My arm is aching. No, pain is not exactly the correct word for it. (I know how to handle pain, you see.) It is a prickly sensation that just seems to get under my skin in the wrong way. It doesn't let me think or move without feeling like somebody is putting needles in me. It is honestly more irritating than any pain that I have felt. (That is why I don't like to do this in the first place.)
This is a consequence of strengthening your body for too long using vital mana. You are supposed to strengthen your body only for a few moments with your vital mana. Any more than this and there is a chance of damaging your body. The only people that have any counter for it are the martial mages. (Sadly I haven't learnt these techniques.)
Even with all of this, I can't stop it now, though. This is the only way that I will be able to throw the spear far enough to reach beyond the wall. Oh right, I am presently standing in the watchtower.
The watchtower is used by the soldiers for patrolling. They can look pretty far away from here using a spyglass. It is the tallest structure in the temporary fort. The reason that I am standing here right now is that this is the most central point of the tower. (And the tallest point.) I am equally far from each of the four gates, allowing me to reach all of them as long as I push myself like this. (it certainly have nothing to do with the fact that I can barely put any weight on my legs at this moment.)
From here, my spears can hit anything close enough to the wall. The reason that I am forced to fight from here is the fact that right now, three of the troop leaders are attacking us. They are not attacking the wall as a group at this time. Instead they are targetting the walls from the north, the south and the east. (Nice to see I managed to get at least one leader out of commision.)
I can hold my own against the three quite easily. The problem is that split up like this, there is no way that I can focus on any single creature. That would give the other two creatures the chance to attack and destroy the wall in their part of the fort. Their goal is clearly to bring down the wall. The only reason I am able to prevent them from doing anything is the place that I am in.
To attack the walls, they need to use their ability to control the surrounding mana to create a strong attack. This tends to be pretty obvious in my mana sense. That is why I am attacking them whenever they begin to gather mana.
This strategy is barely working. The pain in my arms means that I won't be able to pull this off for long without permanent damage, though. Some medicines can heal vital mana overuse, but they tend to be pretty rare. Getting my hands on any of them is going to be a task in itself.
I must admit that I am struggling quite a bit right now. The Ice Beasts are in a worse position, though. The strategy the enemy is using is monumentally stupid. It is just going to make things easier for me if they attack me in this split manner. While it does make fighting them harder, as long as one of them makes a mistake and dies, we will eventually win.
The grunts are being massacred by my soldiers at this moment. They managed to get their hands on a bunch of bow and arrows, which has made hunting the minions that much easier. This is to the point where Shamon is not even needed to direct the troops. The man is standing here with me. The two of us are crushed against each other in this narrow space. As for what the man has been doing, he has been surveying the battlefield using his spyglass.
What the man sees confirms what I know. The Ice Beasts are just charging towards their death. There is no strategy or logic in this blind charge of theirs. The longer this goes on, the better it is for us. After all, if all the grunts are killed, then the troop leaders aren't a threat. Once eighty soldiers begin to shoot their bows, even the troop leaders will become porcupines pretty quickly.
That is why Shamon is in here with me. He claims that there is something very off about the attack happening here. All of this is an excuse. Basically, the man feels that I will pull off something suicidal, like jumping down the wall again. So he has come here to prevent that from happening. The man does not say it to my face, but it is easy to see from his actions. (I assure you, I have no plan to do that. Jumping from here will shatter my legs.)
"Captain, could you explain to me how exactly the quiver works and why you can't move it from this place?" he asks. This has been a question that he has been asking every few minutes. If he asks it again, I might just kill him. Screw it, I am answering him.
"Now, how am I supposed to describe the quiver? The best description that I can think of is that it is a hole in the ironskin," I speak, trying to simplify it for the man. "Inside the hole are all the water spears that are being produced by the formation. There are not many water spears with me, only twenty or so, at the moment."
Calling the quiver a hole in the ground would be wrong. The quiver is a spell that makes use of ironskin as the base to build on top of. It can be placed anywhere the ironskin exists. I would have to make sure that you know that this is not a true spatial formation. Such a formation would be class six at the very least. I have no desire to explain this to the man with me, though.
It would be accurate to claim that right now, they are being stored in the ironskin. (Technically, it is supposed to be a layer on top of the ironskin.) The metal mana in the ironskin ensures that the water mana present in the spear does not dissipate or lose its shape.
Regardless of how the quiver works and looks, I grasp another spear from it and aim it. Grasp would be the wrong word. It would be more accurate to call it willed to my hand. There is a lag in the process because I am using formation control to do it. With the class eight spell inscribed, this would have been instantaneous.
I throw it as quickly as I can. I already gave them too much time to react to my spear, but I can't throw it any quicker. Still, If I manage to kill one of these creatures now, dealing with the remaining would get so much easier.
As I am recording, I have launched three more spears, each targeting a troop leader. Only one of those spears finds a target as it grazes the leg of one of the creatures. (The creature has already retreated before the spear could explode.) It is not a heavy injury, but these injuries tend to accumulate. A battle of attrition is not something that a formation mage will ever fear. (I just don't know if my hand can hold on for so long.)
With the quiver formation, at the very least, the water mana is not going to be wasted. There is enough mana to throw a water spear every ten seconds or so. (I even have a decent buffer in case something happens.) The earth mana is still going to waste, though. With the ballista, I would have been able to manage that loss as well. Now is not the time to think about that, though.
Due to the water spear, I have managed to fight off the creatures even when they are split up like this. As for why they have decided to suddenly attack this morning, nobody knows.
"Captain, you haven't told me yet why you can't move it from this place?" he asks, interrupting my thoughts.
"A quiver is essentially something built by modifying the ironskin," I speak. "I can put the quiver wherever I want it to, but the runes need to link the quiver to the ironskin by twisting the metal mana. Have you ever dealt with metal mana? The damn thing is a nightmare to shape. I barely had the quiver ready before this attack. I could put it somewhere else, but that would take a while. I can use that time to build the ballista."
"Did you have to pick this place? I am sure there are better places. How about the archer's tower? It is literally built to shoot at the enemy," he says, pointing to the other tower here, which is half the height of this tower.
I see the man's point. The watchtower is not particularly durable. A single spell connects to the place, and it might collapse the whole thing. It is pretty hard to do so, due to how thin the tower is. (The Snowwinders built this tower for only two to three people to come up it.)
The archer's tower is more solidly built and would be able to take more hits. It is also much shorter compared to this tower, though.
"True, the archer tower is perfect for archers, Shamon. For the range of the ballista I am going to build, the watchtower is the better option," I say. "I had to modify the place a bit, but you will see how much it is going to benefit us once I start working on the formation."
I had to knock down a couple of the walls in the room to make space for the ballista and its specifications. The man is still pretty pissed off about it, it looks like.
(After about five minutes.)
"Shamon, I would assume that at the moment, you should be down below commanding the soldiers. Why are you up here?" I ask the man. I will be honest, I wanted to ask that since the man popped in here.
"I am trying to figure out what the creatures are trying to do. There is no way that the creatures are so stupid that they would charge to their deaths like this. They have something planned, Captain," he says.
"Couldn't they be compelled by their master to attack us?" I ask.
"That is true, but then why are the Snowlords wasting their troops like this?" he replies. "They are anything but idiots."
"If they are planning something, wouldn't it be wiser to just be down there?" I ask. "You would be able to direct the troops better down there."
"Well, maybe. Staying here in the watchtower gives me the best idea of what is happening out there. If anything happens, I will catch it first here. My soldiers are disciplined and smart enough to adapt to any sudden change in the situation. I won't be able to give them the appropriate commands without knowing the situation," he replies. "My only problem is what exactly could they be planning. What is worth wasting so many of their troops?"
"Why are they targeting in the first place? You have mentioned that it is an abnormal number of troops to be attacking a single fort. What do you think is the reason?" I ask.
"Normally, they attack us with a single troop, Captain. This many troops attacking has never happened before. That has been going on in my mind for a while. Maybe the Snowlords fear your formations," he replies. "That would explain their reaction pretty well."
"Even your people have just begun the usage of formations, Shamon," I speak. "The Snowlords are even more cut off than you. How the fuck would they have access to formation magic? Even if they had an idea about all this, do you think that they would be able to detect it from so far away? Even experienced formation mages can't predict a formation's strength from so far away."
"One of their allies are the sages, Captain. Those bas....."
The man speaks, realization hitting him as soon as the words leave his mouth. He zips his mouth immediately. The man did not need to worry that much. He has not exposed anything vital after all. We at the Hexmountain have always kept an eye on the sages.
I really should speak about them in detail one of these days, if they are involved. Let's just say that they have a complicated relationship with the Hexmountain. (especially the Legion.) Also, I am not surprised that they are here. The sages like to trade everywhere, especially if they are enemies of the Black Mountain.
Still, the man has a point. The Sages could have given something to the Snowlords to allow them to see the strength of my formations. After all, who would know the Druids better than the people that brought them d...
I feel a massive spike of mana. This is at the south gate. The mana is intense enough that the man next to me can feel it as well. I can feel my mana sense struggling even as I grab the spyglass from the man next to me.
A glance is enough for me to confirm the massive spike of ice that has pierced the southern gate.