Eight
Nick couldn’t see what was happening.
He could hear it though.
A roar of sound and screams. The bang of weapons on armor, spells detonating, massive workings getting canceled screams of the dead and dying, and so much more he couldn’t identify.
The four indirect magic support squads he’d purchased were endlessly launching attacked and they were screaming high upward, then downward. Landing amongst the enemy combatants on the other side of the wall.
Despite it being thirty feet tall, Nick saw bodies, or parts of bodies, fly higher than the angle he could see past at least thrice.
Staring at the wall, Nick sat there, listening, unable to see much at all given the wall’s height and angle, and unable to act directly.
All nobility that wasn’t directly serving Marshal Ferish all retreated to the rear camp where non-combatants and others had gone. Angelique’s kids, Lorelai and her guards, as well as a number of personal body-guards and wounded soldiers off front-line rotation, were all keeping it secure.
Realistically most of the work was being done by Lorelai’s people.
Angelique swooped in low over the camp, turned up partially at the wall, and let loose a massive breath of fire against what was likely the main force the enemy soldiers.
Her strange maneuver had her flying upward even as the breath continued then ended. It wasn’t an aerial shifting he’d ever seen Lucian perform let alone attempt.
Then Lucian appeared as Angelique drifted away.
The massive Red Earth Dragon didn’t try any strange. He just flapped his wings and hovered over the enemy while exhaling fire breath.
Once his breath ended his stopped flapping his wings and plummeted to the ground.
There was a heavy boom, followed by Lucian taking to flight again and flying away to the side.
Given he had no fear of wounds, maiming, or death, the Dragon had taken to using himself like an extremely destructive weapon.
“Gramps is a damn monster,” Jessie murmured from beside Nick, then laughed. “I feel like I should line up a Dragon for our kid to marry. Keep pumping Dragon blood into our family line. Every other being a Dark Elf or a human.”
Nick smirked, glanced at Jessie, and then looked to the ledger in front of him. Then back to the wall.
He hadn’t needed to purchase anything else so far for which he was grateful for, but he wanted to be ready.
“Sire! Gryphons are coming in!” shouted a messenger running up to Nick.
That wasn’t great news.
Right now, much of the shielding being used for his army was all forward at the wall. If he remained where he was, and if the gryphons came to attack him, he would be forced to divert shielding away from his soldiers.
“Alright. Order everyone to the wall here to condense resources. I’m falling back to the rear-camp,” Nick stated and stood up. He picked up his ledger and stuck it into his spatial backpack as well as the rest of his belongings. Taking Jessie by the shoulder he began leading her to where the gryphons were.
Delaney, Sara, and Harlowe were all with them and had just been chatting amongst themselves while watching the wall.
“Mount up!” Nick called to them as he went straight to Glorious. “Enemy gryphons are coming and I really don’t want to divert resources away.”
No one questioned what was said and got onto their gryphons. The royal guard also all mounted up.
Taking to flight the group moved away swiftly. It wasn’t a long flight to the rear-camp, but it was far enough that it could retreat and break away if the front line was completely over-run.
As Nick and his company got airborne he turned to look toward the wall and the battle.
There wasn’t much to see other than the visual addition to what he’d been hearing.
On the horizon in that direction though was a large number of gryphons coming onward. Just as he’d been told.
Looking ahead, Nick saw something else though as his gaze moved toward the rear-camp.
To the west, in the direction of the Harbor, was a group of hundreds of gryphons.
Nick had no idea why they were coming from this direction, but he could see the location they were angled on.
The rear-camp.
It wasn’t a position that could resist that many gryphons without assistance, but trying to pull anything away from the wall at all would endanger the front-line deeply.
Gramps, I’m thinking of taking myself and my royal guard into that group. Try to attack, engage, and drag them toward the front-line. Then slide into the defense at the wall since the shields will already be up.
“Dangerous, but likely the best answer we have if we don’t want to pull resources away,” Lucian advised. “It would also fit your promise to Angelique as her children are in the rear-camp, Sire.”
With a click of his tongue, Nick pulled the reins on Glorious and started guiding it toward the secondary enemy force.
“We’re going to engage, hit hard, then break away back to the wall!” Nick shouted at the top of his lungs. “Look to yourself and your own defenses first! I can defend myself well and I don’t plan on sticking around!”
He knew they all heard him though he wasn’t quite sure how well they’d all do in this situation.
For those who had cavalry training, this might not be as difficult.
For someone like Harlowe this would be rather difficult he imagined. She would likely be better off keeping some distance and trying to use her bow while flying.
Holding up his poleaxe, Nick suddenly wished he had an actual spear.
His weapon was a great one, but in this particular situation, it wouldn’t be as ideal. It lacked the critical length and reach he would want to be able to try and unhorse a gryphon.
Adjusting his own personal thoughts, Nick decided he wouldn’t be going into melee range. He would in fact do the same thing the gryphons had been doing.
Distance attacks and draw away.
“Keep to ranged!” Nick called as they closed on the enemy gryphons. He pulled partially to the side and then started to parallel the gryphons as he continued to close at an angle.
The defensive forces at the rear-camp would be enough to hold for a time, but not a prolonged one. If the enemy didn’t engage his small group, he’d just keep peppering them the entire time.
They’d likely have to eventually act or risk a slow loss.
Grasping at his ability to craft Wind spells, Nick took hold of it, looked at it, and released it.
It was well and truly beyond him and it wasn’t something he’d be able to get a hold over on the fly.
Instead, he went to the simple spells he’d picked up from other magicians in the army.
Things that he could expand upon to a degree and utilize more effectively than making his own.
A great many of them were more utility based than damaged, but he knew one right off the top of his head he wanted to invoke and utilize.
He drew up the spell ‘draw-out’ and ‘thin-out’, then lashed them to a third which was ‘expel’.
His goal was to thin-out the air around him, draw-out the portion that’d been thinned, and expel it toward the enemy in a blast. It would likely be more than enough to cause a massive disturbance to those struck by it.
Likely causing them to lose the ability to fly, break concentrating, and probably cause a good bit of harm.
Activating the spell he let it take up an entire fourth of his magic pool and then launched it. His left arm becoming the channel of it, held up in front of himself and pointed toward his foe.
With a strange hazy effect the spell detonated and vanished into the horizon before him.
There was no visual aspect to the spell, no color that made it distinct, nothing at all that set it apart from the sky all around them.
At least, until it struck the enemy flight of gryphons.
A large number suddenly began falling out of the sky, feathers were stripped from gryphons, and weapons tumbled out of seemingly weakened hands.
It was paired with a great many notifications that wanted to get his attention.
A series of notifications of broken bones, ruptured ear-drumbs, torn arteries and veins, as well as straight up experience points.
Many of those that’d begun tumbling toward the ground righted themselves, but not all. A good double handful struck the ground and left strange sunken craters around their bodies.
Not waiting, Nick threw another attack, dropping his magic pool to less than half almost immediately.
Shields appeared even before he’d finished the attack and appeared over a large portion of the force. Magical constructs that were meant to break and separate attacks to either side.
Nick continued on in his way, moving toward the front, but also angling toward the enemy at the same time. He wanted them to know he wasn’t going to leave them alone, but he also wasn’t going to charge at them directly.
Not attacking again, he instead kept pace and let his pool begin to refill. If they were going to hold their shields, he would hold his attack. The longer they held it up the more it would drain them. Yet if they dropped it, they’d have to deal with his attack breaking through.
He’d noted that a good number of those shields that’d been thrown up had failed, at least a third of them, in fact. So he wasn’t something they could just pretend didn’t exist.
Harlowe’s gryphon short forward, followed by a handful of others.
They began moving upward to gain altitude as they did, spiraling above Nick and keeping pace with him at the same time.
Much as he had suspected, Harlowe drew an arrow and began firing on the enemy gryphons. Her shots were clearly well picked and precise, because she managed to actually strike someone. The arrow finding a thigh between gaps in the shielding and armor as well.
Those who had gone with her began lobbing spells and shooting arrows as well.
The force of gryphons continued toward the rear-camp despite now taking losses.
Nick wanted them to think that he had more than enough spell-power to give them difficulties unless they actually came to fight him.
He filled up a duplicate of his previous spell and launched it. Then did it a gain.
Setting two loose back to back, just about on top of each other.
Shields and spells winked out and double attack. Washing over the enemy force in a massive wave.
Only for Harlowe and her contingent to land a great many hits on those who were suddenly unprotected.
In a span of minutes since his small force had engaged the other, they’d taken a fifth of their number out of the fight and sent them crashing to the earth below.
Unfortunately Nick was out of mana.
“Jessie, grab me a mana potion out of my pack my love?” Nick asked and held back his left hand toward her.
“Sure hon!” shouted the Dark Elf followed by a potion getting thumped into his gauntelted palm. “Tops off! Just how I like being!”
Nick smirked, downed the potion and tossed the glass bottle to the side when it was empty.
Holding his hand up, he launched four spells in rapid casting. Each one going off without any delay, then he held his hand back to Jessie once more.
All four spells ran through the enemy and Nick got a flood of pop-up messages. Letting him know that he’d killed more than a few outright and a great many others were terribly injured.
Before Jessie could put the bottle in his hand, the enemy force turned as one and began flying at a mad dash for Nick and his people.
It was what he wanted, but the speed they were moving at was surprising. It genuinely felt like their gryphons were moving faster then the ones Nick and his people were flying.
At this moment, he was glad that he’d kept his distance and left a gap between the enemy and his own forces. He’d need every inch of it to scurry back to the front line and take cover behind their shields.
Except even as he turned to look, he could see thousands of gryphons blanketing the sky over the wall. All of them firing downward into his forces.
If he pushed his people into that mess, he wasn’t quite sure how it would turn out.
Except the alternative wasn’t great either.
Taking in a sharp breath, Nick held it, then pulled glorious into a dive.
If he wanted to get in, it would have to be quickly. Then it’d become a slog to beat back the enemy.
Angelique and then Lucian made a pass through the gryphons. Wiping out hundreds with their flame breath and casual tail swipes and slashes with their talons. Yet despite that, the enemy seemed unbothered and continued to attack.
“Holy shit love!” screamed Jessie from behind him. “This feels so very much not in our favor!”
Nick couldn’t argue that even as glorious dove at ever increasing speed toward the wall.
Thankfully none of the gryphons that were attackign seemed to notice his groups approach and they were able to enter the friendly shields without issue. Though no sooner than he was under them, than Nick realized he’d under-estimated how bad this was.
Two portions of the wall had been breached and shattered. With crumbled bricks and stones strewn about wildly. One was especially wide while the other was only perhaps two people in width of a hole.
Rather than dismount Nick rode Glorious right up to the larger of the two breaches. Pushing in up against the wall and then letting Glorious’ body forcibly push his own troops to the back and side until the gryphon was just about at the front with only a single line between the enemy and Nick.
Wasting no time, Nick started laying about with his poleaxe over the heads of his own troops. Letting End of the Line axe blade and spear tip top carve up enemies who were pushing forward.
Several of his soldiers directly in front of him realized that he was there and shifted out, the big gryphon he was riding taking the gap immediately. It’s beat came out and cracked open a helmeted man’s head, shattering the metal protection he’d been wearing with ease.
Grunting, Nick dismissed all the messages that came his way and focused on just killing the enemy.
Arrows began slashing past him into the enemy ranks though the angle they left was odd.
It took him a full minute to realize Jessie was using her bow and firing across the line toward unarmored flanks and sides of the enemy as they tried to push through the breach.
“Fire bomb potions, Jessie dear!” Nick called and stabbed with his poleaxe at a rather large man wielding a shield. The polexe missed the man but caught the upper edge of the shield.
Jerking backward on it, Nick pulled the man toward Glorious.
Who shattered his shoulder with a beak-peck, blasting right through his armor and finding soft flesh beneath.
Fires began erupting amongst the enemy soldiers as thrown potions shattered and caught fire immediately upon breaking. Setting people alight as they pushed forward to try and get into the breaches.
The die of the enemy was piling up with every second and Nick found that his own people were actually having difficulties with it.
There were so many dead on the enemy side, that they were almost unable to get to the front anymore and often stood upon a mound of their fallen.
Giving them a strange height advantage that Nick wasn’t sure was helping them at all considering how unstable it was.
Then Nick forcefully turned off his thinking and focused on trying to hold the wall.
Because until his Marshal called the retreat, they weren’t losing that many troops and holding the wall was feasable.
Nick thrust forward with his poleaxe and caught a soldier through the eyeslit in their visor. The heavy spiked-head of the polaxe crumpling it around the orbit and sending the individual to the ground.
The spike came bloody from the fallen enemy and Nick noted that part of an eyeball was lodged onto the base of the spike.
He returned to the fight without a thought.