The way in which the ice beasts attack the fort is pretty surprising. At the very least it is not something that I would expect out of dumb beasts like these. I will admit that this is not the best strategy to employ at this moment, but it is a strategy nonetheless.

They are presently systematically testing the walls of the fort for any weaknesses. They are doing this by attacking the fort in waves. Groups of five icebeasts attack the fort at various random locations. Most of these attacks are stopped by the soldiers on patrol. It is not even too hard, as the creatures tend to retreat immediately after the patrol begins to fight them seriously.

If the patrol do not manage to do so or if the beasts manage to injure the soldiers, the creatures will focus their attacks at that location. They will strike in waves of ten at the location then. Most of the time, shamon manages to send reinforcements to the targetted area but until then the patrolling soldiers have to manage the fight.

This barrage of attacks has certainly resulted in casualties. right now, five soldiers are presently isolated to the room in which the formation core is present because they are facing the chill. It is nothing as intense as what I am facing but it is there.

The formation core is storing mana of the water and earth elements. It is able to displace the mana of the ice element to a certain degree. It is not much due to the efficiency of the mana core but even a one percent reduction in ice mana will help.

On top of that, the location that I have picked to keep my formation core is the deepest basement that I could find in this place. It was supposed to be a storage room storing the rations of the soldiers.

Most of those rations have now been removed to hold the formation core and me when I am working. It is actually pretty roomy, all things considered.

Regardless, All of this means that right now it is one of the most secure rooms in the fort. Having them recover there ensures the safety of the soldiers too. We can't really spare any soldiers right now to protect them anyways.

It would be bad form if an icebeast managed to enter into the fort and kill our injured soldiers while they are recovering.

Well, there is nothing really for them to recover from. They do not have any mana base to pull from to resist the chill. This also means that they cannot push out the chill like I can.

Pushing out the chill is actually quite simple in theory. All you have to do is cycle your mana at its full power. The force of the mana circulating in your body will be enough to push out the external ice mana that is the root of the problem. Once that happens, things will return to normal. The only problem is that the chill is like a leaking boat. There is constant inflow of ice mana from the world outside that has to be removed as well.

Naturally, the soldiers cannot really rely on meditation to do that. they are not mages to actively control their mana. Instead, they are trying to push out the mana naturally. Every person has a layer of vital mana that protects them. This mana circulates naturally and is able to push out ice mana too. It will be much slower but that is all these soldiers have.

Even right now the only thing that can be done to help them is to cover them in coats and place them near the formation core. Until I can inscribe the final class eight spell into the formation I also do not have much that I can do to help these guys. Once that happens, all the mana in the formation core will come out forming a mana cycle. Once that occurs, the concentration of ice mana in this place will reduce drastically.

Right now though these soldiers are quite safe. Their chill is not as intense as mine. I would say the ice mana that they have is about a thousandth of mine. Right now their chill is basically equivalent to a bad cold.

The only risk that they are facing is that this chill could get even worse. It could happen naturally due to the flow of ice mana from the outside. It could happen due to an attack from the enemy. That is why these soldiers are not fighting now. As for how that impacts the troop that only Shamon will be able to tell.

As for why I have yet to deal with the chill myself is due to the fact that I simply did not have enough time for it. Immediately after starting on the formation base, I had to start work on the water spear formation. That took me almost half a week to complete. With the enemy ready to attack at any moment that was quite the nervewracking week.

The enemy did begin their attack roughly two days before the spell was inscribed but it was only the probe attacks I described till now which Shamon managed quite effectively. After that I have been constantly scanning the battlefield to keep out an eye for the enemy troop leaders. So naturally I had no time to push out the chill.

On top of that pushing out the chill is a very slow process, taking anywhere from a couple of days to a couple of weeks. I would have to spend all of that time in meditation, completely cut off from the world. I will not be able to join the battlefield the instant that the enemy makes their move. When the enemy is already outnumbering me that is a benefit that I cannot give them. Also, the iron skin is no miracle worker.

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It might be able to survive quite a few attacks from the enemy but if four or five troop leaders were attacking it simultaneously I am certain that they will bring down the entire thing quite easily. They might even end up requiring a single attack to do this. (This is a very untested formation.) If I had a couple of months for the iron skin to set in properly things would be quite different. There is no reason to give the enemy a reason to attack the wall.

Yeah, I guess I should mention that we do not actually know how many enemy troop leaders there are. The probe attacks and the beasts following up after that are not particularly numerous, maybe somewhere closer to fifty. We do know that there are more than one because the enemy has made two separate bases, one to the west and one to the north.

Shamon thinks that at the very least four troops are attacking us. He estimates that these troops would be at most six. Any more than that and the nobles present in the frozen peak would be tempted to swing by here. Then I do not even need to worry about the things going on here.

It is not like I am worrying too much about it even now. All of that has been Shamon. Shamon has been quite exemplary in the management of the troop. He has a very clear idea on the battlefield, sending troops to reinforce vulnerable spots. If any attack does happen, he manages to send reinforcements in a couple of minutes at most.

the man has managed to setup a system in which the soldiers split their day into three tasks. One third will manage the task of patrolling and the task of sending commands from Shamon to the rest of the group. The next one third will rest but will have to be ready to enter into a fight when commanded and and the last one third will have to sleep and rest.

The soldiers are maintaining these schedules quite perfectly as well. I wonder what type of training these soldiers had to go through to achieve such a discipline. It is actually pretty rare to find such disciplined soldiers.

Even with this the soldiers are not getting much rest. The intensity of the attacks of the icebeasts has certainly kept on growing. Before they used to attempt their probe once every hour. Now they are doing it once every fourty five minutes. It is just going to get worse.

As for what I am doing to help out in this mess. That would be nothing. I could help out the soldiers and kill the icebeasts ten at a time. Still, that won't be enough to really help out the soldiers. The enemies number in the hundreds after all.

On top of all that I will have to risk being injected with more ice mana fighting these pests. Maybe a single strike won't hurt me but such methods of fighting tend to cause injuries to accumulate. Even if I do not get injured all it will end up doing is waste my mana.

I certainly am going to be needing all of my mana if I want to survive the fight with the troop leaders. After all, my present situation was caused by a bite from one of these creatures. Granted this time I will not be fighting them from such a close range. I will be on the wall, throwing water spears at them. Meanwhile they will be throwing bolts of ice mana at me. They could also throw it at the wall. I am hoping that the iron skin will dissuade them from doing that.

Well, I will be frank with you it is kind of embarrassing that I got injured like this. Close range combat was one of the things that I have been trained the most on. Granted ever since I came under my master, fighting has been rare. Still, I have at least seven methods of killing the creatures without taking any hits. With my sword, you could make it a dozen.

Well, with my sword it would have been an impossibility to get injured like this in the first place. My sword is halfway across the continent safely in the hands of my master. Even if I completed the journey I would not be able to get it from my master's hand. The bastard finds the cruelest things to do sometimes.

Anyway, back to the situation at hand. I absolutely cannot get hit. This time, it might be enough to tip the ice mana in me beyond the tipping point. If the ice mana entering my body were to go beyond my ability to push it out then I will be in a pretty similar situation as to the soldiers that are resting in the room below.

Well, I would be in a worser position because I would have to keep meditating to make sure that I do not become a sculpture of ice. (Well, it will slow down the process at the very least.) The soldiers at the very least are able to move around even if that area is a single room.

If I did become a sculpture, every person in this fort is going to die. That means all of their lives have suddenly become my responsibility. Well, thinking too much about it is the best way for me to enter into a spiral of anxiety. The best thing that I can do now would be to just relax and do something else.

Fuck, I can't even do that because the damn chill is freezing me from the inside out. All I can do now is to wait for the enemy to make a move while I sit here feeling like I am sitting on needles of ice and hope that they do not manage to screw me up even worse than I already am.

Well, I will do my next log whenever these damn creatures strike next.