Vihrogon was the first to predict it. While enemy battle movements had been slow since the last major encounter, they quickly picked up at an alarming pace. The closer everyone got to the vortexes’ appearance, the bolder the Azures became, targeting imperial cloud forts hourly. The attacks followed a hit-and-run tactic, aimed at testing strength and disrupting positions more than anything else. The local commanders were smart enough not to give in to provocations, but while they could fend off most of the attacks, now and again there would be a fort that would vanish completely.
It didn’t take Dallion long to realize the obvious—there was a battle mage among the attackers. He could think of no one else capable of destroying a whole cloud fort in a single spell.
They’re using nymph tactics, the armadil shield said. More annoying than efficient, but able to rattle people up.
“I thought the nymphs were banished by the time you tried to take over the world,” Dallion said.
Not against us. Against the copyettes. The nymphs were the ones who put up a fight. Everyone else just hid in their towns and cities, focusing on revealing the copyettes already among them.
“Did it work?”
The hiding and revealing part? Not particularly. It did give rise to lots of devices with questionable functionality.
Apparently, the Azure Federation remained true to their name. On the third day, as Dallion’s cloud fort was approaching the meeting point with Katka’s group, things took a surprising turn for the better. Two imperial legions had managed to overwhelm the Azures’ defenses, taking several towns and even a whole city. According to reports, the ruling nobles were killed and the city’s overseer assumed the role, vowing loyalty to the highest-ranking legionary officer until a full noble arrived from the empire to take over.
The success had raised spirits within the cloud fort, with mages praising the Moons and marking this as the start of the end for the Azures. The more tactically minded, such as the furies, saw this as a tit for tat. While it was undeniable that the enemy’s losses were significant, the empire had failed to make any headway when it came to the vortex region. If anything, its forces had retreated in an attempt to regroup before another push.
“Eager for the fight?” Diroh asked.
Dallion didn’t budge. He had been spending so much time concentrating on the war map that his immediate surroundings were less relevant.
A month, even a week ago, he would have said yes without question, now he wasn’t so sure. It was a fact that while Grym and his group still existed, there’d be no end to the war. At the same time, he was back to following the Path of the Empath.
“Eager for it to be over,” he replied. Even as he said it, though, Dallion couldn’t kick the feeling that something was not right.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m not sure.”
“You’re just like the archmage.” The fury tilted her head to the side. “He’s also obsessed with failure.”
That was probably one of the things Dallion and Alien saw eye to eye on. Neither of them could afford a loss, and achieving even a small victory against an opponent who had been kicking their ass filled them with paranoia.
What am I missing? Dallion wondered.
“I’ve learned how to remove my novice mark,” Diroh said, in an attempt to attract his attention. “I figured it out a while back, but there never was an opportunity to try it out. With all the lessons and attention back in the Learning Hall.”
“That’s nice,” Dallion replied, clearly not into it.
Shield, are you sure there’s nothing wrong? he asked mentally.
Oh, there is something, no doubt about it, the guardian replied. But not enough to keep you from paying attention to a charming fury.
Shield…
What do you want me to say? Yes, they are leading you into a trap. Everyone can see that. However, at this point, there isn’t much that can be done about it. You have scouts all over the area. There’s no concentration of troops anywhere close. Even if he casts his destructive ray spells, there are a dozen cloud forts around you. As long as none of them turns against you, there’s nothing to be concerned about.
Dallion didn’t like the answer. Following Vihrogon’s advice, he had made sure that all the cloud forts in his group remained loyal to the empire. Even if a spy was aboard, there was no way for them to achieve anything more than a skirmish within the fort itself. Suddenly, a terrible thought crossed his mind. What about Katka? No one could be sure about her forces. After the woman’s last defeat, she had retreated with her forces, but there was no telling whether all of her forces really were hers. There probably had been too much chaos to notice, and it was just like the enemy to bide their time until the last possible moment.
“Tell all fort mages to cast shield spells!” Dallion yelled. “Tisaku isn’t waiting for us to approach. He’s on one of Katka’s cloud forts!”
Echoes conveyed the order among all other forts. Mages rushed, casting nine-circle spells in a rushed attempt to surround the massive clouds with aether barriers. Dallion himself started a far more complex spell, aiming to cast a protective sphere around his. Halfway through, a beam of fire shot up from the ground, burning through a cloud less than five hundred feet from Dallion’s.
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Lightning crackled within what was left of the cloud fort as the beam continued towards the sky. The group was under attack. Unfortunately for Dallion, his guess was only half right. The enemy battle mage had lulled them into his trap, but he hadn’t been hiding in another cloud fort, but on the ground they had flown over.
“Those idiot scouts!” Dallion gritted his teeth as he completed his spell.
A massive sphere of purple emerged, surrounding the cloud fort just in time to avoid a direct hit from a second ray coming from below. Dallion’s current magic proved insufficient to stop the attack outright. The barrier cracked under the pressure, maintaining its integrity for a few seconds before shattering. Thankfully, those few seconds proved enough for many of the other mages aboard to cast their aether barriers at the exact spot of the beam, taking on the brunt of its force. The cloud stretched to the side, allowing an opening to form within it.
Dallion watched with a sense of amazement as the spell shattered everything in its path, then passed through, continuing into the sky.
Crimson furies flew off the dozens of cloud forts in the hundreds, swooping down to find the source of their attacks. Meanwhile, the mages remained, casting additional barriers as a means of defense should other devastating spells follow.
“Di, stay close!” Dallion burst into instances, several of them casting protection spells, while dozens joined the crimson furies heading to the ground.
That’s the problem of sending guards to fight a war. Vihrogon sighed.
You think he’ll kill them off? Dallion asked, combining magic and layer vision as he searched for the enemy battle mage.
They’re so useless that I doubt he’ll bother. That’s why the empire’s been losing. Big battles require big vision, not petty skirmishes. This isn’t a couple of nobles squabbling for a few fields. And until your side realizes that, they’ll keep losing no matter how many of them are thrown into the fight.
Dallion considered his words for a moment.
The furies are the best scouts we have, he said tentatively.
You don’t need scouts. What you need is a series of mass spells that would cover the ground with hail for miles away. The battle mage is long gone by now. And even if he wasn’t, what will a couple of furies do against him?
Aether shards rained down from a few distant cloud forts. Having finished their barrier spells, a few mages must have taken the initiative and engaged in combat. Naturally, as mages, they didn’t see the need to warn any of the furies about it. It was purely thanks to luck and the furies’ fast reactions that they managed to fly out of the killing zone with nothing but a few minor injuries.
Idiots, Dallion thought. I’m surrounded by idiots.
If a few days ago he had been impressed by the success of his enemy, now he was astonished that the empire was still standing. Alien hadn’t been exaggerating when he had described the shortcomings of his given army. Individually, everyone was doing exactly what they should. Each group of furies swept through part of the area, using air currents to slice up anything suspicious. The mages had also performed quite well, protecting their cloud forts. Even the misguided attackers had cast a rather intricate set of spells, transforming the area beneath them into a mile-wide pincushion. However, there wasn’t even a semblance of overall coordination.
Now, Dallion understood what Vihrogon meant. The forces that had been sent to the front thought like guards and acted appropriately. For them, fighting an army was no different from fighting a hundred small skirmishes simultaneously—the same thing they had done on multiple occasions. Border conflicts weren’t rare even before the latest events. However, an all-out war hadn’t occurred for centuries. Even the war against the furies didn’t count: back then, the furies were the ones attacking. The empire had held their ground and destroyed the enemy as they approached. Also, as it was painfully obvious now, the battle mages had gained more than enough practice as shown by how they used it against Dallion just now.
The search continued for twenty minutes before Dallion ordered everyone back to the cloud forts. All that was found were the bodies of a few low-level mages lying on the ground.
According to Adzorg, their role must have been to create a portal for the real battle mages to cast their spell safely far away, then redirect it to their real targets.
At this point, one thing became painfully obvious. Someone had to take on the role of commander, and provide guidance and instructions to all the individual units. Sadly, that someone had to be Dallion.
“I want a dozen scouts per cloud fort!” he ordered in the war room. “Eight of them five miles from the fort in every direction, including back! Four—right beneath at all times! If anyone sees anything suspicious, they are to let the cloud fort and me know. Also, I want all mages divided into two groups: attack and defense. If the fort is under attack, the defense group protects it, while the attack group counterattacks, only this time avoiding our own troops!”
No one said a word. None of them knew that Dallion had become a noble, but subconsciously they were already accepting him as one. Not a single person dared argue or disagree. As far as they were concerned, the orders had come from the emperor himself.
Feels different being a noble, doesn’t it? Vihrogon asked. Now you understand why so many of them order people about. It’s childishly easy, and to many—incredibly addictive.
I’m not a noble, Dallion replied mentally.
You don’t have the time, but you are a domain ruler. You might like to believe differently, but since you passed through the gate,. from here on you are the Moons’ equal.
The Moons’ equal. It was a dangerous notion to consider, but also very much true. If he chose, he could create an area in which he had the same authority as the Moons. What he had considered to be arrogance in all the domain rulers he’d seen was actually awareness of what they had become. The one thing he had to avoid was the temptation of viewing himself as the Moons’ rival.
“Someone, give me a report on Katka.” Dallion turned to the nearest white-haired fury.
“Battle mage Katka’s cloud fort is unharmed,” the fury instantly replied. “She welcomes you and is grateful—”
“Tell her to come here at once. Also, inform the archmage that I’ll be taking over the day-to-day planning.” Not that Alien bothered with that stuff. So far, he had done nothing but remain locked in his fake room refusing to interact with reality.
“Yes, battle mage!” The fury flew off.
“Um, battle mage?” Diroh asked.
Dallion’s first instinct was to snap at her. It was only thanks to his high mind trait that he managed to keep himself from doing so.
“Yes?” he asked with the barest of smiles.
Awe and infatuation radiated from the ice fury. “You’ve given instructions to everyone else. How can I be useful?”
Dallion looked at her intently for several seconds. She had grown a lot since her awakening, but unlike Jiroh, she wasn’t an otherworlder. Her path to nobility was going to be a lot slower and more difficult, but there was a lot she could help with in the meantime.
“Learn.” He gently placed his hand on her cheek. “For now, just watch and learn.”