Part Sixty-Eight

Snnnnrf, hahaha, oh man! That was hilarious. What the heck did he do to do that to himself? Wait, is that what ramping mana looks like? It certainly didn’t look as bad as the Archmage made it seem, but maybe that was relatively tame? Though if that had been Miasma instead of wind…

That thought was rather chilling. Even if the Miasma was only half as thick as it was for [Rot], then it could’ve done a great deal of damage. It was no wonder the Archmage had warned me about the dangers of Grudge Magic. I’d need to ensure I kept a strict hold on my mana.

Actually, how would that work? I can’t even make Miasma without Grudge, so shouldn’t there be no danger of my mana running wild like that? Unless there’s something more to it, then it shouldn’t be an issue for now. Now, what’s Alicia up to?

She’d attended both lessons, as well as asking Kalia to give her extra lessons. She was quite determined to Awaken before the Dungeon ended. Considering I’d Awakened on accident, I didn’t know how much longer it was going to take her to do so herself. Though it appeared she wouldn’t succeed for now.

“Alright everyone, that’s enough for today. We’ll pick back up tomorrow at the same time. Now ,those that successfully Awakened today should keep practicing the basic exercises. The first few days after Awakening are the most dangerous.”

Wait, I just realized something. Awakening is basically the process of acquiring your natural affinity and unlocking the first kind of magic you can use, right? But Kalia made it sound like the two were separate processes. What I just saw implies that they’re one and the same, so what gives? Her advice lined up near-perfectly with what the Archmage said, so I doubt she was lying to us. Hrm, could she have had a misconception about it? I’ve always thought it was weird that knew so much about magic, but not about Skills in general. There’s something I’m missing here, and pondering it isn’t going to help.

I wouldn’t have had long to ponder anyway.

“Ah, one more thing. All members of the strike squad are to gather in the conference room in an hour. Please let everyone not here know.”

Oh no. Here we go again.

Every mission we’d been given had all ended in highly irritating, or dangerous, situations for me. It was starting to get to the point where I just hated the idea of going to the conference room. Nothing good had come from going there. Though maybe this one would be different.

Hah! Yeah right. And I’ll start getting along with everyone. I can already tell, this is going to be a pain in the ass. I’ll just go collect-. Wait, where’s Alicia? She was just there a moment ago, so where’d she go?

“Cameron, did you see where Alicia went? I could’ve sworn she was here just a moment ago.”

“She was. Huh, where’d she go? It’s not like her to wander off like that. That’s more like you than her.”

“While that may be true, and well deserved, it still hurts. I mean, I know I can be a little aloof, but you guys don’t have to keep bringing it up.”

“Er?”

“I’m well aware of my flaws, or most of them at least. You don’t have to rub it in. Ehem, but yeah, it’s not like her to just leave out of nowhere like that. You don’t think someone grabbed her, do ya?”

“It’s unlikely. There’s too many people to make a clean escape. And even if they could, do you really see anyone being able to kidnap Alicia?”

“Good point. I’d almost feel sorry for whoever tried take her, considering she’d probably stab them. Oh wait, she probably snuck out of here with Stealth. Hm, which means she wants to be left alone right now?”

I’d almost forgotten she had that Skill. It hadn’t been all that useful inside the Dungeon. Since most of the monsters simply charged straight at the fort, there was little call for such maneuvers.

“So we just leave her for now?”

“Guess so. Welp, I’m gonna go brood somewhere. I’ll see ya later.”

I’m definitely not sneaking off to find Alicia. Definitely not.

***

*POP!*

Ah! Another failure. Damnit! I just can’t get this to work!!

She watched as yet another arrow disinterested into dust, the result of a failed Imbuing. A few days ago, after she’d gotten Imbuement, she’d thought of two ways she could use it, ways that would work on relatively hard to fight enemies like Golems. And yet, neither had worked.

It wasn’t that her ideas were bad, just that she didn’t have enough proficiency with the Skill to execute it. The only remedy for that was to keep practicing and raise her proficiency with the Skill enough so that she could do what she wanted. But since just making Blitz and Lancing Arrows would be boring, she’d tried to make several different types of arrow, only for nearly every idea to fail.

Only two had actually worked. Grenade Arrows, which exploded on contact, and Drift Arrows, which were immune to, ironically, the drifting caused by air currents. Both weren’t exactly stellar ideas, but at least she now had a way to damage inanimate monsters like Golems. Anything more advanced would have to wait until either her Skill went up, or she had more mana to experiment with.

Haaah, there’s still like, twelve hours until I can talk again. Observer’s effects are really useful, but are just as annoying to use. Wouldn’t a single day make more sense? Or even just an hour?

In the end, she created two Grenade Arrows and a dozen Drift Arrows. Even if they weren’t as good as the other ideas she’d had, they were still better than nothing.

Since it was nearly time for the meeting, she gathered her things up and made for the conference room. As she went, she held her hand out, cupping a single small, jagged glyph, which soon transformed into a series of bright sparks. Practicing was important, even if just to keep her newly Awakened mana in check.

***

“So, we’ve got a massive problem on our hands. The monsters are mobilizing heavily, more than we’ve seen since the start of the siege. It’s possible we may be looking at a large-scale assault, one which may have tens of thousands of monsters. Maybe even half of the remaining Army in the worst-case scenario.”

My, and everyone in the room's, blood ran cold at that. Up to now, the biggest wave we’d faced was twelve thousand or so monsters. For maybe twice that or more to be on the table, well…

Shit, talk about a difficulty spike. I bet this is because we killed the Orc General.

But just before true panic could set in, the Commander continued on.

“Of course, we are not merely going to sit around and let them do so. No, we will fight to very end. Aliver and the mage corps have already established a plan to halt or slow their assault. As such, the Archmage will take command of these efforts. Myself, and the other soldiers, will be undertaking tasks of our own to improve the forts defenses. Aliver, the floor is yours.”

“Thank you Commander. Now obviously the news that a large-scale assault is imminent isn’t something to celebrate, but I believe this to be an opportunity of sorts. For while the monsters may be preparing to attack us, it also leaves them open to attack.”

“How so Archmage? Wouldn’t the monsters be on high alert? If they’re planning to attack, then won’t they be looking for saboteurs?”

“A human army would be, but most monsters lack the intelligence or discipline needed to fully guard their borders. Except for highly intelligent monsters like the Mivians, most will be too preoccupied with their preparations to keep a vigilant watch. And so we will use their laxity to throw a proverbial wrench into the works, and slow their progress down.”

It was actually a pretty good plan. Send us out, and have us cause as much mayhem as possible. It was simple, but effective. There was just one concern.

“So, are we hitting one big target, or a few small ones?”

“About that. In order to ensure we cause as much disruption to them as possible, we have selected dozens of targets to attack, ranging from supply convoys to mid-management monsters.” Wait what?

A quick headcount revealed that there were only twenty something groups among the strike squad. We’d started with less than a dozen, but recent events being what they were, the elite roster had changed quite a bit. But that meant that the Archmage’s plan wasn’t tenable, unless…

“Uh, sir? Even if you sent out each group on their own, we’d need to hit multiple targets. Isn’t that a bit difficult for every group to do?”

“It would be, if that was how we were proceeding. Everyone will be divided up into groups of five, and assigned a targ-.” Oh no.

The uproar that ensued was almost inevitable. It was bad enough back when we had to work with multiple groups, but now he wanted to divide us up? I mean, I could see the point of it, but it wasn’t easy to accept. And nearly everyone was trying to protest that decision.

“SILENCE! This is not debatable! First of all, all of your groups are imbalanced and have uneven numbers. Even if we were to break the larger groups down to even the numbers out, it would be difficult to ensure that each group had an even amount of combat potential. Secondly, each of the targets has been thoroughly vetted to ensure that a smaller group can deal with it. Finally, there is no other way to cause a big enough impact to the monster’s forces to disrupt their offensive. If one of you had a better plan, I’d like to hear it.”

Naturally, no one had one. The Archmage continued speaking after a few minutes.

“Then we will proceed as planned. If there are any other questions, now is the time.”

It was Braddock, one of the more reasonable mercenaries, who responded to the Archmage.

“How will you divide us up? Even if you try to ensure an equilibrium among the groups, surely you can’t be aware of the relationships between us. What happens if you assign two people to the same group, and they can’t stand one another? Wouldn’t that imbalance the groups?”

Damn he’s good!! That was a logical argument completely separate from emotion. How will the Archmage respond?

“Simple. We’ve selected individuals who have displayed competence in decision-making to act as captains for each group. Thus the final line-ups will up to you. Is that acceptable?”

Even though many were still reluctant, this was as good of a compromise as we’d get, so they agreed. Fighting with the NPCs wouldn’t earn us anything. It would only bring about unnecessary strife.

“So since that’s out of the way, shall we proceed to the rest of the explanation?”