learned to picture the act before it happened. He could almost feel their thoughts tracing the motion—how easily their blades would carve flesh, the wet gurgle of a severed throat, the flicker of fear as a man realized his life had already slipped beyond saving.

His fingers twitched, craving the familiar weight of his weapon. But what good would a blade do here? Against an army of men who wore war like a second skin? If they wanted him dead none could stop it.

His heart pounded in his chest, each beat echoing in his ears like a drum. He forced himself to keep walking, his pace steady, his face calm. He would not show fear. He could not. Not here. Not in front of these men.

They walked beneath the weight of a thousand stares, each one as sharp as the steel glinting beneath the sun. The world felt smaller under their gaze, the very air thick with something unspoken, something heavy.

What the outsiders had told his father—it had been the truth. Every man standing before him bore the very thing his people would have fought, bled, and died for: steel. Not scraps, not rusted fragments scavenged from the dead of a nation much stronger than them, but whole suits of mail, shields polished to a dull gleam, swords resting easily in their scabbards, waiting for the moment they would drink blood again.