Dawn finally arrived. The dark force retreated but was not yet defeated. It seems they retreated due to Reis’ order. The army pulled back until it was out of archer and ballista’s range. Finally a breather.

“Man... they still have a lot of troops there.“ Iris commented.

“But at least they pulled back for a bit.” I said.

“Let them come. Maria has rested and even if they come, we will have that boost. They are going down!” Victor said.

“I have only seen several battles. But I know that behaviour. They did not retreat nor are they defeated. They plan to reform the line and attack again!” Ragnar said.

“Seriously?” Victor blurted.

“Just see.”

True to his word. The enemy didn’t retreat, Reis released a large amount of dark fog. The dark fog then seeped into the earth and fifteen mountain sized golems rose. They were not really mountain sized just around 50 meters. Somewhere around 10 meters or so above us (we were standing on a wall.) The stone of the golems’ bodies turned black slowly. After it had turned into dark grey, the golems started to move forward.

As the golems marched, the dark army marched slowly behind it. We could only stand there as the golems continued to march. They were moving very slowly, but stones from the trebuchets and javelins from ballistae didn’t seem like they would destroy all the golems before they reach our gate.

“No comments now?” Xmoon asked.

“No. I have no words to express this feeling.” Iris answered.

“His class is simply cheating. Is he even a human to begin with? This is an impossible quest. I am gonna sue Unicorp for this.” Hasega made the comment

“Well then. Commander Riri, or should I call you white princess now. Any ideas?” Victor asked.

“Umm. No.” A short clear answer from me. “El?”

“Don’t even ask.” El retorted. “Ahh, but.. want to try cast another enigma spell?”

“Will it work? Stone and lightning aren’t very good match right?” Iris asked.

“Well, no harm in trying.”

“Umm, the count is preparing something. It might be ready soon.” i said while listening to whisper channel from Reiner

*Riri, are you there?*

*Yes. Is the bomb ready?*

*Well, we only managed to get a few barrels. But it seems to work.*

“What barrels?” Iris interrupted our party chat

“Umm, gunpowder.” i said

“Huh?”

“Umm, well. There is gunpowder here. Stuff it together. Then enhance it with fire enchantment and umm, I think we got a few bombs.”

“I have never heard about that.”

“Me neither. Until we began preparing that is. They first planned to scatter it on the ground then lit it up using fire arrows but then I interrupted them.” I answered.

“Alright. Bring it on.” Iris said.

Then a wooden barrel with a fuse lit came flying from above. The barrel hit the face of a golem and with a loud explosion it blew up the golem’s head. Without a head said golem stopped moving and crumbled leaving a pile of stones.

“YES! It worked!” Iris shouted.

The barrels continued to fly one at a time. We currently only have 3 trebuchets. Some golems took 3 barrels to bring down. Without hitting its head one barrel was not enough.

*We are out.* Said Reiner.

“No good. We are out of gunpowder-barrels.”

“There are still 5 of those golems!“ Iris shouted.

#Ting

Blessing of the goddess is activated

Your Mana regen increased by 50%

Your Health regen increased by 50%

Mana and health increased by 30%

Magical resistance increased by 20%

All stats increased by 40%

All damage received will be reduced by 20%

Faith increased by 200

Stamina regeneration increased by 100%

Stamina consumption reduced by 30%

Morale is at maximum

The buff will last until Maria’s praying is disrupted.

I then shifted my gaze to El. She nodded and casted her Zeus strike at one of the golem. The golem was close enough now for our mages to attack. Another 2 were brought down before the golems reached out right in front of us. With a sweep of their right hands, we, the army at the front wall, jumped or fell back, while those at the back fell from the wall.

After that one of the golems slammed its hand and dug its head in the wall. Then it stopped moving. The other golems did the same and the dark forces behind the golems ran up and climbed the golems. The stones on the golems were used as ladders and stepping stones while the golem’s hand that covered the back of his head also covered the army. This was worse than the webbed wall!

“Block them. Block them!!” Iris shouted while climbing the stairs with his soldiers. Arknum, me and Xmoon followed suit. Even Itsa who was stationed as the gate’s guard brought his army. As the enemy ran towards us from the hill like bodies of golems we shot some arrows and killed several of them but they keep marching forward. War trolls made their way with giant hammers in their hands sending some of our soldiers flying. Paladins and mercenaries tried to guard but only veteran paladins managed to block them while fighting one on one. While the archer and mages were busy hitting them with arrows and magic.

Stella nimbly dodged and counterattacked with her rapiers. This time she wore a green cotton. The light armor seemed to provide little defense. But she was able to move incredibly fast with that. No hit has managed to land on her so far. Sometimes she countered with magic. I am always amazed seeing her fighting like she is dancing while blocking and countering, stabbing and dodging. Slashing and kicking. Double slash, circular slash. It was harmonious.

No time to be amazed now. I had my own battle in front of me. After using light bless and single bless on Iris (I deemed him more efficient than me). I charged and tried a poor imitation of what Stella was doing. I was not as graceful as her, sometimes I overreacted when I saw a sword slashing towards me. My damage was low due to my class penalty. I could afford several fireballs, but I decided to surrender my mana bar to a certain Pikachu that was buzzing and crackling somewhere. I felt like a meatshield now, doing nothing and just bothering enemies. Even Hasega did better than me in combat. I should learn and train blacksmithing until intermediate after this.

3 hours had passed. We were slowly pushed back to the second level. We were near Tantalus headquarters. After leaving a party gift of Stella’s curtain bullet fire seal which wiped the wall and a golem’s back clean we slowly retreated to the second level, archers climbed the second gate while Hasega and Iris with 50 veteran paladins blocked the entrance. This gate had no doors so it couldn’t be closed. We will have to bottleneck the enemy here for the best chance of survival. Kobolds, orcs and goblins rampaged through the city destroying everything they encountered. Several groups of soldiers were left behind because they were surrounded. Even with a buff, they wouldn’t last that long when surrounded from all sides.

“FIGHT!! Fight to the last man. We can win this. Don’t lose!! For our lives!” Hasega shouted a battle cry.

“Men, ready your shields! They are coming.” Iris said while pointing at the herd of.

Arrows were shot from above killing the first line but it was just the tip of the iceberg. Soon a rhino and a war roll paired up charging at us. Iris quickly ran forward trying to intercept the troll while the rhino’s charge was met head on with Hasega’s shield.

*BOOM*

A shockwave occurred after they clashed. Hasega was pushed back several meters but he managed to hold on. He has been improving a lot these days. He also got a shining shield with a solid defense. He was not far from Iris in terms of skill now. As he blocked the rhinos, the paladins sliced and banged the rhino from its sides killing it. Hasega then drank a healing potion recovering his HP completely. That charge from the rhino cost him almost half of his life.

Iris on the other hand showed magnificent sword play by dodging the wartroll’s club and slashing at its feet. After the wartroll went down he quickly climbed and stabbed its head. Well, after seeing that display, I guess Hasega still had a long way to go. But they both fight differently anyway so I couldn’t really measure their strength well.

Even with little mastery, Hector and Arknum had archery skills. They away now at some other section of the wall while firing their arrows. Their arrows hardly killed anything but at least the archers with them showed better results. It was just a desperate attempt to increase damage on enemies even a little really.

“We are losing. The enemy has archers stationed at the top of our houses. They are firing at us!” Iris said as he tried to run back to the paladins’ ranks. The paladins raised their shields but with the arrows being shot at them one after the other and the minions charging from the front, they took more damage. Should we retreat to the last level? The church portal was cut off during the siege. Either it was a game rule or Reis had intervened in the magic (He did disrupt our teleportation before). But if we retreat, we would lose 2 trebuchets and 1 ballista that were stationed on this level’s wall.

“We will not lose. Paladins. Fight bravely. We will not lose!!” Hasega shouted desperately. He was really on fire now I will have to do my best too then.

“El, shoot at the archers. Experienced archers! Shoot at the archers that are on the houses!“ I didn’t expect them to listen but surprisingly they did as I wanted. Some good archers from my group did as I had said while the other common archers (Self-evaluation) still shot at the goblins and orcs that were harassing our paladins.

Then a shadow passed by the paladins group. Behind them, there emerged armored black hounds. They seemed stronger than the one I had fought before. Why did the enemy monsters seem to power up greatly each time we encountered Reis?

I sighed for a while. Then I jumped from the wall behind the paladins with Xmoon and Itsa. “Paladins in the back, help me while the others continue the fight!” Xmoon ordered efficiently. He was saying what was on my minds with better and shorter words. I readied my sword and charged forward. Since I had the sword mastery skill, I did more damage than when I used my staff but it was still low regardless. This enemy was easy to defeat, but its problem lies with its numbers. They kept spawning here and there. I had killed 20 in the last hour while Xmoon and other paladins might have already hit 3 digit numbers. I needed 5 hits to kill one while he just needed one hit. I now knew why no one wanted this class. The penalties were ridiculous. Even my healing aura or group cure can do twice or trice the damage of my sword while my healing hands or expert cure could kill them in a single spell. Expert cure is overdoing it so I only used it on myself.

The problem was that the black dogs could climb the walls in their shadow form and appear right behind our archers and trebuchets. Ragnar tried to fend them of with the other reserve troops stationed there. Though they were low in level those hounds could cause a real distraction.

In place of mosquitos and dragonflies black birds soared in the skies. Their shape was eagle-like with long tails fluttering in the sky. These ones had an archer rider on their backs too. They shot arrows like crazy. Some even had mages on their back now and those mages were casting fireball spells. They were playing with our mages and archers now.

*Ragnar told you to pull back. We need to tighten our defences!*

“Umm, pull back. Everyone pull back!” I sounded the order.

“But we can’t fall back here!!” Hasega screamed.

“We will get surrounded if we linger here. The enemy dark hounds have breached the second level!” Iris shouted.

With this all of us gathered at the last level. Note that this place only had a white church and a great round square filled with trees on its sides. We were now moving our final line of defense to the level 2 entrances. One was guarded by Hasega and Iris while the other was guarded by Hector and Arknum. If you are wondering about Hasega’s companions, they were somewhere here as soldiers. Not all of us are leaders.

The black hounds then came behind the defensive line. Initiating an open battle at the square, the count and the noble group would have to draw their swords too. I was quite amazed that some fat nobles there managed to do as well as normal infantrymen. Sometimes fear increases someone’s strength by many folds.

Since healing spells were the most efficient here, I ordered El to stop her spells and I spammed my healing spells here and there. When I looked outside I could still see about 100.000 enemies lining up outside of Trisia. While we were down to our last 10 thousand here. I tried to calculate every possible method to turn the tables but I found none. This is just hopeless.

#SHIN#

A bombardment of healing magic cleared the black dogs and the black eagles at the square while healing us to our max health. When I looked above at the user of that healing magic I saw a white light and a white steed piercing through the dark skies. Ahh, it is that horned Pegasus bringing its Pegasus and unicorn friends. With a holy magic they cleared the entrance to the third level.

“Sorry. We are late. “

“How..” I stumbled at my words.

“Yggdrasil pondered for a long time whether to help the humans or not. But in the end he decided to help you defeat those monsters since other gods bugged him.” The horned Pegasus said. ”After all, he has personal grudge against him for destroying one of our forests.”

“We also brought some friends.”

“Len, Lin, Lan!!” Elkami shouted while hugging her fairy friends. After rough counting there were about 100 pegasi and unicorns with over 300 fairies. So we got about 500 new strong comrades.

Then Swogystar the horned pegasus asked. “So, who will ride us? We can fight alone but with a knight on our back we will do better.” I looked around only to see Hasega wagging his tail (he has no tail. It is just a metaphorical statement). He definitely wanted to ride one of those unicorns or pegasi.

“Alright, paladins and their leader please climb on unicorns’ backs while clerics and mages climb on pegasi’s backs.” I gave a statement. Hasega felt a little bit dejected and he shot looks of envy towards me when the horned unicorn rejected him saying that he only wanted to be ridden by me. He said that he somehow trusts me after he saw that I cared for El until the end.

And so, with the title of white rider in action plus Elkami on my shoulder, I was riding a horned white pegasus. Damn, I can’t stop smiling, I must look incredibly cool now.

‘Riri, you must control yourself. Focus. Don’t let anything distract you. Focus only on your enemies.’ I chanted those words in my head to bring my concentration back.

“Everyone. Charge!!” I led Hasega and Iris charging towards the left entrance while Hector and Arknum charged towards the right entrance. The power of the unicorns is no joke, the enemies in our way were cleared in an instant. While charging the pegasi even released some magic to clear the enemies that escaped the unicorns’ charge. Holy lightning, purification flame, mana ball, mana spear, Lightning strike, flame burst. The unicorns were well versed in light magic (Healing magic included) while the pegasi had a wider variety of magic flame and lightning spells.

Dusk then came and passed. The second level of this city was retaken by nightfall.. Maria didn’t fainted again as 2 or 3 pegasi were with her to maintain her magic, it couldn’t be helped that she had to stop the buff, but it was not so sudden anymore. She could raise it again when I deemed it necessary.

“Enigma of the flame god. Efreet’s fury!”

“Enigma of the earth god. Trees animation of Atlas!”

“Enigma of the wind god. Jupiter’s tornado!”

When the night came, the unicorn and Pegasus squad was guarding the second level entrances. This was the plan because the little fairies were now levelling the ground level part of the city.

“Holy.. can I have that one too as a pet?” Iris commented.

Well, that was to be expected. Those fairies were real powerhouses despite their tiny bodies. Enigma spells were cast here and there. Meteors rained towards the city, a volcano abruptly erupted spitting some rocks covered in flames, a freaking tornado formed all of a sudden in another part of the city. Trees came to life and were kicking some dark forces. In short the dark forces were being annihilated. Around 100.000 enemies inside the ground level were annihilated and then with the rest of the troops outside, they pulled their forces back.

It was past midnight and we had taken back the city. The dark force retreated but I could still see Reis standing there not budging an inch. He hasn’t given up yet. With several men posted here and there as night guards, we finally managed to get some rest. Iris, Hasega, Victor and other members tried to make a contract with the fairies like I did with praises and flattery. But the fairies said with flustering cute voices that they are forbidden to make a contract with others especially humans.

Elkami was an exception since El is now aligned with the dark, by the law of the forest, she was supposed to be exiled. Even though Yggdrasil was pretty sad about this, he had no choice, El was supposed to be left dead and buried somewhere in the forest. Her soul would not return to Yggdrasil as the corruption in her soul would poison the god. Rather than dying a dog’s death Yggdrasil decided to bind her soul into a weapon and gave it to the most worthy and caring of humans. It was supposed to be forbidden as the power of these fairies is no joke. But Riri fit the criteria of a caring and kind person so Yggdrasil entrusted El’s soul to her now.

And so, they turned towards the Unicorns and Pegasi. But their answer was pretty much the same, feeling dejected, the players (Hasega co, Iris, and the other humans) just lied down somewhere and went to sleep. With a blanket I slept at the front walls where I stand before the battle began. I decided to stay here with Swogystar. I procured some blankets for him as well. The blankets were rough so he threw them away. As the Pegasi have a high resistance against cold, he had no trouble sleeping naked in the middle of the night. I was not sleeping alone as Stella also slept beside me.

There was almost no difference between the battlefield in front of me and the city behind me. The second level still had some houses intact but the first level was destroyed beyond repair. Not even piles of stones and wood that made up the houses were left. The fairies did a better job than bulldozers with their magic. Well, houses can be rebuild. The important thing now is our lives

“I am sorry.” Stella whispered in her sleep. Does she have a nightmare?

“It is fine. It is not your fault.” I whispered back into her ear and continued to sleep.

The buff was deactivated.

http://www.royalroadl.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=350&t=3728http://www.royalroadl.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=350&t=3762&p=23807#p23807

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Author note

- 2 chapters at once. enjoy.

- questions, comments, suggestions are welcomed in here and discussion topic. :hi: