Vol. 3: Chapter 21
The players were ready.
The instant the elite worg riders landed among them, a dozen tanks slammed their shields, unleashing their taunt abilities. The riders, who had been about to tear into the mages and archers, found themselves compelled to turn and attack the heavily armored players instead.
The backline was safe, but the tactical victory came at a cost. With the players’ firepower now split, the heavy armor soldiers at the front smashed through the last of the iron barricades with terrifying speed.
Just as the players settled into a rhythm of managing the riders and the heavy infantry, a new sound cut across the battlefield. From the center of the Burning Horde, a Tauren horncaller raised a massive horn to its lips. It drew a deep breath and blew.
Hoooooooonk
The deep, mournful note echoed again and again. It was the signal.
With a unified roar, the Burning Horde advanced. All thirty thousand of them.
Leading the charge was a wall of nearly ten thousand Tauren Warriors, wielding massive axes or shouldering stone pillars.
[Tauren Warrior] (Level 34)
HP: 200,000
Phys Atk: 12,000
Phys Def: 9,500
...
Behind them marched a hundred War Elephants, each colossal beast carrying twenty Troll Throwers on its back and surrounded by a protective screen of Orc Heavy Infantry and Orc Heavy Infantry Elites.
[War Elephant] (Level 35)
HP: 5,000,000
Phys Atk: 5,500
Phys Def: 13,000
...
[Troll Thrower] (Level 32)
HP: 85,000
Phys Atk: 12,500
Phys Def: 1,800
...
Thousands of Black-Raven Warlocks and Shamans followed, flanked by ten mobile siege towers and twenty catapults. The true army had arrived.
From their forward tower, SkyVault and Lotusbond exchanged a final, grim look. They issued one last command.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
"There's no more room to retreat! Everyone, hold your ground to the last man! Archers, Mages, I want you to focus fire on those War Elephants and mobile siege towers! Take down as many as you can!"
Then, they descended from the tower and charged into the fray themselves.
In truth, their mission was already a success. With fewer than ten thousand players, they had whittled down the enemy's vanguard by sixteen thousand troops. But against the might of the main army, Legions A1 and A2 began to melt away. The casualty rate skyrocketed.
From within the village, the other players watched the brutal slaughter, their knuckles whitening as they gripped their weapons, helpless to intervene. The players' advantage was never in a direct, head-to-head slugfest with high-health, high-defense orcs. As the defending force, their only path to victory was to leverage their fortifications to wear down the enemy.
Legion by legion, the frontline was annihilated. But they sold their lives dearly. In their final moments, they brought down thirty War Elephants, destroyed three mobile siege towers, and shattered a catapult.
The main Horde army was now down to twenty-five thousand troops, but its core strength was intact. And now, all the forward defenses were gone. The Burning Horde had reached the main walls of Starlight Village.
Meanwhile, on the western flank, a second battle was raging.
As the main engagement began in the east, two new enemy forces had erupted from the Shadowcrag Mountains and the river at their base. A swarm of Tusked Crocolisks and Berserker Goblins flooded the fields, spearheaded by two formidable bosses.
[River-Croc Chieftain] (Boss, Level 33)
HP: 32,000,000
Phys Atk: 12,500
Phys Def: 12,000
...
[Storm Shaman] (Boss, Level 33)
HP: 30,000,000
Phys Atk: 9,200
Mag Atk: 12,500
Phys Def: 4,500
...
Unlike the goblin raiders from the other night, this was a disciplined assault force, intent on breaching the village. With no fortifications on the western side, the players of Legion A8 were forced into a direct engagement.
They quickly discovered the two bosses had deadly synergy. The Storm Shaman, in particular, blanketed the area with one massive AOE spell after another. Legion A8 was getting shredded.
Lila quickly diverted the reserve Legion A9 to support them, but the boss damage was simply too high. Even with reinforcements, the tanks couldn't stay alive for long. It was a meat grinder.
Left with no choice, Lila called on her aces. "Hazel, Rena, get to the west gate and stabilize that front. Now."
"On it!"
The two of them broke off and raced west. Their arrival immediately shifted the battle. With Hazel's unshakeable tanking drawing the bosses' attention, the DPS players could finally position themselves freely and unload their skills.
Rena’s two mass-healing spells, Healing Wave and Mass Holy Word: Shield, provided the crucial survivability needed to withstand the Storm Shaman’s AOE pulses.
Lila watched their impact for only a moment before turning her full attention back to the east. The western flank was secure.
The main Burning Horde army had halted about a hundred yards from the village's outer palisade. The Tauren Warriors parted, creating lanes for the catapults to be wheeled to the front. Hulking orcs loaded a massive boulder onto a catapult and cut the rope.
The boulder soared through the air in a high arc, crashing against the wooden palisade with a splintering boom. The wall's health bar dropped by a third.
Lila's commands were instant. "Legion A10, repair teams on that wall! Ballista crews, return fire!"
"Copy!"
Dozens of players swarmed the damaged section of the wall, with others hauling stone and lumber to them. On the ramparts above, eight heavy ballistae swiveled to aim at the enemy siege engines.
All eight fired as one, their massive bolts converging on a single catapult. The war machine exploded into a shower of splinters.
Here, the players' true advantage was revealed. The Horde's catapults hit harder individually, but the players had focus fire.
After three volleys, the palisade, under constant repair, was still holding. The Horde, however, was down three catapults. The enemy orcs roared in frustration.
Suddenly, the war drums began to beat with a new, frantic rhythm. The entire orc army surged forward.
They were abandoning the siege. This was an all-out charge.