A Story of Freytara

I commanded, “Alright, listen up.”

Many minotaur ex-bandits stood in a line. I stood in front of them, dwarfed by them all. We were standing in a clearing outside town, which I’d decided should be my new barracks. I called one of them out.

“You there. Step forward,” I instructed.

The selected minotaur, a grey one with particularly sharp horns, stiffened and stepped out of line. I walked up to him, looked up into his fearful face, and said, “What’re your credentials?”

The bull braved to glance down at me and uttered, “Uh...”

I held my hands behind my back and said, “You know. What’s your history?”

The grey thing replied, “Oh. Uh, I was... a bandit for many years.”

I quickly announced, “You’re all pardoned.”

Every bull looked at each other, wondering if I had lost my mind. Perhaps I had, a few weeks ago when I was brought here... and was born... essentially.

I held up a finger.

“On one condition," I elaborated. "You all work for me now. This isn’t the banditry camp where your pay was how well you raided. Your pay is set, as is your new life. You’ve all volunteered to be the new Freytaran Guard. You are now the militia of this city.”

I started walking up and down the line, watching as the bulls tried to stand up straighter than they already were. The heavy smell of grass was in the air.

“This won’t be the militia you’ve probably faced in your plunderous adventures. You will not be poorly armed and armored. Show them, Autumn.”

I turned around, and an autumn-colored earth pony pulled the covers off of a cart that had been brought to the clearing. Sitting therein was some of the work I had just done for Captain Bullheart. Gleaming in the sun, it was my proudest creation yet. It was a set of plate armor, articulate and complex, made for a minotaur. It practically stood like an iron golem, with only its occupant missing. Resting on it was a minotaur-sized sword, easily outclassing the one that Bullheart had used against me. I looked back to the awestruck rag-tag bulls of my militia.

“My people have had a ten-thousand-year legacy of excellent craftsmanship. We started with bronze, made our way to iron and steel, and our works only continue to get more impressive back in my homeland. This armor is something my people perfected a thousand years ago.
Now we build great flying machines out of the precious metal aluminum which propels itself through the sky on great fire-spitting engines. This armor and weapon are yours...”

Autumn took the cue and threw the covers back on the set of equipment.

“..If you can prove yourself worthy of holding them. You up for it?” I challenged.

The bulls roared their acceptance of my challenge.

This was going to be fun.

He made us run miles until our legs were unsteady.

He made us do pushups until our arms tired.

He made us do pull-ups until our shoulders and elbows hurt.

He made us do crunches until our bellies ached.

He made us spar with weighted wooden swords until we sported many bruises.

He made us study a human document called The Art of War until our minds were fried. He even had to teach a few of us to read!

Ty was brutal on the Bulls that had made the decision to become the militia of this new sprawling town. The Bulls hated Ty for it, but they knew better than to tempt the one being that could out-shout even the minotaurs. For all their hardship, the Bulls definitely showed improvements.

They could now go faster and further.

They could now fight for far longer and far harder, and their minds were as sharp as their weapons, which they now wielded with great skill as well as increased strength.

Perhaps there was something, after all, to come from these human training methods.

Bullheart could only hope that this would be worth it.

“Alright, final day,” I shouted.

The battered, bruised, weary, and hungry Bulls chinned up at the news. At least it was almost over.

“Final Lesson!" I announced. "Gather ‘round.”

The line dissolved as the Bulls surrounded Ty.

I declared, with a raised, clenched fist, “Spirit!”

The militia looked at each other, lost to the meaning of the human’s babbling.

“You can have the best swords, the best armor, the best food, and the best training in the world if you don’t have the spirit of a successful army. A long time ago, there were people called the Romans, and they were called Romans because they were from a city called Rome.”

Ty walked out of the circle of bulls and continued.

“They made an empire with the drive that came from within. They said to themselves that their destiny was to rule the world.”

Ty flashed a maniacal toothy grin at the Bulls.

“They established one of the grandest ancient empires ever known to man with this energy and with this fire, but they faded from the world because they lost the spirit which made them great.”

Ty dropped the smile and drew one of his swords.

“The same could be said of any large empire. They succeed when a group of warriors comes together under a leader that makes them great. Their spirit and their valor and the best that they could get makes them great.”

As the bulls noticed the carts of new armor and weapons, Ty thrust his sword into the air.

“And with the best weapons and armor anywhere, you fine bulls, and my oversight, we will be unstoppable!”

The cheer that arose from the bulls was awe-inspiring. Bullheart thought that the other tyrants of this land would tremble before them.

As I listened to some music back in my shop in the evening, I wondered about many things.

Was the training I set out for the militia enough? Should I enlist more members now, or when a new danger presented itself? Should I have gone with the medieval swordsman equipment, with the armor and two-handed swords, or with something else? Was staying up late at night bad, or were the armor and weapons that now equipped my new army worth the missed hours of sleep?

As I pondered, nearly napping, there suddenly came a tapping at my forge’s door. That shook me from my train of thought, and I shut off my device and hid it away before answering the door. What met me on the other door was a dagger, held by a black-feathered and black-furred griffon. The blade sank deep into my chest, producing a most shocking, curious, and agonizing sensation.

I whispered, through gritted teeth, "Of all the days to not be wearing that damn armor..."

The steel was as cold as death. Deep inside me, it intruded, creating a very real sensation of wrongness and alarm, not to mention the pain. I stumbled back into my abode, the assassin disappearing, his parting gift jutting out of my chest. My breath quickened. A wound like this was fatal. I could feel my warm heart attempt to pump around the cold steel embedded within. I fell backward, landing on my back. As I felt warmth leave my extremities, some kind of energy within the blade charged up, freezing me further. I felt like I was being squeezed through a tiny space chest first, and I could feel myself departing this realm for a much darker, colder place.

Then all was pain.

The lazy town was awakened not by the harsh voice of a commanding officer, nor the scolding tone of a mother, but the anguished alarm of a pony.

"Murder! Ty's been murdered!"