Author's notes: Trying another layout for the skills, tell me what you think. Tables are a huge annoyance to make and when I have to use them in a chapter it often delays my progress just 'cause they are so troublesome, even with an editor.

I nearly completed friday's chapter already, and hopefully I can get another chapter completed today, to get my backlog really started... If it gets to 10 i'll start doing double releases as I see fit. It's also a lot easier to write now that I don't have to worry about having a chapter ready by the end of the day. (which has kept me awake in the past and wasn't a good thing)

If there's anyone around who can draw pretty well, I am currently looking for someone who can draw maps/cover art as the default picture is quite bland. With the backlog (hopefully) growing I am also looking for a proofreader as english is not my main language and I am bound to err here and there. So if anyone wants to help with that, feel free to pm or post below.

As always enjoy today's chapter.

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Within the largest house on the Enrag mountain, ten large nayeran stood guard for a small nayeran who had a wicked grin on his face and who was seated on his throne. This small nayeran was the king of all the nayeran in this area. Not only was he the strongest and the smartest... but also the most wicked nayeran that had ever existed. Be it valkyrie, beastmen, birdmen, dwarves, zuno, elementals or humans, all who crossed his path had died. And this nayeran made sure that as many crossed his path as possible.

From the moment he took seat on the throne, a reign of blood descended upon the nayeran. Before he took seat on the throne the nayeran never took more than they needed and they definitely would not kill those of other races without being provoked. Even so, the nayeran valued strength before all else and thus there were very little who dared to question their king.

Knock.. Knock..

The ten guards looked in the direction of the king, who simply nodded. One of the guards opened the door and the forty nayeran that had been tasked to report to the king stumbled in front of their king and prostrated themselves before him.

The king looked at the forty men and said in a growling tone. "Speak."

"Spotted, army! Commander fighting! Asks reinforcements!"

While the normal nayeran were only able of very basic speech, the king had a slightly large vocabulary.

"What! An army dared to cross our lands? How large!" The king snarled.

"Two hundred!"

"Two hundred? Audacious!" After a few moments of thought, the king roared. "MOBILIZE ALL TROOPS! We will show them our strength."

The forty nayeran all dashed outside of the room and went to notify the various commanders.

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The top six most powerful commanders were seated at the same table having a casual conversation when they were alerted of a full mobilization due to enemy invaders. The commanders glanced at each other. "Time?" One of them asked.

"Time." Another one replied.

The nayeran commander who had asked the question nodded and stood up. "Gather your troops. Slowly. We will go out last."

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Half an hour after the battle ended, the ground below the guild's feet started to shake. Zaran opened his eyes and looked in the direction of the mountain. Ten thousand nayeran were orderly marching towards the guild's two hundred men and a tenth was mounted on large rhinoceros who served as beasts of war as well as food.

Zaran called out to his troops. "Guys. We'll be facing their full might this time and while normally I would say we run. However we won't run with these troops that they showed us!"

The guild's troops all had very surprised and confused faces. It was clearly 200 versus 10.000. Had their guild leader gone mad? It certainly seemed so with this strange decision.

"I know you're all thinking of me as if I am crazy but don't worry. I got a plan! I will be unable to fight and I need full concentration so I cannot possibly get hurt in the fight! Whatever happens protect me! For this I would like two volunteers from our first line warriors!"

Sylphie and four others raised their hands, after which Zaran chose Sylphie and a Minotaur with a tower shield.

"Florance, Nekorath, you two also stand by to aid me when things go south. As long as I am not disturbed there's a good chance we'll win the fight."

Even Florance gave Zaran a surprised look as he said this. As far as she knew he did not have a skill that could affect the battlefield on such a large radius... and definitely not when he was sitting down. However Zaran looked like he was extremely sure of what he had been saying so she decided to trust on him.

As for Nekorath, he couldn't care and just did as he was told.

Zaran took seat in lotus position and gave two more orders. "Take the formation you had taken earlier, Nuvahn will lead the battle this time. I will also need to know when their troops are within a single kilometer of us. After they are within one kilometer immediately notify me and after that do not disturb me any longer!"

Minutes passed as the nayeran slowly marched onward. The king was in the middle of his army and seated on the largest rhinoceros which was 2,5 meters high and 6 meters long. Behind him were the troops of the six strongest commanders. Even though they were the strongest commanders, not a single one of their troops was seated on a rhinoceros as those were only for the king's honour guard.

The strongest commanders often made fun of the honour guard as in their eyes it was a position for those who were on their last years of their life or for those who had bought the position. There was only a single reason that the strongest commanders did not want to fight the honour guard head on and it wasn't because of their troops, but because of their rhinoceros! Calling them beasts of war was an understatement, they were beasts of slaughter. Their hide was strong and impenetrable by anything weaker than a steel weapon.

An elven assassin suddenly appeared before Zaran and said. "Zaran, their troops are within a kilometer radius of us!"

Zaran nodded and said. "Good, ensure that everyone listens to Irina's commands. I've told her when to join the battle. If it turns out as expected, we won't be needing your help."

The elven assassin smiled. "Let's hope it doesn't come to that then. Even if we don't work we'll still get a reward right?"

"As said before, no matter how much one fights, the reward will still be split fairly. The same holds for me." Zaran said before waving the assassin of and closing his eyes. He utilized a new skill that he had gotten from Henry after the renovation of the cellar had been completed.

His mana and ki were completely drained and his health dropped by 50%. Various windows popped up in his view, telling him that he was suffering from paralysis, blind, deafness and silence. Just using the skill had turned him in a complete puppet! But what he got in return was an extremely powerful skill! 'Call of the beastmaster!'. Any beast that was not controlled by a more powerful beast master within a one kilometer radius would heed the casters command.

Call of the beastmaster!

Beginner level 1

Experience: 20%

Requirements:

Resources at max value.

At least 51% hp.

Effects:

Completely depletes any resources

Depletes health by 50 % of max value

Complete paralysis

Blind

Deafness

Silence

Gain full control over any beasts not controlled by an equally powerful or more powerful beast master 1 kilometer radius

Duration: As long as the caster keeps concentrated, but it may last no longer than ten minutes.

When the king's troops passed the one kilometer mark, the rhinoceroses suddenly started squealing and throwing off their riders. Only the king had been able to momentarily suppress his rhinoceros from going wild, but even he had been thrown off a few seconds later. The thousand rhinoceroses trampled their writers and charged to the six thousand troops before them.

"WHAT!" The king roared. "How did all of them go out of control!?!?! DAMNIT!"

The king somersaulted back up, unsheathed his twin swords and roared "Subdue the rhinoceroses!"

The nayeran started to wildly attack the rhinoceros in the hopes of kill them. But their large horns and the lack of steel weapons made them very powerful foes for the nayeran. Only one in twenty nayeran had a steel weapon and most who did were troops from the six commanders... and those stood idly by as their fellow nayeran were slaughtered by the rhinos.

The rhinos wildly ran about and used their horns to throw the nayeran over their heads or puncture them. With the lack of steel weapons, nayeran were quickly falling left and right. In comparison very few rhinoceroses were killed. Only the commanders and king were dealing with them very effectively and each of them had been able to kill multiple rhinoceroses in mere minutes.

The guild's troops all stared at the scene in disbelief. At first there was an huge amount of troops coming their way in an orderly fashion and then suddenly... their beasts all went out of control at the same time? Moreover... it was when the beasts entered the radius Zaran had previously mentioned. The guild members suddenly thought that it would be better to not provoke their leader if there was a single beast nearby.

Only after three minutes of the rhinoceroses slaughtering nayeran did the six commanders decide that they should step in with the troops that had steel weapons. As for their remaining troops, all of them waited for a command of their commander.

Seeing that more nayeran joined the fray, Zaran made all the rhinos leave and run off in the woods, evading all the traps that the guild had placed. Only ten of the rhinos, including the king's rhino stopped in the woods, turned around and slowly walked to Zaran. With the rhinos before him, Zaran opened his eyes and the spell was cancelled at that instant.

Zaran took out his greatsword and placed it on the king's rhino's throat. The rhino was still under the after-effects of Zaran's spell and did not budge as he did so. Zaran calmly waited until the after-effects disappeared.

The rhino felt the cold metal on its throat and looked at Zaran, whose eyes seemed to convey "yield or die.". It snorted and then lied down on its belly. It still felt a faint connection to the man who had his sword on his throat and it instantly knew that this was the man that had made them go out of control. For the choice of yield or die, it felt that the man in front of him could do as he said and so... it yielded. The nine others following its example.

Zaran only chose to subdue ten, as he instinctively felt that was as many as he could force to yield. He did not want any of these rhinos as pets as he wanted something with more potential. For a tank he already had Kru, whose armour was already far stronger in comparison to the rhino and its strength was also better, even though the rhinos level was higher. The only reason that he chose to bother with forcing the rhinos to yield at all was that he was in need of mounts.

A few of the weaker nayeran commanders and a thousand troops had died, another thousand were wounded and the troops were in complete disarray. Seeing the dead and the wounded clansmen, the king's fury grew to unprecedented highs. He swore that if he lived through this day... he would make sure that every living being he crossed would die an ugly death.

"Those who are too injured... LEAVE! Those who have lost their commanders, join the troops of the six commanders behind me!" The king said. Each of these six already commanded 600 troops and with the troops that had lost their leader, they gained another 200 each. "And get back in formation!"

The six commanders made their new recruits sit at the front of the troop and orderly guarded the back. The king allowed them to at their back because he had absolute trust in their strength and losing even a single of their men was the same as losing two other nayeran therefore they were always the last to enter the battle.

Minutes later, the nayeran's troops were back in formation, or at least what could be called a formation by their standards.

One of the six commanders walked over to the one they had appointed as their leader. "Move?" he asked.

"Not yet. Wait until the majority of the troops are halfway to the enemy." The leader of the six said.

The other one nodded and went back to his own troops.

The king raised one of his two twin swords and pointed towards the guild's formation. "Attack!"