Chapter 32 Part 2 of 3 (Patreon)

Marco frowned looking in the direction of the noise.

“What is that?”

“I will check with the sect ahead,” he pulled out a communication device.

Marco released his reins and pulled out his map.

Once we can get into Vuzgal Valley, I’ll use the planning cart.

He turned the map so Vuzgal sat in the center. The southern mountains around Vuzgal are impossible to cross with anything but aerial beasts, which are rare and expensive. They also have defensive ringed walls around the Alchemist’s valley that Vuzgal sits in the mouth of.

He traced the sweeping lines in the south and north that splintered into smaller lines, like  roots digging through the mountains themselves.

Vuzgal Valley is wild forests other than the area around Vuzgal City and the roads that cut to the east and west.

His eyes fell on the two forces moving down the main roads towards Vuzgal.

“Still nothing,” Marco put the map away.

“You keep frowning like that cousin and you’ll scare all the girls away!”

Leonia faced a glare, her smile disappeared and she lowered her head.

“We have reports of the whistling devices being used!” An aide said.

“Raise mana barriers!” Marco ordered.

The aides hesitated.

“Do it.” Marco snarled. “What about those noises?”

“I’m sorry sir. I haven’t been able to get in contact with any of them.”

His personal guards turned to their formation cart activating their mana barrier.

It materialized in the air and covered the ground.

“Skittish, must be their first fight to put up a barrier when we haven’t even seen the enemy already.”

“Waste of mana stones,” another fighter agreed.

Others repeated similar statements but Marco paid no attention, pulling out his map.

He could hear more of the dull noises in the distance, they fell like a constant rain.

If we are here, then those must be hitting to the west, here.

Marco looked around, his finger pointing at the mountain paths.

“Paths are being hit with that whistling rain spell,” another aide reported as they updated their linked maps.

“They knew where we were coming from and how we would try to attack,” Marco said calmly as if it was all within his expectations. Just a simple trading city in the Fourth Realm.

“I want all of our mana barriers up now!”

Toufpht Toufpht Toufpht.

Marco, like others, looked up to see Sparrows descending from the heavens like the Devil’s own messengers, repeaters along their sides fired twin angry red lines projected out of their chest.

Explosions came before the screaming.

The birds flew in formation, three in the lead with four trailing behind that dropped glowing boulders.

Formation covered metal shells?

They struck the ground as the god’s own hammers. A fifty meter area was vaporized; winds tossed around people, carts, trees and beasts, like playthings. The aerial formation swept down the convoy.

Marco watched the red lines rake his mana barrier, the formation covered metal shells ignited on the barrier’s surface, the explosive force rebounded, clearing trees and killing those outside the barrier, but it held.

As fast as they arrived the aerial formation was once again climbing into the heavens, leaving a path of destruction through the convoy.

A few had been able to pull up mana barriers in time, but the several thousand strong convoy had less than two thousand that could still fight.

Even Marco’s elite guards were shaken by the sheer destruction.

This is happening across all of the routes, in different ways. If we move slowly they will destroy us as they did the Blood Demon Sect. They have had more time to prepare for this kind of fight. We need to throw them off balance. Close with them as soon as possible.

“Order our armies to charge towards Vuzgal as fast as possible!” He turned to the aides who were hunched over their maps, trying to get as close to the ground as possible.

“Give my orders now! If we are too slow then they will grind us down!”

The aides pulled out their sound transmission devices.

“Come on! Hyah!” He snapped his reins and increased his pace, forcing the rest of them into movement.

He didn’t look down as his mount’s sharpened claws drew cries and screams from those that didn’t move fast enough or weren’t able to move.

“Faster, faster!” He yelled, his riders moved with him as they charged forwards feeling the pounding of their beast’s charge.

***

“They what? Charged?” Domonos stared at the map deciphering the ever changing symbols and placements.

Morning had just broke, but Domonos was at his peak.

He stood in the heart of Vuzgal, the under-city’s command center.

The command center was a square room with an inverted U of desks around the outside. In the middle of the room there was a map of Vuzgal and surrounding lands.

The mountain ranges to the north, east, and south with the Chaotic Lands to the east.

A large arm was moved up the map and the formation at its end adjusted. On the main wall the view changed, showing what was under the formation but magnified multiple times. Smaller projection formations were looking at other areas appearing on the two side walls. Information was streaming into the cartographers who added the changes to their maps and then added it to the main map. The map was linked to every member of the Vuzgal army.

Trees that appeared one moment changed with the updated map, disappeared into craters the next, as aerial forces bombed the fighters hiding underneath.

Glowing markers showed where artillery platoons were set up and the path of the aerial forces as they were guided by communications officers onto their targets.

Many of the paths into Vuzgal valley had been covered in mortar fire where it could reach, the Kestrel's raked where they couldn’t. Sparrows were diving, targeting the supply lines.

Aides were alive, transforming and changing the map as new information came in.

Now the swords had turned into arrows that were charging forward without regard.

“They pushed heavy, guessing they tried to find our lines and break through them. The sects are all over the place.

“They charged us and broke apart. If we had forces down there to fight them it would have allowed them to regroup. Don’t think they’re used to an enemy hitting them far away and not getting in close to steal their shit. Command and control is a mess, there are lost units walking in circles. Reinforcements and supplies are stuck in the passes as we keep hammering them. Some units are using mana barriers but the uneven and broken terrain is fucking them up.” Zukal smiled. “They’re a fucking mess.”

“I love good news, but they reacted faster than I thought and while they are fucked up, spreading out and pushing forward as fast as possible is the best move for them,” Domonos said

"Looks like panic or orders and they rushed through the mortar fire, some ran right into the trap fields some made it through," an aide reported.