The withdrawing Red Orcs left the mountain looking very lonely. A shame that they left steaming corpses in their wake, but it was still a good reprieve from what would have been if they had kept the assault.
Steam lifted off fresh kills in faint, pale breaths, the kind a living battlefield released when it had just finished chewing.
Ludwig knew it, Damra knew it, everyone here knew it.
Relief was a dangerous thing. It softened the spine and loosened the grip. Even now, you could see it trying to creep into shoulders, into the way some of the allied orcs lowered their weapons a fraction, into the way goblins emerged from cover too soon, into the way lizardmen swallowed hard and blinked slow.
Ludwig refused it. He watched the empty lower slope like it was a mouth that had only paused mid-bite.
For whatever reason, the Red King had ordered the orcs to withdraw; it was good for them right now.
