Maro woke up from a knightmare, sweating just before noon… he could have sworn he was being mauled and torn apart, trying to fight for his life.
Alleria and Valleria had used their nature magic to grow a large bed to fit all of their activities…He got up and looked at the giant bed and bedroom… Blood everywhere… His blood. He saw one of his ears on the floor… oh yeah one of the cats bit it off…
Luckily 3 people could heal, he had a brand new ear to replace the old… worst case scenario Katarina could ice it and they could heal it back on later… but he hadn't lost any 'large' limbs yet.
He headed straight for the courtyard…
It was impressive, Kadrin had everyone lined up and waiting… Maro slept too long again…
The dwarves looked way too impressive compared to everyone else… 200 lined up in a 4 by 50 formation so they could clog the tunnels. Their beautiful Ebony armour with Ivory trim, they were intimidating and powerful. The Red and gold trim was even more fearsome, their full plate helmets covered their heads entirely except for the eye slits and a mouth one.
By comparison the swordsmen and archers were still in basic leather armour still…
"As soon as we get access to a forge, we're upgrading these bums… the comparison isn't fair"
Kadrin laughed "its all thanks to you Maro… we're reclaiming our heritage and appeasing our ancestors, we will forge you whatever you like as gifts… slowly but surely we can take over the other outposts and fortresses along the mountain chain… one day I hope"
Maro looked all around "you think the kingdom will eventually make a move?"
"Not soon, they are too disorganized, any decent unit is busy on their lord's territory… The country technically doesn't even have a singular command structure… it takes the council to vote on a vote to discuss a vote… yada yada yada… we're also on the edge of the country… I mean their border ends at this mountain range, despite what the map says… They don't have a single town near the mountains"
"Good, we'll need as much time as possible… alright now on to business"
He turned to the men waiting in the courtyard
"We are here to make a peaceful place for us to live… no one is certain of the future… but we all know the Unity kingdom is a farce… they spit on actual unity every day they exist… the corruption and lack of care for our peoples is enough"
"We will conquer this fortress today, we are not coming out until we do… we will become a new bastion of true freedom, reclaiming the ancient Glory of our races!!! The majestic human kingdoms that put their chivalric code above their own lives, The ancient Gnomes who lived alongside humans and Dwarves forever leading Academia and industry forward and the spectacular Dwarf empire of old for which today would not be possible!"
A huge roar erupted, even the regular people who were working around the courtyard were cheering.
"We will show the world true unity!…Forward!"
At sub level 17, they were making amazing progress… no offense to the gnomish crossbow team but they could not keep pace at all with how fast the humans fired… also being taller than the dwarves they did not need to blindly fire over them. The archers would release a volley every couple of seconds.
Any goblin or hobgoblin that somehow managed to get over the dwarf line was immediately skewered by the swordsmen… and whenever there was a difficult target. The Dwarf lines would open up for the swordsmen to strike hard, fast and then retreat under the cover of the dwarves.
They hadn't encountered any trouble so far… in these tight quarters, numbers didn't matter. The goblins could attest to that… tens of thousands of them have died so far to only a couple hundred of them. The dwarves would be telling tales of this for a long time, the hundreds against thousands all to point to this moment as their second resurgence.
Maro had consecrated ground active… they had kept Katarina in the back until the hobgoblin mages would show up. Katarina would effectively keep them blind with a rolling small scale blizzard, while simultaneously hindering the goblin front line.
Maro did not want to use War cry… until after Katarina was in combat, he Pavlov'd himself every time he thought of using War cry he got a little excited. He did not want to have a boner in combat.
It didn't help that Katarina was extremely bored and messing with him… she had a small, ice tendril slowly climb up his leg and tease him…
He would break it and another one would slowly go up his thigh. Maro was sweating buckets despite being constantly Iced.
Maro had bloodrush active the entire time so he could hyper focus on the battle… luckily Bloodrush hadn't been ruined for him yet.
Just then, a volley of fireballs and boulders were launched from out of sight… be careful what you wish for… his will power was wavering before the hobgoblin mages launched their coordinated assault.
The Dwarven front line was separated by multiple explosions, the back lines and the swordsmen rushed to fill the gaps.
Maro grabbed Katarina and kissed her deeply, getting her back for the teasing.
Sarcastically he said "If I die, make an ice sculpture of me and go fuck yourself with it"
This is why you don't go to war with people you fuck… I don't know how the Greeks did it, he thought.
He turned around and ran with 10 of his best men to go behind enemy lines, just as the blizzard started falling… The archers were instructed to focus fire only on enemies they could see so the swordsmen weren't hit.
In the low visibility environment of the blizzard, chaos ensued. The hobgoblin mages were casting randomly not realizing the blizzard and the forces coordinated with their move forward. The hobgoblin mages were missing like they were blind, blowing up their own forces or shooting over his men.
In the midst of the chaos, Maro was on a blissful killing spree… when he was almost at the spot where the Mages were, he cast Warcry as strong as he could.
It looked like even the snow paused mid-fall in fear for a second. His forces were invigorated, his swordsmen all became blades of death.
The goblins however, hearing the shout come from in the middle of their forces, lost their shit… they got primal, they started lashing out at anyone and everything around them… the ones who had space to run, did so. The fear was overpowering, this close and this powerful.
Even the Hobgoblins stopped casting for a while trying to get their troops back… however it was too late… in the low visibility environment, against a mage. Maro cut their heads off with 0 effort, their staves couldn't block his swords, he was sprinting across the battlefield, unimpeded… no more spells were cast… the hobgoblins were dead.
And with that the rout started in full, the blizzard was lifted, their leadership was dead… thousands of goblins stampeded towards the staircase down, trampling over each other.
Meanwhile, Kadrin gave the order to break rank and switch to axes "Kill Them All!" he shouted
Maro let his men go have fun, he returned to where Katarina was to heal the wounded as she was freezing the larger wounds and encasing peoples missing limbs so Alleria and Valleria could heal it back on.
His bloodrush still active, after healing all the men he could he ordered a bunch of men left behind to start helping move the wounded back up stairs.
With the blizzard no longer needed during the rout, he entrusted Katarina to lead the wounded back in case stragglers were hiding around.
Before he ran off to join the rout, he grabbed Katarina by the waist, kissed her, bit her lip and then whispered to her "stay safe" and he took off after his men.