I had one week until Sadian's army reached Windemere's western gate. Merchant traffic already stopped and all of the caravans were going to Lonid full of goods to help them rebuild.
With the dwarven secession now a bygone chapter in Windemere's turbulent history, Helger and I could finally move back home. I took care of our house and smithy while we were away on my off-time so everything was in perfect order. We still had a little problem with it, though.
"This place is not worthy of a former [Queen]," Helger declared. "Stories about your antics in Lonid and Vugh Tarim are circulating everywhere, Haru. I'm sorry but we can't live here anymore."
I kind of expected it, but it was too soon. I noticed people pointing at me and talking in hushed tones. There wasn't much I could do about it. The exposure was necessary. Now Alfondric would oversee the dwarves as a cloth golem until the stubborn dwarven [Thane] decided to…
Damn, I saw the pattern. He was going to be a golem forever, just like Marlowe.
Not my problem. Maybe I should check how long Kazuyran will be around but dark elves lived several thousand years. Not my problem either. I should give him a soul-storing ring and bam! Immortal [Assassin] leader. Eh. Let's put that on the back burner.
"Where then? I have a lot of mansions, castles, and forts, not to mention I just got Lonid's Royal Palace, want to live in it? We just need to find a plot of land. Maybe I can enchant it to float."
Helger deadpanned. "What scares me the most is that you are not bullshitting me."
I put my fists on my waist, "You literally adopted an eternal eldritch monstrosity, old man. Deal with it."
We laughed until our bellies hurt.
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There was one little problem when hunting for a suitable spot for our new habitation. One, it had to be suitable for a former [Queen]. Two, it should be near a spot with lots of traffic, because we were opening a shop. Three, it had to have room for a workshop. Basically, we needed a plot of land. I was certain I either had the right building in storage or could make one.
I felt I was missing something. I let Helger's assumptions rise to my head and followed this line of thought. If my house should be fitting for my Royal self, how should it be? The answer was simple, but not easy. I had a whole dimension worth of space to work with. I could enchant a portal with the ability to move people between the real world and the Ethereal world. Then I needed only space for the entrance. There was a little security problem because the portal could be used to invade in either direction but I knew what to do.
First, I needed to find the perfect spot. It needed to be just a storefront, one meter deep but wider than the portal. I searched the area between the Lamia fortress and the Adventurer's guild. If I settled outside of Vukdon's Wellspring radius, I could set another Wellspring there to harvest MP to fuel my enchantments.
I started to draft the enchantment plan and calculate the point requirement for the portal. Then the dimensional wards and barriers to stop Ethereal denizens like the demons from crossing. One day passed and I realized it was a useless risk.
If the demons found a permanent gateway between the dimensions, they would stop trying to invade the Scorched Continent's western half and flock to Windemere. Breaking any barrier laid by a mortal would be easier than a divine barrier fueled by resonant Demon Lord cores. At least it gave me a point of [Enchanter] proficiency.
I scratched the idea of a dimensional portal and went with another one. I didn't have an enchantment for teleportation that didn't involve the Ethereal but I had {Tree Stride}. Thinking of it, I idly doodled a big tree with a door and a beautiful flower lawn with picket fences. In the background, I drew a flying palace on an inverted cut-off mountaintop.
That was it. I could cast an illusion underneath the floating land to stop surface dwellers from seeing it. Then I could have as much surface area up there as I wanted. As much as I could keep floating. How would I approach the floating issue? A Force effect? Weight reduction enchantment on rocks? Wind magic? All of them?
I did the math and the conclusion I got was that I needed a big-ass Core to make it happen. I had tons of first and second-rank Cores, not enough third-rank, and none on the fourth-rank. I could make it with hundreds of second-rank Cores and maybe get a scalable field effect that didn't have a single point of failure but the time needed to enchant these Cores was ridiculous. If I cut a Core to gemstone quality, I would lose about fifteen percent of the mass and keep 63% of the enchantment potential. Then {Gem Polish} would give a 50% bonus and…
I forgot to add {Shadow Workshop}'s 20% bonus. Cutting the Core, lose 15% of the mass and keep only 76% of the potential, Gem Polish, 60% bonus, {Precise Cut} 304% bonus. That meant I could get 3.91 times the… Wrong again. I could reuse the Core shards from cutting the Core so I didn't lose much mass. Maybe 5% or less. Round it to 4 times the Core potential with my current Abilities.
No good. Worse yet, I still had 29 fast-growth points to level up my [Jeweler] profession. That's at least two new Abilities. That's what I should do, grind this profession by making jewelry and cutting gemstones. And I should aim to do unique designs, since {Beginner's Luck} gave me a 91% (luck score) quality and Proficiency gain bonus each time I made a new item.
That's the reason I got {Arcane Manipulation}. Since I had Energy regeneration to spare, I summoned a lot of {Force Tongs} and put them to manipulate the metal along with the workshop tools. I lost 24% of the item's quality, but that was more than compensated by the previous bonus. Since I was grinding for Proficiency, it didn't matter. If I sold the jewelry for a third of the {Appraise} price I would still profit from it. Leeching MP from the Academy, I could work on twenty jewelry projects at the same time.
In three days, I reached more than my target goal.
Jeweler (*) [ 300 / 300 ]. Select 4 Abilities
* Affinity Cut: Cutting gemstones in particular shapes grants (Proficiency/5)% more points (from the gems) for the Affinity-related enchantment type.
* Paired Jewels: You can make a single piece that can be split in two. Each piece keeps (50 + Proficiency/10)% of the full enchantment and is always treated as being in the same place up to (Proficiency) kilometers of distance.
* Electrochemical Plating: Add a precious metal coating over another metal. The coating grants the better metal properties with (Proficiency/10)% efficiency.
* Metallic Affinity: Using particular metals and alloys grants (Proficiency/5)% more points (from the metals) for the Affinity-related enchantment type.
Paired Jewels were useful for communication devices or other uses where stuff needed to be sent from one place to another. Like when teleporting people around. Electrochemical plating could save metal for low-end jewelry. The other two were what I needed to make the flotation enchantments. That shit was going to be expensive and I needed every single enchantment point I could squeeze out of these materials.
Unfortunately, I was out of time. Sadian was invading and I had an army to defeat in the most humiliating way possible. And for that, I had to allocate my [War Technique] Abilities.
War Technique (**) [142 / 157]. Select 9 abilities.
* Swarm Tactics I: Your units gain (Proficiency/50)% Accuracy and Evasion for each ally engaging the same enemy.
* Swarm Tactics II: ... (Proficiency/40)% …
* Swarm Tactics III: ... (Proficiency/30)% …
* Zerg Rush (IV): Your soldiers gain (Proficiency/30)% Accuracy, Damage, and Evasion for each ally engaging the same enemy.
* Giantbane: For each size of the difference, your units gain (Proficiency/10)% more accuracy and evasion.
* Deadlocked Blades: If your units' loyalty is absolute or better, they cling to the weapon that killed them, requiring a Strength check (With a (Proficiency/10) penalty) from the enemy to get it free.
* Harried Enemies: Each enemy engaged with at least 5 of your troops suffers a (Proficiency/10)% penalty to Accuracy and Evasion.
* Seal the breach: When you order your units to cover an area, they react (Proficiency/2)% faster.
* Hit and Run: Your units gain (Proficiency/10)% more move rate and Evasion when withdrawing from or engaging an enemy for the first time...
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
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Sadian wasn't stupid. No nation that could keep a chokehold on a major trade lane for a thousand years was. Dumb enough to dabble in slavery? Yes. Greedy enough to attack Windemere under the sweet lies Torgo fed them? Definitely. Well, maybe they weren't too stupid, just a little bit. But who wasn't?
They knew of Windermere's strong points. Enchanted walls - which I should review and re-enchant - Lamia knights that excelled in mobility, defense, and elemental magic, shadowy [Assassins] that kept crime rates low, people made of cloth that wove the best fabrics on northern Auvanini if not the whole continent, dwarves mining a whole mountain range for themselves, and a lot of furry people. Also, legends of strange people with too many powers for a person's maximum allotment of one hundred lifetime Perks, if they had [Ultra-Rare] Class and Species.
The prize, control of land trade routes as well as the sea ones was enough for them to try. The other players in the region were all weakened. Lonid lost most of their nobility and the Royal family vanished for a whole week and Leondirac was low on funds. Windemere was weakened. The dwarves rebelled. There was no central government.
That walled country was practically begging to be annexed, or so Torgo whispered in Sadian's ears. Their version of the story was that the nephew twice removed of the former King was a downtrodden Royal without a title and the legitimate heir to the throne. Just because some piece of clothing didn't like him (he never tried the Tabard, BTW) he was barred from taking over his birthright. In their own eyes, Sadian was a [Paladin] in shining armor, helping a neighbor [King] in the making claim it.
Windemere's population was about four hundred thousand people. That included children, elders, and all sorts of noncombatants. In fact, Windemere was so safe that few people joined the military. Still, Sadian brought a hundred thousand well-equipped soldiers. Most of their weapons were of dwarven quality! I wondered where they got it. Once that army moved past the walls, the country was already in their hands, elite snake-women knights or not.
I floated above the army's camp near the ruins of Saegalla. Sadian had line-of-sight to the gates and they were preparing to attack tomorrow at dawn. The gate guards deserted their posts at the sight of the massive host. I used prearranged signals to tell Kazuyran's people to leave too.
Sadian's scouts watched that from afar and reported to their commander. The officers celebrated. There wouldn't be a fight for the gate. All they had to do was to lift the portcullis and waltz in unchallenged. News spread throughout the camp and the soldiers celebrated.
I flew over the camp, {Appraising} the soldiers and searching for my target. It was ridiculously easy to find them. {Detect: Favored Enemy} tuned to [Dragons] gave me one single hit. An inconspicuous officer tent next to the command tent. Phasing inside, I found a lot of cloaked people. The only one without the hood on was Torgo. He'd gained only two levels since I last saw him at the temple back in Rosebush. Their enchanted cloaks interfered with {Appraise}.
Torgo's half-dragon friend was level 178. The tall and serpentine man almost caught me but my luck held. Torgo was a bit worried about what seemed like an obvious trap but the gate was genuinely unguarded. The dragon-man used a few scrying and detection spells and declared, there was not a single soul at or near the gates.
The agitator relaxed. Some of the others removed their hoods. I recognize Dublone's city lord but the others were obviously nobility. The last one to lower his hood was a [Prince]. From where I had no idea and honestly cared little. They were all dead people walking and I could get the information posthumously.
The morale was high but the discipline was terrible. On the eve of their offensive, soldiers were drinking the celebration wine already. The relaxed officers didn't care and some even joined the men. Torgo and his cronies went to sleep. The dragon-man remained in the main room of the tent, watching the door. An hour later, with light snores coming from the cots where the comatose cloaked conspirators calmly coddled their dreams, the dragon-man spoke.
"I know you are there. Show yourself."
One of the oldest tricks in the book. Nobody was watching, nobody was hearing. You say that and some naive [Rogue] unsure of their skills decide to strike or reveal themselves. If nobody reacted, then nobody listened and you didn't pass for a fool. I just stood still, without breathing while I waited for him to do something. He wasn't even focusing on where I stood.
"[Dragon Slayer], I'm sorry I can't give you a proper welcome, but you are trespassing," he continued.
Maybe he did know I was here. Or maybe… Yes. {Detect Divinity} told me the damn lizard was cheating. The guy used the weakest area spell over the tent, one that did nothing except burn his [Priest] MP. Which created a vacuum where I stood because it was divine magic.
The dragon-man turned around and looked straight at where I stood. "Let me tell you. I'm a [Priest] of the Broodmother. If you want Windemere to survive, you'll do as we--"
> Force Sphere <-- To isolate us from the sleeping people.
>
> Barbarian Rage
>
> Flash Blink Step
>
> Vorpal Claws
>
> Multiattack
I cut both of his arms off. His spells deactivated as my {Divine Siphon} ate them. He couldn't use any of his Divinity-laced magic. Then I grabbed the lizard-man by his long scaly neck. "Tell this to your Goddess. Holding civilian lives hostage to achieve your means makes you a terrorist. I do not negotiate with terrorists. I'll make a counteroffer. Keep your scaly lizard paws away from my people, and I don't hunt your kind to extinction. As for you, Trogdor, you'll die for killing the lamia mercenaries."
"My name isn't Trogdor!"
Like I cared. I {Challenged} him and then bit his head off like in the good old times.
> For Killing level 178 Trogdor was a Dragon-Man, you gained 747.6B Exp. (Base 2,900,757 x 3,125 fast-learner, x3,38 Favored Enemy, x3,05 Challenge x2 Rank x2 Rarity x2 Species).
A bit less than 300 more kills like this guy to rank up.
Holding both body and head, I waited for the disembodied voice of the dragon-bitch. Nothing happened. Either she didn't want to spend the ability with this high-level nobody or it was as I suspected. Her {Reverse Fate} power was divine in nature and couldn't be used within a meter of my person.
I dispelled the Force bubble and went around, killing everyone in the tent including Torgo. Then I went outside and found a good place to hide. Aside from a few sentries, the army slept. Perfect. I revealed my Summoning tail. Using {Dolphin Speech} I sang in ultrasound.
> Grand Fermata (100% more effect).
>
> Path least traveled.
>
> Summon 5,000,000 level 10 (Effective level: 37) al-Mi'raj. (Summoning cost: 4,192,628 Energy. Maintenance cost: 117,394 Energy/minute). <-- I regenerated 147k Energy/minute.
Fifty unicorn-horned-murder-rabbits for every soldier in this camp. They appeared as a massive burst of white fur, white teeth, and sharp pearly horns everywhere. They quickly overwhelmed the sentries, burned in the firepits, invaded the tents, killed the sleeping soldiers, got tangled inside the tents, and basically painted their fur blood-dirt brown.
The average level of the soldier in this army was sixty-something. A few recruits didn't have a single rank-up under their belts, but there were a lot of strong officers and veterans. These hewed the rabbits like a gorilla with a scythe reaped wheat if gorillas knew how to farm and had Perks for that.
They still took some damage as more and more frenzied rabbits jumped in front of their weapons. {Deadlocked Blades} proved completely useless. The summons vanished as they died, leaving the weapon unhindered.
The rank-and-file inebriated soldiers, however, were trampled by the fluffiest army that ever fought. The ones on the outskirts fled the sea of blood-and-dirt-stained critters. The al-Mi'raj gave chase.
Mages reacted and tossed area spells everywhere, causing the rabbits to vanish en masse but also dealing a lot of friendly fire. All the partial kill Exp messages I got were proof of that.
An hour later, there were very few summoned monsters alive. I was totally fine with that.
> Reprise
>
> Summon 5,000,000 level 10 (Effective level: 37) al-Mi'raj. (Summoning cost: 3,144,471 (25% off) Energy. Maintenance cost: 88,046 (25% off) Energy/minute).
Another fresh batch appeared as I dismissed the old ones. Chaos ensued. The army fought. Very few people died. That wasn't the point. al-Mi'raj died in batches of hundreds or thousands. Two hours later, I did it again.
> Ritornello
>
> Summon 5,000,000 level 10 (Effective level: 37) al-Mi'raj. (Summoning cost: 2,830,024 (32,5% off) Energy. Maintenance cost: 79,241 (32,5% off) Energy/minute).
Fight for your lives. Three hours later, Galbarar's grace, as the sun was called by the cool kids these days, shone in the east.
> Ritornello
>
> Summon 5,000,000 level 10 (Effective level: 37) al-Mi'raj. (Summoning cost: 2,547,022 (39,2% off) Energy. Maintenance cost: 71,317 (39,2% off) Energy/minute).
The sun shone at the zenith over the battlefield. It was "noon" of the seven-hour window of sunlight we had. The mages ran out of MP and potions. Most died. The officers became tired. Some died, the others attempted to flee. The al-Mi'raj gave chase. I collected everything in the camp, including the souls.
Sadian's incursion was over. Their haughty warriors fled against the meekest of monsters.