Blacksmith vs. the System 292

“You’re here, perfect,” Rosie told me when I arrived at the tent they were using as the battlefield command, only accompanied by Eleanor, just outside the frost dungeon we had acquired.

“I’ll keep an eye on the situation; you two make a decision,” Eleanor said and left, leaving me alone with Rosie.

“What’s the situation?” I asked.

“A team of ascended is approaching our forward base, one that we built next to the new dungeon we had acquired,” she explained.

“What’s the composition?” I asked.

“We don’t know. We know only their numbers, likely just above fifty. We have no idea of their composition.”

“Can it be bait? They can’t expect fifty people to make an impact,” I said.

“Not unless they are willing to send some of their elites this time,” Rosie said. “But, I don’t expect it to be so. They are using their stealth spells perfectly this time.”

“How did we catch them?” I asked.

“Spencer refined your previous work to add that detection method,” she said. “It allowed us to detect their approach.”

“Good,” I said. “It’s good to see them taking the initiative. What’s the plan? Ambush them on the way?”

She shook her head. “Not what I have in mind. I want to keep our capability of detecting them under stealth as long as possible.”

Coming from anyone else, I would have refused it on principle, as I had no intention of risking lives. But knowing Rosie, I knew she had considered that. “What do you have in mind?”

She smirked. “Simple. We’re going to have a firing drill, testing the newest shells,” she said.

“The newest shells?” I asked.

“I have a sample,” she said as she reached into a crate and pulled out a metal shell, one that looked like a larger shell to the naked eye, but one with an absent core. With all the changes my class had gone through recently, I didn’t need to touch it to see the structure inside. “Internal structure inlaid with frost runes?” I asked.

“Yes, Spencer and Liam managed to put your notes together to create it,” she said. “It uses the metal from our latest dungeon. It takes a while to craft, and it requires someone with Epic Mana Forge, but we are no longer lacking them after the dungeon started to drop those skills.”

“That’s true,” I admitted. “I can understand the impact, but it’s … focused. But, it won’t work without mana,” I started, then paused. “They are slotting a core to supply the frost runes with a spell just before the launch, right?” I asked.

“Exactly,” she said. “Not a perfect method, but it’s efficient enough.”

“Smart workaround,” I admitted. “It’s good to see them thinking outside the box. Not exactly my greatest strength. I can be a little over-focussed at times.”

She curled an eyebrow, amused. “At times? I have never noticed.”

“Hey, sarcasm against a king is treason,” I responded. “If you want to keep your pretty head in place, you should be more careful.”

Her smirk twisted. “Oh, my head is pretty,” she responded.

I decided to change the subject. “So, what’s the shells for? For the boss monsters?”

“Yes, but not the land kind,” she admitted. “Currently, ascended are better to deal with them than trying to create high-impact cannons. The real aim is to test it before we expand to the shore. We want something that packs a punch against sea beasts.”

“One that will limit their mobility if nothing else,” I admitted. It was a good plan. “It won’t hold back a boss monster, but it should deal with the weaker beasts easily.”

“Better than trying to boil the sea,” she admitted.

“How about the delivery?” I asked. “Steam cannons should lose their effectiveness at this point.”

“They do,” she admitted. “Luckily, Rebecca and Terry had already developed half a dozen gunpowder variants.”

“Stable gunpowder? Already?” I asked. “A few days have passed, and they already have so many surprises for me.”

Rosie shrugged. “Not exactly a stable product. They need to be kept in boxes made of your new metal-crystal isolator, and even then, it’s likely a bad idea to keep them around for longer than a week. The added range is worth it.”

“Not a bad strategy, as long as you don’t pile it all into one warehouse.”

She nodded. “That’s true. My plan is to start a firing test when the ascended are twenty miles away, and shift to wide area shelling when they clear the fire-mile marker.”

I nodded. “That way, they will think that it’s their misfortune,” I said. “Smart, but what if they don’t want to take the risk?”

“There’s nothing to be done,” she admitted. “As much as I want to weaken Drakka further, our ability to catch them sneak is more important than reducing their numbers further.”

“At least we are properly entranced, with enough ascended at each fortress,” I responded. She nodded. “Do you want me to attack the moment they are revealed?”

She shook her head. “Ideally, no. If you reveal yourself, there’s no way to convince them their discovery is an accident. Maria is already patrolling near enough to explain her rapid arrival. Your students, combined with Eleanor and me, should be enough to deal with them.”

“I am the insurance, then,” I said. “Smart. I can use the opportunity to connect to the last dungeon after completing the full line.”

She nodded. “That’s the plan —” she started, but Eleanor’s arrival interrupted her.

“They have just passed the eleven-mile mark, still coming straight here,” Eleanor said. “We need you out, Rosie,” she said.

“Should I come as well, maybe under invisibility?”

Rosie shook her head. “It’s better if you stay in the tent. We need to convince them that our accuracy is luck,” Rosie finished. “The last thing we need is to have a spy with perception daring to get close enough to catch the spell.”

“Smart,” I admitted.

“Finally, a proper fight,” Eleanor said, her presence lingering at the tent flap, head cocked as if she were already hearing the sound of a battle. “I was getting bored fighting boring monsters.”

“Try not to make it too obvious that you’re ready for a fight,” Rosie responded even as they departed. “If you’re too twitchy, they’ll realize something is wrong…”

Watching them disappear while I stayed at the tent, a part of me couldn’t help but feel a little weird. Up until now, I had to fight on the front line. It was a decision forced by the circumstances, but seeing it change still felt weird.

I watched them from the tent, the wards around the command post strong enough to keep me hidden from any curious spy unless they started to send their best.

Once they arrived at the cannons, they split. Rosie stayed at the center, talking with Liam and Spencer while the new frost cannons started to fire one by one; with the deafening roar of the gunpowder rather than the familiar hiss of the steam.

That made the seed of hope bloom even more than their growing martial competency. That, even without me, things were in the right direction, a new variant of magical technology growing, without requiring my direct supervision.

A smile bloomed on my face even as the first shells had landed at the center of a random group of monsters, a burst of frost blooming like an overgrown snowflake, encasing everything in a fifty-yard range in ice.

“Decent impact,” I muttered as I watched. It wouldn’t take down a boss monster, or even wound it previously, but unlike our older decay shells, it would at least leave a lasting damage, which raised the possibility of taking them down in targeted assault.

Suddenly, I felt a bit bad as I approached the ascended. Hostile they might be, but a part of me pitied them about the turmoil they were about to face. Their ability to regenerate and resist damage was much lower than a boss monster, and such a shell would ruin things far more than anything else.

I continued to watch in anticipation.

“Move to phase 2,” Rosie shouted, and suddenly, all the cannons roared. Not just the gunpowder ones, but also the steam ones. A circle of mayhem and destruction bloomed around the base, frost and fire mixing with decay.

An expensive trick, wasting enough ammunition to take down a large-scale beast wave, but military deception was never cheap. It was a price I was willing to pay. The only exception was when the price tag included lives.

“What’s that in the southeast!” Rosie suddenly shouted, then passed. “Alarm, enemy ascended detected! Concentrate fire!”

I watched as our ragtag army responded, ready to intervene if necessary.