The Siege of Arconia Chapters 21-23

Drake nodded. “That is good - but do get some rest at some point. This siege isn’t going to last a few hours or even a few days, but weeks if not months - it’s important that we all pace ourselves so we don’t all collapse out of exhaustion.” I thought his tone had a strange condescending undercurrent to it, but I could’ve just been imagining that. It was hard to tell with lizardmen voices and even worse so with how the translation magic altered tones to some extent. “Secondly, some of the soldiers say that they saw you giving away some of your meals earlier?”

“Yeah,” I said. I didn’t have to buy my own food and was fed quite generously for being one of the defenders - I was fine cutting down what I was getting by about a third to give to someone else. I figured that I had other ways of getting enough food to fed myself.

Drake sighed. “Master Liberomancer - I can tell that you have a good heart. And it is far better for a person to have a good heart than the other way around - but that is not a good idea. We might not have as much food in the future, and we might end up having to cut rations even for Rank Three Liberomancers. It is important that you eat and are full, else how will you fight?”

“Your charity to those less fortunate would be commendable in any other circumstance, but do not do so by weakening yourself. Though it may sound cruel, it is better for some of the others to go hungry than you do - you do no one a service if one day you fall and the dryads breach our barriers,” Drake said. “It is better that they go hungry than have their throats slit by the dryad hoards.”

There was so much waste of food when they were giving it out, but I nodded anyway. He did have a point, and I didn’t feel like arguing with him on this. I had enough of my plate.

“Good,” Drake said. He seemed to be relaxing somewhat after saying that but then his head snapped as he saw something move in his peripheral vision. “They are moving towards us!”

I turned to see a group in the distance detach themselves from the main body of the horde - much larger than the small groups that had done so up till then. Another group did the same in the distance on the opposite side, but we could do little on this side of the wall for that as we would soon have our hands full - there must have been at least fifteen thousand of them heading this way.

I was well aware that this location would be highly likely to be attacked - aside from the main gate, this was another flaw in the city’s defenses. The dryads hadn’t headed out towards the ocean yet, but I wasn’t sure how much the seawater would damage them, or if they simply didn’t like being in it. No one seemed to have the answer to that question as the dryads had never come in this direction before in such numbers in all of recorded history. If the latter were the case, it would not serve as a deterrent whatsoever and they would rush towards the open sea.

Drake licked one of his teeth before ordering us all to focus on the main center of their formation. “Once they are in your range, start firing!” Range was affected not only by the tier of the spell, but your stats and skills as well, so it could vary widely between Liberomancers. Two people cast spells before they were within my own targeting distance.

“[Grand Fireball]!” I cast while aiming for the center of the formation - but this was my first time using the spell, and I had not aimed it properly. A flash of light burst out from my hands, traveling towards a location twenty feet off from where I should’ve been aiming before it suddenly blossomed into a huge sphere of red-hot flames. Funnily enough, I expected some sort of recoil given the resultant explosion was larger than that you’d get from a Rocket-Propelled Grenade, but nothing of the sort happened. Of course it didn’t, I told myself, this was magic, not an actual weapon.

About seventy of them erupted into ashes, but that was far fewer than I should’ve been able to destroy with a single spell.

I didn’t need to call out what spell I was using in order to cast it - just the thought was enough, but it was common in group fights like this to do so just so that other people knew what you were doing.

I paused before striking again. Did I feel a pang of sympathy for the lives I’d just ended? Maybe I would’ve if I’d had had more time to think, but in the heat of the moment such thoughts could wait for later. I aimed better with my second casting, but it was still less than optimal, with about ninety of them succumbing to the inferno this time.

Drake frowned and clicked his teeth when he saw how my first two spells landed off target. He cast his own, killing nearly two hundred of them. Not only was he a better shot, but also had skills that boosted the spell’s range and power. He had just been waiting for the right moment to join in.

The barrage of spells from our side had cowed the dryads somewhat, with them stepping gingerly out of what they perceived as the range that [Grand Fireball] could reach. If they wanted, they could stay out of reach while heading towards the water and then circle around to get to us. I didn’t think that would work very well, as the water, even if it wasn’t toxic to them, would greatly impede their movement, but I didn’t want to give them any chances.

“I have an idea, if you don’t mind me trying it out by modifying [Grand Fireball],” I said to Drake. It was an idea I’d had since I’d gotten the grimoire for [Grand Fireball] and seen the combo it could make with [Summon Tyrant Arachnea], but how would it play out in practice?

Drake shrugged. “I would love to see your suggestion.” I think there was a hint of sarcasm in his voice, but I took it as a go-ahead signal regardless.

“[Summon Tyrant Arachnea]!” I said, as a spider the size of a semi-truck materialized below us.

The ‘Arachnea’ referred to a species of giant spider that lived in Libraria. A normal individual would only grow to be about as big as a car (I said ‘only’ but even that would no doubt be nightmarish to encounter). The Tyrant Arachnea was the species’ equivalent of a prince or lord among magical beasts - and so was far bigger. There probably was a [Summon Arachnea] skill as well, though I didn’t have it and that was likely Rank Two.

I had gotten this skill from Charlotte’s Web fittingly enough. A Rank Three summon could stay in the world for up to nine hours or until it had been destroyed, and could be summoned again twenty-four hours after the skill had first been used.

“A summon?” Drake said, not looking too happy. “Yes, that can reach them, but a summon won’t be able to stop a horde of that size-”

Before he could finish reprimanding me, I cast [Grand Fireball] on the Tyrant Arachnea.

“He cast a spell on his own summon!”

“Has he lost his mind?”

“Master Liberomancer, why would you-”

Cries like that rose out behind me when they saw what I had done. Drake was probably seething with fury.

Before I describe what happened next, I want you to imagine something - say that you’re a well-trained Liberomancer and you happen to have the misfortune to encounter a Tyrant Arachnea on your travels. What would your first instinct be to do, other than run? Assuming you knew one, to cast a fire spell at it, right? It was simple and intuitive gaming logic - it was a bug, so it should be weak to fire, you’d naturally assume.

I probably would have done the same in such a situation, had I not known about the Tyrant Arachnea’s abilities.

Not only was it completely immune to fire as one of its abilities, but it was coated in a substance that should it catch on fire, enveloped it in flames. Not that it would hurt it, as a matter of fact, the flames strengthened it. The stronger the fire spell, the stronger the flames that coated it would be. It could not shoot the flames out like projectiles, but the fire formed a defensive layer on it and even healed its wounds over time. If you were to use something like [Grand Fireball] on it, the reaction would be intense, coating it in a fiery shell.

The ‘fire’ made by [Fireball] and similar spells was not like normal fire for whatever reason in how it interacted with things - there was the initial impact of the spell when it hit something, yes, but the ‘flames’ created by it did not spread like a fire would normally and died out very quickly. This was despite [Create Flame] being quite suitable to create fire for domestic purposes - but not when used for combat purposes. It was one of those things that no one in this world seemed to be able to explain, and was chalked up to ‘that’s just how magic works’ from everyone I’d asked about it. That was why despite being highly flammable, our attacks did not spread that easily to the neighboring dryads after we had cast them, limiting their effectiveness.

The flames that coated the Tyrant Arachnea though, while they could not shoot out like a flamethrower (as cool as that would be), they could spread just like a normal fire would.

At least, that was what I was expecting it to do. Although I knew that this was a combo that was possible, I still wasn’t sure how effective it was against the dryads. The only way to be sure was to test it out in actual combat, and I prayed that it would be every bit as destructive as I was imagining it in my head.

I sent a command to the Tyrant Arachnea via our mental link to advance.

And so it was that this behemoth of a spider, completely coated in flames, an absolute nightmare fuel of a monstrosity, made its way towards the dryads. If I was an ordinary soldier and I saw something that size lit ablaze charging towards me , I would’ve dropped my weapon then and there and ran as far as I could from it.

I almost felt sorry for the dryads.

Almost.

Until I remembered the sight of all of their victims, that is.

‘Give them hell from us,’ I instructed my summon.

As it advanced, I realized that no one else on the wall knew what I was doing, and it was best that I explain myself.

“Relax,” I told everyone. “My summon is immune to flames and can even use them to its own advantage.”

Most people wouldn’t know about the Arachnea - they didn’t live near Chipker (thank god for that) and I had only found a few pieces of information after asking the guild librarian to dig for them. Most of my knowledge came from the actual summoning spell.

“Immune to flames eh…” Drake said, clicking his tongue. To a fire elementalist like him, that was not good news. It was one of the biggest drawbacks to being an elementalist - if you ran into something like a Tyrant Arachnea that countered your element, you were in trouble. Conversely, it was good to be an elementalist against something you were strong against, which is why it was a huge relief that fire elementalists were so common in Arconia. Thankfully we were fighting dryads and not Arachnea - Drake was likely just annoyed that I had a summon that countered most of his build.

“This is…” Drake began to say as the dryads changed course, no longer heading towards the water, but away from what was rushing at them.

The Tyrant Arachnea’s speed was faster than that of a horse and slower than that of your average car. I could try to make it faster in the future by learning a skill that might speed it up in proportion to my Speed stat, but from what I’d heard that would only be a marginal increase. Regardless, seeing something that big moving at you so fast would give anyone pause. I didn’t know just how much the dryads understood things, but they were not without basic survival instincts.

There were ways to combat the Tyrant Arachnea, of course, even if fire magic didn’t work on it. For one, its underside was not as well armored as the rest of its body, and was very vulnerable to attacks. However, while running, its underbelly was not exposed and very hard to target so this weakness was somewhat covered. Secondly, it was extremely susceptible to cold weather and ice element spells as you might expect, though with the coat of fire around it, it had no need to worry about such a thing currently. Third, its eyes were also a weak point that could be exploited and targeted readily even if its underbelly wasn’t exposed. However, since summoned creatures shared information with their summoners, that meant that even if its eyes were gouged out completely, it would still know where to go via my own mental directions.

In other words, I had covered most of its weaknesses!

It ran into the dryad horde with the momentum of a freight train and suicidal nonchalance to boot - being a summon, it did not care whether it lived or died.

The dryad’s claws and primitive weapons were like toothpicks before its extremely tough exoskeleton, and the fire began to spread very rapidly. Unlike the fire started via [Fireball] or [Grand Fireball], it was being maintained by the Tyrant Arachnea and kept on spreading from its body wherever it made contact, going from one dryad to the next like a stack of dominos falling.

Since the dryads were crowded so close together, it was easy for the flames to spread.

First the fire spread to a hundred, then later two hundred, and so on, until more than a thousand of them were ablaze. Some of them ran for the river as they realized what was going on by this point, but most were too far away and ran for the ocean instead. I guess they were so weak to fire that ‘stop, drop, and roll’ really weren’t options for them.

Eventually though, the dryad’s attacks, even if they were mostly ineffective, turned out to be too much, and the Tyrant Arachnea succumbed to its injuries when one of them got a lucky shot at its underbelly by slipping under it.

Looking at the chaos it had created in the enemy lines, it was more than well worth it.

The dryads had remarkable self-regenerating properties so long as they had enough water, sunlight, and blood. The last ingredient was something that we were starving them out of, but I didn’t know how long they’d need to be starved of that before it affected how much they could regenerate.

As such, it wasn’t like I had killed over a thousand of them. Some of them might recover. Despite that, the effectiveness of this attack couldn’t be understated.

For one, they would be out of commission for the next few days assuming that they still had enough fresh blood in their systems to recover. If not, then they might even end up dying from their injuries.

Secondly, you didn’t need to be Sun Tzu to realize that war is mainly about one thing - fear. It was not about killing every single one of your enemies, but rather getting them to finally give up or in the case of humans and other intelligent races to put their weapons down. The goal was to get them to realize fighting was worthless. We wanted this invasion to end, but that didn’t require killing all one hundred thousand or so of them gathered before us, no, we just needed to convince the majority of them that they had about as much chance of breaching our walls as a mouse did at killing a dragon.

It was here that we had an advantage over them - they did not wish to negotiate in any manner, only to kill all of us, so with our backs to the sea, we would fight to the very end. On the other hand, they were free to roam throughout the countryside. For them, it might soon make sense to leave her and head off for greener pastures rather than squatting at our doorsteps.

And for that matter it was very obvious that I had managed to strike a massive amount of fear into their hearts. Although only a little over a thousand dryads had been directly affected by my spell, the force that had been set out in this direction consisting of over ten thousand was in disarray and many of them were scattered around the landscape in confusion. They must’ve been fearing another such attack, even if I couldn’t do so for another twenty-four hours, it wasn’t like they knew that.

This was why Liberomancers were so dangerous for normal soldiers to face. Yes - we could run out of mana and skills making us no more than regular people, how many ordinary soldiers could we kill before that happened? Any commander who said, “Alright, with that guy’s mana capacity over there, he can only kill about four or five thousand of us. You five thousand, go ahead and sacrifice yourselves by taking his spells until his mana runs out and then we’ll finish him off - okay?” would likely find himself swiftly beheaded by his own men before they agreed to charge the Liberomancer in question.

Ordinary soldiers would almost never charge against Liberomancer unless they were completely forced to, because of the simple fact that people would prefer living to dying.

On top of that, given that Liberomancers were a small target, if they had a way to get away or hide, they could continuously kite a very large force until it was either whittled down to nothing, or simply collapsed. The most obvious was to fly away for anyone who had a spell like that, but even I could do something as simple as riding away on the Elephant Frog after all my mana was used up and outpace most horses. After which I could recover my mana and do it all over again.

If Lance had a full set of thirty Rank Four grimoires - he would not have even needed all of us given how the gap between ranks kept widening. The enemy would’ve been slaughtered before it even reached our walls as he could soar above them like a fighter jet and rain down hellfire before coming back to recharge his mana and then doing so over and over until nothing of the enemy remained.

Alas, even the best Rank Four Liberomancers did not have even half of a set of Rank Four grimoires, so this was just a pointless thought exercise. Lance did not have enough options currently for such a bombardment strategy to work. As it was now, while he could soar out and damage the enemy no problem, the problem would arise if the enemy retaliated once his mana was depleted and then stormed the wall afterwards. Because of that, he was currently standing atop the wall like the rest of us, conserving most his mana for the worst-case scenario. If only he had a Rank Four summoning skill as well, and a greater mana reserve, the scene would be completely different.

Point being - if the enemy dryads wanted to, if they were controlled by a zombie-like hivemind and had no regard for their own safety, they could easily climb over the walls and overwhelm us until we were defeated. They might not be very intelligent, but they had no desire to die either and would not throw themselves at the wall with reckless self-abandon.

It was the same concept the other way around as well. If we wanted to, we could muster about thirty or forty thousand drafted soldiers, march out, and bombard the enemy with our spells out in the open field. We might even win a decisive victory like that. As a matter of fact, it was highly likely that such an endeavor would succeed against an undisciplined army like the dryads and we would probably win. The reason we didn’t was because the risks involved were too high - Liberomancers were glass cannons, and it was here, on top of the wall where we could easily retreat and duck when we ran out of mana that we could show our true strength.

Not to mention victory would mean little if it meant a large number of casualties, especially if those were Rank Thee Liberomancers. Given that, why risk going out onto the field when we were perfectly safe here? Unlike the dryads, we were mostly comfortable camping out here atop our walls.

The dryad advance at our end had its momentum killed, and while the dryads seemed to be trying to rally together again, it would probably take them some time. I also had a feeling that they would not be eager to try the same thing again.

“That was quite the tactic there, Master Liberomancer,” Drake said, watching the sorry state the dryad forces were currently in.

“Right, right, so here’s what I did,” explaining things in more detail to him. The other supporting Liberomancers around us heard my explanation too, with some even running over just to figure out what had happened.

“Incredible!”

“Ah, so it was a combo!”

“He used a Rank Three spell and a Rank Three skill together to get an effect almost equivalent to a Rank Four spell!”

“Master Liberomancers are in a league of their own, huh?”

“I’ve never seen nor heard of that kind of combo before!”

“It’s almost like we have not one, but two Rank Four Liberomancers with us.”

“That really was amazing,” Drake said, almost reluctantly.

“Uh, thanks, but it wasn’t really all that special,” I said. The reason why it was so effective was because of a special weakness that the dryads had, and I wouldn’t have even been able to do this had it not been for the fact that Granny Qi had very generously given me that grimoire. I could’ve tried the combo with [Fireball], but its effects would be lessened with a weaker fire spell.

“No, it really was amazing, I haven’t seen anything like that,” Drake said. “That very well might be what ends up turning the tides of an upcoming fight.”

I couldn’t really get why everyone was so amazed by this - yes, it was a combo, but it wasn’t exactly some sort of 10,000 IQ move. The spider got stronger if fire was cast on it, and I used this ‘defensive’ ability of it to my advantage against an enemy who was weak to fire.

There were much stronger combos that had existed in history. The most famous was one used by the Ruler of the Astral Winds. He had conquered a city by the name of Limarea far away from Chipker, and the citizens had initially surrendered without a fight when his army had approached the city gates. As he continued with his campaign further into the country, however, one day the citizens rebelled and killed the token garrison he had stationed within the city.

In response, he had simply flown back to the city on his own, not bothering to bring his army with him. With a simple wave of his hand the entire city, which was said to house between two and three hundred thousand citizens, sank into the earth and none of its inhabitants were ever seen again. By the standards of that day, and of this world, this was still something seen to be quite cruel - it was not unheard of for a city that behaved in such a way to be razed to the ground, but what took people by surprise was how it was done within a matter of seconds. The Ruler of the Astral Winds had either used three Rank Four skills with one Rank Five spell to carry this out, or three Rank Five spells and skills - it was not fully clear based on the sources we had, as the Ruler of the Astral Winds had never made his full power or potential clear before he was assassinated, but that was the strongest combo that had been seen in history.

Compared to that, what I had done today seemed like nothing more than an elaborate party trick.

As I thought about it though, I could see why they were making such a big deal about it.

While this world felt a lot like a video game with the skills and spells it had - but if this had been a video game, you would usually have some sort of shop in the middle of town or what not that would have infinite copies of whatever grimoires you wanted to buy. Additionally, monsters when killed would drop grimoires, there would be treasure chests in dungeons that had legendary grimoires, and completing certain quests would also give you grimoires. It would be easy to make a competitive set in such a scenario.

But, this world was not like that. If you wanted a grimoire and you couldn’t make it yourself, someone else in the world had to make it for you - and that led to all sorts of logistical issues.

It was hard enough to find even a few grimoires that you really wanted. Many Rank Three Liberomancers specialized as fire elementalists not because they particularly liked it, but simply because those were the only real grimoires you could easily find in this country.

As such, finding two or three Rank Three grimoires that could combo with each other synergistically in this way - it was but a dream for many. I had especially lucked out in that it was effective against the dryads.

Even though it was just luck, I had a feeling some of the people around me were thinking ‘had he planned this all out months in advance?’ though that was far from the case.

There were many looks of wonder, not just from the Liberomancers, but the ordinary draftsmen on the wall as well. Few of them had ever seen an actual offensive spell, and to them, this recent display must have seemed like something right out of a bard’s tale.

Amidst all the praise, there was a sentence that was repeated over and over almost verbatim: “It’s true what they say, there is no strongest spell, only the strongest spellcaster.”

I had heard Granny Qi tell me that a few times, but I had assumed it was just one of those platitudes that old people give out. Turns out that this was actually a far more popular saying than I had originally assumed. There are multiple nuggets of wisdom hidden in that line if you think about it.

The first was the most obvious meaning - many of this world’s equivalent of mad scientists had attempted to make ‘one spell to conquer all’ and failed terribly at it. There could be no spell that was useful in all scenarios. If you made a spell that could deal heavy damage to a single target, it would not be useful against a large army. If you increased its area of effect, it would get weaker. Take [Crimson Lance], a spell that was very overpowered for being Rank One. Against an enemy like the dryads however, it was incredibly weak. Fire elemental spells were good against the dryads, but would be worthless against something like the Tyrant Arachnea.

The second interpretation was the importance of experience when casting spells. I hadn’t been able to practice [Grand Fireball] before today as there was no real opportunity to practice with a spell that destructive, and so had not been able to use it fully and ended up missing twice.

The third pearl of wisdom was that a good build was more important than having a single good spell. You needed spells and skills that synergized with each other to be really effective, and also a few counters to deal with uncommon scenarios.

The fourth and final way of interpreting it was the importance of using combos for synergistic effects.

That said, despite how often the line was repeated, I had to note that when it came to the most straightforward interpretation of the line there had never been a truly 'strongest spellcaster' in all of history. You could maybe mention Serragnin but I couldn’t really see how she’d count, and while the Ruler of the Astral Winds was considered invincible my most of his enemies while he was alive, he had still been caught off guard and killed.

“Great work, Master Liberomancer!”

“As expected of a genius!”

More compliments flowed like water, and though I knew most of them were undeserved, it still felt nice to be appreciated after quite a long time of what felt like being trampled on by society in general ever since I’d first spawned in Arconia. Things had improved after becoming a Master Liberomancer, but lately the stress of managing conflicts all over the city had whittled my patience down. Overall, it just felt nice to know that all of the effort I had put in up to this point had paid off.

My good mood didn’t last for long as a few hours later, the dryads regrouped and some of them, a smaller group than before but sizeable nonetheless, were organizing another attack.

“They’re coming via the sea!” someone noticed.

It looks like they really had been terrorized by the Tyrant Arachnea and so decided on a different avenue of invasion - perhaps assuming that the Tyrant Arachnea could not do well in the water.

Then again, I wasn’t sure how well they could do in the seawater either. Most freshwater plants could not survive in saline water, which is why we had assumed that likewise, the salt water would be toxic to the dryads as well though we had little to no evidence that confirmed it.

It looked like they could survive in it long enough to make themselves towards the city through the sea-facing side though. I doubted they could stay in the salt water for too long, but it wasn’t like they died within minutes of entering it either.

“I have a spell that could take care of them over the water,” Drake said.

“I think I have one too,” I said. “But they need to come closer.”

We watched as they approached, and as the water became shallower, they became faster. The dryads floated in the water much like driftwood it seemed, and though they couldn’t swim very fast, they could still kick and wade their way towards us given enough time.

As they got closer, they also became more crowded, likely because they knew they would need to attack as a mob to break through our defenses, or perhaps as a result of the current bringing them closer together.

But this was also the right time to use our spells.

“[Shark Tornado]!” I yelled out. I still couldn’t get over the fact that the plot of Sharknado managed to make a successful grimoire, let alone the fact that there was a spell like this in this world.

A burst of whirlwind appeared over the sea and I willed it to move towards the dryads. It was way smaller than the one in the movie, but still looked quite deadly. This was a hybrid wind and water elemental spell - though this came with a few caveats. Half of the damage dealt was wind and the other half was water, so if it was not cast over a body of water it would only deal fifty percent of its actual potential in the form of wind damage. Because of this limitation, it was not as good as something like [Grand Fireball] generally speaking, though it was quite suitable for a sea-based assault like this.

Within the whirlwind generated by the spell, I could see the shadows of small beasts being carried along with the wind stream. If something was not cut to pieces by the wind or drowned and crushed by the water’s force, they would be sucked inside the center where they would be munched upon by numerous shark teeth. Unfortunately, this latter effect was of limited use against creatures like the dryads which were not made of regular flesh and bone and whose bark resisted the shark teeth to a very large extent. However, the spell was effective at tossing and scattering them around as the dryads were thrown about and smashed, oftentimes being crushed into pulp by the force of the wind.

Drake unleashed his own spell to deal with them. “[Great Whirlpool]!” he said, as a group of dryads was sucked into a large water vortex, helpless against the current. Their natural buoyancy did nothing to save them as they disappeared beneath the waves, presumably to be smashed against the seafloor by the force of the whirlpool.