“This is your squad leader.” Besides Commander Wil, the Dwarf that beat Ebony up remained in the tent.
“Just cap’s fine, ladie. Good to have ya!”
‘No names again. Is it so that we don’t have any sort of attachment?’ Ebony made a random guess as to why people weren’t introducing themselves.
“Could you explain how to read this map?” He asked directly.
The red and green represented allies and Troll density. Small numbers don’t show up, even their militia barely shows up. It was not difficult for small assaults to happen that doesn’t show up on the scry chart, it wasn’t updated every second after all.
Other than the leader of the first assault squad, their captain was also the militia’s vice commander along with Mr kidnapper.
Commander Wil was not going to attack.
He was marked by the Troll’s shamans along with all the individuals that they recognised as threats. The moment they make a move, the Trolls would send the appropriate forces to counter them. It often leads to bystanders dying so they only moved when they were certain they could benefit more than they would stand to lose. The old man would show up on the battlefield near the Troll’s forward base to put pressure on them so that they couldn’t move away as they wished. He would make sure little to no scouts or reinforcements can escape either.
The two older men stared at them in silence and frowned.
“I’m not sure if we should let the two of you in on this operation.”
“...Will we be marked too? I think we’re a bit too weak for that.” Ebony caught on to the reason for their dilemma.
“It’s hard for us to throw you anywhere, other than a couple of us none of the others can back you up or even stay close to the two of you safely. There’s a good chance they would take note of you due to the strength of your magic, especially you boy.”
“They don’t do very well in extreme temperatures and prioritise such targets. I don’t know why or how long you can maintain a large area of effect spell but you would definitely be targeted.”
“Tell me about this Benumbed tribe.” Ebony changed the topic, he needed more information to give a concrete plan or idea.
“Thick-skinned. Slightly smaller and leaner, so they are somewhat quick on their feet. Relatively high resistance to physical attacks. They are the Troll’s vanguard, this particular camp is their assault squad. They only gathered enough to show up on the scry chart. we expect an attack from them at any time.”
“Magical or elemental resistance?”
“Average.”
“Do they have any shamans there?”
“Not likely. Those cowards hide deep within their bases protected by their strongest forces.”
“We just have to hit so fast and hard that they don’t realise us right?”
The elders nodded.
Ebony paused. He was about to say they could simply drop a bomb or two on the camp. He may or may not be able to fly here due to the corrosive poison cloud but could Ning Xin do that? Perhaps her mask could help with inhalation but their equipment wasn’t enough if the cloud was as potent as they said. They could fill his Glacial Model and he could Will them to be suicide bombers but the explosion goes off pretty quickly once out of Ning Xin’s control and she only has enough mana to charge 1 very potent bomb.
Effectiveness aside, now that he stopped to think he didn’t know how to feel about mass slaughter despite how many he had already killed. He was here on the battlefield for that exact reason.
“No, you’re here to protect.” He felt a tug on his arm.
‘...She can read my mind?’
“And you?” He questioned.
“Both, eat or be eaten. They come here looking to feast on us.” She countered.
Ebony put it to the back of his mind and told them his plan to send a suicide bomber, he could get other fire mages to fill up more Models.
Commander Wil and his squad leader weren't keen on helping with the plan due to the questionable effects. They couldn’t afford to have their fire mages’ mana to be wasted. The militia’s camp didn’t have any magical weapons of mass destruction, unlike the Imperial bases. If they retreat towards their own base, the Trolls wouldn’t chase unless it was an all-out attack.
“You want me to sit out this time?” His fiery companion scowled at the thought.
“You’ll be empty after charging one bomb, they said strong warriors are often made a target too.” While mages are targeted because the Trolls understood how they were the bigger threat, strong warriors are targeted for individual Trolls to prove their strength.
“That’s what I want!”
“I know but I want you to sit out,” Ebony stated.
“I agree, we don’t get a useful card every day. The Trolls are hiding their cards too, although it's probably just sheer numbers. Boy, you sit out. I don’t want them to be wary of another ice mage, the girl gets to fight.” Commander Wil massaged his shoulder with his club.
“Ha!” She bumped her shoulders into his.
‘It backfired…’ The two of them weren’t about to argue when it came to tactics. They knew nothing and he was just making suggestions since the short spar didn’t feel like it was enough for them to show what they could do.
“We dallied for long enough, follow me.” The Dwarf walked out.
“Mmm.” They followed their cap.
The small camp they were going to attack had about 7 to 8 thousand Trolls. First assault and support squad tallied roughly 500 men, 200 of which were part of the support squad. They had about a dozen or so bards and augmenters. Ebony was going to join this group in disguise. With Waning Presence and his sound magic, he could go around giving others buffs without catching much attention. Since the Trolls were horrible at sensing magic, he could support the others with gravity magic as well.
The support squad was very important. Their warriors would never be able to stand up against these physical powerhouses known as Trolls without the buffs from the bards. They had a few healers too, young ones that wanted to level quickly.
The skilled healers were all back in the rear except the Lord family healers but the royals were all activated near Tidal in First and Third Tide where the battle was the fiercest.
The Trolls seemed to have a lot more leeway this time. They always wanted to target the Frost Elves but were forced elsewhere. Whatever the Imperial’s plan was, it wasn’t working too well.
Ebony tried his best to hide his presence but Waning Presence wasn’t an invisibility spell. Everyone who could currently see him couldn’t tell anything different except that he was harder for people with mana sense to spot.
The conjured battlefield was a dry wasteland. There was nowhere to hide and it was going to be very obvious if they made any sort of tall cover for themselves so they had to stay quite a distance away. The silver lining was that the Trolls didn’t have very good perception or any kind of equipment and technology that could spot them with more ease.
Without any Shamans, the militia was confident that a dozen or so kilometres away was enough with the thick dust floating around. It never settled for long enough since they had constant clashes.
They waited but not in silence. These people chatted, laughed, argued and even threw skills at each other. They needed to wait for a signal from Commander Wil that it was time to start their assault. The mind mage in the support squad will be their liaise, they were in charge of communication.
A few tried to talk to them newbies but the only thing they got out of him was ‘mmms’ and Ning Xin either ignored casual conversation or glared at rude remarks. Ebony might have used gravity magic to peel some…disturbing gazes towards her. Those gazes made both of them extremely uncomfortable.
“What happened to your mantle?” He pointed out the main reason for those gazes.
“It’s torn, not much is left of it. Why?”
“Pass it to me.”
She took out her mantle without any further questions.
Ebony took out a red fabric that was as similar in tone as he had before mending the large holes. They didn’t have to have any effect other than to cover her up. It took pretty long due to the mantle having very complicated weaving, he re-weaved the threads to align with his fabric. Once he was done, he put the mantle back on her and secured it firmly in place.
“...Thanks.”
He didn’t fit the hood since there was no hood left but that wasn’t an issue.
When it was roughly ten minutes away from their planned timing, they received a warning from the support squad.
The two of them prepared their suicide bomber. Mostly the one in charge of firepower working but he needed to keep his Model strengthened as much as possible.
‘Wait a minute, I just have to do it in my domain.’ Ebony cast a short-ranged domain.
It became a lot easier to control a tiny suction spot within his Glacial Model. The Model was so detailed that it was swallowing flames through its mouth. He made the spot of revolving gravity mana within the Model’s belly. Wind, lightning and fire were sucked into his Glacial Model at a speed they were both unfamiliar with.
His Model kept glowing brighter.
“I can’t control it, your gravity is too strong. Stabilise it a little.” Ning Xin concentrated as flames poured out from her mask.
It looked like a mad scientist’s experiment.
Instead of slowing down his gravity mana, he cut himself and fed his blood to his Glacial Model. His blood was great at containing energy if he understood it right, especially mana. He should have used his head, the fire mage was already overloaded.
The blood mage had a nosebleed and he didn’t notice until it dripped from under her mask. She was also unaware or she would’ve directed the blood into her mask.
“Stop.” He patted her shoulders and pushed her arms down. She got dizzy but didn’t fall, they did this many times now.
Ebony shut the Glacial Model’s mouth but he could feel the intense heat from it even in his domain. He focused on the gravity mana within it and strengthened the Model’s internals as much as he could. It didn’t even put much of a strain on him. Not while the Model was still in his domain.
He looked around but everyone distanced themselves away except his partner in the artform of explosions and his squad leader. One could squint but still cannot look directly at the bright sculpture of ice. His ‘captain’ conjured a few walls to hide it. He forgot all about how bright it was going to be and he even strengthened it within his domain. Not by much since most of the firepower wasn’t provided by him.
“On my count boy.” Cap gave his helmet a rub. Ebony couldn’t tell if the man was impressed by their combined spell or not.
They were still waiting for the signal from the support squad.
Ebony could feel the vibrations and even see the silhouette of the camp, he was quite confident of his aim. His Glacial Model was smart enough to know what a Troll was. He linked up Guided Path to the limits of his range and prepared to propel this poor Model through it.
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“Let’s see this surprise of yours.” The earthen walls collapsed
Ebony let it rip. The repulsion strengthened by his domain fired his missile off. It put supersonic speed to shame but even so, a Troll pulled out his jagged rock sword and roared. He slashed at the missile with enough intensity to tear buildings down with just wind pressure.
The suicide bomber swung its hand down which turned into a blade. The Troll’s attack was too strong to push back but the Glacial Model only used the momentum to spin itself past the defending Troll. That took away most of its repulsion and brought it to a stop. It had to run on its feet now.
Ebony charged forward a little so that he could help control the Model if necessary. The Glacial Model skill at level 166 increased his range of control for something with his ‘will’ imbued by 445%. His mental reach was about 120 metres now, he could exert manual control over his Models over 600 metres away.
“Stay back for a bit more.” He warned. He didn’t need to, no one was moving forward as Cap was raising his hand and hadn't put it down.
The poor old suicide bomber could only use ice magic and had to avoid getting cut in the belly until it got deeper into the camp. It used its small size and quick feet to dance around the giants attacking it, they found it annoying due to how bright it was shining and that took all the camp's attention so Ebony could stand so close yet no one noticed he was standing there.
He was a little too late to do anything useful as the Trolls surrounded the poor sculpture and jammed their weapon into it. The Model didn’t hesitate to let its body rupture before the power within it got released.
Ebony already pushed himself back when he sensed that. He didn’t want to stay close to the explosion even if he probably wouldn’t get killed by it.
Although they said people of the Benumbed Tribe were a little smaller, the average difference could hardly be seen. They had a wide range of height and size after all. The only thing worth noting was that they were all slimmer than the Trolls he had seen so far.
Two of the Benumbed Tribe threw themselves to hug each other with his suicide bomber unable to dodge since it had giant rocks stuck in its body.
Ebony and Ning Xin got their experience. 6, that was all they got.
‘So many survived?’
Captain Dwarf and Ning Xin didn’t wait any longer but most of the others remained in shock. They needed the heat to die down a little. They could feel the heat reaching their bones from kilometres away. The release of gravity and wind helped to spread the damage further.
“Move idiots! Their regeneration is greatly weakened now!”
Ebony didn’t lag too far behind, a little worried for his partner. They didn’t really have to worry about escapes since this tribe was filled with warriors with even more pride but a few of them including him were on lookout duty to stop any escapees from getting reinforcement.
He arrived to see his squad’s captain and many strong fighters in the heat of the battle. The Trolls and humans recognised each other since they were both external assault squads that have attacked each other multiple times. The tribe didn’t have any walls, tents or a roof over their head. Practically all of them were engulfed in his combined spell but only about a few hundred near the point of the explosion were greatly affected.
The support squad began their work and strings were strummed with dozens upon dozens of mana threads linking up to the militia. It was pretty cool since he could sense the mana threads and their vibrations. He couldn’t link up to so many people unless he used the callstone function. It must be their instrument or their skill. Some were wide-ranging areas of effect buff. The water mages cast a water film on those that couldn’t take the heat.
To say the support squad was essential was an understatement. They were outnumbered and had to take advantage of the initial surprise attack. The assault squad’s mages were dishing out their spells as well, many of which were fire magic.
Ebony sent his buff to his partner while he observed to see who needed it the most.
He wasn’t supposed to jump into battle, anyone who killed too many Trolls in a short period of time would be easy for their shamans to find out even if they weren’t currently present. He used gravity and sound magic freely while being careful not to overuse ice magic.
Ebony only acted in self-defence and didn’t go around picking a fight. Still, he couldn’t stop fighting since they were surrounded and there were many ‘free’ Trolls at the edge of their camp. Other than light burns, those at the edges were relatively unharmed. They all wielded giant single-edge swords with a few carrying thick shields.
At the edge of his senses, one fire mage got caught and stuffed into the Troll’s mouth. He couldn’t buff the man or conjure defences for him fast enough. He also didn’t expect the Trolls to focus on eating, even monsters aim to kill or at least incapacitate before feasting but these warmongers didn’t wait for that. The Troll couldn’t swallow the mage whole, his legs were grabbed like a drumstick before his upper half was munched on and split in half. Two bites were all it took but with all the chewing, the mage was a dead man.
“On me!” Cap Dwarf yelled.
A dozen broke free from their battle to disrupt the apparent leader of this camp. Captain Dwarf wanted to get the persistent giant off his back so that he could cause some rampage. The Trolls understood the overused tactics and the leader’s squad charged back to put pressure on Cap Dwarf. Stalemate.
The situation wasn’t looking good despite the average assault squad member taking on multiple Trolls. The Trolls fought a lot better together than he imagined. Definitely better than the militia in terms of teamwork. It was concerning because they had limited bards and they had limited resources. The Trolls weren’t decreasing in number as they were hard to kill. Relatively uninjured Trolls would take attacks for their fellow compatriots to allow them a chance to recover. Even he wasn’t able to land many killing blows before he was disrupted by another Troll. Doing so without Frostblaze Augmentation or cladding was hard.
Ning Xin already caught the attention of every strong Troll present and was embroiled in the battle with Cap Dwarf and the others that could keep up and even exceed her. She wasn’t able to use her fire magic freely but it wasn’t that big an issue since she never really threw around spells in close combat. All of her excess mana went to enhancements.
The Trolls surrounding him hollered and called him ‘troublesome’.
‘I haven’t got hit once, I should let them knock me around.’ Ebony realised that he was dodging and weaving around hundreds of them too much. His gravity magic was strong enough to heavily hinder most warriors with tier 1 mana enhancement slightly higher level than him. If he cast his domain, even if they had a tier 2 enhancement it would be hard for them to stand. Unless they had high Intelligence, high refinement or just a high skill level.
He had a feeling Cap Dwarf had very decent gravity resistance as his gravity mana slipped from the short man’s armour and skin. If he didn’t waste his time learning from Kong Jing, he was pretty sure it wasn’t the armour that resisted gravity.
Ebony took control over his body and forced it not to evade the rock slashing his belly. He only activated the scales on his robe in the area of impact. The Trolls didn’t have very good perception as far as he could tell.
He smashed his elbow and knee on the rock sword, destroying it with Sonic Intrusion and Chaotic Repulsive Membrane while he tumbled into some other Troll. It hurt quite a bit without Augmentation so he acted like he got hit while he destroyed their weapons and shields. They couldn’t avoid it with Guided Path pulling him towards their weapons and pushing himself away when they tried to attack him.
Restricting the forces wherever any of the militia was having trouble. His limp body flew around at great speeds as he was getting beaten up badly. Oddly arriving at the areas where people were about to die and oddly, they would turn things around and get the upper hand.
All he had to do was cast his domain as a thin film and his sound and gravity magic were greatly strengthened for short-ranged skills. He didn’t take any damage that way. Only about a quarter of the camp were Grandmaster Trolls, large compared to them but the militia’s first assault squad could beat them with the bard’s buffs.
Every Grandmaster Troll was chucking themselves at the centre group so he didn’t have to worry much. He noticed Cap Dwarf glancing at him quite a bit. Only after a few minutes did he know what the man wanted.
Ebony waited for a lull in his captain’s battle before ripping him out of there with Guided Path. He quickly found a Troll to hit him in his captain’s direction. They swapped places and he limited his domain to gravity magic, it was weaker than if he cast a full domain but it worked.
“Give me ten” They bypassed each other and he released the captain to cause some havoc. Cap didn’t even reach the ground when the snakehead swam up and caught him. It moved smoothly enough to mistake for a living creature and the swag Dwarf rode it as a surfboard.
Ebony was snagged out of the air and planted into the ground.
“Ice!”
‘Damn. I guarded that reflexively.’ Ebony wouldn’t be able to take a hit from these guys without Augmentation.
“It’s just my equipment.” He slashed at the arm pushing his chest down. Highly pressurised water blasted the Troll atop him as well.
Fortunately, the chaos brewing meant that not many Trolls cared that he used a tiny bit of ice magic. The Troll that got blasted away was forced to defend himself from another warrior. Ebony tried his best to act as support but he was doing so well that the Trolls figured he was causing all their movements to be so heavy and how they started to miss attacks and opportunities because a phantom force pulled their arms aside.
Ebony was convinced that the Trolls had craftsmen of sorts. He couldn’t destroy the Grandmasters’ weapons although part of the reason should be the reinforcement that they imbue into their weapon being stronger than their weaker members. He recognised the material to be simple ironrock albeit in the Rare quality range, he should be able to crush them into dust with ease even without sound magic. It was definitely the work of a smith that strengthened the material, they don’t have mages after all.
“Stay back boy!” He got surrounded by a few men protecting him. Three squads of regenerative giants worked together to get him. He buffed the militia protecting him and sustained the buff he was sending through his callstone.
They were in on the act as well but they also figured that Battle Song was giving them part of the buff that the bards could. It wasn’t as gentle on their body though, the highly compressed mana wasn’t comfortable as it flowed into their bodies. These veterans were able to utilise the strength buff without being disorientated by an increase in speed and power.
No bard was present since the support squad doesn’t fight so deep, they were only Masters and placed themselves at the rear. Most of the men here were older men who could carry themselves well even against multiple Trolls of a slightly higher level.
That said, he was informed that the Benumbed Tribe’s elite forces had an average level of 350. The militia’s first assault squad only had about 50 Grandmasters, most under level 330. Compared to the attack on the main forward base, they had it good. They weren’t as outnumbered and had far higher average levels.
The loss of their captain added a lot of pressure to the team taking on the Benumbed Tribe leader’s squad of 8. Ning Xin was putting on a great fight and restricted their healing capabilities almost completely. She begrudgingly fought together with mr kidnapper who needed to pick up the slack from the temporary loss of their captain together with an archer who was wielding two arrows as if they were daggers.
Something about the lady archer’s aura was weird, Ebony was too far to tell. Mr kidnapper was taking on the tribe’s leader at almost 8 metres tall together with Ning Xin. The lady archer tied down the other 5 squad members all by herself. Ebony was going to assume 2 died and that was all from the squad leader’s group of 8. The movements of the 5 Trolls that the archer was fighting were very sluggish.
“Stop getting distracted and keep your eyes here!” Someone yelled at him.
“Mmm.” Ebony was worried about his partner since she was poking somewhere above her abilities. Acting mostly as support but also pissing the tribe leader off enough to get targeted.
He pulled his gaze back and took over manual control over his body instead of letting it move as it desired. Frostblaze Augmentation might spike up by instinct if he wasn’t careful. Only a small portion of Trolls had a weaker form of Identify, he wouldn’t be found out as long as he didn’t overuse ice magic and there wasn’t a shaman nearby.
Ebony did his best to keep this group of people alive whilst being surrounded. They had no one to tip the situation over. Being outnumbered, every time they got one on the brink of death another Troll would drag their ally away or take a hit for them. Allowing their allies to retreat and regenerate. They were strong warriors that managed to contain his group and slowly push them. His group had less and less space to move about.
Ten minutes had passed a while back but their captain wasn’t back yet.
These humans and beastmen alike had haggard breaths in less than half an hour. They could all hear screams from the weaker Trolls that had to handle or rather, suffer from Cap’s onslaught. Sadly, there were enough Grandmaster squads and the old Dwarf was taking on multiple squads all by himself.
Instead of stamina, the people Ebony was surrounded by were starting to lack mana. He saw some of them consuming a potion or two already. The Trolls were mostly in the same state, they didn’t need mana and had more than enough endurance to keep pushing the militia. Gravity only hindered them, it didn’t drain their strength or endurance away as fast as they needed.
They already killed two squads worth of Trolls but the numbers surrounding them didn’t change. The only silver lining was that there didn’t seem to be any free Grandmaster squad putting pressure on the militia’s weaker members. The elite group and captain alone took up most of their efforts.
Casualties on the militia’s side were considerably low as of yet. If the captain, the elite party or Ebony’s group cannot free themselves anytime soon the situation would turn for the worst. The support squad would be out of mana soon and they didn’t have enough members to rotate amongst themselves like an army would. The Masters would start to die fast if that came to be.
Ning Xin can reach peak enhancement within a few minutes with her current Core Skill. Ebony noticed that her sword style had increased her speed and power to the limits that her enhanced body can withstand. She didn’t stop herself from getting any faster as mr kidnapper forced away the leader Troll.
‘She’s getting reckless again. I can’t leave these guys as they are now…’
“Anyone has a special skill that can hold them back a minute or two? I think it’s time to tip the scales.” He tried asking.
Other than being strong warriors that are durable, Ebony wasn’t able to see any special skill from the Trolls. Sadly, the same can be said for the people he was trapped with as far as he could tell.
From their reactions, they were practically begging him not to leave them now.
“We’ll force our entourage towards cap!” The lizard woman who he beat was here with him and she had been taking charge even though there were 2 Grandmaster warriors trapped with them.
“Can ya flip gravity horizon-TALLY!?” The Axe wielder roared and rend both arms of his attacker off. The lizard woman leapt to deal the finishing blow but the Troll’s buddy already kicked the injured one back. The militia already cursed many times at the failed attempts.
“Never tried. Sounds simple.” Ebony liked the idea.
It was Magnified Gravity but sideways. It shouldn’t be too hard to manipulate since Guided Path was far more complicated. The volume and range he needed to cast them would be an issue since their enemies were so big.
He spread his domain out to help with the manipulation, the mana consumption dropped with the exclusion of ice mana. Noticing that, he took away the vibrations against movements as well. The range of his impromptu spell decreased from a diameter of 20 metres to 6. Only then did they see the Trolls skid on the ground. He wasn’t able to strengthen it any further but this made it easy for them to slip with a single push from any of them.
“Get their feet off the ground!”
They began to aim at giants' feet. Ebony’s spell was cylinder-shaped, although invisible to the naked eye the effects were obvious. It took some time to get used to the mental movement to prevent the ones within the range of his spell to run away. With his current finesse over gravity mana, his spell could chase them around and still direct them in a general direction.
The axe wielder managed to make an almost naked Troll jump and Ebony took the chance to ram into the body afloat with Treading Stride. Without any grip, the giant was propelled towards Cap Dwarf. The elder would have no problem with that as far as they could see. There were a dozen giants wrestling his earthen snake head and twice that number tossing themselves at the tiny figure in comparison. Literally using their flesh and dead allies' bodies to hold the Dwarf back.
“FEEEAAAST!” The roar echoed in Ning Xin’s direction. The entire battlefield was momentarily silenced by the Troll leader’s warcry.
Most Trolls paused long enough for the militia to land a fatal blow but not everyone was able to make use of the chance. Their giant enemies followed with a warcry of their own and started digging into their fellow soldiers' remaining flesh.
Sobs rang throughout the battlefield as they ate their friends and perhaps, family.