187 Playing with Fire (1/2)

A stroke of luck happened just as the enemies below us began to climb.

I saw the vanguard of their column shudder to a halt just short of being parallel to our sand dune, and I had an inkling as to what might have caused the disturbance among them.

Zooming out as far as Fool's Insight would allow, I just barely managed to see the middle of their line that was at this moment being attacked by a group of soldiers who'd lain in wait to ambush them.

There were maybe fifty of them, which shouldn't have made such a big impact against a column that numbered thousands, but the way they made use of the desert terrain of firs and sinkholes to their advantage was brilliant.

Al must have been leading them directly; otherwise, their meager squad would have been wiped out already. Instead, they'd managed to harass the enemy enough to keep them in place. And they did it in a way that made it look like there were way more of them than there actually were.

I couldn't see Point Alpha even from my high vantage point as it was still a distance away from our location, but I was almost certain that the other half of Al's hundred men were already planting the paper soldiers that would become the base for the arcane illusion of a small army conquering Point Alpha's oasis.

Honestly, if a large enemy force managed to conquer the oasis closest to my army's eastern flank, I'd be worried enough to turn back and reclaim it first.

This was exactly what we hoped would happen as it would give our own army time to take the center of the battlefield.

And if the northern team of led by Dain and Verania was following the plan, they'd be in a similar position as us by now.

Of course, this was in no way a perfect plan. For one, keeping the enemy within this area of the battlefield meant we would try to hold off a force that was roughly a hundred times the size we had.

At the moment, that meant two hundred and fifty from our southern units were up against twenty thousand Dominion soldiers from their eastern flank.

Hopefully, more of my soldiers would arrive before we were overwhelmed and had to abandon our positions because I planned to hold Point Bravo for an entire day at least.

Since Al's position was much closer to the enemy's line, their job was only to harass the enemy long enough for us to set up our defenses. In that regard, they'd done an excellent job so far.

Movement on the northern slope of Point Bravo forced me to zoom back to my oasis.

”Yo, Azuma… the enemy's noticed us now,” I reported.

”All of them or just the soon-to-be-dead men climbing our north slope?” Azuma yelled back from his position on the northern edge of our oasis.

”Just them for now… Al's confusing the rest of our enemies… it won't last long, though,” I answered.

”So… how do you want to do this?” Azuma asked.

It was basically a wall of wooden planks that reached past my head with horizontal murder holes placed at intervals for use of our ranged weapons.

”How far down have you set up the barricades?” I asked.

”About halfway up the slope… we've got them positioned so that a large group of soldiers would have to separate into much smaller groups in order to get past them,” Azuma explained.

”Like a maze,” I realized.

”Nothing so fancy,” Azuma chuckled. ”But it'll get the job done in making it difficult to climb… We're lucky the northern slope is so steep and the footing is shit…”

”Don't let them reach the first barricade… they might break it before it becomes useful,” I reasoned.

”I've got men behind that first barricade… they're armed with those fire spears you and Zarz cooked up,” Azuma pointed through the murder hole between us and down to where a line of Immortals were crouched down behind barricades whose wooden spikes were pointed toward the enemy. ”They're ready to fire on your command.”

Fire spears, that's what we called the flame-spitting lances Zarz created with my input. He'd discovered a way to make black powder ignite in a linear path by combining it with a liquid slime that was also flammable. Basically, we'd made flame throwers that had a longer range than the original thing back on Mudgard.

”I guess you don't need me yet, Commander,” Donar Firemonger spoke from right behind me.

Funny he should say that as he was the muse who inspired this particular project. After all, I envisioned the fire spears after seeing how devastating Donar's Flame Arrow Spell was.

”Hang back, for now, Donar,” I ordered. ”You'll get your turn to blaze brightly soon.”

”That's all I ask,” Donar agreed happily.

After the pyromaniac walked away, I gave the order for the fire spears use in combat once the enemy was within range.

”The fire spears are pretty flashy… we'll get noticed quickly by more enemies if we use them,” Azuma reminded me.