The Siege Pt2

Leaping left of a dark cutting aura cast from the Taurian creatures upper left sword, I land turning back toward the enemy and lightly flap my wings to throw myself forward.

Preemptively augmenting my feathers with chaos soul stone, I close my wings ahead of me to block the greeting of a hammering club. Some of the already metallic feathers cracked and bent, but my wings held out against the heavy blunt impact that stopped me in midair. Once the blow and I had canceled each other out, I exploded my wings outward and open to shove their mace away while spinning my staff upward between my hands.

Smashing up into the demon's long chin with the bottom end of my spinning staff after throwing its balance to the side with its mace, the force of my blow easily rocks the beast up on its hind legs. Spinning the staff back the other way with the weight of Force Strike behind it, I smash the top end of my staff down into the demon's upturned humanoid chest.

Its entire upper torso caved in with the blow at the cost of fifty percent of the surprisingly weak demon's HP, then it simply died as its lower horse body snapped under the sustained weight of my staff bearing down on its body. Even if it still had a few points or percent left, it would not have been going anywhere.

I myself was already leaping forward while channeling earth, fire, and lightning elements into my field skills. Twisted walls of glowing stone that flickered with ethereal white flames and dark purple electricity suddenly rushed up and out from my position. My two elemental walls spread out from ten yards to either side of me all of the way through the press of demons and fifty yards to either side of the outpost breach.

Shortening my wings to conservative sizes as I leap up to the top of one wall, I call out, "Take the walls and hold the lane!"

From my new position I could easily target the largest and most dangerous enemies, casting out rapid magical strikes in blunt forms of my usual cutting skills. These literal Staff Arts had heavy knockback effects that disarrayed all of the enemy ranks in their wake but soon came with names like 'Arcing Force' rather than 'Arc Cutter'.

Another issue I soon realized while using a staff was that not only were 360 Edge and Flying Guillotine no longer available but Geist itself was not an option without a bladed weapon just like Spirit Slash. My original intention had been to act as a wedge with my team as the driving force so that we could cut a path to the breach and skip half of the fighting.

However, my fighting style was heavy on the radial AOE and knockback, half of which I now lacked without a sword. Without that directional half, half of my firepower was actually missing and I was only able to push so far so quickly. Without that half of my skill set, I could not blaze a trail faster than the other players could cycle through their skills.

With these damaging walls and the lane contained within, we could focus and conserve our firepower for a short time while safely approaching the outpost over the last hundred yards. However, my team were the only people who could mantle the walls without suffering friendly fire affects from the elements.

Luckily for all of us, not only did I have over a thousand extra mana from today's efforts but my friends had to have the same benefits as well. I could freely lay into the expenditure of my mana in massive Quick Quakes and St. Elmo's Fire to immobilize everything within thirty yards of my section of wall. The others could also let fly with their own magic and personal skills.

Most of our player forces managed to make it half of the way down the broad lane I carved through the battlefield before I finally ran out of mana. Stopping our troops in their tracks, though, were dozens of charging and roaring demons spilling out of the breach and jumping down from the surrounding walls.

Even though the individual enemies were weak to my team, the numbers were showing their strength against us and our siege was growing harder by the second. After easily defending against our own siege, this was slowly becoming a wake-up call because of the difficulty. After easily defending against a siege, this was exactly what I wanted.

I wanted to see the other clans use their actual strength in action. I wanted to see some struggle and adaptations, some suffering and triumph. I wanted to see the extent of their abilities and then I wanted to see growth.

Not just from my own team for once but from everybody around me. These people were currently carrying my name. If they could not meet a certain standard, they would make me look bad!

However, their responses to the changing situation was rather satisfying.

Up front leading the pack was Little Thirteen wielding a remodeled chaos arc sword and his fastest damage dealers. While my team and I maintained the entry point and surrounding area with crowd controlling skills, he unleashed a ruthless flurry of electrical slash attacks into the incoming throng of beastly bodies.

After these stunning sweeps washed over the first dozen or so enemies to stop their overall advance in its tracks, an assortment of archery and magical skills were released from behind Little Thirteen that cleared away the stunned mobs and those fighting to get around them. Little Thirteen simply repeated the tactic as the elites of other clans joined the front lines.

Taking the time to retrieve a few bottles from my belt, I store the bottles inside of both arms for either health or mana. When needed, I could simply flex and crush one of the small bottles to take care of myself. For immediate recovery, I simply brought out a large biscuit of herbal bread and ate it whole.

The biscuit was similar to the troll ration recipe I sold to Mr. Thirteen but was instead loaded with only recovery ingredients. My mana was half full once the biscuit was gone and a few moments later it was nearly full from regen. Once I started unleashing magic again, it was purely electrical discharge in hundreds of flashing arcs that struck enemy within a couple hundred feet of my position.

My team used this opportunity to see to their own recovery items.

Seconds later, Donna and her troops were using holy spells to repel the demons and undead forces trying to fill in the breach, stopping up the works while our names slowly gained ground while this lasted. At the same time, my own team was done treating themselves.

"Tragedy's! Move up!" I call out, yelling with some mana in my voice to be heard over the roars of monsters and the effects of skills. Advancing forward along the wall, my team starts focusing their ranged attacks and magic skills on the breach while moving in to support the entry of the rest of our people.

Throwing out a platform of ice and stone to bridge the lane, I shrug off the near three hundred pounds of weight on my back in the form of a large wooden coffin. The lid of the deep coffin opened from the shock and revealed a dully but tangible dark purple glow in the neutral lighting of the outpost.

Pouring my mana into the Contents of the coffin to awaken my golem and give it some battery live, I deplete all forty-two hundred mana at my disposal into ten minutes of golem activity. The enemy that were no longer being pushed back by magic or terrain were now crowding the crude elemental walls and the entrance to the lane. However, flashing forward like a bat out of hell, my Chaos Soul Golem turned into a streak of dark light as it rushed from the coffin and into the fray.

Weapon effects and tangible shadows danced wildly about the area, making dozens of health bars suddenly appear and disappear within seconds as the golem unleashed it powers with abandon. At this rate, it would probably deplete the energy in its weapons before it ever ran out of juice itself. Despite this, it was doing its job wonderfully.

With a new combatant on the field and in reach, the demons began turning their attention toward my golem as the battle at the wall itself slowly stalemated. Our troops had gotten through the lane to the breach and even pushed back the demons inside, but they had cycled through their best skills in the process and now had nothing but some magic items and blessings.

We had just gotten to the front door but needed a break?! If these people really made me use my hulk form to tank through the middle of the outpost and buy them time, I was going to be upset. They should mostly have all of their basic and advanced class skills up to level fifty, some members of my team did not even have level thirty passives!

Only a few moments later as the clans were putting their early and quickest cooling skills back in action my team arrived at the tops of the actual wall. From there, Stonewall simply used a charging skill down the opposite side of the enemy's wall to use himself as a distractions. Following close behind him for support were Lil, Agnes, Go, and Papi while everybody else from Tragedy's Travelers unleashed enchanted ranged hell upon the demons inside the breach.

Switching to actively controlling the golem once my mana was over a thousand, I waste the tenfold expenditure by running down into the lane toward the other clans while guiding my puppet golem to fight its way into the lane. Making the golem hold the entrance and the aggro of all the demons outside the outpost, I cut off the connection to my golem and climb up to the top of the nearest lane wall.

Creating another expanse of elemental bridge only fifty yards outside of the breach, I take a brief moment to survey the situation. Stonewall's group inside the fort were taking up a lot of attention with some flashy skills and magic, alleviating pressure on the breach so that the other clans could make it inside. The rest of my team on the walls and all but the troll familiars were firing enchanted arrows into the outpost, brightening up the scenery with flashes of hole white fire that consumed the rubble and scrap structures.

The other clans were looking a little worse for wear, everybody showing serious signs of physical fatigue despite continuing to clash with the front lines of demons in the outpost. They were supplied with Oleander's energy potions but that was probably the only reason they had managed to hold on after fighting across the open field and then through the lane. The open field combat might have been mounted, but that was when people were freer with their higher cost skills.

Outside the lane walls were still a hundred or so demons who were pushing my golem deeper and deeper into the land as they fought for entry. His weapons were still going strong and his own Shadowmancy was creating an array of blurry clones that suicide struck the demons. I had never really tried to use my own Shadowmancy, but seeing the golem's almost instinctive use of the magic was downright inspirational.

"Flash," I say briefly, triggering the golem to use a single Flash Step in order to appear up the wall nearby.

"Cweeper, Hermes, half tank Mana Slash," I call out, summoning my other familiars from where they perched at the top of either side of the breach and rained Spirit Slash attacks into the outpost. Abandoning their positions without any hesitation, my acolytes arrive two seconds later on my bridge only to leap down into the lane while facing the oncoming rush of running demons.

One demigod's Bokuto and another demigod's 'scythe' swept through the air, unleashing a blinding wave of myriad energies that cut through the lane walls and everything in between. Once the pair of skills passed by, the lane walls crumbled inward to bury the dead and dying demons left behind.

"Turn the rest of the lane walls by the breach into towers on either side and practice your Divine Bow Hunting skills," I advise my acolytes, turning away with a simply wave toward my golem. Moving in accordance to my will, the golem turns around and runs toward the outpost with long bounding strides.

Reaching the end of the lane wall, my golem simply leaps fifty feet up and forward into the air before raining sword skills down on the ground below while it fell. Likewise following orders, Cweeper and Hermes used their own magics to refashion the remaining lane walls into sixty-foot towers not unlike what I had made for the trebuchet at the cathedral.

Positioned above the enemy and much of the outpost, arrows streaked with shimmer tails of divine energy started flashing through the air from the towers as fast as three arrows per second. The speed and power of their arrows were like rifle rounds and punched heavy holes into the unlucky demons below. With the addition of divine energy, it only took two or three arrows to kill even a bone giant.

Clasping my hands around my staff behind my back, expand my bridge up and toward the outpost until I had a perfect vantage point between the archery towers. The other clans, who had lost about two dozen people overall so far, were still fighting strong just inside the outpost while following the wake of Stonewall and his small team. Supporting from the sides were the rest of my team, using healing magic and offensive skills at their leisure.

With the loss of the pincer outside, the outpost was almost as good as ours. However, there was one key point missing that I was waiting for. Something that every single one of these outposts had to have.

A boss.

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