Chapter 785. A Long Siege
"Let me!" The players heard a voice and saw Commander Quintus arrive. When the special elite enemy was about to stab the commander, his body split into twenty shadows. The twenty shadows struck at the dagger-wielding special elite as well as the soldier that had just come up the ladder.
The soldier that had just come up was struck by several shadows. He was pushed back and fell away from the wall. The dagger-wielding special elite received the majority of Commander Quintus' shadow strikes. He suffered a large amount of damage and was forced away from the ladder. He was then surrounded by several of commander Quintus' aides.
While the special elite enemy was preoccupied, Commander Quintus lifted his super long katana high. His katana burst with a dark flame. He slashed down. A streak of dark light followed his slash. His katana hit the latch that was holding the ladder and broke it. The ladder slowly detached from the wall and fell away, carrying several soldiers that were half climbing the ladder.
The current Commander Quintus was also stronger than when Jack first met him. He was like Duke Alfredo and Bailey. He had received the Council of Virtus' blessing and training. He had undergone a breakthrough like Bailey. His level had not only increased to 65, but his grade also increased to Rare Elite.
The players aided the natives and fought the dagger-wielding special elite. Being alone, the special elite was soon defeated. Commander Quintus had run to another side to help deal with the other ladders.
The fight continued for a long time. The two ballistae at the front corners as well as the two catapults all concentrated their attacks on the legion that was battering the front wall. The legion was too many for the defending army to vanquish. However, the legion also did not achieve any significant progress in breaching the wall. The wall's HP and defense were too high. After half a day of fighting, the wall's HP was still above 90%. Even the gate's HP was only a bit below 90%.
The ladder climbing was also not so effective. The siege ladders were reusable tools. Despite their latches being destroyed, after a short cooldown, the latches would repair themselves. The soldiers could then latch the ladders and climbed them again. Even so, most climbing soldiers failed to climb up before the latches were destroyed again.
In the end, the attacking forces suffered more casualties while the defending force suffered almost none.
All the while, Duchess Isabelle was keeping Arther busy in the air. Their clashes continued to create thundering sounds that kept reminding the armies below that the battle was far from over.
After almost a day, a horn was heard from the main base of the sieging army. Hearing the horn, the assaulting force slowed down before starting to retreat. The defending force on the wall looked at the retreating legion while panting. Their adrenaline was still high. They watched the surrounding army on alert, believing that another attack would be coming from a different side.
Arther who was in the air also stopped his offense. Duchess Isabelle didn't push on the offensive when she saw her opponent end his aggression.
"You are a worthy opponent," Arther praised. "Despite spending your time mostly at court, you are surprisingly a very able combatant."
"I am also surprised. Your reputation as a war hero is not just hollow recognition," Duchess Isabelle returned.
"Heh. Let's do this again another day," Arther said. He then flew away, following his retreating army. Duchess Isabelle watched the retreating war hero for a bit longer before teleporting back to the fort.
"Are you all right?" Prince Alonzo asked. The prince had also joined the fight on the wall with Samuel and Jeanny on his side. Even with their protection, Alonzo was not without wounds.
"As long as he is involved, I won't be able to help in defending," Isabelle answered.
Prince Alonzo nodded. He watched the army surrounding them with a grim expression.
After the two attacking legions returned, a survey was immediately conducted. An officer soon came to Prince Therribus to report the results of today's attack. Out of the 34,000 troops that were sent, they lost more than 10,000 soldiers. As for the defending army, they estimated the loss was only around 800. They lost more than ten times the defending army. If one only saw the comparison, anyone would say the attacking side had suffered a huge loss.
"Should we go all out tomorrow?" Garland asked. "From the look of today's battle, we should be able to destroy them if we send everyone."
"We can, but we will also suffer a huge loss," Prince Therribus answered. After pondering for a while, he said, "No, we will play the long siege. There is no need in gambling everything. Their supplies are limited. As long as we keep them on a siege, they will run out of supplies and will have no choice but to come out. We can easily destroy them then."
"What about their reinforcement army who is on the way here?" Garland asked.
"What about them? They are only half our number. Not only that, more than half of them consisted of outworlders. If they meet us in an open field, they will be the ones who are crushed. That will be fine as well. If the ones inside that fort see us squash their reinforcement, their morale will drop. They will become easier prey."
"The report says that those cowering inside the fort managed to collect supplies that probably last them three weeks. So, we will wait that long?"
"We might not need to. Claudius!" Therribus called. "How goes those siege weapons?"
"They are en route, Your Highness," Claudius answered. "Because all of us rushed here in speed, we cannot carry the siege weapons. But they continued being transported as we speak. Looking at their speed, they should arrive in two more weeks."
"Then two weeks from now, we will bombard that fort. Let's see if they can still hide inside when those walls are no more," Therribus said with a grin.
In the following days, Therribus' army maintained its encirclement. Therribus didn't send large forces anymore like he did the first day they arrived, but he still sent small forces to harass the defenders continuously, even at night. Simply to keep the defenders on edge.
The small forces were mostly high defense units that retreated once their HP was low, hence minimizing the loss. The defenders didn't know if those small skirmishes were only distractions before Therribus sent a large force, as he did on the first day. The tense situation kept the defenders from being fully at rest. Hence, supply consumption continued at a steady rate. The defenders couldn't ration the supplies too much or the soldiers would not be at their best when a real attack did come.
On the fourth day after he arrived, Therribus noticed the defenders' response to the skirmishes weakened. So, he sent another legion of twenty thousand soldiers. After half a day of battle, Therribus pulled back his soldiers after seeing that the legion was unable to breach the defense. Even though the attack failed, the defenders had woken up and were on alert again. Thus, Therribus didn't consider the attack as wasted. He ordered his army to resume with small skirmishes again. The situation continued in this way for days.
The defenders could see their enemies' intention, but there was nothing they could do about it. They could only hope the situation would be different when the reinforcement army arrived.
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The reinforcement army continued to march at a steady rate. With Jack and his vanguard army clearing the road, they didn't encounter a situation where they needed to slow down.
John complained about why Jack didn't share the exp points this time. Jack asked John back if he had three classes that need feeding? Jack explained he needed to be in tip-top condition or else he also won't be able to do anything in the war. Hence, he had decided to be a bit selfish this time.
Although the monsters they passed through were generally below level 40, with only a few short areas having monsters above level 40, Jack's level still increased at a faster pace than usual. A day before they arrived near Fort Garadhor, Jack's all classes had increased in level. His Blade Dancer increased by one level to 47, his Archmage increased by two levels to 47, and his Beastmaster increased by one to level 46. While in his Container of Souls, there were 384,000 souls.
Jack figured that once they clashed with Therribus' army, his exp and soul's income would skyrocket, considering if his regiment didn't get wiped out miserably.
He used the 12 free attribute points for his Wisdom stat again. While for his free skill points, after some consideration, he used all the free skill points from Blade Dancer, Archmage, and Beastmaster, totaling 12 skill points, in addition to 300,000 souls to level up Spirit Weapon 15 times. Spirit Weapon was a skill received from a Universal Technique Book, such a skill was permitted to be leveled up using skill points from any classes.
His Spirit Weapon was now level 16. Each level-up increased the skill's duration by 24 seconds. His Spirit Weapon could now last eight minutes long. If he max-level it, the Spirit Weapon would last ten long minutes. He figured that during the war, there will be a long grueling battle, so the longer his Spirit Weapon lasted, the better.
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