The combat meeting continued throughout the afternoon as the various players delved deeper into the possibility of a joint battle.

“If shared points are impossible, that really isn’t terribly troublesome,” Athin said, leaning over the table and pulling up a list of buffs and traits for the others to see. “Echo, you bring 5000 points and three heroes of varying skill levels. Heroes, I’m told, who are rather tactically inclined. If you were to focus on your structures and utility, putting the primary bulk of your points into giving your heroes communications, allowing them global casting, enabling teamwide map vision, and defending yourself, then we can handle map terrain modifiers.”

That would use up nearly all of my points, Echo said. It would leave my heroes entirely reliant on you for empowered minions, hiding places, power boosts, or any other modification. She sounded very upset. I would not even be able to modify my basic nexus aura to empower them.

“Well, this is what working together would look like,” Athin said, voice growing stern. “We will have the spare points available to modify your section of the arena, especially if we sacrifice some of our tower defenses. It’s not ideal, but it lets us focus on all around buffs.” He nodded at Elzio. “Your heroes are dependent on working together—positioning, duplicating, confusing the enemy, their ability to gather intel while throwing off the enemy, keeping them disoriented and launching highly coordinated attacks. They need to be able to share vision and communication in order to do so. Meanwhile, we will push lanes and take advantage of the opportunities your heroes allow us.”

It was such an exciting and enticing prospect that Elzio refused to spare Echo’s suspicions any mind.

We need this, he said tersely. We need to be able to out-rotate Deluuth’s forces. Just combining our numbers with Genyl’s would be too risky, since we’re unlikely to be able to turn off friendly fire. A fight between all three of us is going to inherently damage an ally. That’s now how we’re going to win this.

You just want more tools to play with. Echo’s words stung, her voice dripping with acid.

That isn’t true, he said, thoughts growing angry. She wasn’t wrong that he was enjoying this, but to dismiss the tactical value of this move as nothing more than a child playing with toys stung. You know me better than that. This is the highest stakes battle we’ve ever fought. We can’t only trust our allies halfway.

He looked back up to find Fathina somewhat innocently staring off into the air near him, not quite looking at him. When he caught her eye, she smiled a bit condescendingly, and then nodded to Athin.

Elzio’s cheeks burned as he suddenly became aware of just how much younger he was than anyone there. Twenty-five wasn’t young, but Carlin and Athin were both in their thirties, and Syrene and Fathina were both at least in their fifties. Ashlight was at least a century older than Echo. Compared to everyone else, Elzio and Echo’s sniping must appear childish, poorly concealed, and immature.

“I recognize the risks that you must feel this poses,” Fathina said. “But if we can’t pool our resources, you will be the only individual who can buff your own heroes. Ashlight has a significant points advantage. Let her take some of the burden.”

Without giving Echo a chance to complain again, Elzio leaned forward to look over the holograph. The map was divided in three, blue for Echo, purple for Genyl, and green for Deluuth. Deluuth’s whole area was obscured in fog of war.

“Can you prophesy or premonition what their area will look like?” he asked. It was maybe a stupid question, but the average person really didn’t know anything about prophetic magic, so he could be excused.

Fathina pursed her lips. “I can try. Now that we’ve committed to this war, it matters little if they know we’re spying on them. They will likely come to us to challenge us as soon as they do, but we will be well prepared by then. That said…” She frowned. “I can’t promise I’ll find anything interesting. Or anything at all. As I mentioned, there’s a large degree of mystery around how this works.”

“Mhm.” Elzio didn’t say more because there was no point in pushing it, and he really didn’t have a leg to stand on, but he didn’t understand how Fathina and Ashlight still knew so little about their magic. “Once we know more about their heroes, we’ll be able to draft up a way to best utilize their skillsets. Who are you bringing to the team?”

“Five heroes,” Athin said. “You’ve got my stats; I can allow you to look at my skills. The other two senior members of the team are our level 17 Support who specializes in Healing and Psionics and our level 17 Mage, who knows Air Wielding and Venomancing. Then we have a level 16 Tank and finally a level 15 Knife Thrower.”

A real, full, five hero team, each person taking up a different role. Melee combat, magic, support, tank, ranged combat… It would really be beautiful to see them in action.

And Elzio would. Soon.

“All right. I’ll need their stats and skills as well,” he said. His last level up had gone to boosting his doppelgangers, since they were vastly being outscaled by enemy heroes. Now at level 8, the doppels retained 70% of their original’s stats and could cast up to level 4 spells. Once he reached Summon Doppelganger level 9, he would be forced to choose between two subclass of doppelganger: Spell caster and fighter. Fighters became significantly more expensive to summon, since he would be calling forth what was pretty nearly 75% of a full hero. Spell caster doppels, still limited by their max spell levels, were cheaper.

This wasn’t something he’d have to contend with yet, fortunately.

“Deluuth is underhanded with their strategies,” Carlin said. A shadow crossed his face as he spoke. “I spoke to some refugees from Argeny who’d had some reports from the battle there. Deluuth massively outleveled them, but didn’t get cocky like Ythrel did. They ward, they scout, the push slowly and build their advantage. Combined we have the edge on them, but they’ll probably strike out at us first. If they can take us out of the picture, then it really will just be Deluuth versus Genyl.”

“That definitely promotes the idea of Echo defending her turrets,” Elzio said. Carlin’s data came as welcome relief, since it was even more proof that Athin’s strategy was sound. “It also means we have to keep them guessing as to where the Genyl heroes are. They’ll be looking for weak spots in our defenses, but if we can make it seem like every lane has powerful heroes in it, they’ll have to be more strategic. And while they try to figure out how to strike at us, we whittle down their lanes.”

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Athin pulled up icons on their map. “I know you’re used to smaller arenas, being in smaller battles, but with three nexi, there will be six roads total, instead of the two you’re used to.” He highlighted the roads, one leading between each nexus. “There are two from Echo to Deluuth, a Northern and Southern road, two between Echo and Genyl, and two between Genyl and Echo.”

“The roads between us won’t be very important,” Elzio said. “We’ll need to keep an eye on them in case the Deluuth heroes want to use them to move around, but with our own towers there, there’s not a lot that can be gained.”

Athin nodded. “So that’s four roads to worry about, and we have six high leveled heroes.”

“Right.” Elzio looked over the map, grimacing. “So we could pair up, one hero, one doppel in each lane, which gives us two to move around the map with a bit more freedom.”

“Can you summon six?” Athin asked, eyebrows pinching. “Summon and maintain?”

Elzio was unfazed by his skeptical tone. “With my mana, I’ll be able to maintain six level 5 doppelgangers. If I summon them in the fountain, my mana will regen fast enough that the only limiter will be cooldown.” Fountains, the spawning points of heroes, were so rich with magic that they rapidly filled any missing health, mana, or endurance. “The real issue would arise should one fall. I’ll regenerate mana quicker without it, but it would take time to get the mana back to resummon.”

“Is two in a lane going to be enough to dissuade an attack?” Fathina asked. “If Deluuth decides to take the even fight, 2v2, we’ll be defeated for sure with only one hero and one doppel. Even if we can put two heroes there, with how powerful Deluuth is, two of theirs might be able to defeat two full strength heroes, even with a doppel.”

“Perhaps, though with empowered towers, it’ll be a closer battle,” Elzio said. His brain began to warm up as he left his political concerns behind, as his questions about prophecy and foresight slowly ebbed away, leaving way to his favorite puzzle. “So what we need to do, is analyze which towers we think they’ll strike first. Once we do, perhaps we ensure they know we’re pairing one hero with one doppel. They’ll think any engagement will be easy. We have numbers advantage on them. Even if they put two of theirs against two of ours, they can only do that in two of the four lanes. At some point, they have to make decisions. That’s when we can really start playing the game.”

Athin leaned forward, planting his hands on the table. “As you mentioned, they may target Echo’s towers first because they won’t think she has enforced towers.”

A smile crawled across Elzio’s face. “If they do, we move as many of the heroes down towards Echo’s towers. Bait them into taking a fight, 2v3. Flank them when they attack, hard push that road. Keep them guessing and keep them on the back foot. We want them uncertain, scared to take any fight. There’s only five of them, so wherever they aren’t, we push.”

“You and Carlin don’t even need to leave the base.” Athin waved, pulling up Echo’s base. “If you take cross team coms and counter line-of-sight, you can be everywhere. Spread your doppelgangers, abuse the increased mana regeneration, they should never know what they’re about to hit.”

He was right. Elzio couldn’t just teleport a doppelganger wherever he needed, so there would be a delay in what he saw and when he could react but…

They could do this. They would be able to do this. As long as they stayed three steps ahead, they would be able to take down Deluuth.

—

Elzio and Carlin spent the later part of that evening reviewing their allied heroes. The heroes themselves had an abundance of training to do, so he and Carlin watched, taking notes of their skills, their abilities, but also their personalities, their mannerisms. They’d taken out Ythrel by impersonating the enemy heroes, and while the specifics would be as important, Elzio needed the Deluuth heroes to think they were facing a real person. Meanwhile, Elzio’s heroes would attempt to act as stone faced as possible. It wasn’t a terribly important prerogative—really any attempts to obscure their personalities would help—but it would be good to sew as much confusion as possible. A hero that didn’t try at all would be more easily identified.

The biggest personality of the team was Lin Chian, Genyl’s Tank. An enormous woman who fought and defended, throwing up shields and cracking skulls, all with the same face splitting grin and booming laugh. She would be pretty easy to emulate; Elzio just needed to commit those mannerisms to memory so he could lace his doppels with her likeness.

Isla and Ilshe were twin casters, both angular and gaunt, dark hair and ashen complexions. They seemed emotionally distant from their team, with mage Isla often speaking harshly, demanding perfection from every drill. Meanwhile Ilshe, the Support, stayed so quiet Elzio wasn’t sure if he could even speak.

It wasn’t until the end of the first half of practice, when Athin made a joke at Isla’s expense, that their stoney demeanors cracked. Elzio braced himself for her stinging rebuke, but instead she laughed, a dry, raspy sound, and her brother motioned something at Lin Chian, making an odd gesture with his hands that was apparently funny enough for the whole party to laugh.

The final member of the team was Martin, their Knife Thrower. He was the newest addition to the team, having only officially joined a year prior after their old Archer retired. Although not visibly younger or less talented than anyone on the team, he did appear excited, enthusiastic, eager to please, and anxious. This would be his first battle with the team, so it would really test his mettle, and he wanted to stand out.

All together, the team clicked like clockwork. Even their personalities fit. While Isla might brutally call out a blunder for anyone else on the team—even her brother—she softened her tone with Martin. Ilshe never spoke with the team but was, at all times, present where needed. Athin issued orders calmly and effectively, and with every word, the team sprung to follow his lead.

Occasionally someone might raise an issue, which no one would initially respond to, but after the drill, they’d gather to analyze the situation. At first Elzio marveled at their memories, how they were able to hear one person’s comment and recall it perfectly an hour later. Then he realized Ilshe was using Memory Snag to mentally capture a moment, which he would then psychically replay for the team. Now that was how a Support should work. A spell like that wouldn’t even be useful on the battlefield, but it was essential to analyze moments of combat without ever worrying about pausing the action.

Elzio felt a pang of longing as he watched them finally wrap up their practice. In another world, this could have been him. Guiding a team, developing their unity into an effortless cadence, everyone working together, highly skilled, highly respected. So many interesting paths to take, places to go.

Well, in a sense, this was him, wasn’t it? He was here, fighting alongside these people. More than fighting, he was partly in charge of directing them, but as that thought crossed over him, a new wave of anxiety washed over him. Was he cut out for this? Deluuth would be even sharper, even more brutal, even more leveled. Elzio had a handful of battles to his name, but these heroes fought on another lever.

“We got this.”

Elzio jumped, not ever remembering Carlin was by his side. “Hmm?” he asked, not taking his eyes off where the twins signed hand motions at each other, a twisted grin on Isla’s face and a soft laugh in Ilshe’s narrow eyes.

“We absolutely got this.” Carlin sounded more upbeat than he had since Tylin’s death. “We’re taking Deluuth out. I’m gonna… we’re gonna make it right.”

Carlin’s voice held zero doubt, but it wasn’t just blind faith in the Genyl heroes that spurred it. As Elzio turned to the man, he saw pure conviction in his face as they locked eyes, not just in the team, but in Elzio.

Surprisingly, this did more to boost Elzio’s concerns than he expected. At level 13, Carlin had more experience than Elzio, and while he wasn’t quite at the level of the Genyl heroes, he was closer to their lowest leveled hero than he was to Elzio. He had faith in Elzio, though, having seen what he was capable of.

Elzio just couldn’t let them down.