Finally able to take a break, Mike put his hands behind his head and tried to catch his breath. Looking around, he saw that he wasn’t the only one having trouble with the pace the battle leader was setting. ‘That tiny woman is a monster,’ he thought with a smile.
Neither he nor anyone else was complaining though. As a group, they were making their way through the kobald’s fortification faster than the army, and there was a strong sense of accomplishment in the air. Even though they were nothing more than penal conscripts, they were outperforming seasoned veterans. It was amazing.
All around him, he could see people grinning and complimenting each other. More than a few times, he’d heard people pledging their lifelong friendship toward the person fighting next to them. Everyone was supporting each other, making sure that no one was left to die. There was an overwhelming feeling of invincibility as long as they stayed together.
He’d never felt anything like it in his entire life. Even when he was out hunting in the wilds with his party, he’d always had one eye open, looking for the inevitable betrayal from the rest of the party. After all, he wouldn’t have trouble leaving one of them to die if it saved his life, so why wouldn’t they do the same to him?
But here… now… it felt like he was part of something. He was one of Lord Walker’s Wackos, and together they could do anything. Watching Lord Walker recklessly throw himself into battle to save people he’d never met, defying orders to let them die, and spending his center like water to heal whoever was put in front of him was nothing short of an inspiration.
As he was lost in his thoughts, he was caught off guard when a strong voice filled the large room they were resting in.
“You might not realize what you’ve accomplished here today. But, you should all be proud of yourselves,” stated the larger-than-life Captain Angleton.
The 50 or 60 people in the room all looked up from what they were doing and paid attention. The Captain had stepped up onto a table in the center of the room so everyone could see him. It was rather unnecessary as he was already nearly seven feet tall, and now with the table, his head was nearly at the ceiling.
‘If the kobalds are so short, then why the high ceilings?’ he wondered before remembering the few giant kobald variants he’d faced. Shaking off the random thought, he focused on what the captain was saying.
“Your team leaders might not have told you, but Command has asked… ASKED… us to slow down our progress because the other sections are having trouble keeping up. I’ve been serving Dorchester for decades and I’ve never seen anything like it,” he shouted.
Looking down as if he were choosing his words carefully, he continued, “Over the years, I’ve seen men and women hurl themselves into danger to protect the soldier standing next to them. I’ve seen people sacrifice themselves for the greater good, trusting that what they were doing served a greater purpose. But for the most part, I’ve seen people trying to survive whatever horrible situation they found themselves in.”
The room was silent. Everyone was listening closely to what he was saying. With a hard look on his face, the captain ran his eyes across the room seemingly meeting the eyes of every single person in the room.
“You all have spent the last few hours protecting each other with a zeal that leaves me astounded. We haven’t lost a single soldier. Our lines haven’t faltered. Every engagement with the enemy has been a complete and total victory. More than a few of you have died, but you didn’t let that stop you. You came right back and demanded more! If I didn’t know for a fact that you were all penal conscripts, I’d have thought I was fighting alongside the best Dorchester had to offer,” he declared proudly.
“It’s an honor and a privilege to fight alongside you. For now, take advantage of this time. Fill your stomachs. Rehydrate. Meditate. Soon, Lord Walker will be joining us again and we’ll be heading back into the fray,” he finished simply before hopping off the table.
One of the men called out, “I thought the lord was staying with the healers? Most of us he’s already patched up once or twice, even brought a few of us back from the dead. So, why’s he joining the fighting now?”
Mike unconsciously nodded along to the question as he was wondering the same thing. He’d personally seen Lord Walker heal several people who had been dragged away from the fighting. It was amazing to see.
The captain seemed to smirk as if the question somehow amused him. “From what I understand. The little lord felt the other units were taking too long and decided to help them out. Over the command web, they are saying he personally led the charge a few hallways over and broke through the kobald’s defenses. I can’t be sure, but I think he was making sure that we’d have support for when we reached the center. Now that we’ve stopped pushing and are waiting for the rest of the army to catch up, he’s coming back to make sure we’re alright.”
Mike nodded in agreement. To him, that made sense. From what he’d learned of Lord Walker, the crazy bastard would face down a dragon if it meant protecting someone. The man was fearless to the point of madness. ‘Lord Walker’s Wackos, indeed,’ he thought to himself proudly.
—--
Nero eventually found his way into the section being held by his forces. It did however take a conversation with a woman standing at a T-section with a clipboard… but he’d already forgotten about that.
Making his way around a corner, he nearly stumbled when someone shouted, “Lord Walker! You’re here!”
Looking over at a man he vaguely recognized, he replied, “Yup. I’m here. Nick and Cathleen around?”
The man was guarding a door alongside a woman who was smiling down at him like he was her favorite nephew.
Gesturing into the room through the ten-foot by ten-foot rounded opening, the man replied, “Just through here, my lord. Thank you again for bringing me back. I’m your man for life!”
Nero paused as if searching the man’s face for something. ‘I healed this guy?’ he wondered.
Trying to sound like he remembered the guy, Nero patted him on the arm and said, “That’s not necessary. I didn’t do it so you owed me anything. We’re all just doing our part to save the city, am I right?”
Walking away, Nero thought about what he said. ‘Yeah, that sounded good I think. Very presidential or whatever.’
Making his way through the large room, he saw groups of people eating nutrient bars and refilling their canteens from barrels. The mood seemed a little too festive for an active warzone, but he had nothing to compare it to so he didn’t stress about it. However, he did find it weird how many people were staring at him…
Seeing Cathleen speaking with Nick and a few other people, Nero hurried over to talk to her. Along with Captain Angleton and a few sergeants he recognized from the elites, he assumed they were discussing how the battle was going.
As he walked up, they all turned to look at him. Nonchalantly waving his hand, he said, “Hey all. How goes the war with the lizards from down under?”
Cathleen was the first one to speak. “I thought you were supposed to be staying with the healers,” she said accusingly.
Nero shrugged and replied, “When the rest of them caught up, I didn’t see a reason to stick around. I’d rather be fighting.”
Captain Angleton’s deep voice sounded like an uncomfortably smooth rockslide. “That may be so, but I for one am grateful for what you did. Many people here wouldn’t be alive if you hadn’t done what you did. Seeing you war healing like that is something none of these men and women will ever forget.”
Nero did an admirable job of hiding his confusion. “Just doing my part, sir.” Turning back to Cathleen, he said, “So, what’s the plan?”
Standing there like an unamused school principal, Cathleen replied accusingly, “According to Lord Verena you are capable of maintaining a thought connection. So after this after-action report is finished, you’re going to join the unit connection like you should have before we began this fight. Then, if you’re able to, Captain Angleton will walk you through joining the command web. After that, we’ll coordinate with the other captains to finish this.”
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Nero frowned in confusion but didn’t say anything. Instead, he simply replied, “Sounds good. Let me know if you need anything.”
Cathleen harrumphed before turning away from him and returning to the conversation she was having with Captain Angelton and the rest of the sergeants. Nero subtly caught Nick’s eye and gestured with his chin away from the group. Nick, who was trying to pay attention to the conversation, returned Nero’s look with a frown and a sigh.
Not bothering to wait for him, Nero walked away to get some privacy.
Nick walked up and said, “Nero, can’t we speak a little later? I wanted to hear how the different units were handling the combination of forces we’ve gathered. The fact that soldiers are successfully fighting alongside caravan guards and penal conscripts is unprecedented. Although it’s not my field, I’m familiar enough with both military doctrine studies and social dynamic observational theory to recognize a unique opportunity when I see one. Do you think that -”
Nero interrupted him by whisper shouting, “Yeah, Yeah… I get it. Something something science… nerd talk… blah blah blah. Forget about all that for a moment.”
Annoyed, Nick crossed his arms and replied, “Fine. Are you ready to explain what you were doing running off on your own?”
Nero, surprised at the change of subject, replied, “What? No. We already covered that. It was a random series of events that nobody cares about. Let’s just stick to the here and now. Speaking of which, can you show me how to join the command web thing?”
Sighing, Nick replied, “Random series of events, huh? I honestly don’t know how you haven’t gotten yourself killed by now. But, no matter, I’ll not press for details.”
Nero then listened closely as Nick explained in absurdly over-the-top detail about how to join an active connection. After five minutes, Nero had mentally rearranged the lecture into the shortest explanation possible.
“So that’s it? I just have to reach out to the collective group I have the intention of contacting. Whoever is acting as the connection point should feel that? Why don’t I just reach out to whoever is at the center of the connection, wouldn’t that work just as well?” he asked.
Nick, unhappy with Nero’s childish summary of the subject replied, “Well, you could. The person acting as the mental anchor, in this case, Captain Angleton, could then guide you to the connection. But that is a very lazy way to join -”
Nero replied quickly, cutting him off. “Got it. One sec.”
Turning away, he stared at Captain Angleton who was still in the meeting with Cathleen and the other sergeants. Like he’d done with Nick countless times before, he reached out with his mind and offered the man a mental connection.
The captain barely glanced toward Nero before turning back to the meeting. Nero felt the connection stabilize, and he heard Captain Angleton say, “Very well done. Your mental stability is stronger than I thought it would be. You might be able to maintain a connection to the command web as well.”
Before Nero could reply, he felt the connection ‘slide’ a bit to the metaphysical left and slot itself into place. He suddenly had a sense of connection to all the sergeants, Cathleen, Nick, and several other people he didn’t recognize. The connection felt like a mental handshake and he had no trouble pointing out every person sharing the connection. He even felt a few deeper in the corridors who he sensed might be either fighting or observing a fight. Either way, he was sure they were doing something combative.
Suddenly, he heard a voice that he knew came from the area he was thinking about, “We could use a few more bodies to maintain this position. At least another unit if you have anyone available.”
Nero’s attention was then caught by Cathleen’s voice saying, “Sergeant Hobbs, Mr. Oiler, take your units and reinforce the line. Be sure to cycle out anyone who’s injured. There’s no point in them fighting through the pain right now when we’ll need everyone at full strength after we get the call to push.”
He still wasn’t used to seeing people having secret conversations in the background. While she was talking over the mental connection, Nero could see that she hadn’t paused her conversation for even a moment.
After she gave her orders, Nero’s attention was caught by a group of randomly dressed soldiers, who he guessed might be criminals… penal conscripts that is… Regardless, they suddenly stood up from where they were resting. He saw a man who is assumed might be Mr. Oiler lead them off into the hallway on the other side of the room. Meanwhile, one of the sergeants who had been participating in the meeting collected his 5 troop team and followed quickly behind him.
The whole thing took only seconds. Before Nero could wrap his head around how creepy that was, he felt another connection trying to reach out to him.
Tilting his head to the side in confusion, he tried to mentally split his attention and figure out what was happening. ‘What the hell? This feels like Captain Angleton. Aren’t I already connected to him?’
Awkwardly fumbling the connection, he managed to get his brain to accept the new connection.
“Well done. I had a feeling your skill level was high enough to maintain multiple connections. This one will be the command web,” Captain Angleton said before ‘sliding’ the connection over.
Nero felt a twinge in his brain as he tried to conceptualize what was happening. Suddenly, he heard several voices talking over one another. It was like listening to several people talking all at once, but not in any way confusing. All it took was a little flex of brain power, and he could isolate a voice to listen in on.
After cycling through several people talking, he got a sense of what was going on all around the kobald tower. It was like he could point into the distance and know exactly where each captain and team leader was throughout the entire tower. ‘So, this is the command web. How the hell do they pay attention to everything? It’s like a mental game of telephone,’ he thought to himself in wonder.
There was so much information pumping into his brain that he stood there like a stroke patient. Had Nick not shaken his shoulder and snapped him out of it, he probably would have started drooling.
Pushing the connections to the back of his mind, he turned to Nick and asked, “Huh? What is it?”
Nick grinned down at Nero and said, “Having trouble monitoring everything? Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it. Honestly, you shouldn’t even be able to hold onto one connection, let alone two at your level. So, you’re handling it better than I thought you would.”
Nero managed to smirk despite his head feeling like a boat in the middle of a storm. “It’s not any more difficult than maintaining a conversation while on my phone with the TV on.”
Nick didn’t bother to ask, he’d long since resigned himself to only roughly understanding what Nero was trying to say.
Not knowing how much time he had, Nero tried to move the conversation along. “Now that that’s all taken care of, can you explain to me what war healing is? That sounded important.”
Nick visibly paused as his brain tried to keep up with Nero’s subject change. “Right. War healing… or more to the point war casting in general. When you were taking classes with Specialist Howard we never really covered that because we didn’t expect it to come up just yet. But you remember that Specialist Howard is a war mage?”
Nero nodded, then gestured for Nick to go on.
“Well, war casting is a difficult technique. It requires a caster to be able to anchor his spell forms to a personal essence supply. As I’m sure you’ve noticed, when a large number of people or sentient combatants, usually more than 10, are involved in a battle, the ether becomes very difficult to connect with. By using a personal supply of essence, their center isn’t overly taxed and war mages can cast spells while in the middle of a war. War healing is similar as it is healing while in the middle of a war zone. Without the aid of other people working toward a common goal, heightened emotions make essence manipulation very difficult. That’s why for the most part casters stay away from the battle and stay at a distance,” he said, trying to keep it as simple as possible for his young friend.
Nero nodded along, having already figured most of that out. ‘Yeah, that was as pointless as I feared it would be. I already know all this,’ he thought to himself.
“Yeah, I figured out that much. So, this ‘war casting’, it’s considered a big deal?” he asked.
His face blank, Nick replied, “Yes, Nero. It’s not an easy thing to do. You see, emotional fields are created when -”
Nero interrupted him again. “Yeah, like I said, I figured that out. Too many cooks in the ethereal kitchen. I got it. From what I could tell, you could also just overcharge the hell out of your spell with center to overcome the overlapping essence fields, right?”
Nick went from being annoyed at Nero’s interruption to surprised at Nero’s insight. “Overlapping essence fields? That’s a really good way to look at it. But yes, if you were to just imbue sufficient center into the spell form, the effect it had on the local essence would be strong enough to overcome the control issue.”
Rubbing his chin in thought, Nero said, “That all makes a weird amount of sense. How come we haven’t talked about this before?”
Sighing, Nick replied, “Nero, you’ve had one class in actual spell craft, one which you never even finished. You were covering simple tier 1 spell forms, and even those were more advanced than what you should have been learning. You barely managed to understand the concept of center maintenance and identity control. You weren’t ready for anything else.”
Scoffing, Nero replied, “Well, that’s obviously a load of bull. Jennings showed me how to collapse my essence before we even started training. You could have shown me how to connect my spell forms to my essence shield. Do you have any idea how annoying it was to figure out how to do that on my own?”
Nick stood there looking at Nero like he was a puzzle with half the pieces missing. “You know what. I’m done talking to you for now. If you say anything else, I might just have to do something unfortunate to you. Go get yourself ready for the final push into the tunnel. From what I can tell, we’ll be there soon. And considering that we haven’t been following the orders of Command, who knows what Cathleen will end up deciding to do? With you as an influence, we’ll probably end up storming the underground city ourselves,” he said sarcastically.
Nero however took a moment to think about it and wondered if that wasn’t such a bad idea after all. ‘We’ll have to go down there eventually anyway. And it’s not like the fighting has been all that hard. We’ve got healers. We’ve got supplies. We’re motivated. Might as well do this thing,’ he thought to himself with a smile.