Some orcs were hit with the magma, being burnt into nothing, not even leaving a tombstone behind.
The other orcs’ fear of fire made them bunch up again away from the lava falls from above.
“Get ready!” Erik yelled as the Orcs were nearing the machine gunners’ range.
Yuli’s raised hand glowed silver and black as she closed her hand.
Several other spell formations appeared on the other side of the camp wall. A streak of lightning as thick as a tree burst out from the spell formation, hitting one of the leading orcs.
The lightning arced, jumping from one orc to the next, creating a chain of light. Some died outright, others were able to hold on through the attack.
Two totems were struck, one exploded hurting its controlling shaman while the other melted, causing the shaman to turn irate, sending out all the buffs he could muster.
“On my command!” Erik used his comms under the chaos of explosions, orc yells and the others in the camp communicating with one another.
It seemed like it had been forever, but the Orcs had only left their cave less than five minutes ago. A fifth of their number was dead and they had plenty of fight left in them.
The wounded were recovering quickly, they didn’t even recognize their pain unless their wounds were so severe that they couldn’t survive.
“Fire!”
Erik, Lucinda, and Storbon were lit up as they fired from their burnt-out positions in the camp wall.
Three lines of green tracers hit the Orcs head-on.
“Focus your targets!” Storbon yelled.
Just die you damn Orcs!
Traversing his fire from one side of his arc to the other hurt the orcs, but it didn’t put them out of the fight.
Erik picked a target and fired into them, his strength and agility, making him as accurate shooting his automatic weapon as he was shooting it on semi-auto, his rifle shooting straight instead of making a cone of destruction like a true machine gun allowed him to pour rounds into the orcs until their brain realized they were no longer able to survive with the kind of damage they had sustained.
He changed targets and fired, the Orcs were so close now that the grenades were making him starry-eyed and the dull wave he felt in his chest from the grenades now felt like someone smacking his chest.
Erik saw a stream of all tracer come from his rifle signifying he didn’t have many rounds left.
“Reloading!” He pulled out another drum magazine. He used a cooling spell on his weapon, smacking the old magazine out and slapping a new one in place.
Thank fuck we have a mag release liek the M4 and not like the real FAL!
“Barrier!” Lucinda yelled.
The shamans had organized themselves and finally created a barrier to protect their horde.
Erik fired at the barrier. It created flashes of light on the barrier but none of his rounds passed through. Grenades hit the top of the barrier while a line of fire appeared ahead of the orcs. A tornado sprang up from the Orcs’ right flank and smashed into the barrier, lighting up its entire domed side, grinding against it with little effect.
“Reload, re-arm!”
The orcs rushed forward largely uncontested. There wasn’t anything that the Special team could do to take out the barrier that wouldn’t take a tremendous amount of effort that would leave them weak for when they needed to fight the orcs directly.
The orcs used slings and spears, hurling them at the camp. The mana barrier over the camp was revealed as the attacks flashed against the mana barrier.
Erik looked at the barrier formation it was made from hexagonal pieces that linked with one another. It was Julilah and Qin’s creation. The pieces could be changed out or added to, adding functions to the formation, like buffing those that were linked to the formation via their Alva Medallions.
The grenadiers changed to their rifles. Rugrat and George jumped up to a wall on the opposite side of where the Orcs were attacking from, the wall was a shoddy construct so they were as higher than the wall facing the orcs, allowing them a greater vision of the battlefield.
Yuli had changed to a new amplification formation that was glowing brighter than the first she had used, a secondary mana barrier formation was active over her, protecting the area one meter around her.
Gilly was watching the Orcs, the air around her was humid as she readied herself.
Erik patted her absently, everyone was tense behind their guns.
“Shit, the leading orcs are right at the front of the barrier, they’re going to be covered right up until they reach the wall,” Lucinda said.
“Shit,” Yao Meng muttered.
“Lucinda, Yao Meng, fall back to the inner position. Storbon, Erik, be ready to fight hand-to-hand. Tian Cui you’re working on ranged but be ready to fight and run back to the second position if we get overrun at the wall. Hit those shamans with so many silence spells they forget how to speak.”
“Yuli, start dropping fire on their right flank, shift them to the left force them to go in the direction of the broken walls. I will provide cover from back here” Rugrat said.
People organized themselves and got to their positions. The secondary positions were stone walls that Gilly and Yuli had pulled up from the ground, creating half-trenches behind them and covering them in spikes to make them hard to climb.
Erik opened and closed his hands in his Tropic Thunder gloves, pulling them on tighter, the blood-red formations seemed to glow in excitement as Erik circulated his mana, feeling the power in his grasp.
He checked the buffs that the Alvan main defensive formation applied to them.
==========
All base stats increased by 15%
==========
It didn’t seem like much but with their base stats now so high and stacking their titles on top the Special team’s ability had reached a new level. Not to mention all the experience points earned so far as we level up makes our base stats so impressive. Erik thought.
Explosives went off under the orcs as they stepped on trigger points. The orcs were torn apart. In their charge they were largely spread out, some were missed, later groups of orcs finding the traps as the leading orcs met the formation traps.
Looks like the poison has taken some effect. Erik thought to himself as he looked at the color of the orcs, their speed seemed a little slower and their regeneration slower.
The formation traps activated, killing those in their radius, dead orcs fell to the ground, ignoring their losses they kept on charging.
They’ve lost a third of their fighting force already but they’re still coming.
“Be ready at the front,” Rugrat said.
Erik checked his weapon once again. He’d loaded special formation-enhanced rounds made to punch through even Body Like Iron skin.
He saw the leading edge of the mana barrier as it met the side of the camp, interfering with the mana barrier they had placed over the camp.
As it passed, Erik fired his machine gun into the closest Orc.
The rounds punctured and then ruptured. The Orc died after three such hits.
Erik keeping mental notes, sending accurate bursts into the Orcs.
The leading attackers were being thinned out.
Formations shot out tendrils looking to slow and clump the enemy, others released area killing attacks.
Thankfully they don’t have real armor or we’d be truly fucked.
Spears of ice shot out beside him as Gilly attacked. Her spears stabbed into the Orcs, the spears exploded as they struck. The Orcs’ tempered and innately stronger bodies defending against the attacks, direct attacks would gravely wound them, but they could recover with enough time. The shards of ice wounded the other orcs but they ignored these wounds.
Erik cut down orcs and moved to the next one. Storbon was doing the same as the leading orcs just a few meters away from the camp walls jumped.
“Orcs on the walls! “ Rugrat yelled.
Attack formations went off, killin
g a few.
Erik and Storbon put their rifles away. Storbon pulled out his spear moving it in his hand, limbering up. More orcs were on the walls now. One jumped over, a spear of stone cutting through them from Gilly.
It was the start of the flood, several Orcs hurled themselves over the camp walls, waving their rusted weapons.
The second line of Yao Meng, Tian Cui and Lucinda opened fire, shooting above Erik and Storbon who pulled back to the entrances to the second line.
Rugrat was shooting from George on the move.
“Yuli, keep up the flames!”
Orcs were making it through the fire and dropping into the camp. Storbon let out a yell as he used his spear to smack the Orc’s weapon to the side, his spearhead flashing as he took the Orc’s head off in a display of strength.
Erik pulled out a pill and threw it back. The Defender’s Might pill filled him with power as he took a stamina pill as well.
He crushed them in his teeth as three orcs rushed him and Gilly. Gilly launched stone spears at one and sent out her tail, smacking them back into the wall of the camp some thirty meters away.
Erik applied his strength, for the first time, unleashing all of his power.
The ground cracked underneath his feet. There was a savage and wild grin on his face but within, he was ice cold. He unconsciously used a combat scan looking at the Orcs. Based on his previous fights he knew that they were strong, but their agility was low. They were heavy but their knee joints were weak. Their chest was covered in a large skeleton plate and their heads were built like battering rams with their brains being cushioned to take impact better.
Erik used Semi-illusionary fist, creating two more fists around his own, making it hard to know which one was attacking.
The first orc raised his war axe, Erik dodged to the side, his separate fists overlaid his own as he slammed it into the side of the Orc, cracking something.
A grey smoke appeared over the wound as Erik had applied Unhallowed strike to all of his fists.
He dodged under a machete from the second orc and used his One Finger Beats Fist technique.
Stone appeared around his hand, with veins of molten magma and tattooed with poison.
Erik let out a yell as he struck with his finger. The Fire mana encased in stone slammed into the orc, piercing their stomach and driving upwards. The uncontrolled fire mana expanded explosively, the shards of stone tore through the Orc, the poison that laced them seemed like overkill as the Orc dropped to the ground.
“Go left,” Rugrat said.
Erik planted his foot and moved to his left. A split second later the first Orc’s head shattered as Rugrat’s round went through his eye and out the back of his skull.
There were four more Orc’s that had made it over the wall.
Gilly used a yell on them, slowing them, Earth and Water mana revolved together, creating a dirty spear that lanced through an orc and exploded, tearing them apart.
She charged and Erik joined.
They hit the Orcs like wrecking balls.
Every hit could break bone, the hits causing shockwaves in the surrounding area.
Erik used his combat scan, seeing his enemy’s weaknesses, killing the orcs started to become faster as he added poison, fire and Earth mana into his attacks.
Erik stomped the ground. A shield of stone shot up as he kicked it at an orc charging him, the stone shattered and turned into weapons, tearing up the orc, the poison he had applied to the stone quickly entering their veins.
Erik got hit in the side, but he barely registered the hit, his armor taking the brunt of it. Still, he grabbed the offending hand and pulled with a yell, and threw the orc at another attacker.
Erik was hit with a rock to the helmet.
With the power that the Orc had given it, Erik was seeing stars. He used self-heal. There were three orcs to his front and one in the rear with a sling.
A round cracked overhead, the slingshot orc was dead.
George breathed fire across the camp wall, turning it into an inferno as the wall started to burn.
The Orcs charged and instead of dropping back, Erik pushed himself forward. His agility was pushed to the peak, moving through the tiniest of openings, striking out at the Orcs and dodging the enemy. He knew his body better than ever before. He knew his limits perfectly having tempered himself completely.
His movements were almost fluid, a rusted sword went for his side, a spear for his chest, a war hammer from overhead.
Everything seemed to slow, his combat scan showed openings appeared in his orcs based on their motions he could tell how they were manipulating their muscles, the placement of their bones.
Erik sent a fireball into the war hammer wielder’s face. He used an imbued One Finger Beats Fist, the slug of stone and magma exploded under the arm of the sword user, making them stumble into the spear user, whose spear went wide. Erik tore it from their hands and reversed it, his mana and his muscles flowing as one.
The orcs fell to the ground in a pile as he drove the spear through the spear user’s head and kicked the sword wielder, they flew back ten feet as Erik raised his hand, Spears of stone shot out of the ground to catch the Orc.
Erik felt goosebumps across his head; he had started to combine his attacks on an almost instinctual level.
There were only a few orcs able to get through the defenses,most were taken out by weapons fire, magical attacks and traps. Those that were left were in small groups.
He looked around at the rest of the fighting.
“The Orcs will be pushing to the opening. Erik get over there. Yao Meng support him. Yuli be ready to switch your attacks,” Rugrat yelled he fired as he was talking, killing an Orc aiming at Storbon.
Erik felt the adrenaline draining away as he ran to the opened camp walls. There were stone barriers all over the place, creating a spiky funnel.
Erik started to feel the pain of fighting, pushing his body to the limit had its drawbacks.
“The Orcs’ bodies have reached the Body like Stone stage but their regeneration is much higher as is their strength,” Erik told the others as he used a healing blade, and stabbed it into his leg. He didn’t feel any pain as healing radiated through his body. He pulled out his rifle using some rubble as support.
He started firing as soon as he was in place, there were only a few of the orcs getting through the defenses currently, but given time more of them would be able to get further together.
***
Rugrat surveyed the camp. The walls that the Orcs had been climbing on were now on fire, inky smoke curling towards the ceiling, Yuli’s wall of fire had pushed the orcs towards the broken wall, with their fear of fire they were reaching the broken camp walls, meeting the ranged attacks.
“Yuli switch targets,” Rugrat said, seeing the group of Orcs all turning to the new opening.
“Understood!” She said through the comms channel. She sounded tired as she drank a potion and started to prepare spells.
“Everyone focus on the funnel,” Rugrat said.
Rugrat’s eyes found Erik as he was waiting with his rifle ready.
Seeing him fight hand-to-hand with the Orcs, Rugrat felt a shiver of excitement run through him. They’d become stronger, much stronger than he thought, but they just hadn’t been able to use their power.
He was shocked by Erik’s ability to take on multiple orcs at once. As he had been fighting he had been refining his fighting style and even combining his attacks in different unorthodox ways, using a minimal amount of effort for the maximum impact.
Storbon killed the last orc that had made it over the wall.
Erik started firing first, followed by Gilly. The Orcs ran forward into the defenses, catching on the spikes, opening up wounds and running forward.
Rugrat used his link with George to guide him, firing his rifle.
A spell formation covered the funnel, vines grew on the walls and the ground, pulling the orcs toward them. Holding the orcs on the ground or pull
ing them into the spikes.
The ranged attackers fired, tracers lighting up the funnel.
Shamans planted their totems.
“No, you fucking don’t,” Rugrat rose up on George, exposing himself more but allowing him to switch targets and greater freedom of movement.
Three black formations appeared under the orcs. Chains clanked against one another as they shot out and wrapped around the orcs.
Rugrat cast spells on his rounds as he fired them, hitting the shamans he could see. He got two of them as he felt his mana fighting to recover.
Multi-colored chains wrapped around them, covered in mana blades of varying effects. The shamans let out cries of pain. They were used to sitting in the rear and buffing the orcs, their ability to withstand pain was much weaker.
If they weren’t weak already then my chains wouldn’t be able to work on them. Got you now!
He drank from his camelback of mana recovery potion firing, altering his point of aim and firing again. It looked like he was ragging his rifle from the left to the right as the spell covered and enchanted bullets found their targets
Erik gave up his firing position and called down unhallowed Ground on the final funnel.
The ground looked like a swamp, tendrils of poison reaching up, sticking to the Orcs that entered it.
The poison that Yuli had added to her wind attack were slowing them down more, their hits weren’t as powerful as they were before.
Erik stood in their path: an iron wall. He took hit after hit and kept fighting even as his armor started to deform from the strikes.
Rugrat watched him out of the corner of his eye and switched targets. He had fought and lived with Erik for most of his adult life. He fired his rifle, the round passing through Erik’s legs and hitting an Orc in the leg, making them stumble.
Erik used their momentum and threw them to the side, impaling their skull on a spike. As he turned, Rugrat fired over his shoulder, hitting an Orc in the eye. Erik kicked its body into its fellows and stepped forward. He took a hammer blow to the side but held firm, stone cracking around his legs that he had used to brace himself.
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