Ulf's death shattered the last pillar holding up the Sauron Army. The remaining beaten troops had initially tried to make a last stand, relying on Tar Fort's labyrinthine streets and sturdy stone buildings to fight like trapped beasts.
Yet before the Carnford Army's overwhelming advantage in manpower and firepower—advancing from north and south, striking from within and without—that faint will to resist evaporated like dew beneath the sun.
With no unified command or will to fight left, the surviving Sauron soldiers could not even organize a proper street battle. They could only fight in scattered groups of three or five, each on their own, before the Carnford Army swiftly split them apart and crushed them in small-unit clearing operations.
Despair spread like a plague. The remnants either threw down their weapons and dropped to their knees in surrender, or were easily shot down and speared by pursuing cavalry and infantry as they fled blindly.
Inside and outside Tar Fort, the gunfire gradually thinned, replaced by the shouts of Carnford soldiers clearing the battlefield, the groans of the wounded, and the terrified sobbing of prisoners.
Inside the Lord's Hall, where the smoke had yet to fully disperse, the stench of scorched flesh still stung the nose.
Surrounded by a host of officers, Karl silently gazed at the five charred corpses on the floor, their features no longer recognizable. The bodies remained leaning against one another; even amid the flames, they seemed never to have parted. In the center of the hall, the dying embers of the firewood pile still gave off a faint red glow and wisps of bluish smoke.
"Who was the lord of Tar Fort...?" Karl's voice broke the silence, betraying little emotion.
The staff officer beside him immediately opened the roster he carried, which recorded information on the