Chapter 18-477: That’s Heavy, Man (1/2)

There had been a lot of preparation going into this day.

The Shroudlord might have been a wee bit concerned if he had been able to see behind our lines, and the rows of warehouses that had sprung up there, housing the munitions that were being trucked in, flown in, and most powerfully, railed in every day.

We had made track-laying machines just for the specific purpose of carrying ammunition and fuel out here. The conventional air forces of the entire planet had basically been flown in here, and now became active. National armories and munition dumps were emptied and sent here, because they were all going to become useless. If they didn’t get used now, then when?

And if they exploded, it was going to be out in the middle of nowhere, somebody else’s problem.

A pipeline wasn’t feasible in the time we had, but the trains carting stuff in were running non-stop... and the vehicles kept using everything they brought.

It was now time for modern munitions to go against older ones, and to exploit that other edge... that we still had applicable magic.

You couldn’t Cast at all in a Greyfield, as there were no ley lines to pull on, and the ambient magic was gone.

However, there was a way to Cast INTO a Greyfield, and that was Heavy Magic.

In principle, it wasn’t that hard. You wrapped your spell in an identical version of itself, and the first spell protected the second as it hit the Greyfield, getting suppressed but leaving the internal spell to do its job.

Making that work on an unending basis generally required two people, one Casting the Spell and one wrapping it to make it Heavy.

This method worked on all spells, all Sieged spells, and even Reserves. The latter two were the ‘endless Ammunition’ version for most people, although Shardcaster enhancements to Darts of Disruption Cantrips also became very popular suddenly. Being able to Cast three Darts with Kickers was already many Casters’ main form of endless offense against the undead, so doing it Heavy meant halving their offense... which was still pretty good.

Most Reserves didn’t have much Range, so Siegecasting was another method of doing this, and working in Ritual Casting for a Level Boost benefit was also useful here. Four people Sieging out two Shard spells at +4 Levels was almost as good as just Casting them by themselves.

However, that wasn’t the most powerful use of Siegecasting. That went to True Seeking.

Cast True Seeking on someone, and they received an instant +5 insight bonus to hit, +1 per Caster Level, max +10.

That is VERY useful if you are using One Shots with a Weapon whose lethal range is hundreds of yards, such as a Rifle.

Naturally, that meant you needed a target. People could still fly, get very high in the air, and spot for those down below. Mortars had no problem shooting behind walls, nor did howitzers, or tanks at enough range.

True Seeking made all those things lethal, indeed.

Weapons had their own magic, so they weren’t really affected by a Greyfield. While active Chi Forms weren’t usable, passive Techniques still were, as well as Disciplines and Feats.

It was a time for Forsaken to shine, in other words, and the Powered to play support.

Generally speaking, the Powered spotted from the sky, the artillery blasted vivic-imbued payloads into clusters of undead, Powered infantry scaled the walls while tanks blew open breaches in them, and the Forsaken flooded on through in all their numbers and a river of gunfire to mow down the enemy whose positions they already knew.

Then there was the Morningsun Family and my Traveling Knights of various sorts, including The Mick and Amaretta, who knew Ghost-Eating Ki, and could endlessly fire higher Valence effects, then potentially refill the Slots, be it by spell or Weapon.

The spell of the day was Arcane Fusion, which Azaia had introduced to the world. Two spells in one was nice, but the key here was that it allowed you to Heavy-Cast by yourself.

Granted, the spell was only a Valence I if you could only use V Valences... but if you had broken Ten with faux Levels, it scaled up as new Valences became available, and an endless full-power II Valence wasn’t weak at all, especially Seeking spells that could go right over walls and into trenches and the like to find targets.

If you were a certain someone who could Cast out of VIII Valence, well, an endlessly repeating IV was pretty nice, and the backup Fastcast II wasn’t too shabby, either.

Yes, it gave up a lot to my full display, but it meant I still had Twinned Chained Delimited Shards II, and 18 Shards, Chained, with Kickers, x2, which was still pretty damn good.

Very pointedly, I still had a lot of range, which allowed me to pick off incorporeals who might threaten our air power.