We didn't walk into the clearing like soldiers hungry for glory. We moved in like hunters — slow, quiet, pragmatic. The pride's scent had been on the wind for a day; their paw-prints led us to a rocky basin ringed with tall grass and stunted pines. Two great scars in the earth where the ground sank told me these lions preferred the slope — perfect for ambush, and perfect for us to turn the slope against them.
"Trap positions," I said, voice low. "We don't want them to fight us on their terms."
Alex split the squad into teams. Eight men under Liang Hao would dig the pit traps; six under Gao Wei would lay snap-nets and trip-lines; six more prepared bladed stakes and barbs; the remainder carried fire charges, smoke pots, and spatial anchors. We moved like a single organism, efficient and silent. This was the part of warfare most recruits never learned — preparation. Today they'd learn it with sweat and calluses.
I took the high ridge, scanning the basin. The two advanced-tier lions — one with a mane like melted bronze, the other like winter sun—would lead. I assigned the ridgemen to vantage points with long spears and ranged mana launchers; Alex and I would be the bait once their leaders revealed themselves. "If they split, hold your marks and funnel them into the pits. Don't let the pack link up," I told the men.
Dawn was a gray bruise on the horizon when the first low bellows rolled across the basin. The intermediate lions took the lead at the scent, a line of ten massive cats cutting through the grass like living shadows. The two leaders appeared last, slow and deliberate — the male Kharos thundered forward, muscle and old cunning, while the female Nerissa moved like coiled silver, eyes hooded with cold intelligence.
The signal went out. Liang's men slipped into the cut channels and pulled the trip-lines. The first intermediate lion stepped where the ground looked soft, and the earth swallowed it — a pit trap, its sides jagged with stakes and ropes. It howled as men above hurled down spears and poured boiling oil to prevent it from crawling back up. Others fell into nets, ropes tightened, teeth snagged on hidden barbs. Chaos erupted, exactly as planned.
But the pride was not stupid. Nerissa landed with a growl at the pit's edge, hissing to Kharos. The intermediate cats, enraged, took their cues from their leaders. The basin erupted into motion. Ranks of intermediate animals smashed at the lines; several burst through a flank we had underestimated. A spear shattered across bone and fur — the noise was animal and final.
I ran. My blade burned with mana as I cut down a charging lion that lunged at a flankman. The young soldier staggered, then fell hard — a shout of pain. The beast hit him again; I shoved my shoulder into the creature's chest, felt ribs collide, and drove my sword home. Blood sprayed; the world narrowed to heat and the sound of my pulse.
Across the basin Alex danced with Nerissa. She moved unlike any creature we'd faced — one moment almost feline beauty, the next a machine of jaws and fury. He bent space to make her leap into a net, then used the seam to slip behind her, striking at the base of her skull with a short, white-hot blade. She howled and spun, lashing the air with talons.
The squad fought like men who'd become more than the sum of their parts. Fire pots burned the flanks of oncoming lions; spatial anchors briefly folded a charging cat into itself and spat it out stunned. We funneled the majority into the pits and nets, and the men at the ridge rained down controlled mana bolts and spears on the trapped animals. Yet for every beast trapped, another tore free, eyes wild with pain and rage.
We sustained the first price quickly. A spear grazed Jin Yi's thigh, she dropped with blood soaking leather — a heavy wound; the shaft snapped against bone with a sick crack. Two men took deep bites and were dragged from a net before comrades could pull them free. The intermediate wave hit the flanks harder than I'd predicted. We had planned for numbers, not for the pride's ferocity.
When Kharos saw his mates fall, he charged toward the ridge, roaring like a king. He met me halfway.
If the wolves had been a test of tactics, this was the crucible of endurance. Kharos hit like a battering ram. His first swipe sent me skidding across rock and tearing my side open when talons scraped through mail. Pain flared like a brand, breath stealing itself. My ribs felt cracked. I tasted copper.
I steadied, pulling mana through my core to seal wounds enough to fight. The ridgemen aimed at his flank as I baited him toward the pits — but Kharos spun like a wheel and knocked two men into the open. They rolled, then lay still; I did not have the time to know if they lived. The beast's brutality was an engine and we were the fuel.
Alex's cry cut through everything; Nerissa had thrown herself at the center line and caught Liang Hao under her paw. Liang's chest heaved shallow, his armor caved in. Alex diverted space around the lion's coming strike, twisting the attack into the ground so Liang could roll free, but not before the beast's claws shredded his side. The sight of our men falling — some with grievous injuries, some with small cuts — drove the heat in my chest to a red flash.
By the time we'd dragged the last of the trapped intermediate lions into the nets and burned the remaining packs away with coordinated fire-and-spatial volleys, our toll was clear: eight men on stretchers or being bound for field surgery — deep gashes, punctures in the lungs, shattered ribs. Ten more limped, clutching torn arms and bloodied shoulders. The rest of the twenty-eight stood, raw-faced and shaking, but alive.
I forced myself to breathe. I felt each wounded man's presence as an ache in my own body. The pride had tested them and found them as yet unfinished — but alive.
We regrouped, quickly assessing the wounded. Alex moved with practiced hands, binding wounds, calling on his fragile reserves of healing mana to staunch bleeding and slow infection. He was spent; I could see his lips trembling. We had won the field tactically, but the price had not been cheap. The men who'd trained and sweat under our roof now lay groaning, and I felt every weight of that cost.
"Collect the spoils," I ordered. "Stabilize the cores. Harvest teeth, claws, and furs. We move back to camp; we patch our dead and living and we learn what we did wrong." The men obeyed, but their faces had a new something — not just exhaustion or pride, but the raw knowledge of what war demanded.
We left the basin with our shoulders full of prize and our pockets heavy with the ache of survival. The traps had worked; the tactics had held; but the pride had given us our answer in blood and pain. That answer would haunt us and teach us for weeks to come.