The Sword Saint turned the tide completely.
She wasn't just fighting- she was performing. Every movement flowed into the next with impossible grace, her blade tracing arcs of light through the darkness. Any creature that got close was sliced cleanly in two. Some she killed on the approach. Others died on her backswing, their bodies still falling as she moved to the next target.
Her form moved mesmerizingly through the chaos, dancing in the starlit night. Her armor caught the firelight from the burning trenches, transforming it into something molten and alive. She blazed across the battlefield like a comet, trailing death.
She was single-handedly holding back the horde.
Leon watched, transfixed. He'd seen skilled fighters before- soldiers who trained their whole lives, warriors who'd survived dozens of battles. Movie main characters on a rage run, beating all odds. This was different. This was art. This was something so far beyond normal human capability that it redefined what he thought was possible.
Around him, the other mages had stopped calling orders. Everyone was watching her. Even the monsters seemed uncertain, their mindless charge faltering at the edge of her reach.
Lord Casimir was the first to recover.
"SOLDIERS!" His voice cracked like a whip. "FORM UP!"
The command snapped Leon back to focus. The war was still raging. The Sword Saint was incredible, but she was one person against thousands. Tens of thousands.
The soldiers were responding to Casimir's voice, muscle memory overriding their shock. Shields locked back into position. Spears snapped up. The formation that had shattered minutes ago was reforming, the line stabilizing around the Sword Saint's position.
Leon forced himself to look away from her, to survey the broader battlefield.
The fourth tower had resumed bombardment, spells lancing out in steady sequence. The mages up there were still fighting, still following the rotation schedule he'd set. But they were just one tower now. The impact wasn't enough. Not against the volume still pouring through the gate.
Three towers lost. Seventy-five mages dead or scattered.
Leon looked to his right, at the mages on the rampart beside him. They watched the battlefield with a mixture of emotions- awe at the Sword Saint, horror at the casualties, exhaustion from maintaining formations for hours.
The frontline was still too far. Spells fired from here had a high likelihood of hitting allies. The careful calculations he'd made assumed the towers would still be standing, creating clear firing lanes.
Those assumptions were dead.
Leon pushed off the railing and marched to the foremost ledge overlooking the battlefield. His hands were shaking. He didn't let himself think about what he was about to do.
He'd planned this as a last-minute resort. A hidden card he'd hoped not to play.
At the edge of the rampart sat a covered shape, ten feet long, angular under the canvas. Leon grabbed the sheet and pulled it off.
The formation beneath was massive- the largest single spell circle he'd created. It covered the entire forward section of the rampart, carved directly into the stone over two sleepless nights. But what made it unique was the structure built into it.
A long muzzle extended from the formation's focal point. An idea he'd taken from modern firearms- longer barrels for long-range accuracy and force concentration. Except this barrel would channel magical energy instead of bullets.
A magical cannon.
"FORMATION!" Leon's voice came out hoarse. " MAGES, POSITIONS NOW!"
They moved immediately, no questions, taking positions around the massive circle. Forty mages. That was the formation's drawback- it needed an enormous amount of power to function. Leon had wanted to refine it, reduce the power requirements, use projectiles instead of magic, add safety mechanisms. He'd needed more time.
He didn't have more time.
The mages settled into their positions, hands already glowing as they prepared to channel. Leon moved to the aiming mechanism- a simple pivot system he'd designed, nothing fancy, just functional.
The formation started up. The circle blazed to life, lines of blue-white light racing along the carved channels. Power built at the focal point, visible even to non-mages as a sphere of condensed energy that grew brighter and brighter.
Leon aimed the muzzle at the gate. At the horde still pouring through, endless and mindless.
He fired.
The release was catastrophic.
A beam of pure magical force erupted from the muzzle with a sound like reality tearing. It crossed the battlefield in an instant, a lance of white light that carved through everything in its path.
Monsters simply ceased to exist where the beam touched them. Destroyed.
The beam punched through the horde, through the killing ground, through the mass packed around the gate itself. It cleared a corridor of death hundreds of meters long, all the way into the gate and beyond.
When it stopped, Leon counted to three. The mages around the formation collapsed, completely exhausted, their reserves depleted.
The gate was empty. Clear. The shot had taken out thousands- maybe tens of thousands, he hoped - in a single moment.
For three heartbeats, the battlefield was silent.
Then someone- Leon never found out who- shouted: "THE HIGH ARCHMAGE HAS TAKEN ACTION!"
The cry was picked up. Repeated. It spread through the army like wildfire.
"THE ARCHMAGE! THE ARCHMAGE!"
Soldiers who'd been on the edge of breaking rallied. They shouted, bellowed in unison, voices hoarse but defiant. The formation that had been barely holding surged forward, pushing into the cleared ground, reclaiming territory.
Leon barely heard them. He was already signalling the next group.
They moved in immediately, stepping over their exhausted comrades. Fresh reserves taking position around the formation. The circle was still hot- he could feel the residual energy bleeding off it. They needed to let it cool. But the gate was filling up again, creatures emerging from the other side, drawn by some instinct Leon didn't understand.
He aimed the muzzle. Calculated the angle. The formation built power again, slower this time, the stone still radiating heat.
Fifty mages left, excluding those already in battle. Two more shots after this one. Three total.
He hoped it would be enough.
The gate was half-full now, the darkness of the other world visible through the press of bodies. Leon watched the numbers swell, waited for the optimal moment.
Two more shots after this, he thought. Make them count.
The formation reached critical charge.
Leon fired.