I said.

Ezzie said.

The Wyrmking inhales sharply!

I said.

Ezzie launched a mortar skyward, but the projectile fell back to earth long before it reached the sky-bound dragon.

The serpent opened its mouth and blasted a series of orbs—much like those the Warhounds had used, but on a titanic scale—down across the fields that surrounded the southern, eastern, and western gates.

The orbs moved with terrifying speed, and when they slammed into the earth, soundless, thick fog rolled out from the impacts.

The grass froze over all at once, and ice expanded upward from there, building and building until it stood nearly as tall as the walls themselves. Before long, three-quarters of the battlefield was encased in four stories of jagged, bladed ice. It looked utterly impassable.

Ezzie said.

I said.

The serpent roared overhead and vanished back into the dark clouds. Blue orbs began raining from the sky, intermixed with the heavy snow. I examined one of them but got almost no information for my trouble.

{Frostbomb}

HP: 1/1

Ezzie said.

Ezzie said.

The snowfall thickened at the far edge of the battlefield, the winds swirling into a total whiteout. Shadows moved within the snow, well-defined against the white backdrop.

Then one of them stepped out.

The creature was lizard-like, with broad, hunched shoulders and well-muscled limbs. It held a shield in one hand, and a battleaxe in the other. I examined the creature:

{Draconian Enforcer} (Level 9 Dragonkin) (Elite++)

HP: 8000/8000

Ezzie said.

Another shadow resolved into a similar shape, but this one was thin and willowy, its body draped in flowing blue cloth, a crooked staff held between its clawed fingers.

{Draconian Spellslinger} (Level 9 Dragonkin) (Elite++)

HP: 6000/6000

Ezzie said.

And finally, a third creature dressed in white, weaponless, its whole body awash in pale blue light.

{Draconian Oracle} (Level 9 Dragonkin) (Elite++)

HP: 5000/5000

Ezzie said.

A system alert, then.

The Wyrmking returns in 3 minutes!

A timer overlaid the dark clouds:

2:59

2:58

Ezzie said.

I waited for the creatures to charge, but they seemed content to sit at the back of the battlefield.

Ezzie said.

I jogged halfway across the battlefield, then drew a knife from my bracer. I chucked it at the warrior dragon and he instantly whirled on me.

A golden shield popped up around him just as he blurred into motion, clearing the distance between us so quickly that I barely had a chance to get my shield up. The warrior led with his shoulder, smashing into me and forcing me into a couple of quick steps backward.

Ezzie said,

I said, as I parried the warrior’s axe only to catch a shield slam to the chest. The blow didn’t move my health bar, but did knock the wind from me.

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2:25

2:24

I retreated as I continued to fend off the warrior, trying to draw him back toward the wall. A few of the ice bombs were drawing closer, the lowest among them being almost halfway to the ground.

The mage ran forward then, his clawed fingers flicking beneath the sleeves of his robe. An icy bolt shot forward, spinning straight for me.

I activated Magic Reflect and sent the bolt right back where it had come, doing only minimal damage but outlining the mage’s thin body in blue and applying a slow.

I kept trading blows with the warrior, finally notching him beneath ninety percent.

Then the oracle stepped in, winding up a long cast that had her hands glowing gold. The warrior’s health shot back to full, and another golden shield slammed into place.

Ezzie said,

I dragged the warrior closer to the wall until he stood in its shadow, then took stock of the battlefield. Both the mage and the oracle seemed to be maintaining as much distance from me as possible, stepping closer only when they needed to toss a spell or a heal.

Our mages were lighting the warrior up, and though his health bar was flickering, the oracle’s heals were too much to overcome; it almost seemed like they were scaling to account for the damage the mages were dealing.

I said.

Ezzie said.

I nodded and took off, quickly gaining ground on the warrior, cannon fire erupted from all around.

Ezzie said.

1:55

1:54

The orbs were drawing closer; several of them had already erupted across the rear of the battlefield, causing twenty-foot high pillars of ice to erupt out of the ground. But Ezzie was blasting the vast majority of them straight of the sky with fireballs, the blue orbs popping like water balloons.

I said.

Ezzie said.

I dragged the warrior beneath the orb, watching as the oracle and the mage backed away, the mage tossing out another frost bolt that I ate, resisting it completely.

The warrior frowned and looked up just as the orb settled onto his shoulder. Then a pool of frost formed beneath his feet, pulsed once, twice, then flashed up through his body and into the air.

The warrior stood encased in a pillar of ice.

Ezzie said.

All six of the mortar boomed off in the distance as the mage completed his spell and a spherical blue projectile flew toward the pillar. It collided with the ice and caused the whole pillar to shimmer and crack.

“Magic Reflect,” I said, as I readied myself for the blast, standing at what I hoped was the edge of the mortars’ range.

The pillar exploded outward, peppering me with frozen shrapnel and throwing me all the way back to the edge of the moat. All six of the mortars hammered the ground exactly where I’d been standing, and a wave of fireballs lit up the air as the cannons flashed from all around.

When the smoke cleared, the warrior was lying motionless on the ground, a massive burst of yellow numbers floating up above his corpse.

1:23

1:22

Ezzie said.

I jumped to my feet and sprinted across the battlefield, straight at the mage who was winding up another frost spell. Both my defensive cooldowns were down, so I had to eat the bolt, and though I resisted almost all of the damage, the debuff got through and dropped my movement speed to sixty percent.

I felt like I was made of lead as I staggered toward the mage, who now had zero issue keeping his distance. I said.

Ezzie said.

I moved around the mage as the debuff dropped, positioning the mage’s back our defenses, hoping that he’d kite me in that direction.

I could sense the oracle in my peripheral, and though she was chanting, she didn’t seem to be winding up a cast—the mage’s health was still too high, probably.

The mage threw another bolt and I reflected it back his way, using the slow to close to the gap and getting in a few Refraction Strikes for my efforts, dropping his health to ninety-one percent. I could’ve hit him a few more times, but if ninety really was the cutoff at which point the oracle would step in and top him off, then I didn’t want to push the issue.

I said,

Ezzie said.

The mage reached out a hand and a cone of ice swept over me, dropping my movement speed all the way down to thirty percent; I could barely move. And the orb that Ezzie had indicated was creeping downward.

The mage followed his attack up with another frost bolt, then sent an icy nova rippled across the ground just after the frost bolt hit home. My ankles were both fully encased in ice; I couldn’t move a muscle.

56

55

I watched the debuff timers: five more seconds on the root. But the mage was already winding up another bolt. I said,

The mortar boomed as I watched the mage’s spell tick down: four seconds, three, two, one…the nova cleared and mage’s frost bolt splashed over me to no effect.

The mortar followed a second later, chunking the mage all the way down below eighty percent. And between the mages and archers and cannons, his health was falling fast.

I rolled forward, ducking close to the now low-hanging orb. “Magic Reflect!”

I bashed my shield into the orb and sent it flying horizontal across the battlefield, straight at the oncoming oracle. The orb connected and caused another pillar of ice to well up from the earth, enveloping her entirely.

Ezzie said, though the icy tower was already splintering.

I turned my attention to the mage, who was still suffering from the tar debuff and was easy to catch up to. I threw out a quick Refraction Strike as his health plummeted, and unending series of numbers scrolling above his head.

Ezzie said, just as the mortars boomed.

I turned and ran, diving as the first black projectile whistled into the ground. A chain of explosions followed, blanketing the ground in tar and smoke.

But when the dust cleared, the mage still stood, hovering at about ten percent with an icy shield hovering around him.

49

48

Ezzie said, as the icy tower shattered and the oracle stepped out of the cloud of pulverized ice, her hands already glowing gold.

The mage’s shield was weakening under the constant assault of our defenses—it was at thirty percent and falling, judging by the blue bar that overlaid the mage’s health—but not fast enough.

The oracle’s cast was half-way finished, and judging by the amount of golden light radiating off her, it was going to be a massive heal.

I dashed over to the nearest orb—Ezzie must have missed it, or decided that nuking the mage was more important—and shouted Magic Reflect, acting as if the spell wasn’t still on cooldown then immediately running back toward the mage.

The oracle broke off her heal and took a step to the side, resuming her cast when she realized that I’d feigned an attack. Which was all I’d been hoping for.

The mage’s shield popped just as another round of mortars soared into the sky, and I watched the oracle’s castbar, hoping the spell wouldn’t resolve before the mortars hit. And this cast was much faster than the previous one.

The explosions sounded a split-second before the heal went off.

Ezzie said.

19

18

I ran off at a wide angle—the oracle was already retreating—and drove her sideways along the wall, where she’d be in range of the defenses.

The mortars boomed and erupted a few seconds later, two of the projectiles catching the oracle and dropping her to seventy percent while the other four created tar fields that blocked off her escape. I charged in, launching a Refraction Strike and following it up with a flurry of attacks.

The oracle was still trying to run, but the debuff had her moving at a crawl, and the archers and mages were eating through her health.

Then the oracle stopped in place, threw up a shield, and her hands began to glow.

12

11

Ezzie said.

The oracle’s health dropped to sixty percent, to fifty percent. I tossed out another Refraction Strike as the oracle’s heal went off, bringing her back to seventy percent. She stood there chaining heals, but the archers and mages were winning the battle.

Ezzie said.

The mortars boomed again.

4

3

All six mortars struck the oracle directly, dropping her below ten percent. But another one of her heals went off just as she ticked below five percent for the first time, bringing her back to eleven.

The Wyrmking returns!

Ezzie said.

The enormous serpent wound out of the sky, its huge head centered directly above the battlefield, its mouth wide open.

The oracle’s health was still dropping, but with each heal she got off, her health rose slightly over where it had been before. I kept up my attacks, stacking Refracted the full three times.

Ezzie said.

The Wyrmking inhales sharply!

I didn’t have time to question her; I activated the skill just as the cannons flared from one side of the wall to the other, slight delays in between them.

I caught on to the plan just as the first explosion splashed over the healer and I, my shield positioning itself near my feet to absorb the first blast. Nine more explosions followed, my health plummeting then rising as my clerics mitigated the damage.

“Mirrorbomb!” I said, just as the final explosion washed over me, bits of metal and dirt peppering my face.

The healer’s hands fell to her side, and the Wyrmking swam back into the clouds. The mob toppled over.

An alert popped up, then.

You have entered Insanity’s Respite!

This encounter will resume in ten minutes.