I effectively partnered up with the Knights’ efforts, and my team focused all their efforts on the incorps as much as we could.
Naturally said incorps became aware of this, but directed as they were to kill the living, and not individually realizing there was no coming back, they still attacked in droves, and died in droves.
Other than that, random hate lightning, cinderclouds, and the occasional Swarms of undead creatures were the only major threats, and could be dealt with in their own ways and times.
---
Dawn arrived, Natural Renewal swept across the landscape, and the Shroudcloud was now fully a mile shorter in radius than it had been. All the undead outside its radius burned away, not to reform until night came.
Deep in the caldera, under a Hellcloud so thick it totally defied the sun, and with the walls of the caldera oozing darkness like ink, there was little reaction, although the incorporeals fled for cover, their insubstantial forms particularly sensitive to the rays of the sun.
The infantry elements warily pressed in to the open areas, and cautiously probed into the Firelands beyond. The terrain itself was actually far more dangerous to them than the undead they came across, who would die to withering barrages of guncold at safe distances, paint the ground white, and no longer be a threat.
Nobody wanted to die to a sudden fumarole going off underneath them, and the Druids among them were constantly wary about it.
Traveler solved this by setting down at the heart of their advance, mandating everyone stay within a mile of her, directing all their movements to avoid terrain problems, and also pointing out where to go to find things to shoot.
She had already proven the effectiveness of this tactic before, and the teams fanned out, came together, fanned out, and came together time after time, wiping smaller targets, and cooperating to bring down larger targets or numbers, splitting apart before the land could overreact to their presence, and staying away from volatile surprises coming from below.
The Druids were green with envy that she could Commune with the Land so easily, and likely would have fallen over if they knew how she was marking mineral veins to dig out in the hardened lavafields as she walked along, an Infusing Pattern on a Disk next to her she was keeping active while recasting her Commune repeatedly, with only an occasional Shard spell sent out to recharge or help a team.
The Mick and Master Fred had likewise withdrawn to get in their daily Infusing, not needed, and not quite able to Cast and Infuse at the same time.
Like waves of firecrackers popping whiteness, the various gathered armed forces rolled over the landscape, rooting around for threats, shooting them en masse, and collecting themselves a lot of potential Undead Baneskulls for the future from the most powerful of the undead.
Any enemies within a thousand meters of Traveler were viable targets for her, so her range of covering fire was impressive, especially against incorps. Nominally touching the ground to take advantage of the Commune, rising into the air for altitude was anything but difficult, and her Eagle’s Vantage gave her a viewpoint from a thousand feet up, meaning she didn’t even need to have her own line of sight to a target to shoot it.
Backed up by such tremendously powerful spellcasting cover fire, knowing where the enemy was, the tricks and traps of the terrain, and armed with the right Weapons to face the enemy, the soldiers of the country, Heavenbound Hall, and quite a few mercenary adventurers advanced with greater and greater confidence... but equally great alertness and care, remaining careful not to overstep themselves.
The undead left basically nothing to be salvaged except their Skulls, so looting wasn’t an issue. This whole thrust was for Karma and for Glory.
Over the course of the day, the area of the Shroudcloud shrank more and more as foot-slogging Burning Undead were blown to burning ice, and even the eruptions of the landscape began to slow down noticeably...
------
There were two hours to go until dusk when I ordered the men unceremoniously back out of the lethal landscape. Their protests after the active and productive day, with remarkably light casualties, were half-hearted, and suddenly everyone wanted to live long enough to enjoy their Karmic haul.
Mass Disk Trains assembled and vacated the area as rapidly as possible, and they were all well out of easy fly range of any evening incorps before the sun went down.
I spent most of those two hours in Meditation to get back Valences, of which I had very few to actually fill, courtesy of the giving nature of the burning undead. Nobody dared bug me during my down time, as Don’t Disturb the Caster was a well-known rule among anybody who did this sort of stuff for a reason.
There were only three deaths, the speed and availability of healing magic a powerful thing, although there were a lot of men coming out wounded and with burns.
A Healing Trap, a Guitar of Mercy, some use of Reserve Healing, and spending Valences or Wand Charges on the worst cases, and basically all the men would be ready to go again at dawn.
They swallowed when I took out three Life Diamonds, and brought the dead men back to life.
It wasn’t the first time I’d done this for them, of course, and if there were limits in how many times I could do it a day, that was also a thing. But it wasn’t hard to keep Energizing up Life Diamonds when the Fireborn and Burning Dead were being so generous to me, and to say I had gathered quite a stockpile of them by now was not inaccurate in the slightest.
Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.
The men I’d Quickened had literally gone through a life-and-death experience, something people who had not simply could not relate to. Just seeing that the magic of the gods was actually powerful enough to bring someone back from the Shroud was a religious moment for even the most hardened of the men watching, feeling that profound force in the air of things beyond mortal ken brushing up against you...
My Allegiance was growing. So were Sama’s Marked. Her Hagsister Lily, green-haired and leading a contingent from Heavenbound Hall, was making Marked and recruiting them among the Forsaken, with my direct approval.
This was very useful, because Sama and Briggs could help Warlord from the other side of the planet if they had to. I was info-dumping to them, and they were actually giving me the deployment and engagement orders for the whole fight. As the Marked and my Vassals grew in number, that meant ever-quicker response times and reactions, better coordination... and Sama and Tremble thrumming that Song of theirs for constant Heartsong Buffs to everyone who could hear it.
Everything on the stack. With Tremble’s Courageous effect, that Morale bonus was a colossal +4 at least, and the difference it made in fighting effectiveness and morale was apparent to anyone, let alone these experienced troops.
Commander Briggs giving orders, Sama Rantha giving motivation, me supplying information and spell support at that level... no armed force of soldiers had ever had such a direct line to the higher end of magically-supported combat.
Recruitment sped up accordingly.
----------
There was an annoying set of dings, and I glared at a bunch of Artificer/4 stuff that was absolutely useless to me at the moment, and turned my eyes to the lip of the caldera.
Without Death Ward, nobody was going up to the caldera. Without an Amulet, nobody was going to go into it, for fear of the spells being Dispelled. Without the ability to instantly vacate the area for the surprises sure to be within, nobody was going with me up that, or even into threat range, until I found out what we were facing.
My Eagle’s Vantage cleared the rim of the Caldera well before I did, but it was Warded to beat the band, so I could see nothing within, to my utter lack of surprise. The inner crater was ten miles across; that lake of fire was bigger than most lakes!
I was broadcasting to those sworn under me, who were Holoing it all up as I did, trying to replicate all the information I was sending out and the fantastic detail as I surveyed everything below.
I was a bit surprised that Briggs and Sama didn’t insist on being here, but they seemed to have discussed the matter and wanted it made quite public that I could take out a Shroudlord. I didn’t want to argue, so here I was, without them.
The Traveling Knights also patted themselves on the back for not being eager to jump into the fray when they saw what was waiting for them.
Burning undead on the flaming skeletons of horses, all lined up and flying over the caldera, hovering in the air there. Bonemares? Whatever. By their attire, the beads and things, spears, pseudo-feathers, I gathered they were the skeletons of Native American warriors, Cheyenne and other tribes, who had died in the area over a long period of time.
Horses hadn’t been here nearly as long as the tribes, but if you were just harvesting dead horse bones, I suppose you could have gathered enough...
There were well over a hundred thousand of those undead waiting for us, daring us to enter. Indeed, if there had been more behind us, they probably would have charged right out and started the fight immediately.
“Pyre Knights, tribal style,” I mused, looking them over, the different patterns and tribal markings, grouping them and changes over time. “Fully corpsecrafted, powered up, ready to kick arse.”
And then, across the miles, our eyes met.
I blew the Moment of Perfect Clarity, and the DC 40 Gaze Attack didn’t blow me to ashes. I fed it into my immediate counterpunch of Shards, doubled the range, and the Shardray blazed out, force and cold and lightning and thunder and The Light. It smashed into the nearest of the pyre knights fifteen hundred meters away, and blew through it there, blasting it into powder. Then the cold, cold Ray bounced crazily around the nearest other undead knights, totally ignoring their burning mounts, and blew them into sparkling, white-flaming powder, too.
I got the Ki point I used to Cast it back, too.
Their leader didn’t look like a skeleton. It was a molten-skinned figure, wreathed in unholy, profane flames that were triggering my awareness of foul power. It looked like an extremely muscular man in an old leathery loincloth and leggings, but with exaggerated facial features beyond the limits of human. Bulging eyes, a massive nose more like a beak, and a huge mouth whose default state seemed to be an eternal sneer were arranged together in a sinister, rather repulsive mix. I eyed the ornamental Shield at his side, his Tomahawk, feathered Lance, and the Bow he had in his hand, which he was currently debating raising to shoot at me.
“Get out of his line of sight now, or he’ll kill you,” I told both of the boys, and like the preconditioned hardened adventurous types they were, they retreated smoothly from the view of those bulging eyes.
-Hastsezini,- someone threw into the /tell, and I watched it proliferate therein, and the knowledge attached to it.
The ancient Native American deity of fire, or one of them, as they changed names. A cruel, violent, and ugly deity, who demanded sacrifices or he would burn villages to the ground. There were no records of him in anything resembling the modern era, but the low magic pre-Shroud could well be responsible for that.
I just glanced at his hands across five miles, how they were twice the size of humans, and looked him straight in the eyes again.
There was another pulse of a Gaze Attack. I blew the Moment again. Another ravening beam of blessed uttercold pulsed out... only this time there were two of them.
Fifty more of his pyre knights froze, shattered, and burned in vivic flame in the next second.
I reset the Moment, and met his eyes again.
Pulse of fire. FOUR beams of blessed cold and shining Light speared out, and a hundred of his pyre knights blew away.
I reset the Moment, and met his burning gaze again.
He lifted his Bow and fired at me in the blink of an eye.
Space burned, and the arrow was suddenly right in front of me, traversing five miles in an instant and aimed at my heart.
I had slid two feet to the side, and it zipped past my shoulder. The next shot was already on the way.
Deflect Missiles, one auto-deflect of standard ranged weapons per round; extra Dodges required a DC 20 Reflex save, +1 per Enhancement bonus of the missile.
My Reflex Save was in the +16 area... but I was using Clavus for additional Deflections. +4 Greater Ki-Bound, +2 Enmity/Evil, +3 to Hit Sun Discipline Weapon. I considered that I should probably have added Bane of Legends earlier, and shrugged.
+25 meant this old god needed a +7 Weapon to have ANY chance of hitting me, and that bow wasn’t +7, or it would have been popping my eyeballs.
There was a lot of force behind those arrows, but I didn’t care. Clavus was there to smash every single one aside, as the blurring molten streaks arced across the miles with impossible speed and accuracy at me.