Chapter 13

The start of the war was amped up with a single mindedness and cruelty only the goblins could carry out, reading catapults to send their own over the wall by shooting them at it. The dropping of the bombs signified the rest of the troops marching orders, or in other cases their final death. Patrick stood in the breach as he watched the rush of monsters come at his beloved city. Through centuries of practice and hardship, he and his people were ready to take on the oncoming invaders.

“FORM RANKS!” his shout carried over the entire southern wall making even the hardest ear listen to the words of their king. The skill used was -kings voice- along with -bellow-. Over the years all of the immortal’s had gained more skills then any human should have any right to have, making them the most dangerous ones in the kingdom of Waterbrook.

The call was relayed by the standing ranks giving orders out to begin the defense, the population of Patrick’s were well versed in the art of war even if not all of his people were fighters. 2/3 of them had a combat class making it the norm, the rest of them were crafters and farmers. The crafters and farmers were taught how to specialize and be proficient with a weapon still making it so that in an event of a breakthrough ever did come they were able to help quell the invasion.

The caption of the guard was his son Jacob, his sons second was the old lady Katye. He was in charge of the ground forces, his portion of troops made up roughly 8 thousand. What they lacked in movability they more than made up for with defense. They were called the snow soldiers and formed ranks at the base of the walls when they could. Shield wall and frost wall was necessary to have to be in Jacobs troops, along with having the skills at a base of 50 lv. They fought in ranks similar to the wall, the style was called two shields with spears in the back. The idea was to push out along the wall and carry swift death from the back, the men had swords too but carried two shields with weighted spikes at the bottom to be put in place with idents at the edge.

The strength requirement was at copper and had to be at body lv. 30. Through the years of body strengthening Patrick and others found that once a person hit 100 on that stat, it would reset and have a copper 1 by the lv. This newfound information sparked a rush of Patrick’s people to get to copper as fast as possible but they soon found out that the requirement to hit pass copper doubled compared to the norm. Only the original 50 had reached pasted 70 and Patrick was on the precipice of hitting lv. 90.

Jacob kept the tactic of shield wall two lined but without the double shields, as he kept 2 thousand troops in the rear for flanking. Most of the flanks were carried out by the cavalry but one could never be too careful. The cavalry had a different set of skills opposed to the standing troops, the army was focused on defense the cavalry was entirely focused on pure power and speed. Each horse could run around the kingdom in an hours’ time, making their speed reach over 60mph even though the horses were strapped to the teeth with armor. The weapon commonly used was the lance, though officers used the more refined great sword.

Elderly Katye was in charge of forming ranks as she commonly liked to be the tip of the spear, making her one of the most feared to the goblin horde. Weighed down with plated armor and furs, Katye wielded a large mace with runes engraved in it to make it as light as it could. Her shield was embroidered with past wars of her killing the enemy troops. Calling the troops into formation on ground level, she and the men made preparations to open the gates to receive the horde.

Gwen, Jacob’s wife was leader of the scouts and archers. Her force was too 8 thousand strong, and had the base skills of snipe, archer’s eye, power shot and arrow barrage. She had a stricter set of rules, one couldn’t join if they didn’t have a skill lv. of 60. and shoot over 5 thousand yards. She was currently standing beside Jacob when the blast went off sending her and Jacob to the ground as ruble was blasted out at them.

“Steven, send the call to the mages. I don’t know what that engineer is up to but I need them NOW!” Patrick didn’t have any give to his voice making this all the more serious to his men.

“Right away my lord!” Steve and the rest of the war council set about their task as they would any other battle they had been a part of. The years of taking to the walls was not kind to them or anyone. The rest of the room went quiet as the non-combative leaders left the room.

“Gwen, take the scouts to the towers and spread them out along the wall. You know what to do with Henry.” Patrick was keeping his eyes to the oncoming horde as he gave his orders. The sight was horrifying to witness, the land scape before him was blotted out by numerous things coming in from the south. In all his years of taking on the goblins, he has never seen these numbers before.

“Jacob” Patrick turned to his son, giving him his full worry look. “Take to the ground as you would but before you do. Bring your brother to me.”

The worry in Patrick was matched and surpassed by the fear in Jacobs eyes. “This soon?” the answer from his father was one of silence. The only thing he could do was shake his head and follow the orders.

“This is going to be a long battle.” Was the last thing Jacob heard before leaving the chamber.

The outstretched sight to the city was one that made Kafue the goblin leader and master to the horde foam at the mouth. The years of war was not as kind to him as it had been to the humans, under constant threat from mankind he had to sleep with one eye to the north and another on his back incase another insurrection took place with his army. That alone would have been enough to make Kafue to kill himself but his god had a different agenda in mind.

Maglubiyet had conversed with him passed the centuries and had come to the conclusion that the only way to leave this hell was to completely wipe out the city of Waterbrook. The idea was mad but over time it became Kafue’s only hope on this never-ending war. He was sure the humans had the same plan and didn’t want to think about it too hard.

The start of the battle was going in his favor, he had scouts and assassins make extensive notes on where the humans council would meet in the wall so he could wipe them out in one fell swoop. The less he seen of the enemy’s leader the better his people had at wiping the city out.

Kafue was currently being carried by two trolls in a makeshift carriage, he was in the back with his orders being carried out through whisper, a skill he had to use extensively. The plan was to throw everything he had at the wall in hopes it would come crushing down, along with taking out that cursed man Patrick so he could round up the rest of the humans and kill them before the end of the third day. The only problem was what that death stalker would do during his attack.

That soured his mood in his thinking, turning over to look at the horde he took note of the lineup he had prepared before the march. In the front was the more loose knitted of the horde that consisted of the less loyal, that was mashed with every known species he had. It was a motley line of crazed individuals that were promised of rank and title he pulled out of his ass but they didn’t need to know that.

They would be the cannon fodder to the success of his victory, as the wall focused on them his true army would march from behind them and take planned strategic steps in taking out the wall. This had been down a number of times before but this time he had a few things he hadn’t had. The war balloons were the cutting technology from the gremlins and the new addition he had gotten from raising a Flex to the commander of the engineers. The other thing or he should say things were the large basilisk’s he helped raise from birth. It was a long and tedious prosses to do and he would see the payoff here soon.

“Horde leader, do you think it’s wise to dispense with over 12,000 of our own troops just to soften them up? Don’t take my question as disrespect but are you sure that is the wisest course of action we should be taking.” The speaker was also in the carriage with him and the other horde leaders. A few hundred years ago the army had grown too large just for him to take control of so through begrudging choice he gave command to the most loyal of his monsters or the most competent, but that lasted as long as they stayed alive, or stayed loyal.

“Horde master?” the thing said again. Kafue turned from looking at the incoming battle to stare at the speaker, the creature was Flex the very same gremlin he had appointed and was now trying to overthrow him as horde master, by making his choice of action look like it was made by an innated leader.

“Don’t worried about what the horde master does, we follow the old and hope for victory” the old was emphasized by the new speaker in the group. Unlike Flex, this one wasn’t as subtle at hiding his discuss with Kafue as Flex did with his words. The voice was a metal twisting sound that came from a misshapen creature that resembled a woman. But she had no candor or grace with her movements as the gremlin did, she was dressed in rags and had a noose tide around her neck. She was a banshee of flesh after reaching a special ability Kafue didn’t know of, that still drove him mad with rage not knowing what that was.

Her name was Nepeta leader of the harpies and a leading advocate of overthrowing Kafue, lucky for her she couldn’t die. He made arrangements that if he was permanently dead she would be next in line for master of the horde, unlucky Kafue couldn’t be permanently put down. She knew from the countless tries she made to silence him.

“The plan is set and I don’t need another meeting to go over the march, I don’t answer to you! You answer me!” Kafue scream silently. This was his daily life and frankly he was getting sick of it. How many marches had he made against the humans, how many times did he fail or come to an impasse with that man Patrick.

“As you have said, the plan is in motion and all that is to do is wait. I can’t but help wonder that there will be some success this time.” The new spokesmen were Carnal, he held the right to the werewolves and beast they lead. He was one of the few that was loyal to Kafue but unfortunately he wasn’t so easily placed in battle, That human with the wolves was a problem that stopped Carnal from getting into the city.

Carnal was perpetually trapped as a humanoid wolf, with gray fur covering his entire body. Red eyes glisten with hatred as he stared at Nepeta, he didn’t like others challenging Kafue in front of him.

“The plan is good; all we need to do to unleash you is taking out that annoying beast tamer.” Flex stated as he stared at Kafue. The unspoken question hung in the air. -do we have eyes on that human? -.

The plan was in motion, 250,000 monsters were marching and all that was left to do was wait and watch for his opening to cast his ability, his ace in the whole.

Harrison was sitting at the old town meeting hall turn watering whole in Waterbrook. The place was now somewhere to get a drink or others looking to get into a fight. He took a pull from the dark ale he had and looked over his character sheet.

Harrison

Class: Beast tamer

Level: 0

Hp 2450/ Stam 2440/ Mp 750,

-Hp regen 245 per hour

-Stam regen 244 per minute

-Mp regen 75 per hour

Vit 245/ End 244/ Str 200

Agi 235/ Percep 75/ React 30

Will 75/ Intell 75/ Wisdom 50

Skills-(tier5) Trace step lv.25 able to see the after images of the tracks you see, knife proficiency master lv. 13, knifes do an additional 62% damage, Crossbow proficiency master lv. 24 crossbows do an additional 64%, horseback riding lv. 74, hand combat journeyman lv. 29 hand to hand does additional 45% damage, (tier5) Beast taming lv. 16 beast of tier 2 or lower within a hundred feet submit to you. Etc.…

Abilities-Beast tongue, etc..

He had hit iron in most of his physical body stats a long time ago, of course he wasn’t trying like his friend had. Or what had used to be his friend, Patrick was now the king of this city and left him and his rage of the man with chains alone. That thought of that monster pissed him off enough to down his drink in disgust. Henry wasn’t allowed to leave town anymore after werewolves and other beast started appearing, now he was what he hated to call himself “animal control”. He would be summoned when such a beast entered the city or keep them at bay when he was called to the wall.

“Barkeep, another pint if you will!” Harrison sounded out; he would be called soon to the wall. He knew because the pups went back to their pens early this morning. The few people in the bar let him and his dogs alone, no need getting involved with an obsessed man.

“Haven’t you had enough yet? What will the men think of you staggering up the ramparts like this.” The bartender was one in a long line of barkeeps over the years and Harrison knew the family well, he should because he owned the bar or at least 90% of it. But this was the norm so Prat pulled another half full bottle off the shelf and slid it over to Henrys spot.

“Shut that mouth of yours, I know what I can and can’t have. My drinking skill is up at tier 5 so you know.” Harrison slurred out. He and most of the people in town had too many skills to look them all over in one sitting.

“And you best keep an eye out when the cursed man comes knocking around!” at the end of his sentence he fell off his stool nocking the glass of and shattering it across the floor.

“Sure, whatever you say Henry.” Prat said as he took the broom from the corner to clean up a too common occurrence. “Looks like your entourage is here to pick you up again,”

Harrison stirred from his well-worn spot and turned to look at the new figures coming through the entrance of the bar. Men and women arrived in cloaks holstering bows and swords dressed in all dark green, the leather was a special make that was dyed black with archaic runes sewn in like patches on an old work shirt. They blocked off all of the exits making sure Henry couldn’t sneak out through the back. They were Gwen’s elites, with far greater skills then the average scout.

“What took you so long! I’ve been drinking myself into a stupor waiting for ya lot to come for me. Do you have any idea of how hard it is to get another pint from this, this asshole!” Harrison slurred out, his words taking on a broken farmers draw sound to them.

Without a word, the group went over and collected Harrison off the floor. The old farmer grabbing the half empty bottle as they did so, making Prat the bar keep frown at the spectacle. The rest of onlookers didn’t so much as make eye contact at the elites out of fear of pulling their ire from Henry, it was bad enough the rangers had to be used as in this way let alone mocked for it.

One of the shorter ones spoke but a few words as they departed, “Harrison, you are needed at the front as the pre usual. You have the right to defend, you have the right for a bodyguard and if you don’t have one then one shall be provided. You have the right to chant spells but if you do so any escape magic, they can and will be held against you, nod if you understand.”

“Raise the cannons, the first wave is about to hit!” at the command of Patrick, large cannons were turned to the sky as the men got ready to send the first volley of steel at the invaders. The mashed together cannons were one that was a tried-and-true test of the engineers of Waterbrook, though they weren’t the ones managed by black powder, they were armed and fired using magic. The archers had already been firing nonstop at them for the past 10 minutes but there was too many to put a dent in them.

“Armed and ready m’ lord.” Blackwater said, the lead artillery engineer.

Patrick stared at the incoming nightmares that were getting ready to hit the wall, waiting for the best opportunity for the line to come into reach. When they did, he gave no further delay. “Fire!” and with that, the sound of 5000 cannons sounded shattering in the air.

The cannons were only as good as the mage that fired it, the pressure from the concussive force of the artillery vibrated through the men and women on the wall, making the freshly new troops that weren’t used to it vomit from the attack. The shots fired could go roughly 2100 yards, that’s only because it was on the tall wall being shot upward.

The rain of frozen steal fell from the sky landing all across the battlement taking out large portions of the goblin’s horde, any that wasn’t killed from direct hits were blaster outward from the cannon balls taking serious injuries. After the first shot, his engineers and mages made preparations to reload and restock for the next round.

“Ready the next, I want to burn these fuckers!” the call singe for burning made the fire mages and engineers switch from the normal ballista shot to the concussive blast of flame shots. The flame shots were more devastating with runes carved all across them making them an impact timed shot. Of cores if one were to fall while being loaded in the cannon it would kill everyone in a 3-meter radius. That’s why the engraving was finished as they were being stuffed in, it made a longer prosses but a safer system was far better. They stopped immediately what they were doing and switched to the flame shot, the men at arms around them stood stock still as they began the prosses. Patrick watched the approaching army as they did so, not taking any need to correct of force his army to hurry, he had learned this lesson time and again.

Kafue sat in his carrier as he silently watched his first wave get obliterated from the first shot of the contraptions of the humans. “The hell was that!” he spun to the gremlin sitting next to him. “We’ve had centuries of contest with the hell spurn humans and were just finding this out that they have weapons like this!” Kafue seethed in his anger waiting for an appropriate response from his lead engineer.

“Horde leader, try to understand that we have been hard at work trying to make our own. We didn’t have time to learn all the secrets of the miserable humans-” Kafue went into a rage and cast a quick hand gesture at Flex, taking the air from his tiny lungs.

“Time! You said time! I have been her for over a millennium! Don’t you talk to me about time, you wouldn’t understand the meaning of it!” Flex’s face was slowly losing pigment to his fur, without holding on for too long to the spell Kafue let go of the cast or he would have lost a semi-competent engineer. He would look into finding another as soon as he could, the longer his horde leaders stood in power the more they became laxed in the power they had, none of them understood the consequences of losing this or the next battle they had with the humans.

“Nepeta, send the signal for the harpies to take out that accursed weapons so we can send out our ground troops, for the love of Maglubiyet get it done. I don’t want to lose those basilisks.” Kafue turned back to flex, “how many of the war balloons do we have?” He waited as the gremlin squirming under his eyes.

“15,000 if we send the ones that aren’t completely finished. If not then roughly 12000 horde master.” Flex couldn’t look Kafue in his oblique eyes.

“Good, send the call for all of them. I want to march in the city by the end of the night.” The humor was out of him and his horde leaders, he would put that away for later and think back on how he can make them more cooperative.

“Send in the ice knights!” Patrick bellowed out; the ice knights were under Patrick himself, there were 10,000 and each one was worth another 500. They weren’t called out except when it was for the killer. The cacophony of the battle was raging all across the wall as the second half of the war commenced. The start of the war was no basic trade off of spell and arrow as the rest of the horde’s army caught up.

The newer soldiers on the front were reaching their limit or dying without the ice mages there for their support. That crafty lead engineer of his was up to something but he didn’t have the time to look to deeply into it. The cannons that they had was down to three working ones, the rest were either destroyed or fell to the base of the wall. They had taken out a great portion of the war balloons and harpies but that didn’t stop what was coming next.

“Frost wall!” the sound of the men at arms called out. The wall was battered to a barely recognizable that it once was. The plume of ice scattered against the wall in an encroaching pace, it covered wholes and broken parts in places as the men gathered up more mana to deliver a decisive blow to the basilisk that was scaling up to them.

The Basilisk was covered in green scales and was more snake then dragon, or what they could put together from the legends they all shared around the fire. It had two enormous arms that it used to move forward with, the talons of it were longer and larger than the cannons he had lost. The length of it exceeded the walls height but that wouldn’t stop him from kill the creatures.

The sound of an incoming attack from a nearby war balloon screeched in Patrick’s ears as he turned to find the incoming missile. The moment he spotted it was too late for him to stop it. The hit landed taking and injuring his troops at the base of the wall. “Where are those damn knights!” he called out to Gwen as she continuously rained down arrows on the incoming enemy.

The clatter of boots behind him sounded out as the men came in ready to jump down to meet the overgrown snake. “Were ready my lord.” The men behind the spokesmen looked eager to get ready.

“Go, go don’t tarry!” he started to push to the side and soldiers out of the way to let them through, as they free fell down to the damnable thing they let loose ice spikes to catch the ice wall slowing their decent as a multitude of ice spike rushed down to meet the cold-blooded thing. Blood and viscera splashed out from the attack, Patrick caught sight of another one coming as more and more ice knights jumped down to meet the horde. He had well over 2,000 ready and willing to engage the enemy and another 8,000 in reserve so swap out with them.

The call for another frost wall reverberated out to catch another falling bomb before it could let loose its blast. The men pushed out mist that frozen the bomb before it could detonate on the wall. The ice knights below began to carve their way through the serpent.

The knights under the frozen order used the norm weapons but unlike the rest of the army of Waterbrook, they didn’t have a set skill or style in what they used. Patrick watched as one of his knights took out a large broad sword then incased it in ice making it longer and larger than any of his other soldiers could ever hope to use effectively in battle, he took two great swings with his blade lopping off one of the arms of the basilisk. “This is just the start of this damnable battle”, Patrick thought.