Chapter 144: Hopeless Situation
She was both relieved and restless, but there was no time for greetings. I stepped closer to her side, keeping my eyes on the army of monsters below. “Istellise, we came as soon as the town was surrounded by a monster army. What’s the situation here?”
She pressed a hand to her chest, steadying her breath. “The monsters began surrounding the town just before dawn. We’ve evacuated most civilians into the inner district, but…” Her gaze darkened as she looked over the enemy force.
“There are too many monsters… Meanwhile, the town only has about three hundred able-bodied men who can fight and one hundred guards.”
An army of three thousand versus one hundred guards… This was an impossible fight, wasn’t it? It was thirty to one. Not to mention that most of these guards were only Bet rank, with only a handful at Gimmel rank. Against gnolls, ogres, harpies, and those giant mammoths, these numbers were far from enough.
As for the three hundred men… They were just cannon fodder and weren’t worth mentioning.
Istellise seemed to read my thoughts from my expression alone. “We’ve been preparing defenses, but we don’t have enough manpower to guard the walls, not even the illusions that I conjure can effectively trick them. Once they begin their full assault, the town will fall in less than an hour…”
It seemed the only reason the enemies weren’t attacking yet was because of Istellise’s illusion magic. She had masked the entire town with an illusion, causing hesitation and fear among the monsters, preventing them from recklessly advancing. However, she also said it wouldn’t last longer than ten minutes with her current power.
Regardless, it appeared that she had been growing stronger these past few months.
“Still, it’s been some time…”
“A few months to you is only a few days to us…” I explained briskly.
“Mm-hm.” She nodded.
“Why didn’t you escape the town while you still could?” Tuilë questioned, tilting her head.
“Unfortunately,” she explained, “we discovered the enemy too late to escape, and there are many elderly and weak people in the town who can’t run quickly. Some of them also don’t want to flee again and choose to protect this town until their last breath. This is why I can’t abandon them, not to mention that I need this town to keep standing because of the artifact.”
Then the objective was essentially the same as the scenario, and there were no further requests.
Behind me, Boris cracked his knuckles. “Don’t worry. I will protect this town and take down any monster that comes our way.”
Grun grinned, hefting his war axe. “Three thousand or not, we just carve through them.”
Arlen, more grounded, added quietly, “We can’t let them breach the walls. If they do, the casualties will be catastrophic.”
The rest also spoke similar lines about protecting the town. Well, we didn’t have much choice but to follow the scenario’s directive, or else risk our lives. Whether our reasons were righteous or not, we were now on the same page of saving this town from the monster army.
After speaking briefly with Istellise and examining the layout of the settlement from atop the wall, I immediately noticed a critical problem. Graythorn had two main gates—the western gate, which we were currently above, and an eastern gate on the other side of the settlement. Both were reinforced, but no amount of wooden beams or iron bracing would matter if a giant mammoth decided to ram straight through. These gates were the most vulnerable choke points.
Even if the monsters only concentrated on one gate, defending would already be difficult. If they split their troops between both gates… the town would fall instantly.
I folded my arms and thought for a moment. “We’re splitting into two groups. Party A will hold the western gate. Party B takes the east.”
The western gate had the highest concentration of enemies, so it was only natural that my party was stationed here since we were the most versatile and the strongest. Party B wasn’t weak, but they weren’t as coordinated as Party A, and assigning them to the lighter side made far more tactical sense.
Tuilë nodded. “Makes sense. Those gates are the only openings they can realistically break through. The walls are too steep for most of the monsters to scale.”
“If either gate collapses, the civilians will be trapped,” Michelle said with concern.
“Exactly.”
Boris grinned. “Heh. I alone am enough to protect the gate; I’ll stand outside if push comes to shove.”
Standing outside the wall alone was nothing short of suicide for anyone else. However, Boris’s signature skill, Adamant Flesh, could turn his entire body into steel, making him the only one who could do this without risking his life.
“You can count on us,” Erika said with confidence. “Then I’ll lead the east with the others.”
“Good,” I replied. “But we’ll need to stay in constant communication.”
Tuilë pulled out five small, earbud-like objects from her inventory and handed them to each member of Party B. “These let us communicate over distance. Just send a bit of mana into this communication tool, called a comm-link, whenever you want to speak.”
Since everyone in Party A still kept the ones she had given us back in the seventh scenario, there was no need for replacements.
“This looks like an earphone…” Erika muttered, turning the device over in her palm with a confused stare before putting it inside her right ear.
“If anything changes on either side, we report instantly,” I instructed.
And with that, we split into two teams, with Party B heading toward the eastern gate just as the monster army began preparing for their assault.
Michelle looked at the monsters below before turning to Istellise and inquiring, “What have the guards been trying so far?”
“Mostly holding positions and firing from range,” Istellise answered. “But we can’t thin their numbers fast enough… If it wasn’t for you appearing in the nick of time, this would have already become a hopeless situation.”
Lucian took out his magic orb and smirked. “Then we’ll have to force the momentum back to our side.”
“This is great. I just so happen to have completed a masterpiece to handle a monster army.” Tuilë grinned widely, as though she had been waiting precisely for this moment.
A masterpiece? For some reason, I had a bad feeling about this.
Istellise’s eyes brightened. “I don’t know what will become of us without you. Of course, I’ll also support you however I can.”
Soon enough, the monster army finally began its assault. Drums thundered, and the ground quaked beneath the advancing giant mammoths. The gnoll general raised his axe high, and the monsters all charged toward the wall together in a terrifying, unified wave.
“Get ready!” I yelled.
Boris, Michelle, Lucian, and Tuilë all took their respective roles immediately. Arrows were loosed from the wall, raining down on the front lines of charging gnolls. Tuilë fired her magic cannon straight at a cluster of ogres, the resulting explosion sending debris and monster limbs flying into the air. I, too, didn’t just stand still and rained down {Spinning Mana Arrows} at the enemies.
You have hunted [Goblin Scout Lv.46].
You have gained 66 EXP.
You have hunted [Gnoll Rider Lv.80].
You have gained 140 EXP.
You have hunted [Gnoll Warrior Lv.66].
You have gained 126 EXP.
You have hunted [Goblin Archer Lv.44].
You have gained 64 EXP.
…
Since they were clustered so closely together, my magic projectiles hit them with perfect accuracy—effectively making it one kill per shot.
Just then, Lucian formed a large magic circle overhead. “{Arcane Storm}!” Bolts of pure mana shot from the sky, tearing holes into the monsters’ formation.
Advanced Neutral Magic? As expected of a High Mage… He’s clearly grown stronger since the day we fought in our match, I thought.
Michelle stood atop a nearby watchtower, rapidly drawing and releasing her bowstring. Every arrow she fired was a special ammunition that exploded upon impact, annihilating clusters of monsters at once. In addition, her Nature’s Power caused vines to sprout from the arrows, ensnaring nearby enemies before they were engulfed in flames from the explosion’s lingering effect.
But despite all that, the monster army did not stop. Harpies took flight, shrieking as they dived toward the battlements. Ogres rammed themselves against the wall, cracking stone. Goblins carried ladders and began climbing in swarms with the gnolls. And the giant mammoths tanked our attacks and crashed against the walls like living siege weapons.
Boom!
“Aargh!” A guard was blasted off the wall from the impact caused by the giant mammoth.
“This is insane!” a guard shouted, pale as he watched the wall tremble.
“No. This is nothing to be scared about. Windstorm!”
I channeled mana into my sword and slashed downward. A raging vortex exploded outward, knocking down ladders and sending climbing goblins and gnolls flying backward. Several harpies were caught mid-dive and flung away like rag dolls, crashing into their own allies below.
You have hunted [Gnoll Warrior Lv.66].
You have gained 126 EXP.
You have hunted [Goblin Warrior Lv.47].
You have gained 67 EXP.
You have hunted [Goblin Archer Lv.44].
You have gained 64 EXP.
You have hunted [Wild Harpy Lv.81].
You have gained 151 EXP.
Magic Power has increased by 1.
…
The surrounding guards all blinked at me in awe. “You… you can do that?!”
“Don’t get distracted!” I snapped. “They’re still climbing!”
Boris roared as he punched an ogre’s head clean off, sending its massive body tumbling down from the wall. “Hahaha! More! Come at me!” He jumped down the wall and activated Adamant Flesh, turning his body into a metallic sheen as he charged straight into the horde.
Lucian cast {Mana Blast}. A focused beam of energy blasted through an ogre’s chest, then detonated inside the one behind it.
Despite our relentless attacks taking down enemies by the dozens, the monsters did not falter. More ladders slammed into the wall as goblins swarmed upward like ants. Harpies continued circling overhead, shrieking as they dived down toward hapless guards who struggled to defend against both aerial and ground assaults at once.
“S-Save me!”
I quickly cut down the harpy that tried to snatch a guard with my sword, saving him as he fell back to the battlement.
You have hunted [Wild Harpy Lv.90].
You have gained 150 EXP.
“Tuilë! Now would be a great time for that masterpiece of yours!” I shouted.
Hearing that, she flashed a wide grin. “Aight! Time for my masterpiece to shine!”
From her inventory, she deployed a series of strange metal orbs along the battlement. They clicked and unfolded into five turret-like constructs with rotating barrels. Comically enough, each turret even had a small seat—and the ones operating them were none other than the robot ducks she had used in the past to deactivate traps, just that there were five of them now.
“Quack!”
“Introducing: Mk. III Auto-Mana Cannons!”
The devices turned on, and with resounding booms, blinding bursts of concentrated mana tore into the monster ranks below, obliterating everything in their path within seconds. Goblins, gnolls, and even the front-line ogres were reduced to chunks of flesh and scattered bones as the cannons swept across the battlefield.
The guards stared in stunned silence.
“Tuilë…” I muttered.
“Yes?” she replied proudly.
“…Your inventions are terrifying.”