After Throgg shouted her declaration in Dragon Tongue, which no doubt sounded like incoherent roars and growls to everyone else around, she started stomping forward.
"Loose!" shouted the keep's commander, who had just arrived on the wall. Every ballista on our side of the wall, and even a few on the neighboring walls, unleashed their bolts at an elevated angle to try to hit the Earth Drake before she reached the walls.
It was at this time that I slipped into the chaos to wait for my moment to act. I crept into one of the wall's turrets, and when I was sure nobody was looking, I performed an aura-powered jump to reach the rafters of the turret's roof. Once I had a stable perch on the rafters, I took out a balaclava my local tailor had made for me, put it on, and then put my helmet back on. Now, with my face covered and dressed like every soldier, I was unrecognizable.
While I was waiting for my turn to act, I heard the shouts and sounds of the mages setting up the arrays to support their siege spells, and the knight commander shouting for the keep commander to open the gate so they could "Meet and vanquish the dragon on the field of battle." I wish them the best of luck.
As I heard the gates creek open, I pried one of the roof tiles up to look out and see how these knights were going to have their asses handed to them.
The moment the gates opened, twenty armor-clad knights rode forth, lances glowing with enchantments raised.
Seeing the knights advancing on her, Throgg stopped her advance, raised one of her forelegs, and stomped it on the ground, and the moment she did, pillars of earth jutted up at random angles from the ground, starting from where she stomped her foot, and advancing in a fan-shaped spread, each pillar of earth jutting up more randomly the further it got away from her.
Seeing the obvious attack coming, the knights broke formation, but they knew they could not escape the area of effect in time, so they flared their auras and powered through. When they entered the area of effect, they were plunged into chaos, with the very ground against them. Earth pillars shot out at them from all sides, hitting the horses and/or the riders, sending them sprawling to the ground. Some were hit directly by a pillar under their horses, sending them airborne.
Those knights who were hit directly by the pillars were seriously rattled but avoided serious injuries because of their armor and aura, while those whose horses were hit or sent airborne immediately abandoned their horses to charge the Earth Drake on foot.
By the end of that first AOE attack, four-fifths of the knights were unhorsed, and those who weren't were either lucky enough to avoid the pillars or skilled enough to smash the emerging pillars with their enchanted lances.
Seeing the knights survive her first attack, Throgg struck the palm of her foreleg into the ground at an angle, sending a deluge of rock shards and boulders flying at the knights. The horses that were still charging were killed on the spot, their riders unable to defend them against the sheer number of projectiles. As for the knights, those who had been unhorsed by this latest attack used the carcasses of their dead mounts as temporary cover while steadying themselves, while the rest of the knights who were already on foot took a knee with their shields in front of them, their enchantments shining in the storm of dirt being kicked up.
This was when the knights began taking casualties. These knights, who had only ever heard or read about "Earth Dragons", thought it was just a tough, dumb beast that could throw rocks. In their training to become knights, they had boulders thrown at them with only their auras to bolster their defense, so they were confident they could weather this attack and move forward to slay the "Earth Dragon" and earn the glory of becoming dragon slayers.
What they did not know or sense was the dense earth mana contained in the rocky projectiles. So when the first rock shard or boulder with enough mass came into contact with the knights' shields, the enchantments on the shields were quickly overloaded by the damage absorbed, and by the time the knights noticed something was wrong, they were hit again.
They were rocked by the impact of the first or second blows to their now-enchantmentless shields, but their auras, which extended to the shields, held. As more projectiles hit them, their auras were quickly overwhelmed, and their shields were either pierced by the shards or crumpled like foil. Shortly after, the knights met the same fate as their shields. The only ones who survived were those who took cover behind the pillars Throgg created in her first attack.
When the dust settled, only half of the knights were left, at least those who could fight. The rest were either dead, unconscious, or too injured to even move. But even as disadvantaged as they were now, they still charged. Not because they were fearless, but because of vengeance, spite, honor, and glory.
And from a knight's point of view, death by dragon was not the worst way to go, by a knight's standards, besides dying of old age in bed surrounded by loved ones, or fighting in an honorable duel for the hand of a fair maiden, and many other ultra-manly exploits that would make other men say "hell yeah." Death by dragon was solidly somewhere within the top five.
Before Throgg could make a third attack, the remaining knights were upon her. As if they had coordinated everything earlier, the knights split up to attack different parts of the Earth Drake. Some aimed for her legs, others, her eyes, and the rest jumped up on her back, all of them attacking with their lances that were radiating with the power of their aura and the lances' enchantments.
Throgg managed to tilt her head to keep her eyes from being poked by the lances, but she could not avoid the rest of the lances aimed at her. The moment their attacks hit the young Earth Drake, she felt the sting as the lances pierced both her second skin and her real skin, and she reared up on her hind legs while roaring in pain.
Lucky for these knights, this Earth Drake had just reached adulthood. If she had more time to refine her earth armor and grow tougher, their lances would not even get through. And if these knights play their cards right, they may do my job for me, and my objective would change from giving Throgg a beat down to defending her from getting killed. If it comes to that, all restrictions are off for me. I would rather deal with knights than an Earth Drake who is able to use Dragon Tongue magic.
But all my hopes of an easy job were dashed as I saw Throgg flex her whole body for a couple of seconds while the knights were doing their best to kill her, and all of a sudden, the earth armor covering her body exploded outward, shredding every knight attacking her and ejecting any lance that was still stuck in her.
I quickly dropped from the rafters and lay flat on the ground while using earth instinctive magic to reinforce the rock wall of the turret in front of me. Less than a second later, I heard and felt hundreds of impacts along the whole wall as shards of Throgg's earth armor pelted the wall. Shouts of pain and death cries sounded out as anyone on the wall who was not behind some cover was either killed or maimed.
As I looked up, I saw a few holes in the turret where I had taken cover, so maybe even those who had taken cover were not safe. As I looked to the side, I saw that all the ballistas along the wall were damaged or completely destroyed, and half the mages were dead.
I was waiting for Throgg to at least breach the walls so I could beat her ass and then blend into the crowd of soldiers when I was done, but at the rate Throgg was going, there may not be a keep or any soldiers left for me to blend in with.
I guess I am going to have to confront her sooner and with more exposure than I would like. Looks like I am going to have to change plans for my exfiltration.