The scent of scorched air filled Ruwen’s nose and mouth, numbing his tongue. He had insisted Lylan keep his Scarf of Freshness since the enemy had taken hers in the ether cavern. He channeled one Energy per second into Fresh Air and the acrid smell disappeared. Sift, Hamma, and Lylan each used their scarf.
Screams, most of them from outside the walls, echoed off the temple and silos. Thousands of troops readied themselves for the gates to open.
They’re retreating, Elder Vachyl said. Starting phase two in sixty seconds.
The men and women around Ruwen grew still as their Commanders passed down orders via Chat. He relayed the information to the three groups of Void Bands he commanded, and his words passed down to each of the five layers under him.
Workers slid down the wall ropes like rain drops, those with Void Bands sprinting to their assigned groups.
“Thirty seconds,” Ruwen said out loud.
Colyn pulled the shield from off his back and attached it to his arm. Ruwen wished his parents hadn’t insisted on coming. He worried for their safety, even if they were almost ten levels above him. Taking friends and family into danger was a terrible way to live your life.
Ruwen moved to stand directly in front of the enhanced steel gate.
Initiate phase two, Elder Vachyl said.
The metal gate slid silently into the wall, revealing the terium alloy bars of the portcullis. The internal locks released with loud clicks and Stone Mages pushed the portcullis up with pillars of granite. Four more Stone Mages folded the ground, creating a path through over one thousand enemy dead. Ruwen marveled at the enemy’s commitment to the trap, and the sacrifice it required.
Ruwen dashed forward, the apex of a triangle with fifteen thousand warriors. It was humbling that they followed him, trusting his judgement to keep them safe and bring them victory. He wouldn’t fail them.
The enemy reformed in a long line at the entrance of the depression. Ruwen could barely tell the ground sloped downward. He had expected something like cliffs on each side, but they hardly qualified as hills. They certainly offered little in the way of a tactical advantage and were too far away to send troops to.
As Ruwen approached the army he triggered Analyze, and on the third attempt he found the gas.
Target: Carbon Dioxide/Monoxide Blend
Type: Resource
Components: Carbon, Oxygen
Health: Asphyxiant
Alchemy: Colorless, Odorless, Noncombustible
Uses: Fire retardant
Ruwen informed Elder Vachyl, and all the Void Band groups. Finding the gas relieved Ruwen and validated his hypothesis.
Elder Vachyl spoke in Chat, his Commanders passing the info to the entire army in moments. Begin phase three.
Ruwen slowed, and his army separated into one hundred sixty-eight groups of ninety, each group ringed around a Worker with a Void Band. The army contained twenty Commanders, spaced evenly across the groups, and they all channeled ten Energy per second into Gust.
As Ruwen strode toward the waiting enemy army, his cloak whipped in the sudden vortexes that roiled the air. Stepping into the depression, Ruwen squinted as lightning arced toward him from above. The dazzling light revealed a sky filled with arrows.
Colyn stepped up next to Ruwen, his tower shield protecting everyone behind him. The lightning crawled across a violet bubble of Energy that Tremine channeled, protecting Ruwen, his friends, and family. But the librarian’s shield only protected against magic, and the arrows and crossbow bolts passed through Tremine’s shield unaffected.
Metallic booms filled the air as arrows and bolts bounced off Colyn’s tower shield. Ten arrows and three crossbow bolts struck Ruwen’s body, which he ignored. Instead, using his Gold Fortified reflexes and Step training, he knocked down any missile within reach, protecting those behind him.
Elder Yana spoke to Ruwen in Chat. We’ve confirmed there is nothing underground within twenty-five hundred feet of your location.
Ruwen had Stone Echo and Survey active, but his Stone Echo at level one only went five hundred feet. Thank you.
Commencing phase four, Ruwen told his groups and Elder Vachyl in Chat, and then waited a few seconds as the information passed to the army.
Ruwen stopped channeling Fresh Air and opened his Void Band to the left, away from his body. The portal expanded to a diameter of five feet, costing twenty-five Energy per second. He used another twenty-five Energy per second to draw air through his band. Quartermaster’s Yell halved both these costs, but he didn’t compensate by adding more Energy.
While Ruwen had over five times the twenty-five Energy being used in Regeneration alone, most of the Workers didn’t. He had volunteered his group to test the theory that a Void Band could remove enough gas to make the air breathable, and he wanted to test his theory with values the other Bands had.
Remember, Ruwen said in Chat. If you get a debuff, use your Scarf of Freshness and then let me know.
The surrounding ground froze, and the temperature dropped by twenty degrees. Fingers of ice crawled up Tremine’s shield. A fear, three roots, and five stuns struck Ruwen. None of them overcame his Resistances, but at least one affected his dad, who went rigid.
Another volley of arrows struck them, and Colyn’s plate armor and shield protected him even though the crowd control remained active. Ruwen’s level twenty Warlord spell Warcry of Freedom could have cleared the crowd control from everyone in his first layer of groups, but he wanted to save it. They weren’t in terrible danger yet, and while the spell also increased Mind Resistance by fifty percent, the cleanse had a five-minute cooldown.
Ruwen jumped forward ten feet, making himself the best target. The rest of the army slowed their advance, giving his team time to test. He felt the ground vibrate and he channeled one hundred Energy into Harden, focusing on the ground.
The soil hardened into a density comparable to diamond. Something smashed into the newly hardened dirt and Ruwen stopped channeling Harden. Without the channeled Energy the ground would slowly decay back to its normal state, but
