Before Luon’s eyes was an incredible sight. The base that Luon thought was to be undermanned due to their offensive forces being removed from the equation was armed to the teeth with weaponry and thick walls.
Before he had left the base, Luon made sure Thomas was able to operate the summoning mechanism and brought with him an army of human footman and a wagon of scrap materials which was led by a battalion of robotic horses.
Luon soon found Gizmo, Tyron and Bendan camped outside and asked, “What’s going on? How come we haven't raided them yet? Did you guys even try?”
Gizmo shook his head at Luon's response as he said, “It’s not as if we didn’t try. At first, when we were attacking the base, it was half the size then it is now. Our attempt, as you can see, failed despite the army of humans you sent with us. They suddenly turned the tables against us when a wall of defensive turrets appeared. Fortunately, you summoned a necromancer, so we managed to maintain our numbers to build a siege outside. Look over there, we somehow took down one of their walls.”
Gazing past the several undead skeletal workers who were operating a retro looking catapult, was a shattered wall exposing the heads of several green creatures.
Gizmo who sensed Luon gazing over at the walled area pointed out, “I think that the shaman intentionally sent the offensive force out to hide what he was doing behind the scene. Based on the recordings in their previous matches, we had little data in regards to what they did at their base because their frontline garnered all the attention. That shaman is a tricky person, to think he would summon peons and goblins to do construction work. Not only that, he had probably set their gear slots with parts for defensive turrets to set them up fast. How do you want to break through?”
Pondering for a moment, Luon asked, “What kind of projectile do they shoot out?”
Gizmo responded, “Those turrets are Gatling guns that shoot about 200 rounds a minute, though it was unable to annihilate bones completely. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have any undead right now.”
Looking at the horses, he had coincidently brought Luon thought, ‘With 30 horses are we able to overthrow the base? I think it's about time to use our NG-Arms, although it might expose our growth, this moment is more than likely the turning point. The faster we move, the better.’
Thinking about how they were going to attack the base Luon called over his team for a meeting. Luon said, “Alright guys, we know they got no fighters inside of the base, just a bunch of skilled engineers who are over-relying on turrets. Bendan will lead a team of humans on the horses and storm in the base, Tyron and Gizmo are to use their NG-Arms to disable the turrets, as for me...”
Luon’s body went invisible as his words slowly faded away with his presence, “I’ll assassinate the shaman.”
Equipped with a black piece of armor Luon was no longer visible to the crowd, his allies, and his enemies. Soaring in the air silently, Luon searched the enemy base for the shaman. Besides the shabby outer walls that the goblins and peons were hurrying about to reinforce, there was a single stylish looking orc who stood still beside the Crypt of Heroes. Equipped with a pelt of a white wolf and a skull of some kind of canine animal he stood over the table top without revealing a single sign of weakness.
From a distance their operation started, Gizmo and Tyron began to deal with the turrets while the knights led by Bendan were able to easily penetrate into the base slaughtering the weak peons and goblins. However, their progress was delayed even further as traps sprang out from many different locations.
As the base continued to be raided the shaman merely began to summon several orc warriors to deal with the intruder focusing their defenses at the Crypt of Heroes. Luon thought that if he didn’t attack as soon as possible, more warriors would increase the chance of failure for this operation.
Invisibility was only useful for beings that are not so sensitive to their surroundings, orcs were beings like that. However, this shaman wasn’t. Just as Luon’s blade was about to reap the shaman's life, a sword clashed against his as the shaman who was preoccupied with operating the table, appeared with a sword in hand said, “Looks like we got a little rat, how long did you plan on making me wait?”
Luon frowned as he backed away, the shaman wasn’t like those dumb orcs he met before, instead of using the barbaric axe, he was using one hand to hold a greatsword that was 2/3rd of Luon’s height.
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‘He’s stronger than I thought, and he's smarter than what he looks.’ Luon prepared his sword once again letting out a flurry of quick attacks. Using the Steps of Starlight technique his speed exceeded the shaman who was carrying the long sword, however, the shaman stood unfazed.
It was as if the shaman was waiting for something to happen as Luon slowly grew suspicious as their battle continued. ‘There was no way he could win, why would he delay the inevitable? Once the knights, undead, and soldiers occupy the base, the match would be over.’
However, before they could completely take over the base Luon received an urgent message from Thomas, “Luon, do something quick! The orcs you trapped managed to get out the labyrinth and are traveling inside our dungeon!”
Shocked Luon quickly backed away from the shaman who was smugly looking at Luon and said, “What’s wrong? Did you think we’re playing along with your tricks? Our race has spent centuries encountering your human tricks, in fact, we would brag about the biggest tricks that we have thwarted to each other. One of us learned how to use the internet and even made a blog which contains a huge collection of them. Come on, you have no more choice now than to fight me to the death like a real warrior!”
Luon realized the situation turned for the worse, he asked Thomas how much longer until the orcs arrive at the base in which the latter replied that they only have two minutes at most. According to Luon’s research, there were no possible units that they could summon to delay their advance, the Gorging Slime which he left behind may be able to delay one of the orcs. However, a group of them would cause it to fall within a minute.
With his quick calculation, they only had 3 minutes to either kill the shaman or destroy their Crypt of Heroes which was heavily armed with defenders.
How did the stupid orcs escape? How could they do it so fast? It was then he realized that the weak-willed human they brought with them was actually the brain of the group. The average human is smarter than an orc, with their powerful might and a human that had a better than the average mind, it was no surprise that the orcs were able to progress so far ahead.
Looking at his allies struggle against the forces protecting the Crypt of Heroes, he estimates that it would take about ten minutes before they make some progress. The only way to win right now is to eliminate the shaman.
Readying his resolve Luon equipped his NG-Arms, his speed was already beyond the shaman. However, the power behind his attacks was lacking. Luon planned on using his NG-Arms to increase his velocity of attacks, his slashes became more devastating as he began to add a spin behind his strikes.
Seeing his foes antics, the orc shaman smiled as he swung his sword. They clashed numerous more times, however, because of the spin attacks the pacing became more scattered giving the shaman more breathing room. Luon had sacrificed speed for power, the shaman simply thought he was getting desperate due to lack of time.
It was only one minute after they resumed battle did he genuinely realize the aftereffects of the change. The greatsword that the orc was using shattered against Luon’s blade. Orcs usually don’t care too much about worldly belongings. As long as it allowed them to kill, they were all the same. Which is why when Luon’s well-refined sword clashed against the shaman's sword it broke into pieces.
It was no surprise to Luon who had thought carefully about this, it was like taking a metal knife and slicing a plastic one, the materials used was too different. Even though the world was simulated, everything was realistic to the extent where people could live without realizing that the reality they experienced was fake. Which is why there was no omnipotent object with no durability at all.
The shaman tried to back away from Luon who didn’t let this opportunity go to waste, his sword swung once more slicing the skull helmet in half, nearly ending the shaman's life. Desperately picking up the shattered bone pieces the shaman pointed his knife-size bone piece and bellowed at Luon, “That sword is unfair! Fight me on equal grounds! You don’t point your sword at unarmed opponents now do you?”
Luon looked at the shaman stupidly as he replied, “Unarmed? Clearly, you have a weapon right there.”
Looking at what Luon pointed at the shaman realized that the so-called ‘weapon’ was the shattered bone piece that looked less lethal than a spoon.
Throwing it away the shaman said, “There, now I am unarmed. Fight me fair and square now!”
Luon smiled as he began to lower his blade, the shaman seeing Luon do so felt relieved at his gesture. However, this moment didn’t last that long as Luon quickly vanished from his sight and appeared behind the shaman, impaling his sword inside of his body.
The shaman coughed out blood as he mumbled, “You… why?”
Luon said, “This is a battle, a war, honor, pride, and all things alike, are meaningless under the blade of the victor.”
Luon pulled out the sword causing the blood to gush out from the wound. The shaman dropped down with a thud, unsatisfied about this ending.
Luon raised his sword up preparing to end the shaman’s life and thought, ‘Today, although it was a short amount of time, I’ve exposed many different tricks. I don’t believe Zythos would be able to take advantage of this weakness… but Arisa might be able to take advantage of this information. The future battle… seems troubling.’
Luon let out a sigh as he swung downwards dealing the final blow to the shaman.
With this attack, the match was over, if the shaman had killed Luon or destroyed the Crypt of Heroes, they could have lost. Luon had proved to the crowd one crucial fact about their team.
Team Ascension is over geared!