"Forward!"
[Consecrated Ground]
[War Cry]
It was bloody battle after bloody battle, well bloody for the Goblins. The completely armoured dwarves took no damage, added armour increase from consecrated ground and the imbued weapon damage, they were sliding through the savage goblin hordes like butter.
Kadrin was making the most of his strength, he could fully wield his spear with two impaled goblins on it.
Maro wanted to get in on the fight and just cleave the shit out of Goblins with his greatsword or just become a tornado of death with his twin swords… but he would fuck up the formation.
"Fire" he ordered again and again, losing his patience.
Clearing out the under levels was steady but too slow… if they could field 3 lines of spears, it would go faster, if he had quadruple the Gnome crossbow men, it would go faster… heck if they could convince Rolf to go downstairs he could just walk through all of them…
Maro's mind was running fast, trying to find out anything to speed this up..
It had been almost 2 weeks and they were only about to clear Sub level 5.
However… they had been finding treasure after treasure the deeper they went. His greed was especially satiated… they were lucky the Cave Goblins were a lot more savage then their other cousins and didn't really understand what silver/gold were, how to deal with the simple locks on some well preserved buildings and they found another armoury that was locked tight. Which took them two days to break through.
Inside was even more ornate dwarf armour… nothing that fit Humans or Gnomes. The even more ornate armour was decided to be only worn by dwarves who unlocked their classes. So including Kadrin there were 4 dwarves total wearing new armour. In contrast to the Ebony with Ivory trim the new armour had red metal with gold trim. They looked absolutely intimidating.
Maro looked down at his old shit leather and chain mail… he wanted something new too… Kadrin had noticed earlier and told him the Forges were on the bottom levels and half the Dwarves in his unit had blacksmithing experience. He was promised the most finely adorned heavy plate armour and any weapon he wanted.
Maro was sipping on his wine skin while watching the slow unstoppable forward march of the Dwarves proceed. Next to him Gnarlo was just getting drunk just to not be completely bored, once in a while he would try to throw a rock at the Goblins only to hit a Dwarf in the helmet and disappear before they looked back.
The cadence of Stab Stab Step, Stab Stab Step was playing over and over in their minds. His honour prevented him from ever leaving a battle he was part of, but he heavily contemplated leaving to go to the elves or to bring them with him at the back of the war party…
Just as he was about to take another swig, a huge commotion came from the goblin lines.
"Hobgoblins" the dwarves yelled in anger
Just as big and beefy as dwarves, they were a bigger problem… but they were unarmoured for the most part and were easier targets for the Gnomish crossbow teams. Not too big of a problem yet. They couldn't pierce dwarven armour… this would just slow down their progress even more.
Then a huge boulder smashed into the back of the goblins and rolled into the dwarf line to brace themselves.
"Earth Magic!" Kadrin yelled.
Fuck a class unlock that wasn't a warrior, he pointed to the rock pushing a hole in the line and instructed his swordsmen.
"Plug it"
Activating Bloodrush, he took off sprinting. He had to take care of the mage, they had none of their own.
Just then a fireball blew up into the back of the goblins again, tearing them apart and pushing the dwarves back a little… Fucking magic resistance too, their armour was too strong, what the hell.
Okay Earth mage first, they could mess up their front line the most.
He got to the line and jumped over the dwarves and goblins, wielding his greatsword, he swung it in arcs… holy energy emanating from each strike, burning every goblin sliced.
There were two Hobgoblin mages 50 meters behind the line… one fire and one earth magic… he couldn't tell which was which so he ran to them slicing goblins and hobgoblins apart while waiting for the next cast.
The fat hobgoblin covered in robes started to magically gather earth above his head to create a new giant rock projectile.
Too many people in his way, he wouldn't reach in time… would Vanguard Charge work with all the goblin fucks in the way.
He didn't have time to think about it
[Vanguard Charge]
He blew apart the ground beneath his feet as he charged forward holding his sword out front. He sliced through the bodies of Goblins and Hobgoblins alike…
But the crowd slowed him down… and he didn't reach the Earth mage in time. As the giant boulder flew his way, his momentum was too powerful to turn his charge… he braced himself and swung his sword like a baseball bat at the projectile.
Booooom! An explosion of sparks and shrapnel.
Maro's greatsword shattered, he was absolutely peppered with shrapnel from being up close. His shitty chain mail and leather armour was shredded.
For good measure, the god damn fire mage launched a fireball where the explosion happened. Not a direct hit but, whatever was left of his chainmail was completely born apart…
Maro stood up in the middle of the debris field… Both the Goblin army and his own stopped and stared for what seemed an eternity.
There was no way any class would be able to handle that artillery straight to the face without multiple barriers, not including the follow up fireball.
Despite that, his strategy worked… So far in this world Combat mages acted as a sort of artillery… he took two powerful aoe explosions alone. Which saved multiple Dwarf lives… they all knew what he did for them…
The holes that were peppering his body, started emitting steam.
Bleeding, concussed and overall in horrible shape, he knew he was out of the fight. So he did the only thing he had energy left to do [Warcry]...
However he did not expect what came out, he couldn't hear the sound he was making… because his ears were still ringing from the fireball blowing up so close to him. As the last of his energy left, he promptly passed out.
Kadrin, his Dwarves, Maro, his Gnomes and his Human swordsmen he had fought with for weeks non stop… they all lost their collective shit.
They turned into berserking monsters… All the Dwarves dropped their spears and took out their axes. The line broke as all the Dwarves and humans charged forward in an absolute frenzy, they had almost cleared the floor… just to the end of this corridor and they could secure this floor.
The axes were a personal touch, each goblin skull crushed with an axe felt like it made up for how they were living as a race the last couple hundred years.
The slow and steady woodchipper turned into many individual chainsaws.
The warcry had severely stunned and scared the Goblins… combined with the renewed ferocity of his men… it turned into a rout. The two hobgoblin mages were skewered by cross bow bolts, goblins and hobgoblins were throwing weaker allies behind them to slow the enemies advance for a second.
Skulls were crushed, limbs were cut off.
Once his men passed where Maro was laying, Kadrin ordered two men to take him upstairs to get healed.
The rout continued.