It was… a slog. That was all Micky could say for the war effort. It was not looking up either. This didn’t mean Amelia wasn’t doing her thing. No, she was a one woman show, single handedly pushing back the enemy lines. At the rate that she was pushing the enemy we would be in the enemy’s homefront by the time she leaves. But that in itself was the problem. She would show up, blast the enemies to pieces and leave the mess to be cleaned up by the nearest centuri. The enemy runners were running up and down the line with missives and sightings. Many of which were false and handed to the enemy surreptitiously to give them a false impression.
And it worked. However, that didn’t mean the enemy wasn’t fighting back. Especially in their own way. They had foregone their telltale siege weapons on the second day and now they only fought in small groups. At least until they were verified that Amelia wasn’t sighted. Then they would bring in their vast armies in the wings to slog it out, hold the line, and hammer the unsuspecting. This would inevitably bring Amelia which would cause them to retreat with their tails between their legs. Only to repeat the same incident somewhere else in the line. The valkyries had taken it upon themselves to use their pegusi to act as a fast deployment system for her so as to facilitate the battlefield better. They would drop her off in five rotations of 1000 units with the rest waiting in the wings to deploy as needed. As needed usually meant the inevitable traps they set up for Amelia.
None of them worked. But that was obvious. None of them even downed a Valkyrie, which was less obvious, slightly disappointing for the enemy, and also moderately expected. The Valkyrie were a valuable trump card almost as important as Amelia herself. It was going to be a shame to see them go with her, in spite of what the legate was ranting and raving.
Speaking of the legate, he was still following his strategy of a unified front. The difference with the strategy this time was that he was seeing moderate success. This was because any time the enemy deployed in numbers Amelia would inevitably swoop in and take credit for the success. Credit where credit was due obviously, but credit where the legate did not want her. Something that pleased Micky greatly.
Micky was currently setting up in the middle ground. He wasn’t loafing like the back liners were but he was cleaning up the mess that was being left by the front liners that were eager to impress the sexy ass of the skirmishes war hero. It was obvious, especialy when they called her in, pleading for her assistance when they could easily win with a hard push. This only slowed down the war effort in areas it could easily push through. Not that it could be said that without Amelia the war effort could go on at all.
But Micky was more worried about the continued assault on the small villages and towns dotting the landscape behind the pass. The enemy was keeping up pressure on the supplies and burning towns and villages. Then, they would suddenly disappear, never to be heard from again. Of course, now that the enemies tactic had been thoroughly recognized there was an entire second line in patrol that was footed by the local lords whose lands were being razed. This did mean that supplies were having to be stretched from further and further afield though. In turn this was also constantly slowing the war effort. If supply lines weren’t stabilized the war effort may not even be able to continue in the first place. Micky didn’t want to even think about what millions of starving soldiers would do to the land and area. It was one reason that Micky was building stockpiles manned with locals. Others seeing what he was doing have taken up the practice but it is still not widespread.
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So Micky stood over a table as he figured out how to build new roads through the area to facilitate the army, and in particular the wagons, better. The supply lines were being stretched thin already and the army wasn’t keeping pace with the supplies meaning that they were only making the timely supplies harder by not timing the wagon trains properly. This only exacerbated the issues plaguing the front lines further slowing them down… ironically. Lastly the legate, was not helping. In his bid to outpace Amelia, which he was never going to do, he was not securing the supplies that were already had. He was only securing the bare minimum for his own troops and even then, they were on thin rations.
Micky looked over the maps as his Murloc advisor assisted him. She was a Murloc matriarch. A female queen that was too old do give birth to further the line. With the Murloc females giving birth to 20 Murloc individuals at a time it was no wonder that each female was a queen. Unfortunately the males were terribly stupid and only good for the most basic of manual tasks… like reproducing the females tend to joke. The males are treated like sacrificial animals… and Micky himself couldn’t see anything to say to the contrary. Although there were occasionally a few intelligent male shamans that would contrast the rest of the males, they were even rarer than the females which were about 1 in 20. Otherwise, the Murlocs would make great warriors for the frontline and Micky would be more then happy to supply them with what they need. Instead they are more like war beasts with the few females being beast handlers and specialized tamers.
But that was neither here nor there. Micky looked through the information that he had pertaining to a basic Murloc template.
Murloc Female
Murloc Female Template [https://docs.google.com/drawings/d/e/2PACX-1vSCxbEMtAZ9fRmCkWR2fBTb1AguUesdv1-qi3L78a-QLO-prXPNXku31mKrfSLtIJB6u9Y1zgjsgMch/pub?w=480&h=360]
Murloc Male
Murloc Male [https://docs.google.com/drawings/d/e/2PACX-1vRpdG9g1qrXtH8rv0qX_KGbD36VHsSwV-vfckU0Vmn0qH7pUCkBQrOk50oNdzRkAWHayho4hyv5I9qB/pub?w=480&h=360]
These of course were if all things were system equal. They were not. Micky himself knew that the females Had at least 10 times the physical strength of the males, to speak nothing of their INT values which were immensely higher than a standard male. According to the system chart their STR value should be the same. However, the Murlocs were a standard species in consideration for those with differing system values within the same species. Of course most texts would also call them monsters, which they are not. Any that may lay claim probably only met with the males of the species and didn’t bother to contact the females. Of which the standard female is much smarter than the average [Warrior] and that is their weakest state. Granted, that isn’t really a high bar to be set either.
“Matriarch Urgl*pop* *Burp*, are you sure that this area would make for a good storage point. Your kinds help has been immense on the roads for both the land dwellers and the aquatic dwellers, but the last storage depot we were forced to build was in a swamp. The supply officers were not happy.”
“Oh dear, you can just call me Matriarch. I am far too old for you to flatter me with your… attempt.. At my name. Especially with how cute your mating call was, it would not be proper for your kind to call me by anything else.” Said the matriarch.
“Mating call, really?” Winced Micky.
She nodded her head “Yes, mating call truly. It is quite common for your kind to make such a mistake. It was why some of the younger queens of our kind often force the other races to call us by our names when they are acting coy. I have seen far too many seasons for such frivalty however. Or if your kind must, Urgl is fine, or whatever of our name you can definitively and confidently pronounce. Though I would suggest you force that dragon man to call our females only by titles. He seems to think that he can pronounce our names in our own language and has a gift for tongues. Other tongues he may have the gift for, but ours he does not. It has caused many of our females to seek him out, and no amount of strife among the lesser males who take his mating calls as an affront and challenge...” Stated the matriarch.
Micky knew who she was talking of. It was a green dragon scout, of the nature variety, or maybe poison, or both? Micky wasn’t sure. “I will keep that in mind Matriarch. Now, these roads...”