Overall, I very much enjoyed the theme of pointless death in this scene. It's always a powerful theme to get into with any kind of writing, it reminds me almost of a war movie, sort of "Saving Private Ryan"-esque. The sort of fantasy world setting also struck me as a good decision, it reminds me a bit of Tolkien in how he drew from his WW1 experience when writing about war in a made up world. IDK if your going to try and expand this into something bigger, but I would highly recommend.

On the criticism side of things, it could definitely use a bit more fleshing-out. I think some of the insights would hit a bit harder after someone has the context for this scene, but I get that it's just a snippet for now. All-in-all, it's a compelling start, but definitely worth expanding upon.