Touch of Fate

Chapter 238: Prelude to Destruction

"I guess that about does it." Mike whispered to himself, taking a moment to admire his handiwork as he put the last few touches on the rudimentary keep located at the center of the encampment. He knew it would look like an ugly brown splotch on the horizon when seen in the daylight from afar, but right then it seemed pretty impressive with the starry sky as a backdrop. He was still staring at the stone structure when reinforcements arrived.

A warping in the air nearby alerted him, and a few seconds later a large group of people simply appeared. Had he not already been informed of his teacher's arrival, along with as many power fighters and mages as the mage could bring with him, the sight would have been concerning. As it was, he just felt impressed at the demonstration of magical might.

Close to two hundred people materialized in a small area that had been cleared for that exact purpose. According to the message he'd given to Morris, Emmanuel had been planning on rounding up the most combat effective members of the First University Division, to include as many mages as they could spare. The intent was to provide the coalition army with as many high tier powerhouses as possible prior to the arrival of the undead. Knowing that it would be impossible to match the enemy in terms of quantity, he aimed to surpass it in terms of quality.

Owing to his place at the center of the encampment, Mike was among the first to meet the group as they shook off the disorientation that accompanied long distance teleportation, which seemed to affect everyone except the Marshal himself. As he approached, he noticed several familiar faces, including a majority of his magic instructors and a number of students he recognized in passing. For some reason Edgar, the unfortunate dhampyr, was among them.

"You brought more than I expected. Is there anyone left to defend the city?" He asked with a smile while walking up.

Emmanuel frowned at him, "I know I've essentially cultivated an informal relationship between the two of us, and for good reason, but would it kill you to treat me with a little more deference when we are in front of others? I am, at least in theory, your instructor in magic."

"...Would it even matter at this point?" Mike asked, wondering if, after a host of public appearances and meetings, the damage hadn't already been done.

The Marshal opened his mouth to reply, paused and then answered with a resigned sigh, "...Probably not. Never mind, then. Anyway, I've brought most of the faculty from the Martial Arts and Magic Departments, or at least those we could spare. The rest are a grab bag of promising students, particularly competent citizens, hired adventurers and mercenaries, and a few Royal Guardsmen I was able to talk into coming with us."

"Eh? Only a few? They do realize that we are fighting to defend the entire country, right? Why isn't the entire Royal Guard here?"

"Unfortunately, they have the unenviable mission of protecting the royal family, to include all of the component members, no matter the political situation. Since you managed to rescue the Second Prince from his confines on a perfectly safe ship in the middle of the bay, he now needs to be protected." Emmanuel lowered his voice so it wouldn't be overheard by the others nearby. "Especially since there are several people who'd like to see him dead for all the trouble he's caused us."

"Bah, I wasn't even sure if he was on that boat." Mike replied defensively.

"Apparently, he was hiding below decks out of fear of some kind of sea monster. Apparently he witness something indescribably horrible killing some of the Tenundian marines. Speaking of which, some stir was created when the Huntsman put into port accompanied by a Sea Serpent. The harbor guard were fully mobilized in response, and it took several rounds of persuasion from the crew to convince them that this particular ship murdering monster was an ally. Something about the Dragonknight calling it forth from the depths with forbidden magic, I believe." A wry smile had formed on his teacher's face.

"I don't think standard summoning magic counts as forbidden, although I'm surprised it stuck around that long. I only intended on having it buy time for the Huntsman to get clear."

This caused the older mage to frown again, "You didn't use the same sort of spell as with your red friend?"

Unsure, Mike took a moment to look inwards to see if there were any new mana bonds that had formed without his knowledge, but only sensed the usual three. "No...Is there a problem?"

"Hmm, I'm not sure. Its possible it managed to eat something with a sufficient amount of mana to maintain its existence for awhile, and will vanish naturally after some time. Then again, it would not be the first time you've unintentionally shattered my expectations of what should be possible with magic. In any case, its not the issue we should be focusing on right now." He turned to look back at the rest of the transported Almirans. "Alright, you all should be feeling better by now. Just in time, from the looks of it."

By this point, Morris, Talgratha, and a handful of the leaders from both sides had arrived, and were standing awkwardly to one side, as if waiting to be acknowledged. They'd formed into two clearly divided groups. The first consisted of a small contingent of Tenundians and their orcish allies, while the second contained representatives from the coalition army, to include a rather annoyed looked sun elf dressed in gleaming armor, who maintained his distance from the rest.

"Its an honor, Marshal. I suspect you'd be interested in seeing the layout of the situation. May I suggest that we retire to the command tent, where we have the most recent scouting reports." Morris spoke deferentially once he saw they'd been noticed.

"Count Graveston's heir, I presume. Dispensing with needless formalities while maintaining a polite demeanor and humble attitude. Quite admirable for one your age. My student could stand to learn a lot from you." Emmanuel commented dryly while shooting Mike a smug look. "Please lead the way. Jonathan, Asterion, and Edgar come with me. The rest of you, make yourselves comfortable. We'll be back to explain your assignments in a moment."

Jonathan responded quickly enough, grabbing the confused looking Edgar and dragging him towards the tent. They were joined by a grey skinned elf in a silver robe bearing several pictures of the moon in various phases. His features were largely obscured by his drawn hood, but Mike noticed a sharp angular chin and a few locks of dark grey hair framing his face.

Interested, he took a moment to use Appraise.

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Asterion Ruthganti Mal Cornorin

Age: 136

Race: Moon Elf

Class: Ecclesiarch

Title: Seeker of the Woven Mystery

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[Some kind of Divine Mage? I guess I haven't seen him before because he belongs to another department.]

While giving Edgar a sympathetic smile, he followed after the group, joining them as they entered the aforementioned command tent and clustered around a map.

Apparently, Emmanuel had been asking Morris a few quick questions on the way, because he suddenly exclaimed, "What?! You don't know that the enemy's composition is? Don't you have any mages capable of casting divination magic?"

"We do, but it looks like the Lacotians have countermeasures in place. Any attempt to scry on anything besides the outlying portions of their army has been met with failure." Morris replied calmly.

Emmanuel shook his head, "Unfortunate, but we need information. Thoughts Jonathan? You have the most experience fighting the undead."

Mike's Elemental Magic instructor flinched when his name came up. It looked like he'd been staring intensely at someone on the left side of the tent, but Mike couldn't see who. "Ah...yes. We had a similar problem in the past, and we were never able to fully overcome it. Lacotian magic is known to be more advanced than ours, and only by beating them in terms of raw power could we hope to punch through their protections. That might be an option, considering our resources, but my recommendation is to bypass their countermeasures entirely, and visually inspect the enemy."

Morris broke in. "The parts of the army that are of interest to us are located near the center of their formation. Anyone attempting to lay eyes on them would have to pass through hundreds of thousands of their soldiers unseen. While they might be mindless undead, for the most part, we don't know what other security measures they have in place. Without that knowledge, it would be tantamount to a suicide mission."

"Which is why I suggest we make use of summoned creatures that specialize in stealth. Melinda, one of our Summoning Magic instructors specializes in summoning fairies. A few of her more common choices would be ideal for this mission."

Emmanuel nodded, "Good. Have her get started on it as soon as possible. We'll need a solid idea of what we are facing."

Jonathan saluted and headed out, casting one last look over his shoulder at the left side of the tent, eyes roaming for something, but ultimately not finding it.

"Now, how far away are the Lacotians?" Emmanuel asked once he'd gone.

"According to our latest reports, they are currently located here," Morris pointed at a portion of the map roughly a dozen kilometers away from the encampment. "They are advancing slowly for some reason, but at their current rate of movement, we anticipate they will be arriving here a little after dawn."

"That doesn't give us much time, but its more than I expected. Does anyone know the reason for their slower march? Is something impeding them?"

Asterion stepped forward, and gave a polite bow to the assembly, "If I may be so bold, I have a theory about that."

He waited for a few seconds until he'd received an impatient 'go on' gesture from Emmanuel.

"Considering the amount of energy required to create and maintain an army of that size, it seems probable that they are attempting to conserve their power prior to the initial assault. Moving slower would reduce the overall demands."

[So animated undead require additional energy to sustain them? Something about that doesn't sit right.] Mike thought to himself. There was an odd element to the elf's explanation, but he couldn't quite place it. He felt his concerns solidify when he noticed Edgar's face contorting into something approaching a pained grimace. Obviously, he was contending with some pretty serious emotional turmoil.

Deciding to get a second opinion, he sidled around the crowd, angling to get near the dhampyr while the conversation moved on.

"Is that so? Then I suppose we can count our blessings. In any event, show me where our troops are currently allocated. I haven't had a chance to survey the defenses, but this fort looks sturdy enough from the inside."

Mike tuned out the rest, suspecting that it would devolve into tedious logistical discussions. He moved up close enough to whisper to Edgar, and asked quietly, "What's the matter? It looks like you've swallowed something sour."

The dhampyr jumped and let out an awkward squeak that was thankfully too quiet to do much more than annoy a few of their neighbors. "Ah! Mike, I didn't see you there."

"Sorry about that. Wasn't trying to sneak up on you."

"Its alright," Edgar replied once he'd calmed his breathing down.

"So what's wrong?" Mike pressed.

"Ah...well, its...nothing...really." As bad as that explanation was, the way Edgar twisted his fingers together and avoided looking him in the eyes betrayed the lie even before he started speaking.

Trying to keep his face straight, Mike pushed a little harder. "Really? you didn't think there was something wrong with what Instructor Asterion said? You can tell me. We're friends, right?"

There was a few moments of indecision, before the dhampyr finally started speaking. "He's a lot more experienced with Divine Magic, so I'm sure he know better than I...its just..."

"Just what?"

Edgar looked down, almost as if he was ashamed of calling out the elf on his claims, "...From what I know about necromancy, their is no real energy requirement to keep them moving, at least so long as you animated them properly the first time. All you have to do is create a minor mana repository affixed to their corporeal form, and it should refill naturally. I'm not so sure about incorporeal undead though..."

Mike ignored the dhampyr as he lapsed into necromantic theory, mind racing with possibilities. A feeling of dread was slowly coiling in the pit of his stomach. He interrupted Edgar's monologue with a question. "If that's the case, why would Asterion think otherwise. Isn't he the University's expert on undead or something to that effect?"

"Hmm, I guess? I think most Divine Mages can animate the undead, although I don't think they do it very much...or at all, really. Its kind of frowned upon." He sagged slightly, "That's part of the reason why I was brought here. Since I'm the only necromancer in the University, including the faculty, they thought I might be handy to have around."

[If a junior necromancer who's just barely begun his training is capable of creating animated corpses that don't have additional mana requirements, then surely the Lacotians can do the same. That means they slowed down for some other reason. Why would they want to delay their arrival until daylight? Wouldn't it benefit them to attack at night, when the majority of our forces are effectively blind? Unless...]

Suddenly it all fell together in his head, and he rounded on the table where the leaders of the army were still debating details. "Its a ruse! The Lacotians aren't going slowly because they want to conserve energy. They are planning to-"

He was interrupted by the sound of a horn, long and low, which rose from the west side of camp.

"What's that signal mean?" Emmanuel demanded.

Morris started running out of the tent, only taking a moment to yell back over his shoulder. "It means we're under attack!"