This is what comes when I have too much Shakespearian literature in my mental diet...

“Let us to it pell-mell;

If not to heaven, then hand in hand to hell.”

Richard III (.312-313)

The stench of sweat and smoke and death clings to every part of him. The blades of his opponents—now fallen before his own—had bounced off of his mail as they should have, but he can feel the sting of broken links digging into his skin with every movement. Blood seeps from the shallow head wound and thick gray smoke blurs his sight.

“Turn, cur,” a gruff shout came from behind him. “And meet the one who shall rend your head from your shoulders.”

He whips around, swinging his claymore in a wide arc with a roar.

His vision tunnels and, for a moment, the screams around him cut off and he is wholly focused on the opponent before him.

The reverberating clang as two blades meet rings in his ears and as he turns, ducking under the other blade while swinging his own, he hears a scream.

Was it his opponent? Or did it come from his own lips?

Something warm hits his face and he sees the form before him fall. He can’t take time to reflect on yet another life lost to his sword; another opponent waits for him somewhere on this bloody field.

What he’s fighting for doesn’t matter anymore. Who his next opponent is doesn’t matter anymore. Whether he’ll leave this blood-splattered, burning ground whole doesn’t matter anymore.

He’s lost in the fight, lost in the carnage.

And it doesn’t matter.