The other wolves all seemed to pause what they were doing, looking to the wolf king for permission.
“That’s one ugly damn mutt,” Erik said.
“I don’t know—I’m a dog guy,” Rugrat said.
“You got it sighted?”
“Yup, ready to go when you need it,” Rugrat confirmed.
“Hold off. We’ll bleed them a bit—time that our people got some experience with holding the walls,” Erik said.
“Got it. I’ll keep my eyes peeled for any other groups.”
The wolf king let out a roar. The forest seemed to boil as squeals filled the air. Boars rushed out of the tree line as wolves rushed out. The true first wave had begun.
Erik could feel the nervousness of everyone on the wall. “Hold your fire.” His calm voice cut through the air as people gripped their weapons tighter. “Breathe. Let them come to us. No sense in shooting at them before they get into range.”
The sharpshooters and sergeants of the different archer groups looked over their people.
The wolves had made it through the first line of defenses in places. The second defenses were meant to injure and push the beasts into killing corridors.
They got packed together, running straight toward the village’s walls.
Like fish in a barrel.
“Prepare to fire!” Erik yelled out.
Everyone checked their weapons and sighted their targets as the sergeants picked out areas for them to aim at.
The beasts threw one another off, cutting themselves on the spiked defenses.
Erik saw the beasts come into range. “Fire!” he yelled.
The archers fired, raining down arrows on the beasts the beasts howled in pain as they were cut down.
The archers had trained again and again, but training and combat were very different things. Many were stunned with the effectiveness of massed fire.
“Do you think we have all morning!? Reload!” Sergeants yelled out instructions to their people, motivating them and pushing them to be faster.
“Fire in groups! Sergeants, you have fire control!” Erik ordered as he fired on a beast. It crumpled under the powerful arrow and he loaded another arrow with quick, precise actions, looking up and over the wall.
There looks to be a lot of them but we’ve got plenty of people and crossbows. As long as we have ammunition and there’s not a big jump in numbers, we should be able to bleed them white.
Erik quickly looked over the situation as he loaded an arrow, sighted a wolf and fired. It crumpled as Erik reloaded once again.
Now that they were into the rhythm of things, death came quickly for these beasts.
“We’ve got incoming at the ten o’clock.” Rugrat’s voice sounded in Erik’s ear. “Just wolves. It looks like the wolf king is directing them. They’re trying to come in quietly.”
Erik frowned. This showed that the beast horde had some tactics. Dealing with beasts was one thing; dealing with smart beasts was another thing totally.
“Archers will bring them under fire as soon as they get into range.”
“Got it,” Erik said.
Across the battlefield, arrows continued to fall like a black rain on top of the beasts, whittling down their numbers. More were coming out of the forests, seemingly endless as they pushed around the areas they’d made progress, finding new routes to the walls.
So it went on for twenty minutes. The wolf king seemed to be annoyed as it pawed the ground and let out another howl.
The wolves seemed to resist for a second before they began to turn back.
“Take the wolf king,” Erik said.
“On it,” Rugrat said.
Erik heard the familiar crack of a rifle. Others looked around in shock as the wolf king was hit in the chest, dropping to the ground in a pool of blood.
The other wolves all looked around in alarm. They didn’t know what had happened, but they seemed to realize that the noise had come from the village.
Their retreat was cancelled as the elites rushed forward as well; the wolves charged forward again.
“Bring up three of the archer groups; have them on the five to six o’clock wall,” Erik ordered Blaze, who was still in the village square.
“On their way!” Blaze said.
The village wasn’t all that big and the archers quickly crossed the distance. The archers on the wall were pressured but with the reinforcements, they once again pushed the wolves back.
“Sharpshooters, target the elites,” Erik ordered.
Armed with the advanced crossbows and with their higher Marksman skill, the sharpshooters quickly brought down a large number of elites.
They were the fastest and strongest; without them, the wolves were being torn apart.
After ten minutes, the wolves broke and started to flee, seeing the losses. Even if they were feeling the loss of their wolf king, they weren’t willing to just throw all of their lives away.
The crossbows slowed their rate of fire as the wolves got out of range. Finally the sergeants started to stop them from shooting.
Jasper’s people came around with arrows and food.
People reloaded and ate their meals, their hands still shaking. The peaceful morning was broken—the beast horde had arrived.
The pits were opened, with many beasts falling into them. The killing corridors that had been created with different obstacles were filled with bodies.
They hadn’t made it to the third layer of defenses.
We need to patch the hole in our defenses to the west. “Have the heavy infantry prepare to move out and clear the battlefield,” Erik ordered Blaze.
“Will move two groups to the southern gate, with another moving to the eastern,” Blaze replied.
“See to it.” Erik wasn’t jealous of the men doing the task. They’d need to pull down the wolf carcasses so that they wouldn’t affect the defenses and make it easier for those that attacked later.
Erik felt as though dozens of eyes watched him from the forest. Erik looked back, tapping his finger on the side of the crossbow.
A screen appeared in Erik’s vision.
==========
Quest Updated: Beast Mountains Trial
==========
Requirements:
Defeat the beast horde (4/5 Waves remaining)
==========
Rewards:
Dependent upon results
==========
“It’s just started,” Erik muttered.
Chapter: Welcoming the Horde
Blaze had trained in the royal army for decades. Although it looked as though it was a system meant to work together, it was more the guards than the actual soldiers who had the best cooperation.
Everyone joined the army to gain skills and levels; there wasn’t a lack of people wanting to join. It might be bloody and people died, but it was one of the fastest ways to increase one’s power and reach higher, even touching the boundary of the higher realms.
When he had trained the heavy infantry, he thought that as soon as the battle started that they would break apart, simply wanting to get as many merits as possible and increase their own power. Everyone was looking to make their own legends and the military was filled with wild and ambitious people.
Well, most militaries. The Alva Village people had been turned into soldiers. With their grim faces, they were ready to go into battle, waiting for their orders. Now that they were sent to clean up the battlefield, they didn’t complain and understood that their actions, which seemed simple, helped the whole.
Blaze felt great pride looking on them and the people of Alva Village. They were closer than ever before, putting the group ahead of the individual.
I wonder how much stronger we will be once everyone is working together? Once all of their forces were deployed to the walls, he was interested to see how things would go.
As the heavy infantry left the southern gate, they looked to the arche
rs. They had been simple farmers and village folk; now they were steely-eyed watchers, looking out for the heavy infantry and ready to fight again.
The heavy infantry dispersed into pairs. Using their storage rings, they were able to clear up the tens of wolves and boars, returning the defenses to how they were.
Blaze could feel that something was happening in the forest but he didn’t know what. He worked with his people to speed up how fast they cleared the area and then pulled back to the village.
The heavy infantry passed off the full storage rings to the quartermaster division being run by Jasper. Rugrat had renamed it a few days ago, finding that the name suited the group better.
They took all of the storage rings. Most of the meat was ruined but they could still use the tendons and other parts, though it would be much harder to separate them.
Roska came over to them, a strange look on her face. She walked up to Blaze. Roska had been badly wounded at an early age, abandoned by her family as they moved to another village. He felt sorry for the girl and wanted to help her but she was determined to do things on her own.
Now she was no longer wounded and although she wasn’t immensely powerful, her reserved air and the way she analyzed things made Blaze feel that she would quickly surpass him in ability.
“May I have one of the corpses?” Roska asked.
Blaze opened his mouth to reply and then closed it. He waved his hand; a boar appeared on the ground.
Roska didn’t care about the blood or the dead beast’s wounds as she put her hands on it. A magical circle appeared around her hands. The spell formation flashed with bright light.
The boar split apart, creating a row of pieces. One was bones, another tendons, another the meat; the skin was pulled from the boar and the organs neatly arranged.
The blood splashed on the ground. The rest of the meat had little blood on them.
“What is that?” Jasper, who was nearby, asked in a husky voice. Cleaning and storing the meats and materials took a lot of time, but Roska had separated it all in just a single spell.
Roska didn’t answer right away. A screen appeared in front of her. A hint of a smile showed on her face as she dismissed it. She looked around, noticing everyone staring at her. Her expression turned cold once again.
“It’s a spell called Separation. It breaks down the target into its components. It can only be used on dead bodies and inanimate objects. More Mana is required to break apart stronger weapons, and if they’re in use, then the Mana requirement increases quickly,” Roska said.
Blaze let out a short laugh.
Roska looked at him in question.
“Looks like Jasper is going to want to steal you. Also, it’s funny—no one would share the effects of their spell with everyone,” Blaze said.
“Did I do something wrong?” Roska asked.
“Nothing at all—just showed me something I haven’t seen before,” Blaze said with approval, looking to his people. “All right, let’s get a move on back to the village square!”
“Before you go, take these.” Jasper held out a sack to Blaze.
Blaze frowned but looked inside the bag. “What am I supposed to do with these monster cores?”
“Use them.” A grin slowly spread across Jasper’s face.
“What?”
“Erik and Rugrat kept back a bunch of the monster cores. There are mainly Common Mortal grade monster cores but there are a few Greater Mortal grade monster cores. The Commons will give you five thousand Experience when using them and refill your Stamina, Mana, and increase the speed that you heal. The Common will give you ten thousand Experience, with greater effects. One should use the Lesser core and then the Common core. Once I have some more, I’ll send out more of the Common monster cores. Erik and Rugrat wanted to wait in giving these to everyone so that they pushed hard to increase their levels as much as possible on their own. With these, it will allow people to break through their bottlenecks right before they fight. It would be best to hold back on using them right away. That way, people can use them to get back into the fight. The more cores of the same grade you use, the less effective they will be. After the first use, they’ll go from giving you five thousand Experience to giving you two thousand. And by the fourth use, they’ll practically give you nothing,” Jasper said.
“Been reading up on them?” Blaze asked.
“Something like that.” Jasper pulled out another sack. “These are healing supplies to be given out to your people.”
Blaze accepted the items. “Anything else?”
“Nope!” Jasper turned and look to Roska. “Would you be able to help us out, Miss Roska?”
Blaze smiled and signalled to his sergeants.
The troops moved out, leaving their items with Jasper.
Roska had more than enough corpses to test out her new spell on.
***
Rugrat sat in the watchtower. His rifle rested in his arms as he looked over the village. He was eating his ration as he scanned for threats.
Work crews were coming back from the west side. The entire village had nearly poured out to finish the defenses.
“Feel a lot safer with everything patched up now,” Rugrat said through his sound transmission device.
“You’re bored again,” Erik said.
“Well, sitting in a watchtower like Saving Private Ryan ain’t exactly the most entertaining thing to do,” Rugrat complained. He could hear people filing through the village square, getting their breakfast as they came off the wall, working in shifts to relieve those who had been on the wall since the first wave.
Seeing everything move efficiently, Rugrat couldn’t help but feel satisfied.
“I think I have movement in the northwest,” Glosil said.
Rugrat put his food away and scanned the area quickly before using the scope on his rifle to look over the forest. The trees in the distance were moving and the movements were getting closer.
“Yeah, looks like we have incoming,” Rugrat said.
“I’ve got movements over here,” Erik said.
Other reports of the trees moving came in as archers were moved up to the walls and the gates were checked.
In a rush, beasts appeared around the village. The leading beasts let out their howls and roars. The bushes and trees were shaken as their numbers swelled.
Erik used a whistle, bringing Alva Village on alert. “Archers, fire on the sergeants’ orders!” Erik yelled.
The pits were used once again as the beasts dropped into the spikes. This wave was much larger than the previous one. Even if they wanted to try to dodge, they couldn’t as the pits started to fill up and they were impaled on defenses. The obstacles broke the horde up and packed them in tighter.
The archers couldn’t miss as their arrows cut the beasts down like wheat before a scythe.
Rugrat looked out for strong beasts like the wolf king—those were his targets.
There were hundreds of beasts and they had been starved to the point of insanity.
“We’ve got some panthers!” Rugrat called out as he saw fights break out at the rear of the horde as beasts, smelling nothing but blood and driven wild by the charge, attacked one another. The panthers might not have numbers on their side but they had the strength.
Rugrat silently willed them on. Them killing one another meant less pressure for the people on the wall to face.
Rugrat checked the magazines on his chest rig. He didn’t have that many rounds left. Erik had given him his rifle magazines as well, leaving him only with his shotgun and pistol ammunition.
Even with the panthers in play, Rugrat didn’t fire. Instead, he continued to scan, looking for the areas that seemed to be more controlled.
“Time to earn that pay.” Rugrat sighted a large wolf that was coming out of the forest. The magazine in his gun glowed as he used the spell explosive shot. It gave the projectile an explosive attribute where it would explode when hitting
its target.
Rugrat was a little nervous, scared that it would cause the round to explode within his rifle.
He pulled the trigger. The round cut across the open area, hitting the wolf. It went off with a muffled explosion. The wolf was killed instantly. It was still intact, telling of how tough its body was.
The lower-leveled wolves around it were even slightly wounded.
Rugrat let out a shaky breath. If he had used normal rounds, it would have wounded the wolves, but killing them with one hit wasn’t a sure thing.
Well, looks like I haven’t blown up yet.
He cast the spell again, buffing the next round as he found another wolf. He fired again. The crack of his rifle meant the death of another elite as arrows continued to cut down the charging wolves.
Although they were killing tens of beasts, there were hundreds in the wave.
It wasn’t a glorious fight but one where they needed to wear down the other side to win.
New roars could be heard in the distance as the waves of wolves started to slow and more panthers entered the battlefield. Alva Village was now surrounded by a sea of beasts.
Rugrat saw the flash of power as Erik used Mana Bolt. It arched over the defenses and landed among the beasts.
The Mana bolt went off as other ranged spells were used. There weren’t many people who had gone the path of mage. Erik and Rugrat had basically picked out those with the most open Mana gates as they had a greater natural advantage.
Now they started to show off their power, thinning down the incoming numbers as they launched spells into the beast horde. The dazzling display of magical firepower was similar to machine guns and artillery.
Rugrat needed to take a minute to gather himself and ignore the sights and sounds.
Alva was starting to use their trump cards.
Chapter: Continuous Wave
Erik had turned into a human grenade launcher as he kept firing Mana bolt after Mana bolt. He took a break as Mana fatigue started to set in.
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