Johanna Pov

Sitting in the command over a live map of the area i can see the movements of both my troops, and theirs.

Currently they have pulled back most of their mages, presumably to recover mana. We’ve sucked up most of the mana in the area, effectively turning it into a dead zone, so how are they recovering mana so quickly? They must have a large supply of filled mana batteries.

This siege has gone on for six days now, and has fallen into a predictable pattern, one that is benefiting me at the moment. They alternate their mages and their archers on the wall to pepper us with attacks constantly, though we are well prepared for that tactic. The number of casualties on both sides rarely goes over the one hundred mark every day. While this goes on the city is draining its resources while we have a stable supply line bringing us more constantly, the longer this keeps up the better for us.

The thing that has me worried is that there is no obvious plan for them to upset the current status quo. I’d wager on some sort of large enchantment is being powered up, it wouldn’t show on the map, and if it is well made, no one would be able to detect it.

Of course i might just be paranoid and they just suck at this.

I doubt it though.

“General, the healers are reporting fleshrot from mana of the arrow wounds”

I look over to the soldier, a thin, wiry hobgoblin. Likely one of the couriers.

“How bad is it, and how many have been inflicted?” Johanna

“Twenty-one have succumbed to it, and at least one-hundred are inflicted, with even slight scrapes being able to cause it.”

Not too bad then, certainly not big enough to upset the current status quo, it’s probably just a couple of their elites decided to get in on the action.

“For the ones that can’t be quickly healed remove the afflicted limb, better to regrow it than lose a soldier, or exhausted a healer.” Johanna

With a salute the courier sprints away to the medical tents, and i’m left alone again.

Seems like the mages are coming back, and my field commanders have noticed. It must be incredibly expensive for them to use that many mana batteries.

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Hmm, are there any noxious or poisonous gases we could through over the walls? Nah, to much of a risk right now.

Unless.

Our siege weaponry has been all but useless. We want to keep the walls more or less intact and they aren’t very good as anti-personnel weapons, but we could use them to throw some volatile compounds over the wall.

Why didn’t i think of it before? Uncle and his trainees haven’t been busy much at all recently, i expected there to be more injuries but their efforts have been mostly wasted making healing potions.

Calling out to the guards outside my tent i order them to bring me the head engineer and alchemist.

Within minutes uncle and a man I have grown somewhat familiar with over the last week are standing in front of me.

“Do you have any potion bottles that would survive being thrown from a trebuchet or catapult and shatter upon impact?” Johanna

“Of course, in several sizes too” Uncle

“Good, good. I want you and your alchemists to focus on creating noxious and poisonous volatile compounds. We’re going to throw them over the wall. Work with the engineers to get everything working right, this should gives us enough of an edge to claim the city before whatever it is their planning comes to fruition.” Johanna

With a salute the two of them leave me to look over the battlefield again.

I spend the next several hours watching over it, trying to figure out anything in their troops movements that could give me a clue.

I think i finally found something.

On the east side, all the mages cycle through a particular clump of buildings, that must be where they are refilling their mana. If we could take that out it would be a sure victory.

Standing up i head outside to tell the guards to bring me the head engineer, only to find the sun long set and the moon high in the sky. The lazy bastard is almost certainly asleep by now. His second should work just fine, however.

Within minutes his second is standing in front of me. A lovely young girl, a couple years older than me. The head engineer's daughter i believe. I explain the situation to her and ask for her input on how we can go about destroying that area.

“That area over there is new, all stone and clay buildings. Firebombing it will do nothin, explosives might, but with your alchemists working on yer posinin idea and don’t have time for making what we need. Large stones should work the best, if ya had an enchanter we could do some real damage to em. Only reason we havent yet is ya want this city intact.”

I get the guards to send someone through the ranks of mages to see if anyone knows even the basics of enchanting. I doubt it, artificial enchanting is pretty difficult to learn, a mere soldier usually wouldn’t, at least not without being promoted to a non-combat role.

Less than an hour later i received word that a pair of mages that are adept with enchanting have discovered in the ranks and have met up with the engineer. Whatever she’s doing i hope she does it quickly, the majority of the mages will be in there in a couple hours, that would be the ideal time to strike.

I feel an explosion several hours later, and see a large section of the eastern wall crumble on the map. Bah, i wanted to avoid rebuilding as much as i could.

Whatever, it’s more important that we take the city than we preserve it.

Seems many soldiers have started to desert, now that there is a large, convenient escape path. They’re less disciplined than i thought.

It won’t be long now before they surrender, with their mages out of commission and an easy entry point if i want to take the city street by street they don’t have much of a chance of winning. At least not so long as they didn’t finish whatever it is their planning.

The poisonous gases won’t be as effective now that there isn’t a large wall preventing them from dissipating, but they should work well enough to drive soldiers into deserting. I should make a show of being merciful to the ones that desert the city, i’d never hire them, but they can be useful here.

It was three more days before the city fell. Though it would be more accurate to say that we realized there were more soldiers outside the city than inside, by a lot. We just walked in and claimed the city street by street with no real opposition until we reached the keep, where we lost a couple dozen putting down the last of their forces.

you have conquered the city of Melnin for the kingdom of Greica. you have gained the following titles: General, Conquerer.