Chapter 16 : Assault
This was so stupid! Max found himself wondering where it had gone wrong. It had worked out in his favor but he felt inadequate and incompetent. It felt like the stupid plot of some novel where everything happens in the background and is shown only when the MC needs it at the last moment. He had always hated those novels. He felt powerless to the plot. Sure, this time it was in his favor, but it could have easily been against him. In retrospect, it was his own fault that he had no idea of the truth.
He had made uninformed assumptions. And he could see any of them leading to a hilariously stupid death, had it not been for his luck. When the system said ‘Traitor,’ it did not mean a traitor to humanity. But quite literally the “Traitor”, which is an Orcish title for their sacrificial head mage. During wars, one or two of the Orcish Head mages went through a ritual that burnt their life force and soul for enormous power. But they burned out in a few days. The ritual was very hard to do and resource intensive, so an Orcish horde had at max, one if any “Traitors”. And this was the guy they had been using to power up that massive siege engine that blew up their wall.
That’s why the Orcs were running without sweeping battlefields. They were in a quite literal sense, CRANKED. And Max had stupidly been directing his efforts into analysing his comrades for signs of treason. That was when he realized that he had made a lot of assumptions that he took for granted. Like the fact that ‘shorties’ referred not to their stature or sarcasm, but to the fact that in this kingdom, people believed that the amount of patience you had corresponded to the length of your spine. And thus, Orcs who were intelligent but had an extremely short temper were called shorties for having a shorter spine than humans.
He promised himself that if he survived to the next phase, the first thing he would do would be to properly get his quests explained in the context of that world. Otherwise, he might find himself on another quest, like finding a traitor that doesn’t exist. Before he could continue his thoughts, he saw their leader making a hand symbol. And in unison, their small force started jogging.
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“Hmm...”
The weird guy from Max’s tutorial stood deep in thought at an ornate white table with a map spread out in front of him. This time, he was dressed in clothes that made him look like a middle-aged noble from some faraway land. He was in strange flowing robes but they were definitely high quality. Kind of like those that a bishop wears in isekai animes.
“What is it, Milord?” An old servant standing behind him questioned.
“I gave a Chaos seed out to a potential seedling. But accidentally left him in that Bertram’s version of the tutorial.”
“He would have been quite good for you to give him a Chaos Seed. As long as he doesn’t overreach, he should turn out fine.”
“That’s the thing Rawl, I can’t interfere but I know he started the trial for a Race Piece.”
“Sigh, That’s Such a shame, but If you are worried about the seed, Milord won’t it just come back if he dies without integrating it. I believe it took 3 days for all those other ones to die.”
In response, the Chaos Lord’s lips curved up,
“That’s the thing! Rawl, that was 5 days ago.”
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Max remembered their target. A frail Orc surrounded by a dozen specially armored Orcs and accompanied by what Max came to know as the Forward commander. It was a purplish black Orc who looked about the same as the others but had almost zero armour. Even Kiraak recognised it by the drawings on gold on its hide. And which was also why, despite not being a soldier Max simply went along with the current suicidal plan instead running off.
The fact that they had been joined by 20 new men helped bolster his confidence a little more. Although no new mages or commanders.
Although, when the commander had said Sneak attack, Max had expected powerful skills with men materializing out of thin air or something. Or maybe emerging from the ground due to the lack of cover. But what he didn’t expect was calmly jogging up to the ridge and charging down into the Orcish Patrol.
But it turned out fine, nonetheless. At least in the beginning.
The Orcish patrol was marching in step as they did the last round of their shift. There were 4 Orcs marching in twos, with a captain leading. They were surrounded by their beasts on all sides. It took them a few seconds before they spotted the group of humans jogging towards them. As soon as the leading commander saw that they had been spotted, he ordered, “Chaaaaarge!” No point in running and wasting stamina before the big show right?
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The first row broke into a run first, followed by the rest in a roughly V-shaped horde. The Orc captain issued some orders, and 3 Orcs turned to face them. They started issuing short, sharp commands to the beasts, but before they could properly rally them, a wall of humans crashed into the beasts, severing several heads and shoulders. One stood in place and began chanting.
Max found himself panting in the middle of the human pack, protected by a wall of muscle. Shooting arrows into the beasts. Usually, he was so busy looking at the kill counter that nothing else mattered. But since there were no variants in this pack, there was nothing he could get but XP, whose demand was already so ridiculous that it wouldn’t really matter either way.
The beasts crashed into the men as the Orcs began supporting them with well-placed bows. But they were outnumbered and outclassed now. The deal was sealed when the human mage struck a fireball into one of the Orcs. That’s when Max saw the chanting Orc open his eyes. He instinctively yelled, “Look out!” But the blast he expected never came. The Orc waved his hand upward and sent a fireball into the sky.
He was struck down by a mana-laced blade just a few seconds later, but the damage was done. The men watched helplessly as the fireball rose up in the air and exploded into fireworks and smoke, alerting every orc within miles about their presence.
“C’mon people! This was never going to be a silent thing anyway. We just need to do it all a bit faster now!” the commander roared and began jogging towards the camp again. “Yeah!” the men joined him, and they all began moving.
Max had expected magical fights with everyone hurling fire and lightning, but it turned out the mage class was not that common. Most around him had the class of ‘soldier’ or a similar variant. And at seedling and Initiate Seeker levels, they could only imbue mana into their weapons, making them glowing swords and shining shields. The bulk of the soldiers were just that.
Max would later find out that this was how most of the population was in most worlds before system decided to make everyone go through a tutorial. One of the secondary purposes of the system was to provide a class and aid in using it so that the people were trained in a speedrun. Instead of waiting for realisations and breakthroughs, it allowed the seedlings to experience the power that they used to instinctively stabilize to level up, and advance. It was like learning to drive a car by actually driving it, while Max and this trial world, which was copied from a real scenario, were stuck assembling the car from the wheels and nuts and screws.
The company of 40 men jogged slowly towards the encampment pacing themselves for the confrontation that was to come. More than halfway there, suddenly, the barricade opened to show a row of Orcs on large boars. “Kaaihbema!!” And that wall of pure muscle began advancing towards the humans. “Scattterrrr!” Screamed the wide-eyed commander as the company divided into two halves scrambling to get out of the charging horde’s path. When something they knew but didn’t wanna confront happened. The horde turned veered.
“Shit! Shit! Shit!” Max heard as he got close to a warrior standing. For a moment it confused him as to why he was just standing there when he looked back and saw the horde veering right and crashing into the other half. There was almost no resistance as glowing maces met and broke the shining shields and humongous feet crushed their skulls. The horde just destroyed 20 men like a steamroller flattening trash, leaving nothing but broken bodies and screaming cripples behind.
As Max witnessed thi horror the commander screamed “To the gates! To the gates! We need to break in before they come around!” The soldiers rallied behind the man and started bolting towards away from the horde and towards the gate. Max too started following trying to keep himself from vomiting. He had seen death before but that was like seeing humans go through a meat grinder.
As he swallowed he saw the Orcs at the barricades who expected the men to scramble away he realised their plan. The charging orcs couldn’t charge the through these hills if they managed to run far enough, but they also couldn’t keep charging in their own damn camp. And besides, that was the plan from th beginning. A high risk almost suicidal assault to assasinate the Traitor for glory and victory. After all no Traitor no siege canon right?
Max glanced back to see the orc cavalry turning around to charge at their backs. But before they could catch up the mage hurled a fireball blowing up the barricade blocking their paths. A bit of Orcs tried to form a line to stop them but the commander just slashed through with an extremely strong glowing sword slash that protruded out of his swing cutting down 3 orcs and opening up a hole through which they charged in.
They didn’t stop to deal with the orcs but instead just scrambled into the camp aiming to reach the traitor’s camp. As they ran surprising the resting Orcs busy arming themselves. A doubt clouded Max’s mind. “Why didn’t he stop the cavalry if he was so strong!” Which was answered as they reached the tent. A blue shield covered it whole while a group of strong orcs stood inside that shield. Max remembered seeing these Orcs with their commander. Who sure enough walked out from behind them grinning like it was Christmas.
“Siege Form!” shouted the commander. Max looked around confused as everyone began forming a line at the edge of the shield and began charging up their weapons. Max wondered how was this guy planning to break through the magic of a creature that treated that huge first wall as a lego blocks tower, and apparently the mage shared his doubts. “We can’t break through a traitor’s wall!”
“The mana a traitor has is limited since he sacrifices his soul. They won’t waste it here!”
The soldiers had time against them. If they couldn’t get through they would be swarmed and surrounded.
“Now!” he shouted as all the soldiers attacked the shield with their charged up weapons. The mana shield cracked but held. Meanwhile the orcs behind it spread out as if taking the picks of their opponents. Max didn’t know how to imbue his sword with mana but he struck either way. “Again!” the soldiers struck and the cracks widened. A smaller orc took up a position opposite Max. He readied his axe for the moment the shield broke.
“Again!” Max knew this time it will break so instead of swinging his sword he got readey for a confrontation. Which turned out to be a very good move. As soon as the commander gave the order the Orc commander grunted. The orcish mages stopped maintaining the barrier causing the humans to fumble as the orcs advanced on them.
And just like that, it was pandemonium!