Chapter 250: Counters (1/2)
[This is slightly troublesome.] Kultanis thought to himself as he watched the dragon make another pass, unleashing a stream of fire which incinerated another batch of animate corpses.
Combined with the earlier meteors, the Dragonknight had already destroyed a significant portion of his army, somewhere in the region of 8-9% of his available forces. Thankfully, the Entropic Field around the command center had limited the destruction to the expendable troops. Still, the situation was one that needed an immediate remedy.
The Skull Lord briefly considered going forth to challenge him personally, but dismissed the idea. Clearly, the Dragonknight's harrying actions were designed to provoke a response, and draw the best of his forces away from the command center. More than likely, the mortals were planning on direct assault with the best of their fighters once the necromancers were left unguarded.
Although the entirety of their scheme was laughably obvious, Kultanis couldn't really blame the ones who came up with it. After all, they didn't have have any other options at this point.
[At least the pressure of our previous two attacks has prevented them from taking the most dangerous course of action.]
Previously he'd been concerned that the Almirans would resort to hit and run tactics in order to wear down his forces. With both the Dragonknight and one of the world's most accomplished Space Mage's on their side, they could rapidly attack and retreat with relative ease. While that wouldn't have won them a victory in the end, it would force Kultanis to alter key elements of his plan, and potentially delay his ultimate goal for another few decades.
Fortunately, it appeared that the enemy had completely fallen into his trap. They not only hid within their makeshift castle, but took a defensive stance and surrendered the initiative. As it stood, he merely had to keep the Dragonknight busy until the strike force arrived, and then it should be a simple matter to destroy the core of their forces. Once that was accomplished, the remainder of the coalition army would be easy pickings.
He turned to an adjutant, ”Gather a contingent of Death Riders and a company of Skeleton Archers and engage the enemy. Do not concern yourself with killing either the rider or his mount. I want you to keep him occupied to the best of your ability. In a few minutes I'll also send a squad of Plaguewings to assist.”
The adjutant saluted, and moved to gather his forces. With the exception of the relatively mundane archers, the troops Kultanis had listed were powerful undead which required extensive rituals to create. They'd been smuggled in as part of the initial invasion, and formed the heart of his army.
[If I hadn't wasted all that time and effort in the creation of those zombie birds, we could have made more. Oh well, I should treat this as just further proof that mortals cannot be trusted.]
Immediate tasks dealt with, he calmly watched the fight between the Dragonknight and his troops while waiting for his next foe to arrive.
After a few minutes, a region just outside of the Entropic Field warped and was rent asunder, depositing close to a hundred living humanoids who immediately began cutting their way towards the center of the Lacotian army.
[They have a few strong ones amongst them, even a few of the rumored Royal Guard. Excellent. We will be able to create strong minions from their corpses.]
Kultanis strode forth calmly, his cadre of Death Knights moving to match. He signaled the rest of his counter-ambush force to begin closing in on the isolated group of mortals, trapping them in a tightening noose. Or at least, that should have been the case.
Instead, the strike force had simply scattered, melting into small pockets of fighters that promptly proceeded to bypass his army's defenses with apparent ease. So shocking was this development, that he found himself mildly concerned that the enemy's leader had somehow outplayed him.
It took the Skull Lord close to a minute to determine what was actually going on, and by then it was largely too late to respond.
”They really threw a bunch of untrained fools at us without anything resembling a cohesive plan?” He muttered while observing one of the small groups fleeing from the surrounding undead in obvious panic, only to be caught and quickly destroyed.
It was a move that he hadn't considered. In almost any other circumstance, it should have resulted in the strike force's piecemeal destruction, but Kultanis had placed so many of his key troops in areas where they could unite to crush an enemy unit, they'd been slow to respond to the complete lack of unity.
As it was, they now had several dangerous experts loose in the most important part of his formation. Low though it was, they did have a chance of inflicting serious harm to his command structure, depending on where they ended up. If they should succeed in killing any of his necromancers, then a large part of his plan would fall to ruin.
”I can't tell if the Almiran Marshal is a genius or merely a lucky fool. Nonetheless, we cannot let them succeed in their efforts. Hunt them down and destroy them!” He ordered, spurring a legion of undead monstrosities into action.
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On another part of the battlefield, the Death Knight Yukrina was organizing her remaining troops for an assault on the Almiran fort. While she'd been tasked with merely keeping the defenders penned up within their walls, she had every intention of crushing them. After all, the sooner the irritating mortals were killed, the sooner they could finish the glorious task of eliminating the scourge of life from this continent.
Admittedly, it was going to be a difficult task. She'd only been given a handful of Skeleton Warriors to lead the horde of zombies that represented the eastern section of the Lacotian army, and a large portion of those had been caught up in the meteor strike which had signaled the start of the battle. Quite frankly, she was probably going to have to do the majority of the work herself, if she wanted to succeed.
Not that a little hard work bothered her. Over the course of the last few centuries, she'd climbed her way up from the rank and file to her current position as the Right Wing Commander under the Skull Lord. She'd done so by repeatedly taking the lead in critical moments, and her instincts were telling her that this was just such an occasion.
”Get the assault ladders in position, and keep the defenders distracted.” She ordered the Skeleton Warrior that was serving as her second in command. ”I'll take half of the rest of the Warriors and a few thousand zombies and circle around to their southern gate. It should fall quickly to my axe.”
She hefted the heavy Necril weapon, taking a muted sense of pleasure at the way the light reflected off its bone-white blade. Despite not being enchanted, the material alone made it more than capable of cutting through something like a castle gate.