I have been scaling the tunnels and the paths around the fire altar. It is a bit of a hassle due to my left leg. (While it has been healing pretty well, I still can't put weight on it.) The reason that I am doing this is to do a final check of all the formations for one last time.
I am also trying to make a mental image of the three paths in my head. The reason that I do this is to make sure that I know all about how the enemy will attack these paths. Technically speaking, any person with a half-decent mana sense should be able to do it.
I would say that Alfred would be able to do this even better than me. I am not sure about Amelia, but even she should be able to do it. One problem is that relying on them for such a thing will certainly be a hit on my authority. I can barely command these people as it is. The only reason that they are bothering to follow me is because the patriarch has commanded them.
If Alfred or Amelia were to start questioning my commands (or, gods forbid, give their own commands.), it would lead to a rift. When that time inevitably comes, I want them to have as little authority as possible. After all, I am certainly in no shape to fight them in a duel.
Another problem is that I am the only person here who knows exactly how all the traps have been placed. Alfred or Amelia would have inevitably set off all the traps here if I were to give them this task.
I also don't want them setting off my little trap. They would end up dying due to that, and that would have the Mayfires hanging me by the end of the day. I will be honest. I think that I am being a bit paranoid. Still better to plan for the worst-case scenario, I say.
They may be very good allies of ours. They also would not like that relationship to be damaged. That doesn't mean that the Mayfires are going to think of me as anything other than an outsider. They are very good allies, but I have seen brothers hunt brothers to prove their superiority. What is an ally in front of that?
On top of that, a significant bunch of the Mayfires look at me as if they are looking at a vampire. They don't realize that I am supposed to be different from the vampires that have been attacking them.
A majority still support me, but you never know what can happen in the heat of the moment.
Anyway, I am not one to leave such a vital task so late. The reason that I am doing it now is so that I don't remain in the fire altar. After all, the patriarch is going to be leaving on this attack of his within a couple of hours.
Right now, inside, every soldier is preparing for this attack with mad energy. Even the young ones who are going to remain behind here with me are helping the soldiers pack.
I wish that they had allowed me to observe this preparation of theirs. I would have learned so much about their secrets. Well, there is a limit to how trusting the mayfires will be.
I am sure that they are preparing every single trick that they have for this fight. That is why I am out here. Trying to get inside now would have meant offending the Mayfires. The relationship between the Mayfires and the black mountain would have been damaged. Anyway, Trevor is inside. I am sure that Trevor is in there, recording all the juicy details anyway. (You can refer to his logs for that.)
Well, trying to enter back into the fire altar would be pretty stupid. The soldiers will find a convenient excuse to leave me out here. Why increase my work and theirs by trying to pull it off? After all, I need these people to succeed as well. I guess that I should make use of this time to discuss what they are even planning to pull off here.
To explain their plan of attack, I will first have to explain what the fuck is even going on here. Before I start, I have to point out that it has mostly been Trevor who has learned these things.
The soldiers are just too alert around me, Jacob and Andrew for us to learn anything. Everything that we have learned here comes from what Trevor has learned. The people don't mind gossiping with Trevor. So there might be a possibility that some details are not true.
You see, at the beginning of this mess, the necromancers had managed to catch the mayfires by surprise. They quickly managed to conquer large chunks of the fortress. (How exactly they made it in here is something that we haven't managed to learn yet. We also don't know why they have not destroyed the outer keep, entering here.)
By the time the mayfires managed to react, they had lost most parts of the fort. Still, they retreated to the fire altar and quickly set up the barrier between the outer keep and the inner keep. Right now, it is separating the necromancers from the rest of the city. This was the only thing that gave them a fighting chance against the enemy.
The fire altar is acting as a makeshift mana battery powering the barrier. If they had not managed to put up this barrier, the mayfires would have all been defeated in a matter of a week.
A populated city is the worst place in which you can fight a necromancer after all. The Mayfires did a pretty good job restricting them like this. After all, the Mayfire Castle is pretty heavily populated.
A necromancer army here would have been a threat to even the hexmountain. Anyway, the necromancers managed to take control of the southern part of the fort. This is where they have built their base. This is the area in which all of the formation arrays of the Mayfires are present.
These arrays contain all of the defenses that the mayfires have. The things that they can use to attack the enemy and get rid of them quickly.
Thankfully, the mayfires have protection present against the activation of these formations. Only authorized people can activate them. Thankfully, the necromancers have yet to break through these defenses. That means that they won't be using these formations against the Mayfires at least.
Still, by taking over the place, they have managed to make the mayfires weaponless in this fight. Even the mayfire's barrier cannot be maintained forever. After all, the mana present at the fire altar is not infinite.
They estimate that they will not be able to power the barrier anymore in about half a month. That is why there is a desperate edge to the people here.
Anyways, even if they could maintain the barriers for long enough. It is not like they would have been able to hold against the encroaching undead. Fighting a battle of attrition against a necromancer is stupid. Every soldier that you lose means that they gain a soldier. I also think that they are getting bodies from the outer keep.
The necromancers might not be able to get out, but I think the Bloodfire gang is supplying them with bodies. It is going to be much easier than for a living person to breach the barriers. They certainly would not need to blow holes in the barrier to get the bodies in. (You can be a bit rougher with bodies.)
The necromancers had started this fight with only the corpses of the servants in this place. Slowly and steadily, though, they have been growing their army here. If that barrier were to fall now, this army would become ten times its present size.
Right now, we have not managed to confirm just how many people have been lost here. We just know that it is a significantly large number. This all means that the mayfires won't be able to hold on for long. Right now, the only option they have left is to attack the enemy and take back the fort.
That is where their plan of attack comes in. The mayfires are betting their survival on a single attack. If it succeeds, it will allow them to take over the enemy stronghold. It will also help them get back their weapons.
The main problem that the mayfires are facing while trying to attack this base is the barrier. The necromancers have covered their base in a kind of toxic miasma. You can barely resist it by channeling your vital mana. When you have to face a group of necromancers you cannot handicap yourself in this manner, though. Trying to fight them inside this miasma is stupidly dangerous.
With their abilities, the Mayfires should be able to quickly take over the enemy base. That is why the patriarch needed a method to burn the miasma.
The plan is simple if you were to think about it. The attacking forces are going to split themselves into two groups. The first group is the patriarch and the formation mages. The second group is the remaining mayfires.
The second group will attract the attention of the enemy. They will essentially be acting as bait. Their job is to make the necromancers divert their undead to them.
Then the first group is going to be getting close to this miasma while sneaking around the undead. They will then make use of the mana in the fire altar to power some kind of a powerful spell. They theorize that it should be able to burn through the miasma.
Once that happens, the second group is going to attack the undead along with the first group. With all of the necromancer's army stuck in this pincer, they should fall pretty quickly. At least that is the hope.
It is a pretty risky plan, but I think that the Mayfires have no other option right now. Even this last gamble of theirs, they are trying out because I have come here. After all, this plan of theirs is forcing them to commit all of their resources to attack.
If the enemy were to attack the fire altar during this period, then it would all go to waste. The patriarch would have no way to destroy the miasma. After all, what is the use of projecting when the mana inside the barrier is lost? The enemy can do that by destroying the barrier around the altar. Well, I and the young masters are here to stop exactly that, but it is not going to be easy.
On top of that projection is always a risky process. Even if the formation mages somehow succeed in controlled projection. There is always the chance that something else will go wrong. The sword could get overloaded with mana. Then who knows what will happen? It could simply explode. It could cause the entire fortress to melt. There are so many things that could go wrong.
I can see why they are taking a risk, though. If they succeed with this plan of theirs, they will be able to quickly take back their weapons. Once they do that, the necromancers will be pretty easy to get rid of. Then they can ambush the pirates in the outer keep as well. With the guard corps coming, it would let them take back the city with minimal damage.
If they fail, though, they will be hunted like prey in their fort. The move that the patriarch is planning will completely drain the fire altar of mana.
It won't be able to maintain the barrier anymore. The necromancers will be allowed into the city. Once there, they will slaughter everybody in the outer keep to raise their new soldiers. The archer is holding back the guard corps. The time that the archer will buy will allow the necromancers to quickly raise an army in the outer keep.
The guard corps would not be able to hold against the army. They will finally be forced to give up their mission to the legion. I don't want to imagine the destruction that they will be bringing to this place. They would flatten the soldar plains in the process of destroying the necromancers. You can be certain of that.
Well, my work is cut out in all of this. I don't need to think about the patriarch and his success. My thinking about it will not help me in any way. Instead, I should be focusing on making sure that nobody will manage to breach the fire altar or damage it in any way.
If they manage to breach the fire altar during this process, we will all be dead. There is a pretty good chance that the entire plan will fail on the spot. If that were to happen, it does not matter whether the patriarch succeeded or not. We all will die.
Well, there I go working myself into a panic again. I am shutting down this log for now.