It took several hours before he left his position, every time he had enough mana he summoned another eagle and sent it on its way to continue clearing the fortress. It wasn’t until he had capped out on how many he could summon did he start restoring his mana to continue to fight himself. His eagles were doing well enough on their own and were now just killing off those that were hiding away with the help of the remaining hounds.
Once he re-entered the fight, killing off the remaining people was quick and easy. During this entire time no one had tried to enter the fortress to take it back, they, for some reason, were leaving him to do what he wanted.
He had spoken to Viv and Eric during this period and they had all agreed that for now he would stay where he was and try and claim the fortress out from under the pantheon before leaving. They had no plans on staying here for long, it was more to prove to The Pantheon that he could do it, to distract them and push them back rather than fully hold this position. A message appeared to him the moment that the last person was killed that explained how to take over the fortress.
Strategic position (Central Fortress) has been cleared of Jason Charlo’s team.
To claim the position for Shaun Clermont you must hold this position for 24 hours without leaving or allowing the opposing team into the fortress. If someone enters the fortress with the intent of stopping you from claiming the position the timer will be stopped, restarting again once the fortress has been cleared again.
If you leave the position you forfeit claiming the Fortress.
Do you wish to claim the position from Jason Charlo?
He accepted immediately, it would in all probably take longer than 24 hours but he was more than prepared to battle it out. Rather than sitting idle he figured he would turn the fortress into a booby trap. He knew he would leave here as soon as he could and others would come in to reclaim it, so why not leave them a few gifts before he left.
He had a good amount of his mana left and moving up into the sky he started to map out the fortress as if he was going to turn it into a ritual. He didn’t have the vast amount of mana he had when he did the ward but he did have enough to cause mass casualties in this fortress when the time was right.
The first thing he did was create a plan of the fortress, and although it wasn’t very detailed, it was enough for what he needed, then he started to think of what he could do to cause the most damage, he was limited to fire, air and lightning but with the three elements he could still cause more than enough damage to an area.
He reverted back to some of his previous plans, utilising the walls of the fortress as a key concept in the ritual he was planning on using. As he wouldn’t be able to supply the mana he needed to get creative with how he set the ritual up.
He had the ability to use a siphon rune, which if he set it up right could be used to siphon off the mana from everyone in the fortress until it hit a critical point and then it could be set off to power the destructive aspect of the ritual.
The destructive aspect was the easiest aspect, forming fire and lightning attuned rituals were second nature to him, putting a dozen or so of these around the fortress in key areas was easy enough. Linking them to the siphon runes embedded into the fortress walls would take time and a good a lot of energy but he was confident in being able to do it in the time he had. It was hiding all of this, especially when the gathered mana was nearing its peak was where he needed to think. The fortress was pretty damaged as it was and they would need to spend points to fix it up. He assumed they would do it as a priority so he could use that to his advantage. Hiding the ritual within stone was going to be his best way forward.
Now with a plan and a mock up of what he was going to do he got to work. He kept checking his surroundings the entire time as no one could see him work the earth the way he did with his affinity, but given how very little of what he was doing could be seen through the naked eye he felt pretty safe.
He spent 6 hours working on the walls of the fortress before he was done with the first part of his plan. It had all gone smoothly and he was happy with the results. He still needed to do the rest of the rituals and then activate it all but he wouldn’t dwell on that part till he came to it. He spent another 6 hours working tirelessly and in that time he had formed not one but two dozen rituals throughout the fortress. Although they were small they would pack one hell of a punch.
Linking them all up as much harder as he needed to form interlocking runes throughout the entirety of the fortress and by the time he was halfway through he got a notification that put everything at risk.
Claiming of Strategic position (Central Fortress) has been put on hold due to entry of enemy team.
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He was actually shocked it had taken this long, he knew it was coming but now that there was only activating the ritual left he was beyond annoyed. He flew up into the air, bringing his eagles with him who he never sent away after clearing the fortress.
He found where his enemy was in seconds, this wasn’t a full blown army but by the looks of hit a mere 10,000 or so soldiers that looked to have grouped together. They looked similar to the ones he had killed before he got to the fortress and as expected they were all in the low to middle E grade.
Wanting to save his mana he just sent all of his summons to deal with them. They had killed more when they invaded the fortress and these 10,000 people had done nothing but sign their own death warrant. He watched as his eagles crossed the distance and without any sign of slowing they used claw and lightning to beat the people who had come here into nothingness. A minute, that was all it took for 10 eagles to slaughter 1000 times their numbers. It was embarrassing, for them.
Claiming of Strategic position (Central Fortress) has resumed 7 hours 53 minutes remaining.
He had plenty of time to finish off his plans so he got back to work as he sent his summons to patrol the perimeter. He went back to the centre of the fortress and went into meditation as he pushed his mana into the fortress wide ritual. He didn’t have to fully power it as it was fully dependant on taking the mana from people that were here, that said he still needed to activate it.
It took long hours, and by the time he was done he had already come to the conclusion that for the ritual to fully power up there would need to be a minimum of 1,000,000 people in the fortress for at least a full day. The ritual would constantly sap the mana from anyone inside, not enough for anyone to notice, but enough to slowly take the mana it needed. That was the reason why the number of people was so high, if he had made the siphon any quicker people would have noticed and he would have put the entire plan into jeopardy.
**Profession: Elemental Creator has levelled up by 3 levels. [Advanced] Elemental Creator has reached Level 110. +15 Int, +6 Wil, +9 Per, +15 Soul**
**Race: Human has levelled up by +2 levels. Human I has reached Level 117. +32 Ap gained**
Happy to have finally got some levels he just sat and enjoyed the moment for a bit. As he assessed his handy work he got a feeling from one of his eagles that had requested his presence. It was not with words but a sense of urgency that he immediately moved towards its position.
As he got to the wall he saw what the trouble was. In the distance he saw hundred of thousands of people headed his way. No sooner did he take this in than he got another, similar feel form another of his eagles in the opposite direction. He was being attacked by both sides just before the timer hit 0 and he could claim the fortress.
This had all been planned out from the beginning, they had consolidated as many people as they could, probably from the nearby fortresses and then sent them his way to stop him taking over at the last moment.
He had a decision to make, he could fight or he could run away. The timer to claiming had less than an hour left but both armies would make it here by then and there was no way he would be able to kill so many before his mana ran dry and he would have to run anyway. He had no choice but to give up on claiming the fortress, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t make sure that as many people as possible made their way into the fortress.
Rather than meet either army he moved back to the centre of the fortress with all of his summons and waited. As he sat there he couldn’t help but feel the glee of what would happen here without anyone being the wiser. As long as he did just enough damage to make everyone stay here and rest for a while he was going to make a huge dent in their numbers and the points they had with the repairs they would need to do if they ever wanted to use this fortress again.
He had to admit, their plan was a good one. Rather than just send everyone at him in small groups they came all at once and ensured that they won. He got the notification that the timer was paused when there was only 20 minutes left. He still didn’t move though. It was another 15 minutes before he felt himself being surrounded and at that point he sent out his summons to start killing as many as they could until their time was up, ensuring they spread out the damage.
Before his summons got far in one direction though he felt one then two and then a third of his eagles die in quick succession. Curious as to who it was that could kill his summons so quickly he shifted his echo to encompass that area. His summons were not the most powerful he had ever summoned, but they should have been more than enough for early E grades, even those towards the middle. When he found three figures in the direction that his summons died he immediately knew the answer as to who had come.
One of the people he recognised immediately, Persephone had come back. Of the other two, one was of equal strength to her and the other was even stronger than them. It seems like he was going to get to meet Jason. Rather than run or hide or even attack he just kept sitting where he was, waiting for them to approach him.
All three of them approached at a steady pace, none of them gave off a truly threatening aura but they were definitely here for business. When they finally came into view he gave them a smile and waved at them to come join him.
**Jason Charlo – Level 92**
**Percy Charlo – Level 84**
He had been right that Jason had come, although finding a third member of the Charlo family here was interesting. All three of the Charlo were of high level and from what he could feel each of the them had at least one affinity. To say he wasn’t very curious as to how three people of the same family were all bonded to an affinity and at such a high level would have been an understatement. He was itching to know how this had happened and if there was any intervention from The Pantheon in this.
“I was hoping you would still be here when I arrived. Its nice to finally meet the infamous Shaun Clermont.” He was a bit weirded out by the smile on Jason’s face as he spoke, the guy actually looked like he meant what he said. “If you wouldn’t mind calling back your creatures. I would much rather have a conversation without my people being slaughtered while we do.”